Winthrop forum brings Cruz, Carson to Rock Hill after Iowa fracas

Now that the results from Iowa and New Hampshire are in, the remaining presidential candidates and national media will turn their attention to South Carolina – including a multi-candidate forum in Rock Hill on Thursday.

At least two Republican candidates – both of whom have publicly clashed over the results of the Iowa caucuses last week – will speak at the Carolina Values Summit in Byrnes Auditorium on the campus of Winthrop University.

Retired neurosurgeon Ben Carson and Texas Sen. Ted Cruz are confirmed speakers at the event, but other GOP presidential candidates also have been invited to attend the public forum two days after New Hampshire’s first-in-the-nation and nine days before South Carolina’s first-in-the-South Republican primary on Feb. 20.

General admission tickets to the 3,500-seat venue are already sold out, but anyone interested in attending is asked to put their name on a waiting list for available seats, or sign up to volunteer for the event, at the summit’s Eventbrite page.

Cruz was the top vote-winner in the Feb. 1 Iowa caucuses, coming from behind to beat putative frontrunner Donald Trump thanks to a strong performance among evangelical voters. Carson, another favorite among Christian conservatives, also an early frontrunner this fall, has dropped in recent polls and finished fourth in Iowa.

The Iowa results created friction between the two campaigns, after Cruz’s campaign told caucus-goers that Carson was dropping out the night of the caucus and convinced some to caucus for the Texas senator instead. CNN reported earlier in the day that Carson would be leaving Iowa to return home to Florida, but did not indicate the candidate was dropping out, and a Carson spokesman later clarified that Carson just needed to pick up some “fresh clothes” for the rest of the campaign.

Voicemails were sent out to some voters announcing Carson’s exit from the race, and one Monmouth University study showed that up to a third of Carson supporters switched their votes. Carson later told CNN “whoever is responsible for blatant lying should be dismissed,” and received an apology from Cruz, whose campaign nevertheless maintains it only passed along information from CNN.

Trump, the second-place finisher in Iowa, later took to Twitter to call for the caucus results to be thrown out.

Carson and Cruz will speak separately at Thursday’s summit, so they aren’t expected to be on the Winthrop stage at the same time.

Both candidates have drawn large crowds in the area in recent months; Cruz at a national security forum in Fort Mill in January, and Carson at a town hall at Winthrop Coliseum in December.

Thursday’s event will be co-hosted by the Reconciled Church Movement and the North Carolina Values Coalition. The Reconciled Church works to address the racial divide among Christians. The church’s event page calls for “a racially diverse event that will address key public policy and social concerns of evangelicals of all ethnicities around the nation.”

The N.C. Values Coalition was founded in 2011 to “preserve the family unit and marriage,” said coalition spokeswoman Kami Mueller. The organization has most recently been active in opposing a proposed Charlotte city ordinance that would set new anti-discrimination protections for gay, lesbian and transgender residents.

The moderator for the forum will be Alveda King, a civil rights activist and niece of Martin Luther King Jr.

The summit is scheduled to run from 6 to 9 p.m., with doors tentatively scheduled to open at 4 p.m. Each candidate will speak for about 30 minutes.

This story was originally published February 9, 2016 at 1:01 PM with the headline "Winthrop forum brings Cruz, Carson to Rock Hill after Iowa fracas."