Carson ends presidential bid after far-from-super Tuesday results

Ben Carson told supporters today he is ending his bid for president. The retired neurosurgeon led a somewhat successful campaign for the Republican nomination throughout 2015, but fell out of favor with voters early this year. He failed to find equal footing with Sens. Marco Rubio of Florida or Ted Cruz of Texas in the race for second place.

“I do not see a path forward in light of last evening’s Super Tuesday results,” Carson said in a statement today. He will not participate in Thursday night’s debate on Fox News, but he does plan to give a speech at the Conservative Political Action Committee conference in Washington on Friday.

Carson, 64, dived into politics in 2013 as the keynote speaker at the National Prayer Breakfast, where he denounced political correctness and called for a flat income tax. His story of growing up in a poor, single-parent household in Detroit and becoming a world-famous neurosurgeon became an oft-cited conservative anecdote about personal responsibility. Prior to retiring and getting involved in politics, Carson conducted the first successful surgical separation of twins born conjoined at the head. Cuba Gooding Jr. played him in the movie adaptation of his memoir, Gifted Hands.

In early November 2015, Carson tied GOP front-runner Donald Trump for the top spot in GOP presidential polls at 24.8 percent. But his star fell faster than it rose. In late December and early January, internal feuds among his campaign staff boiled over into the media, and the resulting negative press signaled the beginning of the end of his campaign.

In the end, Carson’s soft-spoken, straight-talking persona was too much of a liability in this year’s bombastic race for the White House. The revelation that he didn’t properly attribute portions of a book he wrote to other sources, along with acknowledging he conducted research on cells from aborted babies, tarnished his golden-boy image, and he couldn’t compete with Trump for top billing as a political outsider. Like many presidential might-have-beens before him, Carson promised supporters today not to give up fighting for the changes he promised in his campaign.

“Along with millions of patriots who have supported my campaign for president, I will remain committed to saving future generations,” he said.