In the final weeks of his unsuccessful campaign for governor, then-Lt. Gov. Mark Robinson struggled to raise money, while spending much of his remaining funds on campaign consultants, legal bills and parties.
Campaign finance reports for the final quarter of 2024, released this month, provide new information on the Robinson campaign's struggles in the wake of a devastating CNN report that found he'd made pro-Nazi comments on a pornographic website.
The Republican nominee for governor lost support from major GOP donors, all while spending more money on his defamation lawsuit against CNN than he spent on advertising his candidacy. The lawsuit is still pending in federal court as of January, where Robinson's attorneys are seeking to have the matter returned to a state court.
Robinson raised just $159,000 in the fourth-quarter campaign finance period, which covers fundraising from Oct. 20 through the end of the calendar year; he spent $590,000 during the same period.
Democrat Josh Stein, by contrast, raised $6.54 million during that period and spent $5.85 million. Over the entire campaign, Robinson raised a total of about $20 million, while Stein's campaign brought in $84 million.
The total fundraising in the 2024 governor's race significantly exceeded 2020 totals, when Gov. Roy Cooper raised a total of $41 million in his re-election campaign, and Republican Dan Forest raised $12 million. Last year marked the first time in North Carolina history where total campaign fundraising exceeded $100 million in a race for governor.
Pricey new management
After Robinson's longtime campaign manager, Conrad Pogorzelski, quit in late September alongside other top staffers, the campaign hired Florida-based political consultant Matt Hurley to serve as campaign manager for the final six weeks before the election.
Hurley's last-minute services came at a steep cost: Robinson paid his firm Victory Insights $283,000 for "fundraising consulting," the campaign finance report said, and it paid an additional $50,000 to Hurley's other firm Southeastern Strategies for travel reimbursements.
By comparison, that total is nearly one-third of what Robinson paid Pogorzelski's firm, Conservative Connections, over the rest of the campaign.
After this story was first published Tuesday, a spokesperson for Southeastern Strategies contacted 瓜神app to clarify that the payments to Victory Strategies were not used for fundraising as the campaign's filing stated. "They were for numerous forms of voter outreach, digital placements and targeting," the spokesperson said. "The campaign spent no money on fundraising consultants in the last several weeks of the campaign."
Fundraising efforts for the Robinson campaign failed to yield significant results in the final weeks before Election Day. Only one donor gave the maximum $6,400 in the fourth quarter, Hickory furniture company owner Ted Corwin. Most of Robinson's final fundraising came from small-dollar donors, although he did receive a $1,000 contribution from N.C. Sen. Norm Sanderson, R-Pamlico.
The result of the anemic fundraising meant that Robinson's TV ads stopped airing soon after the CNN report, and they never resumed. The fourth-quarter report shows that the campaign's only advertising in the final weeks was about $8,000 spent on newspaper ads in two publications serving the Black community.
Robinson also spent $59,000 right before election for "ad production" with Florida-based LakeSide Media, according to the report, but it's unclear where those ads appeared.
Attorney fees went to three firms
Meanwhile, legal bills were among the campaign's biggest expenses. Robinson's campaign paid $117,000 to the law firm of Jesse Binnall, the former attorney for President Donald Trump who has spearheaded the lieutenant governor's legal case against CNN.
The campaign also paid $49,500 to the Washington, D.C.-based law firm Dickinson Wright, as well as $10,000 to the Florida-based Holmes Fraser law firm.
So far, the campaign doesn't list any direct payments to another law firm, Raleigh-based Envisage Law.
That firm has represented Robinson in the CNN defamation case, as well as a . Envisage is also representing Robinson's wife, Yolanda, in a by her federally funded nonprofit Balanced Nutrition.
Another big expense at the end of Robinson's unsuccessful campaign was celebratory. The campaign paid City Club Raleigh, an event venue atop the Wells Fargo Building downtown, nearly $33,000 for an election night watch party and later for a holiday party.
The watch party was where Robinson conceded the race shortly after the polls closed, in front of a small crowd of supporters.
Still though, Robinson's campaign account ended 2024 with about $250,000 remaining in the bank 鈥� even after he paid a $35,000 fine in December for years of campaign finance violations uncovered by the State Board of Elections.
