Texas Sen. Ted Cruz said that the ‘defund Obamacare’ effort and the partial government shutdown associated with it helped bring to light the flaws of a law that Americans now oppose in great numbers, ultimately proving beneficial to the cause.
The Republican and tea party star famous for his 21-hour address against the Affordable Care Act made his comments in a year-end interview with The Texas Tribune. The piece noted that Cruz concludes 2013 as he began it: with “no apologies,” and that includes the shutdown fight he contended was good for the anti-Obamacare crusade.
“The proof is in the pudding,” he told the publication. “As a consequence of that fight, we elevated the national debate over the harms Obamacare is causing, and today President Obama has the lowest approval rating he has ever had, and the American public has turned strongly against Obamacare. The reason is simple. This thing isn’t working.”
Recent polling confirms that the country’s disfavor of the president’s signature law is growing — even a majority of Democrats now believe that implementation should be delayed for a year, according to a FOX News survey — and the program has caused migraines for the public, from a broken website to rising premium costs and cancelled insurance policies.
Whether or not the highly politicized movement to defund Obamacare helped illuminate these failures and convert Americans to skeptics, though, is at least questionable. The bungled rollout began on the heels of the government shutdown — for which the public had little taste but blamed many chefs — and the implementation’s most embarrassing and costly consequences spread like disease with time. Frustration with Healthcare.gov and the enrollment process left consumers increasingly frustrated, and the news of cancellation notices and high prices for plans under the exchanges left them angry.
That’s tangible, kitchen-table reality, which doesn’t necessarily need a spotlight.
But it does need a remedy, which is why Cruz insisted to The Texas Tribune that he continues to press for the law’s repeal, and that it’s the very people the law is harming who must lead the charge.
“The path to repealing Obamacare is going to be continuing to energize and mobilize the American people. The answers are not going to come from Washington,” he said.
Cruz spoke about other issues to the publication, including his plans — or lack thereof — for the Senate primary race involving his Texas Republican counterparts John Cornyn and challenger Steve Stockman. Saying that he likes both men, he plans to leave it to “the voters of Texas” to decide who the party’s nominee for Senate in 2014 should be.
“I think primaries should be decided by the grassroots in each state,” Cruz said.
Read the full interview here.
