AUSTIN, Texas — U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) often makes headlines for his words and actions, but some say his rhetoric has gone too far.
"Ted Cruz not only peddled conspiracy theories about a stolen election, he actually led the coalition of Republicans in the Senate to try and overturn the results of the election," said Zack Malitz, founder and treasurer of the Boot TX Republicans Political Action Committee.
Three days before rioters attacked the U.S. Capitol, Sen. Cruz tweeted a video of himself speaking to supporters in Georgia.
"We will not go quietly into the night. We will defend liberty," Cruz told the crowd.
"He stirred up and created the political environment where people would think they should take up arms against the government. That they should kidnap and hold hostage members of Congress," Malitz added.
The PAC's long-term goal is to fundraise for Democrats running in 2022. In the short term, it launched the website DefundCruz, listing the names of 7,000 people who donated $1,000 or more to the Cruz campaign in hopes that they will ask for their money back and publicly vow to never donate to Cruz again.
"The reason that we decided to put public pressure on Ted Cruz's donors is because that's how we can hit him where it hurts – his money," explained Malitz. "And so his donors have the power to end his political career by defunding it."
Malitz said asking for a refund isn't unheard of and all someone has to do is contact the campaign.
"It's a really common policy for campaigns to return donations if the donor asks for them back, precisely because the optics of not doing that are really bad," he added.
So far, he doesn't know if any Cruz donors have asked for refunds.
Meanwhile, Sen. Cruz is standing by his actions in the Senate and said he is not responsible for the attack on the Capitol.
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