IREDELL COUNTY, N.C. (WGHP) — The Lieutenant Governor of North Carolina went on a radio talk show this weekend, saying in part that if he had the authority, abortion would be completely illegal in the state.
Mark Robinson appeared on a WSIC program called “Taking Care of Iredell with NC Representative Jeff McNeely,” primarily talking about his position on abortion.
“I’m just an ordinary guy,” Mark Robinson said when asked to summarize himself by McNeely. He went on to elaborate; “Some folks on the Left think I’m this horrible person that was created in some conservative laboratory to terrorize the left, and then there are people on the right side that think I’m some kinda, I don’t know, Greek god that came here with a lightning bolt and I shoot lasers out of my eyes and can destroy the Left in one word,” he said. “Neither one of those is true. I’m just an ordinary dude.”
“I’m pulling for the second part, but if it don’t happen, it don’t happen,” McNeely said in response.
“I’d like to be that second part,” he agreed with a laugh.
They quickly ran down Robinson’s background; a Greensboro native who was in the Army reserves, and his fame-making gun rights speech to the Greensboro City Council in 2018, which was turned into an NRA advertisement.
The two men discussed, briefly, Mark Robinson’s own experience with abortion, which he has publicly expressed regret for. He has remained consistent in his staunch anti-abortion views.
“If I had all the power right now, say I was the governor and had a willing legislature, we could pass a bill right now that says you can’t get an abortion in North Carolina for any reason. Would that stop abortions? No. People would get in their car, they’d go to Georgia, they’d go to South Carolina,” he said, although South Carolina has passed an abortion ban and has proposed a bill that would make abortion legally tantamount to murder. “They would go to Virginia, they’d go wherever they could. They’d get pills online. Passing a law is one thing, I’d love to pass a law. I’d love to see a heartbeat bill proposed in our legislature.”
McNeely responds as Ronsin’s speaking that they’re “working on it.”
Robinson suggests a desire to improve systems for childcare, adoption and healthcare in the state as a way of lowering the number of abortions, though no specifics about how he believes those systems need to be fixed were discussed.
“We are a destination state right now for death,” Robinson said. “We’ve got to change our laws and rework our systems so we become a destination state for life.”
As the interview draws to a close, McNeely winds up in an apparent attempt to get Robinson to announce his candidacy for governor in 2024, but Robinson side-steps the layup to discuss the upcoming Duke vs NC State game, declaring his allegiance to NC State instead.
“I thought I had him,” McNeely joked. “We’ve got another job for you in a couple of years, and we’re counting on you.”
An opinion piece written for the New York Times decried the idea of Robinson running for governor in 2024, calling him “extremism incarnate: gun-loving, gay-hating and primed for conspiracy theories, with a garnish of antisemitism.”
Current District Attorney Josh Stein has already announced his intention to run for governor in 2024 on the Democrat side, and Robinson is the current Republican favorite to run against him. A political science professor at Catawba University has a spreadsheet tracking potential gubernatorial candidates for 2024.
Robinson will be speaking at CPAC on March 4.
