R. Edward "Ted" Cruz, who argued eight cases before the U.S. Supreme Court during his tenure as solicitor general for the state of Texas, jumped into a race today for U.S. Senate.
Cruz joins a growing field of Republicans hoping to win their party’s nomination to succeed Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison (R-Texas), who is not running for re-election in 2012. Other announced candidates include Republican Michael Williams, a former federal prosecutor who served as a special assistant to then-U.S. Attorney General Richard Thornburgh.
On his newly launched campaign Web site, Cruz plays up his performance as solicitor general. A video notes his advocacy in cases involving a Ten Commandments monument, the Pledge of Allegiance, the Second Amendment and the so-called “world court.” (As the state’s lawyer, he defended the monument, supported a “voluntary teacher-led recitation” of the pledge, supported the right of individuals to own guns and argued against applying rulings of the International Court of Justice to state criminal cases.)
“For the past decade, I have been fighting to defend free market principles, to defend our Constitution, to defend conservative values,” Cruz says in the video.
Cruz joined Morgan, Lewis & Bockius as a partner in 2008, and he’s the head of the firm’s Supreme Court and appellate practice. In November, The National Law Journal reported on the increasing prevalence of former Supreme Court clerks in the Senate; as a former clerk to Chief Justice William Rehnquist, Cruz would join that group if he’s elected.
The senator that Cruz, Williams and others hope to succeed has her own ties to Big Law. Hutchinson’s husband, Ray Hutchison, is of counsel at Vinson & Elkins in Dallas.
Comments