Photograph by KAREN BLEIER/AFP/Getty

WASHINGTON (The Borowitz Report)—The United States Senate declared an official day of mourning on Wednesday to mark the impending return of Senator Ted Cruz (R-Texas) to the legislative body.

Ordering all flags at the U.S. Capitol to half-staff, the Senate Majority Leader, Mitch McConnell, announced the day of mourning in a somber proclamation. “We mark this day with a deep personal sense of loss that will never completely heal,” he said.

To recognize Cruz’s return, which is expected to be imminent, McConnell said that the Senate would suspend all work for the day. “Ordinarily our members would welcome a day off,” he said. “But not for this.”

In a rare moment of consensus for this bitterly divided chamber, both Republicans and Democrats expressed their sorrow, but the news of Cruz’s return seemed to cut the deepest among Republicans, many of whom now regret their decision not to endorse the Texas senator for President.

“If that bastard had somehow been elected President, we would have only had to see him one day a year, at the State of the Union,” Senator Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) said. “I should have done everything in my power to make that happen. And now it’s too damn late.”

“We have to respect the will of the voters, but they didn’t think about the devastating effect this would have on us,” the usually stoic McConnell said, his voice quavering. “There’s a real human cost to this.”