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Paleo's avatar

Just amazing that Ed Case has managed to survive this long in a solidly Democratic district. Best of luck to Keohokalole.

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alienalias's avatar

And Case's "I'm on approps and that matters." He's 17th in seniority and his subcommittees are Defense and Homeland Security that aren't exactly "bring home the bacon" areas (compared to Military Construction and Veterans Affairs in the national security bucket). Even if his argument is that he still does as a full committee member, he's well below the top successful earmarks in this year's bills in this Roll Call analysis. This is compared to Schatz and Hirono, who have actually used their built up seniority in the Senate to include large directed spending for Hawaii (and Hirono's not even an appropriator).

I went back thru the last Dem majority start in 2019 (they weren't brought back to the House until DeLauro in 2021), and he goes similarly unmentioned in nearly all their House earmark reporting (one 2021 article on surface transportation includes a request he made, and the later reporting doesn't seem to indicate it was successful). So not only are his successful approps not worth mentioning, but he has also not played a real role in any discussions relating to them back to 2019. In fact, searching for his name and approps at large for articles directly dealing with the spending process, he's only mentioned in an article this year about the Homeland Security 2026 budget request with a quote as the ranking member (most are just picking up some word ending in "-ed case" or the word "appropriations" is used in an unrelated article referentially), so he's far from a notable committee member at all. His most notable mentions are related to fucking up reconciliation in 2021.

2025 article from yesterday: https://rollcall.com/2025/07/31/republicans-appropriators-dominate-house-earmarks/

Searching appropriations and "ed case": https://rollcall.com/search/appropriations+%22ed+case%22/

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alienalias's avatar

When he joined the committee in 2019, he and Will Hurd were named to oversee the "flower fund" to send Members for celebrating special occasions or commemorating a family death. Powerful stuff.

https://rollcall.com/2019/01/30/flower-fund-collects-pocket-change-while-appropriators-tally-billions/

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michaelflutist's avatar

Great reporting!

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Paleo's avatar

Gov. Gavin Newsom wants to ask voters in November to approve a series of new congressional maps to redistrict the state and combat a similar effort in Texas, he said Thursday. The special election would be held the first Tuesday of November, and the maps would be in effect for the 2026, 2028, and 2030 election cycles, before reverting back to the control of the state Citizen Redistricting Commission.

https://www.sacbee.com/news/politics-government/capitol-alert/article311540417.html#storylink=cpy

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Kevin H.'s avatar

This is what he came up with after all the tough talk? Why not take the opportunity to ditch the commission when voters are most prone too?

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Paleo's avatar

That's not clear. This is a smart way to do it, as a direct response to Texas, IMO.

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Kevin H.'s avatar

What's not clear?

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Paleo's avatar

It's not clear that a total repeal of the independent commission will pass.

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Kevin H.'s avatar

It's not clear this will pass. We'll just get screwed over in the next decade by these other states and California will still have it's stupid commission.

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sacman701's avatar

Voters would probably balk at repealing the commission outright. There's no need to gerrymander the state legislature because Dems always have 2/3 or more of both houses. The way they're doing it is smart. Draw the map first, and ask the voters to suspend the commission requirement to stop Trump.

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Aaron Apollo Camp's avatar

Wouldn't this special election have to be called by either the California Legislature or by voters in a petition drive? I don't think Newsom can do this unilaterally, although I might be wrong about that.

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Kevin H.'s avatar

The legislature can do it.

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JanusIanitos's avatar

Republicans are going to gerrymander as hard as they can after 2030 and next time there will be no backlash for them doing it mid-decade. Making this a temporary measure is emblematic of the short sighted thinking from our party that has weakened us so much politically.

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Paleo's avatar

It can always be revisited. The important thing now is to get something that is likely to pass now. Permanent elimination of the commission risks backfiring.

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michaelflutist's avatar

I shrugged in response. I don't know if you're right, but it's intuitive, as this is likely to be a tough thing to sell, regardless.

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JanusIanitos's avatar

Revisited with another ballot measure in 2031? Without the impetus of a backlash against republicans for "breaking the rules" by doing mid-decade redistricting to help a deeply unpopular president? Sounds like wishful thinking to me. It's kicking the can down the road.

More often than not, what we can get now is what we're going to get for the foreseeable future.

I don't think the temporary measure is any easier to sell to the public. Even adding in that extra line or two of description is a penalty as far as I'm concerned. People are less likely to vote for things the more complex that thing is. This could be a 1-2 sentence measure to vote on without the temporary qualifications added to it.

