The state elections board, which concluded last month that fraud had tainted November’s voting for the seat, ruled Monday that a new open primary would be held in the district on May 14 and a new general election on Sept. 10.
The off-year race, likely to be competitive, expensive and closely scrutinized for signs of new misconduct, drew a handful of candidates even before the board set the schedule. The filing period for candidates begins next week.
There is scarce precedent for a start-to-finish redo of a congressional election, and officials in both parties are bracing for a season of sharp-edged advertisements and high-profile campaign stops, after a scandal that left North Carolina voters shaken.
Republicans, frustrated and embarrassed by how the fleeting victory of Mark Harris in November unraveled after the revelation that his campaign financed an illicit voter-turnout effort, are expected to mount an aggressive attempt to retain the seat, which the party has held since 1963.
And Democrats, energized by the scandal that subsumed Harris and their sooner-than-expected shot at the seat, are similarly poised for a vigorous campaign. Leading Democrats have already begun to coalesce behind Dan McCready, who trailed Harris by 905 votes after last fall’s balloting.
But there will not be a rematch between the two men, at least this time. Harris, who has denied any knowledge of the misconduct that his campaign financed, announced last Tuesday that he would not run in the new election. The next day, state authorities arrested L. McCrae Dowless Jr., the Harris campaign contractor who oversaw the illicit effort, after his indictment for obstruction of justice and other charges.
Harris, an evangelical pastor from Charlotte, has endorsed Stony Rushing, a commissioner from Union County, for the Republican nomination in the 9th, which includes part of Charlotte and stretches eastward, encompassing all or parts of Fayetteville, Lumberton, Monroe and Rockingham.
The campaign begins at a moment when North Carolina voters are signaling worries about the way elections are conducted in the state.
In an Elon University poll of North Carolina registered voters, just more than half of respondents reported that they thought election fraud was a “major problem” in the state. According to the study, which the university released Friday, about 60 percent of voters said they were “somewhat confident” that future elections would be fair.
Although the poll suggested that Democratic respondents were slightly more anxious about the potential for fraud than Republicans, the survey, which had a margin of sampling error of 3.4 percent, reflected bipartisan concerns in the wake of the 9th District’s scandal.
“Now, months out from the tainted 9th District election, North Carolina voters are broadly skeptical of elections in the state,” Jason Husser, an associate professor of political science at the university and director of the poll, wrote in a summary that accompanied the survey’s release. “A majority of the electorate has clear concerns about the fairness of future elections and the extent of fraud.”
State election officials have already said they would send staff members to Bladen and Robeson counties — the epicenters of the scandal — “to monitor and assist with the elections process.”
The newly elected House, which convened in January without a representative from the 9th District, has two other vacancies. On May 21, Pennsylvania voters in the 12th District will pick a replacement for former Rep. Tom Marino, a Republican who resigned in January.
And North Carolina’s 3rd District will hold a special election on July 9 or Sept. 10, depending on whether a primary runoff is required, to fill the seat of Rep. Walter B. Jones Jr. Jones, a Republican who represented much of the state’s Atlantic coast, died in February.
This article originally appeared in The New York Times.