The first major candidate of the 2016 presidential race is making his first official campaign visit to the first-in-the-nation presidential primary state.
Sen. Ted Cruz is making his first sweep through New Hampshire, carrying a message of creating jobs and rolling back much of the Obama era.
“It is my intention the next two years every day to take the case to the American people that Obamacare is the biggest job killer in this country,” the Texas Republican said Friday, quoted by the Washington Post.
The candidate, who kicked off his campaign Monday at Liberty University in Virginia, addressed supporters at a Veterans of Foreign Wars post in Merrimack and a young conservatives’ dinner in Nashua, the Post said.
“There’s nothing wrong with Cruz that I can see,” Phil Straight, a New Hampshire state legislator at one Cruz appearance Friday, told the Dallas Morning News. “I like his border stance. I like that he’s an outsider.”
And Cruz played up that reputation, the News said, quoting him telling supporters, “You may have heard I’m not exactly the most popular person with congressional leadership.”
The Post reported that Cruz raised $1 million on the first day of his presidential bid and had raised $2 million by Thursday.
A darling of the Tea Party, Cruz rose to national prominence for his opposition to the Affordable Care Act, including his role in the 16-day 2013 government shutdown as part of an effort to defund the law. The runup to the shutdown included a Cruz filibuster on the Senate floor that saw him read aloud from Dr. Seuss’ “Green Eggs and Ham.”
Cruz made headlines again last week when it was revealed that he would sign up for health insurance through Obamacare, as his wife, a managing director with Goldman Sachs, would be taking a leave of absence from her job as Cruz launches his campaign.
