Will the GOP pull the plug on Robinson?

Trailing by double digits, the gubernatorial nominee is a drain on resources.

Last summer, a lobbyist friend told me that Republican legislators were giddy about the prospect of Lieutenant Governor Mark Robinson running against Attorney General Josh Stein. They were almost certain Robinson would win, giving them control of the legislature, Governor’s Mansion, and courts. By their reckoning, Robinson would draw enough Black voters away from Stein to close the gap that separated most statewide races in North Carolina. They can’t really imagine people who put values over race—or sense over nonsense. Talk about the race card.

A year later, Republicans are now deciding when to pull the plug on Robinson’s sinking ship. A SurveyUSA/High Point University poll that came out late last week shows Stein leading by fourteen points, 48-34. Two other polls released within the past two weeks show Robinson down by ten. The Real Clear Politics average, which ignores one of the polls showing him down by ten, has Robinson trailing by 8.7%. This late in the campaign, those are deficits hard to overcome.

Republicans are in a bind. They know that supporting Robinson is almost certainly throwing good money after bad, but if Robinson loses by too large a margin, he could sink other GOP candidates below him on the ballot. If they keep spending valuable resources on him, they’re just trying to keep the race from becoming a blowout. They don’t have good options.

Robinson spent the past ten years telling us who he is. He’s an internet hero who doesn’t like LGBT+ people. He believes Democrats are communists and socialists, though he’s really not sure what those terms mean. He thinks we need a ban on abortion without exception. He blames women for unplanned pregnancies. And he told us, “some people just need killing.” He’s sees the world in stark terms with little room for forgiveness or redemption—except for himself, of course, since he and his wife chose to have an abortion. In essence, Robinson told us whose vote he does not want. With a little help from Stein and the Democrats, he got that message out early.

Robinson has spent most of August trying to tell us that he didn’t really mean all those things he’s been saying for all those years. In order for him to win, he will have to recover from the self-inflicted wounds. Even if he could reverse the damage from what he’s already said about himself, it’s really too little too late.

Stein and company have just begun to unload on him. They aren’t going to let voters forget what Robinson said about himself and they also have plenty more ammunition to take him out. They haven’t even gotten to the fiscal mismanagement and corruption stuff yet.

Democrats would be wise to start wrapping the rest of the Council of State and judicial candidates around Robinson. They chose him to be the GOP standard bearer and now they should be forced to defend him. He should be the centerpiece of the campaign moving forward and they should use him to damage the Republican brand. Not only can they turn off swing voters to the GOP, they can suppress the Republican base, keeping turnout below 2020 levels.

(On a side note, if you want to see an analogy for his campaign, go to Robinson’s official Lieutenant Governor’s page.)

The poll also shows Kamala Harris with a one-point lead over Donald Trump in the state. Several polls have shown the presidential race tied or leaning slightly toward Harris. That said, Trump over performed polling averages in the state in 2020. He also had a more favorable turnout than anyone predicted. Tanking Robinson could help Democrats fix that problem.

Robinson probably won’t lose North Carolina by double digits. The state is just too evenly divided, but he will lose and Republicans know that. At some point, they will stop funding his campaign. The question is whether they stop in September or if they wait until October. The next ten weeks will be brutal for Robinson’s campaign, playing defense against a brutal assault and trying to mitigate the damage Stein’s attack.

On the bright side, in eleven weeks, Robinson can begin his primary campaign against Thom Tillis.