Will Trump’s Failures Cost the G.O.P. in Texas?

Summary

---

Podcast Summary: The Opinions – Will Trump’s Failures Cost the G.O.P. in Texas?

Host: Michelle Cottle
Guests: David French, Jamel Bouie
Date: February 28, 2026
Podcast: The Opinions (The New York Times Opinion)
Main Theme:
How Donald Trump’s political style, policies, and recent failures are affecting the Republican Party in Texas—including performance with Latino voters, the upcoming Senate primary, and the broader implications for November 2026 and the possibility of a post-Trump GOP.

---

Episode Overview

This episode delves into the cracks emerging in Trump’s coalition ahead of the Texas primary, analyzes his State of the Union performance, dissects the key races in Texas (Republican and Democratic strategies), and investigates the G.O.P’s diminishing appeal among Latino voters. The panel also discusses the decline of political rhetoric, the challenge of building lasting coalitions, and what messaging might work for Democrats in Texas and nationally.

---

Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Trump’s State of the Union: Style and Substance

• Jamel Bouie reflects on Trump’s rhetoric, noting the “level of truly lurid and virulent racism, especially against Somali Americans,” which he calls “truly extraordinary.” (02:06)

• Bouie argues the speech is devoid of aspiration, focused more on “the most base kind of emotions and attitudes... a crude instinct to dominate others.” (02:57)

• David French points out that Trump’s economic boasting “cannot lie your way out of voters actual experiences”—voters in Texas are still facing real economic hardships like high prices and aren’t swayed by claims that “everything is great.” (04:09)

  “You cannot lie your way out of voters actual experiences.”
  – David French (04:09)

• Bouie observes the broader problem: metrics might look good but “the vibe was off.” Many Americans “didn’t feel as if they were living in a prosperous society, even though the indicators seem to say that they were.” (06:20)

• The panel highlights the lack of effective oratory—neither Trump nor Biden captivate with rhetorical skill. Bouie laments, “We are living at a time when the high arts of rhetoric are just in such short supply.” (07:59)

---

2. Texas Senate Primary: Models in Conflict

• Michelle Cottle outlines the Republican Senate primary battleground:
  • Ken Paxton: “MAGA warrior… perhaps the most corrupt politician in America not named Donald Trump.”
  • Wesley Hunt: Charismatic, young Black conservative vet.
  • John Cornyn: Four-term incumbent deemed “not nearly Trumpy enough.”
• David French: “It’s American national politics and our choice in a microcosm.” French ridicules the idea that only MAGA-style politics can win, pointing to Republicans like Cornyn who’ve succeeded without Trumpian tactics. (11:20)
• On the Democratic side:
  • Jasmine Crockett: Populist, “pugilistic.”
  • James Talarico: “Walking TED Talk… seminarian.”
• French believes that if Paxton wins, even a Democrat like Talarico might beat him; if Cornyn wins, the race becomes “a dramatically different dynamic.” (13:25)

---

3. The Shadow of Trump: Can the Party Move On?

• Jamel Bouie: Asserts, “As long as Donald Trump is alive, there will not be a post-Trump Republican Party. I think that he’s like a gravity well. And there’s no real escaping his influence.” (14:08)
• Republican base seems to value “aggression and contempt for decency,” which advantages figures like Paxton.

---

4. The Latino Voter Shift and Republican Missteps

• Cottle notes the importance of the Latino vote—about a third of the Texas electorate. There was a significant shift in 2020 toward G.O.P. among Latino men, but this seems to be reversing.

• Jamel Bouie:

  • Republicans confused an “electoral coalition” with a “durable party coalition.” Trump won over some minority voters in 2024, but policies and rhetoric quickly “began to fall apart” that coalition.
  • “A bunch of these voters weren’t voting for snatching grabs of brown people off the streets. They were voting for maybe another stimulus check.” Gains Trump made “haven’t just reversed, but have gone fleeing in the other direction.” (17:38)

  “The result has been that this nascent coalition immediately began to fall apart… Every gain Trump made in 2024 hasn’t just reversed itself, but has gone basically fleeing in the other direction.”
  – Jamel Bouie (18:01–18:22)

• David French:

  • Contrasts “commercial Trump” (mainstream economic messaging) with “rally Trump” (“wild down every conspiracy rabbit hole”).
  • The result: "Extremism and brutality" have “taken a sledgehammer to his coalition literally from day one.” (19:31)

