Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) gushed over Hollywood actress Scarlett Johansson and her “gorgeous” and “H๏τ” appearance on Wednesday.

During a conversation with Sen. Katie Britt (R-AL) on his podcast Verdict with Ted Cruz, Cruz praised Johansson’s “scary mom” parody of Britt’s State of the Union response on Saturday Night Live last week.

“The thing that was the coolest is you’re played by Scarlett Johansson,” said Cruz. “Scarlett Johansson is H๏τ.”

He continued, “I am genuinely jealous ’cause, look, SNL has come after me a bunch of times, they don’t ever have Tom Cruise play me! How come you get a gorgeous movie star?… That is a real compliment that you ought to be pretty psyched with.”

“Well I actually was pretty pumped about that,” replied Britt. “You wonder who in the world is gonna play you, right? And I’ll be honest with you, a bingo card of 2024 for Katie Britt, I did not have this on it, right? And so certainly didn’t have Scarlett Johansson playing me.”

Britt told Cruz, “We were talking to the kids about all of it and they were like, ‘Oh my gosh, mom,’ and da da da, and I said, ‘Look, it could be worse.’ I mean Scarlett Johansson. Here you have Black Widow, they bring in someone from Avengers to play me in the cold open. I’m here for it.”

Cruz concluded, “By the way, in terms of Republican portrayals, like they have had some vicious ones. Okay, let’s start off with at least you were played by a woman. So when SNL has had me, I’ve also been played by a woman.”