Posted on 01/12/2016 8:35:12 PM PST by Isara
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."
Ted can actually do insults that are funny.
I like that in a man.
You can’t discuss The Donald’s records. That’s smears and lies. Don’t you know that?
It was a joke, Steve.
Maybe an edgy joke but a joke. Cruz has a sense of humor.
To be President or V.P you need to be born on U.S. soil...
To be a Citizen of the U.S. you can have one parent born on U.S. Soil; since his father was born on Cuban soil, this omits him; and his mother ‘as they say’ was born on U.S. soil will make him a Citizen of the U.S. but not ‘Natural Born Citizen’ because Cruz was born on Canadian soil...it's not hard to understand this point...
What the Supreme Court did for obuma is against the Constitution of The United States of America, they wanted a ‘black president’ so the Supreme Court said what they wanted to say, but not what the Constitution said they were suppose to uphold....
So remark, slander, insult all you want, it isn't going to change a thing...We are Trump supporters and that is who we are voting for...period....
So to those who say people born in a different country to US citizens are NOT a citizen at birth and thus not Natural Born Citizens, let me put forth another scenario. A soldier or citizen spouse stationed overseas becomes pregnant and has the child off base at a hospital. Both parents are citizens and serving our country. Do you seriously say that this child would not be a natural born citizen?
I hope you didn’t consider my question slander but you didn’t answer it.
When did you get all het up about Cruz birthplace?
(het up is used in Texas where I was born)
I have a feeling you didn’t know squat about it until your hero brought it up and you don’t know squat about it now.
You know what you’ve read somewhere. There are as many legal minds who disagree with your take as agree, probably more.
So stop being the Queen Birtha... it gets boring.
To be President or V.P. of the United States of America, you have to be born on American Soil...
To be a Citizen of the United States of America, one of your parents need to be born in The United States of America...if your father was born in another Country or you mother was born in the United States of America it grants you ‘citizenship’ but doesn't not grant you ‘Natural Born Citizen’ because you were not born on American Soil...
You can use insults, you can stomp your feet, you can scream and yell and threaten all you want, it won't change the Constitution of The United States of America...it was written with this fact and the Supreme Court did a very terrible disservice to the Constitution because they said what they wanted to say to have a ‘black president’ but they did not uphold the Constitution of the United States of America as they were elected to do...
I defended Cruz when people were attacking him for going to that donors party at the gay apartment in NYC, now he attacks NYC.
Joke or not it’s annoying. I’ll still defend Cruz when I think people are being unfair(THIS BIRTHER THING IS DUMB) but between this and the new allegation that he’s using push polling I am starting to get really ticked off.
Natural Born Citizen, for President and V.P. is to be born on United States Soil;
To be a citizen of the United States of America you have to have one parent born on United States soil...Cruz's father was born on Cuban soil, his mother, as some have reported, was born on American soil, that gives him Citizenship but he was NOT born on United States of America soil, he was born on Canadian soil...there is a difference...take it up with the Supreme Court, they made that decision because they wanted a ‘black president’...it never should have been upheld, they did a great disservice in what they did and they need to be brought up for not holding up the Constitution of the United States of America since this is their job to do so...
If you read article II, section 1, paragraph 5 very closely, you can see the definition of a NBC as clear as day and Ted Cruz does not fit that definition. This issue will be his undoing. Whether it will be ours remains to be seen.
He’s ineligible to be POTUS or even Vice POTUS; He’s wasting his time and ours.
Poor guy.
You still don’t know Trump’s platform after seven months.
Well, there’ll always be slow people out there I guess.
I don’t believe I insulted or screamed.
I simply pointed out that you have read something you believe about citizenship and a majority of other authorities disagree.
So why do you say I screamed?
Your supporting a man whose wife is a member of the CFR trying to toss mud on his oponent. What else don’t you know?
New York, New York.
If you can make it there, you’ll make it anywhere ...
He spent the majority of his working life working in state and federal government.
That goes back to the McCain situation...whenever your serving your Country, be it Iraq, Iran, Afghanstan you are on American Soil...
Have you read the Constitution?
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.”
And like I said before, New York values were just fine when Cruz was taking money at an event held by two gay New Yorkers.
Then they should get off the pot or DO it!
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