Ted Cruz Wins in Texas GOP Senate Runoff

Ted Cruz: ‘Count Me a Proud Wacko Bird’

Mar 172013

Douglas Graham/Roll Call(WASHINGTON) — Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, said he’s willing to embrace the “wacko bird” label given to him by Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., if it means he is defending the Constitution.

“If standing for liberty and standing for the Constitution makes you a wacko bird, then count me a proud wacko bird,” Cruz said as he delivered the keynote address Saturday at the Conservative Political Action Conference in National Harbor, Md.

In an interview with the Huffington Post earlier this month, McCain singled out Cruz, Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., and Rep. Justin Amash, R-Mich., as “wacko birds” when asked whether he felt they are a “positive force” within the Republican Party.

“They were elected, nobody believes that there was a corrupt election, anything else,” McCain said. “But I also think that when, you know, it’s always the wacko birds on right and left that get the media megaphone.

“I think it can be harmful if there is a belief among the American people that those people are reflective of the views of the majority of Republicans. They’re not,” he said. McCain apologized for the remark Friday in an interview with Fox News.

As he closed out the three-day conservative convention, Cruz took pride in joining Paul’s 13-hour filibuster over the nomination of John Brennan to be director of the CIA, and without naming names, he criticized the senators who refrained from participating in the filibuster.

“There were more than a few senators who were not there with us that have had their manhood cheapened as a result,” Cruz said.

The filibuster marked Cruz’s first time speaking on the floor of the Senate, a moment to which Cruz said, “to my grave, I will owe Rand Paul a debt of gratitude.”

Even though the Republican Party experienced a loss in the presidential election last November, Cruz argued that it’s the conservative movement that’s heading towards success.

“For the last three weeks, conservatives have been winning, and we’re winning because of you,” Cruz said.

Cruz, who is in his first term as a senator, tied for seventh place in the CPAC straw poll with Dr. Ben Carson, a neurosurgeon, at 4 percent. Paul narrowly won the straw poll. Cruz’s keynote address occurred after straw poll balloting concluded.

Senators’ Kids Steal the Show at Mock Swear-In

Jan 032013

iStockphoto/Thinkstock(WASHINGTON) — They have been sworn into the Senate Thursday, but for Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.), Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Conn.) and Ted Cruz (R-Texas), their kids were the ones who stole the show.

First was Gillibrand’s son, held atop his mother’s hip as she lightly touched the Bible during a mock swear-in with Vice President Joe Biden.

Midway through the oath, Gillibrand’s son reached out his hand and ruffled his mom’s hair. With a big smile, Gillibrand proceeded with the oath as she tried to tamp down her hair.

Then came Murphy, who carried his son in one arm as he participated in the mock swear-in. (The real swearing-in occurs on the Senate floor; this particular one is a re-enactment for families, friends and photos.) As Murphy lifted his hand to take the oath, the toddler raised his hand as well, providing a perfect photo op for Murphy and his young son together being sworn in as a senator.

And as Catherine Cruz, the youngest daughter of the new Republican senator from Texas, started to cry, Biden quickly picked her up and joked about himself, “That’s a Democrat, I know but that’s O.K.”

Cruz’s wife Heidi quipped back, “She cries loudly for Republicans too.”

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GOP Senate Candidate Ted Cruz Sees Tea Party as ‘the Future’

Aug 302012

Douglas Graham/Roll Call(TAMPA, Fla.) — With the help of the Tea Party, Ted Cruz bucked the establishment in Texas this summer when he knocked a long-term state politician out of the Republican Senate primary, sending a message that the Tea Party is here to stay.

“I think it is absolutely the future,” Cruz told ABC’s Nightline anchor Terry Moran. “In 2010, the Tea Party had a lot of protests in the blazing hot sun. In 2011 and 2012, the Tea Party went to work. They rolled up their sleeves. They got involved in the parties. They got involved in campaigns. They started block walking, phone banking.”

“In my race, thousands and thousands of Tea Party activists made the difference in the race and it’s a fundamental shift. It’s getting the Republican Party back to the principles we should have been standing for in the first place,” Cruz told Moran.

Cruz, 41, has never held elective office, but with the support of the Tea Party and prominent Republicans such as former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin and former presidential candidate Rick Santorum, he was catapulted to victory this summer in a bitter run-off with Texas Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst for a Senate seat left open by Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison, R-Texas.

When he entered the race, Cruz was polling at just single digits, but he forced Dewhurst, who was backed by Texas Gov. Rick Perry and former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee, into a run-off in July, demonstrating the frustration Texans had towards the establishment.

“There is a sense that the folks who have been in office for a long time, they don’t get it. And it is both parties have let us down. Barack Obama is the most radical president we’ve ever seen but a lot of Republicans have been complicit with the Democrats in growing spending out of control,” Cruz told Moran. “I think the voters are saying to both parties, ‘Get back to the basic, founding principles of our country — limited government, free markets, individual liberty,’ and I think that’s what this movement all across the country is about.”

