Brendan K. Maginnis
Charlotte Mayoral Primary, 2025 · Democratic Runner-Up · 2026 Interim Mayor Applicant
Brendan K. Maginnis applied in 2026 to be Charlotte’s interim mayor after Vi Lyles announced her resignation. He was one of more than 100 applicants and was not among the five finalists the City Council interviewed. On June 22 the council appointed Robert “Rob” Harrington, who beat Carrie Cook 6 to 5 in a runoff and was sworn in July 1 to serve through December 2027.
Brendan K. Maginnis finished second in Charlotte’s September 9, 2025 Democratic mayoral primary, taking 12.3 percent of the vote behind incumbent Vi Lyles, who took over 70 percent and went on to win a fifth two-year term in November. Maginnis is a former US Marine, a former Ameriprise Financial advisor, and vice president of Maginnis Bros. Holding Company.
He has run for federal office twice and city office once: the 2022 US Senate Democratic primary, the 2024 US House Democratic primary, and the 2025 Charlotte mayoral Democratic primary. His family relocated to Copenhagen in January 2026. He remains registered to vote in Mecklenburg County, with Charlotte as his primary legal voting residence.
On May 15, 2026, Maginnis wrote the Charlotte City Council from Copenhagen offering to serve as interim mayor between Vi Lyles’s June 30 resignation and the November 2027 election. He volunteered an unsolicited demographic argument with the offer: by his count, 44 Democratic elected officials represent Charlotte at various levels and zero of them are white males. He is the second outside name to publicly volunteer for the appointment, after former Mayor Jennifer Roberts.
In The Mercury
Charlotte Council Names Robert Harrington Its Next Mayor
Council appointment · June 22
Brendan Maginnis Offers to Serve as Interim Mayor
Letter to Charlotte City Council from Copenhagen · Demographic-counter pitch · 2025 primary runner-up volunteers
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