Republican presidential front-runner Donald Trump said Wednesday the contest for the 2016 GOP presidential nomination is starting to look like a two-man race between himself and retired neurosurgeon Ben Carson and that he might have to start going after Mr. Carson even though the doctor has been nice to him.
A Fox News poll released Tuesday had Mr. Trump in the lead at 24 percent, with Mr. Carson right behind him at 23 percent.
“He’s been getting a lot of ink on the Muslims and other things, and I guess people look at that and they probably like it,” Mr. Trump said on ABC’s “Good Morning America.” “Some people thought they wouldn’t like it, but they probably do.”
Mr. Carson suggested recently that he would not advocate that a Muslim serve as president of the United States, but that he would be willing to support anyone as long as they put the country and the Constitution ahead of their religion.
Mr. Trump said Mr. Carson is a “good guy” and a “nice guy.”
“So many of the others are way down. It’s really amazing,” Mr. Trump said. “It looks like a two-man race.”
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The next-closest competitor in the poll was Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas at 10 percent.
Mr. Trump said the gloves are probably going to have to come off eventually.
“Which I actually look forward to doing,” he said of Mr. Carson. “I can’t do it, though. He’s been so nice to me. … I can’t do it.”
He said there are lot of issues to take on, including experience.
“I mean, Ben is a doctor and that’s what he’s been doing and the question is, is he capable of negotiating with China and Russia and Iran and all of the things you have to do and, you know, there’ll be a lot of things, but I think at this moment I’m not going to go into ’em, but there will be a lot of things having to do with capacity, having to do with experience,” Mr. Trump said.
• David Sherfinski can be reached at dsherfinski@washingtontimes.com.
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