(NBC NEWS) Texas Sen. Ted Cruz on Friday opened up about his troubled early childhood, telling a group of social conservatives that his parents were alcoholics and that his father temporarily abandoned the family.
“My parents drank far too much,” Cruz said at the Values Voter Summit in Washington. “Both of them had serious problems with alcohol. And when I was 3 years old, my father decided he didn’t want to be married anymore. And he didn’t want a 3-year-old son. So he got on a plane and left.”
It is rare for Cruz, a potential 2016 Republican presidential candidate, to publicly deliver personal details about his family’s struggles. His father, Rafel Cruz, is a well-known minister who will sometimes appear with his son.
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