CNN
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Donald Trump’s campaign team declined to comment on Thursday on whether North Carolina Lieutenant Governor Mark Robinson, whom the former president once described as “Martin Luther King on steroids,” should drop out of the race for governor in this swing state.

Vice President Kamala Harris’ campaign team, meanwhile, highlighted Trump’s previous praise for Robinson after CNN reported on Robinson’s history of disturbing comments on a porn website’s message board on Thursday.

Robinson, a Trump ally who won the Republican nomination for governor in March, is under growing pressure to drop out of the race after it was revealed that he made comments more than a decade ago calling himself a “black NAZI!” and advocating the reinstatement of slavery. Robinson denied making those comments.

The report immediately made headlines in the 2024 presidential race, where North Carolina is a target for both Trump and Harris. The deadline for a candidate to withdraw under state law is 11:59 p.m. ET Thursday, and the state’s first mail-in ballots are scheduled to be sent out Friday.

Harris’ campaign responded to the report by posting photos of Trump and Robinson together on social media, including one of the two posing with a thumbs up.

In another social media post, the Harris campaign shared a video in which Trump praises Robinson, calling him “one of the great leaders of our country” and describing him as “better than Martin Luther King.” The campaign superimposed the headline of the CNN report on the video.

The Trump campaign did not directly address the reporting or whether the former president wants Robinson to drop out of the race for governor in a statement Thursday afternoon.

“President Trump’s campaign is focused on winning the White House and saving this country. North Carolina is an essential part of that plan. We are confident that President Trump will win the Tarheel State again as voters compare Trump’s record of a strong economy, low inflation, a secure border and safe streets with the failures of Biden-Harris. We will not take our eye off the ball,” Trump campaign spokeswoman Karoline Leavitt told CNN.

Trump has always praised Robinson. At a campaign rally in Greensboro, North Carolina, in March, Trump said he heard Robinson’s speech on the plane and called him “Martin Luther King on steroids.”

“I said, ‘I think you’re better than Martin Luther King. I think you’re Martin Luther King times two,'” Trump said at the time.

The NAACP called on Robinson to drop out of the race, writing on social media Thursday that the organization is “nonpartisan, but we are not blind. And we speak out against what is wrong. Mark Robinson: Drop out.”

Robinson is currently in a neck-and-neck race with Democrat Josh Stein to succeed Democratic Governor Roy Cooper, who is limited to one year in office.

Stein, the state’s attorney general, is ahead of Robinson in recent polls. His campaign said in a statement Thursday: “The people of North Carolina already know that Mark Robinson is completely unfit for the office of governor. Josh remains focused on winning this race so that together we can build a safer and stronger North Carolina for all.”

The Democratic Governors Association also pounced on the CNN report. Spokeswoman Izzi Levy called it “the latest proof that Mark Robinson is insane, dangerous and completely unfit for the office of governor.”

“Many Republicans are warning of the damage Robinson would do as governor. But it is now clear that the stakes have never been higher than they are today. We must go full throttle to defeat him in November,” Levy said.

The Republican Governors Association did not respond to a request for comment on the report or whether Robinson should drop out of the race.

North Carolina Rep. Richard Hudson, who heads the Republican campaign arm in the House, told reporters on Thursday that “the allegations are very troubling.”

But Hudson was reluctant to ask Robinson to resign.

“I hope the lieutenant governor can convince the people of North Carolina that the allegations are not true,” he said.

Another North Carolina Republican, Rep. Greg Murphy, who is a member of the hard-line House Freedom Caucus, also called the allegations “very troubling” but expressed doubts about their authenticity.

“What I read was very disturbing, but given the level of electronic manipulation that is possible these days with AI and everything else, nobody knows what is true and what is not,” he said.

South Carolina state Rep. Ralph Norman, also a member of the Freedom Caucus, told CNN the report was “pretty sad.”

“To come this far and then the people who supported him, all the money he raised. I think he has to drop out today so there can be another candidate,” he said.

Norman also said Robinson should have known that previous comments on the message board would become public.

“I think he’s a different person now – obviously a lot of this happened in the past – but in politics they’ll figure everything out, as is their right,” Norman said.

Republican Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia said she wanted to read the allegations, but “if all of this turns out to be true, that would certainly be something I definitely could not support.”

CNN’s Alayna Treene, Aaron Pellish, Dianne Gallagher, Annie Grayer, Morgan Rimmer, Kate Sullivan and Omar Jimenez contributed to this report.