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Like millions of his constituents across Texas, Senator Ted Cruz had a freezing cold house with no power this week amid the state’s electrical crisis. But unlike most people, Mr. Cruz got out, fleeing Houston and taking a Wednesday afternoon flight to Cancun with his family for a respite at a luxury hotel.
Photos of Mr Cruz and his wife, Heidi, on the flight quickly ricocheted through social media and left his political allies and rivals dismayed by a tropical trip as a disaster unfolded at their home. The backlash only intensified after Mr. Cruz, a Republican, issued a statement saying he flew to Mexico “to be a good father” and accompany his daughters and their friends; he noted he was back Thursday afternoon, but did not disclose how long he originally planned to stay.
Text messages Ms Cruz sent to friends and neighbors in Houston on Wednesday revealed a hastily planned trip. Their house was “FREEZING,” as Ms. Cruz put it – and she offered a getaway until Sunday. Ms Cruz invited others to join them at the Ritz-Carlton in Cancun, where they had stayed “several times,” noting the price of the room this week ($ 309 a night) and its good security. The texts were provided to The New York Times and confirmed by a second person in the thread, who declined to be identified due to the private nature of the texts.
For more than 12 hours after the photos of the departure from the airport first appeared, Mr. Cruz’s office declined to comment on his whereabouts. Houston Police confirmed that the senator’s office requested their assistance with his trip to the airport on Wednesday and that Mr. Cruz was finally seen rolling his suitcase in Mexico on Thursday as he returned to the state. that he represents in the Senate.
While the Cruzes were away, millions of Texans were still without power, many had no running water, and the icy air entering the state was so harsh that the Federal Emergency Management Agency was enabled to send supplies, including generators. Some searched the neighborhoods for fallen trees to burn to warm up.
“What is happening in Texas is unacceptable,” said Mr. Cruz a television crew at Cancún airport. He wore a Texas state flag mask and a short-sleeved polo shirt tucked into his jeans; the temperature in Cancun was over 80 degrees Fahrenheit Thursday, and in the 1930s in Houston.
Critics of Mr. Cruz quickly circulated hashtags mocking his trip: #FlyinTed, a play about former President Donald J. Trump’s derisory nickname for Mr. Cruz in the 2016 primary race, and #FledCruz, among them. Some Democratic groups have sought to raise funds for the episode, and the state’s Democratic Party has renewed its calls for Mr. Cruz to resign.
“It’s about as hard as any politician can be,” said Gilberto Hinojosa, chairman of the Texas Democratic Party. Mr Hinojosa said he was shocked but not surprised by Mr Cruz’s international excursion: “He is a politician who really never cared about anyone other than himself.
If Mr. Cruz intended to give the impression that he was planning to stay only one day, his large suitcase and the group texts Ms. Cruz had sent to plan a longer route suggested that he had cut short his trip. trip. NBC separately reported that Mr. Cruz had booked his return ticket Thursday morning.
“With school canceled for the week, our daughters have asked to take a trip with friends,” Cruz said of his daughters, who are 10 and 12, in his statement Thursday. “Wanting to be a good father, I went down with them last night and am coming back this afternoon.
Untimely vacations and opulent follies have long trapped politicians in scandals and public relations headaches: the international trips organized by disgraced former lobbyist Jack Abramoff in the early 2000s for members of the Congress; Chris Christie, then Governor of New Jersey, sat on a state beach in 2017 after ordering those beaches to be closed due to a government shutdown; and, most recently, Governor Gavin Newsom of California dined maskless during last year’s pandemic at upscale restaurant The French Laundry.
Mr Cruz’s decision to leave his state in the midst of an emergency was particularly baffling for an ambitious politician who has already run for president once and who is widely seen as wishing to run again in 2024 or beyond.
“It was clearly an error in judgment,” said Ray Sullivan, an Austin-based Republican strategist who served as chief of staff to former Gov. Rick Perry. Although a senator cannot personally restore the electricity grid, Mr. Sullivan said, “People expect their elected officials to be fully engaged during a crisis.”