Keep things simple and don't play cute with voters.

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AnthonySF's avatar

I don’t know why it would risk backfiring any more than approving new maps would. New maps are ok in 2026-30 but voters put their foot down in 2032? Better to get rid of it all when voters are most inclined (unless there’s a legal reason of course).

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Paleo's avatar

In one you’re getting rid of the commission for good. In the other you’re responding to Texas’s mid-decade gerrymandering.

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AnthonySF's avatar

I understand that. But in practicality there is no difference. The hairs being split to voters would be immaterial, epically if the new map is for multiple cycles and not just this one cycle.

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Paleo's avatar

In terms of public relations there is.

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Paleo's avatar

Is no "name" Democrat going to run for the Florida senate seat? Seriously? It's bad enough that the likely nominee for governor is a former Republican (once again), but are there no elected representatives in the state willing to run for what is a quasi-open seat? No multi-millionaire willing to take a shot? Florida's primary is still over a year away, but still.

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John Carr's avatar

Who would run at this point in Florida?

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MPC's avatar

I would like to see Vindman run for the seat.

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Ron Britney's avatar

I’ve heard rumors that he’s considering

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dragonfire5004's avatar

We blew over $100m to try to win the Senate race in 2022. We lost by 15 in a year Democrats as a whole did remarkably well. Florida is gone and every Democrat knows it. Waste of money.

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Ron Britney's avatar

As a Florida Democrat I have to say you are correct. Unfortunately.

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dragonfire5004's avatar

Until the housing insurance market collapses from Florida basically being a swamp that floods daily and Republicans running roughshod for two decades uninterrupted, people won’t wake up from the stupor of their partisan preference. Not what I want, but it is the reality we face sadly.

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MPC's avatar

They need somebody to run against Ashley Moody -- who wasn't elected to the seat. Even if the FL Dem candidate loses, s/he can help gain seats down ballot in state legislature and judicial races.

Although they should probably run a Cuban or Venezuelan American for the seat.

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Paleo's avatar

NC Senate Emerson: Cooper 47 Whatley 41

Former Governor Cooper starts the race with a 19-point lead among independent voters, who support Cooper over Whatley, 47% to 28%. Cooper has a 25-point advantage on Whately among voters under 50, 54% to 29%, whereas Whatley leads with voters over 50 by 11 points, 52% to 41%.”

https://emersoncollegepolling.com/north-carolina-2026-poll-cooper-starts-us-senate-race-with-six-point-lead-and-clear-name-recognition-advantage-over-whatley/

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MPC's avatar

That's a good start. Hopefully people ignore the polling and cast their ballots in numbers too big for NC GOP simp Dave Boliek and NCSBE to ignore.

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Toiler On the Sea's avatar

Actually lower than you'd want to start at but Emerson has something in their secret sauce that keeps wide deltas in check.

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Kevin H.'s avatar

It's North Carolina, a reddish purple, Cooper ain't winning by more than 3 if he does win.

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Toiler On the Sea's avatar

I know but given Cooper is such a known commodity, Whatley is not a popular figure, NC polling skews blue, and the negative ads haven't started . .the race starting at Cooper +5 or below would IMO not be great.

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michaelflutist's avatar

I wouldn't make that assumption, as per Toiler On the Sea's points.

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hilltopper's avatar

Pretty solid starting point for Cooper for a race that will end up close.

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AnthonySF's avatar

I know the 50% incumbent rule has been a bit debunked (and Cooper is not the incumbent) but I’m actually surprised he isn’t at 50% yet. I feel like even Bredesen was there before predictably slipping.

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Conor Gallogly's avatar

If Kapos’s reporting is correct, Jackson Jr. will be starting to collect signatures before the legal start on Tuesday, August 5th. From page 7 of the 2026 Election & Campaign Finance Calendar. Starting his political comeback by disregarding state law would be very on brand for Jackson Jr.

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Jeff Singer's avatar

This is a very good catch, and the mistake is ours. What Kapos wrote was:

"Though Jackson’s still in the analysis phase, his exploratory committee will host an event Sunday to begin the process of collecting 10,000 signatures for nominating petitions.

"Starting Tuesday, candidates statewide can gather signatures for the 2026 campaign. Jackson’s team says it will also work to register 5,000 new voters in the process."

We've corrected the Digest. Thank you for flagging!

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Conor Gallogly's avatar

Thank you for acknowledging your mistake so quickly and clearly!

