DONALD TRUMP HAS linked the father of his rival Ted Cruz to the man who assassinated US President John F. Kennedy.
In an interview with Fox News, Trump brought up a report that was carried in the National Enquirer gossip magazine which claimed that a photograph from 1963 placed Rafael Cruz alongside Lee Harvey Oswald.
The unsubstantiated National Enquirer’s claim was rubbished last month by the Cruz campaign which called it “another garbage story in a tabloid full of garbage.”
But that denial did not stop Trump repeating the claim today when asked about Cruz’s father, who has been imploring evangelicals to vote for his son over Trump.
Rafael Cruz said recently that “the alternative could be the destruction of America.”
“I think it’s a disgrace that he’s allowed to do it. I think it’s a disgrace he’s allowed to say it,” Trump said before bringing up the conspiracy theory.
His father was with Lee Harvey Oswald prior to Oswald being, you know, shot. I mean the whole thing is ridiculous. What is this, right prior to his being shot, and nobody even brings it up? They don’t even talk about that. That was reported, and nobody talks about it.
“What was he doing with Lee Harvey Oswald shortly before the death, shortly before the shooting? It’s horrible,” Trump said.
The Cruz campaign has been quick to respond to Trump’s latest claim, labelling him as being “detached from reality”.
“We are campaigning on jobs, freedom and security while Trump campaigns on false tabloid garbage. And the media is willfully enabling him to cheapen the value of our democratic process,” a statement from the campaign said.
A 1963 video recorded four months before kennedy was killed shows Harvey Oswald handing out leaflets in support of Fidel Castro in New Orleans. It is the National Enquirer’s claim that they have determined that Rafael Cruz is the man in a black tie standing behind him.
Cuban-born Rafael Cruz was a supporter of Castro’s regime when it overthrew the corrupt Cuban government in 1959, but he renounced his support when Castro labelled himself as a Marxist.
“When people ask me why I supported Castro in overthrowing the Cuban government, I readily admit that I didn’t realise he was a communist,” Rafael Cruz said in his autobiography.
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