Mr Cruz, 50, was narrowly re-elected in 2018 against Beto O’Rourke, a former Democratic congressman, with less than 51% of the vote. During that race, Mr. Cruz had aggressively insisted on his efforts during a past emergency, Hurricane Harvey. He is not re-elected until 2024.
As the city of Houston was gripped by freezing weather on Wednesday, a member of Mr. Cruz’s staff contacted Houston Police Department personnel at the George Bush Intercontinental Airport prior to his flight to request “assistance.” arrival, ”according to Jodi Silva, a spokesperson for the department.
Ms Silva said police “monitored her movements” before she left. Officers were seen accompanying him on his return Thursday.
Cruz insisted in his statement on Thursday that he and his staff had been “in constant communication” with heads of state and local during his brief trip to Cancun.
“It’s been an infuriating week for the Texans,” he said.
In his statement, Mr. Cruz noted that the private school his daughters attend in Houston was closed this week. But some other parents at the school were furious when they heard about his international trip due to the pandemic and school policies that discouraged such trips abroad.
Two parents provided a copy of the school’s written policy for students not to return to classrooms for seven days after international travel, or to take a Covid test three to five days after their return, which would prevent the Cruz children from attending school the following week. . (Separately, an aide to Mr Cruz said he was tested for the virus before his flight home Thursday; the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is demanding a negative result.)
When Ms Cruz wrote to The Neighbors Group Trying to Weather the Extreme Conditions text channel early Wednesday, she said the family stayed with friends to warm up, but quickly switched to offer an invitation to get away. .
“Can or does anyone want to go for the week?” she wrote. “We can go to Cancún.” She teased “direct flight” and “hotels with capacity.” Seriously. ”Ms. Cruz quickly shared details of a Wednesday afternoon departure, Sunday round trip, and a luxurious stay at the Ritz-Carlton Ocean in the meantime.
No one seemed to bite, but Ms. Cruz made a more practical offer. “We have a gas stove, so at least we can heat some water and we’re happy to help anyone we can too,” she wrote.
The Times shared the contents of the messages with Mr. Cruz’s Senate office, but his aides did not comment. Ms. Cruz did not return a call seeking comment.
Mr Cruz has long classified members of both parties as self-promoters since arriving on Capitol Hill in 2013. Later that year he became the lead actor in the drama that forced the government to shut down. because of the Affordable Care Act, and in 2016, “Senator Lindsey Graham, Republican of South Carolina, joked during a speech,” If you kill Ted Cruz on the Senate floor and the trial goes taking place in the Senate, no one would condemn you. “
But if Mr. Cruz annoyed his colleagues, he just as quickly won the GOP’s Tea Party wing, running as an anti-establishment champion in the party’s 2016 presidential primary and finishing as a Mr. Trump’s finalist, brandishing his disdain of colleagues as a token of honor.
Representative Lizzie Fletcher, a Democrat who represents Mr. Cruz’s Houston neighborhood in Congress, said Thursday that the state faces a “middle ground situation” and its leaders are needed to help organize the federal response on the ground. .
Ms Fletcher was powerless herself until Wednesday and charged her phone in her car to continue calling the Speaker of the House, FEMA and other agencies – too busy, she said, to think about it to “Mr. Cruz’s decision to leave the state.” at the moment.”
“Leadership matters,” she says.
Mr. Cruz had been fully aware of the possible crisis in advance. In a radio interview on Monday, he said the state could see as many as 100 dead this week. “So don’t risk that,” he said. “Protect your family, stay home, and hug your children.”
Mr Cruz had attacked a Democrat, Mayor Stephen Adler of Austin, in December for making a trip to Cabo San Lucas, Mexico, while telling voters to “stay home” during the pandemic.
“Hypocrites,” Cruz wrote on Twitter. “Complete and absolute hypocrites.”
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