Sen. Ted Cruz took $45,000 worth of private flights paid for by others during his presidential campaign, The Dallas Morning News reports, citing new disclosures.
The most expensive of the flights, to the Cayman Islands last September for the Texas Republican and his family, came courtesy of former ExxonMobil executive Michael Bleyzer, the head of private-equity firm SigmaBleyzer, and his wife, Natasha.
Bleyzer has called Cruz "a dear and trusted friend" and "a unique politician," according to a Salon profile of the Ukrainian-born executive who made a fortune during the privatization era in the former Soviet Union republic. Bleyzer has been an active advocate for Ukraine in its ongoing confrontations with Moscow and has courted Cruz’s support for that cause.
"For most politicians, the gap between their words and their deeds is wide," Bleyzer said in Salon. "With Ted Cruz, I have always found that what he said and what he did were one and the same. That makes him a very impressive man and political leader."
Cruz also took a $15,000 private flight from Houston to Fishers Island, N.Y., paid for by Lee and Allie Hanley, major donors to his campaign. Their Florida home was where Cruz and future members of his campaign staff crafted his strategy in February 2014, according to Bloomberg News.
The senator did not receive any private flights from donors in 2014, though he did accept a ticket to see a Houston Rockets basketball game, worth $450.
Cruz has also received a book advance for just over $475,000 from HarperCollins, Politico reports. The publisher is a unit of Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp.
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