"If you're going to win, you've got to make the election about issues and not personalities," Cruz said on his podcast, "Verdict with Ted Cruz," which aired Wednesday but was recorded Tuesday night as midterm election results were arriving.
"And by the way, this is a broader point: I think too many of these Republican races became personality battles," Cruz said.
"When you have first time candidates who've never run, who are celebrities or coming from outside, they have no record. They have no voting record. They've not been involved in issues. They've never taken a stand on anything. They frequently make major mistakes and, you know, experience matters," he added.
Control of Congress has still not been determined as of Wednesday, the result dependent on the outcome of three Senate races and about a dozen in the House.
Many elections-watchers feel Republicans, though, did not achieve the "red wave" that was predicted. Democrats won major statewide races and flipped a Senate seat in Pennsylvania. Abortion remained an animating issue.
After Democrats racked up several hard-fought wins in swing districts, like Rep. Abigail Spanberger's Virginia seat, the sweeping wins many Republicans predicted had yet to materialize Wednesday.
Democrat John Fetterman defeated Republican Dr. Mehmet Oz for a crucial Pennsylvania Senate seat vacated by retiring Republican Sen. Pat Toomey. Democratic Sen. Raphael Warnock and former NFL star Herschel Walker, a Republican, were headed to a runoff in Georgia in December.
And the outcome of the remaining two seats that will determine which party will hold a Senate majority — Arizona and Nevada — may not be known for days because both states conduct elections in part by mail ballots, which take a long time to count.
Cruz in his podcast said the best advice he received early on in his political career was from his wife, Heidi Cruz, who told him: "Remember, it's not about you. It's about them. It's about their lives. It's about their kids, it's about their family. It's about their future."
"You can tell a bad candidate if they stand up there and say over and over again, the word ‘I, I, I, I,'" Cruz said.
Cruz added: "In too many of these races, it became about the personality and not about the issues that impact the kitchen table, the kids, the family, the safety, the security that impact the people."
Newsmax/AP