Just after a new poll showed Ben Carson is leading in Iowa, Donald Trump’s verified account retweeted a controversial message aimed at the state and Monsanto, a giant agricultural biotech company.
The retweet read, “‘@mygreenhippo #BenCarson is now leading in the #polls in #Iowa. Too much #Monsanto in the #corn creates issues in the brain? #Trump #GOP.'”
But Trump deleted the tweet and stated that it wasn’t his doing, but rather someone else. After a few hours, he removed it and tweeted that “the young intern who accidentally did a Retweet apologizes.”
A Quinnipiac University poll of Iowa Republicans released Thursday revealed that Ben Carson has knocked Trump from his perch atop the field in Iowa with an 8 percentage point lead over the real estate mogul. This is the first major poll to find Trump trailing by a significant margin nationally or in the four early states since late June.
CNN had asked Trump his thoughts about his retweets earlier this year. “Well I do retweets, and I mean, to a certain extent, I do, yeah. I think that’s right. Do you want me to say no? You know, I retweet, I retweet for a reason,” he said.