Ted Cruz says Roy Moore shouldn't step down if elected, but calls allegations against Al Franken a serious problem

(Image credit: Justin Sullivan/Getty Images)

published 1 December 2017

Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) may have a degree from Harvard Law School, but it seems his Ivy League education didn't teach him about the meaning of irony. Cruz told Fox News Friday that it would be "completely unacceptable" to remove Republican Alabama Senate candidate Roy Moore — who has been accused of courting teenagers and sexually assaulting several women — from the Senate if he were elected. But in the same breath, Cruz said there was "a rich irony" in watching Democrats come to the defense of Sen. Al Franken (D-Minn.), who has been accused of sexual assault and harassment by six women.

Cruz shook his head and scoffed as Fox News' Neil Cavuto mentioned that Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) said Moore would not be welcome in the Senate, even if he were to win the upcoming special election. Cruz called that type of reaction "completely unacceptable" and said, "I think we need to respect the will of the voters." Cruz then called the sexual assault allegations against Franken "a serious, serious problem."

Cruz was actually quite critical of Moore when the initial allegations against him came out. "There are serious charges of criminal conduct that if true, not only make him unfit to serve in the Senate but merit criminal prosecution," Cruz told reporters in November. But this wouldn't be the first time Cruz changed his mind about supporting someone he'd previously condemned. He was infamously photographed during the 2016 presidential campaign phone-banking for then-candidate Donald Trump, a man he once called a "sniveling coward" and urged Republicans to vote against during the 2016 Republican National Convention.

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Kelly O'Meara Morales is a staff writer at The Week. He graduated from Sarah Lawrence College and studied Middle Eastern history and nonfiction writing amongst other esoteric subjects. When not compulsively checking Twitter, he writes and records music, subsists on tacos, and watches basketball.

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