Ben Carson to 'Many' Voters Writing in His Name: Don't Vote for Me, Cast Vote That Counts
Former Republican presidential candidate Ben Carson has asked Americans not to write in his name on the presidential ballot on Election Day Tuesday, and instead cast a vote for a candidate that has a realistic chance to win.
"Dear friends, it's come to my attention that many people around the country are writing my name in on the presidential ballot. Please don't waste your vote. Please reconsider and make sure you cast a vote that really will count. Thank you. We must save our country," read Carson's Facebook page. Carson is backing Republican nominee Donald Trump for president.
The retired neurosurgeon also linked to an op-ed of his in the Independent Journal Review, where he listed a number of the biggest problems facing the country in his view, from the size of the government to health care.
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He suggested that the election is not really about the various controversies surrounding Trump, but to standing up to the "political elites."
"It is about whether we want to continue on the downward spiral fueled by corruption or whether we are willing to break the bonds of political correctness and refuse to be manipulated by the political elites and their slavishly devoted media minions," Carson wrote.
Carson wrote in another article earlier in October that Christians have a responsibility to vote based on biblical values come Election Day, and suggested that religious freedom is on the line.
"Laws are being passed both here and around the globe that continue to erode our rights to share the Gospel, and to live our lives according to the Bible. Courts are now ruling that laws that have protected our churches and businesses for decades are unconstitutional," he warned.
"If we don't turn things around soon, the America we have grown up with will be gone, right along with our freedoms."
Carson is also the national chairman of My Faith Votes, a website dedicated to getting people informed about their choices in the elections, including a pledge to pray for America.
Other Christians, such as Eric Sapp of the political consulting firm Eleison Group, have said that they will be voting for Clinton, because he has "witnessed her faith in action first hand, because of her life of service dedicated to those Christ focused his attention on."
"I saw how often she'd turn to prayer and heard personal staff discuss with her on how key theologians might approach a decision ... and how she wrestled with (and demanded her staff also ask) the difficult moral question of how to do the most good and serve God best in our deeply flawed political system," Sapp wrote in an op-ed for The Christian Post last week.
"And while Trump needs a teleprompter to correctly pronounce books of the Bible, Hillary is at her best when she is talking about her faith, God, and redemption off-the-cuff and without notes ... because she's been doing it her whole life."
