Ben Carson jokes his mother would've 'shot some of the dishonest reporters' covering his campaign

Ben Carson joked that his mother would&#039;ve &quot;shot some of the dishonest reporters&quot; covering his campaign for the presidency.

(Image credit: SAUL LOEB/AFP/Getty Images)

published 29 June 2016

Ben Carson is certain that his mother would not have taken kindly to how "dishonest reporters" covered his bid for the Republican presidential nomination earlier this year. In fact, in response to a question on CBS Radio's Brown and Scoop podcast about what his mom, Sonya, would've thought about her son running for president, Carson said Wednesday he thinks she might have chosen to exercise her Second Amendment rights.

"She has Alzheimer's," Carson said, correcting the question's implication that his mother was dead. "She's not really cognizant of that, which is a good thing because my mother is really a fighter. She probably would have taken a gun and gone out and shot some of the dishonest reporters."

In case that quote doesn't make it clear, Carson seems to think that the media was one of the reasons his campaign ended when it did. He pointed out that "one of the reasons that our founders said that our system and our freedom depends on a well-informed and educated populace is because they recognize that if people were not well-informed and well-educated, they can be easily manipulated by a dishonest media." Carson concluded: "That's exactly what happens in our society today."