“Exactly. Cruz running his mouth in the press is leadership. Recall when the border National Emergency executive order debate was raging. Cruz announced he was undecided, hid under his desk for a week and then in the end voted for it. THAT is not leadership.”
Your position fits the saying “not even wrong” as it would take improvement just to get up to merely being wrong. You either have selective memory or you get your information from fake news.
First, he was speaking at a Christian Science Monitor breakfast which is a platform from which to be heard. This is no different than President Trump trying to raise support with emails and Tweets PLUS action. Cruz has taken plenty of action. Politicians, by the nature of their job, must answer questions from the press.
Cruz did not EVER oppose Trump on the executive order, but as a Constitutional scholar who clerked for a chief justice and argued before the supreme court nine times, I’d say he was reasonable to investigate this cautiously. Obviously the president did not want to telegraph in advance his intentions so he never called Cruz to ask for his opinion or support (except right before issuing the order):
https://www.mcclatchydc.com/news/policy/article226838224.html
“I’ve long said that any president, Republican or Democrat, must follow the constitution and must follow the laws. So I’m taking the time to consider and analyze the specific statutory authorities the administration is relying upon and their arguments as to why they might apply.”
There is nothing unreasonable about this. Cruz was also VERY vocal in support of the president and in addressing the border crisis at the same time he made the above statement to the press:
“I emphatically agree that we have a crisis at the border and that we need to solve it, and I am grateful that the president and the administration are leading to secure the border and to build a wall.”
The president’s executive order triggered a lot of debate over the subsequent two weeks, and Cruz came down decisively on the president’s side:
https://www.cruz.senate.gov/?p=press_release&id=4377
“Today, the National Emergencies Act required the Senate to answer one question: whether there is an ongoing emergency at our southern border. I voted to support the President’s declaration because, as Texans realize all too well, there is one.”
Further, Cruz and President Trump addressed the concerns over the broad powers that the office has to declare national emergencies by executive order and have worked together to implement reasonable reforms that will not hamper Trump but will avoid possible future abuses.
You’re also forgetting that Cruz supported the president on getting money in the actual budget for the wall. He supported the president during the shutdown over border funding and supported the president on his compromise that ended the shutdown in January and led up to the executive order:
https://www.cruz.senate.gov/?p=press_release&id=4298
“Today, I joined a bipartisan majority in voting for President Trump’s plan to secure our border and reopen the federal government. The president asked me to support his plan, and I did so because I agree with him that border security is unquestionably a national priority and that we must build a wall to secure the border. The president put forward a reasonable compromise to end this shutdown. This plan secures our border, funds the construction of a much-needed border wall, and reopens the federal government. In exchange, the president offered to provide a three-year extension of status limited to current DACA recipients and current enrollees in TPS. I agreed to the president’s compromise because it didn’t extend amnesty to anybody not covered already under current law and, critically, it didn’t create a pathway to citizenship for those here illegally.”
Cruz consistently supported ALL of the president’s efforts and agenda on border security. And, very importantly, he has stood firm against any compromise on amnesty.
Anyone on this forum who is still fixated on Cruz to oppose him are either mentally ill or a fake conservative. Of the 53 Republican senators, Cruz is among the top ten percent who are consistently conservative and vote in support of President Trump’s agenda. That’s the top 5% on the senate.
Any real effort to improve our senate in support of conservative principles and our president would reasonably be directed at the other 95%. Those who always have something nasty to say about Cruz on this forum are either too stupid to get the basics of politics or they are phonies who don’t belong here.