Thank You

Texas Democrats had a great runoff election day this past Tuesday. We got our preferred opponent to be on top of the MAGA ticket. See the featured photo. A big thank you to the PACs aligned with the punkarse Sen. John Cornyn for driving up the negatives on cheating, crooked Ken Paxton and making sure that voters know he is one of the most corrupt elected officials in American politics today. A big thank you also goes to the 2023 MAGA Texas House leadership for initiating impeachment proceedings against Paxton. And let’s not forget the MAGA high ranking attorneys in the Texas AG office who had enough and went into whistleblower mode.

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Here is what former H-Town Mayor Annise Parker had to say about her loss to former H-Town City Council member Letitia Plummer in the Democratic Party primary runoff race for Harris County Judge:

“While I didn’t think my opponent could beat me, low turnout absolutely could.”

I don’t even know what that means. The scoreboard clearly shows that Plummer beat Annise 51.13% to 48.87%. Oh, well.

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This is from the Chron E-Board take today:

Plummer’s win signals that younger, more progressive voters are quickly becoming a powerful, influential bloc in local races. The outcome puts Mayor John Whitmire on notice. His moderate brand of Democratic leadership could be going out of style. Plummer and (Cong. Christian) Menefee’s runoff wins, and recent victories from left-leaning City Council members Alejandra Salinas and Joe Panzarella, feel like bellwether shifts in Harris County’s political landscape. 

Two years ago, Houston voters were picking between a duo of septuagenarian candidates for mayor. This year, much of the energy among primary voters was channeled towards a new, younger generation of political candidates that challenged longtime incumbents. 

Here is the entire E-Board take: Harris County Democrats want fresh blood. Republicans want more MAGA.

Yawn. Next year H-Town voters will decide who gets to be our mayor. Crime, infrastructure, trash pick-up, flooding, property taxes, city finances, and fighting corruption will be the issues of concern. It looks like the E-Board is itching for a younger person versus Mayor Whitmire match-up.

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This is a great public policy proposal. See this from Politico:

SACRAMENTO, California — Gavin Newsom vowed Wednesday to tax any payouts that California residents receive from a $1.776 billion “anti-weaponization” fund that Donald Trump secured in a settlement with his own Justice Department, as Democratic lawmakers in states across the country ramp up efforts to counter the president on the measure.

“Anyone from California that receives any of those funds, we want to tax 100 percent of those proceeds,” the California governor told reporters during a press conference in his office, calling the settlement a “slush fund.”

Newsom’s pledge mirrors legislation unveiled earlier this week in New York by Democrat Alex Bores, a state assemblymember and House candidate, that would assess a 100 percent tax against payouts from the fund. Trump announced the fund last week as part of his $10 billion settlement with the DOJ in his lawsuit against the IRS, and Democratic efforts to undercut any payouts are picking up across the country.
Democratic state lawmakers in New York are pushing for a vote by next week to fully tax payouts from the fund. Queens state Sen. Mike Gianaris in an interview said his measure was in the process of being introduced in the Democratic-dominated Legislature.

“There’s widespread, bipartisan agreement that this is baldfaced corruption at its worst and if we have the ability in New York to combat it by ensuring that none of this money benefits anyone in our state’s borders, I’d expect there’d be widespread support for that idea,” he said.

Bores in a text message Wednesday night said he was working on getting his bill put up for a vote next week as well. Time is running short in Albany, where lawmakers are scheduled to end their legislative session late next week and will have a heavy docket of bills to approve.

In New Jersey, a Democratic state lawmaker said he was already working to draft a bill to set up a 100 percent tax on recipients of the funds.

Here is the entire Politico read: Newsom vows 100 percent tax on DOJ ‘Anti-Weaponization Fund’ payouts – POLITICO.

Nice. Just in case it is needed.

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We won 4-3 last night thanks to a couple of dingers from Yordan Alvarez. We wrap up the roadie in Arlington this evening.