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I'm Nick Craig. Good morning to you.
Well, it is the day after Election Day of municipal elections taking place in North Carolina yesterday. More than 550 municipalities across the state hosting elections in the off-year election cycle. Taking a look at some of the results that we are tracking across the state this morning. A very good night for Democrats, a very bad night for Republicans in many municipalities across the state. We start off this morning in the Queen City where incumbent Mayor Vi Lyles, the Democrat candidate there, has officially won her election.
It is important to note that election results are not official yet. They will be official officially nine days from now as the canvas will take place.
Some additional election results will come in, some outstanding provisional, maybe some outstanding mail ballots.
However, certain candidates with large margins, it is all but official at this point. And that is the case for the Charlotte Mayor and Vi Lyles, who received a whopping 70% of the vote in the Queen City. This comes after increased scrutiny in Charlotte over the last couple of months. That, of course, a lot of it starting with the death, the murder of Irina Zaruska on the Charlotte light rail, then an out-of-control crime spree taking place in the following months. A lot of media attention, a lot of national attention on the Queen.
Queen City, as it relates to that.
However, voters in the Queen City did decide to continue with the same direction, voting for Vilis 70%. Terry Donovan, who was the Republican running against Vilis, received 25% of the vote, a very large margin between those two candidates as well. Taking a look at some of the seats as well on the Charlotte City Council, some surprising results coming in this morning as well. There are four at-large seats available. All four of those seats taken by Democrat candidates.
Republican Edwin Peacock, who is currently on the Charlotte City Council, was unsuccessful in getting elected to an at-large seat. Democrats pulling between 21 and 19% of the vote. Edwin Peacock, I should say, pulling in just 10%, and in a surprising result as well. Krista Baccari, unsuccessful in winning the Charlotte City Council District 6 seat. Kimberly Owens, the Democrat there, getting 56% of the vote.
Krista Baccari pulling in just 43% of the vote. Looking at the results here this morning on the state board of election website, the only successful race for Republicans. In a districted seat, did come in District 7, where Ed Driggs ran unopposed, pulling in 83% of the vote. In other races in Charlotte, of course, a big discussion over a sales tax referendum. And looking at the, again, final, unofficial final results, there will be more votes that tick in in the coming days and weeks.
But it would appear that voters within the city of Charlotte did approve a referendum and a sales and use tax to fund additional public transportation projects across the region. The final tally as it stands right now: 52.13 in favor, 47.87 against the sales tax referendum. The majority of voters in Mecklenburg County did vote in favor of that proposed one-cent sales tax increase, which was meant to benefit transportation initiatives and infrastructure in the county. With the approved referendum, which will be certified by the Board of Elections over the next 10 days, city and county leaders have been pushing for this for years, which means that the local sales tax rate in Mecklenburg County will go from 7.25% to 8.25% if this final tally, which it would appear is going to stick, will be the case. The sales tax increase is estimated to generate roughly $19 billion for Mecklenburg County over the next three-decade, 30-year period of time.
With officials estimating that with that one-cent or 1% sales tax increase, it could cost the average household about $240 a year. Revenue from the increase. Sales tax will reportedly fund improvements for roads, rail, and buses to address traffic congestion and improve transportation options across Mecklenburg County. The proposed the purpose of the proposed sales tax increase is to fund transportation projects and improvements within the county. This is how the revenue is set to break down over a as I mentioned, a thirty year period of time for Some of these projects, but this is how the breakdown will go.
40% of the revenue will go to roads. 40% will go to expanded rail projects. The Charlotte Light Rail, of course, making a lot of national news over the last couple of months. And 20% will go to bus improvements across the region as well. In August, officials outlined several transportation-related changes that Mecklenburg County could expect if the sales tax increase was approved, and it was even on some tight margins.
