Ted Cruz–Zodiac Killer meme
The Ted Cruz–Zodiac Killer meme is an Internet meme which originated in 2013 and gained popularity in 2015. The meme is a satirical conspiracy theory which posits United States senator Ted Cruz is the Zodiac Killer. Ted Cruz was born in 1970 after the last confirmed Zodiac killing. Proponents of this meme generally do not genuinely believe that Cruz is the Zodiac Killer. The absurdity of the premise is the point. According to NPR, the meme captures an unease with Cruz, " think he's creepy. And they want to point that out, as clearly as they can."
Origin and spread
A 2016 investigation by Miles Klee of The Daily Dot found the first use of the meme to be by a Twitter user in March 2013, as Cruz was speaking at the Conservative Political Action Conference and vowing to repeal the Affordable Care Act. The actual Tweet was, "Alert: Ted Cruz is speaking!! His speech is titled: 'This Is The Zodiac Speaking. The meme was not repeated until November 2014, by another Twitter user writing about Cruz's proposal against net neutrality.It continued in obscurity up to February 2016, when another Twitter user edited a picture of a Republican debate in order to include "Is Ted Cruz the Zodiac Killer?" in the interactive ticker at the bottom. That month, "is ted cruz the zodiac killer" was the second highest suggestion in Google's autocomplete for "is ted", but by April it was not in the autocomplete at all. News.com.au writer Matthew Dunn suggested that Google was censoring the search term, showing evidence that it accounted for 89% of total searches when compared to other terms in the autocomplete.
In April 2016, the Houston Chronicle said the meme "has a following. A Facebook group named for the meme has more than 27,000 members. A Google search turns up 621,000 hits, including exploratory articles by some of the biggest news publications on the web".
Cruz himself has jocularly alluded to the meme by tweeting one of the Zodiac Killer's cryptograms; first in October 2017 responding to a retweet from Senator Ben Sasse referring to Cruz as "the son of the guy who killed Kennedy" and then wishing a "Happy Halloween" in 2018. In December 2020, after the 340-character Zodiac cipher was cracked, Cruz retweeted an article about the cipher with the caption "uh oh".
In popular culture
After the edited image showing the question on Google trended, the meme spread into popular culture. GQ and the Chicago Tribune have referenced the meme. Books about Cruz being the Zodiac Killer, including romantic ones, were listed on Amazon.com.In February 2016, Public Policy Polling asked registered voters in Florida ahead of the Republican primary if they believed Cruz to be the Zodiac Killer; 10% believed and 28% were not sure. The other 62% did not think he was.
Comedian Larry Wilmore made references to the meme in his April 2016 routine at the White House Correspondents' Dinner, including a joke that Cruz was not campaigning to win the nomination, but to continue a murder spree.
In October of 2022, satirical news outlet The Babylon Bee produced a sketch as part of a series following the lives of two Californians who had moved to Texas. In the sketch titled "Episode 3 – The Church", the Californians are canvassing for Beto O'Rourke as part of the 2022 US midterm elections and Cruz answers the door. In response to the canvassers, Cruz states he is short on time having "letters to write" before closing the door and inadvertently dropping one of the letters. The canvassers quickly flee after seeing that the letter is printed with a cypher. Ted Cruz plays himself in the video.