#Burn the ships series

And he does believe he’s here to keep Charlotte from suffocating under all-Democrat rule. He thinks people are wrong in their perception of him. He believes he’ll be proven right in the long run for his stance on the 2040 plan and elections. Photo: Michael Graff/Axios He does, he says, in that he wants people to know he stands by most of it, if not all.

#Burn the ships series

Why it matters: We wanted to talk with him in a casual setting to see if the millennial firebrand who’s a series of point-counterpoints - who’s become Charlotte Twitter’s most despised public figure, but who’s also helped make Charlotte a fintech capital and brought millions in new business to town … who’s created a jobs program that pulls people out of poverty, but who’s also made national news for suggesting it be illegal to give food to homeless people … who’s been the subject of ethics complaints and the tosser of ethics complaints … who’s defended police, and who’s wept at the center of a group of Black Lives Matter protesters, and accused colleagues of “pandering to the rioters” … who’s been labeled a racist but is also a first-generation Pakistani American who grew up being pelted by racist comments - wanted to clear anything up.īokhari came into office with a group of millennials in 2017. This is why, he says, “Nobody legit wants to do this.” People trusted me to come here and deal with the big issues. “All the other little things day to day, get the potholes filled, anyone can do that. “I feel like I’ve let down everyone who gave me money to run,” he said of the back-to-back Monday night losses. That last thing prompted the mayor to shove her chair out from behind the table in frustration and call a recess.Īs it happens, we’d scheduled our meeting with Bokhari for the next morning. He let words fly, pointing directly at council member Malcolm Graham and saying Graham had no respect for anyone other than himself ( interaction at 2:38). He accused his colleagues of pearl clutching, and of giving themselves contract extensions without the voters’ blessing. He slouched in his chair and sat up straight. Bokhari understood that, but he couldn’t understand why the hell they’d wait to hold the four at-large contests and mayor’s race, all of which are voted on citywide.īokhari sees most political interactions as competitions - there’s the side he’s on, and the side for people who are wrong - so even something as procedural as sliding an election back a few months was crushing.Īs the vote on the elections collapsed in front of him, he became rabid. They did it because a delay in census data made it impossible to draw district boundaries. On June 28, they voted to move this fall’s city council elections to next year. On June 21, council voted 6-5 to pass the 2040 Comprehensive Plan he despised and fought relentlessly against. There’ve been stretches where he’s dominated the news cycle for several days.īut the spring victories only gave way to larger losses in early summer.

Despite his youth and political affiliation, Bokhari had played lead role in 2021, luring new companies such as Robinhood here and helping to bolster Charlotte’s status as a tech city. And it’s enough to make even the cockiest and brashest among them crash from time to time.īokhari and Ed Driggs, a retired banker, are Charlotte’s only GOP reps on the 11-member council. It’s left Republicans with little say in the governing of the country’s economic and population hubs, even as they dominate in state legislatures such as North Carolina’s. Of the 100 largest, only 26 have Republican mayors only two of the top 25 do.

The New York Times recently reported that the top 11 are all led by Democrats. The 41-year-old is one of the last of his party elected to serve in a large American city, this one or any. So goes the ride of the urban Republican. “I’m depressed,” Tariq Bokhari was telling us now, sitting outside of a South End coffee shop and market. The morning after another rager of a Monday night in local government, Charlotte’s most controversial city council member tapped the top of his Corkcicle tumbler while his eyes welled up with tears.