Sen. Ted Cruz For President? National Review’s Eliana Johnson Has the Latest [AUDIO]

Is U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz running for President in 2016? All indications certainly point to yes.

National Review Washington Editor Eliana Johnson joined us this week to talk about how Cruz is staffing up and laying out a strategy to win the GOP nomination. Johnson told us Cruz isn't planning to make a big play for so-called independent voters in the general election if he wins the Republican nomination. Why? He doesn't believe it's necessarily effective:

He points to the examples of George W. Bush and Mitt Romney. Bush won independents in 2000 but lost the popular vote, while both John Kerry in 2004 and Mitt Romney in 2012 won them and, of course, still lost. Beyond that, the strategist explains, conservative turnout peaked in 2004, declined in 2008, and declined again in 2012. Recapturing those votes, he says, is the key to a potential Cruz victory. The senator’s advisers believe they can increase turnout to between 2004 and 2008 levels, at least, by energizing the grassroots and recapturing Reagan Democrats.

Here's our full conversation with Eliana Johnson of National Review, in which we also discuss which fellow Senators in D.C. have the ear of Cruz: