Hour 1 - Dems Cry Wolf on Redistricting

Summary

The Clay Travis and Buck Sexton Show: Hour 1 - Dems Cry Wolf on Redistricting

Release Date: August 4, 2025

In the latest episode of The Clay Travis and Buck Sexton Show, hosts Clay Travis and Buck Sexton delve deep into the contentious issue of redistricting, focusing primarily on the tumultuous developments in Texas. The duo navigates through the complexities of political maneuvering, gerrymandering, and the broader implications these actions have on the American electoral landscape. This detailed summary captures the essence of their discussions, enriched with notable quotes and timestamps for reference.

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Economic Outlook: Interest Rates and Market Movements

The episode opens with an analysis of the current economic climate. Travis and Sexton discuss the prevailing optimism surrounding the expected interest rate cuts in September, a move many attribute to former President Donald Trump's accurate predictions. This anticipation has buoyed the stock market, pushing it towards record highs. The conversation also touches upon ongoing tariff resolutions with various countries, highlighting the complexities of international trade dynamics.

Notable Quote:

• Buck Sexton [02:06]: "There now seems to be expectation that guess what? Trump was right. They are going to cut interest rates in September."

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The Texas Redistricting Crisis

A significant portion of the episode is dedicated to the unfolding redistricting battle in Texas. The hosts explore the Democratic Party's controversial strategy to flee the state legislature to obstruct the redistricting process. This tactic aims to prevent the redraw of congressional districts, which Republicans argue would favor their party by adding five seats in Texas.

Notable Quotes:

• Buck Sexton [05:55]: "So very simply, it would be bribery if any lawmaker took money to perform or to refuse to perform an act in the legislature."
• Clay Travis [12:43]: "With Texas and Republican states are doing at the direction of Donald Trump. I say is nothing short of, of a legal insurrection against our capital."

Governor Greg Abbott's firm stance against the fleeing Democrats is emphasized, with Travis noting that Abbott threatens felony charges for those who refuse to return, underscoring the gravity of the situation.

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Democratic Strategies and Allegations of Misconduct

The hosts scrutinize the Democratic Party's actions, suggesting that Democrats are employing tactics similar to gerrymandering to maintain their political stronghold. They argue that just as Republicans have historically redrawn districts to their advantage, Democrats are now attempting to do the same in Texas. The accusation of seeking or offering money to legislators to skip votes is particularly highlighted, painting a picture of potential corruption within the party ranks.

Notable Quote:

• Buck Sexton [07:02]: "This is just childish whining from Democrats on this issue."

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The Broader Landscape of Gerrymandering in the US

Expanding beyond Texas, Travis and Sexton draw parallels with other states, notably Illinois and New Mexico. Illinois is cited as one of the most gerrymandered states, with disproportionate representation favoring Democrats despite significant Republican support in the state. New Mexico's redistricting efforts are also examined, illustrating how Democratic leaders have strategically redrawn maps to dilute Republican influence.

Notable Quotes:

• Buck Sexton [15:13]: "Illinois was closer percentage wise than Texas was, certainly than Florida was."
• Clay Travis [42:22]: "Kathy Hochul in California and Illinois, hold my beer. I live in New York. We do it better than anybody."

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The Role of Census Data and Illegal Immigration in Redistricting

A critical aspect of the discussion revolves around the impact of census data on redistricting, particularly the inclusion of illegal immigrants in population counts. Travis and Sexton argue that counting unauthorized immigrants skews congressional district boundaries, inadvertently benefiting the Democratic Party by increasing their representation in certain areas. This strategy, they contend, undermines the principle of representation based solely on eligible voters.

Notable Quote:

• Buck Sexton [25:19]: "Illegal immigrants are counted there. And depending on which study you look at, Republicans are losing and Democrats are gaining 10 or more seats based on illegal immigrants being counted for purposes of a redistricting."

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Implications for Future Elections and the Electoral College

The hosts project the long-term consequences of current redistricting practices. They suggest that the manipulation of district lines and census data could severely disadvantage Democrats in future elections, including the Electoral College. With population shifts favoring red states like Texas, Tennessee, and Florida, the Democratic stronghold is projected to weaken significantly by 2032, complicating their path to the presidency.

Notable Quote:

• Buck Sexton [07:02]: "We screwed up as a country, the census. And as a result the electoral votes are all screwed up and in favor of Democrats right now."

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Listener Insights and State Examples: New Mexico and Illinois

The episode features listener correspondence that provides real-world examples of the discussed phenomena:

• New Mexico's Redistricting Efforts: Kevin from New Mexico shares how redistricting has effectively eliminated Republican representation by merging conservative southern regions with liberal urban areas, diluting potential Republican votes.

  Notable Quote:

  • Kevin [27:19]: "They can't handle not being in power. New Mexico is a great example."

