Analysis: The GOP’s utterly embarrassing capitulation to Donald Trump, in 1 photo
“Had a great dinner tonight with President Trump at Mar-a-Lago. He’s in great spirits! We spent the evening talking about working together to re-take the House & Senate in 2022.”
What Cruz is doing here isn’t complicated. He wants to run for president in 2024 — particularly if Trump himself takes a pass on the contest. And Cruz is smart enough to know that, at least at the moment, the path to the Republican nomination goes directly through Mar-a-Lago. As in, there is a zero percent chance of winning if Trump is actively opposed to you doing so. If Trump says something nice about you publicly, so much the better!
That Cruz feels the need to kiss the ring — and make it VERY public that he is doing so — after everything Trump has said about him (and his loved ones) speaks to the depths of capitulation (and obsequiousness) that even the ostensible future leaders of the party (like Cruz) are willing to stoop to in order to please the former president.
What, again, has Trump said about Cruz?
And then there’s what Cruz has said about Trump.
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Which was harsh — and left some hard feelings that took a months for some in both camps to get over!
But there’s a big difference between going after a past policy position held by a politician and suggesting his wife is ugly. Or that his dad somehow played a role in the assassination of an American president. Or that you hide behind your religion while lying constantly.
Those sorts of attacks feel, to me at least, like the sort of stuff you don’t get over. Because they are totally outside the bounds of normal political hits, in that they are so deeply personal.
It’s also a testament to the depths of Cruz’s ambition and the death grip that the 45th President of the United States still exerts on the GOP.
