Ben Carson is dismissing suggestions that he would enter the White House ill-prepared to handle foreign policy challenges.
The Republican presidential candidate, 63, told reporters last weekend that he has read “a lot” to bone up on foreign policy and national security issues. The retired pediatric neurosurgeon also said that foreign policy experts have briefed him on an ongoing basis. Carson demurred when asked to name the books he’s read or the experts he’s consulted, other than to cite retired Army Major General Robert F. Dees as “one of my most regular people.”
“I will be certainly as ready as anybody else when foreign policy questions come up,” Carson told a scrum of reporters, while campaigning Saturday in Iowa.
The Carson campaign confirmed Dees’ role, telling the Washington Examiner that he conducts research and advises Carson on policy issues. Dees, 65, served as a brigadier general and a major general, and was vice director for operational plans and interoperability for the Department of Defense, officially retiring from the military in 2003.
Carson, the former director of pediatric neurosurgery at Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore, was renowned in his field and is among the most educated Republicans running for his party’s 2016 nomination. But Carson, who now lives in Florida, has never run for office or served in government. That, and stumbles in some interviews earlier this year, led to extra scrutiny of his knowledge of international affairs and national security policy.
Carson is likely to be tested in the upcoming GOP primary debates. The first one, hosted by Fox News Channel, is scheduled for Aug. 6. Carson should qualify. He has been holding his own in the polls, currently sitting in fourth place, with 9 percent, according to the latest RealClearPolitics average. Sen. Marco Rubio of Florida is ahead of him at 10.3 percent; Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky is behind him at 8.8 percent.
In recent days, there has been an exodus of staff from Carson’s campaign team. Some political observers have described it as the result of a campaign that has lost its footing. But Carson said that the moves were part of a carefully orchestrated strategy to move certain advisors from his official campaign to a super PAC supporting his candidacy.
Indeed, a Republican election lawyer confirmed that federal law requires political operatives who leave a campaign to go to a super PAC to observe a 120-day cooling off period. So, the departed Carson staffers are not allowed to begin work for his super PAC for four months. Carson dismissed the story as “yellow journalism” and said suggestions that his campaign is in chaos are ridiculous.
“The people who exited, that was a plan to exit when we transitioned from an exploratory committee to a campaign and they have to be separated from a campaign for a requisite amount of time before they can pursue other things,” he said. “Things are going as smoothly as they possibly can … If this is what chaos is, bring it on.”
Disclosure: The author’s wife works as an adviser to Scott Walker.
