CLEVELAND- The shock was still wearing off Thursday afternoon as Republican lawmakers at the convention were contending with the reality that the brightest part of their convention – the selection of conservative Indiana Gov. Mike Pence to be vice president – had been overshadowed by their routinely rogue colleague Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX).
On Thursday evening, delegates in the convention hall were livid Cruz that exhorted the room to vote its “conscience” in November. They stood. They booed. They couldn’t believe a conservative hero had used a primetime speaking slot to disparage their nominee.
“I want him to be stronger,” said Maria Espinoza, an alternative delegate from Texas. “He’s got to get up, shake hands.”
The irony of Cruz’s speech Wednesday night remained that just little more than a year ago, Cruz was considered the outsider in the race for the White House. By crossing leaders in Washington, Cruz had successfully portrayed himself to voters back in Texas and across the nation as someone willing to take on the party apparatus when no one else was. On the convention stage, however, Cruz did what he always has. He rejected the party , even though it’s now led by the “outsider” Trump. For Republican voters ready to follow Trump over the barricades, Cruz’s attack was a betrayal.
Lawmakers backing Trump who have worked with Cruz in the Senate, or have watched his career in Congress, say Cruz’s move Thursday evening was hardly surprising or out of character.
“I think what people saw last night is what we have seen in the Senate. No matter how conservative you are, you never can meet Ted’s standard,” Sen. Dan Coats (R-IN) told the IndyStar. “He only thinks of himself.”
Cruz is the one who, among other things, had orchestrated a 17-day government shutdown and called Mitch McConnell “a liar” on the Senate floor. Cruz is so disdained by colleagues in Washington that Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) once joked, “If you killed Ted Cruz on the floor of the Senate, and the trial was in the Senate, nobody would convict you.”
“Unfortunately, I’ve seen these kinds of things over and over again in Washington,” Rep. Renee Ellmers (R-NC) told TPM. “I know he believes his conviction is so strong, but sometimes you have to understand that it is bigger than you. This is about America. This is bigger than any one of us and it’s time for him to be a part of that.”
On Thursday morning, Cruz tried to defend his position to hurt and dismayed Texas delegates, who according to various media reports shouted and questioned Cruz as he spoke to them over 25 minutes. Delegates in the room told TPM that Cruz had ultimately denied Trump an endorsement because Trump had disparaged his wife and accused his father of somehow being involved in the assassination of John F. Kennedy.
“I really thought it would be a big move to unite our party,” said Karen Hale, a Texas delegate who had hoped Cruz was going to endorse Trump Wednesday. “I guess in Texas though we support God, family and country in that order.”
In a year when the Republican Party has struggled with its identity, a fractured base and a bruising primary, however, pro-Trump Republicans were hoping for a little more from Cruz then they had seen in the past.
“We had hoped he would follow through after the pledge,” said Sen. Mike Rounds (R-SD).
When asked, however, if Thursday’s speech changed his opinion of Cruz, Rounds said “it really has not.”
“As you know, we’ve been frustrated in the past and we’ve suggested that Ted could help himself with some of the things that he could have done in the United States Senate in terms of apologizing to the majority leader for some of the comments he made. We were hoping that we would see a man come out and unite for the good of the party and literally try to save the Supreme Court and so forth. We thought that was a bigger issue here.”
Even some of Cruz’s allies in the Freedom Caucus were dismayed by Cruz’s actions. Rep. Scott DeJarlais (R-TN), an early Trump supporter, said he thought Cruz had made a mistake.
“I was a little bit perplexed … a man who is a champion of the Constitution and probably one of the most important issues to him is the Supreme Court. He’s basically got two choices either Hillary Clinton or Donald Trump, and I don’t understand why he wouldn’t throw his support behind our nominee knowing how different the world could look if Hillary Clinton gets to make those appointments,” DeJarlais told TPM. “Ted Cruz does what Ted Cruz does.”
Cruz’s rejection of Trump didn’t sit well with other elected Republicans who have accepted Trump’s primary victory.
“I just think the statesman thing to do is to get behind the nominee and he wasn’t selected in a smoke filled room. This was the American people who selected him. The largest number of Republicans who have gotten behind a nominee in history so that’s something we need to honor,” said Rep. John Fleming (R-LA).