• Illinois' Gerrymandering Extremes: The hosts discuss Illinois' congressional districts, highlighting the disproportionate number of Democratic seats compared to Republican vote shares, emphasizing the state's manipulation to maintain a one-party dominance.

  Notable Quote:

  • Buck Sexton [29:18]: "Illinois, 14 Democrats, three Republicans. And I just told you that Republicans got almost 45% of the overall presidential vote in the state."

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Political Fallout and Future Projections

Concluding the main discussion, Travis and Sexton explore the potential political fallout from these redistricting strategies. They warn of increased polarization and the erosion of democratic norms, as both major parties engage in similar tactics to secure political advantage. The conversation underscores the urgency for electoral reforms to ensure fair and representative governance.

Notable Quote:

• Buck Sexton [31:19]: "Anybody who's in the minority party could completely block all business in the state legislature that they don't like by refusing to show up for work."

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Additional Topics and Remarks

While the primary focus remains on redistricting and its implications, the hosts briefly touch upon other political events, including the banning of machetes in Australia and reactions to violent incidents in Cincinnati. They also address the future political climate, encouraging listeners to stay informed and engaged.

Notable Interaction:

• Clay Travis [39:28]: "Whenever you think about why Texas is able to change the congressional districts as they are is because Democrats have hemorrhaged Hispanic support."

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Conclusion

The Clay Travis and Buck Sexton Show provides an incisive analysis of the ongoing redistricting battles in Texas and beyond, highlighting the intricate interplay between political strategy, demographic shifts, and legislative maneuvers. Through detailed discussions and listener insights, the hosts paint a comprehensive picture of the challenges facing the American democratic process, urging vigilance and proactive engagement from their audience.

For those interested in understanding the current state of American politics, particularly the machinations of redistricting and its far-reaching consequences, this episode offers a compelling and informative perspective.

Transcript

[Buck Sexton]

This is an iHeart podcast.

[Clay Travis]

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[Buck Sexton]

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Monday Edition Clay Travis, Buck Sexton Show. Appreciate all of you hanging out with us as we are rolling into yet another week with lots of good news pouring in. There now seems to be expectation that guess what? Trump was right. They are going to cut interest rates in September. Stock market is soaring on those expectations today, moving back towards record high levels. So that is the big economic news as we move closer and closer to a tariff resolution with many different countries around the world. Also, a bunch of other things going on we have got Texas redistricting turning into a monster battle, which I am going to to dive into here with you guys shortly. Machetes have been banned in Australia, which is just a ridiculously funny story we'll have some fun with. And President Trump has weighed in on Sydney Sweeney and the impact of that ad continues to echo as also, for those of you out there that get fired up about culture and don't care and you're like, Sydney Sweeney is registered as a Republican in Buck's state of Florida. I, I challenge anybody out there, Buck, we'll get into this a little bit, but I can't think of anybody in his or her twenties that is as famous in Hollywood as Sydney Sweeney is that has ever been publicly identified as a Republican. Now, there are lots of people because I spent a lot of time in la and what you always hear in LA is if they never talk about politics, they're a Republican. And there are lots of those people out there, many of whom you would be fans of if you enjoy going to movies, television shows, streaming services, all those things. So there are lots of them. They just don't speak out. Sidney Sweeney being a registered Republican in her 20s, look, there are guys like Sylvester Stallone, Arnold Schwarzenegger, uh, Mel Gibson, a lot of the stars of 1980s film are Republicans and are out there publicly, but they're all in their 70s or older. To have a 27 year old Hollywood starlet near the top of her game be an out and out Republican, I think is significant culturally. We'll get into that. But in the meantime, and this is actually very significant, I think, um, and we talked about this a little bit last week, there is a panic setting in inside of the Democrat Party over the fact that Texas is potentially going to be redistricting as part of its midterm sort of process. This is normal in Texas because the legislature, I believe, only comes in like every other year. Uh, they do not have a supremely active legislature. And so they're a little bit behind on some of these things. But. And by the way, we'll also update you on the latest. I know many of you fired up about that attack in Cincinnati, which has received a great deal of discussion, appears a guy and a gal both innocent of doing basically anything wrong, getting beaten up in Cincinnati and the reaction to it. We talked about that with Bernie Marino last week. But I want to start with this. Democrats Buck are saying that they are going to flee the state to stop this redistricting from taking place. This is something that I think they have done before. And it's turned into a controversy and Greg Abbott, governor of Texas, is having none of it. He says they will face felony charges if they refuse to return to the capitol. Here's cut 10.

So very simply, it would be bribery if any lawmaker took money to perform or to refuse to perform an act in the legislature. And the reports are these legislators have been both, they sought money and they offered money to skip the vote, to leave the legislature to take a legislative act, that would be bribery. And so the facts will have to come out. But I think based upon comments made by legislators themselves, they face a possibility of facing bribery charges which is a second degree felony in the state of Texas.

