Donald Trump is facing calls from allies and within his own campaign to endorse the embattled North Carolina gubernatorial candidate. Mark Robinsonaccording to four people familiar with the discussions.
However, there are currently no plans for the former president to officially call it quits.
Thursday, CNN informed Robinson, who is now the state’s lieutenant governor, posted a series of offensive comments on the message board of the pornography website Naked Africa, including calling himself a “black Nazi!” called “tranny” and said he enjoys watching porn. and revealed that he spied on women in the shower at a public gym when he was 14. The comments were allegedly posted between 2008 and 2012, before Robinson was lieutenant governor.
In the statement, the Trump campaign did not directly address the former president’s major news story about Robinson. confirmed in March and “Martin Luther King on steroids.”
“President Trump’s campaign is focused on winning the White House and saving the country,” Trump campaign press secretary Caroline Leavitt said. “North Carolina is an important part of this plan. We are confident that as voters compare Trump’s record of a strong economy, low inflation, secure borders and safe streets to the failure of Biden-Harris, President Trump will once again win the Tarheel State.”
On Friday morning, he told NBC News that reports that Trump was considering withdrawing the approval were “false.”
There are advisers within the Trump campaign who have been quietly urging him to withdraw his endorsement of Robinson, but according to one campaign official who, like others in this article, spoke on condition of anonymity, those pleas have so far gone on deaf ears. talk freely about the issue.
Additionally, Republican members of North Carolina’s congressional delegation, including Sens. Ted Budd and Tom Tillis, and Republican National Committee Chairman Michael Whatley of North Carolina plan to personally urge Trump to endorse Robinson. is familiar with conversations.
When asked for comment for this story, Budd’s office said a statement released on Thursday. In it, the senator called the alleged comments “disgusting.”
“Mark Robinson says they’re not from him. He has to prove that to the voters,” Budd said.
A spokesman for Tillis did not respond to a request for comment.
A person close to the Trump campaign involved in the discussions surrounding Robinson said Trump has gone back and forth on the issue and is in close contact with Whatley, who did not respond to a request for comment.
But if Trump loses support, it will be a break from what he has done in the past. He rarely backs down publicly from endorsements because he has long believed it would make him look weak — part of the reason he has not formally withdrawn his endorsement of Robinson.
“The problem with that is, even if he thinks it might be a smart move — and I don’t know that he does — there’s no way in hell he’s going to risk a base that’s going to be angry,” a former senior Trump official said.
The person said Trump could try to thread the needle by not withdrawing his endorsement, but instead issuing a statement “rejecting the moves.”
Robinson will not attend a Trump rally scheduled for Saturday in Wilmington, North Carolina, although he has attended past Trump events in the state, according to a person familiar with the planning of the event.
The buzz began to build Thursday afternoon, before CNN published its Robinson story was released before the news, a video stating that the words the network was about to report were not his own.
“You know my words, you know my character and you know that I have been completely transparent in this race. Clarence Thomas famously said that he was once the victim of a high-tech lynching. So does Mark Robinson, it seems,” he said, comparing himself to the Supreme Court justice who faced allegations of sexual harassment during his 1991 confirmation hearings.
The CNN story broke on the final day of the candidate’s withdrawal from the race, even as the scandal likely deepened, Robinson said He will remain the Republican candidate for a key swing state governor.
“Robinson could have hurt Trump, but it’s too late for him to fall now, and if Trump wanted to weigh in, he should have done it before 12 o’clock last night,” said a longtime Republican Senate strategist. “Ads are going to be brutal.”
The Republican Governors Association, which has just two competitive races this election cycle, including Robinson, did not respond to requests for comment.
The political fallout from Robinson’s past comments could be especially difficult for Trump because North Carolina looms large as one of the seven key states on the presidential map.
End vote Trump was in a statistical dead heat with Vice President Kamala Harris in the state, at about 48%. That beats Robinson, who polled against Democrat Josh Stein, who has consistently led the race in the 40s.
Even before Robinson’s alleged message board comments came to light, he was viewed as an underdog in his race and potentially influenced Trump due to past controversial comments. He called same-sex marriage”evil“It’s not women who have abortions”responsible enough to pull down your skirt” and he scoffed victims of school shootings.
Robinson also criticized the transgender community. Robinson’s past comments, including comments on a pornographic message board that he liked to “watch tranny in girl porn,” are facing new scrutiny after Thursday’s report.
Robinson called for transgender women to be jailed for using the bathroom.
“If you’re a man on Friday night and you suddenly feel like a woman on Saturday and want to go into the women’s bathroom at the mall, you’re going to be arrested — or whatever we do to you,” he said. he said in February.
Robinson isn’t the only controversial candidate Trump has endorsed.
Trump in 2017 is supported the failed Alabama Senate run of Roy Moore, who was accused of sexually abusing young girls.
During the 2022 midterm elections, Trump endorsed North Carolina Rep. Madison Cawthorn’s unsuccessful re-election bid after the freshman lawmaker was embroiled in a series of scandals. loaded pistol to an airport, under the eyes of ethical guards on suspicions about possible insider trading meme related to cryptocurrency and calling the president of Ukraine a “thug” against the backdrop of Russia’s invasion, other things.
Trump also stood by Georgia Senate candidate Herschel Walker after reports that he is a staunch anti-abortion candidate in 2022. In 2009, a woman paid for an abortion.