Since September, Lieutenant Governor Mark Robinson has been ghosted by Donald Trump, removed from statewide Republican campaign flyers, and ridiculed at every turn for foul comments (see: “Black Nazi”), unearthed by CNN, that he appears to have left on a porn site over a decade ago.
But you’d never know that from the warm Durham welcome the gubernatorial candidate received from a crowd of about 60 people at Grill 46 on Wednesday morning.
“Mark! Mark! Mark!” chanted the group of mostly older and whiter people in the NASCAR-themed restaurant off Wake Forest Highway.
“Well, guys, thank y’all so much for being here. And as always, we give thanks to our lord and savior, Jesus Christ,” Robinson said.
Dressed for the part of disaster relief leader in a sturdy windbreaker, he promised to ensure that “nobody in this state is disenfranchised” because of Hurricane Helene. Although Robinson was the only member of the Council of State to miss a vote to declare a state of emergency before the storm hit, he called Gov. Roy Cooper’s response “sad” and promised that he would do better as governor.
Since the CNN report went public, Robinson’s crisis strategy has followed the Donald Trump playbook to woo holdouts—asking voters to pick him because of “policy, not personality,” and then attacking the press.
“The border is not wide open because of what somebody said on Instagram or some lie somebody supposedly said way back 15 years ago on some website,” said Robinson to the breakfast crowd, in a thinly veiled reference to the scandal over his past comments. “None of that is driving policy in this state and this nation. What’s driving us into the ground at the national level right now is poor policy.”
“Amen!” an audience member called out.
Durhamite Victoria Peterson, repping her eagle pride in a North Carolina Central University sweatshirt and sweatpants, was particularly excited to see Robinson in the Bull City. As a Black conservative, she told the INDY that she sees Robinson as a “good, positive role model for our community, and particularly for our young African American men.”
Peterson, who ran for Durham city council in 2019, is no stranger to disinformation herself. When she failed to win enough votes in the primary to continue on in the race, she went on a crusade of falsehoods against then-candidate Javiera Caballero, accusing Caballero, who immigrated to the United States as a teenager, of not being an American citizen.
“Unless [CNN has] something in writing with Robinson’s name on it that he signed, they should have never covered it,” said Peterson. “I did not believe it and I still do not believe it. I thought it was messy that the media even covered it.”
After an obligatory photo line with supporters, Robinson reassured the press gaggle that the campaign is going well, despite a series of resignations that left him with a skeleton crew of two spokesmen and a bodyguard, per WUNC, and polling numbers hovering 15 points behind his Democratic opponent, Josh Stein.
“The campaign is going fantastic,” Robinson said. “In fact, it’s going better now than it ever has.”
In September, Robinson announced that he had hired Binnall Law Group to “investigate where and how these false smears originated” and “use every legal means to hold CNN accountable for their lies.” When the INDY asked about the investigation’s progress, Robinson said that the firm is “working towards a lawsuit.”
“The news media has its nose in the wrong place,” Robinson continued. “Instead of having its nose in the business of taking care of people, they have their nose in the trash pile trying to destroy people and it needs to stop.”
The assembled crowd cheered and a few supporters bowed their heads in prayer with the candidate before he was driven away.
Reach Reporter Chase Pellegrini de Paur at [email protected]. Comment on this story at [email protected].
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