Okay. I believe the reports are buck that they are fleeing to Illinois. This has turned into a big deal not only in Texas but other states now saying, well, maybe we'll have to redistrict your thoughts.

Illinois, also known as Midwest California. Yeah, yeah, I think.

And by the way, Illinois, one of the most of all gerrymandered states in the nation to flee to. Illinois actually just points out that blue states do this too.

This is just childish whining from Democrats on this issue. This, there's, there's no argument to be made. It is actually not possible to raise a good faith argument that Democrats don't do exactly this which is gerrymander to their political liking in states where that is lawful and they have control. So let's not pretend like this is all of a sudden it would be like saying, oh my gosh, do you see all these, all these people the president is appointing who agree with the president on policy. Yeah, that's the point. It's our turn now. We're in charge in Texas. Deal with it libs. But instead they try to raise really Alinskyite sabotage in the system. They try to find ways to pretend like they're in the bathroom the whole time. So they can't actually let the business of the state house go forward or in this case they're fleeing the state entirely. I'll also point this out, Clay, Governor Abbott, when he says that people are accepting money to do a thing in the legislature, that sounds like bribery. You know, this isn't, this isn't like someone explaining a complicated RICO case. And no, no, no, if someone's giving you money and you're doing something or not doing something in the legislature because of it, that is pretty much textbook bribery. So if that is. Now he says we have to see and look at the facts, but I don't think he would raise that unless there is some reason to believe that this is what has been going on with some Democrats in that state. I think that they maybe have forgotten themselves and forgotten statutory definitions a bit here, but this is, it's absurd. So they're going to try to prevent the business of the state from occurring as representatives of the state by just calling in sick to work. I mean think, imagine if the Republicans in when we had a minority in the House of the Senate did this. We'd be told that this is the end of the, of the republic as we know it.

Yeah. And it's just frankly an embarrassment. And so again, I did a lot of deep dive on this because I'm a little bit of a nerd when it comes to districting. And effectively this question is just a function of when you start it. And let me explain what I mean by that. Everybody does this to your point. And so acting like what Texas is doing is somehow beyond the pale. What has got Democrats nervous is look, there's a three seat majority right now in the House and if five Republican seats in theory were added in Texas, that takes it to eight. It makes it harder for them to take back the House and they don't like usually the redistricting happens at the, you know, closer to 2020. The mid decade redistricting is somewhat rare and not necessarily for Texas here. So there's actually a little bit of a slant towards Democrats right now in the House because they did better in the, in the House than they should have based on how the national popular vote went. Right. In theory, if we had completely without gerrymandering a national popular vote and assigned congressional seats based on that, then, then Republicans would have done a better job in the house in 2024 than they did. Won a narrow majority, the Republicans did by three. Because Democrats have successfully gerrymandered so many different states and now they're fired up about Texas. Let me also point this out. Almost no one talks about it. We screwed up as a country, the census. And as a result the electoral votes are all screwed up and in favor of Democrats right now. And almost no one will talk about it in 2030 when the new census is done. And, and you also then are able to take into account all of the relocations to red states. Democrats are in a tremendous amount of trouble in the electoral College starting in 2032 because for instance, Kamala's path, she would have won the election 270 to 268 if she had won Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin. That would have narrowly gotten her to the 270 majority that she needed to get to that pathway is not going to exist because red states are going to be picking up a lot of additional electoral votes. And so you can't win the presidency really without being able to win some of the South. And so we're headed for no one is talking about it because it's like nobody can look more than one year in the future when it comes to politics. But I think part of this is a little bit of a panic setting in on the Democrat side that the population bases of places like Tennessee, Texas and Florida are skyrocketing and they're taking away the electoral votes of much of the Democrat base. And so this is kind of an early preview of, of a little bit of a panic that's setting in where you're going to have more seats being reassigned to red states and fewer in blue states. And and again, the other part of this that gets almost no attention is the skewing for illegal immigration. And that is a big part of the taking people out of the country that is hurting overall Democrats. So this story, I think, is a significant one not only for what Texas does, but for the mobilization that's going to be able to occur in response to Texas. And that is why you are already hearing people like Cory Booker and Kathy Hochul. Let's play Kathy Hochul More on New Yorker saying, hey, maybe we're going to have to do this to cut 12.

[Clay Travis]

With Texas and Republican states are doing at the direction of Donald Trump. I say is nothing short of, of a legal insurrection against our capital. Legal, meaning they're using the legal process does not mean it's legal and it must be stopped. If Republicans are willing to rewrite these rules to give themselves an advantage, then they're leaving us no choice. We must do the same. There's a phrase you have to fight fire with fire. That is a true statement of how we're feeling right now. And as I've said, another overused but applicable phrase, all spare in love and war. That's why I'm exploring with our leaders every option to redraw our state congressional lines as soon as possible.

