Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) was the subject of a scathing tirade by former George W. Bush consultant Steve Schmidt, who called the Texas Republican a “historically despicable person” and went on to compare him to Sen. Joe McCarthy (R-WI) during an interview on MSNBC.
Asked by host Nicolle Wallace to comment on Cruz’s recent appearance on CBS’s “Face The Nation,” Schmidt didn’t mince word to express his disdain for the “lying” senator. He also slammed other controversial figures driving the message for the Republican party.
“These people … from Paul Gosar (R-AZ), who has raised money from a Holocaust denier, who has aligned himself with white nationalists and white supremacists,” Schmidt began. “No hyperbole at all involved. He ideated about the murder of a Congresswoman. Matt Gaetz, all the rest of them are — they’re loony. They’re, crazy. Lauren Boebert, six or seven different arrests on her criminal jacket. These political extremists are in charge of the Republican Party.”
He then took aim at Ted Cruz. “He is a historically despicable person. He ranks up there with Joe McCarthy. He’s a demagogue. He’s a liar. He’s as irresponsible United States senator as there has ever been in the history of the United States. He arrived in the Senate and has been a vandal towards our institutions and towards the idea of the truth and delivering it to the American people.”
He added; “When you look at somebody like Ted Cruz, you know he’s lying. Everybody knows he’s lying. Ted Cruz knows he’s lying,” Schmidt said. “But extraordinary cynicism coupled with the type of propaganda that comes out of Fox News and the right-wing can turn that nonsense into reality. So, Ted Cruz helped incite the Jan. 6th attacks with his lying, with instigations. He was, of course, revving up the crowd there that morning. And he has sought to whitewash it with more lying for many, many months. He is a truly despicable figure at a moment of real crisis.”
Schmidt also hit House Minority leader Kevin McCarthy for contributing to the cancer spreading in the Republican party.
Watch the full rant in the clip below from MSNBC.