---

5. Trump’s Cult of Personality and the G.O.P’s Dilemma

• Jamel Bouie: Trump draws “low propensity voters” with “the Trump vibe,” not policies or party loyalty. The challenge: “How can [Republicans] convert people who vote for Trump into reliable Republicans? They just haven’t been able to do it.” (22:10–22:47)
• David French: Democrats, meanwhile, are activating “anti-chaos voters”—educated, moderate-to-high income, exhausted by Trump-era chaos, now shifting to Democrats. (22:49)

---

6. Democratic Messaging: What Works in Texas?

• Cottle: Urges listeners to look beyond top-of-ticket races—state and local battles matter, too.

• Jamel Bouie: Emphasizes a message that weds the material (cuts to healthcare) and the moral (ICE violence):

  "They took $75 billion from Medicaid to give to ICE."
  – Jamel Bouie (24:23–25:02)

• David French: Proposes a two-part message:

  • "STM: Stop The Madness"
  • "FOY: Focus On You"
    Democrats should connect “stop Trump from wrecking our society” with “focus on you”—concrete policy changes that improve lives. (25:41–27:00)

  “We have to stop the madness, stop Trump from wrecking our society, wrecking the Constitution, so that we can do what both parties should have been doing for a long time, which is F-O-Y, focus on you.”
  – David French (25:41–27:00)

---

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On Trump’s Oratory and Appeal:

  “We are living at a time when the high arts of rhetoric are just in such short supply.”
  – Jamel Bouie (07:59)

• On Ken Paxton:

  “He could be the most corrupt politician in America not named Donald Trump.”
  – David French (11:20)

• On coalition-building:

  “A durable party coalition... is a product of a set of policies, a set of political approaches that didn't just win votes, but that, like, binded a number of different communities.”
  – Jamel Bouie (16:21)

---

Timestamps for Important Segments

• Trump’s State of the Union Recap and Critique:
  01:58 – 07:59
• Political Rhetoric, Civility, and Decline:
  07:59 – 09:56
• Texas Republican Senate Primary Breakdown:
  09:56 – 13:25
• Role of Trump in G.O.P & Party Identity:
  13:25 – 14:32
• Latino Voter Shifts & G.O.P. Strategy:
  15:55 – 18:22
• Trump’s “Vibe” Coalition Problem:
  21:11 – 23:36
• Effective Democratic Messaging for Texas:
  24:23 – 27:43
• Panel Recommendations (Non-content):
  28:32 – 33:48 (skipped for summary purposes)

---

Overall Tone and Takeaways

• The conversation is frank, occasionally humorous, but heavily analytical and critical of the current state of both parties—especially the G.O.P under Trump.
• There’s skepticism about the party’s ability to recover or pivot while Trump is influential, particularly in diverse states like Texas.
• The experts call for a Democratic message that combines rejecting Trumpian chaos with real, tangible policies that address everyday struggles.

---

Conclusion

This episode offers a sharp analysis of why Trump’s approach may now be undermining the G.O.P. in critical states like Texas. The panelists break down how the party’s gains with Latino voters are fragile, the Senate primary encapsulates the party’s crisis of identity, and neither a simple message nor a return to “normal” politics is likely as long as Trump dominates the party. For Democrats, the answer may lie in merging substantive policy focus with a bold stand against extremism and corruption.

---

Notable Quote to End:
“They took $75 billion from Medicaid to give to ICE. That, to me, is the message…” – Jamel Bouie (24:23)

---

Transcript

[Betterment Ad Narrator]

When you use the trusted investing and savings app Betterment to help grow your money automatically, you have more time for new niche hobbies like collecting miniatures. The joy that brings helps you sleep better at night and even motivates you to always use your PM moisturizer. Now you've got a dewy glow and a sense of balance to match, not worrying where your money is growing. That's the Betterment effect. Get started [e-mail] investing involves risk performance not guaranteed.

[Show Announcer]

This is the Opinions, a show that brings you a mix of voices from New York Times Opinion. You've heard the news. Here's what to make of it.

[Michelle Cottle]

I'm Michelle Cottle. I cover national politics for New York Times Opinion. And this week, we've got the band back together. I've got my fabulous colleagues David French coming to us from Chicag, and our man in Charlottesville, Jamel Bouie. Guys, good to see you as always.