[Buck Sexton]

What a moron she is. Buck.

Well, it's but it's a widespread thing among Democrats now, right? She's not the only one. You know what, Clay? Let's have some fun with this Cory Booker, Another prominent this in this case New Jersey Democrats having too much fun trashing these Northeastern libs today. But here is Cory Booker of New Jersey on the midterms and gerrymandering play 11.

I'm sick of the gerrymandering. But if Donald Trump is going to push to gerrymander Texas, he's going to break the rules in order to win. He can't win by the rules. They are right now. So he thinks you should break the rules. For Democrats to sit back and just say, okay, we're going to play by the Queen's rules. No, I'm telling you right now, we need to win in the midterm. We need to stop him from cheating, from lying and from stealing the election. And if they're doing something to add their congressional seats, we need to look at our ways of doing that right now.

Can I just tell you, Clay, for anyone's fun, maybe we should put this up on clayandbuck.com take a look at Illinois's congressional districts, everybody. A state where unfortunately, you know, I've been to Springfield, Illinois, years ago to give a speech. There's actually a fair amount of Republicans in that area, like the rest of Illinois, like a lot of blue states is actually quite sane and quite beautiful in its politics and in its countryside. It's Chicago that makes the whole thing just a Democrat, Democrat uniparty. And when you look at the congressional map, it is absurd. I mean, you've got the, you've got the congressional map. It's like this little sliver here and there. They have gone to extreme lengths to maintain the maximum number of congressional seats for themselves in that state. And Cory Booker and Kathy Hochul are a senator and a governor respectively, of the Democrats acting like, hey, if you guys don't stop what you're doing, we're going to do the thing that we've ruthlessly been doing all along. What kind of a threat is that? It's like them threatening to be a bunch of emotionally unstable weirdos. They're already there.

Yeah. Let me give you an example because to your point, Buck, Illinois was about a ten and a half point difference in the election, 54 to 43. So Illinois was closer percentage wise than Texas was, certainly than Florida was. They used to be toss up states too.

So.

And they basically have written out almost all Democrats, have taken over almost all of the congressional seats. Even though to your point, you're Talking about a 44% of the vote going this past year to Trump inside of Illinois. Yeah, to your, your point as well, it's the Midwest version of, of New York and California. Because of Chicago's size, they have been able basically to take over the entire state and make it a only one in the Midwest that is somewhat of a monster reliable blue state turnout. So point on all this is there is much drama to come but it is starting in Texas and we will see what happens with when the Democrat legislatures in the state legislature are going to be forced to come back and we'll follow this. And we have reached out as well by the way to the Governor of Texas who's been on the show quite a lot, Greg Abbott, to see what the latest is there and he has an open invite to come on the program also. But I want to tell you right now if you ever had any doubt about the kind of evil permeating within Hamas on full display over the weekend when they released video of surviving Israeli hostages, including one that they made dig his own grave. They've been in control of Hamas for nearly two years and the reason Hamas took those hostages was to try to retain political power. And that is what they are still attempting to do even as so many people in Gaza struggle. If you want to make a donation right now to help everyone in Israel, the International Fellowship of Christians and Jews helps provide food distribution, critical first aid and emergency supplies. Your gift today will also help place new bomb shelters all over Israel, along with necessary supplies for the existing bomb shelters. Now's the time to help Israel's innocent and most vulnerable. You can call 888488 IFCJ. That's 888488 IFCJ. You can also go online at IFCJ.org that's IFCJ.org you ain't imagining it. The world has gone insane. Reclaim your sanity with clay and bun. Find them on the free iHeartRadio app or wherever you get your podcasts.

[Clay Travis]

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[Buck Sexton]

Sharing a true story Imagine a teenage girl by the name of Kayla, just 17 years old, pregnant, sitting all alone in a clinic. She's terrified in every way, tears blurring her eyes. She thinks abortion's her only choice and it's the biggest one she'll make in her whole life. She's afraid to decide. But then she was offered a free ultrasound, paid for by a thoughtful person just like you. The moment Kayla heard her baby's heartbeat, the decision was made. And today her little baby boy, Gabriel is thriving because preborn walked with Kayla every step of the way. Now multiply that by 38,000. That's how many babies preborn has helped save just this year. Their goal is to save 70,000 by the end of the year. And they can't do it without you and me. Every $28 provides that ultrasound. The moment that changes everything. To donate, dial 250 and say the keyword baby. That's 250. Say baby or donate [e-mail] Buck that's preborn.com Bucks Sponsored by Preborn welcome back in here to Clay and Buck. And Trump is not happy with something. And I'm going to tell you, when Trump isn't happy about something, he lets people know. He tends not to bottle it up inside. He's not, he's not shy about somebody messing up that is in his orbit. And he was not happy with the jobs report numbers on Friday. This is what he said. Play 13 will be announcing a new.

