Mark Robinson’s campaign staff had the integrity to flee. NC Republicans don’t. | Opinion
The political fallout has officially begun following CNN’s report that North Carolina Lt. Gov. Mark Robinson made graphic and disturbing comments on a pornography website more than a decade ago.
But the fallout hasn’t come from members of his party — it’s come from inside his own campaign.
Robinson’s top campaign staff have resigned en masse following the scandal, his campaign announced in a news release Sunday evening. They include his campaign manager and deputy campaign manager, senior advisor and finance director. According to reporting from WUNC, there have been even more resignations, leaving the campaign with a staff of just three people: two campaign spokesmen and a bodyguard. (The campaign said it is hiring more staff in the coming days.)
Whether the resignations were born from moral objection or the realization that Robinson’s campaign is likely a sinking ship, we can applaud them for having the courage and integrity to take a stand. That’s more than can be said of the Republican Party, whose members still seem far too willing to give Robinson the benefit of the doubt — despite the fact that he has done absolutely nothing to earn it.
For the most part, Republicans have said little publicly other than to call on Robinson to “prove” that he was not the one who said things like “I’m a black NAZI!” and “I wish they would bring [slavery] back. I would certainly buy a few.” Robinson has forcefully denied the reports, calling them ““salacious tabloid lies.”
Donald Trump’s running mate, U.S. Sen. J.D. Vance, stumbled when a reporter asked if he believed Robinson’s claims that those were not his posts.
“I don’t not believe him, I don’t believe him,” Vance said. “I just think that you have to let these things sometimes play out in the court of public opinion.”
OK, then. That’s a whole lot of verbal gymnastics to avoid saying what every Republican ought to say: “Those comments are reprehensible. He should drop out of the race.”
Then there’s the North Carolina Republican Party, which has not only refused to disavow Robinson, but has even gone so far as to openly defend him. In a post on social media, the NCGOP wrote that Robinson “has categorically denied the allegations made by CNN but that won’t stop the Left from trying to demonize him via personal attacks.”
How disappointing that Robinson’s campaign staff appears to have more integrity than Republican leaders who were elected to serve the people of North Carolina.
Of course, even if Republicans were to distance themselves from Robinson now, it wouldn’t change the fact that they’ve stood by him through everything else. They’ve already shown themselves to be far too tolerant of Robinson’s hateful and incendiary rhetoric, and they have had plenty of opportunities to condemn it.
They didn’t do anything when he called LGBTQ+ people “filth.” They shrugged off past social media posts where he appeared to question if the Holocaust really happened. They were fine when he attacked public school teachers, when he suggested he would take up arms against the government, when he said society should be led by men not women, when he proclaimed “some folks need killing,” and when he said that a pregnant woman’s body is “not her body anymore.”
It’s not just that Republican leaders didn’t condemn Robinson then — many embraced him. Trump knew who Robinson was when he called him “Martin Luther King, Jr. on steroids.” Senate leader Phil Berger knew who Robinson was when he endorsed Robinson and said he has a “good head on his shoulders.”
Now they are mired in a mess of their own making. It’s not surprising, it’s not shocking and it’s certainly not hard to believe. Even the people paid to defend Robinson — his own campaign staff — have realized that some things are simply indefensible. So why are Republicans still so determined to defend him?