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Senator Ted Cruz, R-Texas, is expected to confirm plans to run for president in 2016 on Monday, the Houston Chronicle reports.

WASHINGTON Texas Republican Sen. Ted Cruz will become the first major candidate for president when he launches his campaign Monday, kicking off what is expected to be a rush over the next few weeks of more than a dozen White House hopefuls into the 2016 campaign.

Cruz will formally get into the race during a morning speech at Liberty University in Lynchburg, Va., choosing to begin his campaign at the Christian college founded by the Rev. Jerry Falwell rather than his home state of Texas or the early voting states of Iowa and New Hampshire.

It's a fitting setting for Cruz, a 44-year-old Tea Party darling whose entry into the 2016 campaign drew cheers Sunday among fellow conservatives.

"The official Republican pool of candidates will take a quantum leap forward with his announcement tomorrow," said Amy Kremer, former head of the Tea Party Express. Cruz's announcement, she said, "will excite the base in a way we haven't seen in years."

His plans were confirmed Sunday by one of his political strategists, who spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity so as not to preclude the announcement. The Houston Chronicle first reported details about Cruz's campaign launch.

Cruz's announcement is all but certain to be followed by former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker and two Senate colleagues, Kentucky's Rand Paul and Florida's Marco Rubio.

His move puts him into the pole position among those whose strategy to win the nomination counts on courting the party's most conservative voters, who hold an outsized influence in the nominating process.

"Cruz is going to make it tough for all of the candidates who are fighting to emerge as the champion of the anti-establishment wing of the party," said GOP strategist Kevin Madden. "That is starting to look like quite a scrum where lots of candidates will be throwing some sharp elbows."

After his election to the Senate in 2012, the former Texas solicitor general established himself as an uncompromising conservative willing to take on Democrats and Republicans alike. He won praise from Tea Party activists in 2013 for leading the GOP's push to partially shut down the federal government during an unsuccessful bid to block money for President Barack Obama's health care law. In December, Cruz defied party leaders to force a vote on opposing Obama's executive actions on immigration. The strategy failed and led several of his Republican colleagues to call Cruz out.

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Republican Ted Cruz to announce campaign for president