Ted Cruz Was on Vacation During a Texas Disaster (Again)
On Sunday, Senator Ted Cruz flew back to Texas after a devastating natural disaster hit the state while he was on vacation and required him to actually do his job. No, you have not found yourself back in 2021, history is just repeating itself. Cruz was in Greece with his family on Friday when catastrophic floods swept through central Texas, and according to his office, the senator got back to his state “as fast as humanly possible.” Okay, but did he?
According to Cruz, shortly after the flooding began on Friday, he called President Donald Trump from his vacation in Greece. “I said, ‘Mr. President, everything we’re hearing right now, this appears to be bad. Really bad. There may be a very significant loss of life unfolding right now in Texas,’” Cruz recounted in a Monday press conference.
The next day, the senator was photographed touring the Parthenon with his wife. A source sent the photo to the Daily Beast and told the outlet that they chastised the senator, saying, “Twenty kids dead in Texas and you take a vacation?” Cruz then “sort of grunted and walked on,” while his wife apparently shot the source “a dirty look.”
The Houston Chronicle spoke to Michael Rocchio, another tourist who was at the Parthenon and took a different photo of Cruz. Rocchio confirmed Cruz was taking a tour at around 6 p.m. local time, which would be 10 a.m. CST. Less than an hour later, officials in Kerr County confirmed that at least 27 people had died in the flooding. As of Tuesday, the death toll has risen to 105, including 27 young campers and counselors from the all-girls Camp Mystic who were confirmed dead on Monday.
Responding to accusations that Cruz had vacationed through yet another Texas crisis, his office told CNN in a statement that “the Senator was already in the middle of preplanned family vacation travel overseas when the flooding occurred on July 4. Within hours, he spoke by phone with Governor (Greg) Abbott, Lt. Governor (Dan) Patrick, Texas Emergency Management Director Nim Kidd, and President (Donald) Trump, working to ensure that the maximum federal assets were available for search and rescue.” According to his spokesperson, Cruz “promptly” booked a ticket back to Texas. “Given the time difference, he left Athens on Sunday morning and was back in Texas that night. And he was in Kerrville on the ground early Monday morning.”
If this is all sounding familiar, it’s because this is not the first time Cruz has had to rush back to Texas because he was on vacation during a natural disaster. Back in 2021, Cruz faced outrage for jetting off to Cancún while a historic winter storm created an unprecedented crisis in Texas. At the time, he tried to claim he was simply dropping his daughters off for a trip. Then his wife’s group text was leaked, revealing that the family was trying to get out of town for the week because it was cold in their house.
This time around, Cruz was not seeking to flee from his state’s crisis, but it doesn’t really seem like he was rushing to get back either. While he claims he returned as quickly as possible, he still spent a full day in Greece after learning of the floods — and squeezed in some last-minute sightseeing. It’s not like it’s impossible to get a next-day flight from Athens to Texas, either. The Daily Beast later reported that there were several flights from Athens to San Antonio that would have gotten Cruz back to the state before Sunday night. At time of writing, you can buy a flight that leaves tomorrow morning and gets you back that evening for about $1,600. You could touch down even sooner if you fly into Houston and take a one-hour flight to San Antonio. The price is steep, sure, but children are dead and Cruz is reportedly worth more than $9 million. He could spare it.
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