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Henrik's avatar

Today’s jobs number was on its own mediocre (73k) but more disastrous was revisions down to 20kish of the previous two months - why I always say “watch the revision” because gaudy initial numbers would get revised down in 2023-24 all the time.

But three sub-100k months like this is 2010-11 levels of employment production and augurs for a negative reading in the next 2-3 months even in a secularly tight labor market. This is not good

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Henrik's avatar

If you want evidence that Trump’s tariff policy is not work, well. Look no further

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dragonfire5004's avatar

When even Fox is saying the obvious, you know it’s really bad.

https://www.foxbusiness.com/economy/us-jobs-report-july-2025.amp

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Henrik's avatar

The headline tariff rates are bad enough (especially for construction related industries), but the arbitrariness and uncertainty makes it so much worse. Any kind of even medium range planning is impossible for businesses in this environment, whether mega corps or small biz.

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MPC's avatar

The orange TACO pushed back his tariff nonsense seven days but upped his tariffs on Canada from 25% to 35%. What a dumbass.

I hope the federal courts slap this down and that SCOTUS doesn't give him a procedural win on this BS.

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Henrik's avatar

We’re gonna see soon if the job of SCOTUS is to protect the GOP’s broader interests or Trump’s ego, because on the tariff matter they can’t coexist

Allegedly (and this is an internet rumor) Lutnick’s sons are taking bets through their hedge fund this all gets slapped down

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Tigercourse's avatar

Politically speaking, it would be best if it doesn't.

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PollJunkie's avatar

That too because of Carney's announcement on Palestine. It's just stupid to tariffs countries based on non-economic rationales like imprisonment for a coup, a corruption trial and foreign policy.

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Toiler On the Sea's avatar

Tariffs and federal job cuts won't be fully felt/reflected until the Fall.

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Buckeye73's avatar

Don't forget what will happen to food prices when the farmers can't get anyone to pick the crops.

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Tigercourse's avatar

Jobs down, inflation up, housing market sputtering (which I am frankly in favor of because it's the answer to our questions about how to improve affordability), Trump is doing a horrible job with the economy. I hope Dems can do as much as possible to remind voters that this is always the pattern. Republicans screw up the economy, Democrats put it back together.

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dragonfire5004's avatar

Tale as old as time.

Oh well, I’ll take a 2028 Democratic trifecta (and hopefully this time with a Democrat as president actually wanting to work on BUILDING THE PARTY EVERYWHERE unlike literally every Democratic president that gets elected) once voters realize how stupid they were to trade a 200k+ per month jobs economy with wages + buying power of poor people actually going up in favour of the conman that everyone wants to believe means a word he says and can actually achieve his economic promises.

Yeah Biden was old, yeah Harris was left, yeah inflation sucked, but anyone with a brain knew the data didn’t lie, there was an economic revival from the pandemic years being created, but now all that progress has been thrown away because voters didn’t like the cost of gas and groceries. Talk about a self own. I wonder if they like the price of things now after Trump implemented his tariff agenda which he promised over and over again in 2024. Too late to save the US from recession, but maybe enough time to save a 2008-like economic collapse.

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Henrik's avatar

I think this undervalues the anecdotal experience people had in the post-COVID economy that we were stupid in hindsight to dismiss, but at the same time, the buzz around the economy sputtering the last couple of months now finally has supportive data - so that cuts both ways.

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Brad Warren's avatar

The problem is that there were essentially two ways that the post-covid economic recovery could have played out, neither of them painless: (1.) slow job growth/wage gains resulting in higher unemployment and lower (but still rising) inflation, or (2.) faster job growth fueled by government spending resulting in low unemployment and higher inflation.

Biden chose the second option, and I still feel it was the right way to go. We tried the first option after 2008 and it was a disaster, especially for young people.

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PollJunkie's avatar

🎯

"We", more like Emanuel and Axelrod for Obama after he never campaigned on it. Both of them are the swamp.

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John Carr's avatar

Dems suffered way less under Biden downballot than Clinton or Obama. I guess a lot of that is because Dems were starting from a much lower base under Biden. He and Dems also knew from the start that they had to cut Republicans out of the process on the stimulus bill and Dems went right to reconciliation to pass it with 50 votes (like Obama and Dems should have done in early 2009).

But yeah the next Dem trifecta needs to immediately start passing legislation to help the party’s future (start with strict national redistricting rules).

