Is it finally time to shut it down and start investigating?
It now appears that a Greensboro-based business owned by NC’s aspiring First Lady Yolanda Hill (aka “Mrs. Mark Robinson”) has been making unauthorized payments of tax dollars to family members for at least six years.
According to public records, Hill is the registered agent and CFO for something called Balanced Nutrition. Balanced Nutrition is, basically, a contractor that dispenses money from the NC Department of Health and Human Services (NCDHHS) – via the US Department of Agriculture (USDA) – to reimburse day care centers who provide lunches to their attendees. Balanced Nutrition is required to submit budgets to NCDHHS for approval, as well as file financial reports — such as Form 990 – with the Internal Revenue Service.
According to government documents we obtained, Balanced Nutrition‘s total revenue (tax dollars) for 2017 was $111,628. Balanced Nutrition‘s yearly revenue was expected to meet or exceed $2 million (tax dollars) for 2023.
Worksheet D on the NCDHHS budget form specifically states that “sponsors” (contractors like Balanced Nutrition) need prior approval for payment of funds to family members.
Budget documents we obtained – dating back to budget year 2018/2019 – indicate that ALL paid employees identified by Hill and Balanced Nutrition since that time have indeed been family members. NCDHHS spokesman Charles Epstein confirmed to us that the only request for authorization to pay a family member that has been submitted to his agency by Balanced Nutrition occurred in April 2023 — seven months after the budget year had already started. That request was for Dayson Robinson, the son of Yolanda Hill and Mark Robinson.
So, let’s pause to run through all the folks identified on state government documents as paid employees of Balanced Nutrition. The company’s 2018/2019 budget document identified Yolanda Hill and Mark Robinson, himself, as the only paid employees of Balanced Nutrition. NCDHHS’s Epstein could not confirm that his agency had ever received a request for permission to pay Robinson — obviously a member of Hill’s family.
Balanced Nutrition’s 2019/2020 budget submission to NCDHHS identified Hill and Cassaundra Spinks (Hill’s mother) as the only paid employees of the company for that budget year. NCDHHS’s Epstein could not confirm that his agency had ever received a request for permission from Balanced Nutrition to pay Spinks — obviously a member of Hill’s family.
Balanced Nutrition’s 2020/2021 budget submission to NCDHHS identified Hill and Kameron Brunson (Hill and Robinson’s nephew) as the only paid employees for the company that budget year.
Balanced Nutrition’s 2021/2022 budget submission to NCDHHS indentified Hill and Kandace Stephenson (also a family member) as the only paid employees for the company that budget year.
Balanced Nutrition’s 2022/23 budget submission to NCDHHS identified Hill and Dayson Robinson (Hill and Mark Robinson‘s son) as the only paid employees for Balanced Nutrition that calendar year. This is the first time he shows up on the state documents we found. (Though, the company’s 2019-2023 filings to the IRS identify Dayson Robinson as a paid employee each of those five years.)
On each year’s filing of Form 990 to the IRS. (years 2017 to 2021), Yolanda Hill – on behalf of Balanced Nutrition – checks a box that no family members are being paid. Many of the IRS filings do not match the information filed with NCDHHS.
Okay. We’ve generated over 30 posts loaded with serious concerns about the business practices 
of a couple seeking to be the next First Couple of North Carolina. All of the money flowing through this business — approximately $2 million per year as of this writing – is taxpayer money.
If we are simply mistaken, it would be comforting to have the Robinsons or their representatives help us correct the record. This strategy of clamming up — saying nothing –– is simply not cutting it.
We’ve tried reaching out to Yolanda Hill to make sure we have the most accurate, up-to-date information on her company. (On all of her filings, she states that she will share — upon request – with anyone who asks.) But we’ve been ignored.
At what point do government authorities say “Hey, let’s take a pause and review this thing” ?
Who with political experience believes that the Democrats have not found all of this themselves in their opposition research on Mark Robinson? Their smart play is to sit on it until he is the nominee and then feed it to their allies in the liberal media, who will then go all out to destroy Robinson with it, and that is apparently what they are doing. Thanks, Brant for digging this out, so Republicans can be aware of it before our primary. Our smart play is to drop Robinson like a hot potato. We have a solid alternative in Dale Folwell. Nominating Robinson could blow up on other races, particularly the Council of State.
Josh Stein is the likely Democrat nominee, and it is his office, the Attorney General’s office that would act on this information. They have no incentive to touch it during the GOP primary, but every incentive to do so afterward. Mark Robinson is a ticking time bomb for the GOP.
