The Great American State Fair Kerfuffle of 2026 | Hour 3

What's going on? Thank you so much for listening to this podcast. It is herd live every day from noon to three on WBT Radio in Charlotte. And if you want exclusive content like invitations to events, the weekly live stream, my daily show prep with all the links, become a patron, go to dpetecleanershow dot com. Make sure you hit the subscribe button. Get every episode for free, write to your smartphone or tablet, and again, thank you so much for your support. It is Monday, and it's two o'clock and that means we chat with Ap Dylan from the North State Journal. You can read her work at nsjonline dot com, and you can also subscribe to her newsletter. It's called more to the Story over on substack. Ap. How are you today? I'm good, Pete. How are you all right? Busy weekend? Busy weekend with a lot of the dumb assery on Twitter formerly known as x. So. Okay, let's start at the beginning, shall we. I think we may have talked about this. I know I definitely covered it on the show. I'm not sure if we discussed it or not. But the Great American State Fair, this is the event that is showcasing all fifty states up on the National Mall. They all have little booths set up and people walk around and visit every state whatever. And we learned a couple of weeks ago that North Carolina's governor and through his what the Department of Cultural Resources, had opted not to send anybody to our tent along with I think there was about a dozen states, virtually all of them controlled by democratic governors, and so this was seen as sort of Governor Josh Stein flipping the bird to Donald Trump. And they cited at the time right that there was just not enough money in the budget. Oh, we're so poor, we have no money to be able to go to this event. And then you had an article at North State Journal about what some private citizens who stepped up and sent a delegation and put some stuff in there. So tell us about sort of that first development. Well, yeah, apparently the Department of Natural Culture Resources told organizers back in April that they weren't going to come, and they said it was cost prohibitive. They said it would have cost them one hundred thousand dollars estimated to send people and displays and all this kind of stuff for the couple of weeks that it goes on, and that was interesting to me because there are some states that were spending as little as twelve grand on this, so it was interesting to me. But also they didn't bother to tell the semi Quincentennial Committee at the Legislature that this was going on, even though they have a liaison to that committee. And all this came out, you know, after a private citizen found out that this was happening. So she doctor Laury Gadd She basically took up the mantle and got a whole bunch of people involved, Arry Childer's Racings, Pepco a bunch of people, and got our tent flushed out, which is bigger than the other tents because we're one of the thirteen colonies. Yeah, so it's kind of important that we be there, I think. So that really didn't The money thing didn't really hold out for me either, because I've been following that committee and I happen to know that the Natural and Cultural Resources has given out something like four million dollars worth of grants to communities and took towns and things in the state for America two fifty stuff that they couldn't earmark, you know, a couple of thousands for themselves to go to this. Well, so it's a big hairy deal. Yeah. And here's the other thing that has kind of chapped me on this is that they make it sound like the Governor's office and the Department of Natural and Cultural Resources they make it sound like that they have to like cut a check for one hundred thousand dollars or else they can't go. And that is a false choice because, as we saw with the private effort, you don't need to actually spend the money yourself. You can get private entities to volunteer to be a part of the ten like you can organize something where you don't have to shell out really any money at all. Yeah, they could have totally outsourced it, and they didn't. So they just decided to pull out. And I think it was a bad move, and I think it's probably one of the first nasty things that's probably come down the pike out of the Sime administration. This is you know, this is the two hundred and fiftieth anniversary for one of the thirteen Calories colonies. You send someone, right, That's pretty much. It's that's the long and short of it. There was no set cost what's over however much you wanted to spend or didn't want to spend, you could have outsourced it, like you said, So this was this was kind of garbage. Yeah, yeah, So the idea that this was a financial decision and not a political one it does not pass the smell test for me. And I got to tell you when I when we talked about this previously, I mean, the text line blew up. My tweets, you know, notifications blew up like this thing, Like people are really mad at Governor Josh Stein for, you know, abandoning this event. Now. To be fair, the Great American State Fair is put on by Freedom to Fifty and that is a separate organizer then the official like government run organization. Right, there are two different hints. It's just for that, right, so, like and the Freedom to Fifty is being pitched as that's Trump's thing. This is all about Trump and all of that. But it's like you've got this event and like this is literally what you're supposed to be doing at the Cultural Resources