North Carolina lieutenant governor names new chief aide as staff departures grow
RALEIGH, N.C. — Republican lieutenant governor of North Carolina Mark Robinson quickly appointed to head his next state government office on Thursday, after a dozen workers left his office or gubernatorial campaign following last week’s election CNN report he claimed he posted strongly worded racist and sexual comments on an online message board.
Robinson said he elevated Deputy Chief of Staff Krishana Polite to be the next chief of staff in the lieutenant governor’s office. The announcement came the day after current chief of staff and general counsel Brian LiVecchi announced that he was resigning effective next week.
Polite “has been a great asset to our great state for years,” Robinson wrote on X. “We are blessed to have her lead our government.”
LiVecchi, who has served in Robinson’s office since his term began in early 2021, confirmed Thursday that three other office employees also resigned effective Oct. 1: communications director John Wesley Waugh, policy director Jonathan Harris and government affairs director Nathan Lewis. The office, which will receive $1.3 million from this year’s state budget, lists eight employees on its website. A lieutenant governor has few inherent duties.
LiVecchi did not give a reason for the departure, which was revealed a few days after the Robinson campaign’s senior adviser said eight of the campaign’s top staffers members resigned, including himself, the campaign manager and finance director. Robinson, who if elected would be the state’s first black governor, has said he will rebuild his campaign staff. A spokesman said Thursday he had no information about the hiring of campaign staff.
The staff departures come as Republican officials and Republican groups have distanced themselves from Robinson just weeks before the Nov. 5 election, where he faces Democratic candidate Josh Stein, the incumbent attorney general. Absentee voting has begun. The Republican Governors Association said it no longer supports Robinson. And Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump, who endorsed Robinson before the March primary, did not mention Robinson at two rallies in North Carolina since last weekend.
Last week’s CNN report said Robinson left statements on a porn site message board in which he called himself a “black NAZI,” said he enjoyed transgender pornography, said in 2012 that he chose Hitler over then-President Barack Obama and denounced the late Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. as “worse than a maggot.”
Robinson, who has denied writing the posts, already had a history of inflammatory comments on topics such as abortion and LGBTQ+ rights, which Stein and his allies have highlighted in their opposition in TV commercials and online. The campaign of Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris and her party are also focused Linking Trump to Robinson to win the battleground state.
Robinson’s campaign said this week that was the case hired a law firm in Virginia to investigate how what he calls “false slander” in the report came about. Jesse Binnall, a partner in the legal group, told Fox News that “voters need an answer before the election. And so we work very quickly and still issue a very comprehensive report.”
“We are going to investigate this vigorously,” said Binnall, whose clients include Trump and his campaign. “We are not going to leave any stone unturned. We will be very, very aggressive.”
CNN has not commented on Robinson’s allegations. But the network report said it linked details of the message board account to other online accounts owned by Robinson by comparing usernames, a known email address and his full name. CNN reported that details discussed by the account holder matched Robinson’s age, length of marriage and other biographical information.