Sen. Ted Cruz’s dad, Rafael Cruz, joined right-wing Florida radio host Joyce Kaufman yesterday to promote his son’s candidacy. In response to a caller who wondered whether “our Hispanic immigrants” are falling for “some type of deception” from Democrats, Cruz responded that immigrants and others are being tricked by Democrats into being “locked into a slavery relationship with the government” through government assistance.

“I think that deception is the way that this administration operates in every area,” he said. “Look how people have been deceived into becoming dependent upon the government and having the government telling them that they’re going to take care of them from the cradle to the grave. It has destroyed the American dream, destroyed these people’s lives, they no longer strive to better themselves and to provide for their family.

“So it is just, you have realize the following: For Democrats to win, they have to lie because their policies do not work. Their policies have been a failure throughout history. So if their policies of bigger government, more control, less freedom, more taxation, more regulations don’t work, they have to lie to the American people. And unfortunately we have many, many people in American have drank the Kool-Aid.”

Kaufman interjected with a story about the owner of a Florida bodega offering to point her to government services.

“I keep going back to how that destroys the American dream, that destroys the incentive for somebody to better themselves,” Cruz responded, “and they become serfs of the government, and that just makes them locked into a slavery relationship with the government.”