A previously secret audio recording of Texas Senator Ted Cruz speaking with Fox News host Maria Bartiromo in the days surrounding January 6 has revealed Mr Cruz’s intentions to assist Donald Trump in overturning the 2020 election.
The recording, made by former Fox News producer Abby Grossberg and obtained by The Washington Post, reveals Mr Cruz’s support for the appointed electoral commission to deny election certification with unsubstantiated claims of voter fraud.
In the private conversation recorded on 2 January, Bartiromo asks Mr Cruz, “Who’s deciding who gets inaugurated?”
Mr Cruz responds, “It would be the results of that commission and what they find and if they found credible evidence of fraud that undermines confidence in the electoral results in any given state they would report on that.”
Bartiromo asks Mr Cruz, “Is there any chance you can overturn this?”
Mr Cruz responds, “I hope so.”
Much of what Mr Cruz says in the conversation echoes what the Texas senator publicly said in the days surrounding January 6.
In a press release that Mr Cruz sent out on 2 January, with 10 other senators, he indicated that they intended to vote on January 6 “to reject the electors from disputed states as not ‘regularly given’ and ‘lawfully certified’.”
On Twitter, Mr Cruz responded to the audio leak, first revealed by MSNBC, saying, “This MSNBC is breathlessly reporting that I ‘secretly’ said in a phone call… the EXACT same thing I said on national television the next morning! And then said again on the Senate floor four days later.”
But the audio recording reveals Mr Cruz’s push to decertify election results and overturn the election.
“I think that the country deserves to have a credible assessment of these claims and what the evidence shows and the mechanism to try to force that is denying certification on the sixth,” Mr Cruz told Bartiromo.
