Ben Carson’s Republican presidential campaign says he was never accepted to the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, but in an Oct. 9 interview with CBS’s Charlie Rose, Carson told a different story. (Reuters) 
 
 Ben Carson’s Republican presidential campaign says he was never accepted to the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, but in an Oct. 9 interview with CBS’s Charlie Rose, Carson told a different story. (Reuters) 
 
 Republican presidential candidate Ben Carson — now making the transition from living legend to scrutinized candidate — faced new questions Friday about the way he tells his powerful life story. 
 
 For years, Carson has said he was offered a “full scholarship” to the U.S. Military Academy when he was a high-achieving high school Army ROTC cadet in the late 1960s. But Carson never applied to West Point, was never accepted and never received a formal scholarship offer. In fact, West Point does not offer scholarships; all cadets attend free. 
 
 The story was first reported Friday by Politico. Carson responded to the resulting controversy by saying that when he spoke of an “offer,” he referred to informal, verbal statements of encouragement from military leaders he met through the ROTC, the Reserve Officers’ Training Corps . 
 
 “I was told that because of my accomplishments, they would be able to manage to get me into West Point and that I wouldn’t have to pay anything,” Carson said on the Christian Broadcasting Network. He said he decided not to apply and went to Yale University instead to pursue medicine. “There was no application process [at West Point]. I never even started down that path,” Carson said. 
 
 Carson’s campaign cast the episode as new evidence of persecution of the candidate by the news media. Tension between Carson and the media came to a boil Friday night in Florida, where at a combative news conference the candidate asked why President Obama had not been subjected to such scrutiny. 
 
 After questions of Republican presidential candidate Ben Carson's past came under question, Carson said the media is "getting desperate" while at a news conference in Florida on Friday, Nov. 6. (Reuters) 
 
 “The words ‘a scholarship was offered’ were a big deal, but the president of the United States’ academic records being sealed is not?” he said. 
 
 The original Politico report declared that Carson had “fabricated” a story about “his application and acceptance” at West Point. It also claimed that the candidate had “admitted” the fabrication. 
 
 Carson’s campaign vehemently denied those statements. 
 
 [Ben Carson’s first foray into politics, on both sides of a 1992 abortion battle] 
 
 The Politico story seemed to mischaracterize a small but key detail in the way Carson has told the story. In many cases, Carson implied only that he received a formal offer from West Point. He never said explicitly that he had been accepted or even that he had applied. 
 
 “It gives journalism a bad name,” said Armstrong Williams, Carson’s close friend and business manager. “It only fits into Dr. Carson’s narrative of a witch hunt” by the media. 
 
 By mid-afternoon, Politico posted a new version of its story that no longer included the wording that Carson had “fabricated” a part of his biography. Later in the day, the news site posted an editor’s note stating that the story should have made clear that Carson never claimed to have applied for admission to West Point. 
 
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 “We continue to stand by the story,” Politico spokeswoman Lauren Edmonds said in a statement. “We updated it to reflect Ben Carson’s on the record response to the New York Times and other new details, which underscore the validity of our original reporting.” 
 
 As the day went on, conservative media voices chimed in to agree with Carson. “It’s almost like the Politico is the official leak machine for the Republican establishment,” Rush Limbaugh said on his syndicated radio show. Radio host and blogger Erick Erickson replaced an entire post about “the beginning of Ben Carson’s end” with one about a “demonstrably false” Politico report. 
 
 Carson, 64, achieved worldwide fame for his daring surgeries at Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore and for his story of rising out of poverty in southwest Detroit. This week, as Carson has challenged Donald Trump for the lead in the Republican presidential primary contest, there has been a new focus on Carson’s personal beliefs and on the way he tells his life story. 
 
 First, the Web site BuzzFeed posted a 17-year-old video of a commencement speech in which Carson offers an alternative theory about why the ancient Egyptians built the pyramids. In Carson’s telling, they were not built to be tombs, as historians and archeologists say. Instead, they were built for grain storage, in keeping with the biblical story of Joseph, in which the patriarch counseled the pharaoh to store up grain for years of famine. 
 
 Carson told CBS News this week that he still believes that the pyramids were granaries, saying the proof was in sealed chambers inside the structures. “You would need that if you were trying to preserve grain for a long period of time,” he said. 
 
