David Hogg, a Parkland school shooting survivor, has helped to raise nearly $10,000 through a GoFundMe campaign to put up a billboard featuring a 2016 tweet from Donald Trump attacking Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX), Axios reports.
Said the tweet: “Why would the people of Texas support Ted Cruz when he has accomplished absolutely nothing for them. He is another all talk, no action pol!”
President Trump announced that will travel to Texas in October to campaign for Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX), “an incumbent in a deep-red state who is facing an unexpectedly tough race for reelection,” CNBC reports.
“The announcement of a presidential campaign trip more than a month in advance reflects the growing sense of panic among Republicans, who fear that a Senate seat once considered among the most solidly Republican in all of American politics could be up for grabs.”
Peter Hamby: “The hype emerging from the Democrat’s campaign points to something rather obvious: O’Rourke is good at this, way better than most of the Democrats sniffing around the next presidential race from the boring hallways of Capitol Hill. Whether he wins or loses his race—and yes, even if he loses—O’Rourke should be included in every conversation about the 2020 Democratic primary. That’s because, unlike most of the paint-by-numbers politicians in his party, O’Rourke actually understands how politics should be conducted in the Donald Trump era: authentic, full of energy, stripped of consultant-driven sterility, and waged at all times with a social-media-primed video screen in mind. O’Rourke is making a bet that running on his gut and giving voters a clear choice against Cruz, rather than just a mushy alternative, offers not just a path to victory in Texas but an antidote to the entire stupid artifice of American politics in the Trump era.”
“The most appealing thing about O’Rourke is both delightfully uncomplicated and extremely powerful: he talks about politics like you and your friends do.”
“Republicans are sounding the alarm about Texas Sen. Ted Cruz’s closer-than-expected reelection contest, with an influential conservative group racing to his aid,” Politico reports.
“The Club for Growth, a Washington-based anti-tax group, is drawing up plans for a major TV ad campaign boosting Cruz — the first such intervention by a Republican outside group in this race. The move comes as Democratic Rep. Beto O’Rourke, an online fundraising behemoth who has attracted national support, continues to narrow the gap in polling.”
Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX), “during a lunch with colleagues last week in Washington passed the hat for campaign cash, as the Texas Republican’s anxiety mounts about the unusually brisk challenge from Democratic Rep. Beto O’Rourke (D),” the Washington Examiner reports.
“O’Rourke is raising money by the truckload — enough to compete in Texas, a big state with costly media markets. The development has forced Cruz to hunt for resources in unlikely places for a politician who built his national career on opposition to the party establishment: fellow lawmakers, political action committees, and wealthy Republican donors.”
Said one GOP operative: “He was pretty intense last week and he should be — he needs the dough.”
A new Emerson College poll in Texas finds Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) barely ahead of challenger Beto O’Rourke (D) in the U.S. Senate race, 38% to 37%, with 21% still undecided.
“I can think of nothing more American.”
— Rep. Beto O’Rourke (D-TX), explaining why NFL players kneeling during the national anthem is not disrespectful.
A new NBC News/Marist poll in Texas finds Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) leading challenger Beto O’Rourke (D) by just four points among registered voters, 49% to 45%.
“While both candidates have largely consolidated their bases — with O’Rourke capturing the support of 90% of Democrats and Cruz securing 91% of Republicans — independents in the state are equally split between the two men.”
“When Amy and I were first talking about running for Congress in 2011-2012, we decided that we would do term limits, and not serve more than four years. In part it was, ‘I just don’t want you to be an asshole; I haven’t met somebody in this line of work who doesn’t become one, that doesn’t think that they are so important only they can do it.'”
— Rep. Beto O’Rourke (D-TX), in an interview with the Austin Chronicle, explaining why he supports term limits.
Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) told the Houston Chronicle that he asked President Trump to assist him in his re-election efforts.
Said Cruz: “I would certainly welcome his support, and I hope to see him in Texas. I think we are likely to see the president down in Texas before the election.”
Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) “used a protester’s outburst Saturday to riff on how unhinged the left is, how the display of anger was evidence of the tough race he faces against Rep. Beto O’Rourke in the fall, and how it was really President Obama who colluded with Russia,” the Austin American Statesman reports.
Said Cruz: “It seems to me the very definition of cowardice is standing up and screaming like a child and being afraid to engage in any substance, not knowing any substance, which is why you’re afraid to engage in any substance, and just yelling, ‘Russia, Russia, Russia,’ which is what I guess the fever swamps of the left have told him.”
He added: “The irony of course is that eight years of Obama were eight years of absolute appeasement. We saw eight years of bootlicking for Vladimir Putin.”
A new Public Policy Polling survey in Texas finds Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) leading challenger Beto O’Rourke (D) by just four points, 46% to 42%.
Cruz had an eight-point lead in a poll earlier this year.
Also interesting: “Once voters were told about O’Rourke’s decision to reject PAC money, he took the lead, 46% to 43%.”
A new Texas Lyceum Poll finds Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) leading challenger to O’Rourke (D) by a hair, 41% to 39% among likely voters.
That’s well within the survey’s margin of error of 4.67 percentage points.
A new Quinnipiac poll finds Cruz leading by six points, 49% to 43%.
Town & Country: “It’s not just the toothy grin, the tall stature, and the shock of hair swept over his brow. With a disdain for highly paid consultants, a willingness to travel to unexpected places, and an inspiring message for an extraordinarily divided electorate, it’s hard to look at O’Rourke and not think of Bobby Kennedy in 1968. He has been to all of Texas’s 254 counties — including ones no Democratic candidate has seriously contested in decades. If he can meet every person, knock on every door, he thinks he can win.”
Rep. Beto O’Rourke (D-TX), who is challenging Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX), told the Dallas Morning News that President Trump’s performance at a summit with Russian strongman Vladimir Putin merits impeachment.
Said O’Rourke: “Standing on stage in another country with the leader of another country who wants to and has sought to undermine this country, and to side with him over the United States – if I were asked to vote on this I would vote to impeach the president. Impeachment, much like an indictment, shows that there is enough there for the case to proceed and at this point there is certainly enough there for the case to proceed.”
A new Texas Tribune poll finds Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) leads challenger Beto O’Rourke by just five points in the U.S. Senate race, 41% to 36%.
A new CBS News poll in Texas finds Sen. Ted Cruz (R) leading challenger Beto O’Rourke (D) by ten points in the U.S. Senate race, 50% to 40%.
A new Quinnipiac poll in Texas finds Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) leading challenger Beto O’Rourke (D) by double-digits, 50% to 39%.
Said pollster Peter Brown: “Cruz, apparently benefiting from a nationwide Republican mini-move, has taken a solid lead in his reelection race. President Trump’s Texas numbers also have climbed during those six weeks moving from a nine point deficit on job approval to an even split today. It is hard not to see a pro- Cruz effect there.”
Taegan Goddard
Taegan Goddard is the founder of Political Wire -- which for more than two decades has been one of the nation's most influential political news sites.
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