Mark Robinson sues CNN over report he wrote racist posts on porn website
Mark Robinson sues CNN over report he wrote racist posts on porn website
CNN report said North Carolina candidate for governor made explicit posts on website’s message board
CNN report said North Carolina candidate for governor made explicit posts on website’s message board
Mark Robinson, North Carolina’s lieutenant governor, announced a lawsuit Tuesday against CNN over its recent report alleging he made explicit racial and sexual posts on a pornography website’s message board, calling the reporting reckless and defamatory.
The lawsuit, filed in Wake county superior court, comes less than four weeks after a television report that led many fellow GOP elected officials and candidates, including Donald Trump, to distance themselves from Robinson’s gubernatorial campaign. Robinson announced the lawsuit at a news conference in Raleigh.
Ooooh. Discovery, you say?
Bet that will unearth even more Nazi/Porn weirdness.
Sadly it won't ever get to that phase. This is just so he can claim it's a lie between now and election day. He'll quietly drop the lawsuit about a week after the election.
His biggest problem is North Carolina has a big Dixiecrat/ Republican base. He was getting a pass due to having a R next to his name. Now, they will vote for a white guy.
Possibly, but I could also see WB countersuing. They really don't have much to lose there.
I think it's more likely that he'll demand to settle or simply drop the lawsuit. Typical SLAPP behaviour.
CNN will likely try to have it dismissed because the legal fees will surely be astronomical.
I assume a company like CNN has a law firm on retainer who is being paid whether or not they're needed.
Real news media doesn't make controversial statements about individuals unless they have proof. I am quite certain that before this story went to press, there were serious internal discussions at CNN about not only its validity, but about CNN's ability to demonstrate that validity in court.
Yep. The truth is an absolute defense against defamation.
Yeah, this won't be like the Hulk Hogan/Gawker case. CNN doesn't play.
Things have been so crazy I forgot about this. Thanks for the reminder, Mark Robinson.
Right, if he hadn't brought it up again we'd have all moved on to the next news item. Thanks Mark, and let's see how your case goes.
Dropped right after the election you say?
"Calling the report reckless and defamatory" but not incorrect.
Defamatory implies it's false
True. Though if you read the original CNN article, the circumstantial evidence is fairly damning. I don't think he has any chance of getting out from under this.
Also, in a legal context, I think there very well may be a distinction between claiming a report is defamatory versus claiming it is false. As per Wikipedia:
The precise legal definition of defamation varies from country to country. It is not necessarily restricted to making assertions that are falsifiable
Actually he is. Calling something defamatory implies that the statement is false. The inverse is also true: if a statement is true, then it's not defamation.
(source: I was hyperfixated on the Depp v. Heard trial)
Yeah, IIRC the comment was deleted not long after the story came out about it, which is insanely odd timing if he's not the guy who left it.
Well… discovery should at least be entertaining.
Seriously...does he not know that is part of the process? And to defend it they'll dig up everything and more to produce as evidence.
Problem is, it'll likely be silently settled and we'll never hear about it again and he can just lie and say he won or some shit.
He's not planning to get that far... Just needs the optics a few weeks before the election and then, win or lose, will drop the case without going through discovery.
Can't wait for whatever comes out in discovery.
Wasn't CNN like crazy-careful about documentation, proof, and public records? Good luck, you weird racist MAGA pervert-freak...
It’s almost impossible to win a defamation lawsuit as a public person. This is just being used as a flimsy shield before the election to try to give his denials some credibility. The standard is so high that unless someone at CNN was recorded as admitting to making this up then this case won’t make it very far.
That's foolish of him, because as defendants they now have standing to subpoena. He will be proven to be a weird fucking pervert in civil court.
His public comments are equally as disgusting.
Ah, the old Trumpian tactic of suing someone for telling the truth.
I'm betting Warner Bros. has more money and better lawyers than you, Mark.
This will be an interesting court case.
If cnn can prove what they reported then he's just digging a deeper hole.
If cnn can't prove it they are in deep doggy doo doo.
I'm going out on a limb, just a hunch really, and I think CNN will come out of this just fine. Robinson is the man with a shovel, and he's gonna dig.
If cnn can’t prove it they are in deep doggy doo doo.
Not really. They came with the receipts, showing time after time that the commenter shared personal details and used indiosyncratic turns of phrase that Robinson repeated on public accounts and forums. They had a very reasonable belief that it was true, and never claimed more than that. In the US, for a public figure, that's generally more than enough.
Either way someone’s getting that doo-doo feces thrown all over the walls, the floor, the ceiling, and it will stink so bad
Oh look, North Carolina just happens to be one of the states with no anti-SLAPP laws on the books.
What a dunderhead.
Please, that's "Lt. Governor Black Nazi Dunderhead" to you.