Ashton Kutcher Invoked By Sen. Ted Cruz During Filibuster (Video)

Ashton Kutcher‘s political opinions keep getting championed by notable conservatives.

First Rush Limbaugh praised the actor for a speech he delivered last month, and now Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas has done likewise during his anti-Obamacare filibuster at the nation’s capitol.

“I will take it as a given that there is no politician on the planet who would actually qualify as cool,” Cruz said at one point during his 21-hour speech that ended Wednesday. “Ashton Kutcher, I don’t know and I don’t expect ever to meet, I suspect his and my politics may be quite different. And yet at the Teen Choice Awards he gave a speech that I thought was remarkable.”

VIDEO: Ashton Kutcher on Portraying Steve Jobs

“He talked about the importance of work,” Cruz continued. “And his speech was so remarkable that I took the opportunity to tweet it out. Because frankly, Mr. President, Ashton Kutcher can reach young people in a way that I never can, that you never can, that no member of this Senate can. And I thought the message was important, and it was important about a principal that was imperiled by Obamacare.”

Cruz then read from a partial transcript of Kutcher’s speech.

“I believe that opportunity looks a lot like hard work,” Kutcher said at the Teen Choice Awards. “I’ve never had a job in my life that I was better than. I was always just lucky to have a job. And every job I had was a stepping stone to my next job. And I never quit my job until I had my next job. And so opportunity looks a lot like work.”

Cruz spent four minutes on Kutcher at the Teen Choice Awards, while last month Limbaugh spent an entire hour on his top-rated syndicated radio show dissecting the speech.

“Right on,” Limbaugh said that day. “This is a message that young kids today are not hearing.”

Limbaugh ended his segment noting, as did Cruz, that Kutcher doesn’t share his political philosophy.

“I’m sure by the time he hears about this I will be the devil incarnate, but regardless, kudos to him,” Limbaugh said.

Last year Kutcher donated some $50,000 to Democrats and to President Barack Obama‘s reelection campaign.

Since his speech at the Teen Choice Awards, Kutcher has also earned praise from other Republicans and conservatives, including Sarah Palin and Glenn Beck.

During his filibuster, Cruz also invoked a few others from the world of entertainment and media, including Darth Vader, country singer Toby Keith, authors Ayn Rand and Dr. Seuss and the TV show Duck Dynasty.

A four-minute video of Cruz discussing Kutcher is below, as is the actor’s speech from the Teen Choice Awards.

Paul Bond E-mail: Paul.Bond@THR.com