Jerry Falwell Jr.: Cruz aides lobbied to get us into Division I
Ted Cruz at Liberty University on Monday (Photo: Andrew Harnik/AP)
LYNCHBURG, Va. — Liberty University President Jerry Falwell Jr. said Monday that associates of Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, lobbied university presidents on behalf of his school’s attempt to join a new athletic conference.
Speaking to a handful of reporters after Cruz addressed Liberty’s student body and announced he was running for president, Falwell was asked how long he has known Cruz and how much of a relationship he has with the freshman senator.
Falwell, 52, said he met Cruz in 2014 when the Texas lawmaker first spoke at Liberty — a Christian college with a student body of around 13,800 that was founded in 1971 by Falwell’s father, Jerry Falwell Sr. — but that he has interacted “mainly with his people.”
“They helped us,” Falwell volunteered. “Liberty’s trying to move into one of the top athletic conferences, and they did a little lobbying help for us on that, talking to college presidents.
“But that’s it. No personal relationship,” Falwell said.
Moments earlier, Falwell had stressed that Liberty went out of its way to make sure that Cruz’s speech on Monday did not violate federal laws that prohibit nonprofit institutions such as universities or religious institutions from endorsing specific candidates.
“We spent over a week making sure that we abided by all the rules that apply to 501(c)(3) organizations, made sure it was not a campaign event,” Falwell said. He noted that, technically speaking, Cruz had not made the first public announcement of his candidacy at Liberty, but on Twitter a few minutes after midnight earlier that morning. “He actually announced his candidacy just prior to the event today,” Falwell said.
Falwell was asked if he had talked to his lawyers about the issue, and said quickly, “He’s right here,” motioning to the man to his left, David Corry, general counsel for Liberty. Corry spoke up.
“It was a Liberty University event. It wasn’t a campaign event. There are certain hallmarks of a campaign event and there are certain hallmarks of a university event. And universities are free to have speakers, even candidates appear in their capacity as candidates as long as there aren’t any campaign banners or campaign signs, things like that,” Corry said.
But it was noteworthy that moments after this, Falwell mentioned on his own that people who worked for Cruz had done “lobbying” for the university. Yahoo News asked Falwell to clarify his comments, and he said that “there were people that worked for [Cruz] that made some calls for us.
“We had lots of people making calls for us all over the country,” he said.
Yahoo News asked Corry what conference Liberty was trying to gain entry to, and he demurred. “I shouldn’t say,” he said.
But USA Today in 2014 detailed Liberty’s attempts to join the Sun Belt Conference, which would move the football program from the NCAA Division I Football Championship Subdivision (FCS), which used to be known as Division I-AA, to the NCAA Division I Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS), formerly known as Division I-A. FBS teams can offer 85 scholarships, compared to the 63 that are allowed for FCS teams.
Liberty’s football team has been a member of the Big South Conference since 2002 and has won seven conference championships. A move to full Division I status would allow Liberty to play tougher, higher-profile competition and would be a status badge for a school that yearns to be viewed as the evangelical Christian equal to Brigham Young University, the flagship university for young members of the Mormon church.
Falwell was also asked about the full field of likely 2016 presidential candidates, particularly former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush.
“A Bush or a Clinton is going to have a lot of work to do with young people to bring them aboard. It’s just because those are names from the past,” Falwell said.
That reference to Bush as a name from the past is almost identical to the language that Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker — a likely presidential candidate himself — used to describe Bush recently.
Falwell thought younger voters would be aware of Bush and the negative connotations around his last name, despite their short memories of American politics.
“I think they grew up hearing [HBO show host] Bill Maher talk about how awful George Bush was,” he said. “So I think their views of Bush and Clinton might be tainted, and that’s just my opinion.”
