Climate Protesters Arrested for Trespassing on Ted Cruz’s Lawn

Ted Cruz is in the news again, and this time it's not for leaving the state for friendlier climes.

On Monday, Houston police arrested eight people for trespassing at Texas Senator Ted Cruz's residence while protesting climate change amid the state's ongoing power crisis. KTRK reports that around 60-70 people participated, but only a handful were caught trespassing and taken into custody.

Cruz has been a vocal opponent of legislative attempts to address climate change and its harmful effects.

Joe Biden stopped negotiating with so-called "climate deniers" like Cruz and has been pushing for the creation of what's been called the Civilian Climate Corps - an effort to create government jobs to combat climate change.

Interestingly, Cruz hasn't been the only lawmaker to be protested in response to climate change policy lately. Fox News reports that protestors recently marched on Nancy Pelosi's San Francisco residence and dumped wildfire ashes on her front porch. They too were calling for the creation of a Civilian Climate Corps.

Senator Cruz received widespread criticism back in February for jetting off to a sunny holiday destination in Mexico during the massive February winter storm that left countless Texans in the freezing dark and may have killed hundreds more than the state's official death toll suggested.

Cruz has also been criticized for using social media memes and stunts to engage in unrelated politics while his state grapples with how to strengthen the energy grid or deadly crises such as the pandemic. Others argue these are state issues in which he has little say, but still question his focus.

The same day that the state's largest electric power grid company urged Texans to reduce their electric use to avoid blackouts during a blistering heatwave, he tweeted a video.

In a five-day-long advisory, the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) warned residents that the power supply was low due to "a significant number of forced power outages combined with potential record electric use for June".

Living in this great state of Texas and experiencing one of the coldest winters since I've lived here, I feel like this summer will not be as hot with consecutive days of 100-degree+ weather.

Still, it's important to remember just how brutal a blow the winter storm delivered to our energy infrastructure and the weaknesses it revealed. We face energy challenges every summer, and while someone in Ted Cruz's position may not be able to do much to directly address that, he is in a position to be involved in wider efforts to address climate change and its expected impact.

LOOK: The most expensive weather and climate disasters in recent decades

Stacker ranked the most expensive climate disasters by the billions since 1980 by the total cost of all damages, adjusted for inflation, based on 2021 data from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). The list starts with Hurricane Sally, which caused $7.3 billion in damages in 2020, and ends with a devastating 2005 hurricane that caused $170 billion in damage and killed at least 1,833 people. Keep reading to discover the 50 of the most expensive climate disasters in recent decades in the U.S.