Ted Cruz’s not-so-secret Super Tuesday weapon: the ground game
File Photo/Vernon Bryant
Sen. Ted Cruz, celebrating Gov. Greg Abbott’s election in 2014, has a home-field advantage in Texas as Super Tuesday approaches.
By TOM BENNING
Austin Bureau
Published: 17 February 2016 10:00 AM
Updated: 17 February 2016 11:01 AM
AUSTIN — In Texas, Ted Cruz can count on more than just his status as a favored son.
His home-field advantage ahead of the March 1 primary banks on the vast network of activists — dubbed his “grass-roots army” — that he cultivated in his 2012 Senate upset and has carefully maintained ever since.
Those troops now stand ready to fortify Cruz’s White House bid at a particularly critical moment.
Cruz won’t be able to campaign the way he likes ahead of Super Tuesday by visiting every far-flung corner of the map — Texas is just one of 13 states casting ballots or going to caucus on that day, and early voting started Tuesday. That means he must, for the first time, ditch part of his tried-and-true playbook.
And with Texas’ 155 delegates hanging in the balance, Cruz’s motivated home-state supporters are already setting up phone banks, walking blocks and otherwise working to get out the vote for that day’s biggest prize.
“He doesn’t have to create anything — it’s already on the ground,” said Steve Munisteri, a former top adviser to Rand Paul’s campaign and an ex-chairman of the Texas GOP. “And it’s not smoke and mirrors. It’s real.”
‘Grass-roots army’
Cruz, who is now firmly entrenched in the GOP’s top tier, is hardly alone in facing the challenge of shifting to the campaign’s next stage.
Standalone contests in small states such as Iowa, New Hampshire and South Carolina have drawn a more traditional brand of retail politicking from candidates. Only real estate mogul Donald Trump appears to benefit from the campaign stretching over many states at once, since he relies more on his star power to reach voters than a robust ground game.
But frequent, personal voter contact has been a signature of Cruz’s political rise.
“We will continue to campaign the same way, sitting down person-to-person, leader-to-leader, VFW Hall to Dunkin Donuts,” Cruz said in his Iowa victory speech, looking ahead to the New Hampshire primary.
That style was born of necessity.
When Cruz entered the 2012 Senate race as a virtual unknown, his team set out to create the “largest grass-roots army that Texas had ever seen,” said John Drogin, Cruz’s Senate campaign manager.
His team got Cruz in front of tea party groups big and small, and let those activists “ask the hard questions,” said Drogin, who now runs a pro-Cruz political group. Not only did those people get on board, they agreed to “put in the time and effort that it took to win,” he said.
Far from disappearing over the last four years, those groups are now poised to fill Cruz’s pending void on the trail.
“Everybody is still in place,” said JoAnn Fleming, a Tyler activist who leads Cruz’s tea party outreach in Texas. “In fact, many of those organizations have actually grown.”
The Texas volunteer network already flexed its muscle in Iowa, where its members stayed in an old college dorm and spent days block-walking and phone-banking. And while those volunteers were a luxury up north, they’ve long known their biggest task comes on March 1.
They drove through the night after Cruz’s Iowa victory — some even skipping the big celebration — so they could avoid bad weather and make it back home. Others worked the phones on the drive back to Texas to start mobilizing forces in earnest.
“It’s such a daunting task between Iowa and the March 1 primary,” said Dale Hulz, a key Cruz volunteer and tea party leader near Houston. “There’s so much to do. … Everybody is spread thin.
“But the Cruz campaign has been planning this for a while.”
Key endorsements
Notable on the list of Texas endorsements Cruz rolled out this week was more than 500 campaign chairs and co-chairs in congressional districts and counties.
And early on, the campaign sent out a list of eight things Cruz backers could do to get started. Among them: Sign up for a “call from home” program. Download a canvassing app for block-walking. Call up precinct chairs to muster support. Join the “Cruz Crew” on social media.
That work has been noticed. Denton County GOP chairwoman Dianne Edmondson, for example, said the Cruz backers have been more active than other campaigns in reaching out at the local level.
The “grass-roots army,” of course, is just one piece of Cruz’s Texas equation.
His campaign staff features seasoned Texas operatives such as state director Tyler Norris, who used to work for state Sen. Konni Burton, R-Colleyville. Cruz will need his camp’s digital efforts to target voters in all the March 1 primary states. The super PACs supporting his bid could pitch in with TV ads. And Cruz will no doubt make some appearances in his home state.
But with every candidate scrambling to pick up delegates on the Super Tuesday map, Cruz’s Texas firewall of on-the-ground support can’t be overlooked, experts said.
“It’s been probably underestimated all along how much of an asset Texas was going to be to Cruz,” said Jim Henson, a University of Texas at Austin political scientist.