[David French]

Hey, Michelle.

[Unidentified Female Contributor]

Hey, Michelle.

[Jamel Bouie]

Hey, David.

[Michelle Cottle]

All right, today we're gonna talk about the center of the electoral universe in the coming week, Texas and the emerging cracks in Trump's coalition. Usual caveat, we are recording this on Thursday, and Trump is set to head to Texas on Friday ahead of the state's primary elections next week. So, you know, anything goes. But as for the current known knowns, Trump is hitting the Lone Star trail to spread his message of economic victory, prosperity. Now, of course, this past Tuesday, he had an even bigger platform from which to tout his economic record during the marathon State of the Union. So how did he do on that front?

[Jamel Bouie]

I am sort of astonished that I managed to sit through the whole two hours.

[Michelle Cottle]

Hey, good endurance, very impressive.

[Jamel Bouie]

But the things that stuck out to me, I mean, the two big things that stuck out to me, the first was really the level of truly lurid and virulent racism, especially against Somali Americans. I think people have gotten desensitized to this kind of public performance of bigotry, and. And they shouldn't, because it's truly extraordinary. It's not as if all American past American presidents, or even most American presidents have ever been racial egalitarians. But there was a recognition that public bigotry of that kind was just not acceptable, just not a thing. That was okay, because the president is supposed to represent all Americans and at best try to represent all Americans at their highest aspirations. And that gets to the second thing that was striking to me about the Soviet Union, which is that there are no aspirations here. Sort of the most base kind of emotions and attitudes and feelings you know, a crude instinct to dominate others. And that's all that Trump has to offer to the public.

[Michelle Cottle]

Okay, so he was supposed to be going in there to focus on the economy and make America feel like he understands their concerns. Now, he started off with a list, a laundry list of all the magical things he feels that he has done for the country. And that included some, some plans or moves he's made, although they were creatively spun, like how he has lifted so many people up off of food stamps, by which he means he has slashed the number of people who are receiving food stamps. So I'm not sure that even in that small chunk of time where he talked about the economy and economic achievements that it would necessarily resonate with a public that clearly doesn't think that the economic problems have been solved. And I just wanted to get your thoughts on that specific part of this, because that's so important to the party in November.

[David French]

Yeah, this is a really important point, and I think it's something that, you know, both parties really, you know, they're doing what they only thing they can do when voters experiences are sour. So what Trump did is sort of boast about things in a completely false way to say, everything's better now, everything's great, but vote. You cannot lie your way out of voters actual experiences. Right. So if voters are experiencing a job crunch, if they're experiencing higher prices and key goods and services that they want, if their interest rates aren't as low as they want, you can talk and boast all you want and it's going, it's not going to land. And this is something the Democrats kind of learned in the 2024 race, is that even though inflation had come way down, people were still behind where they'd been in 2018, 2019, et cetera. And sort of saying, here are the statistics, aren't they great? Wasn't effective to Trump people's experiences. And now Trump is coming out and he's sort of, he's up the ante and saying, well, I'll make up statistics, I'll make things up and tell you how great everything is. But again, you just can't lie your way out of voters actual experiences.

[Michelle Cottle]

So, Jamel, what do you think in terms of looking at the midterm? They know what he needs to do or they have a sense of what he needs to do. How did he approach?

[Jamel Bouie]

I mean, I don't think this was particularly successful. We have actually, as David kind of alluded to, we have an example of a elderly declining president trying to Tell people that things are good when they feel otherwise.

[Michelle Cottle]

Just a disaster.

[Jamel Bouie]

Didn't work out well for him. Yeah, it's just. So in fairness to lawmakers, I'll say in fairness to people in politics, there is a bit of a conundrum here because macroeconomic indicators up until recently were showing a pretty strong American economy. Right. Like something that was humming along. And even in the midst of that, even in the midst of sort of at least what appeared to be wage growth, what appeared to be high employment growth, people were still very dissatisfied. The vibe was off.

[Unidentified Female Contributor]

People didn't feel as if they were

[Jamel Bouie]

living in a prosperous society, even though the indicators seem to say that they were. And that's sort of a, that's like a hard problem to solve. So let's be being fair to the political problem here. But the Trump administration and Donald Trump have done nothing to try to really

[Unidentified Female Contributor]

reach people where they are.

[Jamel Bouie]

Right?

