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RALEIGH — It’s too soon to say the battle lines are being drawn for the 2010 U.S. Senate campaign, but troops are mustering.

U.S. Sen. Richard Burr, a Winston-Salem Republican, is winding up his first term as a senator — he served five terms in the House — and preparing to defend his seat in a political landscape much changed from his previous statewide run.

In 2008, a Democrat won North Carolina’s electoral votes for the first time since 1976. And Democrats wrested the seat once held by Republican icon Jesse Helms from the hands of Elizabeth Dole, a GOP luminary in her own right.

“When you look at what happened here in 2008, it turned upside-down what everybody thought they knew about North Carolina politics,” said Steven Greene, a political science professor at N.C. State.

The question, Greene said, is whether 2008 represents an unusual event or the beginning of a trend turning North Carolina from a reliably Republican state in national elections to one that is more a swing state or gets in the habit of backing Democrats.

“Even though it is only a single data point, some of the trends that led to 2008 are ongoing,” Greene said. In particular, he said, an influx of transplants from the Northeast and the continued rise of the Latino voting bloc are demographic trends that could aid Democrats.

“Our opponent in 2010 is not just going to be whoever the Democrat turns out to be,” said Paul Shumaker, a longtime political consultant for Burr who has been tapped again to coordinate his re-election effort. “U.S. Senate races are national elections.”

With Democrats tantalizingly close to winning a filibuster-proof 60-vote majority in the Senate and no presidential or gubernatorial campaigns to soak up attention and resources, millions of dollars of national money will pour into Senate races, he said.

The Hagan-Dole campaign cost more than $47 million when spending by candidates and outside groups such as national political parties and union groups are included, reports show.

That has focused attention on Democratic efforts to recruit a strong opponent to Burr. Already, western North Carolina Rep. Heath Shuler has said he would not run after briefly but publicly flirting with the possibility.

Attorney General Roy Cooper is the name most frequently mentioned as a top-tier contender.

“I look forward to deciding that very soon,” Cooper said last week. “A lot of people are talking to me.”

Officials in Raleigh and Washington are involved in those conversations, he said.

Cooper is attractive for Democrats for a number of reasons. He could run without risking his current seat on the council of state.

Cooper also won more votes in 2008 than any other candidate running statewide.

“Attorney generals make strong federal candidates because they can show they’re tough on crime and they’ve got a nice portfolio of things like consumer issues they’ve done,” said Morgan Jackson, a campaign strategist at Nexus Strategies.

Jackson is a longtime adviser to Cooper and emphasizes that no decision has been made on whether to pursue a Senate bid.

Operatives in Democratic and Republican camps say that it’s still early to begin the public jockeying for position in 2010.

“A lot of people worked so hard in 2008,” Jackson said. “A lot of those folks were involved at that level for the first time and are excited about what’s next...It’s a little bit of, 'What do we do now?’”

Shumaker, Burr’s consultant, said that much of the same team that helped the Winston-Salem Republican get elected in 2004 is in place for the next election. Burr, he said, never shut down his campaign office.

“It’s not too early to put together the business side of the campaign,” he said. But residents might not see the public face of the campaign, other than appearances by Burr, for a while.

Other political observers question how long the campaigns can stay on the sidelines.

“I’ve never understood the logic that said you wait to start a political campaign,” said Carter Wrenn, who was a strategist for Helms. “Waiting is dangerous to both sides.”

The side that spends money on television ads first, Wrenn said, will have the opportunity to define the campaign. Even without a declared candidate, he said, national Democrats could spend time tearing away at Burr’s image.

Greene agreed, saying that Dole’s campaign made a “tactical error” when she stayed off television for much of summer 2008, the same time the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee was hammering away with ads questioning Dole’s effectiveness.

Similar attention, he said, will be coming to the Burr race.

“This has to be seen as one of the most competitive and targeted races next year,” Greene said.

Contact Mark Binker at (919) 832-5549 or mark.binker@news-record.com