Trump has not apologized for dragging Cruz’s family into the race, and after the convention, he continued to discuss the lines of attack. Cruz said he will vote for Trump in November, but he stopped short of an official endorsement in a statement posted Friday on Facebook.
Advertisement
The problem here is that for the longest time, both Cruz and Trump have sold themselves as the outsiders who hated establishment politics and the kind of “you scratch my back, I scratch yours” dealing that goes on in the corrupt establishment. Trump, in particular, has been branded as a phony by hard-line conservatives, Cruz among them, who see him more as a political opportunist than a true Republican.
The New York businessman also shared an unflattering image of Cruz’s wife, Heidi, on social media and suggested that Cruz’s father was somehow involved in the 1963 assassination of President John F. Kennedy – items Cruz himself cited in explaining to supporters why he did not endorse Trump at the convention.
But he’s now praising Cruz’s timing ahead of Monday night’s first presidential debate when, “America focuses on this election”.
‘He doesn’t know the difference between truth and lies.
“A year ago, I pledged to endorse the Republican nominee, and I am honoring that commitment”, he added.
In his Facebook post, Cruz writes he for months has “been seeking greater specificity on this issue”, but found satisfaction with the Trump’s expansion of his potential list of Supreme Court nominees to include nine more conservatives. Trump had also repeatedly accused Cruz of being pathologically dishonest, referring to him repeatedly as “lyin’ Ted”.
At the convention, Cruz dramatically declined to endorse the nominee.
‘Second, even though I have had areas of significant disagreement with our nominee, by any measure Hillary Clinton is wholly unacceptable – that’s why I have always been #NeverHillary’. Cruz said he has offered his help to the Trump campaign, but there are no formal plans for any campaigning yet. The Republicans spoke on the condition of anonymity because these were internal discussions.
But even prior to the election, Trump has already thrown a few crumbs Cruz’s way. To Trump supporters, Cruz appeared to be more concerned with his political career than the good of the GOP.
Cruz’s fight against Trump officially ended on Friday. Trump also backed Cruz’s position in a congressional squabble over internet regulation. Other Republican leaders in hard political situations, notably New Hampshire Sen. “Hillary Clinton is manifestly unfit to be president, and her policies would harm millions of Americans”, Cruz wrote Friday.
Advertisement
But in the end, he decided, Trump “is the only thing standing in the way” of a Clinton presidency that he said would be devastating to the United States.
