Ted Cruz warned Donald Trump, his fellow Republican, that he would face a “bloodbath” in the November midterm elections if prices continued to rise, prompting the president to respond, “fuck you, Ted,” the US senator told donors, according to a secret recording of the private conversation obtained by Axios.
Cruz reportedly delivered the reality check to the president in a phone conversation after Trump presented sweeping tariffs a few months after returning to the Oval Office in early 2025. The president was unhappy, Cruz said – and yelled and cursed in a conversation with Republican senators.
“Mr President, if we get to November of [2026] and people’s 401(k)s are down 30% and prices are up 10–20% at the supermarket, we’re going to go into election day, face a bloodbath,” Cruz said he told the president, according to Axios. “You’re going to lose the House, you’re going to lose the Senate, you’re going to spend the next two years being impeached every single week.”
Only 34% approve of how Trump has handled the cost of living while 64% disapprove, according to a recent New York Times/Siena poll. There is also evidence the economy may be motivating those who voted for Trump in 2024 but now disapprove of him, according to the Times.
Cruz also reportedly attacked JD Vance in the recordings, tying the vice-president to conservative media figure Tucker Carlson, whom he has accused of trying to thwart the president’s foreign policy agenda. Cruz had a heated interview with Carlson last year that exposed a significant divide on the right on foreign affairs.
“Tucker created JD. JD is Tucker’s protégé, and they are one and the same,” Cruz reportedly said. He also accused the vice-president and Carlson of ousting Mike Waltz, the national security adviser, because Waltz supported bombing Iran.
A statement from Cruz’s office called him Trump’s “greatest ally in the Senate” and said he “battles every day in the trenches to advance the [president’s] agenda”.
“Those battles include fights over staffers who try to enter the administration despite disagreeing with the president and seeking to undermine his foreign policy,” the statement from Cruz’s office added. “Senator Cruz is proud of those fights, his accomplishments, and his close relationship with the president. These attempts at sowing division are pathetic and getting boring.”
