Open warfare has broken out between the respective presidential campaigns of Ted Cruz of Texas and Marco Rubio for Florida, just 24 hours after the Republican senators traded barbs and debated their records in Las Vegas.
On Wednesday evening, the Cruz campaign issued a press release, titled “Marco Rubio’s Trouble With the Truth.” The official statement lists ten falsehoods the Cruz campaign claims Rubio made during a Wednesday morning interview on Fox News. Among them: that the Rand Paul-authored budget Cruz voted for in 2013 would “dramatically reduce the size of our military.”
“FALSE,” reads the Cruz release. “The budget spends more on military each year.” That’s a link to a Politifact article from 2014. Another Rubio claim, almost identical, is that the budget Cruz supported “dramatically cuts defense spending.” “FALSE,” reads the release from Cruz. “The budget spends more on military each year and Cruz supported the 2015 Rubio-Cotton amendment to increase military spending.” That’s a link to the same Politifact article.
“Rubio’s rhetoric smacked down by reality,” the Cruz campaign concluded.
About two hours later on Wednesday evening, the Rubio campaign fired back in an email to reporters.
“Earlier tonight, Senator Cruz put out a release claiming that Senator Rand Paul’s budget which he voted for, does not reduce the size of our military or cuts defense spending,” wrote Rubio staffer Jahan Wilcox. “Here’s the deal, Cruz’s campaign refuses to link their so-called ‘fact sheet’ to the actual budget, as they know that page 38 and 39 clearly states that it will reduce the size of our military and it cuts defense spending.”
The Rubio campaign provided links to Paul’s budget fact-sheet, along with the relevant quotations: “This budget proposal does not simply reduce military spending, but provides directives to realign the military for the 21st Century,” reads an excerpt from page 38. “It seeks to reduce the size and scope of the military complex, including its global footprint to one that is more in line with a policy of containment,” reads an excerpt from page 39.
Wilcox concludes with a harsh assessment of Cruz’s motivations. “There is no ambiguity,” he writes. “Senator Cruz voted to cut defense spending and to reduce the size of the military. So the next time Cruz’s campaign puts out a ‘fact sheet,’ just remember that they play fast and loose with the facts, because Senator Cruz believes in saying or doing anything to win an election.”
As Jedi master Yoda might say, begun the Cruz-Rubio war has.