You are absolutely right. Josh Stein and the democrats can’t wait for Robinson to win the Republican nomination. If these allegations about Robinson are true, I have no doubt that Josh Stein has the proof, and he and the democrats will bring it all out in the open about March 6 if Robinson wins on March 5. Dale Folwell, on the other hand, is as honest and dedicated to the freedom and well-being of our citizens as the day is long. Stein and company are probably afraid of Dale Folwell getting the nomination, because he has fought their shenanigans the whole time he has been in office, and he knows “where the bodies are buried,” so to speak. In connection with your comments about Dale’s efforts against the medical monopolies and their lack of transparency, I would add that he understands what I mean when I say that we need to bring them down. I told Tim Moore, when I was still in the NC House, that we needed to get rid of them because they are ruining healthcare and doctor/patient relationships in North Carolina, and they violate our State Constitution’s prohibition of monopolies. Tim Moore didn’t even answer me. I presume that was because he gets too much campaign money from them. Dale Folwell would have understood what I meant. We need to elect Dale Folwell to be our next Governor, and stop Tim Moore from going to Congress. We have too many like Thom Tillis up there already.
This is all very disturbing. I had been a supporter of Mark Robinson early on. Once Dale Folwell got into the race, however, I had to switch my support to him, as he is the only candidate in the race for Governor who is worth supporting.
These allegations about Robinson’s shady business dealings involving misappropriation of taxpayer funding are shocking. Too many people don’t know about them, and the denial of the Holocaust is just inexcusable, too.
But there is more to the story than that. Mark Robinson is very good at making bombastic speeches, while doing nothing in office. I tried for the last two years of my time in Raleigh, which were his first two years, to meet with him to discuss mutual goals on behalf of our citizens. He never made himself available. I would go to his office in the Legislative Building to try to see him. Not only was he never there, there was no one there, not even one staff person, any time I went.
Dale Folwell, on the other hand, is a true public servant. He helped me save a business in Harrisburg when he was at the Commerce Department. Commerce was telling that business that they owed $20,000 in unemployment fees. It turned out that a few people they had let go had already gotten other jobs but were still collecting unemployment benefits against that business’s account. I called Commerce and was told they wouldn’t do anything about it. So I hung up and called again, and asked to speak to Dale Folwell. Within two days, not only did the business not owe the $20,000, but Dale made sure they went after the people committing the fraud
After Dale became Treasurer, I had a number of occasions to call him on behalf of constituents who were having problems with the State government bureaucracy. Dale was quick to help our citizens every time. Dale Folwell is a conscientious servant of our citizens, who has saved the State and our taxpayers a lot of money. He is the best qualified by his competence, his commitment to serving our people, and by his record of doing so to serve as our Governor, over any other candidate in this race. That includes Bill Graham, who has put out some impressive ads, but whom I do not consider as trustworthy as Dale Folwell.
I was greatly alarmed by this part of your remarks: “and the denial of the Holocaust is just inexcusable”. What can you show me that supports this accusation that Mark is a Holocaust-denier ? Do you have a link to a clip showing him saying something that indicates that? Or a link to a quote that he wrote? Or anything showing that he has questioned anything about the Holocaust? If so, I would very much like to see it.
Thank you.
Why depend on me? It is easy to look it up yourself. I understand your skepticism about the accuracy of those reports; but when I said “if” that covered this issue as well as the other allegations. From what I have read, I am satisfied, but you are certainly right and free to check into it and form your own opinion.
Correction. In my original post. I meant to say, “These allegations…if true…” Going back, I see I left out the words “if true.” At any rate, “allegations” implies the “if true,” even if not directly stated, but I should have been more precise in the original post to which Karen Raines understandably raised a question.
Thank you for your response., Mr. Pittman. Please read this entire reply, to see that I am not bashing you for what you wrote, and in fact, have tremendous respect for you. But there is another side to this controversy that you should be made aware of, which is what I’m sharing with you.
Of course, I did look deeper into this, reviewing the clip in which Mark uttered those words and a transcript of them.
Then I reviewed them again.
It seemed to me that one interpretation, based on his stressing the timeline of the Jews’ disarmament was not that the Holocaust did not occur, but rather when the disarmament of the Jews (and, indeed, everyone) occurred, and by whom. He seemed to be saying that that happened long before Hitler took office, by the centrist and left-leaning Weimar Republic.
His message to conservatives, however, was muddled. It seemed to be the need to assign the blame for today’s gun control efforts where it properly belongs, on left-leaning Marxists, not on fascists (although I fail to see a distinction between the two.) Maybe that lack of clear distinction between who he’s saying today’s conservatives should be blaming for the threat of gun control on and who they are blaming it on in this speech is why he says he apologized for the wording but not the context.
Clearly the clip does not provide the context in which he spoke on that issue (of course, given that it was mainstream (aka, leftist) media that covered it). But that is one possible explanation one could possibly derive from it. Of course, he would be the better one to provide the actual context than any of us through sheer speculation.
