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I just heard a 15 second spot ad for Ted Cruz on KSFO radio . [ S.F.CA ] short to the point... and I approve of that ad

On Wednesday night, U.S. Senator Ted Cruz (TX-R) essentially tied Senator Marco Rubio in Florida Family Policy Council’s GOP Presidential Straw Poll in Orlando, Fl.Marco Rubio got 33.7% of the vote whereas Ted Cruz came in a close second with 30.7%.Jeb Bush and Scott Walker both came in third-place with 8.9% each, Rick Santorum 6.7%, Rand Paul 4.5%, Ben Carson 3.4%, Mike Huckabee 2.2% and Rick Perry 1.1%.The other 2016 GOP candidates: Chris Christie, Carly Fiorina, Lindsey Graham, Bobby Jindal and John Kasich didn’t get any votes.Political analysts have since viewed this poll as a victory for Ted Cruz. They...

But as the forum got underway, it became apparent that most of the speakers hadn’t prepared themselves accordingly. In fact, five of the six candidates gave some version of the standard stump speech they offer the public, attendees said, ignoring what one described as “the elephant in the room, this idea that people want to coalesce behind one candidate.”The lone exception was Cruz. “He was the only one who bought into that and tailored his entire speech to it,” says the attendee, who, despite working for a rival candidate, gushed that on a scale of 1 to 10, Cruz’s speech...

He’s stuck in the middle of the pack in Iowa, lags in polls, and much of the GOP donor class views him with disdain. But Ted Cruz is embracing a novel strategy for winning the nomination: He’s lowering expectations in the early states while investing in later-voting states that hardly see a candidate before March. In the past week or so alone, the Texas senator has taken his presidential campaign to Michigan and Massachusetts, staffed up in New Jersey and Tennessee, and skipped an Iowa cattle call to stump in North Carolina — all states expected to vote in March,...

Nah, I’m just kidding. This is an outlier. Isn’t it? Carly Fiorina ahead of Chris Christie and Ted Cruz in New Hampshire? C’mon, I … can totally believe that, actually, given the state’s fondness for outsiders and “mavericks. In fact, for a supposed outlier, the only number in this poll that’s strikingly out of sync with other recent polls of New Hampshire is Jeb’s. He’s fully 10 points higher than he was in Bloomberg’s poll of the state last month. Maybe not coincidentally, the other noticeable gainer is Donald Trump, who was at five points two months ago in a...

Raleigh looked like Iowa-lite over the weekend, with presidential candidates popping up everywhere. They gave speeches, worked the hallways, and posed for selfies at the three-day state GOP convention held at the Raleigh Convention Center. They met with potential donors and activists, attended fundraisers, and made pilgrimages to Jones Street. They hated Barack and Hillary, loved Reagan and Israel. And left the impression that Obamacare was only slightly better than radical Islamic terrorism. This is the result of the legislature moving up North Carolina’s presidential primaries from its traditional date in May to probably the first Tuesday in March –...

Texas Sen. Ted Cruz poked fun at reporters at a town hall event last week, saying he’d send a condolence note to reporters and editors that would have to check themselves into therapy if he were elected president. “Let me start by saying if I’m elected, January 2017, I suppose the first thing I should do is send flowers and a note of condolences to all of the reporters and editors who’ve check themselves into therapy,” said Cruz to radio host Jeff Kuhner at a WRKO town hall event.

DES MOINES, Iowa -- Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) told a gaggle of reporters in Iowa on Saturday the response from conservatives to his potential presidential candidacy has been overwhelming.   “I’ve been incredibly encouraged by the support I’ve seen,” Cruz said in a media availability just outside of the Iowa Ag Summit in Des Moines. “The support from the grassroots, frankly has been breathtaking, and the financial support we’ve received from Texas and all across the country. So it’s something I’m looking at closely, and I think that decision will be made shortly.” Cruz is in Iowa with a handful...

One of the biggest criticisms of the GOP when it comes to healthcare reform is that, for all their blustering and fulminating against the Affordable Care Act, they just can’t seem to put together a coherent plan of their own. The Washington Post’s Greg Sargent leafed through his calendar this morning and discovered that Republicans have promising to unveil their big Obamacare replacement for 50 months, a gestation period that is about twice as long as that of actual, real-live elephants. Instead of substantive plans, they give us vague notions of plans spelled out in newspaper Op-Eds. Typically they don’t...

Sen. Ted Cruz is now the leader of a reactionary faction that includes some of the dimmest bulbs in Congress. (AP Photo/) In advance of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s speech to Congress on Tuesday, the New York Times reported on a small irritant exacerbating already tense U.S.-Israeli relations. It seems President Barack Obama’s former campaign operative, Jeremy Bird, is currently advising a group in Israel that seeks to defeat Netanyahu in national elections later this month.The story is mostly inconsequential. American political consultants have worked for one side or another in foreign countries for years. Political skills and strategies...

Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) on Saturday insisted that American voters have plenty of reasons to be optimistic, he said at a stop in the important presidential state of Iowa. Speaking at the Iowa State Fair, Cruz said that grassroots conservatives would wrest the country back from President Obama and Democrats – much the way they did from President Jimmy Carter more than three decades ago. “All across this country, people are waking up,” said Cruz, long rumored to be considering a 2016 presidential bid. “And they’re waking up to bring America back to the principles we have been founded on....

Several GOP 2016 presidential hopefuls made public appearances in Iowa Saturday, including Texas Republican Sen. Ted Cruz who told conservatives to remain optimistic going into the next election cycle. During a speech at the Iowa state fair, Mr. Cruz told listeners that conservatives would take back the country from President Obama and Democrats, just as they did when Jimmy Carter was president, The Hill reported. “All across this country, people are waking up,” Mr. Cruz said. “And they’re waking up to bring America back to the principles we have been founded on. There is a better way than the path...