Top GOP Candidate For N.C. Governor Spread Islamophobia On Facebook For Years

Mark Robinson, the leading Republican candidate for governor in North Carolina, spent years mocking and attacking Muslims on social media, a review of his posts on Facebook reveals.

Robinson, who is the state’s lieutenant governor, regularly made Islamophobic comments on his personal account from 2012 to 2017. He assumed his leadership role in January 2021.

In November 2016, he called it “sad” that religious freedom applies to Muslims and that it means they are “free to do as they please.”

What’s also sad, Robinson continued, is that “anyone who says anything about it is a bigot.”

In a post a month earlier, Robinson said he didn’t respect or trust Muslims.

“Someone just asked me if I trust Muslims and respect Islam,” he wrote. “I told them I’ll do both when I’m allowed to preach the Gospel of Jesus Christ in Saudi Arabia and Saudi women are allowed to drive to my church to hear it.”

Robinson also argued that mosques shouldn’t be allowed to be built in the United States.

“Until they let us build churches in Saudi Arabia, we shouldn’t let them build mosque in America,” he posted in June 2016.

Robinson’s campaign did not respond to requests for comment about his years of Islamophobic posts and whether he stands by them.

For anyone familiar with Robinson’s background, these posts may not be a surprise. He has a well-documented record of peddling wild conspiracy theories  and has a history of demeaning women  and referring to LGBTQ+ people as “filth. ”  He has also dabbled in Holocaust denialism and antisemitic conspiracy theories, including his agreement with a claim that the “Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse” include the Rothschild family of “international bankers that rule every single ... central bank.”  He has said that his statements were “poorly worded” but denied they were antisemitic.

Now, as Robinson tries to downplay  at least some of his record in his quest to become the governor of North Carolina, it is worth shedding light on his speech targeting Muslims, too. About 54,000 Muslims were registered to vote in North Carolina in 2020, per Emgage , a national nonprofit focused on empowering Muslim Americans through civic engagement. 

In 2017, Robinson referred to Linda Sarsour, a hijab-wearing American political activist and co-chair of the 2017 Women’s March, as a “mummy wrapped anti-American blabber mouth.”

He repeatedly associated Muslims with violence in his Facebook posts. In 2017, he wrote that Britain should “rid itself of it’s growing radical Muslim element” and used the hashtag, #byanymeansnecessary.

Robinson has joked several times about Muslims supposedly being violent.

“Someone should open an Islamic theme park. That would be a blast,” he posted in June 2017 .

In 2016, he wrote that Muslims “sure LOVE ‘peace’ …. they like cuttin’ folks into pieces and blowin’ folks into pieces….”

“If one more movie or book comes out that insults Christianity I’m gonna @$^&^##%&**() the __&%765#$#@47(9^4#43^&7 OUTTA SOMEBODY!!!!!!!!! Just following that good ol’ Muslim example,” Robinson posted in 2012 .

He has also accused multiple Obama administration officials of being “Muslim Brotherhood infiltrators” and spies from Saudi Arabia , and defended Marines who were caught urinating on the corpses of three Taliban fighters something a Marine Corps official said at the time could be considered a war crime.

He posted a meme in 2012 that depicted then-President Barack Obama urinating on the U.S. Constitution while expressing outrage that Marines urinated on the bodies of terrorists.

“Amateurs!” reads a caption bubble next to the cartoon image of Obama. “Do I have to show people how to do everything right?”

Robinson is the front-runner in the Republican gubernatorial primary, but he recently drew a new challenger, Bill Graham, a veteran trial lawyer who is pledging to spend millions of dollars of his own money. Other GOP candidates include State Treasurer Dale Folwell and former U.S. Rep. Mark Walker.

Sen. Thom Tillis (R-N.C.) snubbed Robinson this week in announcing his support for Graham. Former President Donald Trump was throwing his support to Robinson  late Tuesday at a joint event at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago private club in Florida.

Whoever wins the GOP primary will likely take on Democrat Josh Stein in 2024. North Carolina’s current governor, Democrat Roy Cooper, is term-limited out.

Steven Greene, a political science professor at North Carolina State University in Raleigh, recently predicted to HuffPost that Robinson will win the primary and ultimately lose the general election.

“We have seen ever since the elevation of Trump, Republican primary voters, again and again, time and time and time again, choosing the candidate who makes an awful general election candidate in a purple state,” Greene said in August. “My presumption is Mark Robinson will fall right into this pattern.”