The unsurprising Democrat sweep of Charlotte elections (11-05-2025--Hour1)

What's going on? Thank you so much for listening to this podcast. It is heard live every day from noon to three on WBT Radio in Charlotte. And if you want exclusive content like invitations to events, the weekly live stream, my daily show prep with all the links, become a patron, go to dpeakclendershow dot com. Make sure you hit the subscribe button. Get every episode for free right to your smartphone or tablet. And again, thank you so much for your support. So what did you make of the the election results last night? I have some thoughts. I have a lot of thoughts. I probably have too many thoughts to even do in the entire program, Lots and lots of thoughts, But I want to start with Charlotte. The local race is here, the mayor's race, not a surprise city council race. I was not surprised. School board race, I was not surprised. There's a reason I don't make predictions on election results. Number one, I learned in twenty sixteen that the polling cannot be trusted. I try to look at trend lines, but even those are not entirely accurate. But more importantly, there's very little benefit to making a prediction in my case, like me just sitting here telling you who I think will win in a particular race. If I'm right, I get to say I was right. If I'm wrong, then I just like pretend what that I never made the prediction. Nobody holds me accountable for it. I'm just like, I'm not keeping a scorecard of all the races that I used to predict in which ones I got right or wrong or anything like that. But something has been very clear in Charlotte Mecklenburg for the last fifteen years, and so no, the results last night were not surprising. They reinforce what I have come to believe about Charlotte. But also I saw it in Asheville, and I said it when I was on the air up in Asheville. It's true in Raleigh, It's true in the big blue cities in North Carolina, but also all around the country, which is that Republicans are permitted, Conservatives are permitted to participate in building a city, and once the city becomes successful, there is no room for you anymore. You can leave. That's the message that I have gotten from Democrats in multiple cities, and watching the national results, it's the same pattern over and over and over again, and Charlotte is it could very well be like the ultimate example. It's a case study because Charlotte's growth, its boom occurred within the last you know, fifty years, and it was a bipartisan boom. The running joke in Charlotte when I first started as a reporter and I would cover city council, County Commission, school Board, so this was starting in around two thousand and one, and there was always a joke that there are three major parties in Charlotte, the Democrats, the Republicans, and the Chamber of Commerce. And you can fold center city partners into that chamber. It's the uptown crowd, it's the business community, and these are sort of your country club Republicans, the more moderates conservative Democrats. Right, a conservative Democrat might want to. You know, donate money to Planned Parenthood and all, but they're not into you know, sticking the trans books in your kid's library like that kind of stuff. Fiscally prudent right to a large degree, these old blue dog Democrats that don't exist any longer. They just don't because the Democrat Party has moved so far to the left on so many issues. There's no room for like a pro choice Democrat, they don't exist, sorry, a pro life Democrat, they don't exist any longer. They're not welcome. And we've had examples of this around the country over the last decade where a pro life Democrat tried to run and they were just clobbered by the Democrat Party, by the activist wing, and then by the Democrat voters in the primary. So they just aren't there any longer. So much like that example, in Charlotte, it was always well, is this good for Charlotte? Is this the Charlotte way? You know, the business of Charlotte is business. We built up as a trade town then banking right, commerce was the language, and it was the animating civic priority. It's why you ended up with all of the big, shiny projects, all of the stuff that we could be proud of that would make us a world class city. Like we joke about it, and to be fair, we've been joking about it for twenty years. But this was a moniker that was sought explicitly by city leaders. Here, people in office and the business leaders were constantly hammering away at this desire to be considered a world class city. And in my mind, It really culminated in the announcement of a marketing campaign that was aimed at telling the rest of the world, you know, where Charlotte is, what Charlotte is, and all of that. And because there were all these stories and this was true, people who are new arrivals may not believe this, but it is true. People used to confuse Charlotte with Charleston, South Carolina, a much much smaller city. So they would say Charlotte, South Carolina that would appear in news stories frequently, Charlotte SC or we would be confused with Charlottesville Virginia, or people thought we were just in Virginia. And so they launched this big marketing campaign to try to, you know, inform and educate and mark get Charlotte North Carolina. And the unveiling of the big marketing campaign, which then was like the logo and the symbol was put on all of the city communications and chamber communications and all this stuff. I mean, it was a big event. I think it was over at the Blumenthal Performing Arts Center and they had this big reveal and the big reveal was that they were branding us Charlotte USA, which doesn't actually tell you that we're in North Carolina, right, it actually is not helpful. But for the people who wanted us to be seen as a world class city, that's why they went with Charlotte, USA. Even then, even in that marketing pitch, they couldn't break out of this mindset that we have to be world class. We want to be seen as an Atlanta, as a Washington, d C. As a New York, a Boston, whatever, And so everything was about growth. At the time we had Democrats running the General Assembly. They empowered cities to just involuntary, forcibly annex all sorts of land. That's why the City of Charlotte's boundaries are so huge. It's because