The Mark Robinson Show, episode 38: “Why’s everybody always pickin’ on ME?”

Let’s recap for some of you who may be behind on this story.  A spokesman for the NC Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) confirms that the audit / review of the Robinson family business – Balanced Nutrition – is “ongoing.’’  (It appears to be week #3 we’re in.)

CBS17 reports that the state auditor’s investigative unit requested some info from Balanced Nutrition back in November 2023.  (You know,  when we were the only ones writing about this hot mess.)

 So, that makes at least TWO state agencies looking into the business – a DHHS contractor now shuttered – that had been managed by Second Lady Yolanda Hill.

Hill has already played the victim card – accusing some colleagues at DHHS of playing office politics with this investigation.  The lieutenant governor, himself, upped the ante at the recent Strawberry Festival in Columbus County:

Lt. Gov. Mark Robinson spoke out recently about the “challenges” his wife is facing amid a state agency’s probe of her nonprofit, saying he and former President Donald Trump are “being pushed to the edge through an unfair system.”

In video of his remarks last weekend in Chadbourn at the Columbus County town’s Strawberry Festival, the Republican candidate for governor notes that his wife, Yolanda Hill, wasn’t with him at the event and she’s “been facing some challenges.”

He followed that comment by saying, “I wasn’t going to say this tonight but I’m going to say it: There are some people in our government that need to grow up. They need to understand they’re not in the government system, the seat that they sit in was not ordained for them to browbeat the people they don’t like, that they despise.”

“Far too much of that is going on in our nation and our state right now … Folks like me, and President Trump and others, are being pushed to the edge through an unfair system,” he added.

A spokesman for Robinson’s campaign did not respond to a request for the candidate to further explain his comments and concerns about the Department of Health and Human Services review of Hill’s nonprofit, Balanced Nutrition.

[…] In the Chadbourn speech, Robinson had a warning for his political opponents: “I can guarantee you tomorrow when the shoe is on the other foot and it’s something that they said that others don’t like, and the system comes after them, they’ll remember those days when they grinned when others were being treated unfairly.

*Nice.*

We can follow up all this vendetta talk with word that the Robinsons took out a second mortgage –  providing  a line of credit up to $96,000 – on May 1 for the Colfax home they purchased in 2019.  It’s already public knowledge that Hill retained a lawyer for her DHHS review.  And the last time I checked, lawyers like to get paid. (The way things are going, there is likely to be further need for legal services.)

A DHHS spokesman confirmed to us that government funds obtained via Balanced Nutrition cannot be used to pay legal fees.  Campaign funds cannot be used either.  Since Balanced Nutrition ceased operations on April 30, the Second Couple is down to only one salary – Mark’s lieutenant governor salary.