On Wednesday, 16th October, Mark Robinson, North Carolina’s Lieutenant Governor and Republican candidate for governor, filed a $50 million defamation litigation against CNN stating that the network’s report that he identified himself as a “black Nazi” on a pornography internet site more than a decade ago and made other offensive comments was “recklessly false.” Robinson, an African-US lieutenant governor in North Carolina, filed a lawsuit in the Superior Court of Wake County, North Carolina, asserting that he never made such comments.
It described CNN’s September coverage as a “malicious hit job” based on unverifiable data and timed to undermine his chances in the state’s November 5th governor election, when he will face Democrat Josh Stein, the state’s attorney general. The suit was filed around four weeks after the report was published.
“CNN chose to publish despite knowing or recklessly disregarding that Lt. Gov. Robinson’s data including his name, date of birth, passwords, and the email address supposedly associated with the NudeAfrica account, were previously compromised by multiple data breaches,” the lawsuit read.
According to the CNN report published on 19th September, Robinson left statements on the message board over a decade ago in which, among other things, he referred to himself as a “black NAZI,” said he appreciated transgender pornography, and that he favored Hitler to then-President Barack Obama and called the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. worse than a maggot.
According to the network report, the details of Robinson’s message board account were matched to his other internet identities by comparing usernames, a known email address, and his complete name. According to CNN, the account holder mentioned characteristics that matched Robinson’s age, length of marriage, and other personal information. CNN also stated that it linked figures of speech that featured frequently in his public Twitter profile with those used in discussions by the account on the pornographic website. The CNN report added that Robinson had denied making those comments.
The report claimed that the comments were made between 2008 and 2012 on “Nude Africa,” a pornographic website that includes a message board. It claimed that many of Robinson’s comments were gratuitously sexual and lewd in nature. As per CNN, the comments were made using the name ‘minisoldr’, saying Robinson frequently uses this moniker online.
At a press conference on Tuesday, October 15th, Robinson described the lawsuit as a bid to fight back against one of the most significant instances of political interference in this state’s history. Former President Donald Trump has endorsed Robinson, and he is represented by Virginia attorney Jesse Binnall, who has previously represented Trump.
“CNN published the article despite harboring doubt over the veracity and verifiability of the supposedly supporting information and deliberately avoided the truth,” Robinson said.
In the same defamation action, Robinson also sued a Greensboro punk rock band singer who claimed in a music video and an interview with a media outlet that Robinson visited and purchased movies from a porn business where the singer once worked in the 1990s and early 2000s. Louis Love Money, the other named defendant, published the video and spoke with other media outlets prior to the CNN discovery.
“Lt. Gov. Robinson was not spending hours at the video store, five nights a week. He was not renting or previewing videos, and he did not purchase ‘bootleg’ or other videos from Defendant Money,” the lawsuit read denying allegations.
The lawsuit, which seeks at least $50 million in damages, states that the attempt against Robinson appears to be a coordinated attack aimed at derailing his campaign for governor. It presents no evidence that the network or Money conspired with outside entities to produce what Robinson claims are fraudulent assertions.
Reportedly, the comments appearing under Robinson’s name on the Nude Africa website site have been removed. However, the profile page mentioned in CNN report remains on the website, and “mark robinson” is listed as the account holder’s name, as verified by Poliltico.
