Ted Cruz Is in Panic Mode Over His Terrible Fundraising
The jig is almost up for Senator Ted Cruz—and he knows it.
On Wednesday, the Texas Republican leveraged an interview with Fox News to beg for campaign donations after his opponent, NFL player and current Representative Colin Allred, took Texas’s Democratic Senate primary in a landslide.
“The Democrats are coming after me, they are gonna spend more than $100 million this year, George Soros is already spending millions of dollars in the state of Texas,” Cruz said, leaning on the popular Republican and antisemitic talking point, billionaire George Soros.
“My opponent, a liberal Democrat named Colin Allred, is out-raising Beto O’Rourke, my last opponent, 3-to-1. They are flooding millions of dollars into Texas—and the reason is simple. You remember my last reelection, it was a three-point race. I won by 2.6 percent.”
Cruz: Colin Allred is outraising my last opponent 3-1. They are flooding millions of dollars into Texas and the reason is simple. My last reelection was a 3-point race. I won by 2.6% pic.twitter.com/9RB0Hof7Wb
— Acyn (@Acyn) April 4, 2024
That’s a pretty slim margin for someone who has had a strong hold on Texas politics for the last decade—even if he has been called “Lucifer in the flesh” by members of his own party and crowned the most “unpopular member of the U.S. Senate” by local papers.
Allred was originally predicted to be a long-shot candidate behind Cruz. After all, it’s been 33 years since a Democrat held a statewide position in the traditionally deep-red state. But Allred has quickly picked up steam in the race, trailing behind the incumbent by just 6 percent, according to a Marist College poll conducted in March. It would seem that 10 years in the Texas sun have led to some shortcomings in the Lone Star State, where Cruz has repeatedly showcased himself to be as spineless as he is self-interested.
Recall that, in the face of a devastating winter storm that wrecked Texas’s infrastructure, Cruz decided to skip town, opting to vacation in Cancun rather than help the state recover, leaving behind Texans and his dog. And Cruz rolled over and endorsed Donald Trump for president even after the latter insulted his wife ahead of the 2016 election.
Then, in January, Cruz endorsed Trump again, despite enduring months of ruthless mockery from the Trump campaign over his alleged need to wear heels to reach the podium. (On a side note, Cruz also made fun of then–Vice President Joe Biden on the eve of his son Beau’s funeral in 2015.)
Cruz’s rhetoric has also veered the state toward political extremes that don’t necessarily align with what the majority of Texans want: He backed Trump’s claim that the 2020 presidential election was rigged, supported a draconian abortion ban, and has done practically nothing to support IVF access within the state.
He has also vehemently opposed gun control measures in the state even after lone shooters killed 21 people at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, 23 people in an El Paso Walmart, and 27 people at a church in Sutherland Springs, in separate shootings. The Sutherland Springs attack is the state’s deadliest mass shooting ever.
Cruz’s bid to keep his seat also flies in the face of legislation he introduced last year, proposing two-term limits in an effort to rid Congress of “permanently entrenched politicians.” Of course, Cruz admitted later he didn’t necessarily think the restrictions would apply to him.
Allred, meanwhile, has a completely different approach.
“My temperament is very different. I try to stay even-keel. I work in a bipartisan way. I don’t yell at people. I want to represent Texas in a way that’s sort of what I think a senator’s job should be, which is to introduce legislation that helps Texans—not to be a kind of media personality,” the 40-year-old told The New Republic in September.
That might be just what Texas is looking for.