It had been a warm spring day that finally gave way to twilight of cobalt-grey, sharpening the flashing red and blue police lights slashing through dusk restless and unyielding. Demonstrators waving signs and banging rhythmically on locked glass doors, their chants pulsed through the cool evening air. 

“Save our democracy.” 

When the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians overwhelmingly approved a measure to get into the recreational marijuana business last week, it set up a showdown of sorts with Rep. Chuck Edwards (R-Henderson) that could have far-reaching negative ramifications for the tribe. 

With former President Donald Trump’s most recent indictment — his fourth in five months — comes a slew of familiar names like Rudy Giuliani and Sidney Powell, but there’s at least one more name included in the list of Trump’s co-defendants that’s well known to Western North Carolina voters.