Ted Cruz is not happy
Just 10 short years ago, George W. Bush was using using opposition to same-sex marriage to help win swing states. But Monday, when the Supreme Court effectively made marriage equality the law in five and soon to be 11 more states, Republican candidates
didn't want to talk about it.
Perhaps the most outspoken current Republican candidate was North Carolina's Thom Tillis, and even he kept it to a joint statement with the Republican state Senate leader saying that, until the Supreme Court settles the matter, "we will vigorously defend the values of our state and the will of more than 60 percent of North Carolina voters who made it clear that marriage is between one man and one woman." Other candidates kept their heads down, likely embracing this logic:
“We don’t have to agree with the decision, but as long as we’re not against it we should be okay,” said one aide to a 2016 contender who declined to be named to speak candidly on the sensitive topic. “The base, meanwhile, will focus its anger on the Court, and not on us.”
By contrast, 2016 Republican hopeful Ted Cruz was practically breathing fire over the Supreme Court's rejection of the appeals, calling it "judicial activism at its worst." The "activism" part is funny, given that what the Court did was to decide not to act to overturn lower courts. But the fact that the Republican shrieking the most loudly is one with his eye not on November's general elections but on 2016 Republican primary voters is telling: Cruz's outrage may well work with Iowa caucusers and South Carolina primary voters, but, as this year's candidates clearly know, it will not help in a general election.
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