Ted Cruz invited his college roommate on the Mexico trip he blamed on his daughters

Ted Cruz
(Image credit: Stefani Reynolds/AFP/Getty Images)

When Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) was discovered to have fled frozen, outage-plagued Texas for an extended weekend vacation at the Ritz-Carlton Cancún, he first blamed the trip on his daughters, aged 10 and 12. That was bad politics and probably worse parenting, but then someone on his wife's text message chain leaked the messages to The New York Times, showing that she had been trying to round up a group of neighborhood friends to join them in Mexico. They did not get any takers from Houston, but they also didn't vacation alone.

Ted Cruz invited his longtime friend and college roommate, David Panton, to join the family in Mexico — and Panton, who lives in Atlanta, accepted, Axios reported Monday morning. "An aide tells Axios the senator extended the invitation only after the Cruz family planned the vacation last Tuesday" — leaving conspicuously open the possibility that Cruz himself wasn't the driving force behind the vacation.

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Peter Weber, The Week US

Peter has worked as a news and culture writer and editor at The Week since the site's launch in 2008. He covers politics, world affairs, religion and cultural currents. His journalism career began as a copy editor at a financial newswire and has included editorial positions at The New York Times Magazine, Facts on File, and Oregon State University.