Rafael Edward 'Ted' Cruz, born on December 22, 1970, in Calgary, Alberta, Canada, is an American politician, attorney, and former law clerk serving as United States Senator from Texas since 2013. The son of Cuban immigrant Rafael Bienvenido Cruz and American Eleanor Elizabeth Wilson, Cruz held dual U.S.-Canadian citizenship by birth but renounced his Canadian citizenship in 2014. Raised primarily in Houston, Texas, he attended Second Baptist School and Foothill High School, where he developed his debating skills. He earned a Bachelor of Arts from Princeton University (1992) and a Juris Doctor magna cum laude from Harvard Law School (1995), where he was a managing editor of the Harvard Law Review. After clerking for Judge J. Michael Luttig and Chief Justice William Rehnquist, he worked in private practice, served as a policy advisor in the George W. Bush administration, and was Solicitor General of Texas from 2003 to 2008, arguing nine cases before the U.S. Supreme Court. Elected to the Senate in 2012 as a Tea Party-backed Republican, he has become a leading conservative Republican politician and voice on issues like immigration, healthcare, and fiscal policy. He ran for the 2016 presidential nomination, winning the Iowa caucuses but ultimately conceding to Donald Trump. Known for his constitutional conservatism and evangelical ties, Cruz has chaired the Senate Commerce Committee since 2025 and is noted for high-profile Senate actions, including a 2013 filibuster during an Obamacare debate.