One of the most significant projects is a planned expansion of the Charlotte Light Rail system from the airport, that's the Charlotte Douglas International Airport, to Bojangles Coliseum. Another notable change would be extended bus access, which would reach an additional 450,000 residents, according to officials in that August press conference. That would be part of the better bus plan and would use tax revenues to improve services over the next five to ten years. With the approval of the at least seemingly approval of the sales tax right now, 40% of the tax revenue would be dedicated to road improvements throughout the county. The main goal of that, upgrading roadways and various intersections to alleviate traffic congestion.
Improvements across the county would reportedly address a range of infrastructure needs. Officials said that some of those needs included, but are not limited to, transit-focused roadway upgrades like dedicated bus lanes and curb reconfigurations, intersections, grade separations, safety projects, including some signal upgrades. Upgrades and new turn lanes across some of the busiest intersections in the Queen City. Street projects such as protected bike lanes and improvements connecting neighborhoods to already existing and some new transit stops throughout the Queen City. Park and ride transfer facilities, as well as EV and alternative fuel infrastructure, including publicly accessible EV chargers.
Many of these projects will be managed by CATS. That's the Charlotte Area Transportation System, which launched on February of this year.
Some additional projects, including a microtransit group that is under the CATS umbrella, to conduct some of these services.
So, one of the largest features of this sales tax referendum will be that red line, which would become the county's first commuter rail. The red line would start a little north of Uptown Charlotte at the Gateway station. From there, it would travel more than 20 miles to Davidson with multiple stops along the way. Riders would also be able to get to Huntersville or Cornelius with the red line.
However, of individuals not in favor of the Charlotte transportation project and not in favor of this sales tax referendum point to other states and cities across the nation, most predominantly California and some of their attempts to build large-scale transportation projects in recent years that it is hard to argue have been anything but complete and total abysmal failures. We will wait and see once the county canvas is completed in the next 10 days what those final results look like. But for voters in the for residents, I should say, within Mecklenburg County and the city of Charlotte, they will be seeing that increase in sales tax from 7.25 to 8.25%. That will Officially start coming up next year. And then we will watch what Katz, what Mecklenburg County, what the city of Charlotte, and what many other municipalities do with the nearly $19 billion that this program is set to generate over the next 10 years.
We will keep an eye on those details right here on the Carolina Journal News Hour. I've never felt like this before. It's like you just get me. I feel like my true self with you. Does that sound crazy?
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Welcome back to the Carolina Journal News Hour. Good Wednesday morning to you. News Talk 11:10:99.3 WBT as we continue with election coverage this morning. Looking at what was going on in the Queen City of Charlotte. A very good night for Democrats across Charlotte.
And well, that trend did continue across the country as well as we zoom out at some other elections this morning. I'll note not with direct impacts on North Carolina, but many are calling a precursor to midterm elections next year. Democrats having a very good night in the state of Virginia, where Jay Jones, who of course found himself under an incredible amount of scrutiny just back a month or two ago, was successful in beating Jason Maires as the Virginia Attorney General 53 to 46 there. The Virginia governor election governors in the state of Virginia. Virginia are limited to a single term.
Abigail Spanberger, the Democrat there, winning with 57% of the vote. The current lieutenant governor, Republican, Winsom Earl Sears, with 42% of the vote. A very solid victory for Spanberger in the state of Virginia. And there will be a new lieutenant governor in Virginia as well. The Democrat beating out the Republican there 56 to 44.
Taking a look at some other states that had major elections while North Carolina's elections were municipal.
Some off-election cycles were taking place in other states, including the state of New Jersey, where Miki Shirelli was successful, winning a 56.2% of the vote. Jack Sitterelli, who has run now three times to be the Republican governor of the state of New Jersey, did not have anywhere near the performance that he did just a couple of years ago. 56.2%. To 43.2, a proverbial bloodbath for the Republican governor candidate in the state of New Jersey. Not successful.
It was a three-point advantage back just a couple of election cycles ago, this time looking at a very-handed victory for the Democrats, nearly 13% in some of the election results coming in from the state of New Jersey. 93% of the vote is in there.
