COLFAX, NC (AP) — North Carolina conservatives who gathered recently over coffee and pancakes at the Olympic Family restaurant to support Republican Lt. Gov. Mark Robinson were aware of some of the controversial things he’s said in the past, but they were inclined to be forgiving. .
“He’s a good speaker. He made some mistakes in his past,” said Allan Jones, a 59-year-old truck driver, at a campaign event near his home in Colfax, about 90 miles (145 kilometers) west of Raleigh. “Aren’t we all? Shall we learn from them? Let’s move on.”
Robinson, a favorite of former President Donald Trump, is the party’s candidate for governor in the November election. He wants to succeed incumbent Democrat Roy Cooper in the state, which has voted for Trump twice and has backed a Republican for president all but once since 1980. Robinson is popular because of his working-class background and blunt speaking style that at times resembles Trump.
But Robinson also has a history of inflammatory comments that his opponent, Democratic Attorney General Josh Stein, says make him too extreme to lead North Carolina. That raises the possibility that campaign battles over Robinson could hurt Trump’s chances of winning a state he can’t afford to lose to Democrat Kamala Harris.
In a 2019 Facebook post, Robinson said abortion in America was about “killing a baby because you weren’t responsible enough to keep your skirt down.” In a speech at a church in 2021, he used the word “filth” when talking about gays and transgender people.
Democrats led by Cooper, Harris’ top surrogate, have tried to make the case that North Carolina’s 16 electoral votes are up for grabs. Trump’s 1.3 percentage point victory over Democrat Joe Biden in North Carolina in 2020 was Trump’s narrowest. Cooper argues that Republican candidates with views closely aligned with Trump — Robinson and state schools superintendent candidate Michele Morrow among them — can win over people who might not otherwise have voted for Democrats.
After a campaign event at Wilber’s Barbecue in Goldsboro last month, Stein said he didn’t know if those kinds of views from the candidates would affect the presidential race, but he thought they could be on voters’ minds.
“These are not normal people or candidates, and I think that’s going to have a big impact on how voters view the Democratic Party in our state and the Republican Party in that light,” he said.
There are no public signs that Trump is distancing himself from Robinson, who appeared on stage at Trump’s recent rallies in the state.
Stein was leading Robinson in two August polls of North Carolina voters. Robinson’s campaign released a poll this week claiming Robinson has fared better than the previous two GOP candidates for governor.
“Reversed suits or other Democratic fever dreams are not real, especially during a presidential election,” said Matt Mercer, a spokesman for the state Republican Party. “Donald J. Trump’s electoral strength in North Carolina is real.”
Stein and his allies have so far managed to define Robinson in a tightly divided state. Robinson’s views on abortion have been front and center, and Democrats have used material from Robinson’s social media posts in their television ads and videos.
Data from AdImpact, which monitors campaign spending, shows Stein has outspent Robinson by a more than 3-1 margin since the March primary, which is widening based on seats filled between now and the fall general election.
“Mark Robinson is the chief spokesman for Josh Stein’s attack campaign,” said Paul Shumaker, a veteran GOP consultant whose clients included the candidate who lost to Robinson in the primary.
Robinson has also received bad press from his family’s businesses, including a nonprofit run by his wife, which state regulators found had numerous problems managing a child nutrition program.
Robinson says others have misrepresented his earlier words, and he blames the “weaponizing” of the state government for the attack on his wife’s business. He remains optimistic going into the final two months of the competition.
“Obviously, when you look at the poll, you might be shocked by some of the numbers,” Robinson told reporters outside the Olympic restaurant. “But we’re not looking at the numbers, we’re looking at the people and we’re going to vote. And we know we can still win this race.
Concerns about a candidate whose views are considered extreme could hurt the enthusiasm of party loyalists, experts say.
“Issues and disagreements can have an impact on a party’s voter turnout, which can affect outcomes at the top of the ticket,” said Larry Sabato, director of the University of Virginia’s Center for Politics. He said moderate North Carolina Republicans could vote for Harris and Stein to “send a message to the GOP.”
Trump endorsed Robinson before the primary, calling him a “Martin Luther King on steroids,” referring to the civil rights leader for his oratory. Robinson would become North Carolina’s first black governor if elected.
Schools Superintendent nominee Morrow attended a Jan. 6, 2021 rally in Washington before the attack on the US Capitol, suggested at the time that the military could keep Trump in office, and has called public schools liberal “centers of indoctrination.”
Robinson has dismissed the abortion issue and is offended. He has published on economic and public safety forums and runs a trade publication that accuses Stein of failing to address rising crime and violence. Robinson launched an ad last month in which he appears to endorse the state’s current 12-week abortion ban, which was passed by the Republican-controlled General Assembly last year. The ad also revealed to a wider audience an earlier revelation about his wife’s abortion decades ago.
Last week, Robinson described to a table of restaurant customers how she supports a ban on abortion after about six weeks of pregnancy, but the 12-week limit won over the legislature.
“As an elected official, I have a personal opinion, but also as an elected official, I have to go with what I call the consensus,” Robinson told reporters afterward as he began a statewide campaign tour. Stein’s campaign says Robinson will seek a total abortion ban with no exceptions if elected.
Shumaker, a Republican consultant, said polls show Stein is doing better than Robinson among independent voters. One independent voter, Richard Morgan, 68, attended the event in Colfax and is voting Republican. She said she told Robinson she needed to sharpen her abortion ads to highlight her support for women.
As for Robinson’s previous controversial comments, Morgan said he gives Robinson “the benefit of the doubt that he’s a changed man because everyone else does for other candidates” who say things they later regret.
It may be too late to convince other independents.
Susie Hess, 64, a retired social worker who attended Stein’s event, said the things Robinson said are “monstrous.” He said he’s voted Republican in the past and believes some of them share his values, but that doesn’t appear to be the case this year.
“Because a lot of them are aligned with Trump,” Hess said, “they’re kind of abandoning their values.”
___
Associated Press polling reporter Amelia Thomson-DeVeaux and Washington chief election analyst Chad Day contributed to this report.