To that end, I asked one of Mark’s county leaders to get Mark’s explanation of that clip. Sure enough, it seems to mesh with how I interpreted it:
“There is additional evidence backing up the Lt. Governor’s view here, both in historical
scholarship and even from the left-leaning press. For example, writing about the Nazis’ gun
policies in the Fordham Law Review in 2004, attorney and Columbia University professor
Bernard Harcourt said
“…Nazis were intent on killing Jewish persons and used the gun laws and regulations to
further the genocide…”
11 but that;
• “…[i]t is absurd to even try to characterize this as either pro- or anti-gun control.”12”
Lt. Governor Mark Robinson, Remarks to 2023 Moms for Liberty Summit, Philadelphia, PA June 2023
7 Reuters: Video of North Carolina official citing dictators stripped of context online, 7/7/2023
8 USA Today, North Carolina official encouraged studying dictators to understand threats — Fact check, Nate Trela,
7/18/2023
9
Lt. Gov. Mark Robinson, Twitter, 7/5/2023
10 WFAE Public Radio, GOP governor primary heats up as Graham airs TV ads criticizing Robinson over Holocaust
posts, Steve Harrison, 1/17/23
“Now-Lt. Gov. Robinson was decidedly more blunt in his Facebook post; he just called the myth “hogwash”! For once even the often left-leaning PolitiFact agrees with Lt. Gov. Robinson: “No, gun control regulation in Nazi Germany did not help advance the Holocaust”13
.
Gun owners in North Carolina have no better friend than Lt. Gov. Mark Robinson – and as a student of history he was pointing out that the failed pre-World War II German Weimar Republic had made it easier for the Nazis to take power in Germany and carry out their evil
vision for the Holocaust. The bottom line is that Lt. Governor Robinson has never questioned the Holocaust….”
It further goes on to say that “Lt. Gov. Mark Robinson Shows North Carolina Stands with Israel & the Jewish People….”
For me, it was comforting to know that this quote has been the object of what strongly seems to me, a half-Jew, to be a mischaracterization of his meaning, whether intentional or accidental. To be sure, the original press about it appears to have been intentional, based on the complete absence of context accompanying it. Context, as we all know, is critical, especially where political quotes are concerned.
But knowing you to be the faithful truthful, champion of conservative values and the man of integrity that you are, I strongly suspect that any subsequent mischaracterization of Mark’s stance on the Holocaust on your part as referenced in your article was purely accidental, and most likely not intentional in the least. For there has been no greater ally of grassroots conservatives in the General Assembly than you, and we all appreciate your efforts on our behalf more than words can say.. Hence, my writing to kindly set the record straight as to Mark’s REAL message, when taken in the full context in which it was given. Because we all know you to be a man of character and fairness who is dedicated to the truth. And as such, I felt obligated to share it with you on this issue, knowing that you would want nothing less.
For the record, by the way, I DO plan to vote for Dale Folwell, and told him so yesterday. But it’s because of his abiding concern for election integrity, vs Mark’s seemingly lack thereof (or at least less thereof than Dale’s, based on a comparison of both men’s actions), not because of anything related to this.
If Mark Robinson is truly a friend of gun rights, why did he take a powder while Phil Berger was killing Constitutional Carry legislation in North Carolina last session? As usual on major issues, Robinson was Missing in Action. Twenty six states now have Constitutional Carry, but not North Carolina, due to Phil Berger, while Mark Robinson sat and did nothing.
Robinson has not stood up for conservatives on key issues, and that is why he has been a huge disappointment. He has a bully pulpit and the speaking skills to use it effectively but just lacks the backbone to actually do it. Or is he just brownnosing Berger?
Mark is all go and no show. Preaches. Lots. Zero Results. I’ve lost all respect for him. Sadly.
Treasurer Dale Folwell is a man of few words. He doesn’t need them. He is a man on a mission, a man of action. Because of Treasurer FOLWELL, NC and her citizens are in a great financial situation. He has protected each and every purse. AMAZING.
He is a CHAMPION of Hospital Transparency. He waged war on the unfair practices of the hospitals billing. He risked it all for us! This is the man that will take care of NC. He will fight for what is right, even if he does it a lone. Dale can and will defeat Josh.
#DaleforNCGovernor
A good friend of mine is gay. He is a lifelong Republican. Robinson said that gays are “filth”. He will not be voting for Mark Robinson. Neither will I. You’ll hear more about this problem after the primary, which Mark will win.
Lol. At least have it right,
Actually Robinson essentially said their lifestyle is filth. Not that gays specifically are filth. In other words. he says they live a filthy lifestyle. Since Robinson seems to be a religious man, this is exactly “the love the sinner hate the sin” approach you would expect. And in fact it is what every Christian is asked to do. Love the sinner but condemn what they do. And hope pray and encourage them to stop sinning and turn to God. Some are nicer about it then others but they ALL want the same thing.