However, it is over for the Republican Democrats will retain the governor's mansion in the state of New Jersey. And of course, New York City as well, where a lot of national attention was put on a very contested mayorial race. Incumbent Eric Adams was essentially ousted by his party, running as an independent candidate, then dropping out of the race. Zoron Mamdani, who did receive the Democrat endorsement, was the frontrunner in the race. Andrew Cuomo, the former Democrat governor.
Of New York, also not successful in the Democrat primary earlier this year, running as an independent, and Curtis Sliwa running as a Republican. And it was a very good night for Democrats in New York City. Zoron Mamdani, the self-described Democrat socialist, said just as much in his election victory speech last night, winning 50.6% of the vote, receiving over a million votes across the five boroughs of New York City, successful in becoming the next mayor of New York. Andrew Cuomo, the former governor there, pulling in 41.7% of the vote, and Curtis Sliwa pulling in 7% of the vote, even adding. Sliwa and Cuomo together, still not enough votes to beat out Zoron Momdani.
That race did garner an incredible amount of national attention over the last couple of months. President Donald Trump jumping into the race just a couple of days ago and encouraging individuals to vote for the lesser of two evils, at least from his vantage point, in supporting, throwing his support and weight behind former Governor Andrew Cuomo, encouraging Republican candidate Curtis Sliwa to drop out of the race. But again, just looking at the math and the numbers, with 98% of precincts reporting this morning, even Sliwa and Cuomo combined, does not make up the 50.6% of the votes that Zoron Mamdani did successfully garner in the state of, or excuse me, in New York City.
So that is going to be a very interesting race or very interesting city to keep an eye on as we head into the midterm election. coming up next year. Turning our coverage back to the state of North Carolina this morning and looking at some other contests across the state, the mayor of Durham has been successful in winning re-election, with two incumbents also being ousted from city council. That seemed to be a pretty common threat across the state, whether you were looking at municipalities as we talked about a little bit earlier in Charlotte, the Wilmington area, Asheville, Durham, and Raleigh. Was in many cases a very rough night for incumbents across a variety of city council and township elections across the state of North Carolina.
So the Durham mayor winning a re-election there. Incumbent mayor pro tem Mark Anthony Middleton was unsuccessful, lost a re-election effort there, as well as incumbent council member Deandra Freeman also lost that position as well. Incumbent Chelsea Cook was. Was returned to office, beating the challenger there.
So, just one of three incumbents successful in the city of Durham for their election results. And as we talked about yesterday with Dr. Andy Jackson from the John Locke Foundation, turnout was unfortunately across many municipalities in the state of North Carolina incredibly low. Looking at the Mecklenburg County results, again, not every single vote is in. There will likely be a couple of dozen that trickle in, maybe a couple of hundred in the next couple of days as the county canvas process takes place.
You're looking at a voter turnout right now of less than 22%.
So that is a very, very low turnout. Turning our attention to Durham, looking at there, a similar results as well. 21.91% in Durham as well.
So tough, just very low turnout for some candidates there as well. Looking at Wake County, a little bit above the average there, about 25% of voters turning out in Wake County. And looking at some of our other municipalities, Buncombe County as well. That, of course, hosts the city of Asheville. Similar results to what we saw in Charlotte.
22.85% of the vote. I'll note that unlike what we saw in many other places, Buncombe County. Which again hosts the city of Asheville, does not have major mayorial elections for the city of Asheville.
So no results there. Looking down in the Wilmington area, New Hanover County, voter turnout there a little bit higher than the average as well, 26%. But we have not seen a single municipality and will not likely see a single municipality that has voter turnout above 30%. Everything will be well into the 20, some into the teens as well.
So incredibly low voter turnout. And as Andy Jackson from the John Locke Foundation talked about with us yesterday, that means for the individuals that did show up to vote in the municipal elections, yes, everybody's vote is important, but those individuals that did show up, their vote absolutely had a heavier weight to play with some of these very small turnout numbers in contests across the state of North Carolina. It's 5:37. Welcome back to the Carolina Journal News Hour. News Talk 11:10, 99.3, as we continue our coverage of municipal elections across the state of North Carolina this morning in Mecklenburg County.
