Republican presidential candidate Ben Carson described a time where he was held at gunpoint.
The retired neurosurgeon’s story comes as he faces a backlash over comments he made about the Oregon community college mass shooting suggesting that victims could have done more to fight back.
“I have had a gun held on me when I was in a Popeye’s organization” in Baltimore, Carson said in an interview with Karen Hunter on Sirius XM Radio, referring to the fried chicken fast-food chain. “Guy comes in, put the gun in my ribs. And I just said, ‘I believe that you want the guy behind the counter.'”
This seems to differ from his previous advice for dealing with potential shooters. On Fox News Tuesday, Carson said that if he had been present at the Oregon shooting, which left 10 dead, “not only would I probably not cooperate with him, I would not just stand there and let him shoot me.”
“I would say, ‘Everybody attack,'” Carson added. “‘He may shoot me, but he can’t get us all.'”
Mathew Downing, who survived the shooting at Umpqua Community College, criticized Carson’s answer. “I’m fairly upset he said that. Nobody could truly understand what actions they would take like that in a situation unless they lived it,” he told CNN via Facebook.
