Charlotte City Council Slammed For Shelling Out Millions On PR Following Train Stabbings

The Charlotte City Council is being slammed for approving $3.4 million to hire a PR company to clean up the reputation of their public transportation after a string of recent stabbings.

The city’s latest action comes after two widely-publicized stabbings, including one that ended fatally on Charlotte’s train system and sparked a national conversation on rising crime and lax prosecution in urban areas of the country. On Tuesday, Republican North Carolina Rep. Mark Harris called out the “pro-crime Democrats in Charlotte” for spending the cash on “misleading ads” rather than choosing to “invest in REAL safety to prevent another tragedy like Iryna Zarutska’s brutal murder.”

“No amount of marketing will cause us to forget Iryna,” Harris wrote.

Local radio host Nick Craig called out local leaders on X Tuesday for using the funds “on ads telling you everything is fine” rather than “fixing safety.”

Pro-crime Democrats in Charlotte are doing everything they possibly can EXCEPT FOR ACTUALLY ADDRESSING CRIME. https://t.co/azb5FlLHoQ

— Rep. Mark Harris (@RepMarkHarrisNC) December 9, 2025

Honduran illegal immigrant Oscar Gerardo Solorzano-Garcia allegedly stabbed a man using a “large fixed-blade knife” on a Charlotte train Friday, according to The Charlotte Observer.

Solorzano-Garcia was deported on two separate occasions before the attack and had a lengthy rap sheet for aggravated battery with a deadly weapon, destroying evidence, resisting arrest, using a false ID, along with convictions for robbery and illegal re-entry.

It came just four months after the unprovoked murder of Ukrainian refugee Iryna Zarutska, 23, in Charlotte by a man with at least 14 prior arrests for offenses such as armed robbery and assault with a deadly weapon.

Decarlos Brown Jr. served five years for the robbery, but got off on time served, probation, or community service in most of his other cases.

He allegedly stabbed Zarutska repeatedly in the neck as she was commuting from her job at a local pizzeria.

The Trump administration responded to Charlotte’s crime surge and sanctuary policies by deploying federal immigration agents to carry out what they dubbed “Operation Charlotte’s Web,” which resulted in hundreds of arrests of illegal immigrants.