Pretty hard to argue anything but a very good night for Democrats as Democrat Mayor Vi Lyles handedly won her re-election effort as the mayor of the city of Charlotte, the Queen City, pulling in 70.43% of the vote. The Republican challenger in that race, Terry Donovan, picking up just 25.5% of the vote, nearly a 60,000-vote margin between the two candidates. A very solid victory for Democrat Mayor Vi Lyles. Looking at the four at-large seats that were available for the Charlotte City Council, all four of those taken by Democrats as well. Edwin P.
Peacock, who was one of just two Republicans on the Charlotte City Council, was unsuccessful in coming in one of those top four of seats. His vote margin and the percentage difference between the first and fifth spot is almost 11%.
So, a huge margin there. An unsuccessful election attempt there from Edwin Peacock. And in a surprising result, looking at the Charlotte City Council district number six, that seat formerly held by Tark Bakari. His wife, Krista Bakari, running in that election, she was also unsuccessful in getting elected to that position. The Democrat in Kimberly Owens won with 56.45% of the vote.
Krista Bakari with 43.43% of the vote there.
So a Democrat's being successful. The only Republican to have a successful night in the Charlotte City Council elections was Ed Driggs. He ran in District 7 unopposed. He won with. With 83.8% of the vote, as more than 2,000 voters wrote in various candidates for that election.
Now, all of these results that we are bringing to you this morning are officially listed as unofficial municipal election results. That's because a county canvas will take place over the next 10 days or so. We will provide you additional coverage on what that will look like. But any mail ballots that made their way in by 7.30 p.m. last night still have to be tallied.
Individuals maybe that had an issue with their photo identification, their voter ID, they may have had to vote a provisional ballot throughout the next couple of days. All county board of elections that hosted elections, including, of course, Mecklenburg County, will convene and go through all of those provisional ballots and determine whether to approve or deny those ballots from counting.
So depending on the race and depending in the area, there could be a couple of dozen to maybe a couple of hundred of ballots. It's still outstanding. We will keep an eye on these unofficial relations, unofficial election results, I should say. And we'll have continued coverage over on our website, CarolinaJournal.com. And of course, continued coverage throughout the day right here on News Talk 1110 and 99.3 WBT, where it's now 540.
As we continue to watch the illegal fight that is playing out in North Carolina over a new congressional map, lawmakers and their legal team have provided some information to the courts to walk us through that this morning. Mitch Kokai of the John Locke Foundation joins us on the Carolina Journal News Hour. Mitch, what are the lawyers for Republicans in the General Assembly saying in some of the briefings that you're reading? Their latest request, Nick, is that the three-judge panel that's overseeing two different redistricting lawsuits that challenge the new congressional map. The legislators are asking that those suits get dismissed.
And the reason is that they say the arguments that are being made against the new congressional map are essentially arguments about partisan gerrymandering. That the reason that the new map was drawn the way that it was was for partisan reasons. And the General Assembly says: look, both the North Carolina State Supreme Court and, more importantly, here in federal court, the U.S. Supreme Court, have said that partisan gerrymandering is a political question. It's not something the court should deal with, and that any partisan gerrymandering cases need to be thrown out.
Now, remember, this is in the context of the most recent developments in this case. There were two ongoing lawsuits against North Carolina's congressional and legislative districts that were lumped together. There was a trial this summer before this three-judge federal panel. There had been no decision in that trial. And so, as the Parties in the suit were awaiting a decision in this trial.
The General Assembly redrew a new congressional map. And so the plaintiffs in both cases asked the three-judge panel to allow them to add the new congressional map to this ongoing legal situation. The three-judge panel said yes. And as soon as the three judge panels said yes and allowed them to add the new congressional map to an existing set of redistricting lawsuits, right after that, then the plaintiffs asked for an injunction. They want an injunction blocking the new map from being used in the 2026 election.