Department, Like you're supposed to be showcasing US as a state to the rest of the country. These people go to trade shows, they go all over the country in order to pitch North Carolina to potential businesses, to industries, to tourists. It's their reason for being. And you're telling me that this was a bridge too far to drive, you know, five hours up the road. That's it's it does not pass the smell test. No, it doesn't. And then there was a kerfuffle over the weekend about the monitors and the pavilion. Yeah, let's get to that now. So it showed the stars and bars. It was one of the old battle flags, and it wasn't even one of the official battle flags either, which I had posted an image of what they were showing in there, and I got read the riot Act by someone on AX about it and that's not even one of them. I said, no, that that's what they're showing on the monitor, and I showed the screenshot from the monitor. Yeah that, I'm just pointing out that it was cycling through different maps, right, and so Ruben's different state flags and you know, apparently Josh Stein was able to get involved in that part of it. Oh yeah, yeah, hang on, hang on, let's hold them to get rid of. It, right, hang on, So let me let me walk through this for people who aren't aware of the flag kerfuffle. So Reuben Jones from Spectrum News, he's their DC corresponding guy up there. He goes and he checks out the North Carolina tent and when he walks in, you can see there's a monitor. There are actually two of them in the tent. There's a race car there from Childres's Racing and like Operation Hilo that did a bunch of the rescuing after Hurricane Helene. I don't know whose monitors they were and who programmed them, but they have these monitors and they're cycling through. So when he first walks in, he's shooting video. You can see the North Carolina flag, and then he looks at he pans over, you can see the race car. He swings back, and as he's swinging back, you can see there is sort of the left half of the North Carolina flag with the seal I think, and then there's the Confederate flag next to it, as if it's one big flag. That was never an official state flag, but it was obviously a monitor that was rolling through a bunch of flags, and that was one of the the whole point. Yeah, you know, this wasn't the flag that was being used to represent North Carolina. It was scrolling through the different flags for the state like historically, you know, and I mean it's people are still apparently upset over flags, so right, Yeah, So Josh Shawn got involved in that apparently and called them up, called up the organizers and asked them to remove it, and they did. They apologized and they did, and you know, but this was a whole thing apparently, So he can get involved in making sure that our flag is being presented correctly at the pavilion, but he can actually send his own people to it, right, so he said. The governor's office said, this display does not reflect the North Carolina that we love. America two fifty is about unity and bringing our nation together. As we boycott them glorifying this divisive Confederate symbol does the exact opposite. We demand the organizers stop dishonoring the flag of North Carolina. Look, this is catnip to Democrats obviously, even though it was their battle flag, but whatever like that, Like this is katnaby. My view on this is like when you don't fund then you can't maintain control, right, Like that's that's the point of funding it. If you had organized this through your executive agency, then you would have the ability to set this up however you wanted to, but you refused. So the private individuals get involved, and that means you don't have any editorial control anymore. Over that booth, like that to me is obvious, right, So he gets involved, and then of course mount Olive Pickle Company they pulled their sponsorship because they were getting targeted. Children's racing is getting targeted, like everybody that's now at the booth is being subjected to the old school cancel culture crap from the left because somebody put that flag in the rotation of all of these historical flags from North Carolina history. So like, do we know who actually put the images in the monitors? Do we know who was responsible for that? No? I haven't been able to figure that out either. You know, they're a little bit busy actually running the pavilion because well, the state's not doing it right. I'm honestly not that put out by it. Yeah, it was kind of like, oh, that's not a good idea. But by the same token, it's like, folks, you know what, I thought we were past the whole hurt feelings thing. No, you know, no, there are still some more statues to tear down. Yeah, And I think what makes it to me, what makes it more egregious, is the fact that it like, it's not like it seemed to be like an amalgamation of the actual flag, because like the flag that North Carolina adopted, the first one was like after or right before the Civil War, during the Civil War something like, we didn't even have a state flag for a while, and then the first one had our secession date on the flag. So and then they removed that after the Civil War and they swapped it out with the uh was it the Halifax Resolves or something? I forget, but they swapped out. The dat it was the Halifax Revolting. Yeah, so they swapped it out later. Yeah. But the but the Confederates stars and bars, that was ever part of the official state flag. No, that was one of the old battle flags. And there's multiple different versions of