Republicans Running Democrat Playbook📖
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Behind the curtain📺: Right after “Born Lucky” came out, I got an email from Steve Barrett — a reporter I worked with in the early part of my career
🗣️Steve basically said “I wish I had known” about my diagnosis, as it would have explained a lot — he then did something nobody in this business does — apologize.
Steve was a gentleman 20 years ago when I first met him, and like most gentlemen, he hasn’t changed
📱He left the TV news business and now has a GREAT podcast, YouTube and social media presence — no surprise he’s very successful.
🎤Steve interviewed me here — it’s a lot of inside baseball and behind the scenes of local and cable news
Shameless plug📗: “Born Lucky” makes a great Father’s Day gift.
Breaking tonight📺: On Balance, 9 p.m. ET on NewsNation — live Texas Senate primary results will almost certainly show Trump-backed and morally compromised Attorney General Ken Paxton will beat longtime Republican Senator John Cornyn in the runoff.
In short‼️: Trump has won the battle, the GOP is relying on a Nazi tattoo and fears a terrorist sympathizer to keep them from losing control of the Senate — Polymarket says that is an even money bet
Last hope🙏: With Cornyn out, Republicans have fully adopted Democrats’ 2022 strategy to save the Senate — despite an unpopular president, just hope the other side picks really, really awful candidates.
And🤷: Democrats might just do that
❗James Talarico’s belief in non-binary, trans-Jesus
🗣️Paxton nicknamed him ‘Tala-freak-o’
❗Graham Platner in Maine, who long sported a Nazi tattoo.
❗Abdul El-Sayed in Michigan, whose terrorist sympathies would make Yasser Arafat blush.
❗Then there is Maureen Galindo, the sex therapist and Democratic congressional candidate who wants to put Israel supporters in camps.
📰The New York Times headlines “Democrat’s Comment About ‘Zionists’ Drew Rebuke. Will Texas Voters Care?”
Irony🤦: If Republicans’ margins don’t hold, a number of their newly drawn “safe” districts could end up not so safe
Must read🗞️: George Will’s writing is always relevant — Will headlines: “Dumb and dumber, Republican-style”
What I am thinking💭: George Will with a dumb and dumber reference is pretty epic.
Math🔢: Trump’s mafia boss, bare-knuckle tactics that worked a year ago are failing him.
📉As Trump’s popularity sinks, his demands become increasingly problematic
⚠️Cornyn, Tillis and Cassidy all have reasons to hate him and actively vote against his pet projects — lose those three, and Trump needs Vance to break a tie
🗳️Collins must answer for every vote on the campaign trail
Anti-weaponization slush funds and ballrooms aren’t popular with independent voters struggling — that is who she needs to win against the Nazi tattooed oysterman.
🌪️Trump is meeting a perfect storm
📉Declining popularity
🤦An unwillingness to control his need for quick wins
📉Daily decay of his relevance heading toward 2028
Tomorrow❗: The entire Trump camp will meet at the White House for a cabinet meeting.
TBD👀: Will Trump invite the “pool” to come watch the Cabinet go in order to praise Trump?
👀If they do, who cares — if they don’t, it will tell us something a lot more interesting
▶️The midterms are ahead
‼️Trump must figure out who stays and goes before potentially losing the Senate and can’t confirm Cabinet members
Tonight📺: The 2Way Trio — Mark Halperin, Larry O’Connor and Kevin Walling
Plus➕: Scott Tranter from Decision Desk HQ
What does Trump need for a win? 👀
‼️Trump’s negotiations strategy with Iran shows us a few things —
✔️He wants to declare victory and move on
✔️He will enforce his red line of preventing Iran from getting a nuclear weapon
✔️He seems to have given up or is looking to return to the military option
🔼Based on the above, what does Trump need to declare victory in Iran
💥Enriched uranium, aka nuclear dust, was destroyed or taken out of Iran
✅The Strait of Hormuz fully reopened — and the media generally agrees it’s reopened without fees or tolls charged by Iran.
Without either one of those two things, he can’t declare or spin victory
👀Now that we have the framework, getting there is a little more difficult
Look back🔙: Saturday, he said we were 95% of the way there.
🎤Today, Secretary of State Marco Rubio said negotiations are entering the stage where disagreements come down to “a word” or “a sentence”
💭Imagine buying a house
We have decided on the house, so we are 95% of the way.
Just need to decide on price and when we move in – words and commas!
Watch tonight📺: Vice Admiral John W. “Fozzie” Miller, USN (Ret) and Brig Gen John Teichert on whether Trump can force Iran’s hand militarily.
Bonus➕: Rep Adam Smith, D-Wash., on why Democrats can’t get their Iran messaging right.
Long Hot Summer of Disorder⚠️
📈More Americans got shot this weekend in Chicago than died in our war to stop Iran from getting nuclear weapons
📱The videos of “teen takeovers” and a kid plowing into five Chicago police officers show a city lost — the mayor says we can’t arrest our way out of the problem
🤦In New Jersey, a group of misfits left their parents’ basement to fight with ICE at an ICE facility
🗣️In Minneapolis, the mayor posted on Memorial Day memorializing George Floyd and said nothing about MEMORIAL DAY.
🏢Mamdami today said he was going to start taking property from landlords
📊A new poll shows 49 % of Democrats like socialists
☑️Trump and Republicans won in 2022 and 2024 because things felt out of control — the border, crime, culture, etc.
🤷Democrats can’t afford things to feel out of control again.
Look back🔙: The 2020 “summer of love” aka riots didn’t help Trump or Republicans
Watch tonight📺: Yemisi Egbewole on why Democrats can’t give up the socialist soft on crime agenda.
Always look forward to your nightly WarNotes but the best thing about Substack will be the comments! Congratulations on the move!
Great show tonight Leland. The Trio hit it out of the park with their comments during their segment. I liked their interactions with each other and with you. Living just north of Dallas I have an opinion on Paxton vs Talerico. Texas is scared and overwhelmed right now with the Muslim and Indian “takeover” happening all over Texas. Paxton needs to hammer it home and challenge Talerico because Texas will not stand for this. He needs to ask Talerico what he will do about the Muslim cities being built, hijab and Quran days in public schools, fraud within the Indian communities with the HB-1 visas, tax payers having to foot the bill for halal meals for students and the list goes on. Texas is waking up and I don’t think Talerico has any plans to stop any of it. That is how Paxton wins and quite frankly, the “takeover” narrative is how all the republicans can win. My opinion. I know I will love this new format and your loyal supporters will as well! Mazel Tov!