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MPC's avatar

DC statehood also needs to be in the top five priorities a federal Democratic trifecta needs to do. That's when the filibuster carveout comes into play. And enshrining Roe into federal statute.

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PollJunkie's avatar

Then add DC, Puerto Rico and lock them out of power. Enact universal healthcare, expand voting rights, enact a national redistricting commission and let Republicans experiment trying to take away public insurance which would then insure a large share of wealthy and middle class Americans too. Just imagine the 4 new solidly progressive Senate seats and the House seats. PR voted Harris by a huge margin during last year's straw poll. Just end the filibuster and let America function like a normal democracy.

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PollJunkie's avatar

Puerto Rico and independent redistricting too.

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JanusIanitos's avatar

I think the difference between Biden and Obama/Clinton downballot really comes down to Dobbs and only having a single midterm. We had a horrendous 2021, even nearly losing NJ's gubernatorial election that year.

I do think the legislative process was handled clearly better under Biden, though I doubt that impacted the following elections much. Instead it impacted how much we were able to get done.

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Brad Warren's avatar

I'm not sure 2021 can be considered "horrendous" given that Democrats held up pretty well in special elections (NM-1, Newsom recall), Phil Murphy was the first Democratic New Jersey Governor to be re-elected since Brendan Byrne in 1977, and even Glenn Youngkin's victory was far more modest than, say, Bob McDonnell's in 2009.

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JanusIanitos's avatar

Not disputing any of that, but NJ and VA had changed a lot by 2021.

In 2008, Obama won Virginia by six points while winning nationally by seven points. It was the state closest to the national margin and nearly the tipping point state. In 2020 Biden won Virginia by ten points while winning nationally by four points. In 2020 Virginia voted to the left of New Hampshire and Maine, and nearly identically to New Mexico. And clearly to the left of all of the swing states. Virginia had gone from a swing state to a light blue one. We also lost all of the other statewide elections in Virginia that year and lost the house of delegates too.

NJ doesn't have the same story to tell as it had been ~10-15 point margins for us throughout most of this time frame, but it had been doing well for us with the late 10s realignments. We had won 10/12 of house seats there in 2020 despite operating under maps that had favored republicans. Going into 2021 I don't recall a single person being remotely worried about Murphy's chances of winning reelection. Cook and Inside both had it as Solid D, and Sabato had it as Likely D.

I feel comfortable calling it horrendous, but I get why you'd disagree and would suggest less strong language.

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michaelflutist's avatar

Yes on all, except Harris was never that "left". Signed, your resident pragmatic socialist.

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stevk's avatar

100% agree that Harris was not particularly left (in fact, she was branded as too far right while in CA, due to her past as a DA). Signed, a moderate

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Avedee Eikew's avatar

"But the tariffs will create more jobs!" -Too many people in September of 2024.

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Henrik's avatar

The number of people who still claim “other countries pay them to access our market” baffles me. If that was the case free trade would never have taken off anywhere in the world!

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dragonfire5004's avatar

Oh the world of the uneducated. It pains me to see them in action.

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MPC's avatar

My MAGA brother is still deluded about how the tariffs are "great for the country." He kept insisting that Trump was a smart man and even though he didn't like Obama, he thought since Obama was smart, FDJT was too (and why he got elected).

The cognitive dissonance is real with MAGA voters.

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dragonfire5004's avatar

Would love to hear what he says about the jobs report. My guess is something along the lines of “the new actual rich people and corporate giveaway again bill that I bizarrely believe gives everyone tax cuts and will stimulate the economy from no taxes on tips” hasn’t been enacted yet, just you wait until the impact of that great bill gets felt by everyone. There’s always another goalpost to move for these people.

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MPC's avatar

I should've brought up the Epstein files, like "Republicans are too busy covering up Trump being in the Epstein files than lowering costs for Americans."

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JanusIanitos's avatar

Things like that are one of the greater examples of how the dumbing down and focus on "neutrality" for the media are harming us. Both us as in the nation but also us as in democrats.

I doubt you'd have found better knowledge of how tariffs worked in 1995, 1975, or 1955 either. The difference is that back then the mainstream media would have reported that tariffs don't work that way and people would have largely (if begrudgingly) accepted that.

That isn't what happens any more. Any time there's an instance of reporting that republicans lied or are wrong it gets major pushback across the media, even from other journalists. There is a hyper-focus on allowing voters to being as "neutral" as possible and refusing to state that XYZ is true or false in blunt, direct terms. Then add in the existence and growth of Fox as a conservative echo chamber that can muddy the water on demand for their talking points.

