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Texas State Senator Roland Gutierrez weighs challenge to US Senator Ted Cruz

U.S. Senator Ted Cruz (R) (right) could face a challenge from State Senator Roland Gutierrez (D)
U.S. Senator Ted Cruz (R) (right) could face a challenge from State Senator Roland Gutierrez (D)

State Senator Roland Gutierrez said Wednesday he’s going to wait before deciding on running for U.S. Senate. If he jumps in the race, the South Texas Democrat would be challenging incumbent Republican Ted Cruz.

It was six years ago that Cruz faced El Paso Congressman Beto O’Rourke at the ballot box. The Democrat came close to defeating Cruz, but the Republican held on with 50.9% of the vote.

Today political watchers are wondering if Cruz is still vulnerable to a strong challenger, especially after Cruz’s role in the Jan 6th attempt to stop the counting of the Electoral College votes.

It has come to light that Cruz was deeply involved in the attempt to prevent Joe Biden from being sworn into office after he won the 2020 presidential election.

In secretly recorded audio tapes of Cruz speaking with Fox News host Maria Bartiromo, Cruz admits he “hopes” to overturn the election results. According to documents made public in the Dominion lawsuit against Fox News, Bartiromo was a staunch believer in Trump’s Big Lie that the election was stolen. She refused to call Biden president-elect and she instructed her staff at Fox News to follow suit.

Bartiromo asked Cruz, “Who is deciding who get inaugurated?” Cruz answered, “It would be the result of the commission and what they find.”

Also on the tapes, Cruz can be heard saying if the commission found “credible evidence of fraud that undermines confidence in the electoral results in any given state,” then the state would call a special session and re-certify results. This is essentially the creation of a bureaucracy to commit a coup.

“Is there any chance you can overturn this?” Bartiromo asked Cruz.

“I hope so,” he responded.

Gutierrez blasted Cruz for his taped comments released by a former Fox News producer Abby Grossberg.

“Ted Cruz knows who won the last election. He knew it before then. The idea that he was trying to create a special committee to be able to overthrow the government is just nonsense but that’s just more of what you get from a man who truly doesn’t care about our community,” said Gutierrez.

Gutierrez has not ruled out running for Senate but he said a decision on challenging Cruz in the 2024 election is going to have to wait because he’s focused on the current Texas legislative session. And he’s particularly concerned with the issues connected to the Uvalde school shooting.

“I got to be 100% focused on the next five weeks. And gotta do what I can do for these families. My future we’ll figure all those things later down the road,” he said.

Gutierrez said when the session ends — which is in about five weeks — he will then consult with his family before making a decision to enter the race.

If Gutierrez decides to run for Senate, he would not have to resign his state Senate seat. Congressman Colin Allred — a Dallas Democrat —is also reportedly considering a run against Cruz, but Allred would have to give up his seat.

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David Martin Davies can be reached at dmdavies@tpr.org and on Twitter at @DavidMartinDavi