they just kept gobbling up more and more real estate and taking in the people and the tax base and all of that. And Republicans played their part in all of that, angering a lot of Republican voters that did not want what the Republicans were doing. Famous example, the original vote on a new arena. This was in two thousand and one. George Schenn, the owner of the Charlotte Hornets, threatening to move the team out of Charlotte if he didn't get a new arena. The city officials kept selling it, oh, we need to do this or we're going to lose the team. And finally a referendum was held, and of course, Charlotte being Charlotte and the Chamber being the Chamber, they threw in a whole bunch of other projects, like an uptown stadium for the Charlotte Knights, a new Mint museum, another museum for the Harvey Gant Center. All of those projects got built, every single one of them. Despite the fact that the arena bundle was rejected by voters. They voted it down and city officials, led. By Republicans did it anyway, because the Chamber was the most powerful party. Is that still the case? I don't think so. All right, if you're listening to this show, you know I try to keep up with all sorts of current events, and I know you do too, and you've probably heard me say get your news from multiple sources. Why Well, because it's how you detect media bias, which is why I've been so impressed with ground News. It's an app and it's a website, and it combines news from around the world in one place, so you can compare coverage and verify information. You can check it out at check dot ground, dot news slash pete. I put the link in the podcast description too. I started using ground News a few months ago and more recently chose to work with them as an affiliate because it lets me see clearly how stories get covered and by whom. The blind spot feature shows you which stories get ignored by the left and the right. See for yourself. Check dot ground, dot news slash pete. Subscribe through that link and you'll get fifteen percent off any subscription. I use the Vantage plan to get unlimited access to every feature. Your subscription then not only helps my podcast, but it also supports ground News as they make the media landscape more transparent. So for years and years in Charlotte, in my opinion, the uptown crowd, the Chamber Center, City Partners, and all of their affiliated hangers on and nonprofits, those that were even remotely middle of the road, conservative, fiscally prudent, they kept feeding the alligator in the hopes that the alligator would eat them. Last. Well, the alligator. Has feasted upon all Republicans and they are gone. That's just the voter registration data. They're gone. Democrats when they drew the district lines for the Charlotte City Council. This was a big kerfuffle back in twenty twenty one, I believe it was. One, and. They targeted District six to eliminate Tarkbakari. One of the two Republican district reps, the last one now is Ed Driggs District seven. He's the only Republican voice now on the Charlotte City Council because Krista Bakari lost the election for District six, which again was drawn in order to try to oust Tark Bakari. That district, I would suspect is lost now and I believe at some point, probably within the next ten years, District seven will be lost as well. And also, let me take a moment here just to briefly disparage the at large system that the Charlotte City Council refuses to scrap. The at large model where all elected representatives, in this case four of the eleven Charlotte City Council members four are elected at large, meaning city wide. An at large model is designed to suppress minority representation. That's its purpose, Okay, that is the purpose of an at large model. And that was fine when you had an electorate that was more evenly split But when Republican elected officials made common cause with Democrats for thirty years in raising taxes, building all sorts of new projects, taking out more debt via bonds, Republican voters became disillusioned, discouraged. They did not want to live in a place where the taxes kept going up and up and up and up. They wanted a lower tax, safe community with business opportunity. They wanted to be left alone. By banding together with Democrats and the Chamber, Republicans sold out their voters, and those voters then left. I tracked this twenty years ago when the counties around Mecklenburg became more Republican because they used to be Democrat. They used to be Democrat counties back in the days of the blue Dog Democrats, Democrat political machine, all power flowing from the state, and so you had all of these machines throughout the state. You literally could not get a job if you were a Republican in North Carolina. For state government and a lot of local governments, you had to be a Democrat, and then you had to give some of your paycheck over to the campaigns. That was how the Democrats stayed in power since reconstruction. It's how they that's how they kept black people from getting jobs as well in those positions. But over the years, Republicans fled out of the urban areas. They moved over into the. More rural areas where taxes were lower, government was smaller, and you could see it happening over the last twenty years. And this is the natural end result. We are no different than every other city. And more services, more taxes, more spending, drives away people that don't like those things, and those are Republicans. The people who do like those things. Because their philosophy, their political philosophy is born of envy. Well, they move to those places so they could take advantage of all of the things that are being taken from others and. Given to them. Okay, that's it's rational. And here's the bottom line. Democrats in Charlotte like the way the city is governed. They like this. They're okay with all of it. I mean, some of them may show up at a council meeting and talk for two minutes, some of them may post on Facebook about it. But in general, as you should you know, bear witness in the election results of last night, they like where we are they like the way we are being led. They will complain, yes, about how it's unaffordable to live here, but then turn around and vote for an increase in the sales tax. Right. They will put people back in charge