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Henrik's avatar

It’s mind boggingly short sighted that they’ve let themselves get cowed this way. It doesn’t even help their bottom lines!

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JanusIanitos's avatar

Originally I think it was them being cowed, as you say. Republicans played the refs for decades and got enormous benefit from it.

Today? Today it's more a consequence of the ownership class being conservatives across the media landscape. All the mainstream media is owned by either mega corps or rich people. WaPo is owned by Bezos, MSNBC is owned by Comcast, CNN by Warner, ABC by Disney... Etc. They have grown increasingly comfortable and confident with using that ownership to push politics in a direction that favors them. Which, while unfortunate, is a rather natural and logical course of action for them to make.

The problem is nobody on the left seems to be trying to do anything similar. Not that even the left leaning billionaires are all that great either, but you'd expect some effort from the likes of them. It's cheaper than tossing nine figure checks at a super PAC every two years.

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Buckeye73's avatar

Unfortunately, that sentiment plays very well in the rust belt Midwest where many people are living in the past and they think that if we just started up some tariffs then the old factories will come back to their dying hometown.

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Brad Warren's avatar

Yep. I grew up in one of those towns.

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Buckeye73's avatar

So did I. The sad part is that they have no interest in jobs that may realistically come to their area in renewable energy or in battery plants for EV's because those jobs are "woke". There is a strong Luddite element to Trump's appeal in the Midwest.

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Brad Warren's avatar

If memory serves me, the 2023-24 downward revisions were never as dramatic as the ones that dropped today (and there were some upward revisions in the mix, too).

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Henrik's avatar

Correct

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brendan fka HoosierD42's avatar

CA-45: Michelle Steel is not seeking a rematch with Derek Tran.

https://x.com/cameron_arcand/status/1951049820816416912

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MPC's avatar

She knows with the blue wave AND the California redistricting Newsom is putting on the ballot, she's TOAST.

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dragonfire5004's avatar

That’s great news, because it’s easy to snap back to previous political orientation after a new switch of voter preference. Even in a 2026 Trump midterm. Would be nice for once to flip a red seat and easily hold it.

Also another tea leaf among Republicans that think 2026 is going to be brutal for their party at the ballot box. Why run when you don’t think you can win?

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Jenni from Raleigh's avatar

Whatley was also heavily involved in Jefferson Griffin's case to have 65,000 votes tossed in the NC Supreme Court race, a race Griffin lost to Allison Riggs by about 740 votes (confirmed with two recounts). I expect NC's voter suppression efforts to ramp up significantly.

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brendan fka HoosierD42's avatar

Did the scheme to put the Board of Elections under the Auditor get validated by SCONC?

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MPC's avatar
Aug 1Edited

SCONC has not ruled on it... yet. But they allowed the takeover to get underway in the meantime -- which is a good indication they'll rule in favor of the NC GOP.

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MPC's avatar

Oh, for sure. But while the NC GOP succeeded in getting the photo ID constitutional amendment enacted two years ago, their hands are tied with trying to tighten it further. Because of the amendment they simply can't remove physical college student or state employee IDs from the list of IDs voters can use like their counterparts in TX, OH, IN and ID have done. They can't even remove the ID exemption form. They would have to put another constitutional amendment on the ballot to do that.

Will they minimize or make early voting precincts harder to get to? Yes. Will they toss uncured provisional ballots? Yes. Will there be litigation regarding close results like the Riggs/Griffin fight? Yes.

But the Riggs/Griffin fight awakened a sleeping giant here in North Carolina. It ticked off Griffin voters who were not just on the list but wanted him to concede. It ticked off Riggs voters who even weren't on the list.

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hilltopper's avatar

I hope Whatley's attempt to take away the votes of so many people will be in early and frequent attack ads.

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MPC's avatar

Whatley supports FDJT's disastrous policies. Cooper hitting Whatley HARD on tariffs, job losses and Medicaid loss makes a better point than just voter suppression.

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michaelflutist's avatar

Why not both/all? There will be a series of ads.

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MPC's avatar

If anyone that's going to get hit HARD on their "trying to steal your vote" antics, it will be the seditious three SCONC justices (Newby, Berger Jr., Barringer) and NC Court of Appeals judge Jefferson Griffin in 2028.

