Josh Stein, North Carolina’s Democratic attorney general, won the governor’s race in the state, according to The Associated Press. He defeated Lt. Gov. Mark Robinson, a Republican who had been widely criticized for his extensive record of incendiary remarks.
Mr. Stein positioned himself as a moderate Democrat focused on education and protecting abortion rights. But the core of his message was that Mr. Robinson was too extreme, divisive and unfit to lead a rapidly growing and diversifying state. The current governor, Roy Cooper, is a term-limited Democrat.
Mr. Stein flooded the airwaves with TV ads that highlighted Mr. Robinson’s offensive past comments. One showed Mr. Robinson saying in a Facebook video from 2019 that women who got abortions had not been “responsible enough to keep your skirt down.”
On his personal Facebook page, Mr. Robinson, who is Black, had also quoted Hitler, called Michelle Obama a man and said that Black History Month was for “people who have achieved so little.”
But the heaviest damage to Mr. Robinson’s campaign came in September, when a CNN report linked him to disturbing comments left on a pornography website between 2008 and 2012. According to CNN, Mr. Robinson wrote that he was a “Black NAZI,” that slavery was not bad and that, as a teenager, he had gone “peeping” on women in public gym showers.
Mr. Robinson denied that he wrote the posts and sued CNN for defamation, saying it was “recklessly false.” But the suit did not offer evidence to support that claim.
Most Republicans, including former President Donald J. Trump, distanced themselves from Mr. Robinson after the scandal, which prompted resignations from his campaign staff and the lieutenant governor’s office.
Mr. Stein, 58, grew up in Chapel Hill. He will become the first Jewish governor of North Carolina when he is sworn in.
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