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Sen. Cruz on ‘Fox & Friends’ Discusses Coronavirus Containment Efforts, Slams Sen. Schumer’s Supreme Court Threats

WASHINGTON, D.C. - U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas), chairman of the Senate Subcommittee on Aviation and Space, this morning appeared on Fox News' ‘Fox & Friends' to discuss the hearing he chaired yesterday on efforts to contain the coronavirus. Following Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer's attack against Supreme Court Justices Gorsuch and Kavanaugh, Sen. Cruz also condemned Democrats' ongoing efforts to intimidate, blackmail, and undermine America's independent judiciary. Highlights are below:

ON CONTAINING THE CONRONAVIRUS & PROTECTING LIVES

"This virus is serious and we need to treat it seriously. There are worldwide now over 95,000 confirmed cases with the virus. We have over 3,200 people who have died. Now, the vast majority of those infections, the vast majority of those deaths have been in China. The spread to the United States is still relatively limited. [...] We have slightly over 100 cases in the United States, that's far too many. We have 11 fatalities in the United States, that's far too many. But had the President not acted swiftly at the outset, the testimony we heard yesterday is that those numbers in the U.S. would have been much, much higher.

"We need to keep doing everything possible to stop the spread of the disease but we also shouldn't give in to panic or hysteria, we should be driven by facts and medical science."

ON SEN. SCHUMER THREATENING SUPREME COURT JUSTICES

"That is an unambiguous threat. Now whether it's a threat of political retribution, or something even worse, that's not clear. But whatever it is, it's judicial intimidation. [...] The Senate should seriously consider taking disciplinary steps. When you have the leader of one of the two parties going to the steps of the Supreme Court, threatening and trying to intimidate Supreme Court justices, that undermines the rule of law, it undermines the judiciary and it's just flat out wrong."

"Chuck Schumer crossed a line. The Senate Democrats have been getting worse and worse. We saw last year, Senator Sheldon Whitehouse led a letter of a bunch of Senators threatening to pack the court to try to add additional justices to the court."

"Where Senate Democrats are right now, they are so angry that they're willing to try to get what they want through threats and through really naked intimidation."

Watch full interview here.

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