Article Summary –
Republican Dan Bishop, nominee for North Carolina Attorney General, maintains support for gubernatorial candidate Mark Robinson despite Robinson’s controversial past comments involving race, slavery, and other sensitive issues revealed by CNN. Many Republicans distanced themselves, but Bishop blames Democrats and media for character assassination. Bishop and Robinson share similar conservative views on abortion and LGBTQ rights. Robinson’s campaign suffers staff resignations amid these revelations, yet both candidates continue their political endeavors.
The Republican nominee for attorney general isn’t retracting his support for the embattled gubernatorial candidate. Bishop has in the past described Robinson as “groundbreaking” and “the most formidable candidate [he’s] ever seen in North Carolina.”
In the week since CNN reported that Republican Mark Robinson made a series of comments on a pornography message board between 2008 and 2012, including posts where he called himself a “black NAZI!,” expressed support for slavery, and seemed to lament being unable to join the Ku Klux Klan, many North Carolina Republicans have distanced themselves from him.
But not Dan Bishop, the Republican nominee for North Carolina Attorney General, who proudly endorsed Robinson’s campaign in April 2023.
Bishop, who has called Robinson “groundbreaking” and described himself as a “very close friend” of Robinson’s, has blamed Democrats and the media for the revelations about Robinson’s posts (which Robinson denies making).
@cardinalandpine Republican Dan Bishop, running to be North Carolina’s next attorney general, has praised Mark Robinson over the past 18 months. On Thursday, CNN reported Robinson made graphic comments on an adult message board, including calling himself a “black NAZI!,” supporting slavery, and lamenting not joining the Ku Klux Klan. Bishop’s remarks came prior to the CNN story but after Robinson’s controversial comments on abortion, LGBTQ, and other communities.
Speaking at Donald Trump’s rally in Wilmington, Bishop claimed, inaccurately, that hacking was needed to obtain Robinson’s posts.
“This week, Democrats abandoned their aversion to hack and dump, rolled out a coordinated character assassination, and then smeared by association,” Bishop said. “Their aim, they say, is to disgrace all Republican candidates, in the name of decency.”
In a Monday post on X, formerly Twitter, Bishop again dodged the reporting surrounding Robinson.
“I’m focused on winning the Attorney General’s race,” Bishop wrote. “Any decisions about the Governor’s race rest solely with Mark and the people of North Carolina.”
Bishop has maintained his endorsement of Robinson, North Carolina’s current lieutenant governor, despite ongoing reports.
The Washington Post reported that Robinson’s account also praised Adolf Hitler’s Mein Kampf as a “good read” and a “real eye-opener.”
Robinson also rejected offers of IT help to investigate the posts he denies making, prompting several top staffers to resign. His campaign now has only two spokespeople and a bodyguard left. Half of Robinson’s lieutenant governor staff have also reportedly resigned or plan to resign
Robinson denies the allegations and announced Tuesday that he hired a law firm to investigate the CNN story.
Here’s what else you need to know about Bishop and Robinson’s relationship:
Bishop was a day one supporter of Robinson’s campaign
Shortly after Robinson launched his campaign in April 2023, Bishop posted his endorsement video to Facebook.
“He is the most formidable candidate I’ve ever seen in North Carolina,” Bishop said.
Bishop predicted that Robinson would be a “groundbreaking governor” and concluded by saying “I endorse his candidacy with everything I’ve got.”
Bishop said he wanted to be in Robinson’s “new majority”
After launching his campaign for attorney general, Bishop declared he wanted to be “part of Mark Robinson’s new majority.”
But what would that “new majority” look like?
Bishop and Robinson share similar policy stances on a host of issues, including abortion and LGBTQ rights.
Robinson has focused much of his career attacking LGBTQ people, referring to them as “filth” and transgender people as “demonic.”
“The transgender movement in this country, if there’s a movement that is demonic and full of the spirit of the antichrist, it is the transgender movement,” he said.
Bishop authored North Carolina’s House Bill 2 in 2016, legislation that discriminated against transgender residents, forcing them to use the restroom based on their birth certificate. It ultimately cost the state job opportunities and billions of dollars in revenue from event cancellations, including the loss of the 2017 NBA All-Star Game.
Robinson and Bishop have also been in lockstep on their views about abortion rights.
On the day Roe v. Wade was overturned, Bishop celebrated the ruling in a press release, saying “Today, the Supreme Court scored the most foundational victory for life in decades.”
Years before Roe was overturned, Bishop also expressed support for an Alabama law that provided no exceptions for rape or incest.
“I think it’s wrong to have an abortion in the case of rape or incest, just as it would be wrong to take the life of a child born to incest,” he said in 2019.
Robinson, who paid for his now-wife to have an abortion in 1989, has also made opposing abortion a key part of his platform as a political figure.
He’s repeatedly said he supports a total abortion ban, without exceptions for rape, incest, or the life of the mother. Robinson has also referred to abortion as murder, slavery, and genocide; asserted that once a woman is pregnant “it’s not [her] body anymore”; described abortion providers as “butchers of humanity”; and referred to women who get abortions as murderers.
“It’s about killing the child because you weren’t responsible enough to keep your skirt down or your pants up,” Robinson said in a 2019 Facebook Live video. ”And now instead of taking care of that child, you want to kill that child so your life can go on, being on easy street and you can keep running to the club every Friday night.”
Robinson’s attacks on reproductive freedom aren’t just limited to abortion access. In a resurfaced video, Robinson attacked birth control during a 2022 church sermon.
“We love to tell our young women that we want to empower you,” Robinson said. Afterwards he placed his hand near his groin, and said women need to “get this under control.”
Later in the speech, Robinson railed against women having sex unless they want to have children.
“You don’t lay down act like you making a baby until you’re ready to have a baby,” Robinson said.
In all of Robinson’s attacks against reproductive rights, one thing is consistent: he doesn’t believe women should have control over their own bodies.
In 2021, Robinson stated this very thing. “It’s not her body anymore,” he said of pregnant women.
That’s the candidate that Dan Bishop endorsed last year — and has continued to stand
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