IREDELL COUNTY, N.C. (WGHP) — North Carolina’s lieutenant governor 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,” Robinson said when asked to summarize himself by McNeely.
“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.”
McNeely continued the exchange.
“I’m pulling for the second part, but if it don’t happen, it don’t happen,” McNeely said in response.
McNeely responded, “I’d like to be that second part.”
They quickly ran down Robinson’s background: He’s a Greensboro native who was in the Army reserves and is known for his gun rights speech to the Greensboro City Council in 2018 that ultimately was turned into an NRA advertisement.
The two men briefly discussed, Robinson’s own experience with abortion, for which he has publicly expressed regret. 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,” Robinson said. “Would that stop abortions? No. People would get in their car, they’d go to Georgia, they’d go to South Carolina.”
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,” he said.”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.”
As Robinson spoke, McNeely agreed and said that they’re “working on it.”
Robinson suggested a desire to improve systems for childcare, adoption and health care in the state as a way of lowering the number of abortions, though no specifics about how he thinks 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 drew to a close, McNeely winded up in an apparent attempt to get Robinson to announce his candidacy for governor in 2024, but Robinson side-stepped the layup to discuss the upcoming Duke vs. North Carolina State basketball 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.”
State Attorney General 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.
A Charlotte-area state senator, Rachel Hunt, announced her intention to run for lieutenant governor as a Democrat on Wednesday.
Robinson will be speaking at the Conservative Political Action Conference on Saturday.
The event, also referred to as CPAC, is in Washington, D.C. It begins on Wednesday.
