Did Ted Cruz say to stop attacking pedophiles
Executive summary
Yes — on Sept. 30, 2025 Senator Ted Cruz uttered the words “Let’s stop attacking pedophiles” during a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing; the line appears on C-SPAN video and was circulated widely online [1] [2]. His office and multiple fact-checkers characterized the remark as a verbal slip or “gaffe,” saying he intended a different formulation condemning crimes by pedophiles, not defending them [3] [4] [5].
1. The line on video: what was actually said
A C‑SPAN clip of the hearing shows Cruz listing crimes the country should unite against — “Let’s stop murders? Let’s stop rapes?” — and then saying, clearly on camera, “How about we all come together and say, ‘Let’s stop attacking pedophiles’?”; that clip is the source of the viral spread [1] [6] [2].
2. The immediate explanation from Cruz’s team
Within hours the senator’s office told reporters the phrase was a stray word or “verbal slip,” and that Cruz opposes pedophilia and its crimes; those statements were cited by outlets reporting the incident and by aggregated fact-check pieces [3] [4]. The spokesperson’s explanation is the principal public-accountability response documented in the reporting; no transcript evidence in the clips shows Cruz pausing to correct himself on the spot [3] [5].
3. Plausible intended phrasing and expert commentary
Analysts and language commentators suggested Cruz likely intended a parallel construction — for example, “let’s stop pedophiles” or “let’s stop attacks by pedophiles” — and that the insertion of “attacking” produced the absurd meaning that circulated; linguists called it a classic slip of speech in a rapid, rhetorical list [7]. Reporting notes that brief clips omit surrounding remarks that indicate his intention to condemn those crimes as part of a bipartisan anti‑crime pitch [7] [3].
4. Why the clip blew up: context, politics and timing
The gaffe went viral partly because it is an emotionally charged mistake and because it coincided with renewed public interest in the Jeffrey Epstein files and congressional fights over their release — threads that led commentators to cast the slip in a wider political light and to mock or imply worse meanings [8] [9]. Social‑platform reposts and headlines amplified the line, often without the fuller context of the hearing that preceded it [10] [9].
5. What independent fact‑checks and news outlets concluded
Fact‑checking organizations and multiple news outlets reviewed the footage and concluded Cruz did in fact say the phrase as quoted, but assessed the explanation from his office — that it was a misstatement — as consistent with the surrounding remarks and with the absence of any follow‑up correction on the record [5] [4]. Snopes and Yahoo’s fact-check summary both affirmed the clip’s authenticity while recording the spokesperson’s characterization of it as a slip [5] [4].
6. Bottom line: direct answer and caveats
Directly: yes, Ted Cruz said the words “Let’s stop attacking pedophiles” on camera at the Sept. 30 hearing and the clip is authentic [1] [6]; his office and subsequent reporting uniformly describe the line as a verbal gaffe and assert he meant the opposite — to condemn murders, rape and attacks by pedophiles — though the raw clip contains no immediate on‑air correction from Cruz himself [3] [4] [5]. Reporting does not provide independent evidence that the senator meant to defend pedophiles; it does, however, document how the phrase was seized on politically and culturally and how that framing shaped the viral reaction [9] [8] [10].