Ted Cruz apparently has different positions based on which group of donors he’s talking to.
Ted Cruz is under fire today after attending a high-dollar donor fundraiser at a Madison Avenue law firm in Manhattan and telling the crowd that fighting same-sex marriage is not among his top priorities.
One donor, who told Cruz that he disagrees with his stance against same-sex marriage, asked, “So would you say it’s like a top-three priority for you — fighting gay marriage?â€
“No,†Cruz replied. “I would say defending the Constitution is a top priority. And that cuts across the whole spectrum — whether it’s defending [the] First Amendment, defending religious liberty.â€
The exchange, during which Cruz insisted he merely believes that social issues like same-sex marriage should be left to the states, was reported by Politico, which also obtained an audio recording (above) of the event.Â
“People of New York may well resolve the marriage question differently than the people of Florida or Texas or Ohio,” Cruz told the donor, in what Politico called an attempt to soothe him. “That’s why we have 50 states — to allow a diversity of views. And so that is a core commitment.”
Cruz said his approach to everything lies in him being a “constitutionalist,” which he claims means he would not be opposed to same-sex marriage or abortion as long as the people of each state voted on those issues. In reality, it does not. It means, as the Supreme Court decided, based on the constitution, that the right to an abortion or the right to marry someone of the same-sex lies in the constitution, and is thus protected by it.
Politico quotes a “well-known Republican operative not affiliated with a 2016 campaign” who “said by email when sent Cruz’s quote: ‘Wow. Does this not undermine all of his positions? Abortion, Common Core — all to the states? … Worse, he sounds like a slick D.C. politician — says one thing on the campaign trail and trims his sails with NYC elites. Not supposed to be like that.'”
Indeed, Cruz has made fighting same-sex marriage and the LGBT community’s rights a center focus of his campaign. He has teamed up with a large swath of anti-gay hate groups at one point or another, including sharing the stage with a pastor who literally called for the execution of gay people. Cruz refused to acknowledge that pastor’s long history of anti-gay rhetoric, even before attending, when confronted by ABC News’ Jake Tapper.
In May, Cruz told conservative author and talk radio host Eric Metaxas that the Democratic Party is devoted to “mandatory gay marriage” and called same-sex marriage one of “the greatest threats” to religious liberty in the history of this nation.
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Image by Gage Skidmore via Flickr and a CC license