Mark Robinson sends cease-and-desist letter to Josh Stein over campaign ad scrutinizing his daycare

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Attorneys for Lt. Gov. Mark Robinson’s campaign sent a cease-and-desist letter to Attorney General Josh Stein’s campaign after they aired an ad focusing on the daycare formerly operated by Robinson.

The ad, “Unsafe,” details state citations of Precious Beginnings, a Greensboro daycare, from 2006 and 2007. Robinson’s attorneys alleged in a letter that the ad “includes a series of misleading statements, visuals that distort the truth, and false assertions regarding the content of state records.”

“This letter puts Josh Stein and his campaign on notice that this advertisement contains false and defamatory information,” attorneys Charles Spies and Benjamin Mehr wrote. “Both Josh Stein personally and his campaign will bear liability if the advertisement continues to air.”

Stein’s campaign is standing by the ad.

“The ad is factually accurate, based on publicly available information, and, to date, the Robinson campaign has yet to provide any new factual information to refute the ad’s claims,” Stein’s campaign manager Jeff Allen said in a statement. “Mark Robinson may want to hide his record from North Carolina voters, but the voters deserve to know it.”

The attorneys write that the ad’s claim that “state documents show (the daycare) was unsanitary and endangered children” is inaccurate and misleading. The center “was occasionally cited on technicalities,” they write, but “no official documents state” that it was unsanitary or endangered children.

Among their other complaints were graphics “showing an electrical socket out of the wall around children,” which they said did not happen at the center. And they accused the Stein campaign of treating allegations that the center operated without lights, heat or running water as fact.

“North Carolina voters deserve to know the truth about both candidates and their records, and you have a legal obligation not to publish false smears designed to mislead voters,” the attorneys wrote.

Stein faced a grand jury investigation in a case stemming from a 2020 campaign ad , in which his opponent alleged the ad violated a 91-year-old libel law. The case was eventually dismissed.