Sen. Ted Cruz laid into PolitiFact as a “liberal parody site” on Twitter on Thursday, underlining how their “Truth-o-Meter” ratings differed on whether his Senate campaign opponent Beto O’Rourke was being condemned by a Republican or a Democrat. “When his Dem primary opponent said Beto ‘wants to legalize drugs’ they said ‘half true.’ When I said same thing, they say ‘false.’”
W. Gardner Selby took on Cruz over a city-council resolution in El Paso in 2009, where O’Rourke clearly signaled at least the fervent desire to discuss abandoning the “War on Drugs” in its entirety, including opioids.
The Houston Republican said in his May 1, 2018, tweet: "With opioids ravaging so many American communities, Congressman Beto O’Rourke's radical resolution to legalize all narcotics -- including heroin and other deadly opioids -- is looking worse and worse all the time."
David Wysong of O’Rourke’s campaign brought Cruz’s claim to our attention. By email, Wysong noted that in 2012, we rated Half True a claim that O’Rourke favored legalizing drugs across the board. O’Rourke, then a member of the El Paso City Council, favored legalizing marijuana, we confirmed, but had called only for debate about legalizing narcotics.
Selby is being legalistic again, calling Cruz false for one politician’s weasel wording. He concluded:
In 2009, an El Paso City Council resolution directed at the federal government included language from O’Rourke urging open debate about ending the national prohibition of narcotics. The resolution, adopted but later vetoed, did not call for legalizing all narcotics nor did we spot evidence that O’Rourke has taken that sweeping stand.
We rate Cruz’s claim False.
Selby laid out that this is what O’Rourke said at the city council meeting:
“I’d ask that there be some language in here that would also include advocating, or looking at, rethinking our War on Drugs, which by any measure I’ve looked it has been an abject failure. And also, looking at ending the prohibition on narcotics in the United States. And I’m not saying that we need to do that – to end the prohibition. I think we need to have a serious discussion about doing that, and that may, in the end, be the right course of action."
The text of this resolution clearly reflected O'Rourke's thinking in this clause:
i. Supporting an honest, open national debate on ending the prohibition of narcotics.
Now imagine if Cruz or Donald Trump said "I didn't propose a ban on racial quotas in hiring. I said it was time for an open and honest debate about banning racial quotas, which in the end, may be the right course of action." Would Selby and PolitiFact say it was "False" to say "Cruz favors banning racial quotas"?
Selby is the same genius who couldn't definitively say an abortion killed a baby.
These elastic definitions are why overall, PolitiFact has slammed Cruz as "Mostly False," "False," or "Pants on Fire" in 83 rulings, or 64 percent of "fact checks." (Another 15 percent were "Half True.") So far, O'Rourke has one "True," one "False," and four "Half True" rulings.
We have rated this "fact-check" by PolitiFact as Deeply Distorted. For similar analyses, please visit our Fact-Checking the Fact-Checkers site.