A few blocks from the main convention proceedings in Tampa, Fla., hundreds of delegates streamed into a revival style tent on Wednesday to lay the groundwork for an even more conservative Republican future, grooming a whole new crop of leaders, like Cruz, who spoke before the crowd as he was accompanied by his father.

“The stakes have never been higher. Americans are uniting to turn the country around,” Cruz said.

A magna cum laude graduate of Harvard Law School who attended Princeton University as an undergrad, Cruz served as solicitor general in Texas from 2003 to 2008. Prior to that, Cruz worked for the Federal Trade Commission and Justice Department, and he clerked for former Chief Justice William Rehnquist, making Cruz the first Latino to clerk for a chief justice.

Cruz is the son of a Cuban immigrant whose story the Texan shared at the convention Tuesday night, even speaking in Spanish — a language in which Cruz is not fluent — to describe his father’s determination to achieve the American dream.

“He fled to Texas in 1957, not speaking English, with $100 sewn into his underwear. He washed dishes making 50 cents an hour to pay his way through the University of Texas and to start a small business in the oil and gas industry,” Cruz said of his father in a speech at the RNC Tuesday night. “When he came to America, el no tenia nada, pero tenia corazon. He had nothing, but he had heart. A heart for freedom. Thank you, Dad.”

Ted Cruz: ‘Thankful’ Tropical Storm Isaac Keeping Biden Away from RNC

Aug 272012

Douglas Graham/Roll Call(TAMPA, Fla.) — Republican Texas Senate candidate Ted Cruz tried to make a joke at the expense of Tropical Storm Isaac, counting it among his “blessings” that the storm kept Vice President Joe Biden from campaigning in Tampa during the Republican National Convention.

“We have so many things to be thankful for. So many blessings, including even we can be thankful for Hurricane Isaac. If nothing else, it kept Joe Biden away,” Cruz said Sunday at a rally organized by the Faith and Freedom Coalition.

Biden planned on bracketing the convention with stops in Tampa Monday and Orlando and St. Augustine Tuesday, but postponed his trip so that resources would be focused on managing the impact of the storm.

“I understand that the Democrats are very sensitive about jokes about Joe Biden, and for good reason. As Ted expressed the very same day, it is critical that everyone be fully prepared for any hurricane, and our prayers are with everyone in the path of Tropical Storm Isaac,” John Drogin, campaign manager for Cruz, said in a statement.

Over the weekend, Isaac tore through the Caribbean, hitting Haiti and the Florida Keys and killing at least nineteen.

The Republican National Committee shortened its convention schedule when the storm threatened to come close to Tampa. Its course has since turned toward New Orleans, and it is expected to strengthen to Category 1 hurricane status before it hits land late Tuesday or early Wednesday.

Ted Cruz Wins in Texas GOP Senate Runoff

Aug 012012

Bill Clark/Roll Call(AUSTIN, Texas) — Tea Party star Ted Cruz won the Texas Republican Senate primary Tuesday night, defeating “establishment” candidate and longtime Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst.

In the past several weeks, victory for Cruz, the former solicitor general, had begun to look increasingly likely, with polls showing him ahead of Dewhurst, and major national Tea Party stars like Sarah Palin and Sen. Jim DeMint turning out to campaign for him in the final days leading up to Tuesday’s runoff. However, for the bulk of the race Cruz had been the underdog, lacking in the wealth and name recognition enjoyed by Dewhurst, who has been the lieutenant governor under Rick Perry since 2003.

While Cruz, 41, may have had the majority of national star power on his side, Dewhurst, 66, had the backing of many in the Texas political establishment, including Perry. Dewhurst also enjoyed a huge financial advantage over Cruz. According to the Center for Responsive Politics, Dewhurst poured $11 million of his own personal fortune — he founded a successful energy company called Falcon Seaboard — into his campaign, spending a total of $19 million, as compared to Cruz’s $7 million spent.

But ultimately Dewhurst’s wallet was no match for Cruz’s political prowess.

Cruz painted his opponent as a moderate who would be willing, if not eager, to compromise with Democrats in Congress.

Dewhurst has a very conservative record — he’s anti-abortion rights, he supports a balanced budget amendment, and on Monday morning, he stopped by a Chick-Fil-A to show his support for the restaurant embroiled in a controversy regarding their president’s recent comments on gay marriage.

Nevertheless, Cruz and his supporters pointed to compromises Dewhurst had made with Democrats in the state legislature, and argued that his record was merely a reflection of Perry’s conservative agenda and did not provide an accurate representation of Dewhurst’s own governing style.

The two men battled fiercely; neither imploded at any time, neither veered off their course, and the race remained close throughout the two months in between the state and presidential primary on May 29, when no one candidate received more than 50 percent of the vote, forcing a runoff.

But in the end, strong poll numbers, strong surrogates and a slew of outside spending money from Tea Party affiliated groups like “FreedomWorks” and “Club For Growth” came together to give Cruz momentum that carried him over the finish line.

Cruz will go up against Democratic challenger state Rep. Paul Sadler in the fall in the open race to fill the seat left open by Kay Bailey Hutchison’s retirement, but he is widely expected to win because of the state’s strong Republican leanings.

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