During the summer and fall of 2013, Texas senator Ted Cruz repeatedly warned that it would be impossible to repeal Obamacare once Americans began receiving subsidies on January 1, 2014.

In the new year, Americans would become “hooked on the subsidies, addicted to the sugar,” Cruz told a Tea Party gathering in his home state on August 19, according to the Texas Tribune. “If we get to January 1, this thing is here forever.” This belief was a main justification for the last-ditch campaign to fund the government if, and only if, Obamacare was defunded.

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