jacob biba
@jacobbiba.bsky.social
NC Local/Open Campus Investigative Reporter jacob@nclocal.org jacobbiba@protonmail.com jacobbiba.03 on signal
Chuck Edwards has now withdrawn from the #nc11 election. What happens next? See below for a thread I wrote last night that spells out the process to replace him on the ballot #ncpol
Chris Cooper@chriscooperwcu.bsky.social · 17h agoA brief thread on the rules around candidates for Congress in #ncpol withdrawing. I'm posting it now for....reasons. Also, because of @daniellebattaglia.bsky.social's recent story newsobserver.com/news/politic... (1/7) #nc11
NC GOP Rep. Chuck Edwards ends reelection campaign after sexual harassment report #ncpol www.newsobserver.com/news/politic...
NC GOP Rep. Chuck Edwards ends reelection campaign after sexual harassment report
Edwards is at the center of an ethics report that found he created a hostile work environment and sexually harassed young staffers.
newsobserver.com
#ncpol #nc11 www.cnn.com/2026/08/04/p...
GOP leaders privately push embattled Rep. Chuck Edwards to abandon reelection bid | CNN Politics
House Republican leaders are privately working to convince Rep. Chuck Edwards to abandon his reelection bid for a competitive North Carolina seat after an ethics report dropped against the congressman...
cnn.com
“It is shameful to sign away public trust while residents are left to ask basic questions about our energy, wells, water, wildlife, and our health." Richmond County officials secretly crafted the deal w Amazon then sprang it on an area burdened by pollution insideclimatenews.org/news/0408202...
Inside the Secretive Deal for a $10 Billion Data Center in Rural North Carolina - Inside Climate News
Residents say they were left out of the decision-making process for a project that includes hundreds of polluting diesel generators.
insideclimatenews.org
Here's @phillipvancesmith2.bsky.social, a journalist incarcerated in North Carolina, talking about his recent story in @boltsmag.org about three-strikes laws—featuring the voices of a man serving life, and the victim he shot who’s been pushing for his release full story boltsmag.org/north-caroli...
The House Ethics Committee recommended censuring Rep. Chuck Edwards, citing his alleged inappropriate relationships with staffers. https://www.notus.org/house/ethics-committee-censure-chuck-edwards-inappropriate-conduct
Ethics Committee Recommends Censure for Rep. Chuck Edwards Over ‘Inappropriate Conduct’
Edwards denies the conduct was “intended as a sexual or romantic advance.”
notus.org
New: we've obtained the guide Flock makes for police to try to convince cities to buy Flock cameras, even when there is widespread opposition to it. Encourages police to "own the narrative before someone else does," need to have a "carefully scripted presentation" www.404media.co/own-the-narr...
‘Own the Narrative’: Leaked Flock Guide Shows How It Teaches Cops to Promote Its Tech
"This document shows a coordinated effort from Flock Safety to compel law enforcement agencies to convince our elected leaders to represent their interests as a company rather than the interests of co...
404media.co
“We have to tell her that he’s working on a mountain where he doesn’t have service. The eleven-year-old is having nightmares because they watch the news and they know about the two people who were killed." greensborothread.com/news/politic...
Immigration Agents 'Ramping Up' Detentions
A Nicaraguan man was detained in Greensboro by immigration agents. What are the trends and future of detentions in the state?
greensborothread.com
"It should be next to impossible to defeat a Republican incumbent, but a poorly-timed scandal and a lack of fundraising by the incumbent proved enough to move the university’s ranking left." www.newsobserver.com/news/politic...
Two NC congressional districts moved from leans Republican to toss-ups
Reps. Don Davis and Chuck Edwards now find themselves battling for re-election in districts deemed toss-ups by election watchers.
newsobserver.com
jacob biba@jacobbiba.bsky.social · 6d agocenterforpolitics.org/crystalball/...
Prisciliano Trejo Ricano came to the U.S. at 3yrs old. ICE took him this June. He was 29. He told his family he didn't feel right but ICE wouldn't give him medical attention. After a month, ICE finally moved him to a hospital Prisciliano died five days later enlacelatinonc.org/en/Young-Mex...
