this post was submitted on 21 Feb 2026
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In what appeared to be a moment of misspeaking, anti-LGBTQ+ Republican Sen. Ted Cruz (TX) said in a recent congressional speech, “How about we all come together and say ‘Let’s stop attacking pedophiles’?”

During a congressional hearing on the current president’s actions addressing crime in cities — which seems mostly to be insulting large city mayors, ignoring higher-crime areas in red states, and then sending in armed federal officers against the mayors’ wishes — Sen. Cruz referred to Sen. Cory Booker’s (D-NJ) plea for Democrats and Republicans to “come together and have bipartisan agreement.”

“I think that’s a great idea. We should have bipartisan agreement,” Cruz said. “How about we all come together and say, ‘Let’s stop murder’? How about we all come together and say, ‘Let’s stop rape’? How about we all come together and say, ‘Let’s stop attacking pedophiles’?”

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[–] givesomefucks@lemmy.world 0 points 6 months ago (1 children)

I mean...

“I think that’s a great idea. We should have bipartisan agreement,” Cruz said. “How about we all come together and say, ‘Let’s stop murder’? How about we all come together and say, ‘Let’s stop rape’? How about we all come together and say, ‘Let’s stop attacking pedophiles’?”

Seems pretty clear he had:

Stop pedophiles

In his head, realized he shouldn't say that since he's a spineless Republican and tried to pivot to:

Stop attacking people

And his mouth just said both at the same time meaning he said neither.

The jumble that spilled out doesn't matter, piece of shit that he is, he's a great public speaker. He's not trump or Biden who can't string a sentence together. If he fucks up speaking it's because he realized he was about to say something he couldn't and panicked. So the value is in looking at what would logically have made sense in a debate for him to have said.

It's like GW Bush realizing he didn't want a soundbite saying "shame on me":

There's an old saying in Tennessee - I know it's in Texas, probably in Tennessee - that says, fool me once, shame on - shame on you. Fool me - you can't get fooled again.

But we're overdue for J Cole's plan:

Fool me three times, fuck the peace sign

[–] ilinamorato@lemmy.world 1 points 6 months ago

Yeah, Cruz is a terrible person and should be in prison, but this was clearly just a slip of the tongue. We should be mad at him about real things.