CLIVE, Iowa—Ted Cruz isn’t hiding his presidential ambitions—and he is taking some digs at the presumptive front-runner along the way.
He is also quietly asking people if they would be interested in working on his 2028 bid, according to people familiar with the requests. But Cruz, the Texas senator and firebrand conservative, is already putting in the legwork in Iowa, hitting the podcast circuit and embarking on a book tour.
Asked about Cruz, Steve Bannon, a chief strategist for Trump’s 2016 election, said: “He’s going to have plenty of money, but unfortunately he’s not a populist, he’s a throwback to the neocon and neoliberal policies of the old Republican party that’s essentially been destroyed. Cruz, 55, came to Congress in 2012, as the Tea Party movement gained political traction. He ran for president and won the Iowa caucuses in 2016 and held on in the crowded race as it winnowed to just him and Trump.
Republicans running for Congress and governor in Iowa are facing some of the toughest races in years, in part due to a climate that many candidates are blaming on the Trump administration, including the monthslong war with Iran and a trade dispute with Canada .
Cruz told MSNOW that the party hasn’t coalesced around Vance. “I’ll certainly be part of the discussion,” he said. That was a terrible deal,” Cruz said. “No tax on tips, I wrote that,” Cruz told the crowd. He said that he was the one who pushed for investment accounts for children, known as Trump Accounts , to be included in the tax bill passed by Republicans last year.
Several times this year, he has condemned rising antisemitism on the right, and specifically targeted Republicans who, like Vance, haven’t separated themselves from conservative media personality Tucker Carlson, who has hosted Holocaust deniers on his podcast. Vance’s allies have privately dismissed and scoffed at Cruz running, arguing he wouldn’t be a serious threat to the vice president if he chose to run. He also took a shot at the vice president’s role negotiating the memorandum of understanding that aimed to end the Iran war but has since fallen apart. “JD negotiated the MOU with Iran. Hinson recently called Trump’s decision to boost beef imports a bad idea. Trump dubbed him “Lyin’ Ted. The two men have since become friends, and Trump promoted Cruz’s new book on Truth Social this week.
If the speech Cruz gave to the crowd on Saturday is any indication, Cruz will campaign on the same policies that Vance is likely to claim too.
