U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) has not yet endorsed presumptive Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump, nor did he mention the GOP front-runner’s name during a speech Saturday at the party’s Texas state convention.
In fact, he gave no indication during his speech that he was going to heed the call for unity ahead of November’s general election. And in an interview with the media afterward, he passed on the opportunity to “give instruction”—as the reporter put it—to his many delegate supporters:
“Listen, I think every voter is going to have to make an assessment and listen we have got time,” he told the Dallas-Fort Worth NBC affiliate. “The national convention is two months away. The election is six months away.
“I can tell you what I am doing and what I suspect millions of Americans are doing, which is looking and listening to what the candidates have to say and in particular, I am looking for a candidate who will defend the conservative principles that this campaign was all about.”
That hasn’t stopped the talk that Cruz would be an ideal candidate to replace the late Associate Justice Antonin Scalia on the U.S. Supreme Court, should Trump win the presidency. The presumptive GOP nominee has even said he thought his former opponent would be a good pick.
But while many conservatives and Christians who equally concerned about the direction of the high court have promoted the idea, the senator himself has been largely silent on the issue—until last Friday. Talking with Chris Salcedo of WBAP-AM in Fort Worth on Friday, Cruz was again asked about the possibility of serving on the Supreme Court.
“Everybody mentions your name, a lot of people do, and the Supreme Court,” Salcedo said. “Frankly, all the times I’ve interviewed you, I’ve never asked if you have any aspirations or felt called, if asked, to serve on the Supreme Court.
“I mean, I know you have the sharp intelligence to handle the job. But is it even something you even consider?”
In response, Cruz said, “That is not a desire of my heart.”
“I have had several opportunities in the past to go to the bench, and I certainly deeply respect the job the justices do,” he added. “But I think our country is in crisis. And I think we need a strong conservative president who will appoint not just one, but two, three, four, five Supreme Court justices who are principled constitutionalists.”
While fighting to put conservatives on the high court from his position in the Senate, there are a number of other issues where he said he would like to have some influence.
“I believe that I can do a great more good fighting across the political spectrum,” he said. “Because we also need leadership to repeal every word of Obamacare, to pass a flat-tax and abolish the IRS, to protect religious liberty and stop the federal government from violating our First Amendment rights and to stand with our friends and allies, especially the nation of Israel.”
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