Saturday, October 17, 2026

Good Morning! On this day in 2003, Charlie “Choo Choo” Justice died at his Cherryville home at age 79. The Asheville native was a two-time Heisman runner-up who made the Tar Heels a national power in the late 1940s.

Speaking of UNC football, the Tar Heels head to Durham today for their annual ACC rivalry game with Duke. Learn more in Sports, then test your knowledge of how the “Victory Bell Game” got its name in today’s Trivia.

Some of the most trusted drinks in your fridge have a health reputation they never earned. That reputation shapes what you pour at breakfast, grab after a workout, and hand to your kids, yet most people don’t check the label. The gaps are bigger than you’d think, including a “gut health” brand that paid millions to settle a lawsuit over its claims and a glass toasted as heart-healthy for 30 years. So how many are in your fridge right now? On today’s episode of The Flyover Podcast, Amy goes in-depth to count down the 10 worst drinks that sound healthy but aren’t. Tune in here!

Flying cars are getting closer to everyday life, and today’s sponsor, Doroni, is giving investors a chance to get involved. With a share price change coming after October 22, there’s still time to invest at the current price. Get the details below.

NC Ranks 3rd in Education ‘Integrity’

North Carolina tied with Florida for third in Defending Education’s first 50-state ranking of public-school policy, trailing only Tennessee and Alabama.

The national parent-advocacy group scored states on 17 measures in five categories, and North Carolina took top marks on teacher policies, parental rights, and limits on foreign government influence in schools. It ranked lowest on diversity, equity, and inclusion, placing 26th.

Terry Stoops of Defending Education credited the Republican-led General Assembly, saying the state does “a superb job of restraining teacher union politics.”

The rankings reward policies that have split the state along party lines. Many of the laws credited, including the 2023 Parents’ Bill of Rights and a K-12 DEI ban enacted in June, became law only after Republicans overrode Democrat governors’ vetoes.

Other national scorecards have graded the state differently, ranking it 13th on education freedom and tied for last on public-school open enrollment.

CMPD Officers Out over Racist Texts

Three Charlotte-Mecklenburg police officers have resigned and three more face termination after investigators found racial, sexual, and religious bias in a group text thread.

Chief Estella Patterson said four of the six officers came from the same 2024 academy class, and the group includes officers of three different races. The texts remain unreleased, and the termination recommendations now go to the city’s Civil Service Board.

The messages surfaced during a State Bureau of Investigation probe, opened in July, of former officer Seth Elliott, who was charged with misusing the department’s Flock license-plate-reader system and has since resigned.

Patterson said the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police Department has begun auditing body-worn camera footage and is reviewing its hiring practices. Charlotte Mayor Rob Harrington said, “Racism and bias have no place in our police department.”

The Charlotte-Mecklenburg NAACP has called for the officers to be barred from policing.

NC Absentee Requests Fall

Absentee ballot requests in North Carolina have fallen 32.7% from the same point in the 2022 midterms, with nearly 140,000 requested so far.

The decline is steepest among Democrats, whose requests are down more than 40%, while Republican and unaffiliated requests have each dropped about 25%.

Analysts tie the slide to voters returning to in-person voting after the pandemic drove up mail voting in 2020 and 2022. In the 2024 general election, 74% of North Carolinians voted early in person and just 5% by mail.

Andy Jackson of the John Locke Foundation predicts mail ballots will make up only 3% to 4% of this year’s vote.

Early voting opened Thursday in all 100 counties, drawing more than 27,000 ballots in its first hours ahead of the Nov. 3 election.

Flying together with our sponsor

The Pentagon’s Got Their Eye on This Tech

One of the biggest indicators for forward-thinking investors is where the US government puts their money. They move first on the technology they know is going to shape the future.

First, they bet big on jet engines. Then drones. Now? It’s flying cars. This August, the U.S. Air Force just signed a $142M deal for a flying car company building five-seater fleets. But our nation’s defense can’t stop there. Our nation’s most covert operations need smaller, personal aircrafts. And Doroni, the company positioned to lead the $100B personal eVTOL category, aims to capture this opportunity.

Their flying car, the H1-X opens the skies to all members of the military. Their SOULAI platform is so intuitive, you can pilot their aircraft after 25 hours of training. And its patented ducted fan system is designed to be safer than competitors.

This is your chance to get in at the private stage. Invest in Doroni today at $3.30 share before the share price changes after 10/22.

