The senator admitted afterwards that the trip had been a “mistake”, after he flew from Texas to Cancun, Mexico, with his family on Wednesday during the worst winter storm in three decades.
The trip also came as tens of thousands of Texans remained without power and running water for a fourth day running, following temperatures that reached as low as 0F (-18C) last weekend.
But, in an interview with Fox News host Sean Hannity on Monday, Mr Cruz suggested that “the media” was suffering from “Trump withdrawal”, and that was why the trip caused controversy — and not because of the timing, or his explanation for the trip.
“Where they’ve attacked Trump every day for four years, they don’t know what to do so they obsess over my taking my girls to the beach,” Mr Cruz told Mr Hannity of “the media”.
The senator said in an initial statement on Thursday that he “was trying to take care of my kids,” who like millions of Texans last week, went for days without power or running water.
“It’s unfortunate, the fire storm that came from it. It was not my intention,” he told broadcaster ABC13. “In saying yes to my daughters to somehow diminish all the Texans that were going through real hardship.”
He then admitted to Sean Hannity in a separate interview that he had planned to stay in Cancun until Sunday, and was not making a round-trip, as suggested by his initial statement.
“As I was heading down there, you know, I started to have second thoughts almost immediately because the crisis here in Texas, you need to be here on the ground,” Mr Cruz had added on Thursdat night.
On Monday, both Mr Crux and Mr Hannity went on to complain that “the media” was covering the Cancun trip but not the scandal surrounding New York governor Andrew Cuomo, who has faced criticism for allegedly covering-up the number of nursing home deaths caused by Covid-19.
“The media won’t even cover it,” said Mr Cruz, who was criticised by Michael McCaul, another Republican congressman on Sunday.
The Texas politician told CNN: “I know Mr Cruz called it a mistake and he’s owned up to that, but I think that was a big mistake and as for me, I was on the ground trying to help my people out and my constituents, and that’s what we should be doing in a time of crisis.”
