While North Carolinians requested nearly 1.4 million absentee ballots, fewer than half of those have been returned and accepted. Government and watchdog experts continue to express public confidence that mail-in votes are safe and will be counted if filled out properly. 

COVID-19 is spreading more quickly throughout North Carolina's population: public health metrics in the last week have some experts worried the state is heading in the wrong direction. Research shows the virus spreads more quickly indoors and when people have prolonged close contact with one another — something that's almost unavoidable in places like jails and prisons. 

Burning Coal Theatre Company’s only in-person performance this fall opened last week to a rapt audience of...four. Due to COVID-19 restrictions, the live production of “A Hundred Words for Snow” is being performed before drastically-reduced audience sizes, creating an intimate atmosphere. 

North Carolina issued new guidance Monday for counties to proceed with dealing with more than 10,000 deficient absentee ballots, which have been in limbo because of ongoing court battles over a witness requirement for voting by mail.

President Donald Trump and Democratic rival Joe Biden went on offense over the weekend as both campaigned in states they are trying to flip during the Nov. 3 election, just over two weeks away.

The Saint Augustine's University community is mourning the death of its president.

Irving McPhail died this week from complications of COVID-19. Officials said he did not contract the virus from the campus.

At Haywood Funeral Home, every service triggers a bureaucratic process that's been largely unchanged across North Carolina since 1914, when the company pulled its hearses along Raleigh's streets with horses.