 [Ben Carson believes Joseph built Egypt’s pyramids to store grain] 
 
 Then, CNN sought to verify a key part of Carson’s life story: that, as a young man in Detroit, he had committed acts of violence, including smashing a boy’s nose with a thrown rock, attempting to stab a friend in the abdomen and threatening his own mother with a hammer during an argument. 
 
 CNN interviewed nine people who knew Carson during his childhood and who said that the violent incidents did not fit their recollections of him. 
 
 Carson said CNN did not speak with the right people. “I was generally a nice person,” he told the network. “It’s just that I had a very bad temper. So unless you were the victim of that temper, why would you know?” 
 
 It was an unusually odd situation: a presidential candidate insisting, in the face of skepticism, that he really did have a history of violence. 
 
 The part of Carson’s life at issue Friday — the “offer” he got, or did not get, from West Point — is a story that Carson has told repeatedly in books, interviews and speeches. 
 
 He tells it in the context of his rapid rise through high school Army ROTC, which ended with him as the top-ranking cadet in Detroit. 
 
 “I was offered a full scholarship to West Point,” Carson wrote in his 1990 memoir, “Gifted Hands.” “I didn’t refuse the scholarship outright, but I let them know that a military career wasn’t where I saw myself going. As overjoyed as I felt to be offered such a scholarship, I wasn’t really tempted. The scholarship would have obligated me to spend four years in military service after I finished college, precluding my chances to go on to medical school.” 
 
 In that account and others, Carson seems to rely on loose, broad definitions for the words “offer” and “scholarship.” 
 
 In fact, applicants to West Point must be sponsored by a member of Congress or the secretary of the Army. If accepted, they attend tuition-free: There are no “scholarships” at West Point beyond the benefits that all cadets get. 
 
 Doug Watts, a spokesman for Carson’s campaign, said Carson never completed the process for acceptance by West Point and never had an official sponsor. Indeed, in “Gifted Hands,” Carson makes clear that he actually applied only to one school: Yale. 
 
 “Each college required a ten-dollar non-returnable entrance fee sent with the application,” Carson wrote. “I had exactly ten dollars, so I could apply only to one.” 
 
 Still, his campaign spokesman said, it was proper to say Carson had an “offer” of a scholarship because military leaders had told him that his acceptance would be a sure thing. 
 
 “He was told by the ROTC commander that he could have an appointment,” Watts said. “Dr. Carson rejected the offer, did not apply or pursue admission. Had he done so, and been accepted, that would have been tantamount to a scholarship, the same that all cadets receive.” 
 
 In one of his books, Carson also made a similar claim about a scholarship offer from another school. 
 
 “The University of Michigan had offered me a scholarship, but I wanted to go farther from home,” he wrote in his 1999 book, “The Big Picture.” 
 
 A spokesman for the University of Michigan, Rick Fitzgerald, said he could not confirm that account. The university no longer has records from that time. Carson’s camp said the scenario was similar to that involving West Point: He had decided to apply elsewhere and never submitted an application. 
 
 Alice Crites and Robert Samuels contributed to this report. ||||| Washington (CNN) Ben Carson spent much of Friday aggressively rebutting media reports about his past -- a striking departure from the mellow personality he has displayed on the campaign trail. 
 
 "There is a desperation on behalf of some to try to find ways to tarnish me because they've been looking through everything, they have been talking to everybody I've ever known, everybody I've ever seen," Carson told reporters at a media availability in Florida. 
 
 "'There's got to be a scandal. There's got to be some nurse he's had an affair with. There's got to be something.' They have gotten desperate," Carson continued. "Next week, it will be my kindergarten teacher who said I peed in my pants. It's ridiculous. But it's OK because I totally expect it." 
 
 Carson's personal narrative -- a centerpiece of his campaign and star power -- has long revolved around his accounts of his violent past and descriptions of the healing powers of his faith. 
 
 In a story published on Thursday, CNN reported that childhood friends of Carson were surprised about violent incidents he has described in a book, public speeches and interviews and had no recollection of such events. Scott Glover and Maeve Reston spoke with nine friends, classmates and neighbors who grew up with Carson, and none had any memory of the anger or violence the candidate has described. 
 
