In New Hampshire, Cruz Uncorks on Trump

LONDONDERRY, N.H. — Ted Cruz on Tuesday ended his two-month absence from this early voting state with a provocative tour that featured him ratcheting up his rhetoric against all the usual suspects and a less frequent target: his chief rival for the Republican presidential nomination.

Over just seven hours on the ground here, the U.S. senator from Texas debuted a more antagonistic stance toward billionaire Donald Trump, whom he has been resistant to criticizing for months as the two have emerged as the top contenders for the nomination. In campaign events and media appearances, Cruz made clear his kid-gloves approach to Trump is over, sketching multiple lines of attack that could shape the final few weeks before the nominating contests start.

It began Tuesday afternoon in Hudson, just over the Massachusetts border, when Cruz told reporters after a pro-gun rally that it was curious Trump was citing a liberal, pro-Hillary Clinton law professor to raise questions about his citizenship. It makes one wonder, Cruz mused, whether Democrats were propping up Trump because they did not want to face Cruz in the general election.

"We’ve seen the past couple of elections where the Democrats have worked very hard to ensure that they face the Republican they most wanted to face in the general election," Cruz said in an interview on Boston radio. "And you know, it may be driven by the fact that the polling right now shows that Donald loses to Hillary and loses by a pretty big margin but I beat Hillary, and I think that’s got the Hillary folks a little concerned and so they’re doing everything to amplify Donald’s attacks.”

In the same exchange, Cruz was asked about Trump playing the song "Born in the USA" at recent rallies, possibly as a way of ribbing Cruz over his Canadian birth. Not missing a beat, Cruz suggested another ditty for Trump events: "New York, New York."

“Donald comes from New York, and he embodies New York values," Cruz said. "And listen, the Donald seems to be a little rattled."

In another radio interview from New Hampshire, Cruz took a dig at Trump's foreign policy expertise, telling conservative host Hugh Hewitt that America needs a president who knows how to defeat the Islamic State terrorist group "not just based on what’s said on Sunday shows on TV." Asked in August where he gets military advice from, Trump memorably responded "the shows."

By the time Cruz took the mic at a standing-room-only town hall Tuesday evening in Londonderry, a snowstorm raging outside, he was showing no reservations about dinging Trump on matters serious and not. He appeared to have the billionaire on his mind when he warned the crowd about the specter of a "New York gazillionaire" doing business with Clinton, and he flatly mocked one of Trump's signature lines on the stump.

"It's not gonna be us just winning and winning until you're tired of winning," Cruz said of the United States under his administration. “There’s also this little thing called the Constitution."

His remarks at Londonderry High School were otherwise a response of sorts to President Barack Obama's final State of the Union address, imagining what his own State of the Union speech would sound like after a year in office. He forecasted the completion of many well-known campaign promises, punctuating each with generous helpings of political incorrectness.

After a Cruz administration shuts down the U.S. Department of Education, liberal megadonor George Soros would replace it with the "William Jefferson Clinton Museum of Youth Outreach," Cruz said. He also vowed a President Cruz would help terrorists meet their 72 virgins pledged to them by the Muslim holy book the Quran. "By the way," Cruz added, "no one promised those virgins would be women."

Aside from some nervous laughter at his edgier jokes, Cruz's crowds scarfed down the red meat, thrilled with the senator's anti-establishment zeal and willingness to stand up to his own party.

"I'm a conservative," said Tim Kerins, a retired teacher from Sutton, Massachusetts, who came to see Cruz in Hudson. "Unfortunately, my party has disappointed me, and he's one of the few people who hasn't."

It was at the rally in Hudson, held outside a gun range in 32-degree cold, where Cruz's day began with chaos. Moments after he took the stage, a young man joined him and began ranting at the audience for attending an event celebrating firearms. A second agitator also made his presence known.

