EXCLUSIVE: Top Republican contender Ted Cruz 'foolishly experimented with marijuana,' his campaign admits after Bush confesses to high-school pot use

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Texas Republican Senator Ted Cruz smoked marijuana in his youth, his campaign told Daily Mail Online on Tuesday – putting him in the same camp as former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, who acknowledged his high school pot-smoking days on Friday.

'Teenagers are often known for their lack of judgment, and Sen. Cruz was no exception,' a Cruz spokesperson said.

'When he was a teenager, he foolishly experimented with marijuana. It was a mistake, and he's never tried it since.'

The spokesperson wouldn't elaborate about how many times Cruz had tried the illegal drug, over how long a period the experimentation occurred, and exactly how old he was at the time.

Daily Mail Online asked spokespersons for 10 likely Republican presidential candidates whether their bosses had ever lit up doobies, smoked bongs or otherwise tried weed. Seven of them responded.

Cruz's reply was the only one that provided a new admission of what tends to become a character issue during major political cycles.

REBEL WITH A WINSTON CHURCHILL TATTOO: Texas Sen. Ted Cruz's spokesperson told Daily Mail Online that he smoked marijuana as a teenager

BAD BOY IMAGE? A street artist made posters showing Cruz as a tattooed smoker ahead of his April 2014 appearance at the Beverly Wilshire hotel in California

THE FIRST HIT IS THE HARDEST: Former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush was the first Republican presidential hopeful to concede his youthful drug use, telling the Boston Globe that he had smoked pot at an elite prep school

Cruz, 45, was born in Alberta, Canada, the son of a Cuban emigre father and a Delaware-born mother who met the elder Cruz, Rafael, in the oil business in New Orleans. Eleanor Darragh, an Irish-American, had studied mathematics at Rice University in Houston.

Imprisoned and tortured by the Fulgencio Batista regime in Cuba, Rafael, now 75, came to America on a student visa at age 18 – with no possessions other than $100 sewn into his underwear. He also was missing two teeth, whichCuban prison guards kicked out in 1957.

Rafael earned a degree from the University of Texas and paid his tuition by washing dishes for 50 cents per hour.

The Cruzes founded a company that processed seismographic data for oil prospectors, and moved to Canada where there was less competition among the drillers. The senator was born there but returned to Texas at age three when his parents sold their company.

In those early years, however, Rafael abandoned Ted and his mother in Calgary, and returned to Houston alone.

Cruz told an audience at January's Iowa Freedom Summit that his father found God, returned to Canada, and reunited with his wife and son. 

Rafael Cruz is now a preacher, but his marriage to the senator's mother ultimately ended in divorce. He had two daughters in a prior marriage – the senator's half-sisters.

The Houston Chronicle reported in January that Sen. Cruz was ticketed for underage alcohol possession when he was 17, after police found an unopened case of beer in his car.

He listed the offense on an application to become the Texas solicitor general in 2003. 

'Teenagers often make foolish mistakes, and that certainly applied to me as well,' Cruz told Buzzfeed when the document surfaced.

But most of his early history is that of a brilliant overachiever: debating champion at Princeton, honors graduate from Harvard Law School, co-founder of the Harvard Latino Law Review.

As he nudges into the top tier of GOP presidential hopefuls, opposition researchers will no doubt dig deeper for additional 'teenager' moments in his past. 

The last three U.S. presidents were all admitted pot smokers: Bill Clinton claimed improbably that he never inhaled, while Barack Obama said he definitely did. 

George W. Bush told his biographer after he left the White House that he never answered the question publicly because he didn't want American children following his example.

In that light it's unclear whether admitting to having tried a few joints in college is the disqualifier that it likely was in the 1940s or '50s. 

But Cruz's conservative political base may not look kindly on the news.

An aide to a Democratic senator told Daily Mail Online: 'Just wait until the tea party gets its hooks in this. I mean, we all have skeletons and even moral crusaders eventually topple of their own weight, right?'

'At the same time,' he acknowledged, 'this certainly isn't on the level of a Michael Grimm.'

Grimm, a rare New York City Republican congressman, resigned his House seat last month after he pleaded guilty to a federal charge of felony tax fraud.

Spokespersons for Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker, New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie and former neurosurgeon Ben Carson never responded to requests for information about their likely candidates' histories with marijuana.

Christie toured a drug-treatment halfway house in the United Kingdom on Tuesday, saying he had great sympathy for addicts. 

'If you're going to be pro-life, tell me that you're pro-life for the kid who is lying on the floor of a jail cell basement addicted to drugs,' Christie said, according to a report from the Bergen County Record. 

'I had a mother who died of lung cancer who was a smoker her whole life. No one saw her lying in that hospital bed when she was dying and said, "Well you got what you deserved." ... Why do we feel differently about someone who falls victim to the disease of drug or alcohol abuse?' 