[Unidentified Female Contributor]

Like cutting food stamps, cutting ACA subsidies, like cutting direct assistance to people. Recent analyses say that the tariffs have

[Jamel Bouie]

cost the typical American household about $1,000. That's, that's sort of the low end, higher end. The Democratic minority in Congress put out a report. Higher end, around $1,700.

[Unidentified Female Contributor]

So somewhere between $1,000 and $1,700. Between a little less than $100 a month and a little more than $100 a month, Americans have lost due to tariffs. And that's like real money. So the president going before the country and kind of trying to browbeat people into believing that things are all good. I don't think it's going to be very effective. And I actually want to make one. Just quick observation. It has been, it's 2026. We are 10 years removed just about from when we had a president who could deliver good to exceptional oratory. Neither Trump nor Biden, even young Biden, not a particularly good public speaker, neither Trump nor Biden have really that kind of rhetorical command. But we, you know, politics is rhetoric. And we are living at a time when the high arts of rhetoric are just in such short supply.

[Michelle Cottle]

Okay, we gotta get to Texas next. But I want to jump on that because I am fascinated by that, because one of the things that Trumps supporters have always sort of bragged about is that he speaks on a fourth grade level. And so I'm wondering how much of this is that we have dumbed down society to the point that, you know, if you talk at too high a level, you're just going to lose everybody who is going to think you're Snooty or whatever. And Trump has absolutely kind of embraced this whole Democrats bad, I'm good, biggest, baddest ever, whatever. So I am fascinated by the idea of what would happen if we did have somebody who actually knew how to give a good old stem winder anymore. I don't know, would it play?

[David French]

It's a great question. And I think we've always had a vulnerability to just the lowest common denominator politics. And you know, I think for me, when I was growing up, if you watched the way people interacted with each other, the arguments and the conversations that they had, it was fundamentally different. And we just didn't know what we had when we had it. And it really is brought home to me when I teach undergrads. I one time asked some of my students to watch the 2012 first debate between Romney and Obama. And I can't remember if I've told this story before, but the overwhelming sentiment that these students took from it was. I didn't realize they were friends or I didn't realize that, you know, like how civil this could be. And I remember that 2012 first debate in particular is pretty tense.

[Michelle Cottle]

Oh yeah, yeah.

[David French]

But you look at it now, it's just fundamentally different. And I know there are Republicans out there and he lost. Well, there are lots of examples of Republicans who won without being like Trump. So can we just dispense with the idea that that's the only way to win?

[Michelle Cottle]

Well, it's interesting that you have brought up civility and integrity and character because that is indeed the perfect pivot to, to Texas. So in the Republican Senate primary, we are seeing very different political models fighting for the nomination down there. You know, I spent some time down there going to various events, talking with people. Always a good time. Love it. What we're looking at right now in the Senate race, a highly divisive MAGA warrior, State Attorney General Ken Paxton, who we have talked much about on this show because what perhaps defines him more than his politics is his huge pile of scandals that he carries around with him. In this corner we have Representative Wesley Hunt, a young, charismatic conservative military vet who would be Texas's first black senator. And over here, the four term incumbent, John Cornyn, who is seen as to establishment and not nearly Trumpy enough by many in his party's base. So what kind of champion does the party need this cycle to keep Texas deep red, but also maybe to start moving the party into dare we dream a post Trump era.

[David French]

I am so all about this primary. This is such a. It is American national politics and our choice in a microcosm. Right. With Ken Paxton, it might be fair to say that he could be the most corrupt politician in America not named Donald Trump. It's quite possible. The, the charges against him. Look, I, there are personal friends of mine who used to work in his AG's office and quit and protest because of the conduct in this office. It was insiders. And when I tell you insiders, I'm not talking like squish Republicans or whatever, but like, people are very thoughtful, senior, hardcore staffers, senior, very thoughtful, very, you know, very conservative. Texans said no. I mean, he almost was, he was impeached, almost convicted. And then you have John Cornyn, who I don't think anyone would call him a squish. I mean, there's some resentment that he signed onto a gun control bill, but he signed on to measures that were extremely popular, just extremely popular. And so, you know, the idea that John Cornyn's a squish and he needs to be supplanted by the most corrupt politician not named Donald Trump in America, it's absurd. And then I think with the Democrats, you almost have. It's like a, the, the platonic form of the choice. How do you fight Trumpism? Is it, you know, is it going to be the populist, pugilistic, you know, Jasmine Crockett, I'm going to kind of walk out there and punch you in the face rhetorically, or is it going to be like the walking TED Talk, you know, James Talarico, no less? I mean, yes, seminarian. They're very contrasting styles, very contrasting. And here's the interesting thing. If Ken Paxton wins, I think Talarico could probably beat him, and I think Jasmine Crockett might be able to beat him. I think if Cornyn wins, then the dynamic shifts very dramatically. But it really is one of the. It's just, what? Which way? Primary voter, which way?

