In an interview with Ginni Thomas posted on the Daily Caller this weekend, Rafael Cruz claimed that President Obama will be remembered as “the worst president” in history and “the man who destroyed the greatness of America.”

Cruz, the father of Republican Texas Sen. Ted Cruz, told Thomas, the wife of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, that Obama wants to keep Americans in poverty. “The administration is not concerned about lifting anybody out of poverty,” he said. “They want them to continue in dependency so they can buy their votes.”

When Thomas asked Cruz what he thought Obama’s legacy would be, Cruz responded, “I think that he will take Carter’s place as the worst president ever in the United States of America, the man who destroyed the greatness of America.”

“We have a president that does not understand American exceptionalism, does not care about it, and as a matter of fact tries to apologize for it and makes us think that we are no better than any other country,” he claimed.