Rep. Steve King (R-Iowa) on Wednesday defended his decision to share information on the day of the Iowa caucuses that suggested Ben Carson might be dropping out of the presidential race.
“I thought I had an obligation to give people a chance to know,” King said on TheBlaze TV’s “Dana.”
{mosads}“I didn’t have any idea how anybody would even know that [information] information in time to change their judgment and their vote.”
On Monday night, King shared reports about Carson flying to Florida instead of the next primary states of New Hampshire and South Carolina, tweeting, “Carson looks like he is out.”
King, who backs Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) for president, argued that he was merely echoing what was being widely said on social media at the time.
“It was coming through on Twitter, over and over again,” King said of the rumors.
“When I first looked at it I said, ‘that’s not enough, that’s not enough.’ ”
“Then when we got the report that CNN had given that report … I said to my chief of staff, ‘I don’t want to spend any of the limited time I have, but the Carson team needs to know this,’ ” he added. “We can’t ask people to caucus and vote for a candidate who’s now [in] high likelihood that he’s dropping out.”
Cruz ended up winning the Iowa caucuses on Monday, while Carson finished fourth with around 10 percent of the vote.
In the aftermath, Carson ripped Cruz’s campaign as “very dishonest.”
Cruz vowed Wednesday he would not punish his staff for circulating the Carson report, though he has apologized for their actions.