During the campaign, Ted Cruz warned that Donald Trump was “utterly amoral.” Now, the senator prefers not to discuss such issues. Asked about allegations that Trump cheated on his wife with a porn star, the talkative social conservative punted: “I got nothing to say.”
That shift comes as conservatives try to make the most of the political opportunities the morally dubious president provides. But Cruz didn’t just promise to take the good with the bad. He gave Trump a free pass.
Evangelical voters have followed suit to an extent. Tony Perkins, for instance, president of the socially-conservative Family Research Council, said that Trump deserves a “mulligan” when it comes to his personal behavior. But it comes with conditions. “If the president for some reason stopped keeping campaign promises and then engaged in that behavior now,” Perkins continued, “the support is gone.”
Cruz doesn’t bother with stipulations. Speculation about whether Trump did or did not cheat on his pregnant wife with a pornstar “sells a lot of newspapers,” he said during a recent interview with the Washington Examiner’s editorial board. “It drives a lot of eyeballs on cable news.”
“I think we have a unique moment in time to actually get the job done and deliver on promises we made,” Cruz continues. “So, I got nothing to say. I will leave those issues and those topics to somebody else.”
Like so many other conservative senators, Cruz is enjoying the fruits of a unified Republican government. The populist president has helped deliver judges and deregulation, partial Obamacare repeal, and wholesale tax reform. Unlike many other conservative senators, Cruz and Cruz’s wife have endured Trump's repeated and personal attacks.
None of it matters now, though. Asked if the character of the president was always a secondary concern to pragmatic policy results, Cruz turned a blind eye. “My focus is on substance.”
