Sen. Ted Cruz was on Fox News about a week ago, speculating about Donald Trump’s pending federal indictment, three days before it was announced. “Mark my words: I believe [Attorney General] Merrick Garland will indict Donald Trump,” the Texas Republican declared. “He wants to indict Donald Trump because he hates Donald Trump. He hates him. He’s angry, Merrick Garland is angry that he wasn’t confirmed to the Supreme Court, he wants to indict him.”
Even for Cruz, this was all a bit weird. Garland, the victim of Republican abuses that predated Trump’s term and that Trump had nothing to do with, took office in March 2021. If he were a rabid partisan, out for revenge against the former president who didn’t do anything to him, the attorney general could’ve immediately launched criminal investigations into Trump.
But the attorney general did no such thing. Indeed, there’s nothing to suggest Garland has any animosity toward the former president at all. Even now, it wasn’t Garland who indicted Trump; it was a special counsel’s office and grand jury members in Florida.
That was Cruz’s pre-indictment message. The GOP senator’s post-indictment message was arguably worse:
“The problem with the Trump indictment is not whether he violated the law — it’s just how politicized this indictment is. Joe Biden did the exact same thing, and the DOJ doesn’t care!”
What’s always bothered me about Cruz is that he’s smart enough to know better. The Texan peddles lazy claims he knows to be wrong, apparently because he expects the public to believe nonsense.
It’s the cynicism that’s tough to defend.
Take another look at Cruz’s message from yesterday. He begins by suggesting Trump’s alleged crimes are irrelevant — apparently because the senator says so — before trying to change the subject.
“Joe Biden did the exact same thing,” the senator added, despite the fact that the Democrat clearly did not do the same thing, “and the DOJ doesn’t care!”
But the Justice Department does care. We know this for certain because the attorney general appointed a special counsel — a former Trump-appointed U.S. attorney — to investigate Biden’s previous handling of classified documents, and the probe is ongoing.
That’s not indifference; it’s the opposite.
Cruz, a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, surely knows all of this. I’ll leave it to him to explain why he told the public the opposite of the truth.