 Friday morning on CNN's "New Day," he said the network's reporting of his past was a "bunch of lies." 
 
 "This is a bunch of lies, that is what it is," Carson told Alisyn Camerota when she asked about the report by Glover and Reston in which they spoke to people Carson grew up with. "This is a bunch of lies attempting to say I'm lying about my history. I think it's pathetic, and basically what the media does is they try to get you distracted." 
 
 Photos: Ben Carson's career in politics Photos: Ben Carson's career in politics Ben Carson attends the National Action Network (NAN) national convention at the Sheraton New York Times Square Hotel on April 8, 2015, in New York City. Hide Caption 1 of 13 Photos: Ben Carson's career in politics Carson speaks during the 41st annual Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) at the Gaylord International Hotel and Conference Center on March 8, 2014, in National Harbor, Maryland. Hide Caption 2 of 13 Photos: Ben Carson's career in politics Carson speaks to guests at the Iowa Freedom Summit on January 24, 2015, in Des Moines, Iowa. Hide Caption 3 of 13 Photos: Ben Carson's career in politics Carson is surrounded by supporters as he waits to be interviewed at the annual Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) at National Harbor, Maryland, outside Washington on February 26, 2015. Hide Caption 4 of 13 Photos: Ben Carson's career in politics Carson speaks at the South Carolina Tea Party Coalition convention on January 18, 2015, in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina. A variety of conservative presidential hopefuls spoke at the gathering on the second day of a three-day event. Hide Caption 5 of 13 Photos: Ben Carson's career in politics Carson delivers the keynote address at the Wake Up America gala event on September 5, 2014, in Scottsdale, Arizona. Hide Caption 6 of 13 Photos: Ben Carson's career in politics Carson speaks during the 41st annual Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) at the Gaylord International Hotel and Conference Center on March 8, 2014, in National Harbor, Maryland. Hide Caption 7 of 13 Photos: Ben Carson's career in politics Carson speaks during the National Prayer Breakfast at the Washington Hilton on February 7, 2013, in Washington. Hide Caption 8 of 13 Photos: Ben Carson's career in politics Honoree and director of pediatric neurosurgery at Johns Hopkins University, Carson poses with actor James Pickens Jr. at the Jackie Robinson Foundation Annual Awards Dinner on March 16, 2009, in New York City. Hide Caption 9 of 13 Photos: Ben Carson's career in politics Before his jump into conservative politics, Carson was known for his work as a neurosurgeon. Carson was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom by then-President George W. Bush on June 19, 2008. At that time, he was the director of pediatric surgery at Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore, Maryland. Hide Caption 10 of 13 Photos: Ben Carson's career in politics In a story that garnered international attention, Carson was ready to separate a pair of 10-year-old Indian girls, Saba and Farah Shakeel, who are joined at the head in New Delhi, India. Here, he addresses a press conference at the Indraprashtra Apollo Hospital on October 4, 2005. Hide Caption 11 of 13 Photos: Ben Carson's career in politics Carson and a team of 20 specialists approved the procedure after studying the girls' brains; however, their parents were worried about their daughters' lives and did not give doctors permission to operate. The surgery did not happen. Hide Caption 12 of 13 Photos: Ben Carson's career in politics Carson observes the start of neurosurgery proceedings at the Raffles Hospital in Singapore on July 6, 2003. Carson and Dr. Keith Goh, left, performed a complex operation that was unsuccessful to separate 29-year-old twins Ladan And Laleh Bijani, who were joined at the head. Hide Caption 13 of 13 
 
 Camerota pushed back on Carson's argument that the reporters did not talk to people who knew him earlier than high school, but Carson rejected that and launched into an aggressive attack on the media. He accused the media of not scrutinizing President Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton to the same degree. 
 
 "The vetting that you all did with President Obama doesn't even come close, doesn't even come close to what you guys are trying to do in my case, and you're just going to keep going back, 'He said this 12 years ago' -- it is just garbage," Carson said. "Give me a break." 
 
 Reston and Glover repeatedly approached the Carson campaign during their reporting and again before publication of the story. But the campaign staff declined to comment or to assist them in locating classmates or victims of violence who could provide insights about Carson's past. 
 
