On Wednesday afternoon, 2016 Presidential candidate and pediatric surgeon Dr. Ben Carson addressed thousands of people at a rally in Anaheim, California.
Much of Carson’s question and answer session touched significantly on his medical experience. His speech centered around his growing up in poverty with a supportive mother, border security, the debt, corporate tax suggestions, and getting those who didn’t vote in 2012 out to the polls in 2016.
Carson remarked that the most rewarding thing he has done is “when that family comes in and their three-year-old, who is the most precious thing in their life, has been diagnosed with an inoperable brain tumor and by the grace of God you have the ability to remove that tumor and give that family back hope.”
He also touched on sealing the border and illegal immigration. Carson recalled his recent trip to the U.S.-Mexico border and the lack of effective border fencing and Border Patrol to monitor. Breitbart News reported alongside Carson during his trip in late August.
“We have a porous border and we need to seal the border,” Carson told the Anaheim crowd. “It is an open highway for drug traffic, and heroin is just pouring into our country.” He continued, “We have the ability to shut those borders, not just the southern border, but all of those borders.”
Carson commented Tuesday at the Commonwealth Club regarding deporting illegal aliens: “It sounds really cool you know, ‘Let’s just round them all up and ship them back.’ People who say that have no idea what it would entail in terms of our legal system—the cost—forget about it. And plus, where are you going to send them? So that’s, you know, a double whammy.”
The 18-trillion-dollar debt is unfair, said Carson. “We do have a responsibility to the young people, to the next generation.” He spoke of the “fiscal gap” or unfunded liabilities.
“We have the highest corporate tax rates in the world, in the developed world. That’s absurd and it’s driving business out of this nation.” Carson suggested a tax holiday “as one of the first things in a Carson administration.” He suggested “repatriating” funds to be used for a 10% social program stimulus to “create jobs for people who are unemployed and on welfare.”
In 2012, 93 million people who could have voted didn’t vote. Millions and millions of evangelicals didn’t vote. You need to tell those people you know who fit in those categories that when you don’t vote, you are voting, but you’re voting for the other side,” Carson asserted.
During Q&A, Carson stated, “I certainly wouldn’t be making stupid deals with Iran.” He advocated for making the deal with Iran a “treaty. It fits all of the definitions of a treaty; it should be treated as a treaty, which would require two thirds of the Senate to approve it. Because it is not a treaty, it’s an executive deal, it has no standing once this President is gone.”
Responding to a question on strengthening the military, Carson spoke of veterans’ benefits. He noted the military suicide rate, advocated for enrolling members in a support program and “A year before their dispatch is planned, we should have people working on their transition so they are not unemployed when they come out. And they should have health savings accounts that are subsidized by the government and they should be able to go to any hospital or clinic they want to go to.”
Carson closed, “You can see why it is so important for we the people to be awake and not allow ourselves to be manipulated. Don’t let somebody tell you that that person next to you is your enemy just because you believe something different. It’s okay to have different beliefs. Okay. We’re still all Americans.” He finished, “We the people, it’s all about us.
The entire speech can be found on the C-SPAN website.
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