Ted Cruz and Donald Trump didn’t always see eye-to-eye when they were opponents in the race for the Republican nomination. That’s mostly because Donald Trump sunk to a historic, though not a personal, low in his personal attacks and innuendo on Cruz and his wife, Heidi. Trump also coined the phrase “Lyin’ Ted” to describe Cruz, an early indication of his nuanced and sophisticated marketing prowess.
Once he left the race, to his credit, Cruz held out longer than most from wrapping themselves in colors the historically bigoted Trump campaign. At the Republican Convention in Cleveland he angered many in the hall by failing to endorse Trump. But with Trump looking like he might bottom out in the presidential race, there was a healthy dose of good politics mixed in with Cruz’s personal loathing, leading to his decision not to endorse his party’s nominee. With Trump’s campaign stabilized, if still generally offensive, and running competitively against Hillary Clinton, Cruz’s anti-Trump bet began to look more risky. Shifting political winds making it look harder for Cruz to leverage a Trump loss to his benefit along with the prospect of being the least popular member of the Senate during a Trump administration must have been enought to convince Cruz that he needed to jettison his current principled stand and go back to his original principled stand to support the nominee through thick and thin.
Here’s what that looked like in Cruz’s endorsement:
This election is unlike any other in our nation’s history. Like many other voters, I have struggled to determine the right course of action in this general election.
In Cleveland, I urged voters, “please, don’t stay home in November. Stand, and speak, and vote your conscience, vote for candidates up and down the ticket whom you trust to defend our freedom and to be faithful to the Constitution.”
After many months of careful consideration, of prayer and searching my own conscience, I have decided that on Election Day, I will vote for the Republican nominee, Donald Trump.
You can read the full principled-for-now endorsement here.