[Michelle Cottle]

Jamel, what are you thinking?

[Jamel Bouie]

Ultimately, what happens in the Texas Senate race in terms of who wins the

[Unidentified Female Contributor]

actual Senate seat in November is going

[Jamel Bouie]

to be shaped by national conditions.

[Unidentified Female Contributor]

If Trump is just hideously unpopular, if

[Jamel Bouie]

they've done something terrible and egregious that got national attention, then I would very much agree that even if it's Cornyn and Crockett, then I would say Jasmine Crockett has a decent chance of winning that race. It's all national conditions. You raised this question, Michelle, of whether this race might chart a post Trump course forward. And I've sort of come to the view that first, as long as Donald

[Unidentified Female Contributor]

Trump is alive, there will not be

[Jamel Bouie]

a post Trump Republican Party.

[Unidentified Female Contributor]

I think that he's like a gravity well. And there's no real escaping. There's no real escaping his influence in that way. So I'm just not. I'm not certain that there is any way for a Republican to truly distance himself from Trump, even in the interest of trying to win elections.

[Jamel Bouie]

And this gets back to our previous discussion, which is just what Republican primary

[Unidentified Female Contributor]

voters seem to believe is necessary to win elections. And they seem to believe that what is necessary is a level of kind of aggression and contempt for decency that really does advantage a guy like Paxton.

[Michelle Cottle]

So one of the things we're looking at with Texas in particular is how the party is holding onto, or not holding onto the gains that it has made among Hispanic voters, who make up about a third of the electorate in the state. So in 2020, with Trump on the ballot, we saw a significant shift of Latino men, specifically toward the gop. Now that support seems to be slipping away. And again, it's always different when Trump is not on the ballot. And I know that I've done reporting at the border about the Republican Party trying to woo Latino voters up and down the ballots, you know, even in years when Trump wasn't there. But observers in the state note that the Trump policies have not been all that Latino voters were hoping for. So one question in this race, what does the party do to stop the slippage among this demographic? Or is there anything.

[Jamel Bouie]

I don't think there's anything that can be done. So after the 2024 election and after Trump more or less replicated George W.

[Unidentified Female Contributor]

Bush's 2004 performance with Latinos and even black Americans. Right. Sort of begin to reconstitute that Bush coalition.

[Jamel Bouie]

There was a lot of, I would say, crowing among Republicans, like, oh, we

[Unidentified Female Contributor]

are now this multiracial working class coalition. But it's important to sort of distinguish between an electoral coalition and a durable party coalition. A durable party coalition is pieced together through all kinds of moves, through all kinds of actions over time. So the Roosevelt FDR New Deal coalition wasn't just the 1932 election or the 1936 election. It was a product of the New Deal. It was a product of a set of policies, a set of political approaches that didn't just win votes, but that, like, binded a number of different communities and the different groups of Americans to a particular political order. Trump was able to assemble an electoral coalition that put him over the top, but the administration equated that equated that with having bound those voters to the political project.

[Jamel Bouie]

And that's not what happened.

[Unidentified Female Contributor]

It could have happened.

[Jamel Bouie]

There was a path to do that.

[Unidentified Female Contributor]

But what happened instead was operating under the assumption that the battle had been won.

[Jamel Bouie]

The Trump administration and the Republican allies

[Unidentified Female Contributor]

in Congress just began to pursue every single ideological hobby horse and bugaboo that they have. And the result has been that this nascent coalition immediately began to fall apart. Right, because a bunch of these voters weren't voting for snatching grabs of brown people off the streets. They were voting for maybe another stimulus check. I mean, the polling shows this among black voters, among Latino voters, among young voters, young men in particular. Every gain Trump made in 2024 hasn't just reversed itself, but has gone basically fleeing in the other direction.

