Trump accuses Biden and Harris after another assassination attempt: Latest updates

Rumors are circulating that a bombshell story about Mark Robinson, the Republican candidate for governor of North Carolina, will come to light on Thursday. The story is apparently so bad that his aides and members of Donald Trump's campaign team are urging him to drop out of the race.

Details are unclear at this time, but the Carolina Journal reported Thursday that Robinson, who is currently the state's lieutenant governor, is the subject of an upcoming news article covering his activity on adult websites in the 2000s.

According to this report, however, Robinson does not want to retract his accusation and denies the story.

Thursday night is the state's deadline to withdraw from a race. But even if Robinson were to abruptly resign, it would be too late for him to remove his name from the ballot. The deadline to do so has already passed, and mail-in ballots are expected to be sent out Friday.

Curiously, under North Carolina law, if Robinson were to drop out at this late stage of the campaign and someone else were to run in his place, all votes cast for Robinson would be counted as votes for the replacement candidate.
Robinson was scheduled to attend a rally with Republican vice presidential candidate JD Vance on Wednesday, but did not attend. His office said Robinson had tested positive for Covid.

The Republican gubernatorial candidate is steadily trailing in the polls against his opponent, the state's Democratic Attorney General Josh Stein.

Robinson, like Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump, has a long history of sexist, homophobic and otherwise offensive statements, as well as spreading wild conspiracy theories. He has modeled himself on Trump, who endorsed Robinson in March.