The National Enquirer hit news stands this week with explosive allegations that Sen. Ted Cruz has carried on extra-marital affairs with as many as five women. Although the Enquirer didn't name the mistresses, it gave titillating hints of who they were (a sexy school teacher, a D.C. lawyer, a foxy political consultant, a hot babe and a $1,000 a night prostitute) and included pixelated images of the women. The names of the alleged mistresses named in the tabloid story have surfaced in some media reports and a couple of those identified have offered general denials.
Sen. Cruz gave mainstream media an excuse to talk about the alleged affairs when he spoke to reporters today to blast the rumors as "tabloid garbage" and accused Donald Trump and his hinchmen of planting the story, an accusation Trump denies. The National Enquirer is actually owned by an old Clinton political crony, Roger Altman, and other reports have suggested that allies of Sen. Marco Rubio have been peddling the story of Cruz' alleged affairs for months.
Interestingly, one of the identified mistresses is a former Cruz campaign worker who now works for Donald Trump's presidential campaign as a spokesperson. Trump's former, long-time political adviser, Roger Stone, has peddled the story, but he separated from Trump about the time he kicked off his presidential campaign to promote his new book, "The Clintons' War On Women."
Amanda Carpenter, Cruz' former spokesperson, and Katrina Pierson, a former Cruz campaign worker now working for Trump, both denied having an affair with Cruz when their names were identified as two of the women named in the Enquirer report. Sarah Isgur Flores, another former Cruz campaign worker who most recently worked on Carly Fiorina's presidential campaign, has also been identified as one of the alleged mistresses. Some news sources are suggesting there may be something untoward about a $500,000 campaign contribution made to Fiorina's campaign by a super PAC supporting Cruz about the time Flores joined her campaign,
Whoever is the source of the story, the allegations can't be summarily dismissed just because it was reported by a tabloid newspaper like the Enquirer, particularly one that has broken news of several other high-profile affairs, including former Sen. Gary Hart, Rev. Jesse Jackson, Tiger Woods and John Edwards. All of those reports were met with initial denials, only to be later confirmed as true. The messiness of it all has to be music to the ears of Hillary Clinton and Democrats who are just sitting back and watching the Republicans cannibalize their own.
Response to the cover story in this week's National Enquirer about Lyin' Ted Cruz: https://t.co/FRFN9JC1QJ� Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) March 25, 2016
I continue to be impressed with @tedcruz uncanny ability to lie with a straight face #Cruzsexscandal� Roger Stone (@RogerJStoneJr) March 26, 2016
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