CRUZ ON A TIGHTROPE IN TRUMP’S GOP
Staff mum, but experts envision national stage
The presidential campaign trail behind him, Ted Cruz soon will return to Washington as just another freshman senator. His baggage is already there.
Cruz kicked off his campaign widely disliked by his Senate colleagues. Not much has changed; He only cemented his bad relationships and brought them more prominently to public attention.
During his campaign, however, one thing became clear, at least to his Texas colleague, Sen. John Cornyn: Cruz joined the Senate to run for president.
Now that his next shot at the White House is years away, Cruz will need to find a place to work among many of the colleagues he spent months condemning as part of the “Washington cartel.”
“He’s got a lot of work to do to reintegrate himself back into the Senate,” said Cal Jillson, a politi---
cal scientist at Southern Methodist University. “He won’t be able to do it with the Ted Cruz person a we’ve seen to date. He won’t be able to be quite so crass and obvious about his future ambitions.”
Cruz’s campaign and confidants kept mum Wednesday, divulging nothing of the senator’s plans for his political career. Experts and fans agreed that he still has a future in national politics.
“He’s going to return; he’s going to fight like hell,” said Jordan Berry, an Austin-based GOP strategist and Cruz supporter. “And they (other senators) are going to continue to fight him.”
The campaign hinted as much in an email to supporters Wednesday morning: “While Ted suspended his campaign for president last night — this is by no means an end to the movement.”
He still commands an active, faithful following of conservative stalwarts, especially in Texas, who will not quickly get behind Donald Trump as the Republican presidential nominee.
Texas-based GOP consultant Luke Macias said Cruz “built the largest and strongest conservative political operation in our nation.”
Other party affiliates agreed that Cruz holds sway over a large demographic, but none could predict how he would wield it.
“He may be the one person other than Trump who comes out of this campaign a larger figure than he was going in,” said Austinbased GOP strategist Matt Mackowiak. “The question is, what does he do with it?”
For now, Mackowiak added, his focus will be on rejoining the Senate and “repairing those relationships.” Elevating his game
Cruz’s campaign platform was one of rancor for the Republican Party “establishment,” including long-serving senators whom he often charged with corruption and with working against the interests of voters.
It was nothing new for Cruz, who made the same condemnation of his colleagues when he debuted in the national spotlight with his 2013 Senate filibuster and government shutdown.
The presidential race and Cruz’s outsider campaign put a spotlight on his bad working relationships, highlighting his refusal to apologize for the time he called Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell a liar on the chamber’s floor, and encouraging news media to produce articles on how much GOP leaders hate Cruz.
That has become the overwhelming record of Cruz’s Senate tenure, andit could his hinder efforts to move on to the next chapter The list is long of senators who’ve come back (from presidential campaigns) and elevated their game,” said Steve Jarding, a veteran Democratic campaign manager and lecturer at Harvard University, naming John Kerry and John McCain. “I just don’t see it with Cruz.”
Even supporters who think the senator will increase his role acknowledged Cruz would have to adapt. Crucially, hewill not be a fresh-faced outsider come the next presidential campaign in 2020.
It will not be as easy to push the anti-establishment platform as a secondterm senator, should Cruz decide to seek re-election in two years.
“He’ll have to make a conscious adjustment to both re-create a place for himself in the Senate and to open up a future run for president where he presents himself differently than he did this time around,” Jillson said.
At the same time, Cruz will have to figure out how to wield the high profile he attained through months of regular TV appearances during the campaign. Experts wondered if hewould maintain his national name recognition through public activism and appearances, or if he would sink quietly away to hammer out policy achievements.
“Ted and his family are going to take a little while to rest and to prayerfully consider where he goes in the future,” said JoAnn Fleming, tea party chair for the Cruz campaign. ‘Chose evil over good’
Regardless of what he chooses, Cruz’s Tuesday night departure from the presidential race was preceded by a scathing condemnation of Trump that morning that makes it difficult for his fans and activ- ists to throw their weight behind the presumptive Republican nominee.
Fleming said she does not intend to “be a cheerleader for the national helm, GOP” and with others Trump .“sharedat its the sentiment.
“America yesterday chose evil over good, and I worry for our country,” said Maggie Wright, a diehard Cruz fan who hoped to support him at the GOP’s national convention. “I may just have to write in Ted’s name in November.”
Other party operatives in Texas said the party needs to rally to defeat the Democrats in November, but stopped short of saying they should support Trump.
Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick, a onetime state senator from Houston who rode the tea party wave into statewide office in 2015, said that after “a healthy time of healing” for the disappointed followers of Cruz, “I believe they will come around to support the Republican ticket.
“This is not a time to stay home (in November),” he said. “If Republicans stay home, we could lose the country.”