Rep. Steve King of Iowa endorsed Sen. Ted Cruz for president Iowa hardliner Steve King endorses Ted Cruz 'I believe Ted Cruz is the candidate that's the answer to my prayers,' King said.

Iowa Rep. Steve King on Monday endorsed Ted Cruz, a coup for the Texas senator who is seeking to gain ground with the first-in-the-nation caucus state’s conservative activists, with whom King is deeply influential.

He made the announcement at a press conference in Iowa and in a video released on Twitter, a move that gives Cruz momentum in the battle to consolidate the conservative base in the state even as he currently trails other candidates in the polls.


"I believe Ted Cruz is the candidate that's the answer to my prayers," King said. "A candidate whom God will use to restore the soul of America."

Cruz beat King to his own announcement, tweeting out an endorsement video as the congressman's address got underway.

"I am beyond honored to receive Congressman @SteveKingIA's endorsement," he tweeted.

King, an immigration hardliner who did not endorse in 2012 and in 2008 was a last-minute backer of the late Fred Thompson's failed bid, has been heavily courted this cycle by candidates vying to emerge as a conservative standard-bearer. They see King as a gatekeeper to the state's grassroots, particularly in his home base of northwest Iowa, which is particularly conservative. Recently, for example, he embarked on a pheasant hunt, an annual tradition, with candidates including Cruz, former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee, Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal and former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum.

But he has long been thought to favor Cruz, and the senator's campaign expected the endorsement. King's son is involved in a super PAC that backs the senator, and the two have appeared together frequently at events in Iowa. Last week, as Cruz and Sen. Marco Rubio tussled about the Texas senator's record on immigration, King came to Cruz's defense, saying he believed his record was sufficiently conservative, a point he reiterated on Monday.

At the press conference, King made the same case that Cruz frequently makes to potential supporters and donors: that the senator can energize Christian conservatives and bring together a coalition that also includes libertarians and other grassroots activists, and that Cruz — with the most cash on hand of any Republican in the field — has the money to go the distance.

"Victory requires that he energize Christian conservatives for large turnout," King said. "Some said that didn't happen four years ago ... we can't have that again. [The candidate has] got to be able to inspire Christian conservatives."

It's an echo of Cruz's base-focused theory of the case: that in the last 20 or so years, every time the GOP has nominated someone perceived by conservatives as too moderate, the Republican Party has lost.

That approach terrifies establishment Republicans, who believe that Mitt Romney lost in 2012 in part because his rhetoric on immigration was too conservative. Electability is at the core of many rival Republican campaigns' critiques of Cruz.

And for now, the senator lags behind Donald Trump and Ben Carson in Iowa and nationally anyway, and in some polls in Iowa, he also trails Rubio. Carson in particular has cut into the evangelical base that would otherwise be expected to favor Cruz.

Asked about Carson, who is leading among Iowa's evangelicals, King said that the former pediatric neurosurgeon's lack of political experience was troubling.

"I can't quite say there's any intellect superior to Dr. Carson" in the 2016 field, he said, but, "the zone of Washington, D.C. is not an area he's familiar with. That gives me pause. You need to know what's going on in that organism to do something about it."

Cruz, for his part, has been ramping up his organizing in the state, embarking on an effort to tap a supportive pastor in each of Iowa’s 99 counties and pledging that he will hit each county — known as the “Full Grassley,” for an activity undertaken by Iowa’s senior senator — by the time the caucuses hit on Feb. 1.

Later this week, he and several other Republican presidential candidates will attend a cattle call hosted by prominent social conservative Bob Vander Plaats, whose pending endorsement, along with King’s, is thought to have the most sway over Iowa conservative activists. Cruz has already secured the support of radio host Steve Deace, another prominent voice among the state's conservatives.

"I think it absolutely moves the dial on the ground," cheered Deace in a phone call, predicting that King's endorsement "all but locks up" a top-three finish in Iowa for Cruz. "The timing of it, in advance of the [Vander Plaats] event this weekend, is pretty much perfect for Cruz."

Others note that the last time there was a real test of King's influence in a presidential race was in 2008, and Thompson lost. But King said that this time around, "the timing is right."

Some Democrats, who see Cruz as a weaker general election candidate than some of his rivals because of his base-focused, deeply conservative approach, also touted the development.

"Watch out: @SteveKingIA endorsement of @tedcruz is big development in GOP race," tweeted former top Obama aide David Axelrod. "Cruz could very well rise late and win IA--and nomination."