ABC News scored the first interview with Texas senator and anti-Obamacare figurehead Ted Cruz since the government shutdown ended, and it looks like he’s not about to change his mind or work towards a compromise anytime soon — no matter how much his own co-workers want him to.
Jonathan Karl asked Cruz “how much do your colleagues just despite you right now?” to which Cruz laughed and quoted “an old saying.”
Also read: Sen. Ted Cruz Halts Vote on FCC Chairmanship
“Politics, it ain’t bean bag,” Cruz said, adding that he didn’t become a senator to make new senator friends — he’d rather be reviled in D.C. and loved by his Texas constituents.
Cruz said he thought the deal finally reached to re-open the government was “lousy,” and only went through because his fellow Republican senators didn’t support their Congress brethren, and even publicly denounced their efforts to overturn a law that had already been upheld by the Supreme Court.
Also read: Capitol Hill Is Haunted on ‘New Yorker’ Government Shutdown Cover (Photo)
Cruz’s current effort to make it difficult for government to work smoothly is to block the confirmation of Tom Wheeler as chairman of the FCC.
The full version of the interview will air on Sunday’s episode of “This Week.”
Watch the video: