Kimberly Owens made history Tuesday, becoming the first Democrat to win the Charlotte City Council District 6 seat.
With 36 out of 38 precincts reporting, Owens, an attorney, led Republican Krista Bokhari, 56.84% to 43.04%.
Krista Bokhari was trying to win the seat held by her husband, Tariq Bokhari. He resigned from City Council this summer to take a high-level job with the Federal Transit Administration, which he has since left.
The City Council now tilts further to the left, with Democrats poised to hold a 10-1 advantage when the new council is sworn in at the end of the year. Ed Driggs, who ran unopposed in District 7, is the only Republican. The election continues a long-running blue shift in local government, where the Mecklenburg County commission is 9-0 Democrats.
This is the first time a City Council seat has switched political parties since 1999, when Democrat Nancy Carter defeated Republican Tim Sellers to win District 5 in east Charlotte.
The campaign was intense, especially by the standards of a local election.
Owens’ campaign featured mailers that criticized Krista Bohari for supporting President Trump’s efforts to send the National Guard into cities, with a photo of a menacing soldier.
Bokhari, on the other hand, made her message about balance. She said it was important to keep her as one of two Republican voices on council. And Bokhari held the advantage of name recognition.
Still, the district has been trending blue for years, and it was not a surprise that Owens won. In Tariq Bokhari’s two most recent campaigns, he won by less than 500 votes — just 314 in 2023.
Krista Bokhari faced two challenges in this election.
One was that even though no state or national contests were on the ballot, Democrats appeared to be fired up in the first partisan election since Trump’s second term began. And Tariq Bokhari’s council career had been marked by controversy, such as him threatening police chief Johnny Jennings by text message.
Those messages led to the City Council agreeing to pay Jennings a $305,000 settlement to avoid a lawsuit.
