Ted Cruz Uses Washington Post Cartoon as Fundraising Tool

A cartoon that depicted Ted Cruz’s daughters as a pair of trained monkeys has become a potential fundraising bonanza juggernaut of sorts for the Texas senator as he seeks the Republican presidential nomination.

The Washington Post pulled the cartoon from its website Tuesday, with the paper’s editorial page editor, Fred Hiatt, noting that it’s “generally been the policy of the editorial section to leave children” of presidential candidates out of cartoons. On social media, Cruz immediately assailed the cartoon as tasteless.

The cartoonist, Ann Telnaes, originally justified including Cruz’s daughters in her cartoon because the GOP candidate was using them as “political props,” she wrote.

In response, Cruz has implored supporters to donate to his campaign.

“This shows you EXACTLY how desperate the liberal media is to attack and destroy me (and my family) by any means necessary,” he said in a fundraising email to supporters.

He added, “My daughters are NOT FAIR GAME!”

In recent weeks, Cruz has shot toward the top of the crowded GOP presidential field.

Recent polls from Iowa, which will kick off voting in the 2016 campaign on Feb.1, show him leading businessman Donald Trump by about 4 percentage points based on an average of surveys from the state.

This article appeared in print on page 3 of the December 24th, 2015 edition of Hamodia.