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Diogenes's avatar

Ed Case won his first full term to Hawaii's 1st congressional district by defeating Mike Gabbard, father of the egregious Tulsi Gabbard. Father and daughter followed opposite political trajectories. While Mike later switched from Republican to Democrat, his daughter, who was elected to Hawaii's 2nd congressional district as a Democrat, has since become a MAGA sycophant.

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dragonfire5004's avatar

Biden: Jobs report of 150k far below expectations, recession worries loom.

Trump: Here’s why 30k jobs being created each month could be a good thing for Republicans.

The job market isn't as good as we thought. There might be an upside for Trump.

BY VICTORIA GUIDA

https://www.politico.com/news/2025/08/01/jobs-report-federal-reserve-interest-rates-00488229

They’ll never stop and never learn *shakes head*

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MPC's avatar

Politico is a RW media rag. They did several fawning pieces over that meathead governor in FL several years ago.

*gag*

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Guy Cohen's avatar

A few days ago there was also backlash about them making the NYC shooting about Mamdani.

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Burt Kloner's avatar

cuomo also did that!

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Kevin H.'s avatar

They started about the same time as FAUX news, they've always been slanted right

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Brad Warren's avatar

I actually called them "Foxitico" back in the day.

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Brad Warren's avatar

Even the GOOD jobs reports under Biden (and there were many) were trashed as "drivers of inflation."

What the moneyed backers of the mainstream media wanted post-2020 was another economy like the one that followed the Great Recession (i.e., years of persistent high unemployment driving down wages). They were BIG mad that it didn't happen (and are almost certainly hoping that Trump finishes the job).

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PollJunkie's avatar

The mainstream media still tries to blame the IRA for global COVID and Russian invasion induced inflation.

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Tim Nguyen's avatar

I've recently been questioning the wisdom of having high profile candidates mull their bids for statewide offices - whether it's Peltola in Alaska or Harris potentially going for CA governor. At 1 level I think it's fine and we start with strong candidates. But on the other, it tends to suck the oxygen out of the room. No one else has a remote chance to fundraise, let alone build up name recognition or a platform. Granted, it can work out, like with in North Carolina and Roy Cooper, but many of those candidates at least are established.

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Techno00's avatar

I wish Peltola would run for Senate honestly. It would benefit Dems to a greater degree than her running for Governor would.

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AWildLibAppeared's avatar

The problem is Peltola had Murkowski's tacit support to run for an open House seat, which helped her win. She can't afford to lose that. Despite their political differences, Murkowski seems to have a good working relationship with Sullivan.

I'd also like to see Peltola run for the US Senate, but she should only do so if there is a path to victory. She might stand a better chance at winning an open race for Governor.

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Kevin H.'s avatar

Dems need to start telling murkowski to take a hike. Lot of good she did to help peltola win reelection

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Zero Cool's avatar

That’s great but she’s not up for re-election until 2028.

It’s Dan Sullivan who we need to start going after.

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stevk's avatar

Absolutely not. We need her vote on a variety of things and should be treating her with kid gloves...

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Brad Warren's avatar

I think that Sarah Palin was far more helpful to Mary Peltola than Murkowski ever was.

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Avedee Eikew's avatar

I feel that way with ME-Sen and Janet Mills. I have strong reservations about her age but if she really wants to do this I'd rather she announce sooner then later.

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JanusIanitos's avatar

I get the impression that Mills would rather let someone else take the shot, someone who could serve for multiple terms without age issues. But if nobody more serious runs she's willing to do what needs to be done.

Problem is her having that out in the open makes it harder to get someone else to jump in.

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Buckeye73's avatar

Normally I would not support running someone in their late 70's for a Senate race, I would make an exception if she is our best bet to finally get rid of Susan Collins.

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Brad Warren's avatar

Maine is such an idiosyncratic state that I honestly have no idea what the best path forward would be.

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stevk's avatar

Agree...get rid of Collins and THEN figure out how to get a younger D in place. For this year we need to choose whoever has the best shot at her....

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Steven Gould Axelrod's avatar

California has at least a half dozen strong candidates running for governor: Katie Porter (everyone's MSNBC girlfriend), Xavier Becerra (Biden cabinet member), Antonio Villaraigosa (former mayor of L. A.), and others who are well-known and respected locally if not nationally. Harris did not harm at all.

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Burt Kloner's avatar

like I said yesterday..."tariff downturn" among other things starting to tank the economy

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MPC's avatar

And then add MAGA angry with FDJT covering up the Epstein files. Could be a recipe for a perfect electoral storm come 2026.