[David French]

So, you know, when you think about the Trump coalition, you know, if you looked at the commercials that Trump was blanketing their waves with, they were inflation, the economy, too much immigration, just very mainstream messages. But if you went to the rallies, if you saw the rallies, it was wild, you know, just wild down every conspiracy rabbit hole you can imagine. And so the question was, who's going to govern, commercial Trump or rally Trump? Well, it wasn't even really a question. It was going to be rally Trump. And so you put the wildest, most extreme people in charge of some of the most delicate and important policies in the United States of America. And what you're going to see is you're going to see extremism, and you're going to see brutality. And when you combine extremism and brutality, especially when you overlay that with the reality that a lot of, you know, black and Hispanic Americans, depending on where they are in this country, can't feel like they can walk down the street without necessarily having a show me your papers moment. And even if they show their papers can sometimes be seized anyway. And when you do that, you are. You can't build a multiracial coalition around that. That is just not possible. He's taken a sledgehammer to his coalition literally from day one.

[Michelle Cottle]

I had been wondering when you are focusing so much on low propensity voters, and obviously the Trump campaign went all in on whipping voters to the polls who don't like politics, who don't pay. I remember watching people from the campaign or related to the campaign going out and interviewing folks on college campuses, and you'd see these young guys in particular, they were just so excited about the vibe of this campaign. They were expecting it to be so much fun and, and whatever else got Accomplished. It was just kind of this pro wrestling, yeah, let's get out there and do this. Well, but Trump didn't get out there and do the things that people were really interested in with the economy. And I do think to Jamel's point, if he had really dug in and made changes to how people's lives were going, then he could have kind of gotten more of a pass on some of his other crazy, most extreme policies. But he didn't. He didn't deliver on what people cared about. And they see him focused on stuff that they're like, really, this is what we got. So you remove all those low propensity voters from the equation and suddenly you have a very different landscape. And I'm not sure that the party can do much to change that between now and November is just my thought.

[Jamel Bouie]

I mean, the other thing is that these voters weren't voting for the Republican Party. They were voting for Donald Trump.

[David French]

Yeah.

[Jamel Bouie]

And so if Donald Trump is not on the ballot, the electoral problem the Republican Party has always had in the age of Trump is this, that Trump has built a strange cult of personality around himself. People, the low propensity voters come out in 2016, 2020 and 24 to vote for the Trump vibe. They don't know anything about what a Trump administration might look like. They're not. You know, I remember saying to people, you know, in the 2024, hey, you're not just voting for Donald Trump, you're voting for Stephen Miller. And these are people who don't care about this. It means nothing to them. Right. They're voting for Trump, the fun uncle, or Trump, the star of the Apprentice.

[Michelle Cottle]

The lively dancer.

[Jamel Bouie]

The lively dancer. They're voting for Trump, kind of the big, you know, it'd be funny to have a big joke in office, right? Like, that's kind of the whole Trump deal. A big joke. Who is a good businessman or something and very manly.

[Michelle Cottle]

So manly.

[Jamel Bouie]

And somehow people think he's like very masculine. I find, I still find that very strange. But that's what they're voting for. And so the challenge for Republicans has always been to how can they convert people who vote for Trump into reliable Republicans. And they just haven't been able to do it. And so what happens was Democrats who have converted, activated a bunch of high propensity voters, college educated voters, you know, moderate to high income voters who would have voted for Republicans who, like, voted for George W. Bush, right. Who voted, who, if they're old enough, maybe voted for Bob Dole. All that's right McCain.

[Michelle Cottle]

So many suburban moms, people who would

[Jamel Bouie]

have voted for Republicans are like, I don't like all this chaos. You could call them anti chaos voters. I don't like chaos. Or all I want to do is make my money, raise my family, not have to think about this shit. Those people have started voting for Democrats. You have everywhere in the country, these voters who just don't. It's exhausting to have to pay attention to this stuff all the time.

[Unidentified Female Contributor]

It's exhausting for us.

[Jamel Bouie]

And this is our job. The New York Times pays us money to do this.

[Michelle Cottle]

And I'm still tired.

[David French]

We're all tired.

[Unidentified Female Contributor]

We're tired of it.

[Jamel Bouie]

Right. So if you're not being paid money to do it, I can imagine that it's very frustrating to experience. And I just don't, I don't see the Republican Party having any real strategy

[Unidentified Female Contributor]

for dealing with that.