➤ Statewide: North Carolina holds a roughly $7,500-per-taxpayer surplus and earned a B grade in Truth in Accounting’s Financial State of the States report, which found the state has more than enough money to cover its bills. (More)

➤ Also Statewide: More than 220 drivers have filed complaints through Attorney General Jeff Jackson’s new NC Fuel Check tool, saying stations haven’t passed along savings from the state’s gas-tax holiday, which suspends the 41-cent-per-gallon tax through Nov. 30. (More)

➤ Triangle: The state Department of Transportation awarded a $21 million contract to Blythe Construction for a pavement-rehabilitation project along a 9.4-mile stretch of Interstate 40 in Durham and Wake counties. Work is set to begin this fall and finish by late 2028. (More)

➤ Raleigh/Charlotte: Republican Court of Appeals Judge April Wood faulted the News & Observer and Charlotte Observer for claiming a GOP win would leave the 15-member court without a woman. Four Republican women already serve. The papers corrected the editorial to say candidate Christine Walczyk would be the court’s only Democrat woman. (More)

➤ Sanford: Caterpillar is committing up to $10 million for workforce training through Central Carolina Community College and the Sanford Area Growth Alliance, building on the roughly $1 billion expansion it announced in September. (More)

➤ Brunswick County: A passenger was seriously injured after being thrown from an assisted living van that failed to yield and struck a flatbed truck on NC-133 at Mallory Creek Drive Friday morning, closing all northbound lanes for hours. The van’s driver faces charges. (More)

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➤ App State football edged Coastal Carolina 35-32 in a thriller Friday night, powered by Jaquari Lewis’ four rushing touchdowns to secure the Sun Belt win. (See Stats)

➤ Duke football (4-1) hosts UNC (3-2) today at 3:30 p.m. for the Victory Bell. The Blue Devils, favored by 3, seek a third straight win over the Tar Heels under coach Manny Diaz after Duke’s first loss of the year against Georgia Tech. (See Preview)

➤ No. 21 Wake Forest football (5-1) visits California (3-3) tonight at 10:30 p.m., while Charlotte travels to Temple for a 1 p.m. game. (See Wake Forest and Charlotte Previews)

➤ UNC men’s basketball head coach Michael Malone has offered a scholarship to 7-foot-4 class of 2027 center Cherif Millogo of St. Francis High School in California after a West Coast recruiting visit. (More)

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➤ What Chuck Norris discovered about “Rapid Aging” before he died. Chuck Norris spent his life always preparing for the unexpected. But before he passed, he said the most dangerous threat he ever faced wasn’t outside his door…It’s inside our bodies. And according to the research he spent years digging through, there are 3 “internal enemies” that could be rapidly aging your body right now. Chuck recorded a video explaining it all before he passed. Watch this short video here >>

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Morgan Stanley Calls this a $9T Opportunity

Morgan Stanley predicts that the flying car industry will grow 185,850% by 2050. In fact, they say it will reach $9 trillion in size, more than twice as valuable as today’s global car market.

And 17,000+ investors believe Doroni will lead the charge.

Designed for everyday life, Doroni’s H1-X aircraft charges like an EV, fits in two-car garages, and requires just 25 hours of training to pilot.

And while Tesla just unveiled a prototype, Doroni already unveiled a full-scale showroom model 600+ people already ordered in March.

Now, Doroni’s targeting commercial deliveries by 2028; the same year Tesla plans to just start production. This is the final week to invest Doroni at $3.30/share until the share price changes after 10/22.

This is a paid advertisement for Doroni Regulation A offering. Please read the offering circular at invest.doroni.io Forward looking statements were included here that the Company believes to be accurate given the current information. A reservation of the ticker symbol is not a guarantee that we will be listed on the NASDAQ. Listing on the NASDAQ is subject to approvals.

➤ The North Carolina Zoo in Asheboro has welcomed six critically endangered Visayan warty piglets, including a record litter of four. Fewer than 200 remain in the wild, and the births bring the zoo’s herd to nine ahead of its Asia section’s March opening. (See Photo)

➤ Charlotte ranked as the nation’s third-fastest-growing major urban area, expanding by 4.3% in population from 2022 to 2024, behind only Miami and Houston, according to a new analysis of U.S. Census Bureau data. Raleigh came in at No. 28. (See Map)

➤ NC State has joined the Eastern Fire Network, a six-institution effort led by Penn State and backed by a $1.74 million, three-year grant through a National Science Foundation fire-science program, to coordinate wildfire research across the eastern U.S. (More)

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The following stories are featured exclusively on The Flyover Podcast—a daily show that gives you the most important headlines in under 15 minutes, straight from the heart of the country.

➤ Some of your fridge’s most trusted drinks carry health reputations that research can’t back up. (Top 10)

➤ New details are emerging about the Oregon elementary school shooter, including how he got the shotgun used in the attack. (Hear Story)

➤ Federal investigators subpoenaed Rep. Ilhan Omar’s relatives days before searching her Washington home. (Hear Details)