The senator earlier called Trump a "sniveling coward," "serial philanderer" and "pathological" this spring. But these days he's full of praise — albeit delivered uncomfortably.
"I thought it was a very strong debate. I thought Hillary did not have a good performance. I think throughout the night, she was tired, she was formulaic," Cruz told Hewitt. "The entire debate from Hillary was more Washington-as-usual. And every proposal she advanced was another big government solution that isn’t working."
During the primaries, Trump insulted Cruz' wife, threatened to release embarrassing personal information about her and insinuated that Cruz' Cuban-immigrant father Rafael was involved in the assassination of President Kennedy, and now Cruz has been left to carry Trump's water.
"I thought Donald had the strongest debate performance he’s had in this election cycle. I think he really went after Hillary, which was a good thing," he said. "And I think he drew strong contrast, particularly on taxes, and on regulation and on law and order, and on the disastrous Iran deal."
Here is what Trump said about taxes and the economy last night, in it's entirety, which seemingly impressed Cruz:
Our jobs are fleeing the country. They're going to Mexico. They're going to many other countries. You look at what China is doing to our country in terms of making our product. They're devaluing their currency, and there's nobody in our government to fight them. And we have a very good fight. And we have a winning fight. Because they're using our country as a piggy bank to rebuild China, and many other countries are doing the same thing.Cruz also took the time to respond to critics who have accused him of selling out the Never Trump movement, a movement that Cruz himself galvanized when he encouraged voters to "vote their conscience" at July's Republican National Convention.
So we're losing our good jobs, so many of them. When you look at what's happening in Mexico, a friend of mine who builds plants said it's the eighth wonder of the world. They're building some of the biggest plants anywhere in the world, some of the most sophisticated, some of the best plants. With the United States, as he said, not so much.
So Ford is leaving. You see that, their small car division leaving. Thousands of jobs leaving Michigan, leaving Ohio. They're all leaving. And we can't allow it to happen anymore. As far as child care is concerned and so many other things, I think Hillary and I agree on that. We probably disagree a little bit as to numbers and amounts and what we're going to do, but perhaps we'll be talking about that later.
But we have to stop our jobs from being stolen from us. We have to stop our companies from leaving the United States and, with it, firing all of their people. All you have to do is take a look at Carrier air conditioning in Indianapolis. They left — fired 1,400 people. They're going to Mexico. So many, hundreds and hundreds of companies, are doing this.
We cannot let it happen. Under my plan, I'll be reducing taxes tremendously, from 35 percent to 15 percent for companies, small and big businesses. That's going to be a job creator like we haven't seen since Ronald Reagan. It's going to be a beautiful thing to watch.
Companies will come. They will build. They will expand. New companies will start. And I look very, very much forward to doing it. We have to renegotiate our trade deals, and we have to stop these countries from stealing our companies and our jobs.
The only thing this election is about, Cruz said, is making sure a man he believes is "utterly amoral" is allowed to nominate justices to the Supreme Court.
"In the weeks and months since Cleveland, I had been urging the Trump campaign repeatedly to give more specificity, especially on the Supreme Court," Cruz told Hewitt. "And so about three weeks ago when I sat down with Mike Pence, and we had a conversation about what it would take for me to come on board, that was the major issue I stressed, was the Supreme Court."
