GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. (WOOD) — While campaigning with Third District Republican Congressional candidate John Gibbs, former presidential candidate and Trump cabinet member Dr. Ben Carson said he believes the country is at a crossroads.

“Our country was supposed to be of, by and for the people. It wasn’t supposed to be of, by and for the government… The Constitution was primarily to control the government because governments what governments do, they grow, they infiltrate and they dominate,” he said.

Carson elaborated, saying that something was needed to constrain the government while allowing freedoms to remain.

“We also uniquely among nations stated in our founding document that our rights come from God. They don’t come from the government… what’s happening now is we have forces that are trying really hard to move us away from a people-centric governance to a government-centric type of governance,” Carson said.

He said this shift is why it’s so important that Americans elect the “right kind of people” into office and be able to distinguish “those who are truly interested in self-governance and self-reliance and those who want what some people see as a panacea of the government taking care of you from cradle to grave…”