 On "New Day," Carson did not explain which aspects of the story he feels are incorrect. 
 
 CNN's story pointed out that none of the people interviewed challenged the veracity of his accounts, but said they were surprised at them and did not reflect the youth that they knew. 
 
 Meanwhile, Politico published a story midday Friday claiming that the Carson campaign admitted that he "fabricated" an account of applying and being admitted to West Point -- a headline the outlet later softened. 
 
 Friday night, Carson told reporters that the piece was a "bold-faced lie." 
 
 In his autobiography, Carson did not explicitly say he applied to the school. 
 
 "Afterward, Sgt. Hunt introduced me to General (William) Westmoreland, and I had dinner with him and the Congressional Medal winners. Later I was offered a full scholarship to West Point. I didn't refuse the scholarship outright, but I let them know that a military career wasn't where I saw myself going," Carson wrote. 
 
 Carson himself acknowledged in an interview with The New York Times that the scholarship offer was "informal." 
 
 "It was, you know, an informal 'with a record like yours we could easily get you a scholarship to West Point,'" he said. 
 
 Armstrong Williams, Carson's business manager, said earlier in the day that the candidate has "always been clear that he never applied. He gracefully let them know that medicine was his calling." 
 
 "It's clear that what the Politico writer, with what he was trying to gain with the headline, did not substantiate it with his article," Williams told CNN's Wolf Blitzer. 
 
 Politico also reported that West Point would have a record of whether he applied in 1969. But West Point spokeswoman Theresa Brinkerhoff told CNN there would be no records about Carson's interaction with the school unless he actually enrolled. Files on potential cadets from that time would have only been kept three years unless the person became a student, she said. 
 
 "No matter what at this point, because the records were so many years ago, we wouldn't have anything on him," she said. 
 
 While an official letter of admission would have come from the adjutant general of the Army, who was not Westmoreland, she said it was common for top military officials to recruit the best and brightest high school students. And she said she could imagine that the school's lack of tuition -- as a federally funded institution -- could have been communicated or interpreted as a scholarship. 
 
 "I wouldn't find that odd, that a general would pursue a discussion to kind of talk to him and say, 'Do you know what West Point would offer you?' And if you're using general terminology to a 17-year-old, I could see how you would call them scholarships. We don't use that terminology, (but) I could see how that could occur," Brinkerhoff said. 
 
 Speaking at a gala for the Black Republican Caucus of South Florida in Palm Beach Gardens Friday night, Carson was reflective on the "dirty world" of politics. 
 
 "A lot of times people say, 'Why would someone who has had a wonderful career get involved in the dirty world of politics?' I frequently ask myself that when I wake up in the morning. It is a dirty world," Carson said. 
 
 He did not mention the scrutiny on him during the remainder of the speech, but briefly alluded to how he is more forcefully pushing back now. 
 
 "A lot of people think that I'm soft because I'm quiet. I think they're starting to find out that I'm not soft. And that I can be loud, particularly when the injustice is being done," he said.
– Ben Carson is not enjoying the level of scrutiny he is receiving from the media—and he certainly doesn't remember Barack Obama receiving the same degree of "vetting" when he was running for president. He called the media "desperate" at a Friday conference, accusing reporters of talking to just about everybody he ever met in a quest to tarnish him. "There's got to be a scandal. There's got to be some nurse he's had an affair with. There's got to be something. They have gotten desperate," he said, per CNN. "Next week, it will be my kindergarten teacher who said I peed in my pants. It's ridiculous. But it's OK because I totally expect it," he said, adding that he remembers "quite the opposite" happening with Obama. Carson took issue with a Friday Politico report that he had "fabricated" a claim to have been offered a "full scholarship" to West Point, calling the story a "bold-faced" lie. The Politico story was later updated to soften the accusation, which centered on what Carson's campaign says was an informal offer, the Washington Post reports. "The words 'a scholarship was offered' were a big deal, but the president of the United States’ academic records being sealed is not," Carson said. He also rejected a CNN story casting doubt on violent incidents he described in biography Gifted Hands, which the Post notes has created the odd situation of "a presidential candidate insisting, in the face of skepticism, that he really did have a history of violence." (Carson's unusual theory about Egypt's great pyramids also attracted a lot of attention this week.)