Tea Party firebrand but no match for Trump

Once reviled by fellow Republicans as a "wacko bird" eager to shut down the US government, Ted Cruz believed his arch-conservatism could propel him into the White House -- but ultimately proved no match for the Donald Trump steamroller.

The senator from Texas, who bowed out of the race after suffering a knock-out blow in Indiana on Tuesday, was not just battling for the Republican nomination. 

Cruz has fought hard to maintain a prominent place for faith in American life, and sees himself in a battle for the very soul of the country -- as he made clear in his concession speech.

"Hear me now, I am not suspending our fight for liberty," he said. "I am not suspending our fight to defend the constitution, to defend the Christian values that built America."

"Together we will continue as long as God grants us the strength to fight on."

The 45-year-old Texan is an intellectual proponent of a grassroots conservative movement that has simmered for years under the Republican mainstream.
A US Senate freshman, he has barely three years under his belt in national politics.

But in the 2016 presidential race, his outsider status played well with a right-wing base furious with what he derides as the "mushy middle" GOP establishment unwilling to play hardball against US President Barack Obama.

Cruz received a tremendous boost on the first day of the Republican primaries -- when he briefly surged past Trump in the opening contest in Iowa -- and spent months since then seeking to out-maneuver his many rivals.

- Star power -

For Democrats, Cruz is a dangerous demagogue they love to hate.

But to religious conservatives, he is a patriot, a thinking man's champion of the common folk sent to Congress to disrupt the ways of the go-along-to-get-along establishment and fulfill the principles of smaller government.
A master orator with a clear sense of mission, he has angered party elders for showing little deference to seniority and snatching the spotlight from more experienced political stalwarts.

He insists government has wrecked the economy, infringed on religious liberty, trampled on constitutional rights, overtaxed Americans and sought to take away their guns.

Critics blast him as a poster boy for Washington gridlock.

In September 2013, his star power soared when he spoke for 21 hours straight to try to block a stopgap spending bill in the lead-up to a crippling government shutdown the following month, part of a doomed quest to defund Obama's crowning domestic achievement, the Affordable Care Act.

He won the support of the anti-government, anti-tax Tea Party movement, but alienated many in his own party who saw Cruz's drive to shut down the government as a politically damaging act of self-aggrandizement.

Cruz's apparent eagerness to gum up the works led an exasperated John McCain, the 2008 Republican nominee, to deride Cruz and other Tea Party lawmakers as "wacko birds on the right."

- From Harvard to the Hill -
A Texas-raised, Harvard-educated lawyer with a Cuban father and an American mother, Cruz joined the legal elite when he was accepted as a clerk for US Supreme Court Chief Justice William Rehnquist in 1996.

He was part of former president George W. Bush's legal team arguing the 2000 Florida presidential recount, later serving in Bush's Justice Department and the US Federal Trade commission.

He returned to Texas and in 2003 was appointed the state's solicitor general, arguing many cases before the Supreme Court in Washington.

In 2012, he ran for the Senate with support from the Tea Party, defeating the establishment Republican.

Cuban-American Cruz may enjoy plenty of support in Hispanic-heavy Texas, but he staunchly opposes immigration reform, blasting Obama's efforts to shield millions from deportation as "illegal amnesty."

- 'Lyin' Ted' -

For millions of conservatives outside the US capital, Cruz emerged as a hero of the 2016 race.

Finding himself in a crowded running lane -- with retired neurosurgeon Ben Carson, ex-senator Rick Santorum and former Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee vying for the far-right conservative vote -- Cruz outshone them all.

But Trump upended the political playbook, launching brutal personal attacks on his rivals including Cruz who he came to refer to exclusively as "Lyin' Ted."

The Texan pledged not to sink "into the mud" of insults, as the tycoon hammered him over his Canadian birth, suggesting bluntly he may not be eligible for the presidency.

But as all other 17 contenders dropped out except the low-polling John Kasich, the Republican contest increasingly turned to a stand-off between the pair.

Weeks of tensions boiled over Tuesday after Trump made the startling allegation that Cruz's father was with John F. Kennedy's killer shortly before the US president was assassinated.

Cue a blistering retort from Cruz who branded the Republican frontrunner a "pathological liar" in an attack that lasted several minutes.

"Let's be clear, this is nuts," Cruz charged. "He doesn't know the difference between truth and lies," Cruz said, in a final verbal joust with Trump before he bowed out -- and cleared his path to the Republican nomination.

Source: AFP