[Clay Travis]

Statistician sometime over the next three or four days. We had no confidence. I mean, the numbers were ridiculous, which he announced, but that was just one negative number. All of the numbers seem to be great. And so we'll see how that comes out. And if you remember, just before the election, this woman came out with these phenomenal numbers on Biden's economy. Phenomenal numbers. And then right after the election, they announced that those numbers were all wrong. And that's what they did the other day. So it's a scam, in my opinion. My opinion is just, it's just additional scam.

[Buck Sexton]

Clay, he says it's a scam. I just want to point out some things that Trump has said is a scam that we were told you were not allowed to say in the past polls, remember when political polls were somehow supposed to be sacrosanct? Not anymore.

I, I, what I would just say is some people are saying, oh, this is based on one month's numbers. This, this group has been wrong almost every month and they have been wrong on the positive side and come back and had to revise and bring down the numbers. They did it for much of Biden's tenure. They now have done it for some of Trump's tenure as well. If you're trying to accurately reflect the numbers and you always are wrong, it seems to me that in most life experience and jobs, you would get fired. I don't understand why this should be any different if there's somebody else who could do a better job of the job.

There's a lot that went on last week with respect to our economy. You might have missed some of it. We had a Federal Reserve meeting without a rate change. We had a revised jobs report the last three months that showed less than spectacular growth. We just talked about that. Trump very unhappy. But whether the Federal Reserve comes around or not, I'm convinced Trump is doing the right things with our economy. Economy. But remember, you got to think long term. You got to think even beyond the Trump administration for your own financial affairs. And right now, purchasing gold as part of your savings and retirement plan makes sense. Rely on the company I do for my gold purchases. Birch Gold Group. They'll help you make sense of investing in gold. I've been buying gold for a decade now. It's a solid investment. Birch Gold can help you also convert an existing IRA or 401k into a tax sheltered IRA in physical gold or just buy some gold to keep in your safe. Birch Gold will send you a free info kit on gold. Text my name. Buck to 9898. 98. Text Buck to 9898. 98 today.

Welcome back in Clay Travis Buck Sexton show a lot of reactions pouring into the Texas attempt to redistribute, reallocate, redistrict a bunch of different states and the congressional districts so that Republicans would gain five seats. And a lot of you from all over the country are weighing in with a variety of different perspectives. And I'm gonna read several of them. Uh, one of you listening in New Mexico writes in and, and I want to make sure that I get this, but I'm looking, as I was talking to you, I was looking up what the 2024 New Mexico Presidential election results looked like. Um, and Kamala Harris won New Mexico by about five points. Uh, Trump got 46% of the vote. Uh, Kamala Harris got 51 or 52% of the vote. So five to six points. In other words, pretty close as states go. Virginia was very close. New Mexico was very close. New Jersey was very close. Minnesota, very close. If you are on the Republican side looking towards additional states that could have flipped, but for, you know, two and a half or 3% of voters changing their minds, the outcome of that race could have been completely flipped. Um, and the reactions pouring in. And this is a good one. This is from Kevin. I live in New Mexico. I just told you it was a state. Five, five and a half points that Trump lost. A couple of years ago, the Democrat leader of the state legislature publicly stated he would redraw the lines in New Mexico so no Republican would ever win again. And he did just that. Most of southern New Mexico is conservative. We've always been able to elect Republicans. And in the Southern District, the redrawn lines put large portions of more liberal areas in the North, Albuquerque and Santa Fe into the Southern District. As a result, southern New Mexico has no representation. Don't let the Democrats act like this is something new and they've never done it before. They can't handle not being in power. New Mexico is a great example, I believe, again, and there are a lot of different states and a lot of different redistrictings to be on top of. But I believe just in the last few years, New Mexico said, hey, we are going to effectively eliminate the Republican Party and Democrats have all of the congressional seats. I want to look up what the math is in Illinois because it's among the most egregious, as we were talking about earlier. And. But this is a good question, too, from Britt, who writes in I don't know enough to fully understand the redistricting fight in Texas. I'm all for it if it helps keep Texas red. How does the influx of illegal immigrants being counted in the census play into the numbers? Thanks. This is a huge story that no one talks about. They aren't ostensibly allowed to vote, but illegal immigrants are counted for congressional districts for purposes of the overall population in a district, and I think roughly 700,000 and change is the average number of people in each congressional district and illegal immigrants are counted there. And depending on which study you look at, Republicans are losing and democrats are gaining 10 or more seats based on illegal immigrants being counted for purposes of a redistricting. That seems to me like it shouldn't be allowed. And it seems like something that should be addressed. And again, I didn't know this until a few years ago, was even going on, I feel like huge percentages of people don't know it still exists. It's helping to preserve districts that otherwise would be flipped for actual citizens. And it's actually an incentive for why illegal immigration does benefit the Democrat party when it comes to political power allocation.

