Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) feuded with a former law school classmate of his in a series of X posts on Wednesday, where he misattributed Anthony Weiner’s sexting scandal to the wrong person.
The classmate—California State Sen. Scott Wiener (D)—caught the attention of Cruz after rebuking a report that the U.S. Senate did not have the votes necessary to confirm Adeel Mangi, President Joe Biden’s Muslim-American judicial nominee to the Third Circuit Court of Appeals.
“This is straight up Islamophobia,” Scott wrote. “This nominee is highly qualified. Ted Cruz grilled him about October 7.”
“That’s no different than grilling a Jewish nominee about Israel’s conduct of the war,” he added. “Are they asking other nominees these questions? Of course not. Only the Muslim nominee.”
Mangi, for his part, responded to Cruz’s line of questioning by saying Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack was “a horror involving the deaths of innocent civilians” and that he has “no patience, none, for any attempts to justify or defend those events.”
Cruz took a dig at Scott in response, writing: “Wait, I thought this guy was thrown out of Congress for sending naked pictures of himself?”
Except Cruz was clearly referring to former U.S. Rep Anthony Weiner, the New York Democrat who resigned from Congress in 2011 after it was revealed that he sent sexually suggestive texts and explicit photos to women on Twitter. In 2017, he pled guilty to transferring obscene material to a minor and was sentenced to 21 months in prison.
Responding to Cruz’s false allegation, Scott replied: “Ted, remember when we went to law school together & everyone hated you?”
While a mix-up of the names Weiner and Wiener would be an understandable mistake, it appears Cruz’s remark was likely intentional.
“When people tweet deliberately misleading stuff, they damage our ability to talk on this platform,” wrote one X user.
And a community noted under Cruz’s post states: “Sen. Cruz intentionally made this ‘mistake’ to disparage Scott Wiener, who attended law school with Cruz, and is a member of the California State Senate.”
“Much like Ted’s wife, he’s got the wrong Weiner,” quipped someone else who tagged Community Notes.
Another user suggested Cruz knew what he was doing and was attempting to stoke online outrage.
“Weak joke, but decent bait,” he wrote. “Cruz is great at getting dumb people on Twitter to display how dumb they truly are. Reply after reply of ‘Different Weiner.'”
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