(Bloomberg) -- North Carolina Attorney General Josh Stein was elected governor, defeating a Republican opponent who spent the last months of his campaign denying reports that he had posted racist material in online porn forums.
Stein, a Democrat, defeated Mark Robinson, according to Fox and NBC. He will succeed Democrat Roy Cooper, who couldn’t run for reelection after serving two consecutive terms.
Stein, 58, campaigned on his record of suing companies for pollution, opioids and e-cigarette marketing to teens. He also spoke about freedom in terms of public safety and personal health-care decisions, echoing the presidential campaign of Kamala Harris, which spent significant time and resources trying to swing the state’s 16 electoral college votes to Democrats for the first time since 2008.
“We chose hope over hate, competency over chaos,” Stein said Tuesday night at his watch party in Raleigh, where he was introduced by Cooper. “Because that’s who we are as North Carolinians”
CNN in September reported that Robinson, 56, spoke favorably about Hitler and slavery in an online chatroom to discuss porn more than a decade ago. Robinson, who is currently North Carolina’s lieutenant governor, denied that the posts were his and sued CNN for defamation, even though the report corroborated his username and biographical details.
--With assistance from Maria Luiza Rabello.
(Updates with comments from Stein in fourth paragraph)
©2024 Bloomberg L.P.
