Mark Robinson was taken to hospital after campaign incident

AP Photo/Chris Carlson

Lieutenant Governor of North Carolina Mark Robinson was hospitalized late Friday evening after an “incident at a campaign rally,” WSOC in Charlotte reported.

The 56-year-old Republican gubernatorial candidate was at the Mayberry Truck Show and Parade in Mt. Airy in the state’s northwest when the incident occurred. A Robinson campaign official said he was being treated for burns.

“He’s in good spirits,” the employee tweeted. Robinson reportedly suffered burns to his hand while leaning against a truck.

The lieutenant governor was a controversial figure and was supported by the former president Donald Trump in the GOP primary. Robinson’s well-documented extreme rhetoric proved no obstacle to victory in the Republican primary. But last week, CNN published an explosive report about his comments on a porn site called Nude Africa. In several posts, Robinson referred to himself as a “black Nazi,” said, “Slavery is not bad,” and wrote in 2012 that he would “rule Hitler over anything that’s happening in Washington right now!”

Robinson, who denies being behind the now-deleted posts, has consistently been in arrears with the North Carolina attorney general Josh Stein in the polls.

Trump, once an ardent supporter of Robinson, said Thursday he was unfamiliar with the lieutenant governor’s problems.

“Are you going to withdraw your support for Mark Robinson?” a reporter asked the former president.

“Uh, I don’t know the situation,” he replied before walking away.

Earlier this week it was reported that the Republican Governors Association was no longer spending money on Robinson.

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