Exclusive — Watch: Ted Cruz Calls for Congressional Investigation into Federal Pandemic Response

Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) called for a congressional investigation into the federal response to the coronavirus pandemic, telling Breitbart News he wants to see “serious oversight hearings examining not only the corruption of science, not only the suppression of dissent, but also the failure of policies.”

Coming out of a meeting at the U.S. Capitol with “The People’s Convoy” — a trucker movement seeking to end President Biden’s state of emergency declaration — Cruz spoke to Breitbart News about the Biden administration’s “illegal mandates” that have been and are being “used to fire people across the country.”

“The emergency declaration is a tool used to justify many of the mandates,” Cruz said. “Whether it is doctors and nurses being fired in healthcare facilities all across the country, whether it is truck drivers losing their jobs, whether it is airline pilots or flight attendants — thousands of them being fired over illegal vaccine mandates — or whether it is cops, or firefighters, or soldiers, or sailors, or airmen, or Marines, there are millions of people whose livelihoods are threatened by these abuses and these mandates are continuing.”

“I think there is a growing frustration, a rage, among the American people at these abuses of our rights, and the truckers today are giving voice to that frustration and giving voice to that rage,” he continued.

“There needs to be federal investigations,” Cruz explained, noting that the chances of Democrat participation is “essentially zero.”

“They are open partisans. … The corrupt corporate media is the left wing of the Democratic Party. And so, the good news is we will have that oversight a year from now when Republicans retake Congress,” he said, predicting that Republicans take over the House in the midterms and remaining bullish on Republican control of the Senate as well.

“When Republicans take over, I hope we have serious oversight hearings examining not only the corruption of science, not only the suppression of dissent, but also the failure of policies,” Cruz told Breitbart News. “If you look at whether it was the disastrous shutdowns that destroyed millions of jobs, millions of peoples’ livelihoods across this country, or the even more disastrous shutdown of schools — which has hurt tens-of-millions of school children in America — and you see Democratic politicians who simply don’t give a damn. They’re willing to arbitrarily inflict that pain.”

“One of the sources of frustration on all of this is the obvious hypocrisy,” he continued. “When you see Democrat politicians like Stacey Abrams in the picture seen ’round the world sitting there with no mask, grinning ear-to-ear with a classroom full off children forced to mask up to be in her presence, you realize it’s a joke.”

“When you see Democrat politicians like Gavin Newsom or Eric Garcetti at sports games or at fancy dinners with no mask, laughing and yucking it up — these politicians know what they’re saying is a crock,” Cruz said.

“I’ll tell you in the Senate, for months, Democrat senators, when they go behind closed doors, will take off their mask,” he said, continuing to point out instances of Democrat hypocrisy on masking. “They’ll laugh, they’ll yuck it up, then they’ll step out and then suddenly they’ll see a camera and, ‘Oh my goodness, now I’ve got to put a mask on.’ And It’s not science, it’s not medicine, it’s not health. It’s entirely about politics and theatrics. I think people are really fed up with it.”

Cruz and Sen. Mike Lee (R-UT) have forced votes on the Senate floor aimed at halting “all of Joe Biden’s illegal mandates.” Cruz said that he had another amendment “to cut off all federal funds from any government entity that tries to impose a vaccine mandate on children,” explaining that “the government has no right to force you to give a COVID vaccine to your five-year-old child. It ought to be a parents’ decision, not some petty government official.”

“We voted on the Senate floor — sadly, every single Democrat voted to keep those mandates in place,” he concluded.

The Senate did, however, pass a resolution to end Biden’s emergency declaration, something the president has vowed to veto if it reaches his desk.

Breccan F. Thies is a reporter for Breitbart News. You can follow him on Twitter @BreccanFThies.