Both parties set out a timeline of how this is to be resolved. Both sides would like to get the injunction issue resolved before December 1st, which is when candidate filing is scheduled to start. And then they have a difference of opinion about how to handle the rest of the schedule. But then shortly after that was filed, we saw the new motion to dismiss from the leaders in the General Assembly who say, look, we're looking at the two new complaints. What they're saying is that the reason these maps were drawn the way they were was because the voters voted against Donald Trump and voted against Republicans.
They're saying, look, that type of argument is a partisan gerrymandering argument. If you're going to make that argument, You can't win. The U.S. Supreme Court has thrown out That type of argument in a case that came from North Carolina, Ruce Ob Common Cause, in the last decade. And so it'll be very interesting to see what happens.
The three-judge panel will decide not only how to resolve this motion to dismiss, but also whether to grant a preliminary injunction and also the whole schedule of when this is going to take place. We're inching closer and closer to the opening of candidate filing. And anything that happens that gets beyond December 1st could have an impact. on candidate filing and potentially an impact on when we're going to have congressional elections. Could it push off a March primary?
Potentially. Depends on how long it takes for the courts to resolve all of this. Sure. And Mitch, I'm sure a lot of other folks running for various county commission seats. Of course, we'll have a big U.S.
Senate race next year, school board, all of these other races throughout the state as well. They're probably keeping a close eye on this as well. Because while, yes, you could have the situation where just the congressional primaries are moved and changed, but we've seen in the past where everything gets delayed due to some of those legal challenges.
So we'll keep a close eye on that. But I do want to go back to the timeline that you were just laying out. And something that I found interesting when we chatted about this last week. The lawyers for legislative leaders, Mitch, did not inherently oppose these two groups from adding the congressional map, the new congressional map, to their existing lawsuit. Why did they not oppose that if they were going to immediately file to dismiss some of these new allegations?
Well, I think there are a couple of reasons for that. One, this certainly makes it easier for all of the sides that are interested in whether or not this congressional map should move forward. If there was a brand new lawsuit, You wouldn't necessarily know Who was going to be overseeing it? How much would have to be done in terms of discovery and interviewing of witnesses? Much of that is already done.
Now, the plaintiffs in this case are saying that they need more time to do discovery and to conduct an investigation and do all of the things that you would normally do before a trial. Whereas on the other side, the General Assembly is saying, Look, that's already been done. They've suggested that this whole thing could be resolved just by reopening the initial trial that took place in the summer for a couple more days, and then a decision still could be made to resolve the entire dispute over congressional and legislative election maps by December 1st. That's kind of an ambitious timeline, but that's what the General Assembly thinks.
So, there's that: the fact that we've already had so much done on this issue, and that by having a brand new lawsuit with new plaintiffs would extend the process out a long time. I think the second thing that has to be weighing into this is the fact that you have an existing three-judge panel, all of whom, all of the members, were appointed by Republican presidents. And so I think the Republican General Assembly thinks, look, this is the best shot we're going to get. We've got three Republican-appointed judges. They did not block the maps from being used in the 2024 elections.
The 2023 maps that were the initial source of this lawsuit, all of them were allowed to be used in 2024. The three-judge panel did not issue an injunction at that point. And I'm guessing that the lawyers for the legislature said, look, we like this panel. Let's keep this panel. And so when it was suggested that the plaintiffs in these cases would just amend and file supplemental complaints.
Using the existing structure and framework, it judges the General Assembly, I'm sure, said. Even though we oppose this and we think that the case should be thrown out, we like the panel of judges that we have and we like the fact that there's already been a trial and already an extensive court record. Let's not open ourselves up to something that might be a situation we don't like as much in terms of the judge and in terms of the process. There's likely to be a lot of moving developments on this in the coming potentially even days, definitely weeks though, as we move forward. We'll keep you up to date with the latest.