Representatives of three potential GOP White House hopefuls said they have never smoked pot.

Garret Marquis, a spokesman for former United Nations Ambassador John Bolton, offered a cheerful denial.

'Wish I had something juicy for you,' Marquis told Daily Mail Online in an email. 'He's never used pot.'

'And no further statement.' 

NEVER TRIED IT: Former UN Ambassador John Bolton (left) and real estate tycoon-turned-TV-host Donald Trump (right) said there's no Mary Jane in their histories

Rick Perry was governor of Texas in March 2014 when he told ABC late-night host Jimmy Kimmel that he hadn't tried pot: 'No, thank God!'

Donald Trump, the nonsmoking, non-drinking real estate mogul whose personal austerity was forged in four years of military school, also has never had a bong hit.

Hope Hicks, Director of Communications of The Trump Organization, told Daily Mail Online that 'Mr. Trump has never used illegal substances.'

'He has also been a long advocate against drugs and alcohol abuse.'

A press aide for former Texas Gov. Rick Perry pointed Daily Mail Online to an interview he had given with ABC late-night host Jimmy Kimmel in March 2014.

In the midst of a discussion about decriminalizing marijuana, Kimmel asked Perry whether he had ever tried it.

'No, thank God!' came the reply.

But pointing offstage to the green room, he asked, 'Does second-hand count?'

'Because I think there's still some left in there where Snoop [Dogg] was.'

The rapper had been a guest on Kimmel's show the previous night. 

Perry's record as Texas governor has included closing down a state prison that became unnecessary after new 'drug court' diversion programs began to shunt low-level offenders away from incarceration.

'You don't want to ruin a kid's life for having a joint,' he told Kimmel.

Three others dropped hints but wouldn't make definitive yes-or-no statements.

Sarah Isgur Flores, a spokeswoman for former Hewlett-Packard CEO Carly Fiorina, would only say that 'Carly continues to be opposed to legalizing marijuana.'

The issue didn't come up in 2012 when Fiorina ran against Sen. Barbara Boxer for her U.S. Senate seat in California. 

DODGED THE QUESTION: Press representatives of New Jersey Governor Chris Christie (left), retired neurosurgeon Dr. Ben Carson (center) and Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker (right) never responded to repeated requests for information about the politicians' past drug use

Alex Conant, who fields press requests for Florida Sen. Marco Rubio, side-stepped a request for comment about past marijuana use. 

He sent Daily Mail Online a link to a Fusion television interview with a note that 'this is his standard answer to that question.'

Rubio told Fusion, a joint venture between Disney and the Spanish-language Univision network, that he would decline to say whether he had ever smoked pot.

'I'll tell you why I never answer that question,' he said at a February 2014 Miami event. 'If I tell you that I haven't, you won’t believe me.'

'And if I tell you that I did, then kids will look up to me and say, "Well, I can smoke marijuana because look how he made it".' 

'The answer to your question is: at this point, it’s irrelevant,' Rubio said.

But if Rubio throws his hat into the ring for 2016, it might become a question he's pressed to answer.  

'I don’t have anything to add,' Conant said when pressed for a more direct answer.

MUNCHIES? Florida Sen. Marco Rubio has said he won't answer the marijuana-smoking question because 'If I tell you that I haven't, you won’t believe me'

LIKELY TOKER, BUT UNCONFIRMED: Sen. Rand Paul will only say that he 'wasn't a choirboy' in college

Rand Paul, the Kentucky senator known for his libertarian leanings, would be a natural candidate for the 'yes' column, but his press spokesperson also deflected questions with a link to a previous interview.

In December 2014 Paul hinted to WHAS-TV in Louisville that he had smoked pot in his younger days, but wouldn't confirm it directly.

'Let's just say I wasn't a choirboy when I was in college,' Paul said, 'and that I can recognize that kids make mistakes, and I can say that I made mistakes when I was a kid.'

The grown-up Paul, though, described even casual drug use as 'not a good idea.'

'Even people who say marijuana is no big deal. No, I think marijuana is a problem for our kids and I think it's a mistake for kids to be smoking even marijuana.'

'Even though it may not kill you I don't think it's good for you. It's not good for studies, it's not good for showing up for work.' 

Bush, the former Florida governor, told the Boston Globe on Friday that he had smoked pot as a teenager – an activity he describes as 'pretty common' at the tony Phillips Academy in Andover, Massachusetts.

The current GOP fundraising favorite told The Boston Globe in an interview published ahead of Sunday's edition that 'I drank alcohol and I smoked marijuana when I was at Andover.'

Both activities were strictly forbidden at the time – and still are – and could have gotten him expelled.