Story about Ted Cruz’s father and Lee Harvey Oswald was fabricated, David Pecker says

A story linking Sen. Ted Cruz’s (R-TX) father and President John F. Kennedy’s assassin, Lee Harvey Oswald, was fabricated, former National Enquirer Publisher David Pecker revealed on Tuesday.

Taking the stand during former President Donald Trump’s hush money trial in New York, Pecker was pressed on negative stories the outlet wrote on the former president’s rivals during the 2016 Republican primary. Pecker admitted that one of the most infamous, alleging a connection between Cruz’s father and Lee Harvey Oswald, was completely fabricated.

“We mashed the photos and the different picture with Lee Harvey Oswald and mashed the two together. And that’s how that story was prepared — created, I would say,” Pecker said, describing the process by which a picture appearing to show the two together was created.

He went further, alleging that the effort was essentially the doing of the Trump campaign through Trump’s former attorney, Michael Cohen.

“After the Republican debates, and based on the success that some of the other candidates had, I would receive a call from Michael Cohen and he would direct me and direct Dylan Howard which candidate and which direction we should go,” Pecker said.

Trump touted the story of Cruz’s father allegedly being seen next to Oswald, though it was quickly debunked.

“You know, his father was with Lee Harvey Oswald prior to Oswald’s being, you know, shot. … Nobody even brings it up,” he told Fox News in May 2016. “I mean, they don’t even talk about that. That was reported, and nobody talks about it.”

He later defended his remarks, saying in July of that year, “There was a picture on the front page of the National Enquirer, which does have credibility.”

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Cruz waved off the revelation on Tuesday, telling NBC News that he’s “not interested in revisiting ancient history.”

Cruz, despite a fierce primary in 2016 that saw a slew of personal insults exchanged between him and Trump, has since put their differences aside and become one of Trump’s closest allies in the Senate.