Donald Trump had a week to withdraw his support from Mark Robinson. Now that he has failed to do so, the North Carolina lieutenant governor’s latest scandal is his as well.
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A week ago, when the latest scandal surrounding North Carolina Lt. Gov. Mark Robinson (R) began to unfold and the campaign of Kamala Harris immediately tried to tie Donald Trump to the controversial gubernatorial candidate, we defended the former president.
After all, it seemed highly unlikely that Trump’s campaign knew about statements that Robinson allegedly made years ago in online forums… at least until CNN reported that a user whose personal information matched that of the Republican candidate had called himself a “Black Nazi,” expressed support for reinstating slavery, and admitted to being a voyeur.
In addition, the man whom Trump called “Martin Luther King on steroids” also made some incendiary remarks about the civil rights icon.
“I’m not in the KKK. They don’t let blacks join,” Robinson allegedly wrote. “If I was in the KKK I would have called him Martin Lucifer Koon!”
And those were just the things CNN found fit to print.
In our article from last week, we noted that, while Trump “owns” all of the things the scandal-plagued Robinson had publicly said previously, it would be unfair to expect him to immediately withdraw his support for the lieutenant governor based on a news article (even one that seemed to be well-sourced and very convincing).
Any Republican should be afforded the time to vet the allegations before weighing in on the scandal.
Many of them did so and disavowed Robinson.
Since the news broke, there has been an exodus of campaign staffers. In addition, high-ranking Republicans have also abandoned the gubernatorial candidate.
This includes the GOP governors from neighboring South Carolina, Tennessee, Virginia, and Georgia, all of whom have distanced themselves from Robinson.
In addition, the Republican Governors Association announced it would no longer spend money on North Carolina’s gubernatorial race.
All of this is a real problem for Trump. If he loses the Tar Heel state to Harris, his path to the presidency narrows significantly.
And yet, the former president on Thursday declined to withdraw his support for Robinson when given the chance.
Asked whether he would pull his endorsement of the embattled candidate, who has almost no chance of winning, Trump declined to do so.
Instead, the former president said that he is not familiar with the situation.
That seems highly implausible. Trump is an avid consumer of cable news, and even the right-wing propaganda network Fox News had some coverage of the scandal.
In addition, even a presidential candidate as ignorant as Trump should be expected to keep up with major political events.
What seems much more likely is that the former president simply cannot bring himself to disavow someone who likes him.
And that is why he now co-owns this scandal and is responsible for all consequences this entails for his own chances in North Carolina.
