CNN Report Claims Ted Cruz ‘Lies’ About Its Carson Reporting — Then Dials It Back

CNN on Saturday night published a report claiming that Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) “lies” about the network’s reporting on Ben Carson’s trip to Florida following the Iowa caucuses, but the outlet quickly changed the post’s headline to remove the word “lies.”

The initial headline on the piece by media reporter Dylan Byers read, “Ted Cruz lies about CNN at Republican debate.” The network then changed the headline to read, “Ted Cruz is wrong about CNN’s reporting.”

During the Saturday night Republican Debate, Cruz claimed that CNN failed to correct a report about Carson’s break from the campaign trail after the Iowa caucuses.

“CNN reported that Ben was not going from Iowa to New Hampshire or South Carolina,” Cruz said. “They didn’t correct that story until 9:15 that night, so, from 6:30 p.m. to 9:15, that’s what CNN was reporting. Subsequent to that initial report, Ben’s campaign put out a statement saying that he was not suspending his campaign.”

According to the CNN report, Cruz’s claims about the network’s reporting “are false” and he “knowingly misstated” the facts.

“In fact, CNN never reported nor implied that Carson was going to suspend his campaign, as Cruz’s campaign did. And the fact that Cruz reverted to this excuse during Saturday night’s debate was especially notable because Cruz had walked back his accusations against the network earlier this week and said, ‘CNN got it right,'” Byers wrote. “Essentially the Cruz campaign ignored the inconvenient part of CNN’s original report — that Carson was not dropping out of the race.”

According to a timeline constructed by TPM, Carson’s campaign clarified that he was not suspending his campaign shortly after CNN reported that Carson was heading home for several days.