You couldn’t be more wrong. Without Trump, Cruz would be running away with the nomination as the only true conservative in the race. Cruz is and would be campaigning on the Tea Party agenda of shrinking government, stopping NSA surveillance overreach, cutting taxes, stopping illegal immigration, defeating ISIS, calling out radical Islamic terrorism, repealing Obamacare, ending sanctuary cities, appointing originalist judges.
Cruz’ agenda is the true conservative Tea Party agenda. He’s been talking about all the key conservative issues since he ran for Senate and he’s kept all his promises to fight for what conservatives want.
Cruz started out as very unpopular and was not expected to do well. Jeb Bush was expected to be the nominee.
Cruz visited Trump and they reached an agreement to work together. Other candidates attacked Trump. Cruz stayed beneath the radar. In an early debate the moderator set up Jeb and Carly Fiorina with free shots at Trump saying that Trump was angry and irresponsible and that Trump did not have the temperament to be president or to be trusted to have his finger on the nuclear trigger.
Had Trump not been in the race the other establishment candidates would have attacked Cruz but Trump took the abuse. And Trump was willing to stand up to Jeb and the well funded establishment candidates. Only when Trump's outsider, anti-Washington message began to resonate did Cruz adopt that message. Trump's message allowed Cruz to give legitimacy to Cruz's claim of outsider status and to use his unpopularity in Washington to his advantage.
Cruz was no longer just someone who was unpopular in Washington, he was now an outsider like Trump.
Without Trump in the race, Cruz would have never opposed the amnesty plans and open border policies that were supported by all other candidates. Cruz would have been just one of many candidates who bragged about how conservative they were.
I like Cruz and think he would be a good president. I think he would be better as a Supreme Court Justice or Attorney General.