On Ted Cruz, Strategic Ambiguity, and Losing the General to Win the Primary
Why re-litigating 2013 misses the point
Jeb Bush took his share of ribbing last year for his dubious exhortation that the Republican nominee must be willing to “lose the primary to win the general,” but the latest salvo in the long-simmering battle over immigration underscores a degree of truth to this paradox.
While much of the current debate has centered around relitigating the events of 2013, retroactively divining intentions and parsing quotes, this analysis amounts to a Ted Cruz Rohrshach test of little value. But the key upshot is two-fold, no matter your perspective on the junior Senator from Texas.
First, Cruz’s preferred narrative requires an acknowledgement (if not outright embrace) of his slippery tendencies- “Trust me now that I was lying then” is a flawed defense, however valid. And second, we are reduced to revisionist histories of 2013 because, despite three years at the white hot center of the immigration debate, the amendment gambit is the only real clue Cruz has offered as to his disposition toward legal status.
We know that he supports “common sense immigration reform,” whatever that means. We know he s̶u̶p̶p̶o̶r̶t̶s̶ supported increased legal immigration. We know that he has not called for widespread deportation (or self-deportation) of those here illegally. And we now know with a reasonable level of detail what his immigration plan would look like.
And yet despite being harangued by the press since 2013, Cruz has steadfastly refused to answer the question beyond the context of G8, even to the point of engaging in comically eliptical exchanges with reporters. That is, until now.
Which brings us back to the now-infamous Jebism, highlighting the zero sum nature of primary politics. Cruz’s strategic ambiguity on legal status has been meant to elide this tension, knowing that staking out a firm position would make him less palatable to either a GOP electorate or a general one.
On the one hand, Cruz knows his primary path depends on converting the vast majority of voters for whom deportation is a requisite and legal status is anathema. For now, most are parked with a carnival barker throwing red meat and promising the moon.
But ever a savvy politician, Cruz surely appreciates that going Full Trump would cost him any shot at the general election, where Hillary Clinton and her allies would inevitably pillory him for wanting to tear apart families. Better to maintain deniability, avoid the DREAMer attacks, and leave the legal status back door open for when the time comes.
Moreover, if you buy Team Cruz’s spin on the smashing electoral success of his G8 amendment gambit, it would be campaign malpractice not to use the same legal status wedge against HRC herself.
Watching him lay out a compelling case for his legal status amendment during the Senate Judiciary Committee markup, it’s easy to envision Cruz touting the same quotes and videos to swing voters as proof that he is indeed for “common sense immigration reform” after all, just not for the moral hazard of citizenship (and voting rights) sought by Dem politicians.
Or at least that was the case until last night, when an an exchange with Marco Rubio flushed him out of his comfort zone. Faced with the choice of sticking to his guns or prioritizing one election over the other, Cruz bet on the primary- first equivocally, and later, with the help of his campaign spokesman, unequivocally, shutting the door on legal status once and for all.
And with that, three years of studious and strategic ambiguity went out the window, and with it, an unparalleled political wedge that, according to Cruz’s own rapid response director, won the election for Republicans a year ago.
It’s safe to say by now that you don’t need to lose the Republican primary to win the general- just ask Jeb how that’s working out. But in his haste to lock down the GOP nomination, Cruz just wrote, directed and starred in a Dem attack ad while shutting the door on one of his best weapons against Hillary.
