Kathleen Gray

Detroit Free Press Lansing Bureau

Detroit native Dr. Ben Carson won't return home for the Republican presidential debate on Thursday night.

While the retired pediatric neurosurgeon didn't explicitly say he's dropping out of the race, he said in a statement, "I do not see a political path forward in light of last evening's Super Tuesday primary results."

Republican presidential candidate John Kasich, appearing in Grand Blanc Wednesday, said: "I just had a very, very nice conversation with Dr. Carson, who announced today that he’s suspending his campaign. He’s a good man."

Carson's unlikely presidential campaign gained steam over the summer and he briefly led in the polls last fall before Iowa caucuses were held on Feb. 1. But a lack of coherent answers on foreign policy in light of terrorist attacks in Paris and California caused his campaign to go into a nosedive.

Carson ended up finishing fourth in Iowa and was near the bottom of the pack in the rest of the nominating contests in the states. He only picked up eight delegates during the primaries and caucuses held so far this year.

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He said he'll explain his decision more during a speech Friday at the Conservative Political Action Committee in Washington, D.C.

"The grassroots movement on behalf of 'We the People' will continue. Along with millions of patriots who have supported my campaign for president, I remain committed to Saving America for Future Generations," he said in the statement. "Gratefully, my campaign decisions are not constrained by finances; rather by what is in the best interests of the American people."

How Ben Carson went from poverty to presidential trail

Carson's story was a compelling narrative: a boy brought up in poverty on the southwest side of Detroit by a single mother; a lousy student with a bad temper who turned it around to graduate from Yale, get a medical degree from the University of Michigan and become the youngest doctor, at the age of 33, to head a surgical division at Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore.

“Gifted Hands,” the book and movie about his transformation from young punk to neurosurgeon, sold 614,000 copies, according to Nielsen BookScan, a business that tracks print book sales, and introduced him to a large swath of Americans, including many high school students who were assigned the book in classes.

When the Free Press met Dr. Ben Carson ... in 1988

But that life story began to change dramatically on Feb. 7, 2013, when Carson took on President Barack Obama during a National Prayer Breakfast in Washington, D.C. While Obama sat just a few feet away, Carson gently, but forcefully, criticized the country’s tax and health care policies.

That speech brought him national attention from conservatives and led to a groundswell of people urging him to run for president. He announced his candidacy in May in Detroit and began attracting impressive crowds in Iowa.

Contact Kathleen Gray: 313-223-4430, kgray99@freepress.com or on Twitter @michpoligal