Republican presidential candidate Ted Cruz handily defeated rival Donald Trump in Wisconsin — winning by 16 percentage points after multiple pro-life groups endorsed him. Media outlets called the race for Cruz within an hour of polls closing at 9 p.m. Eastern time.
“Tonight is a turning point. It is a rallying cry,” Cruz told supporters in Milwaukee. “We have a choice. A real choice. The national political terrain began to change two weeks ago,” he said — noting his victory in Utah and indicating his campaign received $2 million in donations just today.
“In exit polls, Cruz seemed to be winning in most slices of the GOP electorate. He won Republicans with college degrees, leading Trump by nearly 20 points. And Cruz also narrowly led Trump among Republicans without college degrees, a group that has been strongly pro-Trump in other states. Exit polls reported by CNN showed Cruz winning with both men and women, with born-again Christians and with everybody else, and in all age groups (except for Republicans under 30, of whom there were too few to poll),” the Washington Post reported.
Meanwhile, Trump had no election night rally and made no statement to the press following his defeat.
Ohio Gov. John Kasich received the support of 15 percent of Wisconsin voters.
The National Right to Life Board of Directors on Saturday voted to support pro-life Texas Sen. Ted Cruz in the remaining Republican presidential primaries, and that endorsement became public today. The support for Cruz follows a decision by its state affiliate Wisconsin Right to Life to endorse Cruz as well.
The following is a statement from Dave Andrusko of National Right to Life on the support for Cruz:
In the week preceding the Board’s vote, Donald Trump first said on Wednesday that were abortion illegal he would “punish” women who had aborted. He said later the same day he wouldn’t punish these women.
Then, on Friday in a clip from an interview with “Face the Nation” moderator John Dickerson that would air Sunday, Trump said, “The laws are set now on abortion and that’s the way they’re going to remain until they’re changed,” adding, “At this moment, the laws are set and I think we have to leave it that way.”
Then, on Friday, after the clip aired, the Trump campaign issued another statement: “Mr. Trump gave an accurate account of the law as it is today and made clear it must stay that way now — until he is president,” it read. “Then he will change the law through his judicial appointments and allow the states to protect the unborn. There is nothing new or different here.”
As reported in NRL News Today, Mr. Trump has said Planned Parenthood does “some good work” but would defund it.
An average of seven recent national political polls shows that Mr. Trump trails Hillary Clinton by 11.2%.
In those same seven polls, Sen. Cruz trails Mrs. Clinton by an average of 3%.
National Right to Life believes Sen. Cruz is the only candidate for president who has always been pro-life, who has a 100% pro-life voting record with National Right to Life, who can win the Republican nomination, and who can defeat pro-abortion Hillary Clinton in November.
In a statement to LifeNews.com the Wisconsin Right to Life organization said Cruz is the only candidate int he race who has always been pro-life and has the ability to defeat pro-abortion Hillary Clinton in November.
“Wisconsin Right to Life’s Political Action Committee supports Ted Cruz as the only presidential candidate with a proven record on life who can win,” the group said.
“There has never been an election more important than this election, and the stakes have never been higher when it comes to protecting the unborn,” stated Chelsea Shields, PAC Director of Wisconsin Right to Life. “There is only one candidate for president who has always been pro-life, who has a 100% pro-life voting record with National Right to Life and Wisconsin Right to Life, and who can win the Republican nomination and defeat pro-abortion Hillary Clinton in November. And that candidate is Ted Cruz.”
The pro-life organziation said that, as president, Ted Cruz would work to restore legal protections to unborn babies and their mothers, protect unborn babies from abortion, including painful and barbaric dismemberment abortions, appoint judges who protect life, and keep your tax dollars from paying for abortion.
“For these reasons, Wisconsin Right to Life’s Political Action Committee is urging every pro-life voter in Wisconsin to vote for Ted Cruz in the Presidential Preference Primary on April 5th,” the group concluded.
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Cruz has a 100% pro-life voting record as a member of the Senate . On 10 total votes on pro-life issues taken while has has served in the Senate, Cruz voted pro-life every single time.
The votes tallied by the national Right to Life Committee include multiple votes supporting a bill to de-fund the Planned Parenthood abortion business over the years, votes to repeal or de-fund Obamacare, which uses taxpayer funds to pay for abortions as well as votes to protect the conscience rights of pro-life Americans.
In a recent interview, Cruz expound on his pro-life views and said that pro-abortion Democrats use the issue of contraception to try to attack pro-life Republicans and make them look like extremists.
Cruz gave an interview last week to the Catholic news network EWTN and he asked Cruz about some comments he made supporting contraception. The Texas senator said he was pushing back against a Democratic “political attack that was deliberately deceptive.”
“I am unequivocally pro-life, I believe that every life is a precious gift from God that needs to be protected from the moment of conception until the moment of natural death,” he said.
