Republicans are the “party of jobs,” Senator Ted Cruz (R-Texas) told a crowd of conservatives at CPAC Saturday, while declaring “socialism sucks.”

Most of the biggest names in Republican presidential politics decided this year to skip the Conservative Political Action Conference – an event that usually serves as an early proving ground for candidates trying to fire up the party’s activist base.

President Trump didn’t attend, opting to fly to Mar-a-Lago for the weekend after speaking at the Saudi-backed Future Investment Initiative summit in Miami.

Cruz, a longtime Republican with eyes on the White House, made the most of the situation, soaking up the available limelight.

During his remarks he ripped New York Mayor Mamdani, saying he should be named “Florida realtor of the year” — for driving New Yorkers out of town. 

He also praised the new “Trump Accounts” to boost Americans’ savings, legislation he helped craft. He said they would raise a “nation of capitalists.”

And he told Democrats they wouldn’t prevail in their efforts to snatch funding from ICE. “We are going to fund ICE and Border Patrol for 10 years,” he intoned. 

“We’ve secured the border and we’re deporting illegal immigrants and murders and gang-bangers and child rapists and getting them the hell out of our country,” he said, borrowing from Trump’s 2024 plans.

Cruz also spoke about the event itself, which was held in his home state this year, and didn’t draw the same stable of luminaries. “By the way, a lot of folks online were saying this room was empty. It ain’t empty now!”

Two leading contenders to succeed Trump, Vice President JD Vance and Secretary of State Marco Rubio, also skipped the event. They have their hands full, as does Trump, with the war in Iran, even as the president extended a Friday deadline for Iran to open the Strait of Hormuz.

Iranian leaders have signaled they want Vance as negotiating partner after two rounds of prior talks blew up.

He had been in Austin and Dallas earlier in the week headline big-dollar fundraisers for the Republican National Committee, but came back to DC.

The group is holding the confab far outside the DC orbit this year, choosing Grapevine, Texas, outside Dallas.

Republican House members had heard about it, but a fraction made the trip. Many were stuck in Washington while the House and Senate slogged through votes to try to fund Homeland Security and get TSA agents paid..

He has been a favorite among CPAC attendees in the past, and has been adept at cultivating activist enthusiasm.

He beat Trump and Rubio in the 2016 Iowa Caucuses. Texas Republican Gov. Greg Abbott also spoke.

Also appearing was Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. He praised a push to get states to ban cell phones from schools, and said it has yielded clear improvements, then claimed the devices had “radiation problems.” 

Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, who is locked in a nasty Senate primary runoff fight against Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas), was honored at the group’s Ronald Reagan dinner Friday night.

He was spotted at Mar-a-Lago the week before.

Cornyn, perhaps reading the room, didn’t go. “I have a day job here in the Senate,” he explained beforehand. Trump did not endorse either man in the runoff before a deadline for candidates to get off the ballot.

No members of the Trump family attended, although they have been stars of CPAC in the past.