Ben Carson, the retired pediatric neurosurgeon and writer of critically acclaimed book; Gifted hands and who also ended his own presidential bid last week, endorsed Donald J. Trump at a news conference on Friday at Mar-a-Lago, Mr. Trump’s club, calling him “actually a very intelligent man who cares deeply about America.”
In a move that looks straight out of a House of Cards script, Mr. Carson praised the Manhattan billionaire, saying, “There are two different Donald Trumps.”
“There’s the one you see on the stage, and there’s the one who’s very cerebral, sits there and considers things very carefully,” Carson said. “You can have a very good conversation with him. And that’s the Donald Trump that you’re going to start seeing more and more of right now.”
Ben Carson and Donald Trump had earlier clashed with the respected doctor comparing him to a child molester, questioning his religion, and calling him “super low energy”
This was put to Mr. Carson who responded, “We buried the hatchet — that was political stuff.”
“We move on,” he said.
But Mr. Trump also publicly defended Mr. Carson after the campaign of Senator Ted Cruz, Mr. Trump’s chief rival, spread false information that Mr. Carson was dropping out of the race before the Iowa caucuses.
And on Friday, Mr. Trump said he had attacked Mr. Carson during the campaign because “I couldn’t lose him, I couldn’t shake him, he did so well.”
“And I fought back and I hit him hard, which is politics and Ben understands that,” Mr. Trump said. “But he handled it with such dignity. I frankly thought it was amazing. I gained a lot respect for him.”
The support of Mr. Carson, a Seventh-day Adventist, could help Mr. Trump woo evangelical voters, who remain an important part of the Republican base. But Corey Lewandowski, Mr. Trump’s campaign manager, said that Mr. Trump himself has done well with evangelicals so far on his own.
Asked if Mr. Carson would be campaigning for Mr. Trump, and would be deployed to help him win over black voters, Mr. Lewandowski dismissed the question.
“I think Dr. Carson is going to campaign with Mr. Trump, but this campaign has been very clear about not trying to segregate out specific demographics to have a different message for,” he said. “I think what you have in this campaign is Mr. Trump talks to everybody exactly the same, and if Dr. Carson joins us on the campaign trail, we’re not going to delineate between African-Africans or white Americans or Hispanic Americans or Asian-Americans. We have the same message for everybody, which is make America great again.”
The endorsement has not gone down well with people and they have taken to their Twitter accounts to decry the development, some calling him a fraud and suggesting he wants the VP slot. The game of politics has always been about twists and turns, I believe we can expect a few more before the election is decided.