Ted Cruz, two former Republican candidates to tour Arizona-Mexico border
Mar 17, 2016, 3:11 PM | Updated: 3:12 pm
(AP Photo/Gerry Broome)
(AP Photo/Gerry Broome)
PHOENIX — Republican presidential hopeful Ted Cruz will take a tour of Arizona’s border with Mexico on Friday with a state legislator.
Arizona House Speaker David Gowan announced he would take Cruz — along with former Republican presidential candidates Carly Fiorina and Rick Perry — on a tour of the border near Douglas.
The tour is expected to begin about 12:30 p.m.
Cruz is scheduled to speak later Friday at Arizona Christian University.
The Texas senator has also planned several other events featuring Perry as he attempts to drum up support in Arizona’s March 22 presidential preference election.
Cruz faces an uphill battle in Arizona. A recent poll had Cruz trailing frontrunner Donald Trump by 14 points, but that was before Sen. Marco Rubio left the race.
Cruz has failed to resonate with Latino voters in Arizona because some of his policies differ from the beliefs of most Latinos in Arizona and throughout the Southwest, experts said.
For voters in Arizona, endorsing a candidate needs to go beyond having the shared identity of “Latino” or “Hispanic,” said Cristian Avila, a state coordinator for Mi Familia Vota, or “My Family Votes.” This matters for both the Republican and the Democratic parties.
“It doesn’t really matter whether (the candidates) are Latino,” Avila said. “(Voters) are interested more in what they’re saying rather than their last names.”
Cronkite News’ Miguel Otarola contributed to this report.