"This is not your stage," Cruz sternly repeated to the interrupters, mocking them as coddled college students before tying them to Hillary Clinton's chief rival for the Democratic nomination. "Boy, it's almost like the Bernie Sanders guys are scared. The Bernistas are out in force!"

As reporters huddled around the protesters to get more information, Cruz did not let the opportunity to bash the media go to waste, asking the crowd to notice how reporters "gather around the lefties who want to strip our rights because those are their values." Cruz continued to berate reporters from the stage as audience members hurled insults at the hecklers, who were eventually escorted off the premises.

The two protesters, who provided their names as John Nelson and Robert Stiefler, told reporters they were with a group that wants to arm every American over the age of 16. They insisted their crashing of the rally was not "performance art," as one reporter suggested.

Cruz's raucous return to New Hampshire marked his first trip to the state in 61 days, a relatively long absence that has not been lost on his GOP rivals. Speaking with reporters in Hudson, Cruz brushed off any concerns about his viability in the Granite State, saying his support there has been "steadily, gradually increasing" on a daily basis.

"The poll that matters is the vote on Election Day," Cruz said. "I am encouraged that polling consistently in New Hampshire has shown me in essentially a tie for second place."

Cruz's campaign is increasingly seeing an opening in the state, where support for more moderate candidates is splintered with just under a month left until the Feb. 9 primary. While New Hampshire has a history of unfriendliness toward White House hopefuls like Cruz, his supporters in the state say he has a chance to reverse that trend.

"Our expectations — we're playing a game to win. There's no doubt about it," said former U.S. Sen. Bob Smith of New Hampshire, who co-chairs Cruz's campaign in the state. "The moderates here, as they are elsewhere, are split, so we don't have a clear establishment favorite like [Mitt] Romney was in 2012. So if the conservatives unite, we can win this thing here."

Seijah Drake, a member of Cruz's "strike force" of volunteers stationed in the Manchester area, did not seem worried about Cruz's limited presence so far in New Hampshire. After all, many voters in New Hampshire still seem to be mulling their options, she said.

"I haven't met a lot of people that have made their decisions, and I've met a lot of people that have him in their top three," said Drake, a college student from Boston. Asked whom she has observed as Cruz's closest competitor in the Granite State, Drake replied without hesitation, "Mostly Trump."

Cruz has been given $43,000 by Goldman Sachs employees/groups.

Hereâ€™s where Ted Cruz gets his campaign money

There's one rich money man, however, who embraces Cruz's anti-government bent: Secretive hedge-fund guru Robert Mercer of Renaissance Technologies. Mercer has reportedly donated at least $31 million to help elect Cruz, which is more than Cruz has raised from other sources during his entire political career.

Since he began campaigning for the 2012 Senate race in Texas, Cruz raised about $18 million, not including any Mercer money. His single biggest donor has been the Club for Growth, a conservative advocacy group funded by wealthy contributors including industrialists Charles and David Koch, private-equity baron J.W. Childs and tech entrepreneur Peter Thiel. The group has given Cruz $706,000 since 2011, according to the Center for Responsive Politics.

Among corporate donors, the oil and gas industry has been Cruzâ€™s biggest supporter, even though it ranks seventh in spending among all candidates. Support from energy firms is hardly surprising, given that Cruz is from Texas. Law firms came next, followed by the securities industry and real-estate concerns. Here are Cruzâ€™s top donors since 2011:

Robert Mercer. The hedge fund magnate has battled with the federal government, which claims his firm, Renaissance, avoided paying several billion in taxes through artful tax strategies. So Mercer's interests seem to align with Cruz's animosity toward the IRS. Mercer's money will reportedly be split among 4 super PACs, with each presumably taking a different role in the way they advocate for Cruz.

Club for Growth: Amount donated to Cruze since 2011: $706,000.

Senate Conservatives Fund: $316,000.

Woodforest National Bank (community bank based in Houston): $112,000.

Goldman Sachs: $69,000.

