Cruz, attacking Rubio, said that “the old program covered 20 percent to 30 percent of phone numbers to search for terrorists; the new program covers almost 100 percent”. Marco Rubio about the new USA Freedom Act, which Cruz supported and Rubio opposed. Yes, there are clear differences of opinion among the candidates – particularly Marco Rubio, Ted Cruz and Rand Paul – which is precisely what a healthy, broad-based party should have.
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Burr said he’d be “a lot more worried” if Cruz were actually a member of the Intelligence Committee, which Rubio is.
“We are now at a time when we need more tools, not less tools, and that tool we lost – the metadata program – was a valuable tool that we no longer have at our disposal”, Rubio said on Tuesday at the CNN debate. You said my objective is not to kill immigration reform. The Senate approved the bill, but it was blocked by House Republicans and widely attacked by conservatives. Rubio and others were using to describe this monumental bill were not accurate. He’s now calling for a piecemeal approach that begins with border security and offers a pathway to legalization only after the influx of illegal immigration is stopped. Cruz did support legalization. “But when 2013 came along, Senator Rubio and I made very different choices”, he said, arguing that Rubio made that push primarily to court elite Republican donors.
Mr Rubio said of Mr Trump’s proposal, “It isn’t going to happen”.
Cruz has been on the defensive in the days after the debate on the issue, and on Thursday, the Texas senator looked to regain momentum after increased attention on his record. The act changes the rules for how the United States Intelligence Community can collect phone data.
Asked if the Cruz campaign is responsible for the content, campaign spokeswoman Catherine Frazier said, “I don’t know where they came from but I wish I could take credit for them”. Ted, you support legalizing people who are in this country illegally.
But Cruz, who frequently mentions Sessions as a partner on defeating the 2013 immigration bill, has said the language he wanted inserted was a “poison pill” created to prove that the Gang of Eight’s main motivation for the bill was amnesty for illegals.
Trump has also pledged to back the GOP nominee and not make a third-party run for the presidency, but he may renege on the deal if other candidates do the same.
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Cruz has previously supported broadening legal immigration in some cases.