that back flag, you know, I mean, they just happened to a Yank one that was like, you know, I'm sure they probably asked AI for it or something like that. And if you if you were to ask AI for it, it would probably pump out that same image. But it was it was. You know, I found that image actually on a website that sells these kinds of things, and it was one of the superimposed, pushed together ones. It was exactly like the one on the monitor. Yeah, which is why I used that as the example. And I got read the Riot Act. That's not even one of the flags for North Carolina. And I said, yeah, I know. I was posting it because it's identical to the one that was on the monitor. And then I pushed the picture of the monitor flag. Oh well sorry, yeah, I didn't even get a story. No, you're not going. No, so this is there. This is you know, look, any any opportunity the left has to call people racist, they're going to take advantage of it. I even saw some. People bringing up the Wilmington riots about oh, yeah, what's that moron's name, uh KD or something I forget the on Twitter former like Democrat candidate or whatever, and you know, he's bringing up the Wilmington race riots, the coupd' tae that occurred, uh in Wilmington after the Civil War, and I'm like, dude, that was Democrats that like overran the Fusion Party, which was. Black voters and Republicans. Former owner right, and they're right. So it's like they have this one p like, oh there's white Christian males. They you know, they they threw a coud a tows like they were Democrats. Oh my gosh, they were democrats anyway. All right, So then real quick, there was also no King's Protest, uh titled all of Us, which I guess was just like twelve people that actually showed for this thing in in various locations. It was, you know, another one. I think there's some protest fatigue going on. But now they this more had more to do with the America to fifty stuff. They were trying to weave that in there. There's this group called the Next to Fifty being run by Linda Sarsor. That's far left activist who was part of the Women's March. She's you know, she's awful. Yeah, she's awful, anti semi yeah, Islamist, just terrible person. Yeah, she's she's celebrated nine to eleven in one point. I think I saw an article about that. But anyway, so she and a couple other individuals who were also both Lestlie and the activists have created this group. It hasn't gotten a lot of traction. Yet a social media has maybe a couple hundred followers, but yet it managed to get fifty to fifty one to live streams in Washington, d C. I believe it's Washington, d C. They and they marched to the White House, so they were either in d C. I think it was Peerson Square and I'm thinking about it. They they then they marched to the past the White House and back to their original location. After about an hour of speakers and whatnot that involved folks from care, several union representatives, a couple of individuals that were with the na A c P. I'm trying to remember who the other one was. That was interest, Oh yeah, the Center for American Progress, which is David Brock's outfit. And the usual suspect. Stein was also one of the speakers, and she she's an interesting one. She was on Zan Mandoni's transition team. That should tell you the flavor of the speakers. And the livestream is available. I've got it up on substack. Folks that want to go view it could go view it, but Linda Sarsoor kicked the thing off. She's the next two fifty is hidden. Who's involved with it? On their website. You can't find out anything about who's running this thing on the website. It's only when you start hitting the videos and you start seeing the press releases which are going out to a third party, that you can see that it is her, along with a girl named Saru Jayara Man and Carmen Purrs Jordan, both of which are our left activists in different Yeah. So if you want to read more about the latest note King's protest, head over to substack dot com. Type in more to the story. That's AP's newsletter there and reader work at nsjonline dot com. AP thanks so much, I appreciate it. Absolutely, have a good one, Pete. All right, Happy Independence Day to you and your family. All right. For over a year now you've heard me talking about Create a Video. 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And this will be starting at fourth and will last until about nine thirty. So Romeier beard In Park is right next to truest Field, home of the Charlotte Knights, which is where we WBT does our sky show. So we have the big fireworks show right over the stadium or from the stadium. So the city for fifty years, the city has glommed on to our fireworks show and they're doing it again. And I will tell you what they are offering you at Romeir beard In Park, which is. Unreal. It's just unreal. One of the benefits of being around for a while in a given place, working in media in that given place, is that you develop what we like to call institutional knowledge. It's the stuff that you learn over time that you can't otherwise, no, unless you've been in a place for a while. Well, I have been in the Charlotte area since well, I mean actually since ninety two, because I came down after I graduated high school in New York. I left as soon as I could, and I came down went to Winthrop University, so I was in the Charlotte region. And then in ninety nine I moved to Charlotte from rock Hill and I was working here. I was a reporter for WBT News and WBT has been putting on the Sky Show on July fourth, or