CHARLOTTE, N.C. (QUEEN CITY NEWS) —An official recount has been called for a Mecklenburg County Superior Court Judge election. The final votes were tallied on Tuesday night, Republican Judge Matt Osman beat his Democratic opponent, Judge Kimberly Best, by just 77 votes out of 51,000.
With such a slim margin of victory, Osman said he expected a recount, but is still feeling confident a confirmed victory is coming.
“My wife and I were waiting at the board of elections, I told my wife that the wait and anticipation felt a little bit like waiting for our first child to be born. And my wife was very quick to point out that from her perspective, as the one giving birth, it was nothing like that,” Osman laughed.
Osman is relieved this tight race is almost over, and it’s been a long time coming. He announced his campaign in July of 2021, before his opponent, Judge Kimberly Best, was even appointed by Governor Roy Cooper.
“We did everything. We reached out to voters directly through door knocking, mailers, online, facebook ads, digital ads, texting, phone calls, working the polls, we literally did everything we possibly could,” Osman said.
As far as Judge Best’s campaign, it was tainted with controversy after she allegedly shoved a delivery truck driver in the courthouse parking lot this summer. Multiple first-hand accounts were provided to the sheriff’s office and almost all of them said Judge Best got out of her Porsche SUV after scraping it along the delivery driver’s truck and then got into a verbal and physical altercation. But Osman didn’t comment on that situation then, or now.
“We ran a positive campaign where we focused on my qualifications, and why we felt I was the best candidate in terms of the outcome. I don’t know that I had any real expectation for what a final margin would be. I simply wanted to win,” Osman said.
The Mecklenburg County Board of elections office was verbally notified by Judge Best to proceed with a recount. Michael Dickerson, the Director of Elections, expects the results to be the same.
“I’m not expecting anything different, especially 77 votes. You know, the 1,2,3, 4 [vote differences] yes, I’d encourage it. But, but here again, if we want to make sure that the candidates who either win or did not win, we want to make sure that they’re satisfied with the results, of how it came out,” Dickerson said.
QCN reached out to Judge Kimberly Best for an interview but has not heard back. As far as how long it’ll take to get the results recounted, the Board of Elections Office is expecting to get it done by early next week.
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