Republican presidential candidate Ted Cruz on Tuesday promised that he would invite Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to his first State of the Union as president.
Speaking to over 1,000 people at a packed town hall meeting in Londonderry, New Hampshire Tuesday evening, Cruz shifted his stump speech from Day One promises to a preview of his 2018 State of the Union address after serving a year as president of the United States.
In his address to Congress, Cruz said he would say he is “pleased today to welcome in the gallery Prime Minister Netanyahu.” Adding that when Obama was president, he, Vice President Joe Biden and every member of the cabinet boycotted Netanyahu’s speech to a joint session of Congress. “Well, today the Prime Minister is with us at the State of the Union.”
Cruz was the only sitting Senator running for president who chose to skip President Obama’s final State of the Union address, campaigning in New Hampshire instead.
The Republican presidential hopeful went on to say what he would tell the Israeli premier watching him on from the gallery: “Mr. Prime Minister, let me say, I enjoyed seeing you just recently at the grand opening of the new American Embassy in Jerusalem, the once and eternal capital of Israel.”
Cruz would also go on to declare that after ripping to shreds the Iran nuclear deal, the U.S. has managed to dismantle the Iranian nuclear program. “When we ripped the Iranian nuclear deal to shreds, Khamenei was not happy; he denounced America . In that regard, it was no different than any other day of the week,” Cruz quipped in fast-forwarding his speech. “What was new that the President of the U.S. made clear that Iran would never acquire nuclear weapons.And when we made clear either they will stop their nuclear program or we will stop it for them, by 2018, we will be able to say the Iranian nuclear program is no more.”
