Incumbent Judge Aretha Blake keeps District Court seat despite contentious campaign
Adding an exclamation point to end a bruising campaign, incumbent Judge Aretha Blake won a second term on Mecklenburg County’s District Court.
With early voting and returns from all but five of the county’s 190 precincts tabulated late Tuesday, Blake had an insurmountable 50,000-vote lead over challenger Lynna Moen in the Democratic primary, 67.8% to 32.2%. There is no Republican opposition in November, so Blake retains her seat.
On the Republican side, incumbent Mecklenburg Superior Court Judge Casey Viser kept a firm hold in District 26, which includes south Charlotte, Matthews and Mint Hill.
Viser led his opponent, District Court Judge David Strickland, 57.2% to 42.8%, with all precincts counted. Viser will face former District Court Judge Alicia Brooks, a Democrat, in November.
Local court races normally are low-key, down-ballot affairs that draw little voter interest. But the Blake-Moen campaign quickly changed lanes.
Blake’s competence became the campaign’s flash point.
At issue was Blake’s performance in her two years in Family Court, her first assignment after being elected judge for the first time in 2016. Family Court Judges make decisions in highly combustible and drawn-out disputes over divorce, alimony and child custody.
Meanwhile, Blake sued a Charlotte television reporter and his station over what she claimed were inaccurate allegations about her record. She also went to court last week in an unsuccessful attempt to block the station’s coverage of her, saying it would damage her re-election chances.
In the end, Blake blasted out of the gate Tuesday night, running up a 20,000-ballot lead among the county’s early voters, and never looked back and her advantage grew throughout the night.
Moen, a family law attorney, claimed she entered the race, in part, because Blake mishandled one of her cases. She expanded those attacks to allege that Blake had a backlog of dozens of cases in which she had not ruled and had kept families hanging.
Blake denied the allegations.
Blake said she had ruled in all but two of the cases. The Observer examined 16 of the disputed cases and found that Blake had indeed made rulings.
However, several prominent family-law attorneys told the Observer that Blake had chronic problems handing down timely decisions. She was also among three of the county’s Family Court judges publicly sanctioned in 2108 for lengthy delays in ruling on individual cases.
The campaign eventually took on racial overtones. During a hearing of her lawsuit, one of Blake’s attorneys intimated that she had been singled out for criticism because she was a black incumbent facing a white opponent.
The county’s Black Political Causus publicly attacked the WBTV story, saying it was evidence of entrenched bias and racism in the media. The station has said it stands by its reporting.
Blake’s husband was accused at a west Charlotte voting site of pressuring an African American voter not to support a white woman over a black one.
