WASHINGTON — Days before the election, North Carolina gubernatorial candidate Mark Robinson appeared to lash out at the Republican Party for abandoning him amid his controversies, not the least of which were the disturbing comments he reportedly made on had created a porn site.
Robinson, the state’s lieutenant governor, ripped unnamed Republican politicians during a Friday meeting with Michele Morrow. a far-right Republican candidate for State Inspector of Schools. After greeting Americans who fought in the Revolutionary War and the world wars, Robinson contrasted them with today’s elected officials, whom he said “stopped and ran” when faced with challenges.
“We I have so-called elected officials, people I call politicians, who are afraid to stand up and fight for what is right,” Robinson told a room full of supporters.
“As soon as they get in trouble, they tuck their tails in and run,” he said, apparently referring to Republicans who cut ties with him after CNN’s September report on the comments on his porn site. “They message you on the phone and say, ‘Uh, uh, uh, I’m sorry, but, uh, uh, uh, I have, I have, I can’t, I I can’t eat… uh , uh.” It gives me a stomach ache.”
Robinson said that when certain Republicans win their elections on Tuesday, they will realize that they are less willing to defend the Constitution than their own “position of power.”
“Then what are you going to do, Mr. Coward, if you don’t stand up and fight? What are you going to do then?” he shouted. “You’re going to tuck your tail and run away. You’re going to turn on your fellow Republicans. You are going to turn against your fellow so-called conservatives.”
The Republican Party all but dumped Robinson in the wake of the CNN report, which came to light Years of disturbing comments he had made on a forum on a porn site, Nude Africa. He called himself a ‘black Nazi’. He described becoming sexually aroused by spying on women and girls in public showers. He called himself a “perv” who enjoys pornography featuring transgender people — a sharp contrast to the transphobic rhetoric he uses as a candidate.
Even Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump, who enthusiastically endorsed Robinson in March and shared the stage with him at campaign events, is now pretending not to know who he is.
Robinson has denied the CNN report and is suing the network for $50 million. But CNN’s report detailed how it linked Robinson to the plethora of comments on the porn site’s forum, and Robinson has not presented any new evidence refuting the report.
He even initially suggested that all those comments might have been his.
Robinson was already going after his Democratic opponent, Josh Stein, before the CNN report came out. The North Carolina Republican has been making vile comments, fueling conspiracy theories and making numerous sexist, transphobic and otherwise offensive claims for years. But his campaign has collapsed in the past month, with his staff resigning en masse and GOP groups cutting him off financially.
You can watch the full clip of Robinson’s Friday speech here. His attacks on unnamed Republican politicians start around the three-minute mark.
At another point during Friday’s meeting, Robinson more or less credited Democrats for uniting behind Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris, who he said was “the worst” candidate ever.
“They don’t tuck their tails in and run away. We don’t need that either, folks,” he said, adding, “We don’t have a problem with people pulling out and quitting.”
Ironically, he urged his supporters to join Trump – who has publicly cut ties with Robinson – in taking on Democrats.
“We must continue to do what our former president and soon to be the next president always do: stand up and fight!” he said to applause.
Robinson and Stein, who currently serves as the state’s attorney general, are vying for an open seat in the governor’s race. North Carolina Governor Roy Cooper (D) is term-limited.
The most recent poll in their race was taken this week and gave Stein a 17 percentage point lead over Robinson, according to poll aggregator FiveThirtyEight.
The Cook Political Report rates this seat as “likely Democrat.”
