Presidential candidate Dr. Ben Carson took CNN to task for bringing up incidents from his past that might or might not have happened. He took issue with CNN for alleging his claims of being a violent teen are untrue.
Carson claimed in his autobiography, "Gifted Hands," that he was a violent teenager who grew up in Detroit with a "pathological temper.'' Carson said in his memoir that he stabbed a classmate when he was in high school. However, friends who grew up with Carson claim he was never violent, according to CNN. "I don't know nothing about that," said Gerald Ware, a former classmate of Carson's. "It would have been all over the whole school."
Carson accused the cable network of ruining his reputation. "There is a desperation on behalf of some to try to find ways to tarnish me because they've been looking through everything, they have been talking to everybody I've ever known, everybody I've ever seen," Carson said, according to CNN.
Carson is also under fire for making claims that he turned down a scholarship to the U.S. Military Academy at West Point. Carson neither applied to the university nor declined admission, according to Politico.
In a recent interview, Carson said that the offer to attend West Point was not an official one. "I don't remember all the specific details," he said. "It was, you know, an informal 'with a record like yours, we could easily get you a scholarship to West Point,'" according to The New York Times.
Despite the controversy, Carson is still a presidential front-runner. He is right behind Donald Trump with 23 percent of support from Republican primary voters, according to Fox News.
