North Carolina Republican Mark Robinson Says Trans People Should Poop Outside, He Can Be Governor Now?

Robinson's still determined to let the hate flow!

Trans people are not popular with North Carolina Republican Mark Robinson. So when the sitting lieutenant governor and leading candidate for his party’s gubernatorial nomination said this week that if elected in 2024 he would arrest assigned-male-at-birth trans folk who use gender-congruent bathrooms, “or whatever we got to do to you,” the looming threat of violence surprised no one.

What he said on February 3 did, though:

ROBINSON: We’re not going to have conversations about which bathrooms to use. If you are a man on Friday night, and you at the mall on Saturday night, you better go to the men’s bathroom. If you are confused, find a corner outside somewhere.

Surprisingly this recommendation has been omitted or downplayed in coverage of Robinson’s threats of arrest — or worse — even though it’s hard to think of a business owner or suburban dad who would be in favor of trans people pooping on the ground in any convenient location. “North Carolina — Just shit anywhere!” doesn’t seem like a slogan that would attract tourists’ dollars either.

In the video you can see and hear the crowd respond positively, so there’s clearly a base there enthusiastic for any laws that target trans people, even if they cover North Carolina in sewage as thick as Robinson himself. You don’t expect to see that from just any voter, but remember that these are the people who voluntarily showed up to a campaign event for the guy who seems to hate everyone but Hitler:

In a series of previously unreported Facebook posts, which remain publicly available, Robinson shared a quotation attributed to Adolf Hitler, compared the toppling of a Confederate statue to Kristallnacht and frequently minimized the legacy of the Holocaust while decrying the threat of communism, among other inflammatory remarks.

This man has chided women for working, leading, and succeeding; called out men who don’t take sufficient leadership (over women) in their homes; maligned queer people as “filth”; ranted that the “transgender movement” was the antichrist’s HR department (we believe we have that correct, but you should check the quote); attacked anyone who wants modest and reasonable gun law reform for being modest and reasonable; advocated getting rid of the UK’s “radical Muslim element #byanymeansnecessary”; called the vengeance of God down upon “cowardly” Republicans who have the temerity to not attack Robinson's enemies or to run against him in the primaries; and has attacked Democrats for, well, probably everything.

And while the media seems reluctant to cover Robinson’s shittiest remarks, his clear intent to revive North Carolina’s much reviled anti-trans bathroom bill from 2016 got plenty of notice in the state and some outside of it.

A reminder of some recent history: In 2017, months after the infamous HB2 went into effect, AP estimated a negative $3.76 billion dollar hit to the state’s economy, projected over a number of years. One big hit happened, with PayPal changing directions and declining to locate a new office and processing center in the state. Other smaller but notable hits included the relocation of the 2017 NBA All-Star Game and certain NCAA events. After being hammered with negative publicity for months and with a looming deadline from the NCAA, which wished to plan ahead as far as 2022 for its meets and championships, on March 30, 2017, HB2 was partially repealed, including all of its bathroom-related provisions (what remained was a ban on local non-discrimination ordinances that differed from statewide non-discrimination law). A sunset clause on the rest of HB2 passively completed the repeal in 2020, somewhat limiting the economic damage that the AP analysis had predicted.

Elected Republicans came out of the HB2 fight looking very much the bigots they were, and appeared to fear getting back into the anti-queer, anti-trans game. Memory of these burns affected GOP politics in the state for years, but as other states stepped up their attacks, the fear of being singled out for negative publicity subsided. Axios declared dead the lingering influence of HB2’s fallout as of the end of April last year.

During the 2023 session the NC General Assembly introduced at least six bills targeting LGBTQ+ people and communities, and the appetite for attack seems only to have increased since then. Robinson, of course, has been vocally opposed to the rights and lives of QTs (say it out loud) for more than a decade, and did not stop when he first became a public figure in 2018 nor when he first took elected office in January 2021. So Republican support for Robinson is something of an imperfect proxy for a number of bigotries in his state’s party.

By that yardstick, the numbers are not encouraging. As of February 16, East Carolina University’s Center for Survey Research puts his Republican primary support at 53 percent, with his declared opposition at 13 percent and seven percent, respectively. Only 27 percent remain undecided.

Source: ECU Center for Survey Research

Nor have all the undecideds that might break for Robinson already done so. Among that 27 percent ECU counts 61 percent leaning toward Robinson. That puts his total support, plus the leaners, at 69 percent. It would seem quite unlikely for Bill Graham or Dale Folwell to pull an upset when early and mail-in voting has already started.

If there is any good news for North Carolina in the poll, it’s that at least a few politically bi-curious voters have noticed the stink surrounding Robinson’s campaign. The dominant Democrat in the primary is Josh Stein (support at 57 percent with his nearest competitor at seven), and when ECU questioned voters about the all-but-certain fall matchup, Stein was tied with Robinson at 41 percent each. Perhaps that doesn’t seem like such good news (especially this far out), but, for perspective it’s better than many Biden-Trump polling matchups.

If Dems make the case that not only would Robinson bring back the economic harms and bad publicity of the HB2 days, but also flood the streets with trans women’s urine, it seems possible that pissed off voters could flush Robinson’s ambitions down the toilet.

Crip Dyke writes Pervert Justice

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