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Martybooks's avatar

And now the economy will really collapse. TRump fires the head of the Bureau of Labor Statistics. https://x.com/yashar/status/1951345703990522283

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Henrik's avatar

Ahh yes when the numbers don’t comport with your feelings, fire the people who publish the numbers

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Paleo's avatar

The numbers will be fake from here on out.

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Brad Warren's avatar

Which was always the endgame.

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Henrik's avatar

BLS numbers are always super quirky initially and there’s an argument that they should have a two month rather than one month trail, but yeah this ain’t it.

Businesses need good data to function but apparently MAGA would rather have a command economy I guess?

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Steven Gould Axelrod's avatar

Trumps paranoia and narcissism were on full display in that decision. God help us.

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Brad Warren's avatar

But I thought Trump ReSpOnDeD tO tHe MaRkEt.

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Guy Cohen's avatar

Is there any chance she defies Trump and stays in her job anyway?

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MPC's avatar

I hope she lawyered up and files a lawsuit against TACO. Absolutely appalling.

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michaelflutist's avatar

Is that possible?

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Aaron Apollo Camp's avatar

Newsom floats a trial balloon for the mother of all California gerrymanders:

https://www.instagram.com/p/DM0ma8zTc3i/?igsh=MTBmMjA0ODNmNjJ4Zg==

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michaelflutist's avatar

Is it possible to make all 52 districts blue? Baconmanders? Where is abgin when we need him?

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Brad Warren's avatar

It's possible to make a 52-seat map in which every district is at least Harris+10, per Election Twitter.

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michaelflutist's avatar

Crazy!

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Brad Warren's avatar

Yep—especially with the knowledge that 2024 was not exactly a great year for California Democrats.

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michaelflutist's avatar

Did Harris get no home state advantage?

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brendan fka HoosierD42's avatar

Every county except Alpine swung right from 2020

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Steven Gould Axelrod's avatar

We did win three House seats from Republicans in California in 2024. Derek Tran, George Whitesides, and Adam Gray. We didn't lose any. That was with non-gerrymandered districts. Not a bad year in this regard. If only other states had done as well.

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Burt Kloner's avatar

People around the country don't realize how badly California republicans suck. I live in south Orange County and in my neighborhood there are more Rs than Ds and just about every R I talk to hates trump. My grand daughters dance teacher could run for Governor as a Dem and finish in the top 2.

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michaelflutist's avatar

It sounds like the Republicans you know don't suck that bad.

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stevk's avatar

Yeah, I read that comment the same way and was also confused...

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Kevin H.'s avatar

LOL hey partisan redistricting is completely legal

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MPC's avatar

Yeah, as the John Roberts SCOTUS says. Racial gerrymandering = bad, partisan gerrymandering = hokey dokey!

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Mr. Rochester's avatar

Honestly, I used to have reservations about being this aggressive, but that part of me is gone. If they want to screw us out of 9-12 seats nationally by redrawing every map they can and the only map we can potentially redraw is California, then god bless. Democrats need to figure out a way of banning gerrymandering on the federal level, though, because this is getting insane and I'd like an off ramp, please.

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Kevin H.'s avatar

I doubt Newsom will go this far, big problem is all the congresscritters will complain about not being in 100% safe districts, so i'd say they'll leave about 4-5 repugs left.

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michaelflutist's avatar

If he wouldn't go that far, do you think he was joking?

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AnthonySF's avatar

He didn’t post the map, just retweeted with a jokey emoji. A potential issue is, as mentioned above, once all the Dem members weigh in I bet the map will be much shittier than one you or I would draw on DRA.

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michaelflutist's avatar

Not unlikely, unfortunately.

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PPTPW (NST4MSU)'s avatar

You don’t think incumbents would be okay with +10 districts if it meant being in the majority?

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AnthonySF's avatar

Sadly no. I’ve been part of redistricting fights in a couple states and members are ridiculously parochial. “I need that precinct because my friend lives there. I need this GOP precinct because the voters there really know me personally.” You saw this in 2010 and 2020 where some Dems insisted on packing their districts just to be safe at the expense of nearby swingy members.

You need a strong hand to just say, fuck it, this is the map. Hopefully Gavin does that..

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Paleo's avatar

Not helpful.

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Avedee Eikew's avatar

*Do it Gif. Seriously it's long past time for the FO part of FAFO.

