Republican Texas Sen. Ted Cruz is taking his summer “Defund Obamacare” campaign to his home state of Texas.
Over the next three weeks, while Congress is in recess, Cruz will be traveling his home state attending small business roundtables and chambers of commerce meetings to pitch his “Defund Obamacare” campaign, a controversial public-relations effort to block continuing-resolution budget bills until President Barack Obama’s signature health care law is stripped of its funding, either through budgetary means or by passing the Defund Obamacare Act, which has already failed three times in Congress.
Cruz has already committed to appearing in at least 15 different areas in Texas, including Houston, Dallas, Corpus Christi, El Paso and Midland.
“Obamacare is hurting the economy and killing jobs. And it will only get worse if Congress doesn’t defund it in the upcoming Continuing Resolution,” according to Cruz’s office.
Cruz’s effort, on which he’s coordinating closely with Utah Sen. Mike Lee, has garnered criticism from prominent Republican lawmakers, including Rep. Paul Ryan, for its infeasibility and potential to force a government shutdown that would be blamed on Republicans before the 2014 midterm elections. (RELATED: Obamacare installs new scrutiny, fines for charitable hospitals that treat uninsured people)
“It’s a sideshow,” a Republican source on Capitol Hill told The Daily Caller in late July. “We all know what’s going on. They’re just trying to drum up the base. That helps their donations, that helps their data collection.”
But Cruz insists that his effort is feasible and that he and Lee working to get other senators on board with their campaign.
Cruz is kicking off this phase of his campaign at an opportune moment. It was revealed Tuesday that the Obama administration is delaying an unpopular Obamacare provision that caps out-of-pocket insurance costs one more year. The administration recently delayed implementation of Obamacare’s unpopular employer mandate until 2015, leading Cruz and other Republicans to accuse Obama of playing 2014 politics.
“More delays for big corporations while hardworking Americans are forced to face brunt of Obamacare,” Cruz tweeted Tuesday after learning the news.