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Ted Cruz Will Seek The Presidency

Bob Daemmrich
/
The Texas Tribune
U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas thanks Republican delegates in Fort Worth on June 6, 2014.

U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz will announce Monday that he is seeking the Republican nomination for president.

It's the boldest step yet in the junior Texas senator's meteoric rise. Only four years ago, he was a virtual unknown in national politics. On Monday, Cruz aides say he will officially make his intentions clear at Liberty University in central Virginia, a nerve center of evangelical thought and activity that telegraphs an emphasis on Christian conservative voters. 

Since the beginning of the year, Cruz has traveled extensively to the early primary states – New Hampshire, Iowa and South Carolina – and appeared on high-profile television programs, like Late Night with Seth Meyers.

Cruz’s announcement, which was first reported by The Houston Chronicle, comes just as one fundraising quarter ends and another is about to begin. Early April is a frequent time for candidates to announce their bids. The timing maximizes the amount of time Cruz can spend raising money out of the gate in the second quarter of the year. 

He has frequently argued on the campaign trail that he believes the way for a Republican to win a general election campaign is to focus on pumping up the conservative base, rather than reaching out to moderate voters amid a splintered, crowded GOP field.

Even so, that field is politically talented. 

Former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee could pose a threat to Cruz’s courtship of the evangelical vote, but it remains unclear whether Huckabee will follow through on a run.

Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., willannounce his intention to run for the presidency on April 7. Paul grew up in Lake Jackson, and could put up a fight with Cruz over Libertarian-leaning Republican primary voters. 

Another Texan, former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, announced on Facebook in December his interest in the GOP nomination.

And former Texas Gov. Rick Perry is active on the campaign trail, repeatedly indicating that he will make a decision on a second GOP nomination run in late May or early June. 

There are another half-dozen GOP contenders canvassing the country ahead of their own expected presidential campaigns. 

At this point, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is the most formidable Democrat eyeing the presidency. 

This story was provided by The Texas Tribune.

Abby Livingston joined the Tribune in 2014 as the publication's first Washington Bureau Chief. Previously, she covered political campaigns, House leadership and Congress for Roll Call, the Capitol Hill newspaper. A seventh-generation Texan, Abby graduated from the University of Texas at Austin. She grew up in Fort Worth and has appeared in an episode of "The Bold and The Beautiful." Abby pitched and produced political segments for CNN and worked as an editor for The Hotline, National Journal’s campaign tipsheet. Abby began her journalism career as a desk assistant at NBC News in Washington, working her way up to the political unit, where she researched stories for Nightly News, the Today Show and Meet the Press. In keeping with the Trib’s great history of hiring softball stars, Abby is a three-time MVP (the most in game history —Ed.) for The Bad News Babes, the women’s press softball team that takes on female members of Congress in the annual Congressional Women’s Softball breast cancer charity game.