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Indybay Feature

A Common Thread Of Cruelty By Ted Cruz In His Supreme Court Cases

by TCADP Supporter
Ted Cruz has chosen cruel and unusual punishment over and over again in his legal history.
Beto O'Rourke is running against Texas senator Ted Cruz. A campaign ad says Cruz won all the cases he argued before the Supreme Court. A factchecking site reported that Cruz won 2 and had partial or total losses in the rest.
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Ted Cruz cases before the Supreme Court have a common thread of unusual cruelty and lack of compassion for the poor. He argued for the execution of the mentally challenged, the mentally ill, a citizen of another country not allowed to contact his embassy.

He argued that rape should be a capital crime, wanted to keep a man in prison 14 years past what the sentencing law designated, for stealing a calculator from WalMart. He defended the Texas government decision to withhold Medicaid from poor children, and defended Texas' racist gerrymandering which disenfranchises Latinos, blacks, Democrats. In his cases before the Supreme Court Ted Cruz always defended Texecution.
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Jose Medellin a Mexican citizen was not allowed by Texas to contact the Mexican embassy though it was his right under the Geneva Convention. Cruz argued against the right of a citizen of another country to contact his own embassy.
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Scott Panetti who was mentally ill was sentenced to death in Texas. Cruz argued that Texas should be able to murder the mentally ill. The Supreme Court disagreed.
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In Smith v. Texas, Cruz argued that the Texas government had the right to murder a man adjudged to have an IQ of 78. Whatever one thinks of the cultural bias and many other errors of alleged intelligence testing, Cruz was arguing for the execution of LeRoyce Smith who was mentally challenged. He lost the case.
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In the Patrick Kennedy case, Texas supported a Louisiana death sentence for rape. The court which since Rehnquist was Chief Justice had reinstituted prisoner murder nevertheless ruled that death sentences should be for murder only, not rape.
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In Frew v. Hawkins, Ted Cruz argued that Texas need not provide Medicaid for poor children.
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Dretke v. Haley: Michael Haley was sentenced to 16 years for a misdemeanor with a maximum 2 year sentence. He had stolen a calculator from WalMart. On behalf of the state, Cruz argued that Haley had waited too long to contest the error. SCOTUS sent case back to lower court which released him.
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In League Of United Latin American Citizens V Perry,
Cruz defended the racist gerrymandering of Texas district lines, a condition which exists to this day.
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As a private lawyer, Cruz won a patent dispute re a deep fat fryer for his client.
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Cruz was part of the Texecution machine, as were Greg Abbott, Rick Perry, and John Cornyn. Texas is one of 7
states, 5 of them in the south with centuries of racist executions. These are AL, FL, GA, NB, OH, TN, and TX. While Virginia has executed the most since 1789, Texas has the record for the last 100 years.
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Texas has denied the Geneva Convention rights of citizens of Germany, Mexico and Canada, executing them all.


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