Rating: False

The Claim:

A Tweet is circulating Twitter claiming that Ted Cruz has said: 

“I’ll believe in climate change when Texas freezes over.”

— Ted Cruz Sep 8,2016

Reasons for the ‘False’ rating

• Context — This appears to be a ‘gotcha’ moment with someone digging up a past statement in order to slap Ted Cruz across the face with ‘his own words’.
• This is a statement of fact — While Cruz’s statement isn’t a statement of fact, the claim that he made it certainly is
• Research done- We searched through Mr. Cruz’s Twitter history, looked through Google, and Duck Duck Go and found no evidence that would suggest that this tweet ever existed. CNN and Snopes have also came to the same conclusion.
• “It’s fake…”- States Cruz’s communications adviser Steve Guest

As of 2/20/2021, a rating of ‘false’ is appropriate

Source/Evidence

On the left you’ll see the tweet in question and on the right you’ll find where CNN stamped it ‘fake’.

Fake tweets, while against Twitter’s terms of service, always seem to go viral and only cut one direction; hopefully you weren’t fooled into believe this was a legitimate tweet.

Sources:

CNN

Snopes