On Thursday, Texas Senator and former Republican presidential candidate Ted Cruz told Oklahoma radio host Pat Campbell that he was holding on to his delegates in part to ensure the GOP platform’s pro-life plank is not weakened at the Republican National Convention.
“You have my word,” Cruz said in response to Campbell’s question about ensuring moderate Republicans did not “screw around with the party platform and remove the abortion plank, or alter it.”
“One of the reasons that we are continuing to work to elect conservatives to be delegates, even though Donald [Trump] has the delegates to get the nomination,” Cruz explained, was “to do everything we can to fight for conservative principles to prevent Washington forces from watering down the platform.”
“The platform is a manifestation of what we believe as a party,” he added, “and I think it is important that it continue to reflect conservative values, free-market values, constitutional liberties, Judeo-Christian principles, the values that built this country, and that is exactly what I intend to fight for.”
The discussion is in reference to Republican nominee Donald Trump’s April remarks that the GOP platform’s abortion plank, which “affirm[s] that the unborn child has a fundamental individual right to life which cannot be infringed,” should be amended to add rape, incest, and life-of-the-mother exceptions, despite the fact that such a change does not prevent support for incremental legislation.
Last month, Republican National Committee Chair Reince Priebus dismissed the likelihood of the platform’s abortion plank being changed at the convention.
Cruz, who dropped out of the primary earlier this month, ran as a 100 percent pro-life candidate who pledged to prosecute Planned Parenthood for its fetal organ harvesting practices, federally extend 14th Amendment protection to preborn babies, and pursue reforms that would curtail the judiciary’s ability to invalidate pro-life legislation.