Morgan Lewis LLP (Philadelphia-based law firm with significant energy-sector practice): $68,000.

The $69,000 from Goldman is one of the largest sums employees from the Wall Street firm have donated to a single candidate during the last few years. The firm has given money to well over 100 candidates since 2012, but only six got more from Goldman than Cruz â€” and two of them were Mitt Romney and Barack Obama. Heidi Cruz, the candidateâ€™s wife, manages investments for wealthy clients at Goldmanâ€™s Houston office, so personal connections may have helped raise the money. (Heidi Cruz announced sheâ€™ll be taking a leave of absence from Goldman during her husbandâ€™s campaign.)

Open Secrets--Cruz

Looking at his history of standing up for gun rights and religious liberty before the Supreme Court, taking on the GOPe to win his Senate seat, taking on the GOPe to defeat amnesty, calling McConnell a liar on the floor of the Senate, etc.....Do you think that he would go against his values for $43,000?????

Money is the mother's milk of politics. First it is $69,000. The donors don't give money and not expect something in return.

I'm not sure who the billionaire sugar daddy is so you will have to enlighten me.

Hedge-Fund Magnate Robert Mercer Emerges as a Generous Backer of Cruz

You are partially right about the dire straights of the Republican party. We can no longer play the political game of demographic politics. WE WILL LOSE EVERY TIME.

We should be going after white voters who form the base of GOP support. Romney won the white vote 59-39. The GOP needs to boost that percentage.

We need to enter into a new era of idea politics. Conservatism wins every time it is tried. Conservatism is based in logic and if presented in a fair debate, it will win over hearts and minds. The reason the Republican party loses is because it doesn't even attempt to defend conservatism. It moves forward with half hearted measures and tries to downplay conservatism by relabling it "compassionate conservatism". (Bush and David Brooks have more in common than we thought)

Sorry, but that is delusional. The issues are not as important as demographics. And the tribes that are growing in number favor Big Government. Immigrants and minorities vote more than two to one Dem. By 2019 half of the children 18 and under will be minorities as defined by the USG. Each cohort that turns 18 each year is more Dem and more minority than the previous one. By 2043, non Hispanic whites will be 50% of the population, down from 89% in 1970.

If we hope to have any conservative ideals left in politics we will need to move forward with this new "idea politics" which will cut across demographics. In this new era, I would much rather have Ted Cruz leading the fight and winning in the arena of ideas than marble mouthed, dimwit Trump. I am not even certain he understands conservatism let alone can effectively articulate it to win hearts and minds.

The issue of immigration is a winning one that cuts across partisan lines and gets traditional Dem constituencies in play, especially blacks. Jeff Sessions provided the template for winning and only Trump and belatedly Cruz are using it. It is a brilliant piece by Sessions written almost two years ago: Becoming the Party of Work: How the GOP can help struggling Americans, and itself. It should be required reading for every GOP candidate at every level.

-- You are assuming everybody who votes understands the details of eligibility law. --

Actually, I assume none of them do. While the public is full of good, honest, intelligent people, those same people are roughly ignorant on the fine details of everything outside of the spheres of interest and work.

-- The low IQ, LOW infomation voter will only hear Cruz was born in Canada. --

It's a statement of fact. If it's harmless, it's harmless. Why worry? Cruz has a US government document that says he was born a citizen. Hasn't shown it yet, but he will when enough people are looking.

-- And therein lies where the RATS will create confusion about Cruz's eligibility. --

That's Cruz's problem. He's the one born in Canada. The party certified him NBC in getting ballot access, he's got scores of celebrity lawyers backing him up, etc.

It's also Cruz's problem to figure out how to reduce the confusion and to rebut the opponents. He's doing that, saying it's clearly settled and implying that to believe otherwise makes one a crackpot.

At any rate, the issue will work itself out, without a ruling on the merits from a court. Nobody can get one of those.

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