Mark Robinson, the lieutenant governor of North Carolina, announced a lawsuit against CNN on Tuesday in response to a recent report that alleged he made explicit racial and sexual remarks on a pornography website’s message board. Robinson described the reporting as reckless and defamatory during a news conference in Raleigh.
The lawsuit was filed in Wake County Superior Court and comes less than a month after a television report that led many GOP officials and candidates, including former President Donald Trump, to distance themselves from Robinson’s campaign for governor.
According to the lawsuit, CNN published the report despite allegedly knowing that Robinson’s personal data, such as his name, date of birth, passwords, and an email address linked to the account in question, had been compromised in previous data breaches. A spokesperson for CNN, Emily Kuhn, declined to comment on the lawsuit.
Polling data around the time of the CNN report indicated that Robinson's Democratic opponent, Josh Stein, the current attorney general, held a lead in the race. With early in-person voting set to begin statewide on Thursday, over 50,000 completed absentee ballots have already been received.
The CNN report claimed that Robinson had made controversial statements on the message board more than a decade ago, including referring to himself as a “black NAZI,” expressing a preference for transgender pornography, and making disparaging remarks about historical figures, including Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.
The lawsuit's outcome and its potential impact on the gubernatorial race remain to be seen as the election approaches.
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