I mean in celebration of Independence Day. Sometimes it would be on July third, but we've been doing this for fifty years, and I remember about well, yes, it would have been twenty years ago, early two thousands, mid two thousands, maybe late two thousands. I want to say there was because like I would always have to work on July fourth, because it was our event, and it used to be in Center City Charlotte. It would be a trade and try on and we would have all of the booths set up. I mean it was a huge It turned into a massive event. I think the last year we did it, we had KC in the Sunshine Band playing as the headliner, and it cost a lot of money. We had to book the bands, We had to get all of the vendors in there, we had to get the city permits, and then like the expense of blowing up like you know, I think it is a technically a metric buttload of dynamite for the for the fireworks show. And like some years it would cost the radio station more money to put on than we made. So it was we would we would lose money doing it, but we did it for decades and decades. And when I say we all had like everybody in the station had to work the event, and I mean like working with the vendors. I would be out there doing you know, I was a reporter, so I would do, you know, some live reports. I would file some reports. But then I was also riding around in a golf cart getting people to clear out of the fireworks landing zone so we could shoot the things off, you know, Like everybody was working on the event. And then that fateful year, I forget which year. It was, a bunch of people came into the center city after the event. They came in on the buses on cats. They came into the main bus station and they began running around the streets, getting in fights, attacking cars, and then the city said to us, you guys have to pay for a massive police force presence now in center city. Well, we could not afford that. It was it became financially unworkable, and so we moved it. We moved it to the Charlotte Knights Stadium, which at the time was in Fort Mill right across the border. The Charlotte Knights used to have their stadium down there with the big baseball water tower up there, remember, So we moved it down there and we can and so we continue to hold the event there. I think we did that for well, I don't know, it was a couple of years. And then when the Knights got their stadium in Uptown, we moved the event with the Knights, who have been great partners in all of this. And during that time period when we announced that we were moving the fireworks show to Knights Stadium because we could provide security basically it was a secure access in and out and all of that, and this way we didn't have to pay for like the entire CMPD force you know, to be working, which they weren't too thrilled with that because that like before that night of uh, you know, of the youths taking over the streets. They weren't all, you know, forced to work overtime and you know, be out on the streets of uptown. And so they the city then attacks us. They they started attacking us for for taking their fireworks show. And then, of course, is the first time I think in recorded history that the Charlotte Observer called it the WBT sky Show was after that night, when these kids started running all over the place and beating on cars and beating each other up. That's the first time that they ever called us the WBT sky Show, because they would just say the Charlotte Sky Show or sky show whatever. They would always leave our call letters out, even though it was all our event. We would call their marathon the Charlotte Observer Marathon because that's what it is. But they could never call it the WBT sky Show until something went wrong and it wasn't even the sky show. It wasn't us, it was cats, It was the city of Charlotte, right, They were the ones who fell asleep at the switch. Anyway, then I start seeing all of the letters to the editor that the Charlotte Observer keeps publishing, ripping on WBT or the city for moving the sky Show, taking our fireworks show. They're taking our show. It's like, whoa, whoa, whoa are you paying for this show? Because like that's a reason why a lot of people didn't get pay raises one year, you know and stuff like that. It's because we ran a deficit putting on your show. Right, So I point all of this history out because we are you know, we do the sky Show. We're back in and have been back for years and years in Uptown with the Charlotte Knights, and they've had this the baseball games that they have been able to play at home, but this year their schedule took them to some other venue, so they're they're playing an away game. And now people are like, they're not giving us a baseball game. It's just like you don't get to have a home game every July fourth, you know, like this, it's just the schedule of the of the league, right. So that's number one, but number two. So we're doing the sky Show, We're doing all of that. But the city and the Center City Partners, they're going to have a July fourth event and they're going to stage it right next to the night Stadium, truest Field Okay, I get it right, makes sense. You're can have people right there watch the fireworks show. I totally understand it. I have no problem with it either. I do have a bit of a problem with your lineup, with your event schedule for the celebration of the two hundred and fiftieth Birthday of America that you are piggybacking onto the WBT Sky Show event. I do have a bit of a problem with your lineup. I