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Sen. Ted Cruz said Donald Trump's campaign has become a "Washington campaign." | AP Photo Cruz on Trump: 'This has become the Washington campaign'

Ted Cruz on Friday intensified his rhetorical attacks on Donald Trump, attempting to tie the Republican front-runner's recent campaign shake-up and hires to the Washington establishment that conservative voters oppose.

“His campaign manager is now a big-time Washington lobbyist. They’ve brought in tons of Washington lobbyists. This has become the Washington campaign," Cruz said in an interview with radio host Dom Giordano on Philadelphia's 1210 WPHT, in reference to the Trump campaign hiring of Paul Manafort to handle the candidate's operations.

Manafort co-founded lobbying outfit Black, Manafort, Stone and Kelly in the 1980s and went on to work as an adviser and political consultant for the likes of ousted Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych. Rick Wiley, who joined the Trump campaign earlier this month as its national political director, was a registered lobbyist in 1999 and 2000 with the Associated Builders & Contractors' Midwest operation.

Cruz has seized upon a series of the Republican front-runner's recent comments , including remarking the previous day in an interview with NBC's "Today" that transgender people should be able to use whatever bathroom they choose and that he would push the Republican National Committee to include in its platform abortion exceptions for rape, incest and the life of the mother. Trump also expressed support for raising taxes on the wealthy, including himself.

Cruz continued, "And if you’re fed up with politicians who lie to us and go to Washington and become liberals, Donald is telling us he wants to raise taxes, and he is the same politically correct New York liberal that Hillary Clinton is.”

When the host remarked of Trump's abortion position, Cruz called it "part of his pulling the mask off and revealing that he is really a New York liberal."

"You know, on Tuesday, two New York liberals won the New York primary: Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump," Cruz said, calling them "flip sides of the same coin."