Texas Sen. Ted Cruz on vacation in Mexico amid storm crisis
- par Laura Grandis
- dans Médecine
- — Fév 18, 2021
Congress is not in session this week following the President's Day holiday.
The Texas Democratic Party is calling on Sen. Ted Cruz acknowledged on Thursday that he had traveled to Mexico for a family vacation this week, leaving his home state as thousands of constituents struggled without power or safe drinking water after a powerful winter storm.
Temperatures this week have plunged to unsafe record lows in the Lone Star State and overwhelmed power grids, leaving millions without power.
The high-profile Republican lawmaker went with his family for a long-planned trip to Cancun and was expected to return immediately, according to a source with direct knowledge of the situation who spoke on the condition of anonymity to share private conversations.
CNN has repeatedly reached out to Cruz's office and people in his orbit late Wednesday night and Thursday morning but they did not respond to multiple requests for comment.
The new scrutiny on Mr Cruz comes as he reportedly contemplates a second presidential bid in 2024.
Texas officials have also ordered seven million people in the state to boil tap water before consuming it due to damaged infrastructure and pipes. The two-term senator's current term expires in early 2025.
In Austin, some hospitals faced a loss in water pressure and in some cases, heat.
Sen. Ted Cruz R-Texas, speaks to the media during the impeachment trial of President Donald Trump, Thursday, Jan. 23, 2020, on Capitol Hill in Washington.
"You lied about the election".
He further described Cruz as "an enemy to our democracy" for challenging the certification of the Electoral College vote before and after the January 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol and "an enemy to our state" for "jetting off to Mexico while Texans remain dying in the cold".
Cruz was already facing criticism this week during the Texas power outages as a tweet resurfaced of him mocking California's "failed energy policies" when it experienced outages last August.
"The left - and some grifters on the right - are consumed by partisan anger and rage", his office said in a written statement. "Cruz seems to believe there isn't much for him to do in Texas for the millions of fellow Texans who remain without electricity/water and are literally freezing", former MSNBC anchor David Shuster tweeted shortly after midnight.
