As I’m sure you’re well aware by now, Texas Senator Ted Cruz has found himself on the wrong end of a whole lot of angry Americans in the midst of the tragic winter storm that has hammered his state this week. And frankly, rightfully so. As Texans all across the state struggled, and continue to struggle, without power or water in dangerously cold temperatures for days upon end now, Cruz took off to Cancun with the family and apparently left the dog at home.
Since getting busted for his little runaway stunt while his constituents suffer, Cruz has scrambled like hell to come up with some semblance of an acceptable excuse for his behavior — ultimately seeming to land on his daughters, saying that he took them to Cancun because they asked for the trip due to the cold weather and he was only trying to be a good father.
But, much like any other GOP scheme, it’s not that simple.
Yesterday, Fox News’ Sean Hannity invited Cruz onto his show to address the criticism that’s been lodged against him over his Cancun vacay. Hannity did his best to defend the Texas senator himself during the segment, only to end up contradicted by Cruz himself.
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“Now, you went and you took your daughters to Cancun and you came back,” Hannity said to Cruz. “I think you can be a father and be the senator of Texas all at the same time and make a round trip, quick drop-off, quick trip, and come home.”
But the thing is, Ted has already confirmed that his original plans consisted of a weekend in Cancun with his family, not simply dropping his daughters off and coming right back. It was only after the severe backlash over the trip that Cruz decided to cut his stay short and head back to Texas on Thursday night, claiming that he needed to be in Texas to help with the relief efforts for his suffering constituents.
Cruz said on the show, “After a couple of days of the girls being really cold and it being in the teens and the 20s outside, our girls said, ‘Look, school’s been canceled for the week. Can we take a trip and go somewhere warm?’ And Heidi and I, as parents, we said ‘Okay, sure.'”
“And so last night I flew down with them to the beach and then I flew back this afternoon,” the senator continued. “I had initially planned to stay through the weekend and to work remotely there, but as I was heading down there, you know, I started to have second thoughts almost immediately because the crisis here in Texas, you need to be here on the ground.”
“As much as you can do by phone, and Zoom, it’s not the same as being here, and so I returned this afternoon and I’m here working to make sure to do everything we can to get the power turned on,” Cruz said.
In addition to contradicting Hannity’s defense of him in real-time, Cruz’s excuse also goes against the GOP talking point that there was nothing the senator could do to help in Texas anyway.
You can watch the clip here:
Featured image via screen capture
