“Taylor Rehmet, a 33-year-old Lockheed Martin machinist and president of the Texas chapter of the international machinist union, in a Saturday special election, flipped a Republican-held state Senate seat in the suburbs of Fort Worth. The neophyte Democratic candidate won a district by 14 points, while Donald Trump carried it by 17 points. While the 31-point swing is particularly wide, Democrats have consistently outperformed in state legislative special elections throughout Trump’s second term. Therefore, Rehmet’s triumph is no fluke, and more than a mere extension of a trend, perhaps, an acceleration. Of course, we must always be careful not to overinterpret a single data point. But some lessons can be reasonably drawn from Rehmet’s shocking upset.” (02/03/26)
Source: TomDispatch
by Liz Theoharis & Sam Theoharis
“Here’s a small suggestion from the two authors of this piece (us): don’t be young in Donald Trump’s America if you can help it. Being young in America right now means you’ll have to contend with stalling job markets, rampant inflation, deep political and economic instability, and impending climate disaster. If you point these things out, you’re labeled a dangerous (and misguided) radical. If you’re too busy trying to make ends meet for you and your family, you get labeled as lazy, apathetic, and defeatist. This is not to say that older generations are doing okay. They’re not. But at least they’ll get to receive (and not just pay into) social security, which has to make the fascism go down easier. Before we explain or suggest what the young can do about all that, let us start by introducing ourselves, since one of us is indeed still Gen Z.” (02/03/25)
“In the 2024 presidential election, Donald Trump carried the 9th State Senate district in Texas by 17 points. Over the weekend, however, Democrat Taylor Rehmet beat Republican Leigh Wambsganss by 14 points in a special election run-off. Republicans had, prior to this point, held the seat for decades—the incumbent who won last in 2022 had left to take a statewide position. But, wait, there’s more.
Wambsganss outspent Rehmet 10 to 1. And Trump sent out three get-out-the-vote messages on her behalf via Truth Social over the last few days, describing her as a ‘true MAGA warrior’ and candidate ‘who has my Complete and Total Endorsement.’ Trump has, of course, since pretended to know nothing about the race; ‘I’m not involved in it,’ he said on Sunday. ‘That’s a local Texas race.’ Ha!” (02/02/26)
“I’m a long-time critic of the modern concept of ‘free speech culture’ — the culturally pervasive notion that supporting freedom of speech requires me not just to refrain from official censorship, but to avoid a wide array of expression that might chill, deter, or punish other people’s speech. The legal view of free speech protects an unpopular speaker from being jailed or (successfully) sued; ‘free speech culture,’ by contrast, is a social norm that discourages me from calling for that person to be fired, shunned, socially sanctioned, or criticized to a degree that is, by some poorly defined measure, excessive.” (02/02/26)
“The Democrats circa 2026 have almost become tax-and-spend parodies of themselves. They used to pretend that raising taxes was a last resort. Now, the left-wing base regards raising taxes as a badge of honor. New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani declared last week that he has no other choice but to raise taxes on the rich and corporations because there aren’t enough savings from efficiencies in agency budgets. New York City spends more money per capita than any other major city in the country, but there’s no way to save money. Uh-huh! At least Mamdani was honest and campaigned as a socialist. The Manhattanites are getting exactly what they voted for. But the two new rising stars of the party, Mikie Sherrill and Abigail Spanberger, the newly elected governors of New Jersey and Virginia, respectively, won what were thought to be tight races by comfortable margins.” (02/03/25)
“Last Monday, FBI Director Kash Patel announced an investigation into Signal group chats that Minnesotans are using to track ICE activity. Independent journalist Cam Higby spurred the move with an X thread that appears to show users of the encrypted messaging app reporting ICE sightings and sharing license plate numbers of agency vehicles. What the thread doesn’t show is evidence of a crime. … speech does not lose constitutional protection simply because it might lead others to break the law. That was true when progressive commentators warned about ‘stochastic terrorism’ — the idea that conservative rhetoric on hot-button issues incites violence against minority groups — and it’s true now.” (02/02/26)
“The Department of Justice has released more than 3 million documents and photos related to Jeffrey Epstein. Here’s who shows up from Big Tech the most often — and what the files reveal.” (02/02/26)
