Sen. Ted Cruz’s presidential campaign released a new television spot on Tuesday that argues business and media elites would oppose immigration reform if their jobs were at stake.
{mosads}The 60-second ad called “Invasion,” which will begin running in New Hampshire this week, shows men and women dressed in suits and carrying briefcases stream across the Southern border.
“I understand that when the mainstream media covers immigration, it doesn’t often see it as an economic issue,” Cruz says in a voiceover. “But I can tell you, it is a very personal economic issue.”
The Texas senator then makes the case that the issue would be treated differently by corporate and media elites if their jobs were at stake, rather than the jobs of low-wage earners.
“I will say, the politics of it would be very, very different if a bunch of lawyers or bankers were coming across the Rio Grande,” Cruz says. “Or if a bunch of people with journalism degrees were coming over and driving down the wages in the press. Then we would see stories about the economic calamity that is befalling our nation.”
Cruz is leading polls in Iowa but trails Donald Trump — who has made illegal immigration the centerpiece of his campaign — and several other candidates in New Hampshire.
The ad suggests he’s making a serious play in the state.
It targets one of his rivals, Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.), who helped write 2013 legislation reforming the nation’s immigration laws that was approved by the Senate.
It cuts to footage of a split screen at a Republican debate where Rubio questioned Cruz’s purity on immigration reform.
“If I’m elected president, we will triple the border patrol,” Cruz says at the debate. “We will build a wall that works. We will secure the border.”