File Photo/Vernon Bryant
Sen. Ted Cruz, celebrating Gov. Greg Abbott’s election in 2014, has a home-field advantage in Texas as Super Tuesday approaches.
By TOM BENNING
Austin Bureau
Published: 17 February 2016 10:00 AM
Updated: 17 February 2016 11:01 AM
AUSTIN — In Texas, Ted Cruz can count on more than just his status as a favored son.
His home-field advantage ahead of the March 1 primary banks on the vast network of activists — dubbed his “grass-roots army” — that he cultivated in his 2012 Senate upset and has carefully maintained ever since.
Those troops now stand ready to fortify Cruz’s White House bid at a particularly critical moment.
Cruz won’t be able to campaign the way he likes ahead of Super Tuesday by visiting every far-flung corner of the map — Texas is just one of 13 states casting ballots or going to caucus on that day, and early voting started Tuesday. That means he must, for the first time, ditch part of his tried-and-true playbook.
And with Texas’ 155 delegates hanging in the balance, Cruz’s motivated home-state supporters are already setting up phone banks, walking blocks and otherwise working to get out the vote for that day’s biggest prize.
“He doesn’t have to create anything — it’s already on the ground,” said Steve Munisteri, a former top adviser to Rand Paul’s campaign and an ex-chairman of the Texas GOP. “And it’s not smoke and mirrors. It’s real.”
‘Grass-roots army’
Cruz, who is now firmly entrenched in the GOP’s top tier, is hardly alone in facing the challenge of shifting to the campaign’s next stage.
Standalone contests in small states such as Iowa, New Hampshire and South Carolina have drawn a more traditional brand of retail politicking from candidates. Only real estate mogul Donald Trump appears to benefit from the campaign stretching over many states at once, since he relies more on his star power to reach voters than a robust ground game.
But frequent, personal voter contact has been a signature of Cruz’s political rise.
“We will continue to campaign the same way, sitting down person-to-person, leader-to-leader, VFW Hall to Dunkin Donuts,” Cruz said in his Iowa victory speech, looking ahead to the New Hampshire primary.
That style was born of necessity.
When Cruz entered the 2012 Senate race as a virtual unknown, his team set out to create the “largest grass-roots army that Texas had ever seen,” said John Drogin, Cruz’s Senate campaign manager.
His team got Cruz in front of tea party groups big and small, and let those activists “ask the hard questions,” said Drogin, who now runs a pro-Cruz political group. Not only did those people get on board, they agreed to “put in the time and effort that it took to win,” he said.
Far from disappearing over the last four years, those groups are now poised to fill Cruz’s pending void on the trail.
“Everybody is still in place,” said JoAnn Fleming, a Tyler activist who leads Cruz’s tea party outreach in Texas. “In fact, many of those organizations have actually grown.”
The Texas volunteer network already flexed its muscle in Iowa, where its members stayed in an old college dorm and spent days block-walking and phone-banking. And while those volunteers were a luxury up north, they’ve long known their biggest task comes on March 1.
They drove through the night after Cruz’s Iowa victory — some even skipping the big celebration — so they could avoid bad weather and make it back home. Others worked the phones on the drive back to Texas to start mobilizing forces in earnest.
“It’s such a daunting task between Iowa and the March 1 primary,” said Dale Hulz, a key Cruz volunteer and tea party leader near Houston. “There’s so much to do. … Everybody is spread thin.
“But the Cruz campaign has been planning this for a while.”
Key endorsements
Notable on the list of Texas endorsements Cruz rolled out this week was more than 500 campaign chairs and co-chairs in congressional districts and counties.
And early on, the campaign sent out a list of eight things Cruz backers could do to get started. Among them: Sign up for a “call from home” program. Download a canvassing app for block-walking. Call up precinct chairs to muster support. Join the “Cruz Crew” on social media.
That work has been noticed. Denton County GOP chairwoman Dianne Edmondson, for example, said the Cruz backers have been more active than other campaigns in reaching out at the local level.
The “grass-roots army,” of course, is just one piece of Cruz’s Texas equation.
His campaign staff features seasoned Texas operatives such as state director Tyler Norris, who used to work for state Sen. Konni Burton, R-Colleyville. Cruz will need his camp’s digital efforts to target voters in all the March 1 primary states. The super PACs supporting his bid could pitch in with TV ads. And Cruz will no doubt make some appearances in his home state.
But with every candidate scrambling to pick up delegates on the Super Tuesday map, Cruz’s Texas firewall of on-the-ground support can’t be overlooked, experts said.
“It’s been probably underestimated all along how much of an asset Texas was going to be to Cruz,” said Jim Henson, a University of Texas at Austin political scientist.
