Political sabotage: Ted Cruz pleads GUILTY to wronging Ben Carson at Iowa caucus

''It was a mistake...I apologize to Ben...''

In a shocking admission, Ted Cruz admits his staff spread rumors of Ben Carson dropping out of the runnings just before the Iowa caucus voting began.

LOS ANGELES, CA (Catholic Online) - As previously reported, the Iowa caucus was filled with surprises that included rumors of foul play.

On Tuesday, those rumors were confirmed.

Daily Mail reported Cruz's admission that his campaign did Carson wrong prior to Monday's Iowa caucus.

Cruz's people used "shameless tactics and dirty political plays" to push Carson out of the race entirely in what can only be called political sabotage.

Carson accused Cruz's workers of "tweeting, texting and telling precinct captains to announce that [he] had suspended [his] campaign - in some cases asking caucus goers to change their votes."

Emails sent by Cruz's digital marketing specialist Spence Rogers just before and after the Iowa caucus was set to begin and end, were sent to Iowa Cruz supporters - with the titles "Carson Likely to Drop Out" and "CNN Reporting Ben Carson Will Stop Campaigning After Iowa."

The first message included the request, "Please inform any Carson caucus goers of this news and urge them to caucus for Ted Cruz."

The second read: "CNN is reporting that Ben Carson will stop campaigning after Iowa. Make sure to tell all of your peers at the caucus supporting Carson that they should coalesce around the true conservative who will be in the race for the long haul: TED CRUZ!"

In an interview with radio host Jeff Kuhner on WRKO AM-680, Cruz claimed his people didn't realize they were spreading a false report and when they realized it was just a rumor, they chose to do nothing rather than correct the record.

The rumors began when CNN reporter Chris Moody wrote "Carson won't go to NH/SC, but instead will head home to Florida for some R&R. He'll be in DC Thursday for the National Prayer Breakfast."

When Moody later clarified, "Ben Carson's campaign tells me he plans to stay in the race beyond Iowa no matter what the results are tonight." Unfortunately, Cruz's campaign never bothered to note the amendment.

"Yesterday when CNN reported and put up a post that Carson was not continuing on to New Hampshire, was not continuing on to South Carolina, but instead was flying home to Florida, our political team forwarded that story to our supporters," Cruz admitted. 

He continued, saying: "What the team didn't do is, subsequently the Carson campaign put out a statement clarifying that he was not suspending his campaign. And the team did not forward that statement to the supporters as well. That was a mistake. It was a mistake for us not to have forwarded the second statement as well, and I apologize to Ben for our not forwarding that second installment."

Carson's spokeswoman, Deana Bass, told Daily Mail that Carson accepted the apology.
Carson told Bill O'Reilly on Tuesday that he "talked to Cruz earlier today and he says that he didn't know anything about what the campaign did in terms of contacting precincts, telling people that I was dropping out, that a vote for me was a wasted vote.

"I have to accept his word that he didn't know, 'cause he said if he had known he would have not agreed with such a thing." 

Though Carson accepted Cruz's apology, the damage is done and he can only hope that Cruz corrects his campaign.

"A culture exists within the Cruz camp that would allow people to take advantage of a situation like this in a very dishonest way," Carson stated. "Isn't this the same thing we see with the Obama administration, the IRS scandal - no responsibility. 

"Let's see what in fact the Cruz campaign will do about those individuals who inappropriately disseminated this information knowing that the caucuses were not over - they were awfully anxious to get it out there weren't they?"

Carson's spokeswoman, Deana Bass, told Daily Mail that "the fact that the Cruz campaign received Dr. Carson's statement and chose not to correct their false statements says it all."

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