[Michelle Cottle]

All right, so last thing before we end this is. So what message do you think is most useful for Democrats in this cycle and in Texas? Let me just say that we focus on the top of the ticket. But as you know, my eternal hobby horse is that's not all that's at stake, especially this year where Trump has tried to rig the system to get himself more House votes. I think all up and down the ballot, you're fighting for something important in Texas. So I just want people to think about that. This is not just about one Senate race, but going forward, kind of. What message do you think is most important for the Democratic Party in the cycle?

[Jamel Bouie]

I mean, I'm very much of the view that, like, I don't, you know, people should tailor messages to their particular states and communities and circumstances. But one thing that does seem to resonate in part because it kind of reflects the two sides of where Trump has become very unpopular is. And I saw Ruben Gallego on CNN or something a couple days ago say something to the effect of they took $75 billion from Medicaid to give to ICE. Right? So I think that actually is the message, right? It' People are angry about the healthcare cuts. They're angry about the ways that the administration has been kind of indifferent to their, like, material circumstance. And they don't like ICE agents shooting

[Unidentified Female Contributor]

people in the streets.

[Jamel Bouie]

So that's. That, to me, is the message like the broad, generic message that would probably resonate in every single congressional district in the country. They took $75 billion from Medicaid to give to ICE and to give to people who are violating your rights.

[Michelle Cottle]

All right, David.

[David French]

Okay, so have y' all seen the Netflix movie the R.I.P. ben Affleck, Matt Damon.

[Michelle Cottle]

Yes.

[David French]

Really good.

[Michelle Cottle]

Yes.

[David French]

I do highly recommend Remember how Matt Damon has the two tattoos, which are acronyms for Are we the Good Guys? And we are and we always will be. It's a. It's a cool part of the. The movie.

[Michelle Cottle]

Yep.

[David French]

But I'm thinking of different tattoos. Michelle. So I'm thinking on the left hand, the Democrats should have stm stop the madness. And on the right hand, it should be Foy. Focus on you. So there are the two elements here. We have to stop the madness, stop Trump from wrecking our society, wrecking the Constitution, so that we can do what both parties should have been doing for a long time, which is f o y focus on you. So I think of it that way. It's two things at once. And I feel like to stop the madness pulls in both the sort of, you know, Talarico super polished mainstream Democrat and the more pugilistic Jasmine Crockett. Because to stop the madness, you got to be somewhat pugilistic. You're going to have to, you know, stand up, you're going to have to have courage to stop the madness. But it's got to be also focus on you. Because we've got to break out of this thermostatic cycle where everybody's being elected every two to four years to stop the other side. And so who's going to break this logjam, stop the other side, and then actually deliver? That's going to be the person who starts to deliver an enduring coalition, an enduring governing structure.

[Michelle Cottle]

Yeah, that strikes me as right. And it's what I've heard from Democratic lawmakers, including Chuck Schumer, the Senate minority leader, which is that you've got to connect those dots. But between the issues that are keeping people up at night and kind of the chaos and madness and corruption of the current administration, which is that because they're doing X, your healthcare costs more, your schools are worse, your housing is more unstable.

[Jamel Bouie]

They did illegal tariffs, and now if there are refunds, you're not going to get them back. You'll never see that money again.

[Michelle Cottle]

Of like, the tariff thing I find fascinating because as we've talked about, people don't pay a lot of attention to economic details and policies and macro trends, but at some point in time, and tariffs can be complicated. Right, Trump? It's not entirely clear that Trump understands tariffs. A lot of the time he doesn't

[Jamel Bouie]

know what they are.

[Michelle Cottle]

But the American people at some point decided they really hate tariffs. If you look in the polls, and that's it. It doesn't matter what Trump says, which is why it's fascinating and probably gave a few Republican lawmakers a migraine that he just drilled down on that during the State of the Union and intends to just keep doubling and tripling down. I'd like to land this plane there so that we can get time for everyone's favorite piece of the show. And you know what that is. Recommendations, Jamel, go first. What do I need to know?

