On Thursday’s “Mark Levin Show,” Republican presidential candidate Texas Senator Ted Cruz argued that fellow candidate Donald Trump “explicitly” agrees with President Obama and Hillary Clinton on North Carolina’s “bathroom law,” “has no idea” what is in his tax plan, and “pretending to be a conservative” while “telling us he’s lying to us.”
The interview began with Cruz responding to Levin’s (who has endorsed Cruz) statement that Trump hadn’t been on his show in a few months by saying that Trump was afraid to do Levin’s show for the same reason he’s afraid to do a debate, “because you won’t kiss his behind. You’ll actually ask difficult questions.”
Cruz was then asked about Trump’s senior aide Paul Manafort’s statement about Trump that “The part that he’s been playing is evolving into the part that now you’ve been expecting, but he wasn’t ready for, because he had first to complete the first phase. The negatives will come down. The image is going to change.”
He responded, “Donald is a New York liberal who is pretending to be a conservative, to try to fool Republican primary voters. And, you know, the amazing thing Mark, all of us are frustrated with politicians lying to us. I’m actually going to give Trump a little bit of credit here. He’s being candid. He’s telling us he’s lying to us.”
Cruz then reacted to Trump’s criticism of North Carolina’s “bathroom law” earlier that day by stating it was “Looney Tunes” and that Trump was “explicitly agreeing with Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton. They have the same views on religious liberty. They have the same views on protecting our kids.”
He continued that Trump’s statement was “conventional wisdom among Manhattan liberals. It is the political correctness that we have seen the last seven years. And Donald told us, again, talking about admitting that he’s lying to us, he told us he could be the most politically correct person in the world.”
After the discussion turned to Trump’s statement that he favors raising taxes on the wealthy, including himself, that also came earlier that day, Cruz said that this went against Trump’s own tax plan, but Trump “has no idea what’s in his tax plan. He hired some staffer to write a tax plan to pretend to be conservative. It’s not a very well-thought-out tax plan. He doesn’t know the details. Donald is a big government liberal. Remember, Donald Trump supported President Obama’s stimulus. He supported the Wall Street bailout. He has proposed expanding Obamacare to make it socialized medicine, like [Democratic presidential candidate Senator] Bernie Sanders (I-VT), government in charge of your healthcare. So, it should be no surprise that Donald is now saying he wants to raise taxes. He’s not going to stand for religious liberty. In one of the last debates that he did, he told Hugh Hewitt, that on the Supreme Court, that he would compromise and negotiate with [Sens.] Harry Reid (D-NV) and Chuck Schumer (D-NY) on the Supreme Court. On the 2nd Amendment, he supported Bill Clinton’s ban on some of the most popular weapons in America. On immigration, he’s told the New York Times he’s not going to do what he said. Donald is telling — oh, and by the way, he also just came out today for changing the pro-life plank of the Republican platform and abandoning our commitment to life. Now, that’s not surprising for someone who, for much of his life, supported partial-birth abortion, and even today, supports taxpayer funding for Planned Parenthood. These are the views of a big government, New York liberal.”
Cruz also argued that Trump’s donations to Democrats such as Representative Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) and Harry Reid, weren’t “just the cost of doing business, the incumbents were the Republicans. He funded the leftist Democrats, Nancy Pelosi, toppling the Republicans, and that’s why we have Obamacare, because Donald Trump wrote the checks to fund it.”
Follow Ian Hanchett on Twitter @IanHanchett
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