Donald Trump and Ben Carson appear to be on a collision course.

The two outsiders have yet to butt heads -- but that may be about to change. Republican activists and operatives are reporting that at the grassroots level, Carson's gentler and more faith-oriented approach is winning over voters at Trump's expense, particularly in Iowa. Both are drawing from the same broad pool of voters who are angry at the GOP establishment, but Trump's bombast, name-calling and more secular outlook is driving many of them to the soft-spoken, retired pediatric neurosurgeon.


The real estate mogul is now damning Carson with faint praise, recently telling the Daily Caller that Carson is "a wonderful guy" and "really a friend of mine" but also "a doctor who wasn't creating jobs." On Friday, one day after a national Monmouth University poll showed Carson moving into second place -- and looming as the only GOP candidate who could defeat Trump in a head-to-head matchup -- Trump telegraphed that Carson's free ride is coming to an end.

"Well, I'm much better as a counterpuncher, so I'd rather have, and I'm hoping for Ben to really hit me at some point, because I love to counterpunch," the billionaire said in response to a question on MSNBC's "Morning Joe."

Carson, however, is the least likely candidate in the field to take the bait. His late summer surge is powered by older, conservative voters who love that he’s just like Trump, only not so rude. His gradual ascent has occurred without attacking his opponents, and in spite of a disorganized and sometimes chaotic campaign apparatus that marches to its own beat.

Carson's camp readily acknowledges that Trump has created the conditions for a candidate like Carson to thrive.

"Donald Trump certainly ignited public awareness on issues about competency, responsiveness and quality of government, even though we've been talking about it for many months, he did it in a pretty loud, boisterous way," said Carson communications director Doug Watts. "He shook people up, and with their eyes open and their ears open, they found another candidate saying the same thing, just in a different key."

Carson has been drawing large crowds for months -- particularly in Iowa, the state he has visited more than any other. He's been there at least 10 times, including the day after the first GOP debate -- when he held a little-noticed but well-attended series of family festivals across Iowa, and delivered testimony at a church service in Osceola. In Phoenix, Arizona, Carson reportedly drew 12,000 people, more than Trump attracted when he held a rally in the same place earlier this summer.

Jeff Kaufmann, the chairman of the Iowa GOP, said the recent polling spike in Carson's favor merely reflects the work the pro-Carson super PAC has been doing in Iowa for over a year, and Carson's frequent presence in the state.

"Since late spring of 2014, I can't think of an event I was at, a political event, where Ben Carson was not represented in some way," he said. "You put that in the mix with his demeanor and his resume and the fact that he represents a fresh perspective, and I think, very clearly, this is real."

In another measure of his grassroots support, 67 percent of Carson's donations from the last fundraising reporting period came from small-dollar donors -- that's better than any other Republican in the field, and second only to Democrat Bernie Sanders among all presidential candidates. His campaign, which says it has raised an additional $6 million in August alone, boasts that is has now received more than 400,000 donations, again driven by small-dollar donors.

"If there’s a narrative of this campaign so far, it’s that Iowans and Americans are tired of politics as usual, that playing by the same political rules has only gotten us where it’s gotten us, so voters are looking to a Trump, to a Carson, to a [Ted] Cruz, the outsider-type image," said Bob Vander Plaats, an influential Iowa Christian conservative who is currently neutral in the race. "Trump, he’s bold, he’s vocal. Ben Carson, he’s kind of that quiet, humble [figure], but you can see a certain kind of bridled strength to him.”

Carson's Aug. 6 debate performance in Cleveland, coupled with the sense that Trump’s rise suggests to many disaffected voters that a political outsider has a chance, has galvanized Carson supporters, said Patrick Murray, the director of the Monmouth University Polling Institute.

“What happened is, Trump’s [success] raised the specter of, ‘Yeah, I don’t have go with somebody like a [Scott] Walker who claims to take on special interests, but at the end of the day is a career politician. But Trump is a little too far out for me. Let me take a second look at Carson, who did really well in that debate.’ That’s the kind of voter he’s getting,” Murray said.

Carson's mild-mannered mien is proving especially appealing to evangelicals,some of whom see the more modest Carson -- married to the same woman for 40 years -- as closer to their values than the boastful and thrice-married Trump. Carson's tractionwith that key GOP voting bloc comes as other Republicans, particularly Jeb Bush, have ramped up their questioning of Trump's conservative credentials, pointing out that he used to be supportive of abortion rights and assembling clips of the billionaire praising Hillary Clinton.

Trump's almost comical attempt to dodge a recent question about his favorite Bible verse -- after calling it his favorite book -- won't help his cause with Christian conservatives against Carson, a former Sunday school teacher who speaks of "the need to reverse the recent trend of secular progressives using activist, federal judges to drive faith out of our society."

During a speech Carson gave at GOP Rep. Jeff Duncan's Faith and Freedom Barbecue in South Carolina in August, as he discussed the process of getting into the presidential race, the retired neurosurgeon demonstrated a natural comfort with his subject. "I prayed, I said, 'Lord, this is not in my bucket list but if you want me to do it, you have to open the doors and you have to make it possible to do this financially, you have to put together an organization,' and that's exactly what He has done."

That easy familiarity and faith-on-his-sleeve style is proving to be an asset in Iowa, where a Monmouth survey Tuesday found Carson tied with the billionaire businessman but leading among evangelicals -- an important segment of the state GOP base -- 29 percent to Trump’s 23 percent.

Carson's celebrity -- not as a candidate, but rather as a famed pediatric neurosurgeon who overcame hardship and deprivation as a child-- is playing a role in driving conservatives in his direction. His life story is the subject of a popular book, "Gifted Hands," that became a movie with Cuba Gooding, Jr., and his more recent book, "One Nation," has sold more than 366,956 hard cover copies, according to Nielsen Bookscan records. That doesn’t include every booksale in the country, but is a strong representation of Carson’s impressive sales numbers, which far exceed those of other GOP contenders.

“I think he is not an unknown quantity among the evangelical and Christian right. I mean this is personal experience, I remember reading his autobiography when I was 12 years old,” said Drew Ryun, the political director of The Madison Project and a former deputy director at the Republican National Committee. Ryun added that “this guy's been around for decades in this crowd, and all of the sudden this crowd is part of the disenfranchised.”

Craig Robinson, a former Iowa GOP political director who edits the conservative blog TheIowaRepublican.com., framed Carson's appeal -- and his positioning against Trump -- similarly.

"Trump has 'The Apprentice' [TV show], he's known for 'You're fired,' he played himself," he said. "Carson was played by Cuba Gooding, Jr. He's an American success story, it's an uplifting thing. He talks about his childhood and it's very inspirational. I don't think anyone would ever use that term to describe someone like Donald Trump."