Sen. Ted Cruz apologized to fellow Republican presidential candidate Ben Carson Saturday night for his campaign’s efforts during the night of the Iowa caucuses to convince voters that Carson was dropping out of the race.
The Texas senator blamed the situation on the media, though, saying it was an honest mistake by his staffers caused by an erroneous CNN news alert.
“When this transpired I apologized to him then and I do so again now: Ben, I am sorry,” Cruz said during Saturday night’s debate on ABC.
Carson has fumed about the incident, calling it “deceitful behavior” on the part of the Cruz’s campaign.
Asked about the incident by moderators at, Carson said that he was “very disappointed” that members of Cruz’s staff “thought so little of me” that they thought he would have dropped out at that point in the race while the caucus was still ongoing.
“To think that I would just walk away 10 minutes before the caucus and say, ‘Forget about you guys.’ I mean, who would do something that?” Carson asked, adding that it was an example of “certain types Washington ethics: If it is is legal, you do what you need to do in order to win.”
Cruz strained to make the case that it was honest mistake, noting that CNN had reported Monday evening that Carson was taking a break from campaigning and not going directly from Iowa to New Hampshire. “My staff saw that CNN report and forwarded it to our volunteers,” adding, “I knew nothing about this.” He conceded that his campaign did not forward a subsequent statement from Carson’s campaign clarifying that he was not dropping out, saying they were unaware of it.
“I wished they had. That’s why I appologized,” Cruz said.
Carson noted that the initial news from CNN was followed by a second alert from the network clarifying that he was not dropping. “So what happened to that one is unclear,” Carsion said. “The bottom line is everyone can see what happened and make their own judgments.”