We appreciate the information this morning. Mitch Kokai from the John Locke Foundation joins us on the Carolina Journal News Hour. Gain Superflings are here to take your laundry to the next level. Super things Super size laundry pack These things are huge. Super fresh, super clean, gang, super lean.
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Welcome back to the Carolina Journal News Hour, News Talk 11:10-993 WBT. As we continue with our election coverage on this Wednesday morning, November the 5th, taking a look and zooming out a little bit across the country this morning, while the state of North Carolina only hosted municipal elections in the off-year election cycle, a couple of other states were hosting some major elections. You likely heard a lot about those in the previous couple of weeks and months. And for Democrats, a pretty strong night across the country as well. Taking a look at Virginia this morning, where Democrat candidate Abigail Spamberger was successful in beating current Republican Lieutenant Governor Winsom Earl Sears in a hefty margin there: 57.5% to 42.5%.
So, a strong victory for Democrats in the Virginia governor. Mansion. I'll note that the governors in Virginia are single-term limited, so Spamberger will serve just one term similar to her predecessor. In the Virginia Attorney General race, that did grab some pretty strong national attention over the last couple of months due to some disturbing text messages sent out by Democrat candidate Jay Jones.
However, that seemingly did not impact voters in the state of Virginia. He won with 53.2% of the vote compared to 46.8% for the Republican challenger.
So Virginia, a strong night for Democrats there. Turning our attention over to the state of New Jersey, where they hosted a gubernatorial election last night as well. Miki Shirelli, the Democrat candidate there, winning 56.2% of the vote. Jack Citterelli, the Republican candidate, with 43.2%, a significantly worse election result for Jack Cittarelli compared to just a couple of years ago, where he once again ran to be the Republican candidate. Governor of the state of New Jersey.
Not a strong showing for him, not a strong showing for Republicans in New Jersey. And a similar situation unfolding in New York as well as the city. The Big Apple hosted a major election last night. Looking at some of the numbers, more than 2 million people voting in those municipal elections with 98% of the vote in. This was an incredibly strong turnout election for the voters in New York City.
And Zoron Mamdani, the self-described Democrat socialist, won with over 1 million votes, pulling in 50.6% of the vote there. Andrew Cuomo running as an independent candidate. A former Democrat governor of the state of New York was unsuccessful in ousting Mom Dani. He received that Cuomo, that is, received 41.7% of the vote. And Republican challenger Curtis Sliwa received just 7% of the vote there.
You add Sleewa and Cuomo's numbers together, there's still not enough votes there to beat out Zoron Mom Dani. There was a lot of criticism on Sliwa and the GOP for continuing to push a candidate that many believed did not have a statistical shot at becoming the next mayor in New York City. Sliwa and Cuomo, again, you add their numbers together with 98% reporting, still not enough to beat Zoron Mom Dani. We will watch how that election plays out, or excuse me, we'll watch how that mayorial ship plays out as we head into the midterm elections next year. Mom Dani's successful in New York City.
Over in the Queen City this morning, we talked about some of the election results there. Voters. also appear to have approved a sales tax referendum in Mecklenburg County that will increase the sales tax by one cent in those municipal elections held last night. The final vote tally show that more than 52 percent of voters supported the referendum and over 47 percent opposed it.
Now, it is important to note that election results are even at this point right now are not considered official. They will go through a process known as the county canvas over the next 10 days and official election results will be reported on November the 14th.
However, it would appear that the approved referendum will mean that sales tax rates in Mecklenburg County will increase from 7.25% to 8.25%. That sales tax increase is set to generate roughly $20 billion over the next 30 years. Officials noting that that sales tax referendum will go to bolster public transportation within the city of Charlotte. in the greater Mecklenburg County area. We will have continued coverage throughout the day over on our website, CarolinaJournal.com.
That's going to do it for a Wednesday edition. WBT News is next. Followed by Good Morning, BT. We're back with you tomorrow morning, 5-6, right here on News Talk 1110 and 99.3, WBT.
