I watched the report and clearly, though not saying the words “Carson is quitting” they said it in every other way...”no person serious about running does this”, it is very curious, he is not going to New Hampshire, he is not going to South Carolina, he is giving an announcement regardless of the outcome...on and on like that. People, especially politicians “speak” with their ACTIONS while saying different things with their words. They are so wily that we have to extrapolate by what they do. The media were clearly indicating and interpreting these behaviors as “quitting behaviors.”
If you saw a sports team you were betting on send in their second tier players, knew they were already packing their gear up while the game was on, noticed their bus warming up outside the arena...would you change your bet if you still could? He signaled quitting, whether by accident or design and it was up to him to correct that impression that he gave. He or his staff goofed up.
There’s a difference between people speculating on what something means and reporting something. One is opinion, the other (hopefully) is fact. CNN never reported that Carson was dropping out. Some commentators speculated that he was. When Cruz says CNN reported it and his staff just passed it along he’s lying.