Ben Carson blows up and threatens to leave GOP over report of potential anti-Trump effort by party leaders
Republican presidential candidate Ben Carson released a fiery statement on
Friday denouncing a reported meeting attended by his party's top leaders earlier in the week.
"If the leaders of the Republican Party want to destroy the party, they should continue to hold meetings like the one described in the Washington Post this morning," Carson said.
The retired neurosurgeon even threatened to leave the GOP, referencing front-runner Donald Trump's own threats to run as an independent.
"If this was the beginning of a plan to subvert the will of the voters and replace it with the will of the political elite, I assure you Donald Trump will not be the only one leaving the party," Carson said.
The Washington Post reported on Thursday that a number of Republican officials, including Republican National Committee Chairman Reince Priebus and US Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Kentucky), had a dinner on Monday where they discussed how the party would handle a so-called brokered convention.
Brokered conventions are rare, as a candidate typically secures a majority of the delegates needed in the primary to secure each party's presidential nomination. But with a deep bench of GOP candidates, some party leaders are reportedly preparing for such a scenario.
"Our goal is to ensure a successful nomination and that requires us thinking through every scenario, including a contested convention," RNC spokesman Sean Spicer told The Post.
The Post report was also explosive because unnamed "longtime power brokers" also discussed organizing an anti-Trump effort should the real-estate mogul still be dominant after the primary contests. Priebus and McConnell were reportedly silent during this part of the meeting, and Spicer said that the national party is officially "neutral."
Trump has created deep divisions within the Republican Party about his candidacy. On Monday, the day of the Republican meeting, Trump drew the most backlash yet byprovocatively proposing to stop virtually all Muslims from entering the US, including immigrants and tourists.
But Carson was clearly unhappy that the Monday meeting even took place.
"I pray that the report in the Post this morning was incorrect," he said in the Friday statement. "If it is correct, every voter who is standing for change must know they are being betrayed. I won't stand for it."
He continued:
This process is the one played out by our party. If the powerful try to manipulate it, the Republican National Convention in Cleveland next summer may be the last convention. I am prepared to lose fair and square, as I am sure is Donald. But I will not sit by and watch a theft. I intend on being the nominee. If I am not, the winner will have my support. If the winner isn’t our nominee then we have a massive problem. My campaign is about "We the People" not "They the Powerful."
After Carson unloaded on the RNC, Spicer suggested that the candidate was overreacting to a fairly mundane meeting.
"I say to Dr. Carson: Don't worry, your prayers have been answered," the RNC spokesman said on CNN. "There was a dinner where the subject was how the delegate-selection process worked. ... And at the end of that dinner, there were a lot of questions asked."
View the RNC's response below:
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