Just looking at the strategy here, what they've got going on, legislators may have committed felonies. We talked about that. If they solicit funds to evade the fines that exist under house rule. So Texas Democrats face a $500 a day fine. Republican controlled legislature approved this punishment in 2023 when Democrats left for three weeks to try to block another bill on, on election integrity. And Abbott has said in his statement, Clay, I will use my full extradition authority to, to demand the return to Texas of any potential out of state felons. Texas state House Democrat caucus said come and take it. So they're, you know, they're creating a showdown. I get it. It's politics and everything else, but the reality here is Democrats are acting like children because they're not getting their way. And that's, there's, there's no. What is the good faith explanation they have for we are, we're supposed to be representatives. We're supposed to show up when there's a session called. We're just not going to show up to do our job so that you can actually function as the state of Texas elected officials. So, you know, I think that this is pretty clear what's going on to anyone who's paying attention. But that's really what this goes to, Clay. They're hoping that a lot of people just want to hear Republicans are bad. They don't ever get beyond that. If you turn on msnbc, I might have even had Morning Joe on a little bit this morning. You turn on msnbc, just Republicans are bad. The argument doesn't matter. And so you have the same thing with gerrymandering where it's they're evil, they're doing the thing that we do all the time exactly the same or worse, it doesn't matter. Right. They just want to hear what they want to hear. So I think whatever tools Texas Republicans have on at hand to get the quorum, they should absolutely use and they should put on the political brass knuckles for this one. It's time.

Illinois, 14 Democrats, three Republicans. And I just told you that Republicans got almost 45% of the overall presidential vote in the state. So 14 to 3 in Illinois is among the most egregious of all of the redrawn states we just mentioned. New Mexico, which 46% of people voted Republican in that state, not one single congressional representative. And by the way, I would think as you look towards 2028, that New Mexico is one of the states that Republicans would say it may well be moving towards us because Nevada and Arizona were both very successful 2024 cycles.

Well, also, what tools are, are at their disposal? Just to clarify that Governor Abbott has said that this is a, quote, abandonment or forfeiture of an elected state office. And so if they don't show up, the Texas AG says that they can take steps to, quote, remove the missing Democrats from membership in the Texas House. Now, maybe that goes into the courts, but let, let's be, let's be very clear about this. If, if they're able to do this. I mean, just, just work on this logically. Like, I'm not going to pretend that I'm an expert in the Texas state constitution, right. And I'm sure it's a robust and very interesting document. But if you just look at this logically, Clay, then anybody who's in the minority party could completely block all business in the, in the Texas or in the state legislature that they don't like by refusing to show up for work. That's it. I mean, think about what a, what a, you know, veto that is on the business of the state. You can just say, oh, until we have a majority in this state, we are just going to stay home from work and prevent the other people who want to show up from doing the people's business. That's insane. And of course that's insane.

Not only that, how about the decision to flee to Illinois, which is, I think, probably the most gerrymandered state in the entire country. Texas Democrats will still have a much higher percentage of seats in the state of Texas than Republicans do in Illinois. So I just, I don't understand sometimes how moronic the calculus is. And it's not always on the Democrat side. Also on the Republican side, sometimes this happens. But if you were just calling up for advice and you said, hey, we're going to leave the state and refuse to do our job, I would say, well, I think that's a bad look. Point one. And then at point two, if you were saying, and we're going to flee and we're going to go to Illinois, I would say, well, have you looked at the map of Illinois? Because you're actually arguing against a gerrymander by fleeing to the most egregious gerrymandered state in the entire country.

But you are getting Several layers deep into this analysis, and they are assuming they're Democrats. They assume their voters don't know anything to begin with. So they're definitely not going to understand or care to understand what's going on here. Right. You're approaching this like if you were sitting across from somebody who's, you know, a Democrat political strategist, and we're having this argument, or you're having this debate. Right. Which. It's important for all of you to hear this. But what Clay is doing doesn't even. I don't think this. The Democrats believe that's even relevant. You know, the argument is irrelevant. It's the emotion, it's the feeling. It's.

Yeah, resist. But even if you're a. Even if you're a moron and you're like, hey, first of all, to start now and act like. When every state has basically gerrymandered for the whole decade, that is either red or blue, to act now as if, oh, my goodness, I can't believe Texas. I love the, you know, grab your pearls and fall on your fainting couch here is ridiculous. But if you're going to protest, I would just suggest going to a blue state that is one of the least gerrymandered states and trying to argue, hey, this is the way that real politicians do it. Jb.

