The joint editorial board of North Carolina’s two largest newspapers published a sharp rebuke of the state’s Lieutenant Governor and Republican gubernatorial candidate Mark Robinson following a series of recent allegations.
The opinion column, published on Thursday in The Charlotte Observer and The News & Observer, both McClatchy-owned papers in the battleground state, opened with: “Republican Lt. Gov. Mark Robinson only has one reasonable option now: Quit the race for governor.”
Robinson, who has been endorsed by former President Donald Trump, the GOP’s presidential nominee, in the governor’s race, has said he will not drop out after a CNN story uncovered alleged activity on an adult website more than a decade ago, including posts that Robinson allegedly called himself a “Black NAZI,” defended slavery, repeated homophobic slurs and fondly recalled “peeping” on women. CNN did not include many of the posts given their graphic nature.
On Friday, The Washington Post reported that “minisoldr,” the username believed to be affiliated with Robinson on the Nude Africa pornography website, also expressed an affinity for Nazi literature.
“Mein Kampf is a good read,” the user reportedly wrote in a thread on book recommendations. “It’s very informative and not at all what I thought it would be. It’s a real eye opener.”
Newsweek reached out to Robinson’s communication director for comment via email on Saturday.
Robinson denied that he was behind those posts to CNN, and also in a video message posted to his social media accounts in the minutes before the story was published. “The things you see in that story are not my words. You know my words, my character, and I’ve been completely transparent in this campaign,” he said in the video.
Robinson’s campaign communications director Mike Lonergan blamed the reported posts on Josh Stein, Robinson’s Democratic gubernatorial opponent, in a statement emailed to Newsweek on Friday.
“Everything Josh Stein [and] the Democrats say about Mark Robinson is either an outright lie or twisted so far out of context it might as well be,” Lonergan said. “The people of North Carolina have had enough lies from career politicians like Josh Stein—and that’s why they’ll elect Mark Robinson governor on November 5.”
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The North Carolina GOP also published a statement on X, formerly Twitter, in defense of the Republican candidate and wrote, “Mark Robinson has categorically denied the allegations made by CNN but that won’t stop the Left from trying to demonize him via personal attacks.” The statement called this an attempt to “smear” Robinson before the election.
Meanwhile, the North Carolina papers wrote in their joint opinion column, “Enough is enough,” adding that Robinson has “gone from being an embarrassment to Republicans to being a stain on the entire state.”
The editorial board urged Republicans to “explore ways to revoke his nomination” if he doesn’t leave the race. “Failing that, they should call for all Republicans to abstain from voting in the gubernatorial race, or, better yet, vote for the Democrat in the race.”
The opinion column concluded by calling Robinson “unfit” and writing that Republicans “are nearly certain to lose the governor’s race, have weakened the chances of Republicans down the ballot and have undercut Trump.” The joint editorial board added that Republicans “should disown him.”
While the state has a history of backing the Republican candidate for president, it has elected a Democratic governor in six of the last seven races. Vice President Kamala Harris, the Democratic presidential nominee, and Trump are in an extremely close race in the battleground state.
Meanwhile, an Emerson College Polling/The Hill survey of 1,000 people conducted between September 15 and 18, showed Stein is backed by 48 percent of respondents and Robinson 40 percent, with 10 percent undecided. The survey has a margin of error of plus or minus 3 percentage points.
On Saturday, Trump is set to appear at a campaign rally in Wilmington, North Carolina. Robinson, however, is not expected to be there. Trump has not made any official comment on the allegations, but previously praised Robinson likening him to Martin Luther King Jr.
Newsweek also reached out to Trump’s campaign for comment via email on Saturday.
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