So I don’t see the big deal about it. If you are a Christian he has done nothing wrong Except point a finger squarely at people who are living against God’s plan. Must be embarrassing for them, but in reality That’s it.
Anyway its not like he can do anything about it, so who cares what he thinks on this particular issue.
I suppose the Gays will vote for Stein. He will make pleasant mouth noises at them and meanwhile make the sate unlivable in every other way.
Seems a bit short sighted.
What’s short sighted is hiding the skeletons in the closet until after the Primary. A vote for MR in the Primary ensures Stein will win in the General.
You saw this video, right? You think the leftists and MSM will take the gloves off beginning in April or will they lay low and stay quiet about Robinson?
https://www.qcnews.com/2023-qcn-specials/your-local-election-hq-north-carolina-governors-race-special/
I posted a reply to Reaganite by mistake that was suppose to be a reply to you, Bev.
I have had many disappointments over Mr Robinson. He makes a great showman, but that is not what is needed. When Raleigh burned he did NOTHING. Instead he used his platform to make platitudes over gender and books in schools. Yet, NOTHING was done about these things. These problems STILL remain in our schools. I personally tried to get access to him to discuss these issues to no avail. Governor or Lt. Governor is not a throne to be sat upon throwing bread and circuses to the masses to placate them.
What I will say…Ive had many conversations with Larry about voter integrity issues. He supported mine and many other’s viewpoints. He earned my respect through action not just words. If he says Dale is the guy we need to look at, then he has my attention.
Thank you for the kind words. I’m sure some who don’t know me might not be as willing to take my word for things as you apparently are, but it means a lot to me that you would indicate that you trust me. As a minister of the Gospel, I am constantly aware that the Lord knows all that I do and say. If I am trustworthy at all, it is because of that awareness. God bless you, and Marine, thank you for my freedom.
I think a bigger problem is The federal government is basically feeding children via this convoluted pass through system. That needs to be stopped all together. federal money comes with federal strings which are always bad and makes NC dependent on the feds which is bad.
Otherwise it sound like a family business, that has family members as employees.
…”Budget documents we obtained – dating back to budget year 2018/2019 – indicate that ALL paid employees identified by Hill and Balanced Nutrition since that time have indeed been family members…” Ok so?
and just because this of this.. …. “NCDHHS’s Epstein could not confirm that his agency had ever received a request for permission to pay Robinson — obviously a member of Hill’s family.”… Does not mean That they are scamming money etc… Maybe he didn’t get paid. Maybe he in fact does not work there and the payroll people did not take him off the list. There are dozen’s and dozens of perfectly reasonable explanations.
I would not expect that a business needs special permission to pay AN EMPLOYEE much less the owner. I mean It is kinda expected that those people are paid. . So the circumstance for “payments of family members.” Which I would guess is “non-employee family members” or maybe sub contractor family member businesses etc…. I don’t know you don’t say because I expect you don’t know either. Nor care I’d guess.
I guess you will be trying to get Robinson’s Tax records to check his income vs the payments from this business next, vs what they reported to NC DHHS and the IRS etc….
I am not going to dig and parse the whole thing but Hey if you don’t like the guy fine…. But INNOCENT UNTIL PROVEN GUILTY AM I RIGHT? Sheesh You guys have already put him in jail and already believe he is a crook. Basically doing Democrat agitprop and opposition research.
BTW If Stein knows all of this and knows of illegal activity ( if any) and is holding it solely for political reasons as many here suspect. That is the greatest campaign gift he could ever give to Robinson. A Lawyer and the chief officer of the court who knows of illegal business dealings of taxpayer money, and cares nothing about the law but only about politics. and will allow illegal activity to go only as far as he can use it to help himself.
Oh yeah. people will just LINE UP to vote for a guy like that. ( That is sarcasm BTW)
Anyway, I though I add some critical thought to the lynch mob. I’ve not decided who I will vote for well it won’t be Stein that I do know.
“The bigger problem is the federal government…” ya think?
Conservatives know liberals and bureaucrats growing the government to take care of us from cradle to grave is the problem.
So here’s a question: if someone is philosophically opposed to big government, why make a (really good) living this way?
For example, I will not move to CO to venture into the cannabis industry to make a buck because – I’m philosophically opposed to citizens walking around high all day. And I won’t start up a business selling tuck friendly swimsuits to men who dress up as women.
So why would any conservative be the middleman between the govt and those receiving taxpayer funds?
That is a good question. Perhaps we can ask Robinson about it. But I am not sure he takes the position about the fed gov.