His wife, Krista Bokhari, and conservative columnist Andrew Dunn are among the dozen people who applied to fill the District 6 seat.
CHARLOTTE, N.C. — It’s been more than a month since Charlotte City Council member Tariq Bokhari was officially tapped to join the Trump administration as deputy administrator of the Federal Transit Administration, leading him to step down from his role as the District 6 representative on the city council. Now, we know who is hoping to fill the seat.
Applications opened up in late April and closed on Tuesday, May 13. All potential applicants must be registered Republicans and will fill in the seat until the election in November.
One of the confirmed applicants is Krista Bokhari, who is Tariq Bokhari’s wife. He had expressed his support for her during a final town hall in April. She ran for House District 104, representing South Charlotte, in 2024. She lost to Democratic incumbent Rep. Brandon Lofton. However, she did overperform compared to other Republican candidates in that district.
Krista Bokhari has recently called for the resignation of Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police Chief Johnny Jennings after the city recently reached a reported settlement with Jennings during a closed-door session over text messages he received from Tariq Bokhari.
“I believe a resignation is justified completely,” Krista Bokhari told WCNC Charlotte. “I think it’s a problem that he’s still holding the position he is. I don’t know if that is standard procedure for the city to keep somebody in their position who is actively seeking compensation from the city and threatening a lawsuit.”
She made two Facebook posts addressing the conflict, the first of which called for an ethics complaint against Charlotte City Attorney Anthony Fox.
Fox said the city is not obligated to release any information about the alleged settlement. At a heated press conference Wednesday, Fox claimed whoever leaked the information will be subject to an investigation and potential criminal sanctions.
Krista Bokhari claims the whistleblower who leaked info of a potential settlement with Jennings doesn’t qualify for censureship because it doesn’t involve sharing a physical file or personnel content, like a performance review. She claims the worst outcome that can come from a closed session leak is censure, not a criminal offense.
Another applicant on the list is Andrew Dunn, a conservative columnist who runs the Longleaf Politics newsletter on Substack and writes for both the Charlotte Observer and the Raleigh News & Observer. He spoke about his candidacy on WCNC+ on Tuesday.
Here’s the full list of candidates who applied:
The list of candidates notes that Poore and Welby are not eligible. Poore’s name on a list reviewed by WCNC Charlotte had “NLB” listed by her name, which might indicate she was registered with the No Labels Party. Welby had “UNA” listed, indicating an unaffiliated voter registration. Sandlin is also pending address verification as of publication.
A public forum is set to be held on Thursday as well.
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