Fact Check

Ted Cruz: The Texas Floods Were Caused by Native American Rain Dances

Rumor: Senator Ted Cruz claimed flooding in Texas was caused by Native American rain dances.

Published June 8, 2015

Claim:

Claim:   Senator Ted Cruz claimed flooding in Texas was caused by Native American rain dances.


FALSE


Example: [Collected via Twitter, June 2015]


Ted Cruz,The Idiot Senator from Texas, by way of Canada. The Texas floods are caused by Native American rain dances

Origins:   On 4 June 2015, the web site The Stately Harold published an article titled "Ted Cruz, The Texas Floods Are Caused by Native American Rain Dances." The article reported that on 4 June 2015 Cruz, a Republican presidential candidate and U.S. Senator, blamed Native American rain dances for deadly floods that affected areas of Texas in May 2015:



In a Texas radio interview this morning, when the topic turned to the recent, devastating floods and Senator Cruz was asked to speculate on their cause, this is what he had to say:

"These things happen and people attribute it to God, but this is no work of God, this is something sinister and there are obviously other forces at work and they've put our great State in shambles in a very short space of time. And you know scientists will blame it on climate change or mumbo jumbo like that, but I know what's really going on. The heavy rain is obviously caused by Native Americans doing their rain dances and what not, and if we don't address the Native American issue better in this State, we'll be seeing further flooding in years to come."


Readers were invited to discuss its claims under the hashtag #CruzRainDance, presumably to object to the offensive and polarizing content presented by the article. But the Stately Harold's disclaimer clearly explains that the site's content is not factual:


The Stately Harold is a satirical website. None of the stories have a grain of truth to them and the opinions do not belong to real people.

Days before the "rain dance" yarn, the Stately Harold published an article claiming that Sen. Cruz was overheard using a racial slur when describing President Obama. That site (and many others) like it have made our lists of fake news sites whose articles dupe social media users every now and again.

Last updated:   8 June 2015

David Mikkelson founded the site now known as snopes.com back in 1994.