Cruz built to a crescendo, getting big cheers from the mix of Trump and Cruz delegates in an arena packed for the first time of the convention as he sounded like he might be on the verge of throwing his support behind a man he once bear-hugged before rejecting at the end of a vicious presidential primary.
“To those listening, please don’t stay home in November,” he said as the crowd rose in celebration of what many thought was going to be a late-coming endorsement that could help Trump with conservative holdouts.
Cruz’s next line brought them crashing down on him.
“Vote your conscience,” he said.
The crowd viscerally turned on him, chanting “Trump, Trump, Trump!”
“Endorse Trump! Endorse Trump!” a woman in a “Make America Great Again” hat who’d been enthusiastically cheering Cruz kept screaming at him.
The New York delegation was particularly irate, immediately on their feet chanting “We want Trump!”
“I appreciate the enthusiasm of the New York delegation,” Cruz said with a wry smile.
The Texas senator, who is already gearing up for another presidential run in 2020, said people needed to vote to be able to say “Freedom matters and I was part of something beautiful.”
The crowd wasn’t happy, and turned nasty.
According to CNN, Ted’s wife Heidi was quickly rushed off the floor as the crowd turned, with one Trump fan screaming “Goldman Sachs!” at her as she exited. Heidi works for the investment bank.
Toby Walker, a Cruz alternate delegate from Texas, began sobbing as the crowd booed her candidate.
"What they did to him was really cruel, I think he did a great job trying to unite the party," she said. "My heart breaks for him and his campaign and his wife and two little girls. The boos aren’t fair… His speech was exactly what we needed from him to unite the party.”
Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich (R-Ga.) sought to spin the Cruz eruption, telling the crowd they’d misunderstood his point.
“Ted Cruz said you can vote your conscience for anyone who will uphold this constitution. In this election there is only one candidate that will uphold this constitution,” he said.
Cruz’s speech and the crowd’s furious reaction showed the deep divisions that remain within the party — ones that threaten to derail Trump as he moves into the general election.
And they threaten to overshadow what was supposed to be the night’s biggest event, Indiana Gov. Mike Pence’s (R) first major address to the nation since he became Trump’s running mate.
Cruz’s tack was very different than another former Trump rival who’s eying a 2020 campaign.
Yelling loudly as he sought to dispel concerns that he lacked charisma, Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker said Trump “knows that there is a better way forward” before delivering a non-sequitur that Clinton was such a Washington insider, “If she were any more on the inside, she would be in prison.”
The comment didn’t completely make sense, but still got a rise out of the crowd.
“America, you have the choice. You decide. You deserve better. Why? Because America deserves better,” he said, returning time and again to a refrain he chanted three times at the end of his speech as delegates waved signs with his old campaign slogan.
Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.), another bitter former rival, said in a video that it was “time to unite” as a party behind Trump.
“All you boys with wounded feelings and bruised egos, we love you but you must honor your pledge to support Donald Trump,” right-wing radio host Laura Ingraham said to a loud standing ovation as the night kicked off, a comment clearly targeted at Cruz and other holdouts like Jeb Bush and John Kasich.
Other Trump allies sought to win the Republican hold-outs with honey, not vinegar.
“I know some of you have reservations about my friend Donald Trump," Florida Gov. Rick Scott said in his speech kicking off the night. "Perhaps sometimes he’s not polite. He can be a little rough, and to some people he can be a little direct."
"But this election isn't about Donald Trump or Hillary Clinton ... it’s about the very survival of the American dream,” he continued, arguing that anyone was better than a Democrat. "It’s time that Americans put down their partisan banners … and do the right thing for this country.”
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