JB Pritzker, the. The trust fund billionaire is. Said he's providing them with office space and he's hooking them up. Right. I mean, he's got them covered. And also, I mean, is it that.

Hard to do that in Minnesota or to do that? I mean, I'm just saying, even by moron status, to go, Jerry, man, you gotta drop.

You gotta drop the IQ 15 points here. Clay, you gotta stop thinking. You know, you gotta start thinking about this like the. The average MSNBC viewer who's just like, republicans are bad. I don't like them. You know, that's it. What they're doing. Gerrymandering is racist. How is. What does that even mean? It's just about getting votes for your side that's racist.

I mean, by anything, this is actually interesting. Do you know why? Why Texas is able to change the congressional districts as they are. Hispanic support.

Yes, The Hispanic support for opposite racist. Yeah. And by the way, the biggest swings when it comes to congressional districts of Hispanic support toward the Republicans are in the areas most directly affected by the open border. Free for all policies of the Biden administration, meaning border adjacent. They've had people literally running through their backyards for years, and they've had enough. They actually don't like that and I understand why.

Yeah. I just think it's super fascinating because the reason this, this map is able to be written and expanded as it is is, is because Democrats have hemorrhaged Hispanic support. And as a result, Republicans can now draw majority Hispanic districts which are going to elect Republicans. Which, by the way, you talked earlier about Trump being right. They said that Trump would make Hispanics forever not willing to vote for Republicans. Instead, he almost won Hispanics in 2024, according to nationwide AP VoteCast. And this is a hugely the historic advantage.

This is a huge reason why the pendulum has swung so clearly on the issue of deportations and immigration enforcement. It used to be, oh, you're racist. You want a secure border. Really? The 60% of Latinos who want a secure border because they're Latino Americans who are legally here, they're racist against Latinos. Is that, is that what we're going for? Doesn't work. That, that's just, that's not, that doesn't fly the way that it used to. All right. If your cell phone service is with Verizon, AT&T or T Mobile, you're overpaying for wireless. You're paying retail. Retail stores that you're never going to go into that you don't need. You're paying for high end sponsorship deals, stadium rights and naming, all that stuff. You don't need any of that. And you also maybe think you're getting superior 5G service, but you're not. PureTalk uses the same 5G network on the same 5G towers as those other companies. Only difference, they don't charge you for any of the extras that you simply don't need. Instead, PureTalk gives you unlimited talk, text and plenty of data for just $25 a month. That's less than half the price of the other companies during a time when saving a dollar really matters. Clay and I are both Pure Talk customers. He's got his boys with PureTalk phones. I've got a Pure Talk phone. It's so easy to switch. You keep your phone and your number if you want from your cell phone, dial pound250, say Clay and Buck. You'll save an additional 50% off your first month. You can switch over to PureTalk in just about 10 minutes. Dial pound250, say Clay and Buck. Switch to PureTalk Wireless by Americans for Americans.

Clay Travis and Buck Sexton telling it like it is. Find them on the free iHeartRadio app or wherever you get your podcasts.

[Clay Travis]

Life's messy. We're talking spills, stains, pets and kids. But with Annabe, you never have to stress about messes again. At WashablesOfAs.com, discover Annabe sofas, the only fully machine washable sofas inside and out, starting at just $699. Made with liquid and stain resistant fabrics, that means fewer stains and more peace of mind. Designed for real life, our sofas feature changeable fabric covers allowing you to refresh your style anytime. Need flexibility? Our modular design lets you rearrange your sofa effortlessly. Perfect for cozy apartments or spacious homes. Plus, they're earth friendly and built to last. That's why over 200,000 happy customers have made the switch. Upgrade your space today. Visit washablesofas.com now and bring home a sofa made for life. That's washablesofas.com offers are subject to change and certain restrictions may apply.

[Buck Sexton]

Sharing a true Story Imagine a teenage girl by the name of Kayla, just 17 years old, pregnant, sitting all alone in a clinic. She's terrified in every way, tears blurring her eyes. She thinks abortion is her only choice and it's the biggest one she'll make in her whole life. She's afraid to decide. But then she was offered a free ultrasound paid for by a thoughtful person just like you. The moment Kayla heard her baby's heartbeat, the decision was made. And today her little baby boy, Gabriel is thriving because preborn walked with Kayla every step of the way. Now multiply that by 38,000. That's how many babies preborn has helped save just this year. Their goal is to save 70,000 by the end of the year and they can't do it without you and me. Every $28 provides that ultrasound the moment that changes everything. To donate, dial £250 and say the keyword BABY. That's £250 say BABY or donate [e-mail] Buck that's preborn.com Buck Sponsored by Preborn all right, welcome back into Clay and Buck. Thanks for being here with us everybody. I want to just point out that I haven't looked at the number. Claire we over a hundred thousand on the YouTube yet. Have you checked?

