Ted Cruz calls it quits

Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, dropped out of the Republican presidential race after losing the Indiana primary to his rival, Donald Trump.

The Cruz exit paves the way for a Trump delegate victory ahead of this summer’s GOP convention in Cleveland. After tonight’s win, the billionaire businessman is just 200 delegates short of the 1,237 he needs to clinch the nomination.

Although he didn’t have a mathematical chance to win his party’s official nod based on first-ballot delegates, Cruz had hoped to siphon enough away from Trump to force a contested convention.

But tonight he admitted he had failed.

“It appears that path has been foreclosed,” Cruz told supporters in Indianapolis. “Together, we left it all on the field of Indiana. We gave it everything we’ve got, but the voters chose another path, and so with a heavy heart but with boundless optimism for the long-term future of our nation, we are suspending our campaign.”

After Trump won a string of victories in the Northeast during the last few weeks, Cruz struggled to regain the brief advantage he enjoyed after a big win in Wisconsin on April 5. Last week, Cruz announced former presidential hopeful Carly Fiorina would be his running mate if Republicans nominated him for president. Pundits said it was a bold move for a candidate so far behind the front-runner but predicted it would not be enough to slow the Trump train.

Following his decisive win tonight, Trump tweeted his thanks to Hoosier voters.

“Thank you Indiana,” he wrote. “We have won in every category. You are very special people—I will never forget!”

His appreciation for Hoosiers is only likely to deepen after they helped him best a rival he sneeringly called “Lyin’ Ted” throughout the campaign. Today he launched a last-minute smear campaign by repeating a tabloid’s claims that Cruz’s father had a connection to Lee Harvey Oswald, before he assassinated President John F. Kennedy. Cruz called the claims “garbage” and hit back hard, describing Trump as a serial philanderer who freely joked about both his sexual conquests and his trials with venereal disease.

As he made his concession speech tonight, Cruz didn’t mention Trump but vowed to continue fighting for liberty and the Constitution, the cornerstones of his political career.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.