I don’t know what you’re talking about.
Seriously? Trump’s October Surprise against Cruz was that his father killed JFK. The truly bizarre thing about it was that Trump had already kinda sorta wrapped up the primary; it was more like out of punishment for running against him, Trump was trying to get Cruz thrown out of the Senate.
The lawyers knew slander law. Trump had his buddies at the National Enquirer make the actual claim that Cruz’s father killed Kennedy. If Trump stated it first, Cruz could’ve easily gotten Trump on actual malice and therefore slander, but it was harder to get the Enquirer for actual malice. But while Trump didn’t quite say “Cruz killed Kennedy,” he talked about how damning and terrible the evidence was.