--- title: Ben Carson Defends Story of West Point Scholarship Offer description: Carson is facing heat for his 1992 autobiography Gifted Hands canonical: https://time.com/4103012/ben-carson-west-point/ author: Daniel White article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2015-11-06T17:42:01.000Z article:modified_time: 2023-12-13T23:11:14.000Z article:section: Politics og:title: Ben Carson Defends Story of West Point Scholarship Offer og:description: He faces questions over his 1992 autobiography Gifted Hands og:url: https://time.com/4103012/ben-carson-west-point/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltdfd7622e2e9c8c77/69886ff6428a9e5a9accffc0/ben-carson2.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 3000 og:image:height: 1688 og:image:alt: Ben Carson Book Signing og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Ben Carson Defends Story of West Point Scholarship Offer twitter:description: He faces questions over his 1992 autobiography Gifted Hands twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltdfd7622e2e9c8c77/69886ff6428a9e5a9accffc0/ben-carson2.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Ben Carson Defends Story of West Point Scholarship Offer > Sponsored content. 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It explains the politics, personalities and power dynamics behind the headlines, twice a week. #### Where can I get analysis of Washington politics by email? D.C. Brief is TIME's free Washington politics newsletter, available at time.com/newsletters. It is written by a TIME senior correspondent who covers the capital full time. #### Who writes TIME's D.C. Brief? Philip Elliott, a senior correspondent at TIME, writes D.C. Brief. #### Is D.C. Brief free? Yes. D.C. Brief is free at time.com/newsletters. ### Sources * TIME Newsletters: [time.com/newsletters](/c/time-nl-dcbrief-2026q3/newsletters?i=a7ff239f-b38a-4139-b7fd-03bcbf9e69f2&cr=time-nl-dcbrief-2026q3-v1) ## Video: Watch Ben Carson Retell His Life Story [Watch (HLS stream): Watch Ben Carson Retell His Life Story](https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/3PLzGzLI.m3u8) (1:39)  _Published 2015-10-27. GOP Presidential Candidate Ben Carson retells his life story_ by [Daniel White](https://time.com/author/daniel-white/) ## Daniel White Updated: Dec 13, 2023 11:11 PM UTCPublished: Nov 6, 2015 5:42 PM UTC by [Daniel White](https://time.com/author/daniel-white/) ## Daniel White Updated: Dec 13, 2023 11:11 PM UTCPublished: Nov 6, 2015 5:42 PM UTC Republican presidential candidate Ben Carson has long maintained that he was “offered a full scholarship to West Point,” while a high school student in Detroit. His campaign said on Friday that the offer was made informally by his high school ROTC leader, and that he never applied to attend the military school. “He was introduced to folks from West Point by his ROTC Supervisors,” Doug Watts, Carson’s communications director said in a statement. “They told him they could help him get an appointment based on his grades and performance in ROTC. He considered it but in the end did not seek admission.” The campaign statement was made in response to a story by [Politico](http://www.politico.com/story/2015/11/ben-carson-west-point-215598) scrutinizing past statements by Carson. In his autobiography, _Gifted Hands_, Carson writes that he as introduced “to General Westmoreland, and I had dinner with him and the Congressional Medal winners. Later I was offered a full scholarship to West Point.” He does not write in the book that he applied to the school. Students who are accepted to West Point, a U.S. Military Academy, do not pay tuition. The Politico story claimed that Carson had “fabricated” his “application and acceptance” into the U.S. Military Academy. \[Hours after the initial publication Friday, [Politico](http://www.politico.com/story/2015/11/ben-carson-west-point-215598) updated its story to remove the claim that Carson had fabricated his application and acceptance into West Point.\] “The Politico story is an outright lie,” Watts wrote in a statement. “Dr. Carson as the leading ROTC student in Detroit was told by his commanders that he could get an Appointment at the academy. He never said he was admitted or even applied.” Rival Republican candidate Donald Trump has already chimed in on Twitter. > [](https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/662672380561661952) **Read More:** [_How Ben Carson Went from Folk Hero to Conservative Rock Star_](http://time.com/4056213/ben-carson-gifted-hands/) _This story has been updated with a response from the Carson campaign and to reflect the change in the Politico story._ ## Transcript I was born and grew up very poor. Single parent home. But my mother was out working extraordinarily hard. Three jobs at a time. And she only had a third grade education. She had to take care of us. [ UNKNOWN ] poverty. I was a terrible student. A horrible student. Had a bad temper. As a teenager, I would go out to people with rocks and bricks and Baseball bats and hammers. Most of my classmates thought I was the stupidest person in the world. They called me dummy. I was the **** of all the jokes. When I was 14 and I tried to stab someone. My mother couldn't stand the fact that we were doing poorly in school. And she prayed and she asked God to give her wisdom. And you know what? God gave her the wisdom. Turning off the TV and making us read books and submit to her written book reports, which she couldn't read. I began to read about people of great accomplishment. I began to see that the person who has the most to do with what happens with you in life is you. Is you. You know, I loved anything that had to do with medicine. I even like going to the doctor's office. [ LAUGH ] And I would gladly sacrifice a shot just to be able to smell those alcohol swabs. And as a pediatric neurosurgeon who spent my entire career Working on the welfare of children. There had been many times when I've operated for 12, 15, 18, 20 hours. I'm the only one that separate Siamese twins. The only one to operate on babies while they were still in their mother's womb. The only one to take out half of a brain, although you would think, if you go to Washington, that someone had beat me to it. Ben Carson And I am a candidate for President of the United States. ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/4103012/ben-carson-west-point/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/4103012/ben-carson-west-point/"},"headline":"Ben Carson Defends Story of West Point Scholarship Offer","datePublished":"2015-11-06T17:42:01.000Z","dateModified":"2023-12-13T23:11:14.000Z","description":"Carson is facing heat for his 1992 autobiography Gifted Hands","url":"https://time.com/4103012/ben-carson-west-point/","keywords":["2016 Election","Dr. Benjamin S. 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