[Jamel Bouie]

Sure thing. This has been the theme for my recommendations this month. Just like watching, you know, black history movies, movies from black directors, movies about the subjects related to black history. So I watched a 2021 documentary, MLK FBI, which is more or less about the FBI's long surveillance of MLK during his life. It's fascinating stuff, has a lot of great commentary from historians and people who knew King who are still living. So I really, I really recommend it. And you can actually do a double feature with another documentary that's a little older than that 2018, called King in the Wilderness, which is about King's last years alive, sort of the year 66 to 68. So both two great documentaries on maybe the darker parts of King's experience and King's life during those years. I also read a book by the historian Thomas Ricks, Waging a Good War, about the civil rights movement. And one thing I've taken away from this kind of somewhat immersion in all of this is just how extraordinary that struggle was, the people involved in that struggle, and how I do think that in addition to how our national mythologizing of the movement and its participants kind of sands away the radicalism, I think it also sands away the really extraordinary heroism at great cost to health and lives. And many movement veterans did not go on to live long lives because of the stress they endured in those years. So worth watching aforementioned documentaries and worth just thinking about the period less in terms of, again, mythology and more in terms of, like, the level of not just organization and dedication, but, like, internal strength it took to. To stand against an entire social system.

[Michelle Cottle]

All right, David.

[David French]

Okay. So Jamel really should have gone after me because I'm going to be so trite compared to that.

[Michelle Cottle]

I'm here for it. You know, I'm here for it.

[David French]

Okay, so one of the great things about every new year is you restart the nerd cycle.

[Michelle Cottle]

Oh, no.

[David French]

Which means that, you know, you. You have a series of fantasy and sci fi, new seasons, new series that restart every year. And like, for, for those of us who ride that nerd cycle with glee. There was much anticipation and nervousness about this show. New Game of Thrones show, Night of the Seven Kingdoms, and it freaking delivers. I'm still not caught up with the finale, so don't say anything, listeners. But it's really good. And this is going to be weird to say in connection with anything related to Game of Thrones, but this actually has lots of moments of delight and fun. It's a fun show to watch now. It's still Game of Thrones. It's still hbo. Some people might have to avert their eyes at some points, but it is.

[Michelle Cottle]

There is blood.

[David French]

Very well done.

[Michelle Cottle]

There's lots of blood.

[David French]

There is lots of blood.

[Michelle Cottle]

And the two lead actors, I bench the whole thing, so I'm not going to say anything. You're behind.

[David French]

And the two main actors, Duncan the Tall and Egg, are just great. They're just great together. And how old is the child actor?

[Michelle Cottle]

I don't know. But kid performance is hard and this is a very good performance, I have to say.

[David French]

Yes, very hard. Absolutely. All right, Michelle, I'm glad you're picking up what I'm laying down. Okay.

[Michelle Cottle]

Absolutely. I'm gonna go with a book I picked up, There is no Place for Us, which is a book about the working homeless by Brian Goldstone. And what it does is it charts five families living in Atlanta. We're talking about COVID era, so very contemporary. And it's just kind of looking at this very particular subset subculture of people who they're not like on the street like you think of when you talk about the homeless population, it's more like people who couch surf from relatives floors to sometimes they're in their cars, but a lot of times they're at these extended stay hotels, which is just another way to exploit the poor and working class. And I actually had a friend who passed away a couple years ago, but her family got caught in this cycle with these extended stay hotels. And it's really appalling, but they paint this with so much compassion. And just the different families all have these different challenges that they're working with. And I'm only about halfway through, so already I think. Highly recommend.

[David French]

So both of you guys. Justice, Mercy. Courage. Sacrifice me. Swords. Dragons.

[Michelle Cottle]

Oh, man, that has to be a piece of this. David, you. You have to have swords.

[David French]

You got. You got to have swords. And an occasional dragon. Occasional dragon.

[Michelle Cottle]

The occasional dragon. I have questions. We'll talk about these offline, about the Targaryens in this, but we're going to say goodbye for the week. Thank you so much as always, for helping me solve the world's troubles.

[Unidentified Female Contributor]

Always a pleasure.

[David French]

Thanks, Michelle.

[Show Announcer]

If you like this show, follow it on YouTube, Spotify or Apple. The opinions is produced by derek arthur, vishaka darba and gillian weinberger. It's edited by kari pitkin and alison bruzek. Mixing by carol sabaro. Original music by isaac jones, sonia herrero, pat mccusker, carol saborough, efim shapiro and amin sahota. The fact check team is kate sinclair, mary marge locker and michelle harris. The head of operations is shannon busta. Audience support by christina samulewski. The director, director of opinion shows is annie rose strasser.