Ted Cruz: did the senator go to Cancun during deadly Texas storm - and why does his state have a power outage?

The Donald Trump supporter has been accused of fleeing Texas during a state of emergency

Ted Cruz has been criticised for visiting Cancun while many of his residents are without power (Getty Images)

Ted Cruz has been accused of fleeing the United States while hundreds of thousands of his constituents remain without electricity and water.

It has been alleged the Texas senator has visited Cancun while freezing weather in the lone star state continues to wreak havoc in the lone star state.

Unverified pictures circulated on Twitter show Cruz wearing a mask while at an airport, apparently fleeing the state.

The senator is yet to verify the trip, but critics of the firebrand lawmaker have called for him to step down from his role, with the Texas Democratic party accusing him of abandoning his state in its time of need.

Beto O’Rourke who challenged Cruz for the seat in 2018 criticised the move, telling MSNBC in an interview: "the junior Senator from Texas, who I understand is vacationing in Cancun right now when people are literally freezing to death in the state that he was elected to represent and serve."

Texas has been hit by widespread blackouts as a result of freezing temperatures, with 7 million residents advised to boil water before drinking it.

Has Ted Cruz visited Cancun?

The pictures of Ted Cruz at an airport have not yet been verified.

The first image of the senator at an airport was posted by a Juan Gomez, who tweeted: “Well Senator Cruz is flying to Cancun while millions of Texans do not have electricity #Priorities #ThanksforNothingSenator”.

David Shuster, a former MSNBC journalist then claimed that he had confirmation of Cruz’s visit to Mexico.

He tweeted: “Just confirmed @SenTedCruz and his family flew to Cancun tonight for a few days at a resort they've visited before. Cruz seems to believe there isn't much for him to do in Texas for the millions of fellow Texans who remain without electricity/water and are literally freezing.”

Further images appearing to show Cruz on a flight were then shared by former adviser to Democratic Senator Jon Ossoff, Keith Edwards.

KSAT a San Antonio affiliate of ABC suggested that Cruz might have taken United flight UA1020 departed Houston for Cancun at 4:44 p.m.

Another unverified image from Twitter user Barnboym appeared to show Cruz arriving in Cancun.

An investigation by Business Insider said that the images were likely recent as a reverse-image search yielded no matches.

Twitter users have also noted that he man in the images is wearing a mask and ring commonly worn by the Texas lawmaker.

Why is Texas without power?

Millions in Texas are without power in what officials have labelled a “total failure” of the state’s electricity infrastructure.

Ercot (Electric Reliability Council of Texas), which manages the state’s power grid, opted to turn off power for millions of customers.

Officials for Ercot said their plants could not handle the extreme low temperatures and that due to the risk of the grid collapsing they had no choice but to shut down power for millions.

Republicans have blamed the freezing of wind turbines for the blackouts but experts and officials have said that issues with natural gas operations were largely to blame.

The mayor of Houston, Sylvester Turner said that "power will not be restored fully, I would say, probably for another couple of days."

Now millions have been asked to boil water before consuming it as it may be contaminated.