Republican GOP hopeful Ted Cruz made another stop at Fort Wayne's Grand Wayne Center, which he also visited last Thursday. Cruz used his time to talk about jobs and manufacturing in the Hoosier state.
Most of Cruz's talking points were similar to his visit last Thursday, focusing on jobs and security, and what his priorities would be as president.
"My number one priority as president will be jobs and economic growth, and my focus is not on all the process stories of a dog chasing his tail in a circle, but instead how do we get the government off the backs of small businesses," Cruz says.
Cruz also touched on Carrier, and responded to Trump's proposal to tax Carrier products at 35 percent if they are imported from Mexico.
"I fully expect in two, three, four years to see Carrier bringing those manufacturing jobs back from Mexico to Indiana," Cruz says. "Not because the government will have used brute force to punish them, but because we will have removed the federal government regulations that drove them away in the first place."
RealClearPolitics shows GOP front-runner Donald Trump leading Cruz by nine points in Indiana. On Sunday, Cruz noted that Americans were "praying for" Hoosiers, warning them against "giving in to evil."
Cruz clarified his comments at the Grand Wayne Center in Fort Wayne Monday.
"I believe we are a loving people," he says. "I believe we are a welcoming people. I believe we are a people who hunger to be united. And I think politics should not be about a tax, about insults, about cursing, about hatred. Politics instead should be about shared values."
Joining him for his tour around Indiana Monday was Governor Mike Pence, who lauded Cruz just days after his endorsement of the candidate.
"He is a principled conservative who has articulated and fought for the Reagan agenda that really drew me into the Republican Party," Pence says. "I think that Ted Cruz's record and the courage of his convictions in Congress make him the right man at this time to be the Republican nominee for president."
Cruz was quick to return the kudos to Pence, calling him an "extraordinary governor" for Indiana, and noting him as a "happy warrior and optimistic voice for conservative principles."
To help sway some votes, Cruz also recruited Glenn Beck to warm up the crowd.
"Thomas Paine wrote ‘Common Sense,' something we are sorely lacking," Beck says. "We are debating with trillions and trillions of dollars of debt, with ISIS that wants to behead us, literally crucifying children. We have no common sense as a country if we're arguing whether a man can go into a woman's restroom or not."
Cruz says he's not backing out of the race even if he loses the Indiana primary, and despite trailing Trump in statewide polls, he believes the tide will turn in his favor.
"Indiana is in a position to decide the direction of this race, not just for Indiana, not just for the Republican Party, but for the entire country," he says. "And I am tremendously encouraged that it is Midwestern common sense and good judgment -- it is Hoosier values -- that will decide this race."
Ted Cruz and his entourage made additional stops in Franklin and Bloomington on the eve of Tuesday's primary.
