Here’s What Happened When Ben Carson Was Actually Confronted by a Dangerous Gunman

“I believe you want the guy behind the counter.”

<a href=http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/2016-GOP-Carson/2b8b0e69e2594e79a73db10a15d05295/39/1>Butch Dill</a>/AP

Get your news from a source that’s not owned and controlled by oligarchs. Sign up for the free Mother Jones Daily.


Since last week’s mass shooting in Oregon, GOP presidential candidate Ben Carson has made a series of eyebrow-raising comments.

On Monday, he wrote on Facebook, “I never saw a body with bullet holes that was more devastating than taking the right to arm ourselves away.”

On Tuesday, he appeared on Fox & Friends, where he seemed to suggest that the victims of the Umpqua Community College shooting should have responded differently to the heavily armed gunman. “Not only would I probably not cooperate with him, I would not just stand there and let him shoot me,” Carson said. “I would say, ‘Hey guys, everybody attack him. He may shoot me, but he can’t get us all.'” (Carson was apparently unaware of the story of Chris Mintz, an army veteran who did block the door between the shooter and a classroom full of people, suffering several gunshot wounds and two broken legs in the process.)

On Wednesday, Carson doubled down on these controversial comments in an interview with CBS This Morning. “I would ask everybody to attack the gunman because he can only shoot one of us at a time,” he said. “That way, we don’t all wind up dead.”

That brings us to Wednesday evening, when Carson appeared on a radio show and described an actual episode in which he was faced with a gunman. In Carson’s telling, he responded quite differently in this real-life scenario than he said he would have reacted if faced with a possible shooter. “I have had a gun held on me when I was in a Popeye’s in Baltimore,” Carson told Sirius XM’s Karen Hunter. “[A] guy comes in, put the gun in my ribs. And I just said, ‘I believe you want the guy behind the counter.'”

Perhaps unsurprisingly, the Twittersphere pounced:

It makes you wonder what Carson really would have done had he been in that classroom, staring down the barrel of a gun. Clearly, he would definitely not “just stand there.”

BEFORE YOU CLICK AWAY!

“Lying.” “Disgusting.” “Scum.” “Slime.” “Corrupt.” “Enemy of the people.” Donald Trump has always made clear what he thinks of journalists. And it’s plain now that his administration intends to do everything it can to stop journalists from reporting things they don’t like—which is most things that are true.

No one gets to tell Mother Jones what to publish or not publish, because no one owns our fiercely independent newsroom. But that also means we need to directly raise the resources it takes to keep our journalism alive. There’s only one way for that to happen, and it’s readers like you stepping up. Please help with a donation today if you can—even a few bucks will make a real difference. A monthly gift would be incredible.

payment methods

BEFORE YOU CLICK AWAY!

“Lying.” “Disgusting.” “Scum.” “Slime.” “Corrupt.” “Enemy of the people.” Donald Trump has always made clear what he thinks of journalists. And it’s plain now that his administration intends to do everything it can to stop journalists from reporting things they don’t like—which is most things that are true.

No one gets to tell Mother Jones what to publish or not publish, because no one owns our fiercely independent newsroom. But that also means we need to directly raise the resources it takes to keep our journalism alive. There’s only one way for that to happen, and it’s readers like you stepping up. Please help with a donation today if you can—even a few bucks will make a real difference. A monthly gift would be incredible.

payment methods

We Recommend

Latest

Sign up for our free newsletter

Subscribe to the Mother Jones Daily to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox.

Get our award-winning magazine

Save big on a full year of investigations, ideas, and insights.

Subscribe

Support our journalism

Help Mother Jones' reporters dig deep with a tax-deductible donation.

Donate