Apologies for the sports metaphor, but this is your 2-minute warning. 

Tuesday is Election Day in North Carolina’s primary elections. Regardless of where you live and what party you’re registered in, there are big votes on the table about what kind of leadership you want. 

If you live in counties that are dominated by one party or the other, primary elections tend to be the chance you have to shape your leadership.

Like in NC’s 4th Congressional district, where incumbent Rep. Valerie Foushee is expected to be in a close contest with Nida Allam, a commissioner in Durham County. 

Cardinal & Pine contributor Ryan Pitkin leads with the elections in his new edition of “3 things happening in NC.” 

Democrats Valerie Foushee (left) and Nida Allam (right) are squaring off in one of NC’s most contentious primary elections this year. Here’s what to know about Election Day. (Courtesy of Foushee, Allam campaigns)

A couple things to remember for voting on Election Day:

Let’s get to the rest of the news this Monday. 

P.S. Today is your last chance to take our short, 5-minute survey that will shape the future of this newsletter. The survey closes at midnight.

Cardinal & Pine reader Karl Schlatzer has given us this gorgeous sunset view from Emerald Isle. 

For more than 70 years, anytime someone got sick in Martin County, really sick, they knew they had a hospital nearby they could go to. A place they could go for emergency and specialty care. 

But after Martin General Hospital closed in 2023, the community lost a literal lifesaver. For lifelong Martin County resident and current county manager, Drew Batts, the loss of the hospital is personal.

Batts’ friend was rushed to the hospital last year after she stopped breathing in her sleep. She lived close to the former site of the hospital, but had to be transferred a half hour away to neighboring Bertie County, and then to Greenville, where she died two days later. 

Batts wonders what might have happened if the local hospital had still been open and if care hadn’t been delayed.

Cardinal & Pine’s Dylan Rhoney brings you this must-read on emergency care in rural NC. 

More Bad Medicine:

1. Anita Earls against the world. The Living South

“The NC Supreme Court justice could be on the shortlist for the US Supreme Court someday. But first, she faces a right-wing smear campaign and a fight with cancer.”

2. Political candidate arrested days before primary election in North Carolina, records show. WBTV

“An arrest warrant alleged 55-year-old Chad Minson Stewart ‘unlawfully and willfully did fail to immediately stop’ after he collided with a school bus on Feb. 26, near the corner of East Sanders Street and Meadow Hills Drive in the town of Four Oaks. Stewart is one of three Republicans running in the March 3, 2026 primary election for the Johnston County Board of Commissioners District 3 seat.”

3. NC politicians react to US-Israel attacks on Iran. ABC-11

“Some praised the move as necessary for national security, while others see it as reckless and unconstitutional.”

4. Early voting turnout surges across North Carolina. WFAE

“More voters showed up early to the polls this year than in the 2022 midterms, and even the 2024 presidential primary.”

Charlotte Hawkins was the first Black woman to be recognized with a North Carolina historic site. Brown, a Hendersonville, NC, native, started an elite school for Black children near Greensboro.

Women’s History Month began March 1. 

We begin it, appropriately, with a look at the places that offer the best chance to dive into the North Carolina woman who changed the game. 

For instance, NC educator Charlotte Hawkins Brown (see above) was the first woman to receive a North Carolina historic site designation. Brown founded the Palmer Memorial Institute, an elite prep school for Black kids, when she was just a teenager.

Brown lived in a time of not just segregation, but hostility to the idea of Black education. Her school near Greensboro was one extraordinary story. 

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Thanks for reading. This newsletter was written by Billy Ball. I’m an NC native and journalist. I tend to lean left on opinion, but I lean no way on facts. Today’s edition includes stories from Ryan Pitkin, Dylan Rhoney, and Brook Bolen . It was edited by Paula Solis.

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