Remember the “tea party” — the faction of Republicans devoted to fighting the establishment? Rafael Edward Cruz is what’s left of it. Whenever controversy is brewing, the one-term senator from Texas is never far from the TV cameras. In fighting for his principles, Cruz often tests the limits of his own party, as when he turned his protest over health-care reform into a 16-day partial shutdown of the federal government in 2013.
Cruz’s father, Rafael Bienvenido Cruz, emigrated from Cuba in 1957, during the revolution there. The elder Cruz’s reminders of the Cold War contrast between the United States and Cuba informed the younger Cruz’s strong belief in American exceptionalism — and his own exceptionalism. When “Ted” was a child, his father told him: “You know, Ted, you have been gifted above any man that I know, and God has destined you for greatness.”
Rafael “Ted” Cruz speaks in Columbus, Ohio, August 22, 2015. Photo: Gage Skidmore (CC2.0)
Rafael “Ted” Cruz
Stated priorities: opposing or undoing whatever Barack Obama has done, reducing the federal budget, fighting illegal immigration, increasing production of oil and gas
Current age: 44
Age on election day: 45Career path: lawyer, domestic-policy adviser to George W. Bush’s 2000 presidential campaign, US associate deputy attorney general under Bush, Texas solicitor general, senator from Texas since 2013
Marriages: 1
Children: 2
Religion: Southern Baptist
Religious fervor: ***
Campaign funds: $$
Skeletons in closet: **
Clown factor: *****
Cuckoo factor: ****
Ability to stretch the truth: *****
Distinguishing features: droopy eyebrows, nasal drawl
Best resembles: the love child of Bill Murray and Pee-Wee Herman
Gimmicky product: Ted Cruz for President coloring book
Campaign video
Why they won’t elect him
Cruz’s favorite word is “truth”, but truth is something the senator has a difficult relationship with. The fact-checkers have their hands full with him. Only three months after masterminding the 16-day shutdown of parts of the federal government, about which he was widely interviewed as it was happening, Cruz denied having been the instigator. The stunt, which cost the US economy $24 billion, had no way of affecting Obamacare, which it was intended as a protest against.
Cruz helped to shut down the government, then denied having done so
Among the candidates, Cruz is a conspiracy theorist without parallel. He believes, for example, that communists have infiltrated the faculty at his alma mater, Harvard Law School; that sharia law is “an enormous problem” in the United States; and that billionaire philanthropist George Soros is leading a United Nations plot to abolish golf courses and paved roads.
A popular conspiracy theory concerns Cruz himself: the candidate was born in Canada and held dual Canadian-US citizenship, something he says he was not aware of until recently. He renounced his Canadian citizenship in 2014. But by some legal interpretations, Cruz is not a natural born US citizen and is thus ineligible to be president of the United States.
Cruz’s talk is bafflingly oxymoronic. He promises “real conservative change”, saying, “I believe in the conservative principles upon which this country was built,” and assures supporters: “I’m ready to stand with you to lead the fight.”
Cruz’s policies, even his call for increased oil production, are all ideological
Cruz’s policies are all ideological in nature. Even his call for increased production of fossil fuels is pitched as a way of harming Russia, not as a way of creating jobs. It is unclear what the candidate would actually do to help Americans, though he might argue that the government’s job is not to help, but to stay out of the way.
Along with Marco Rubio and Piyush “Bobby” Jindal, Cruz is one of the youngest candidates in the race. Any of the three would be the second-youngest president, after John F. Kennedy, to be elected.
Cruz criticizes his adversaries’ politics, not their character, but nonetheless showed poor judgment when he insulted Vice-President Joe Biden the day after Biden’s son died and former president Jimmy Carter the day after Carter was diagnosed with cancer.
Finally, the party establishment’s view of Cruz as a loose cannon will not help him.
Why they might
This election has become an all-out battle between the establishment candidates and the free thinkers. The more unconventional or even outlandish a candidate is, the better his or her chances are. Cruz is the king of political stunts. Beyond shutting down parts of the government, he participated in various filibusters, including one against NSA spying and one against Obamacare, days before the shutdown, in which he read aloud the Dr. Seuss children’s book Green Eggs and Ham. What the stunts often conceal is that Cruz has been entirely consistent in his positions. (Even Green Eggs and Ham is about an annoying individual who pesters someone into adopting his unconventional point of view.)
The senator speaks eloquently and projects great conviction
The senator speaks eloquently, knows exactly what to say to convey an emotional message, and projects great conviction when doing so. He compares his refusal to accept man-made climate change to Galileo Galilei’s opposition to the established thought of his day.
Cruz and Donald Trump appeal to the same supporters, and have conspicuously not been critical of each other. One theory says that Cruz either is waiting for Donald Trump to implode or that he may be setting himself up to be Trump’s vice-president.
Cruz has a sense of humor and is able to laugh at himself. “I have been told many times: I have a face for radio, and I have a face for animation,” he says.
Finally, Cruz’s supporters have no doubts about his devotion to gun advocacy now that he uses an AR-15 semiautomatic rifle to cook breakfast. They’re likely to forgive him for ignoring warnings from both food-safety and gun-safety experts, and for misidentifying the weapon as a machine gun.
In his own words
“The fundamental DNA of what it means to be an American is [that] we are the children of those who risked everything for freedom. And that freedom — that promise of America — is in jeopardy. … I believe in America, and if we can believe again — if we can come back to the free-market principles and constitutional liberties that made America great — we can turn this country around. … That’s what this election is about: reigniting the promise of America.”
(Note on rhetoric: “Believe in America” was Mitt Romney’s slogan in 2012, while “Make America great again” was Ronald Reagan’s in 1980. Cruz was using the latter slogan before Donald Trump appropriated it and trademarked it this year.)
Best quote about him
“Ted Cruz … told pastors Tuesday that he would do his best to make sure the government could not be funded if that funding included any taxpayer support for Planned Parenthood — but that any attempt to blame him for a government shutdown that could result would be ‘nonsense.’” (Washington Post, August 2015)
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