If you thought that the recent Ted Cruz sex scandal couldn’t get any weirder, you clearly haven’t been paying attention to the Republican primaries.
In response to the recent National Enquirer article alleging that Sen. Cruz has had affairs with five women, the evangelical Christian Senator from Texas issued a sharp rebuke, calling the piece “garbage” and accusing Donald Trump himself of planting the story as part of a smear campaign, telling CNN:
“Let me be clear, this National Enquirer story is garbage. It is complete and utter lies. It is a tabloid smear, and it is a smear from Donald Trump and his henchmen.”
Denial is the go-to strategy for politicians ensnared in sex scandals (see here and more recently here), but what makes Sen. Cruz’s particular response intriguing is two-fold.
First, Trump himself said he would do something like this. Following the recent spat in which an anti-Trump super PAC created an ad featuring Trump’s wife, Melania, posing nude, Trump responded with a tweet saying he would “spill the beans” on Cruz’s wife, Heidi.
Lyin’ Ted Cruz just used a picture of Melania from a G.Q. shoot in his ad. Be careful, Lyin’ Ted, or I will spill the beans on your wife!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) March 23, 2016
Second, and perhaps more importantly, is that Donald Trump apparently has a very close relationship with David Pecker, who just happens to be the CEO of the National Enquirer.
According to an article in New York Magazine, Trump and Pecker have been “friends for years”, with Trump going so far as to tweet that Pecker should become CEO of Time magazine.
The article further claims that this would not be the first time Trump has used the Enquirer for his own political purposes.
According to the piece, the Trump campaign provided key information in a “hit piece” against then rival Ben Carson, and has also gone after former rivals Jeb Bush, Carly Fiorina, and Marco Rubio.
Whether or not these allegations pan out is unclear. What is abundantly clear, however, is that November feels an awfully long way away.
