Mark Robinson’s campaign remains silent on status of law firm investigating CNN porn site story

It’s been more than two weeks since CNN published an explosive article about pro-slavery and pro-Nazi messaging, Lt. Gov. Mark Robinson reportedly wrote on a pornographic website.

And it’s been more than a week since Robinson hired a law firm to refute the report, saying, “I fully expect the facts to come to light quickly.” »

Since then, the devastating effects of Helene – a tropical storm when it hit western North Carolina, but destructive nonetheless – have pushed the Robinson scandal out of the headlines. And neither he nor the law firm have released any new information related to CNN’s reporting or taken legal action over the story.

WUNC asked Robinson’s campaign for an update and timeline on when the law firm might release its findings, but spokesman Mike Lonergan did not respond to multiple requests.

Attorney Jesse Binnall said in a Sept. 26 Fox News interview that while some investigations take months, “we can’t do that in this case because voters need an answer before the election, and so we will act very quickly.” and I still give them a very complete report.”

Absentee voting by mail is underway and in-person early voting sites will open next week.

Robinson spent the last week mixing campaign events across the state with visits to western North Carolina, where he worked with the Franklin County sheriff on a supply delivery effort — and frequently posted photos and videos of himself doing it on social media. He has planned “town hall” campaign events this week in four counties.

Other Republicans, like U.S. Sen. Thom Tillis and Agriculture Commissioner Steve Troxler, did not show up alongside Robinson because they, too, spent time traveling to hard-hit counties.

Tillis has not made any public statements about the Robinson scandal since telling reporters that Robinson needed to “defend his name” or “in the absence of a defense, we need to move on.” We will make that decision this week.

Tillis told reporters he was setting Friday, September 27, as the deadline for Robinson to file a lawsuit to refute CNN’s report. Spokespeople for Tillis did not respond to a request for an update this week.

Since the CNN article, Robinson has slipped further behind his Democratic opponent, Attorney General Josh Stein, in several polls. The latest RealClearPolling average for the race has Stein up by almost 16 percentage points.

In addition to the Republican Governors Association’s shutdown of television advertising in North Carolina, campaign disclosures for WRAL-TV show that Robinson’s campaign did not air or book time for commercials after the CNN report was released. His only current campaign ad on Facebook is a pledge to “fight for every struggling North Carolinian” after the storm, according to the social media site’s ad database.