For months, there have been quiet signs that not everyone in President Donald Trump’s orbit is as loyal as they claim. Private rooms, donor circles, and off-camera conversations have become places where the tone subtly shifts — where confidence replaces deference and calculations start to surface.
Secret audio recordings obtained by Axios of Sen. Ted Cruz speaking to wealthy donors in 2025 revealed the Texan Republican trashing Trump when he thought the moment — and the audience — was safe.
Political observers say Cruz, who is a likely 2028 GOP presidential candidate, is privately trotting out campaign fodder for the coming lame duck Trump era that’s not politically safe for him to use publicly just now.
While Cruz has branded himself one of Trump’s closest allies, the 10 minutes of leaked audio provided to Axios by a Republican source captures him warning that Trump’s trade agenda could tank the economy, cost Republicans Congress, and trigger endless impeachment fights.
In one of two recordings made in early and mid-2025, Cruz recounts to donors a rocky call he and several other senators had with Trump in early April, shortly after Trump introduced 10 percent tariffs on all U.S. imports and more punitive tariffs on countries with large trade surpluses.
The call, which stretched past midnight, “did not go well, and Trump was yelling and cursing,” Cruz recounted.
Cruz says he told Trump, “Mr. President, if we get to November of [2026] and people’s 401(k)s are down 30 percent and prices are up 10-20 percent at the supermarket, we’re going to go into Election Day, face a bloodbath.”
“You’re going to lose the House, you’re going to lose the Senate, you’re going to spend the next two years being impeached every single week,” he continued.
Trump’s response, according to Cruz: “F—k you, Ted.”
When a questioner at the donor’s session mentions “Liberation Day” — Trump’s moniker for his tariffs rollout — Cruz jokes, “I’ve told my team if anyone uses those words, they will be terminated on the spot. That is not language we use.”
The magazine predicted that Cruz will continue to quietly sharpen his line of attack against his Republican rivals and publicly debut it after the midterm elections this fall.
For now, Cruz is downplaying his views on Trump exposed in the tapes. A Cruz spokesperson said in a statement last month that the senator is “the president’s greatest ally in the Senate and battles every day in the trenches to advance his agenda.”
The statement continued, “Sen. Cruz is proud of those fights, his accomplishments, and his close relationship with the president. These attempts at sowing division are pathetic and getting boring.’
Online, skeptics argue the recordings feel less like courageous political dissent and more like a calculated attempt to distance himself from a sinking ship ahead of his possible 2028 run.
“I bet they were leaked on purpose,” wrote rationcaption on Threads. “Cruz wants out. Let’s see if recordings of other Trumpers ‘leak.'”
Of Cruz’s clandestine torching of Trump, djpellegrini noted, “So many of them do in private. This is what Rep Eric Swalwell keeps saying. They even laugh at him, then they enter chambers and ‘shrink.'”
“That’s why the infighting is going to destroy the GOP once Trump is gone,” wrote snbandi.
CEOBrandingExpert posted a poll on X asking, “Did Ted Cruz leak his own ‘secret recording’ to Axios to start his 2028 presidential run?”
As of Tuesday, 65% of respondents had chosen, “Yes. Weasel Move.”
Cruz has a long history of modulating his public opinions of Trump according to the political winds he faces.
In 2016, during the presidential campaign, Cruz called fellow GOP candidate Trump “a pathological liar,” “utterly amoral,” “a narcissist,” and “a bully,” observing, “Bullies don’t come from strength, bullies come from weakness. Bullies come from a deep yawning cavern of insecurity. There is a reason Donald builds giant buildings and puts his name on them everywhere he goes.”
Trump called Cruz ‘Lyin’ Ted’ and accused him of election fraud, claimed his father aided in the assassination of John F. Kennedy, and insulted his wife’s looks. Cruz was trampled by Trump in the primary, but then famously turned the other cheek and groveled his way back into Trump’s good graces, campaigning hard for him in the general election.
Of Cruz’s latest public comments praising Trump after his recently divulged private critiques of the president, Jacalyn Junkman wrote on Facebook, “I’ve never seen more neutered men in one place (Congress) in all my life.”
“Now let’s see if he has the guts to criticize openly,” responded Robert Paulin.
