AUSTIN, Texas – On Sunday, U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) joined Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas) and Texas Tribune CEO and co-founder Evan Smith for an onstage discussion at the Texas Tribune Festival in Austin. There, Sen. Cruz discussed his priorities for Hurricane Harvey recovery, among other topics.

Watch Sen. Cruz’s discussion about Hurricane Harvey here.

“Houston is my home,” Sen. Cruz said. “I grew up in Houston. If you grow up in Houston, hurricanes are part of life. That’s life on the Gulf Coast. Harvey was different. I remember growing up as a kid, Hurricane Alicia, my parents and I sheltering in the bathroom while that was hitting, and we had a tree fall in the front yard. I mean that’s life in Texas on the coast. What Harvey did was very different. It came in in South Texas, as a category four hurricane. And it made landfall, just decimating Victoria, and Rockport, and Port Aransas and Aransas Pass and Refugio – all communities I’ve been to multiple times in the last few weeks. And the winds were devastating – you saw homes obliterated, businesses obliterated.”

Sen. Cruz continued, “We had 52 inches of rain in four days, which is about the average annual rain fall in Houston. Then it moved East, and pummeled Beaumont and Port Arthur and Orange and Nederland. You know on Friday, John and I were both down in Houston with Paul Ryan and also with the Chairman of House Appropriations Committee. And among other things we took a helicopter tour of the damage. I think it was very good for the Speaker and the Chairman to see firsthand as we’re flying over neighborhood after neighborhood – and John and I were both pointing out to Paul – you see street after street after street where every house you have all the furniture, all the carpet, all the sheetrock, everything they own just piled in their front yard. And I think it really made an impact on them – the geographic scope. They were just like, ‘it keeps going and going’ and the point I made to them, I said ‘Paul, if you go 100 miles to the East, or 100 miles to the South it keeps on going. It is 250 miles of devastation.’”

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