Texas Senator Ted Cruz’s shamelessness is legendary even by Washington, D.C. standards.
But he hit a new low Monday when he decided to take a cheap shot at CNN correspondent Clarissa Ward as she bravely reported from the chaos currently engulfing Afghanistan.
Cruz accused Ward of being a cheerleader for the Taliban forces that had seized power in Kabul. Here’s the tweet:
Cruz’s thoughtless remark earned him a verbal smackdown from the verified twitter account of CNN’s public relations team. It offered a scathing rebuke of Cruz and offered a reminder of how Cruz reacted when his home state was in the midst of a major weather crisis earlier this year.
Rather than running off to Cancun in tough times, @clarissaward is risking her life to tell the world what’s happening. That’s called bravery. Instead of RTing a conspiracy theorist’s misleading soundbite, perhaps your time would be better spent helping Americans in harm’s way.
— CNN Communications (@CNNPR) August 16, 2021
It’s not just an absurd mischaracterization, but an insult to a journalist showing immense bravery by staying in Kabul to do on-the-ground reporting. There is legitimate criticism for Sen. Cruz to be levying about what’s happening in Afghanistan, but aiming it at a reporter doing her job in the midst of a dangerous situation is not it.
Keep in mind that as a woman, Ward faces additional danger from the Taliban. The change in power has already forced Afghan women to dress in traditional burkas to avoid possible consequences, which is why Ward was dressed in a hijab during her reporting Monday.
It’s important to note that the tweet that led to Cruz’s comment also mischaracterized what Ward was saying. After noting that the Taliban fighters chanting Death to America, sounded friendly at the time, she added that “it is utterly bizarre” — and if you didn’t watch the clip, you wouldn’t have heard it, either. That is important context that the original post left out, likely on purpose because the point appeared to be to paint CNN and Ward as pro-Taliban. Which makes absolutely no sense to sane-thinking people, or crass opportunists like Ted Cruz, looking for any chance to “own the libs.”