Texas is currently in a state of emergency. Recently, President Biden visited Texas, praising relief workers for taking measures to help residents of their state. However, Ted Cruz, U.S. Senator for Texas, decided to leave his home on Wednesday, Feb. 17 and took a trip to Cancun, Mexico with his wife and children.

This year, the average temperature in Texas has dropped by 50-60 degrees within days. On January 15, it was about 20 degrees in Houston, compared to a week earlier when the temperature was 70 degrees Fahrenheit. These incredible weather patterns have left millions of Texans scared and confused. These are not their only feelings, however, as many Texans are also upset with Cruz’s leave of the country, some even holding protests in front of his home.

Coming from someone that lives in Massachusetts, I understand how cold 20 degrees feels. Cruz leaving his state with more than 3 million people without power and heat, along with 14 million citizens without clean water is a move that I feel is unacceptable. To me, this vacation feels very poorly planned, especially since he admits that the trip was planned last-minute after his daughter’s school was canceled because of the weather. I feel as though Cruz disregarded Texan citizens when he created this travel plan. These actions are unprofessional since his first instinct was to escape with his family, and he didn’t think twice about staying in Texas and helping citizens. He prioritized travel over taking the time to create a plan and help the citizens of Texas with their water and heat dilemma. Cruz even later admitted his travel was a mistake.

The fact that Cruz had to blame his trip on his daughters seems inappropriate from a U.S. senator. Cruz believed that he needed to travel with them to be a “good dad”. Even if this was true and in good conscience, he still should have looked at the bigger picture and seen Texas’s current situation as direr. Cruz and his family’s travels were revealed to the public after a text message sent from Cruz’s wife, Heidi Cruz, to her friends was released to the media.

Cruz claims he was planning on just dropping off his family and not actually staying in Cancun, but this claim was only made after news about their travel had been made public. It’s possible that if Cruz had not been exposed by the text message, he would still be in Cancun today. In my opinion, as a senator, Cruz’s duty of staying in Texas is more important than his duties as a good father.

Even if his job as a senator does not allow him to directly help with the current situation in Texas, he still should have stayed and given reassurance to citizens. As a senator, Cruz has to travel frequently, so to him, traveling was not a big deal. However, many of Texas’s citizens currently don’t have the option of traveling to someplace warmer, especially in the time of a pandemic.

More than 80 people have died from this weather crisis and that is not even the fully confirmed amount; it could take months to get the actual number. Seeing Cruz leave the state while people are dying makes the situation even worse. If either Massachusetts senator had left in a deathly storm, I think many citizens would feel abandoned, just like many citizens in Texas do now. There have been protests outside of Cruz’s house and many are pushing for him to resign. Cruz should have considered the consequences before he took the trip. His priorities should have been helping families with burst pipes, destroyed houses, unsafe drinking water and no power.