that keep raising their taxes. They will not stop. They do not connect these things in their own heads. They think somebody else is paying this. I don't know why, but they think somebody else is paying for all this. They like this. And what they have told you, Conservatives and Republicans, what they have told you is that there is no room here for you. You do not get to participate in your local governance. You are free to work some job, pay your taxes into a system that they will then take money out of. But you won't get to volunteer on city appointed committees. You won't get appointments. I have no say in the future of your city that you helped to build with your time, your money, your life. You won't get a thank you for it. Maybe if you die and you were a well known enough Republican official, maybe you get a proclamation. But you'll be dead. Okay, That's that's what you are being offered in the city of Charlotte. Now, I blame the past Republican leaders. I blame the chamber, the business crowd, the uptown crowd. And just so we're clear, you are getting eaten. Now. You know. Stories are powerful. They help us make sense of things, to understand experiences. 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They are your life told through the eyes of everyone around you and all who came before you, and they will tell others to come who you are, visit creative video dot com. I will tell you a response I got from a Republican who works. Up at the legislature or used to. I won't name them, it's not important, but let's just say he had power and influence. He still does not a lawmaker. He worked for lawmakers. And after one of the elections, I think it was in Asheville, and I said the same thing. I've said this same speech that the same thoughts and comments that I just made. I've said this before. And when I posted it up on social media on Twitter. Yes it was Twitter. I posted on Twitter and on and he responded with something and I asked him, like, so, what do you say to Republicans now who have no opportunity to participate in their government any longer because they don't Not in Ashville now, not in Charlotte. You got one, you got one district rep. And by the way, there, if you're doing a proportional map and you got rid of the at large seats, which Charlotte should do. All cities should do this. Over a certain population, there's no reason to have a large seats, right, make them all district reps. And then Republicans would actually buy a proportion right, a quote unquote fair map, as Democrats would call it. That's not true. They would call a fair map anything that advantages them. But the Republicans would actually enjoy more than one seat on the eleven seat body. Okay, And I asked them, well, then what do you say to Republicans now that have no ability to participate in their own governance. They helped to build the city, and. Now the city now Democrats are saying, get the hell out, because that's that's what's happening, by the way they Democrats are telling you. I was told that specifically by a Democrat campaign consultant, guy campaign manager. It's not important who he is, but he told me he will not rest until there's not a single elected Republican left in Charlotte Mecklimerg and he is one seat away from that. All of the school board seats are lost to Republicans, all of the county commissioner seats lost to Republicans, and now all but one district, all of the eleven city council seats lost to Republicans. So he's almost at his goal. And then, as Pat McCrory said last night here on WBT. When you have single party control, that's when you see all of the corruption. And that's true because now everything gets buried inside party politics and the party brand is more important, and there isn't anybody else pushing back in the meetings, in the closed sessions. There's no other diversity of thought. And I heard a lot of lip service being paid over the last twenty four hours to this idea that, oh, it's important to have Republican representation and a diverse city of thought and all that, and I say, that's just lip service. Democrats don't actually believe that. They don't just look at the results. Right, you keep the at large system in place so Democrats can keep running the table and they can always have an assured majority. It's a remnant. And that's the thing. It doesn't even really matter at this point because the city has turned so blue. It doesn't even really matter that at a time there used to be, you know, Republicans that would make up two or three of the at large city council members and now there's zero. And you can't win. There's just no way because of the way the at large system works. And in the past that was always that was the play They always wanted to try to, you know, control those seats because then you could control the majority. But Democrats don't even need the at large seats to have the majority anymore. They've got six of the seven districts and that's a majority on the council, so you don't even need the at large anymore. I don't remember what I was saying, but it's a Oh. The guy who worked up in Raleigh at the legislature, and I said, what do you tell these Republicans? And he said, there are other cities to build. That's the only answer that I've ever gotten. That's it is move, leave. Do. What democrats want is for you to build up a city and then make it so attractive that Democrats flock to it from all over the country. And when they take it over, then you have to move and you've got to now build another city. I guess that's the only model. Huh. This is from Loopy. I have lived in my community for forty five years, have watched Charlotte get bluer each year. Last night's elections was the end for me. I am a seventy six year old widow, a proud Republican who has little or no representation in the city or the county. I pay four thousand dollars in property taxes each year. The schools are awful, and the street in front of my house is falling apart. There are fewer police and traffic is unmanageable. I can live better and more cheaply somewhere else and not be ignored because of my politics. Goodbye Charlotte. Yeah. I'm not a black pill kind of a guy, but I'm a realist and I look around and it seems pretty clear that this is what people want. This is what Democrats are satisfied with the way their city is being governed, and that means no Republican voices in that government. So there you go. That's just the reality. Here's a great idea. How about making an escape to a really special and secluded getaway in western North Carolina. Just a quick drive up the mountain and Cabins of Asheville is your connection. Whether you're celebrating an anniversary, a honeymoon, maybe you want to plan a memorable proposal, or get family and friends together for a big old reunion. Cabins of Asheville has the ideal spot for you where you can reconnect with your loved ones and the things that truly matter. 