Donald Trump-endorsed Republican gubernatorial candidate Mark Robinson may have lied on his 2020 campaign finance report, according to the owners of the company where he said he made the purchase.
Carolina Public Press reported Wednesday that a strange charge popped up when Robinson ran for North Carolina Lt. Governor. The report said that he spent $2,374 at Lake Outfitters for “campaign clothes and accessories" in five purchases over eight months.
But when reporters asked the owners of Lake Gaston Outfitters about the charge, they said the purchases never happened at the recorded address.
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“If you actually look at the credit card statements, it’s not our business, so it was just incorrectly attributed to our business,” owner Dave Blodgett told Carolina Public Press. “We sell kayaks. …We wouldn’t have anything here in our store that he would want.”
A larger investigation is underway about Robinson's 2020 campaign and an alleged $500,000 in violations. Campaign finance watchdog Bob Hall was behind the three-and-a-half-year investigation that continues.
“This is a man who wants to be in charge of a mega-billion dollar state operation,” Hall said about Robinson's bid for governor.
Early voting begins in two months.
“If he can’t manage a small campaign — which is what it was in 2020, it wasn’t that big — and has this continued history of financial mismanagement and is just trying to say, ‘I’m just one of the ordinary citizens who doesn’t know how to add or subtract or has problems with my taxes,’ that just does not bode well for the credentials of somebody who wants to be governor," explained Hall.
Hall sent State Board of Elections executive director Karen Brinson Bell a letter on Feb. 15, 2021, identifying a number of irregularities in the Robinson campaign's expenditures.
Two cash withdrawals — one for $2,400 and the other for $160 — violated the North Carolina law barring cash spending over $50 for nonmedia expenditures.
According to his 2020 Statement of Economic Interest, the withdrawals were made at the same bank where Robinson had a loan.
The cash withdraws add to the $2,374 spent at Lake Gaston Outfitters and a $4,500 reimbursement to Robinson's wife for "campaign apparel."
They could violate the state's election laws banning campaign funds going for personal benefit.
There are six other concerning transactions.
