Republican Senator Ted Cruz became the butt of more than a few jokes overnight after it was revealed that he had “liked” a 2-minute porn video from the account @SexuallPosts. (Links in this post are NSFW.) And amazingly, Cruz’s communications director, Catherine Frazier, tried to imply that the Twitter slip had somehow been perpetrated by someone not associated with Cruz.
The porn video, which shows a woman walking in on a man and woman having sex on a couch, was in Ted Cruz’s likes for at least 30 minutes before being “unliked” sometime around 1:00am. Thanks to the porn flub, “Ted Cruz” was trending globally on Twitter throughout the night.
“The offensive tweet posted on @tedcruz account earlier has been removed by staff and reported to Twitter,” Frazier tweeted at 2:16am Eastern time. But there was clearly nothing to report to Twitter, since someone with access to the account had clearly liked the video. That’s how Twitter likes work. People can’t plant a like on your page.
The Twitter account that Cruz liked changed its bio to read, “Follow for the Same Porn @TedCruz Watches,” and even tweeted “Thanks for watching ted!” at the Senator.
To make everything even more ridiculous, Ted Cruz was once part of a legal team that argued Americans don’t have a constitutionally protected right to use sex toys or even to stimulate their own genitals. Seriously.
A sex shop in Austin objected to a Texas ban on the sale of sex toys back in 2004, but Cruz, as Texas Solicitor General, filed a brief in 2007 defending the law. Cruz and his legal team argued that “obscene devices do not implicate any liberty interest.” That’s lawyer talk for “dildos aren’t in the US Constitution.”
“There is no substantive-due-process right to stimulate one’s genitals for non-medical purposes unrelated to procreation or outside of an interpersonal relationship,” the legal team wrote. The brief doesn’t appear to address the very specific question of whether beating your meat while watching short videos on Twitter is protected.
Ted Cruz’s Twitter like set off a torrent of jokes about the Texas Senator, from the relatively tame jabs (people pointed out that the actress masturbating in the video looked a bit like Cruz’s wife) to those who pointed out that it was the anniversary of the terrorist attacks of September 11th (there oughta be a law) to people who took the opportunity to simply make fun of Cruz’s many strange faces.
The woman in the video who masturbates from behind a pillar while she watches two people have sex quickly became a bit of a meme, naturally. And the meme shows no sign of slowing down as people wake up to the news that Ted Cruz was flogging the bishop last night.
There were also plenty of jokes about Ted Cruz being the Zodiac Killer, an old absurdist joke that originated on Twitter and became popular during the lead up to the 2016 Presidential election.
Ted Cruz’s former roommate in college, HBO writer Craig Mazin, even joined the pile-on, saying that Cruz used to beat off in their dorm room. It almost makes you start to feel bad for poor Ted. Almost.
Ted Cruz, failed presidential candidate and author of the ironically titled book A Time For Truth, is quite infamously the most hated Senator in the US Senate right now. And possibly the most hated Senator of all time.
“You have to understand that I like Ted Cruz probably more than my colleagues like Ted Cruz,” Democratic Senator Al Franken wrote in his new book. “And I hate Ted Cruz.”
This isn’t the first time that Ted Cruz has faced controversy while on the job. The Trump-aligned tabloid the National Enquirer not only accused Cruz’s father of helping assassinate President John F. Kennedy, they accused Cruz of having five secret mistresses. Both claims were absurd, but helped make Cruz’s presidential bid an even bigger joke than it already was.
We’ll see if Cruz even addresses the Twitter like today, or if he just pretends like it never happened. But if we have one piece of advice for Cruz’s staff, it’s this: Don’t pretend like Cruz got hacked. Nobody is going to believe you. Frankly, Americans are just happy that the porn featured living humans doing living human stuff.
Update, 10:30am: The porn star in the video, Cory Chase, is currently without power because of Hurricane Irma. Hopefully this story comes full circle and Cruz can pass a bill to help her out or something.
Update, 10:48am: Apparently Ted Cruz thinks all the attention would’ve worked in his favor during the presidential primary season. Congressional reporter for NBC News Frank Thorp got a quote from Cruz this morning.
Update, 11:00am: And then there’s this from the Washington Post Congressional reporter.
I could be reading this wrong, but it seems like somebody on the Cruz team is going to own up to this. My money is on a poor intern, though Cruz apparently isn’t going to name the staffer.
Update, 11:34am: Porn star Cory Chase is still without power, but it seems she finally got word that she’s pretty famous right now.