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Randall, Hello, Yeah, okay, all right, we're gonna put you on hold, and there you go, Jerry, Welcome to the show. Hey Pete, So my call is perfectly timed. So where where do we go? I'm kind of heartbroken because Wegmans is going to be within a mile of my house. I've been waiting for, hoping and praying for Wegmans. I'd be walking away from a two and a half percent mortgage rate and I don't I'm I'm a tail end boomer. So I hate to say it, but being near like reasonably good medical care, you know, is becoming more of an issue. Where do we go? Where do we go? Where do we well? I'm not telling you, I'm not saying you have to go. I'm just telling you. I'm just saying you need to recognize that the trade off. Okay, go ahead. Yeah, I've seen I've seen this coming. I mean, I've seen this coming, and it's that's what I mean. It's I've only been here twelve years. In twelve years, this whole city has just become like every other blue city, and it's you know, anybody's saying, nos, it's only going to get worse. But I've been struggling with like, like where do where do we go? Where do I go, right. So that's what I was asking it. Yeah, I was. I was giving you an answer, which is the the decision on where to go or if to go. That's that's going. To be an individual decision based on things that you just mentioned. Right. So life is trade offs. There are no solutions. It's all just trade offs. So if you think that you know, you've got a good mortgage, you've got a Wegman's coming in that you really want, and you want to be close to medical facilities, and all of that is worth the trade off of, you know, the higher cost of taxes and the lack of representation in your local government, then stay. That's all. I mean that that that but that's the trade off, right, And. I understand that. I I the the scariest thing for me, I mean personally is being property taxed out of my house, which I know is coming. It's the herd. The other hard part of the equation is that anywhere else that kind of has I had been in consideration. You know, everywhere else is getting so the real estate's getting so high because everybody's leaving and moving there. You know, it's just kind of this vicious circle. I get it. I mean that's a good way to phrase it, or to kind of think about it as trade offs. And I understand that the hardest part is like where else is there to go? Where in another ten years, this won't happen again. Well, from what I understand, there is no guarantee it's not going to happen again. This is apparently the natural cycle of all things that unguarded stores of value gets set upon by parasites. So, Jerry, I appreciate the call. I mean, like there's I'm not telling every single person at an individual level to move. I'm not saying that, but that is what people are doing. Do we know if Randall is back, did you try to pick them up? No? You did not. Okay, I'm going to go to ray then. Hello, Raye. Hello, I'll be quick. Can you hear me? Yes, sir. I was just talking to someone on the radio a while back about people moving from New York down here to North Carolina, and they will they have seen their city destroyed, and they'll move down here and they'll enjoy the fruits of like what the Republicans have built up late, like in Charlotte for a while, and then when they ruin that city, they'll move on to another one. Republicans built up. I think that's what you were saying, like that just keeps happening. And I also heard that John Hancocks say years ago he said that he believed ultimately, I think that we're gonna we're going down the same pathway as the Roman Empire. And I don't I don't think that'll happen because we have a constitution that protects us against that happening. In the in the text, the terms of we're able to keep building these cities and having them destroyed, and you know that assures that the utopia or the good things we need in cities and such are not It's not a destination, it's a journey that keeps changing. How do you feel about that? Well, I mean you've said a couple of things I don't agree with. I don't know about i'd use the word utopia. But look all of this stuff, all cities, countries, like a bar or a restaurant, they all have cycles, right, They all go through decay, growth, rebirth, all of the okay, okay, raise gone. They all go through cycles like that. And this is the cycle that Charlotte is in. And I am allowed to I'm allowed to mourn the loss of the Charlotte that I knew. I'm allowed to do that. We were allowed to do that, the Charlotte that. Was full of this excitement, a boomtown, you know, all of the growth that we were seeing like this is this is amazing. Charlotte's going to be this awesome city and everything, and now to see it and to be shut out of any kind of influence in coming up with solutions, and to just see more and more of the same old you know, left wing solutions quote unquote that get pitched to me and it's just more of the same and you're going to get more of the same results. I'm allowed to mourn that loss, and I do whenever I see these city council results and they just keep going down this same trajectory, you know, And that's what we saw last night. So no, I was not surprised at the election results last night. All right, that'll do it for this episode. Thank you so much for listening. I could not do the show without your support and the support of the businesses that advertise on the podcast, So if you'd like, please support them too and tell them you heard it here. You can also become a patron at my Patreon page or go to dpetecleanershow dot com. Again, thank you so much for listening, and don't break anything while I'm gone.