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michaelflutist's avatar

Please have a look at this article and explain why it's not true if you have a good reason not to believe it: https://thiswillhold.substack.com/p/ex-cia-whistleblower-the-nsa-audited

First paragraph:

“In December 2024, I was personally involved in an NSA‑authorized forensic audit of the 2024 election. Kamala Harris and Tim Walz won—by a wide margin. Trump lost dramatically. There are multiple layers of complexity to this cover‑up, including transnational organized crime syndicates that extend far beyond the United States and our elections. To that point, I work in the human trafficking sector, which intersects with the stolen election(s) and has ties to Trump and Epstein—not to President Biden, Vice President Harris, or Governor Walz, but to the Democrats and other allied interests responsible for burying the audit.” — Adam Zarnowski, ex-CIA agent and author of Jörmungandr

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michaelflutist's avatar

Weird part of this: what would any Democrats gain from burying the audit, and what power do they have to do so? But anyway, it's a severe allegation by someone who sounds like they would know, so why should we not believe it?

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MPC's avatar

We really need hard proof of this. Not just hearsay from an ex-CIA agent or what they write on their Substack.

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michaelflutist's avatar

How do we get hard proof if it's being covered up?

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MPC's avatar

We need a whistleblower who has the evidence or something that leads to it.

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michaelflutist's avatar

And doesn't get killed first...

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Techno00's avatar

And given how insane this last election has been, by now a hypothetical whistleblower would have already leaked the details. That we don’t have one doesn’t strike me as leading credence to this theory.

EDIT: On that note, I find it odd that the midterms aren’t even mentioned in the Substack. Pretty fucking important election to leave out of such a serious alllegation.

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michaelflutist's avatar

How long did it take for the details of Nixon's treason before the 1968 election to come out? Reagan and his people successfully covered up the details of the 1980 treason for quite a while, didn't they?

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Paleo's avatar

That’s not the same as manipulating the numbers. This is not a rabbit hole I’d like to go down.

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FeingoldFan's avatar

Obviously this didn’t happen. There wasn’t a transnational organized crime syndicate that convinced the Democratic secretaries of state in Michigan and Arizona to change vote totals in their states in the presidential race but let Elissa Slotkin and Ruben Gallego win, it’s an absurd idea.

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michaelflutist's avatar

That part does sound absurd.

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PPTPW (NST4MSU)'s avatar

Yeah - it doesn’t add up on that level . However if the code was written only for the presidential line than it would make sense.

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JanusIanitos's avatar

I'm going to be skeptical of claims of election fraud until and unless I see solid evidence. It's too dangerous and too easy of a trap to fall into to believe such claims without that evidence.

Election fraud generally has discernible patterns that analysts can pick up. I also do not understand why people committing such fraud would have democrats do better in swing states relative to everywhere else: this requires fraud not just in PA, WI, MI, etc. but also in NY, CA, MA, TX...

The extent of it would be substantial and is hard to give credence to without solid evidence.

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FeingoldFan's avatar

And even ignoring all of that, if there had been election fraud on that scale Republicans would have won more of the competitive Senate and House races than they did. If people really believe the vote totals were changed, they’d have to believe that Republicans wanted Tammy Baldwin, Elissa Slotkin, Jacky Rosen, etc. to win, which they obviously didn’t.

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michaelflutist's avatar

Hypotheetically, making the results closer but still a trifecta could have been smart.

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JanusIanitos's avatar

All of that. Plus, if the NSA found this out, they would have been looking into this before the inauguration. Even if the analysis wasn't complete by then they would have had substantial evidence and reason to suspect foul play.

Are we to believe that Biden's own NSA appointees covered this up?

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michaelflutist's avatar

I would doubt that.

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Justin Gibson's avatar

Tyrant 47 issues politically-motivated firing of Bureau of Labor Statistics Commissioner Erika McEntarfer in retaliation for today's pathetic jobs report.

https://www.democracydocket.com/news-alerts/trump-fire-bureau-labor-statistics-commissioner-mcentarfer-negative-jobs-report/

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MPC's avatar

McEntarfer needs to sue him for everything he's got and get reinstated. This should alarm Republicans as well as Democrats.

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Paleo's avatar

I think he has the authority to fire her, but she could sue him for libel.

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Ethan (KingofSpades)'s avatar

He was briefed on the numbers yesterday. Did they use the most positive spin possible when they told him and then when everyone else said it sucks today, he flipped out? I would assume they focused like a laser on the "more native-born Americans gained jobs than the jobs foriegn-born Americans and legal residents lost." Naturally, they knew he'd get off on naturalized citizens and green card holders being SoL.

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