Ted Cruz
| Ted Cruz | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| |||
| U.S. Senator from Texas From: January 3, 2013 - Present | |||
| Predecessor | Kay Bailey Hutchison | ||
| Successor | Incumbent (no successor) | ||
| Information | |||
| Party | Republican | ||
| Spouse(s) | Heidi Cruz | ||
| Religion | Southern Baptist | ||
Ted Cruz (born December 22, 1970) is the incoming conservative Republican Senator from Texas, having won the U.S. Senate seat vacated by Kay Bailey Hutchison in the 2012 election cycle. He is the former Solicitor General of Texas, the chief lawyer for the state before the U.S. Supreme Court. Cruz has authored more than eighty U.S. Supreme Court briefs and personally argued forty oral arguments, including nine before the U.S. Supreme Court. He graduated magna cum laude from Harvard Law School and served as a primary editor of the Harvard Law Review.
Cruz's father was a political prisoner in Cuba before escaping to the United States. Cruz's mother is American. Cruz was born in Alberta, Canada; then the family moved to Texas. Cruz is a Southern Baptist, married with two children.
Cruz carriess the backing of the Tea Party movement, Tea Party Express, Club for Growth, FreedomWorks, the Family Research Council, Erick Erickson of RedState, Mark Levin, Senator Jim DeMint, Senator Rand Paul, Senator Pat Toomey, and former Alaska Governor Sarah Palin.
In the Texas Senate primary elections of May 29, 2012, Cruz forced a runoff with Lieutenant Governor David Dewhurst. The pair emerged from a nine-candidate Republican field and squared-off in a second round of voting on July 31. Cruz emerged victorious defeating Dewhurst. Cruz defeated Democrat former State Representative Paul Sadler in the general election.