I will pull it up right now. I know we are insanely close. We are base 99,000 I was going.

To say I think in real time during the show we could probably break that a hundred thousand and that would be a nice little milestone for the show. So Please go to YouTube.com @clay n Buck is what you want to follow the show and check that out there. Also, if you could please get some Crockett Coffee going, go to crockettcoffee.com and sign up, subscribe American Playbook. Get those copies while you can. Signed copies. When you become a subscriber to Crockett Coffee, Clay's book, new book coming out in November, my first book coming out in January. So that'll be fun. And yeah, man, it's gonna be. It's gonna be good times. And we got that going. We got calls coming in as well. So after you go to crockett coffee.com, call our phone number and talk to us. Dan in Long Island, a lovely place this time of year. What's up, Dan?

[Clay Travis]

Oh, beautiful day through, guys. Listen, I'm driving on the Southern State Parkway listening to Kathy Hochul speak about the redistricting, and I was tempted to swerve my car into an abutment and just end it all. Because while I was on hold, I googled this entire process. It's something like in 2010, New York voters, me included, passed an initiative on the ballot demanding a independent person do the ridiculous thing. It passed overwhelmingly. The people spoke. In 2014, from 2014 to 2022, the Democrats realized they just screwed themselves and tried to get out of it. To the point where when our new chief justice was about to be appointed in New York State, Hochul went along with the long respected panel that tells you who the best judge is. She wanted to appoint the judge, but he had already let the cat out of the bag that he was not going to allow this rule to be overturned that we voted for. So they couldn't put him in. So they had to put another person in who allowed this entire process to get. To get politicized. And as a result, my district, I was in Peter King's district. I went to Galvarino's district. Then I was back in Suzzi's district, which became Santos. District when he won was quickly redistrict again. And now you notice that you don't hear a peep from either Suozzi or Laura Gillen about Mandani or anything because they know they are two votes away from losing. They had very tight elections and they're trying desperately to redistrict again to push those districts further into New York City to get more Democratic voters. And for Kathy Hochul to say anything about the state of Texas is, I would say it's comical, but I don't know whether I should laugh or cry. And we're stuck in New York here where we lose the, we lose the Gubertorian elections. We have 42, 45% of the vote, but we only have about 12. You know, our congressional districts are gerrymandered to an inch of life. The state senate and legislative districts are even worse. You couldn't even come up with a Rorschach test of what some of these districts look like. Kathy Hochul in California and Illinois, hold my beer. I live in New York. We do it better than anybody.

[Buck Sexton]

Dan in Long island representing the strong Island. Well, with the call, Dan, thank you so much.

New York Times has a had a big deep dive on this and they said again, I think the easiest way to look at this is by the overall national popular vote in and who the votes are going to. Democrats benefited in 24. Republicans should have had a bigger majority than we did. And so it slants a little bit left according to the New York Times, which if they're saying it, I feel like it's probably a little bit left, slanted right, maybe a little bit more than a little bit more. On this we come back. Appreciate you all. Monday edition.

[Clay Travis]

Life's messy. We're talking spills, stains, pets and kids. But with Annabe, you never have to stress about messes again. @washablesofas.com Discover Annabe sofas, the only fully machine washable style sofas inside and out, starting at just $699. Made with liquid and stain resistant fabrics, that means fewer stains and more peace of mind. Designed for real life, our sofas feature changeable fabric covers allowing you to refresh your style anytime. Need flexibility? Our modular design lets you rearrange your sofa effortlessly. Perfect for cozy apartments or spacious homes. Plus, they're earth friendly and built to last. That's why over 200,000 happy customers have made the switch. Upgrade your space today. Visit washablesofas.com now and bring home a sofa made for life. That's washablesofas.com offers are subject to change and certain restrictions may apply.

[Buck Sexton]

Sharing a true story. Imagine a teenage girl by the name of Kayla, just 17 years old, pregnant, sitting all alone in a clinic. She's terrified in every way, tears blurring her eyes. She thinks abortion's her only choice and it's the biggest one she'll make in her whole life. She's afraid to decide. But then she was offered a free ultrasound, paid for by a thoughtful person just like you. The moment Kayla heard her baby's heartbeat, the decision was made. And today, her little baby boy, Gabriel is thriving. Because preborn walked with Kayla every step of the way. Now multiply that by 38,000. That's how many babies Preborn has helped save just this year. Their goal is to save 70,000 by the end of the year. And they can't do it without you and me. Every $28 provides that ultrasound the moment that changes everything. To donate, dial £250 and say the keyword baby. That's 250. Say baby or donate [e-mail] Buck that's preborn.com Buck sponsored by Preborn. This is an I Heart podcast.