Former presidential candidate Ben Carson says he once turned down an offer from President Barack Obama to serve as the nation's top doctor.
In an interview on "The Alan Colmes Show" on the first night of the Republican National Convention in Cleveland, the retired pediatric neurosurgeon said Republican President George W. Bush also asked him to serve as surgeon general.
"You know George W. Bush offered me that position. The Obama administration, before they found out who I really was, offered me that position," he said at the end of his six-minute interview.
The excerpt was posted by
BuzzFeed News.
In February 2013,
Carson stunningly rebuked Obama and his health care policies at a National Prayer Breakfast that the president was attending.
The soft-spoken doctor also told Colmes he was "not interested" in the surgeon general job even if Donald Trump asks him.
"I will certainly continue to talk to [Trump] and advise him, but I do not want a government position," Carson said.
According to The Hill, Carson criticized the job of surgeon general, who oversees public health issues, in an earlier interview.
"The surgeon general is a very ceremonial position. It has no power to do anything," Carson tells Colmes in October 2014, according to The Hill — though he didn't mention being offered the job.
Obama has nominated four people to serve as surgeon general; the Senate only accepted two of them, including the current surgeon general,
Dr. Vivek Murthy, who was confirmed in December 2014.
© 2025 Newsmax. All rights reserved.