Sen. Ted Cruz made a joke today out of the trip that gave him a nickname — “Cancun Ted” — and made him a much-mocked meme around the internet. Pointing to a neon sign in a Midland, Texas restaurant window that reads “Cancun,” Cruz smiles and says “guess what I found!” in a Twitter post.
Cruz, who has previously expressed second thoughts about having bolted his state for a Mexico vacation during a deadly storm in February of 2021, now evidently finds the incident far enough back in the past — like some teen high jinks — that he can laugh at it.
More than 200 Texans died in that winter storm, officially, but the real death toll was much higher.
— Mehdi Hasan (@mehdirhasan) May 19, 2023
For Cruz, who abandoned suffering Texans for the Ritz in Cancun, it’s all one big joke. https://t.co/WEjh3vRf8B
Not everybody reacted with such jocularity to Cruz’s sense of humor.
@tedcruz
— Jake Laney (@Bruce_Diavolo) May 19, 2023
Why don't you send that picture to those that lost someone during the deep freeze and see how they react?
The Houston Chronicle reported that more than 6,000 Texas died during the week of the storm, which occurred during the 2021 COVID-19 surge.
“The winter storm and outages occurred during the winter 2021 COVID-19 wave in Texas. A total of 6,484 Texans died during the seven-day period, the eighth-deadliest week during the pandemic, according to state health department data.”
— Houston Chronicle
Cruz’s controversial and ultimately truncated trip to Cancun just as Texas was being battered by the deadly winter storm made such headlines that even the normally unapologetic Cruz issued a mea culpa of sorts, saying that he “should have stayed in Texas” and that he understood “the frustration and anger” that Texans were feeling.
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