don't understand what some of these things are. I mean like, I literally ran a search on some of them and nothing comes up. So I'm unclear as to what some of these things are. Maybe you will have an idea, but I don't see how it connects to a celebration of America when you have, for example, a Brazilian dance performance. Right, all right, So over the weekend, there's a guy from Ashville, Matt von Swoll is his name, and he became a huge influencer on Twitter, formerly known as x during and mainly after Hurricane Helene, and he kind of got red pilled, and so he's got like this massive following. He talks about you know, North Carolina stuff and Charlotte stuff and whatever, and he posted up because I had seen this. I had. I had the press release from the Charlotte Center City Partners on Friday afternoon. I never got I just never got around to talking about it. All I got was the press release. And when I'm looking at the press release, I'm like, what is this? Well, Matt got it and he posted it up and he said, you know, the city of Charlotte's not doing its traditional baseball game instead they're doing this, you know, basically like, how dare the city do this? This is outrageous. Well, again, the city doesn't put on the baseball game, right, the nights do that. And the night's. Schedule I don't know who sets their schedule, but it's probably like minor League Baseball. And however they do their schedules. They got an away game and so. But they are still helping with the sky show where they're letting us use it as the venue for the big event, which is fantastic. It's a great event, great venue. The stadium is. If you've never been to truest Field by the way to check out a night's game, I highly recommend it. It's a beautiful stadium. You got the skyline in the background. It's really nice. They do a great job over there. So you've got the you've got the WBT sky Show. And because the game is away, so we're going to have the Charlotte Symphony. They're going to do a big presentation with the music and like we've done, like the fireworks display is always put to music, you know, and sound bites and clips you know, like historical significance and celebrating America. That's our interpretation of America's birthday. This is how we celebrate America is through the patriotic songs, Whitney Houston's version of the Star Spangled Banner. You know, stuff like that. Although there was did y'all see there was a there was a duo that did an a cappella I think it was a capella version of the Star Spangled Banner for one of the World Cup games last week and it was amazing, absolutely amazing. Anyway, So that's what we do. So that's the sky Show. That's our WBT sky Show. Then there is the city. Okay, in the city they do other things like when we moved down to Fort Mill when the Knights had their stadium there and we did our first year or two down there. The city tried to do its own fireworks show, and yeah, you tried, you know, like I it was not the biggest and best in the Southeast, like the WBT sky Show. Like we know what we're doing after fifty years of blowing up dynam like this airborne dynamite, Like we know what we're doing. Well, we hire the right people. They know what they're doing. They don't let us near the dynamite. They never say why not really sure, but anyway, we got it down to a science. Okay, we put on a really good show, and we will this year as well. So the Center City Partners they have opted to do a America two fifty event themselves, and here is their press release. Head to Romer beard In Park in Uptown Charlotte on July fourth to celebrate America two fifty with cultural performances, poetry readings, and a spectacular fireworks slash drone show finale. Okay, I did not know we were doing drones. But maybe they're doing drones and they're going to piggyback onto the firework show. Whatever. Uh, totally fine. You want to celebrate America, have at it. Everyone's welcome the celebrations begin at four thirty and will last approximately until nine thirty. It's presented by Coca Cola Consolidated and Bank of America in partnership with the City of Charlotte and Mecklimburg County Parks and Recreation. We are really excited for the opportunity to come together as a community to celebrate this milestone for our nation, said Michael Smith, CEO of Charlotte Center City Partners. We are proud to stand with our partners and sponsors in creating a vibrant, engaging celebration that reflects our shared story. At four point thirty, kicking off the event will be son Bascha performance. Don't know what that is? Son Bacha five point fifteen Welcome five thirty poet performance, so they'll be poetry. Six o'clock North Carolina, Brazilian dance performance, six 'in ten Shay Movement, African Arts performance, six point twenty Neighborhood shout Out, don't. Know what that is? Six forty five Sombcha is back for another performance. Eight o'clock Charlotte Celebration, don't know what that is? And then nine o'clock is their drone show, so that's what they are off for me. It's part of the celebration of America two point fifty choose wisely. All right, that'll do it for this episode. Thank you so much for listening. I could not do the show without your support and the support of the businesses that advertise on the podcast, so if you'd like, please support them too and tell them you heard it here. You can also become a patron at my Patreon page or go to dpetecallanershow dot com. Again, thank you so much for listening, and don't break anything while I'm gone.