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It's only the latest anti-LGBTQ+ statements from North Carolina Lt. Gov. Mark Robinson, who has called LGBTQ+ people "filth" and "maggots."
North Carolina Republican Lt. Gov. Mark Robinson seems to want to ban transgender people from using the bathroom that most aligns with their gender identity. Yes, the same kind of “bathroom bill” that failed almost seven years ago.
In recent remarks as Robinson campaigns to be the state’s next governor, he’s said that transgender women should be “arrested” for using women’s bathrooms. He’s also said that instead of using the women’s bathroom, trans women should “find a corner outside somewhere.”
“We're going to defend women in this state,” the GOP politician said in a video filmed at a campaign event this month. “That means if you're a man on Friday night, and all the sudden on Saturday, you feel like a woman, and you want to go in the women's bathroom in the mall, you will be arrested — or whatever we got to do to you.”
Mark Robinson - We Will Arrest People For Using The Bathroom They Choosewww.youtube.com
In another speech, Robinson said, “if you are confused, find a corner outside somewhere to go. We're not tearing society down because of this.”
Mark Robinson on Bathroomswww.youtube.com
Robinson’s opponents for the Republican nomination for governor haven’t addressed or condemned his anti-trans comments, but have called him out for his other bigoted remarks.
“Mark Robinson will lose and hurt all GOP candidates if he is the nominee,” candidate Bill Graham’s spokesman Alex Baltzegar said in an email to North Carolina public radio station WUNC. “His comments about the Holocaust being hogwash along with his demeaning comments about women will wreck GOP chances for regaining the White House and the governorship here in North Carolina.”
The station reports that Graham’s campaign launched new campaign ads and a website, meetmarkrobinson.com, which focus on Robinson’s incendiary comments. The outlet notes that the ads leave out his anti-LGBTQ+ statements.
State Treasurer Dale Folwell, another GOP lawmaker running for governor, echoed Robinson’s transphobia. He said, “women should be in women’s bathrooms only, and if the General Assembly thinks those laws need to be tightened, then that’s something they should work on ... I just think there are so many laws that people need to make sure are actually being enforced,” according to the radio station.
“He’s history’s latest example of someone who’s trying to rise to power based on telling people who to hate,” Folwell added.
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Robinson has a history of making gross anti-LGBTQ+ comments.
Speaking at a North Carolina church in June 2021, he said, “There’s no reason anybody anywhere in America should be telling any child about transgenderism, homosexuality, any of that filth.”
He added, “And yes, I called it filth, and if you don’t like that I called it filth, come see me and I’ll explain it to you.”
In November of that year, in another church appearance, he said straight couples are superior to same-sex ones because they can potentially reproduce sexually. He equated LGBTQ+ people with “what the cows leave behind” as well as “maggots” and “flies.”
