As Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Tex.) campaigns across the Granite State ahead of next Tuesday’s first-in-the nation primary, he’s changing rhetoric in an attempt to expand his base and attract libertarian-leaning supporters following Sen. Rand Paul’s (R-Ky.) exit from the race this week.
Cruz won the Iowa caucus this week following a similar path to victory as previous winners, heavily relying on evangelical Christians and strong conservatives. Now, the Texas Senator is working to appeal to a different group in New Hampshire.
“We are seeing so many Rand Paul supporters and libertarian leaders uniting behind this campaign,” Cruz said openly to a standing-room only crowd at Lancaster Elementary on Friday night.
Instead of sprinkling religious references at every turn, a tactic that carried him to victory on Monday, Cruz is now energizing supporters with his rhetoric on privacy, limited government and gun rights.
“New England,” he said, was founded as a land where people “were meant to be free, not have the government dictate our fight.”
“We need to defend the fourth and fifth amendments, the rights to privacy,” Cruz said with bravado, as supporters erupted in applause at a campaign stop inside a Toyota dealership in Portsmouth on Thursday morning. “Please leave your cell phones on, I want to make sure President Obama hears every word we say here,” he added.
Cruz vigorously courted libertarians publicly and privately throughout 2015, contributing to Paul’s slow motion collapse. This fall, the campaign released a video of past Ron Paul supporters talking about why they are supporting Ted Cruz and not the former Texas congressman’s son. That same video is being played repeatedly before all of Cruz’s campaign events in Iowa.
Ron Paul warned Republicans on Friday not to vote for Cruz .
“They think he’s for the free market, and he’s owned by Goldman Sachs,” he told Fox News. “He and Hillary have more in common than we have with Trump or anyone else.”
Earlier in the week, Ron Paul also called Cruz a “real libertarian fake” and told The Washington Post, that he resented the “idea of Cruz claiming he can get the liberty vote.”
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From Eliza Collins, Ron Paul: Ted Cruz is No Libertarian, Politico
Now that Rand Paul is out of the race for the White House his father Ron Paul, who ran in 2008 and 2012, isn’t impressed by Ted Cruz’s attemptsto pick up the “free market” libertarian banner.
“You take a guy like Cruz, people are liking the Cruz — they think he’s for the free market, and [in reality] he’s owned by Goldman Sachs. I mean, he and Hillary have more in common than we would have with either Cruz or Trump or any of them so I just don’t think there is much picking,” Paul said of the Texas senator on Fox Business’ “Varney & Company” on Friday.
Surprisingly, the elder Paul seemed more attracted to the views of Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders, who is giving Hillary Clinton arun for her money in the Democratic primary.
“On occasion, Bernie comes up with libertarian views when he talks about taking away the cronyism on Wall Street, so in essence he’s right, and occasionally he voted against war,” the former Texas congressman said when asked if there was a candidate who was truly for the free market.
“It’s hard to find anybody — since Rand is out of it — anybody that would take a libertarian position, hardcore libertarian position on privacy, on the war issue and on economic policy,” Paul added.
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