From ‘Martin Luther King on Steroids’ to ‘I Hardly Know the Guy’
Trump’s expected to take a page from his playbook regarding NC’s radioactive nominee
It wasn't long ago that Donald Trump was embracing North Carolina Black, far-right Republican Mark Robinson as “Martin Luther King on steroids.”
But the Republican presidential nominee is expected to take a well-used page from his political playbook following new explosive revelations about the candidate for governor in the Tar Heel State.
Despite sharing stages together and handshakes caught on-camera, Trump probably will claim to “hardly know the guy.”
That’s according to Maggie Haberman, the New York Times reporter who has both covered — and regularly spoken with — the former president for years.
Robinson, who is known for a wide variety of offensive comments, has found himself in even deeper hot water since a CNN report Thursday which found North Carolina’s lieutenant governor posted a variety of messages on an online pornography forum.
Among them, Robinson referred to himself as a “Black Nazi” and “a perv.”
He said that he enjoyed secretly “peeping” on women in public gym showers as a 14-year-old. Robinson recounted the story as a memory he said he still fantasized about.
Following the CNN report, there were calls for Robinson to get out of the race for North Carolina governor, although he declined to do so.
Political analysts have begun saying that this new scandal not only sinks Republican chances to retake the state’s governorship but could well swing North Carolina for Vice President Kamala Harris in the presidential election, as well.
The Times’ Haberman now believes that Trump will try to put distance between himself and Robinson.
Trump has a long history of trying to claim he “hardly knows” people with whom he had once closely associated when they become inconvenient.
“What most people who have talked to him said they expect him to say is some version of ‘I hardly know the guy,’” Haberman said. “As we know right now, Democrats are airing an ad tying Trump to Mark Robinson. And I don’t know if that might make him say something different if he would want to condemn it or try to distance himself further and be more forceful about it.
“But his team is certainly looking to put a lot of miles between Donald Trump and Mark Robinson, and had been I should note, leading up to this because there has been as discussed before, this swirl of rumors around him for some time, a lot of concerns around him for some time, Trump got behind him anyway,” she added.
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