A young Mexican man living in Durham died in ICE custody.
News in Spanish about politics, immigration and community issues for Latinos in North Carolina.
enlacelatinonc.org
“I love my government, but I don’t trust you as much as I trust my mother.” nclocal.org/2026/07/30/b...
Balancing public safety and privacy: WNC wrestles with surveillance issues
This summer, counties across Western North Carolina have had varying reactions to increased concerns about video surveillance technology with one county removing license plate readers while the city o...
nclocal.org
“I kept thinking, how do you get this place shut down? Because I don’t know how to do anything like that. No child should be in there.” www.themarshallproject.org/2026/07/30/f...
It Was Supposed to Be a Haven for Troubled Teens. They Risked Everything to Escape.
At Fox Run, one of Ohio’s largest youth residential treatment centers, kids and former staff detail a litany of trauma.
themarshallproject.org
"The National Weather Service also posted it on social media. In a phone call with the Citizen Times July 29, Meteorologist Christiaan Patterson declined to comment on the photo." www.citizen-times.com/story/news/l...
AI image of funnel cloud in Western NC went viral, was never meant to be public
An AI-generated image of a funnel cloud fooled meteorologists and the National Weather Service. Its creator said it wasn't meant to be public.
citizen-times.com
"In one case, Mance identified a Triangle-area deputy who, over two years, overwhelmingly stopped and searched Hispanic drivers in a county where Hispanic residents made up less than 10% of the population." www.newsobserver.com/news/politic...
NC quietly ends decades of tracking racial disparities in policing
The repeal, found in the newly passed budget, eliminates a key tool used to uncover patterns involving police agencies and individual officers, some experts said.
newsobserver.com
My new story, about profiting from gun suicide: www.thetrace.org/2026/07/gun-... Published in partnership with @thetrace.org and @newyorker.com
Parting Shot
Stormy Kay was born in 1961, when her parents were young newlyweds, unprepared and thrust into adulthood. Stormy’s mother cut meat at a grocery store and taught classes at a beauty school, and her fat...
thetrace.org
New post up: The Billion Dollar Election That Hasn't Happened, and a Few Other Items (including more campaign finance, the changing primary calendar, and the Tour de France) chriscooperwcu.substack.com/p/the-billio... #ncpol
The Billion-Dollar Race That Hasn't Happened, and a Few Other Items
It's 99 days before election day; buckle up.
chriscooperwcu.substack.com
“Turning Southern plantations into Southern prisons is not a secret. It’s not an innovation, either. It’s a distinguished tradition in the South." washingtoncitypaper.com/article/2683...
Back to the Big House
The Federal Bureau of Prisons plans to send 1,200 D.C. inmates to a new private prison on the former site of one of North Carolina’s biggest slave plantations. In an open field not too far from the Ch...
washingtoncitypaper.com
jacob biba@jacobbiba.bsky.social · 2w ago"A state official, who requested anonymity to discuss private planning, said the facility could be open as soon as late September." www.nytimes.com/2026/07/23/u...
This just happened: I was standing on a public thoroughfare (airport road in Hamlet) photographing the @amazon data center when the site manager approached me and said I could not take photos, citing “policy” 1/2
“Here is a guy who doesn’t speak the language; he’s in a part of the country he’s never been before; he gets a bunch of boxes dumped on him and tries to figure out what’s going on. The government is faulting him for not figuring out what to do fast enough.” www.newyorker.com/news/annals-...
How a Chinese Immigrant Driver Got Entangled in a Drug Bust
In early 2025, a man from Queens arranged to pick up a passenger in New York’s North Country. He’s been in jail upstate ever since.
newyorker.com
Madison police’s lack of body cams has become a fixation following the police killing of Corey Ruiz, rather than the ongoing scourge of police violence and impunity. It’s a good time to reread @ericumansky.bsky.social’s piece on body cams’ promises and failures: www.nytimes.com/2023/12/13/m...
The Failed Promise of Police Body Cameras (Published 2023)
U.S. taxpayers spent millions to fund what was supposed to be a revolution in accountability. What went wrong?
nytimes.com