diff --git a/lib/ansible/modules/system/cronvar.py b/lib/ansible/modules/system/cronvar.py
index a65610811b..d662de1fa5 100644
--- a/lib/ansible/modules/system/cronvar.py
+++ b/lib/ansible/modules/system/cronvar.py
@@ -135,8 +135,6 @@ class CronVar(object):
     def __init__(self, module, user=None, cron_file=None):
         self.module = module
         self.user = user
-        if self.user is None:
-            self.user = 'root'
         self.lines = None
         self.wordchars = ''.join(chr(x) for x in range(128) if chr(x) not in ('=', "'", '"', ))