President Trump floated the possibility of nominating Senator Ted Cruz to the Supreme Court, praising the Texas Republican and former presidential rival as a “brilliant” man and lawyer.
Speaking at a campaign rally in Lubbock, Texas, on Tuesday night, Trump jokingly compared Cruz with the three conservative justices he appointed during his first term: Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh and Amy Coney Barrett.
“I picked three Supreme Court justices, and it’s very hard to get them approved,” Trump said.
He then described Cruz as a “brilliant guy, brilliant lawyer,” highlighting his education and credentials as a former “top student” at law school.
But unlike his previous nominees, Trump joked that Cruz would face an easier route to confirmation.
Democrats would support Cruz’s confirmation “100 percent,” Trump said, because “they hate the guy and want to get rid of him.”
Trump repeatedly mocked Cruz as “Lyin’ Ted” during the 2016 presidential campaign, using the nickname to attack his Republican primary rival before Cruz ultimately left the race.
Senator Ted Cruz, a Texas Republican, is seen boarding Air Force One alongside President Donald Trump. Trump has campaigned for down-ballot candidates, including Ken Paxton, during a multi-state push ahead of the midterm elections
Trump and Cruz are pictured at the White House before departing for a campaign event in San Antonio
Trump dances during a campaign rally at Freeman Coliseum in San Antonio, Texas
At the Texas rally, however, Trump avoided the insults and instead called Cruz “brilliant” several times.
Discussing the hypothetical Supreme Court nomination, Trump said Republicans would also vote for Cruz “100 percent” because “they can’t stand him” and would want him out of the Senate.
“So I’d get 100 percent of the vote, and he’d be a Supreme Court justice, and he would do a great job,” Trump said.
Trump’s comments came after Justice Samuel Alito said in a rare public interview this month that he had considered retiring this year and planned to revisit the decision in 2027.
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“It’s something that I think that somebody at my age has to think about every term,” Alito told CBS News.
“But I thought that I could still make a valuable contribution, which is why I became a justice and a judge in the first place,” he added.
Trump has praised Alito, who has sided with the president in more cases than any other justice, calling him one of the “Greatest of All Time.”
Even so, Trump has made no secret of his interest in appointing a fourth Supreme Court justice if an opening emerges.
During his second term, Trump has openly criticized his own judicial appointees for ruling against him on major political priorities, including his sweeping tariff program, his attempt to end birthright citizenship and his effort to restrict mail-in voting.
In each case, Trump turned to Truth Social to rebuke the conservative justices, accusing them in September of becoming “merely a shell of their original selves” and of failing to remain “true” to him in their decisions.
Trump has frequently taken to Truth Social to dress down his conservative nominees, whom he blasted in September as ‘merely a shell of their original selves’ and not being ‘true’ to him in their rulings.
‘These are not the people I interviewed to serve on the United States Supreme Court,’ Trump said last month.
‘These are not the people I interviewed to serve on the United States Supreme Court,’ Trump said last month.
The president has frequently floated Cruz’s name to fill a potential slot on the bench, should the opportunity arise.
But the Texas lawmaker has no desire to serve on the bench. Cruz told attendees at a Wall Street Journal event earlier this year that Trump had spoken to him ‘seriously’ during his first term about filling each of the three Supreme Court vacancies when they opened up.
Cruz, for his part, has no desire to serve on the high court – telling attendees at a Wall Street Journal event earlier this year that Trump had spoken to him ‘seriously’ during his first term about filling each of the three Supreme Court vacancies when they opened up.
Each time, Cruz recounted, ‘I said no – because I don’t want to be out of the arena of the political battle.’