Posted on 11/06/2015 10:51:55 AM PST by xzins
“The campaign never ‘admitted to anything,'†a spokesman for Republican presidential candidate Ben Carson told The Daily Caller News Foundation in response to a hit by Politico claiming his campaign admitted to “fabricating†a key point about his West Point story.
“The Politico story is an outright Lie,†Doug Watts told TheDCNF.
Politico published a piece Friday claiming Carson’s campaign “admits fabricating†the fact that he applied and was admitted to West Point.
“Ben Carson’s campaign on Friday admitted, in a response to an inquiry from POLITICO, that a central point in his inspirational personal story was fabricated: his application and acceptance into the U.S. Military Academy at West Point,†Kyle Cheney writes in the lede.
The Carson campaign disputes Politico’s unsubstantiated claim he ever claimed to have applied to West Point or been admitted: “He never said he was admitted or even applied.â€
“This is what we have come to expect from Politico.â€
Here is the full statement Watts provided to TheDCNF:
“Dr Carson was the top ROTC student in the City of Detroit. In that role he was invited to meet General Westmoreland. He believes it was at a banquet. He can’t remember with specificity their brief conversation but it centered around Dr. Carson’s performance as ROTC City Executive Officer.
He was introduced to folks from West Point by his ROTC Supervisors. They told him they could help him get an appointment based on his grades and performance in ROTC. He considered it but in the end did not seek admission. There are “Service Connected†nominations for stellar High School ROTC appointments. Again he was the top ROTC student in Detroit. I would argue strongly that an Appointment is indeed an amazing full scholarship. Having ran several Congressional Offices I am very familiar with the Nomination process.
Again though his Senior Commander was in touch with West Point and told Dr. Carson he could get in, Dr Carson did not seek admission.
The Politico story is an outright Lie. Dr. Carson as the leading ROTC student in Detroit was told by his Commanders that he could get an Appointment to the Academy. He never said he was admitted or even applied.
The campaign never “admitted to anythingâ€
This is what we have come to expect from Politico.â€
Politico reporter Kyle Cheney, who has the byline on the Carson story, did not immediately respond to multiple requests for comment.
Yes. I was in the Army in 1970.
According to Rush Limbaugh’s analysis of this matter, this story is basically a political assassination attempt by way of a twisting of reality to make it looks like something that it is not or never was.
His reasoning seems sound.
I’m not a Carson supporter. I support Trump first and Cruz second at this point.
However, I think Rush is correct on this.
I support Cruz first and then Trump, but I will not shoot down Carson. I think he has some significant weaknesses, but even my frontrunner does.
It's unbelievable the number of folks on another thread who are defending Politico and insisting that Carson is lying.....
It's not enough that the lying MSM is desperately trying to destroy our candidates but that people on our side of the aisle are piling on........
Media Matters??? Where am I, on dailykook or something?
Perfect then you would know someone who has offer potentially on the table from all the prestigious universities and one from West Pointe you don’t find it conceivable given the culture then that he’d select another route?
It provides yet another way to ID trolls, though.
Politico sucks.
Appointments are usually from a Congressional District where interviews are held by a Congressman. I grew up with the local West Point recruiter for Hampton and Newport News VA as a neighbor. Col. Farnsworth was an Academy grad. Carson admits he got into college on AA. AA is not West point types grades. Yes Carson did well after he got it. He is lying about WP.
No, I find it entirely conceivable that he would go Ivy League (which he did) and not go Military (which he didn’t do).
I find it conceivable that Westmoreland would offer him help getting into West Point and that it would go as far as phone calls and checking back.
It happens to athletic recruits probably every single year hundreds of times.
Taken in isolation, maybe so, but there is more that is not entirely clear about his past. My guess is he’s about to reap the whirlwind.
This had to come about. If he survives he’s in good shape. If not, his identity and reputation will be destroyed. He has directly challenged the media, so this is just getting started.
Welcome to presidential politics, Doctor. A lot is at stake and there are plenty of people more than willing to destroy you if they can.
I've worked with several service academy graduates who came from underprivileged families and they are probably the best people I've ever worked with.
All the rest of the media slugs will climb on board and pile on Carson too....
Amen to that.....Things have certainly changed around here since I first joined.
Carson went to his IVY league college on AA according to HIM.
You apparently never read his book or the article or his rebuttel. In fact the only thing you have read is POLITICO’s lies. Those you believed.
Pacifists don’t sign up to shoot people.
They have to go back to when he was in diapers to get any crap on him! Amazing how they can do that when they want to!!
See #46
Just because an inner city black got into Yale or Harvard on AA doesn’t mean he didn’t have exceptional grades.
It meant he needed Harvard/Yale to ignore that his daddy wasn’t rich or an alumni. H/Y are probably the most nepotistic universities in the nation in terms of entry.
Doubt they need to go much further than when he was “13 or 14”. The violence (or lack thereof) needs to be verified.
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