Senator Ted Cruz has spoken out about the hardcore porn video his official Twitter account “liked” Monday night, blaming it on “a staffing issue” and calling it a “mistake.”
Speaking to reporters Tuesday at the Capitol, Cruz said, “There are a number of people on the team who have access to the account. It appears that someone inadvertently hit the ‘like’ button and when we discovered the post, which was I guess an hour or two later, we pulled it down.
“It was a staffing issue and it was inadvertent, it was a mistake, it was not a deliberate action,” he continued, according to the Washington Post. “We’re dealing with it internally but it was a mistake, it was not malicious conduct.”
Cruz did not say which of his staffers “liked” the tweet, and said it was “still being discussed” as to what disciplinary action will be taken.
Despite the social media snafu, Cruz tried to make light of the drama. “This was not how I envisioned waking up this morning,” he said. “Although, I will say that if I had known that this would trend so quickly, then perhaps we should have posted something like this during the Indiana primary.”
Just after midnight Monday, Cruz’s official Twitter account “liked” a pornographic video featuring a blond woman and two “teenagers,” well, we’ll say having a good time. Here’s a screengrab:
The tweet was “removed” shortly after (it must have been “unliked”), as his spokeswoman Catherine Frazier said a little after 2 a.m. Tuesday. “The offensive tweet posted on @tedcruz account earlier has been removed by staff and reported to Twitter,” she said.
https://twitter.com/catblackfrazier/status/907488125445963779
Cruz has been vocal about his opposition to porn and autonomous sex: in 2004, then-solicitor general Cruz’s legal team tried to ban sex toys from the state of Texas.