Is there plenty of voter suppression, certainly, not all to the but to the extent that elections are unwinnable at all yet

There is still room to fight even if the conditions are not what they should be

I mean in Odessa Texas this December, Dems won a city council seat with in a district that voted 70% for Trump. And the dem who won was also gay too - and still won in that super trump heavy district

It’s also worth noting that dem house leadership spoke against it explicitly too. For instance, Hakeem Jefferies, the Dem House Minority Leader, wrote against it before the vote too

The House Republican Child Predator Empowerment Act does not promote fairness and safety in sports.

It will unleash horrific child predators on girls and young women throughout America.

Unacceptable.

https://bsky.app/profile/hakeem-jeffries.bsky.social/post/3lfpl3s35v22s

The Dem House Whip, Whip Clark, made similar remarks on the house floor

While I am here, I will say to make sure to contact your senators on HR 28, regardless of party, so they know how strongly people feel about it and ensure it doesn’t get past the senate filibuster. It can make more of a difference than you might think

https://www.senate.gov/senators/senators-contact.htm

I disagree that it’s only elected representatives that can fight. We the people can, even if that’s just pressuring our elected officials to do the right thing. Enough pushback does change votes and actions

We can vote in local and statewide race. There are some local races in 2025 in Texas and other states

We can run for office ourselves for local and statewide elections too. There’s groups like Run for Something that help progressives run and make sure no seat goes unchallenged

We can organize unions to protect our labor rights

and so on

Yes, we won’t win every fight, but we can still block a lot of horrible things

Yep it is good news, especially given that Paxton ran a whole pressure campaign on Republicans and yet wasn’t able to get it through

Also is reminder that we can resist the far right if and when we fight

What are Dems supposed to do here exactly that they’re not already doing. Please elaborate with specifics because I am very very tired of comments like this without any specific critiques. The title isn’t reflecting what they are doing. They aren’t boycotting, they are specifically trying to block republicans from doing anything until the special election where the chamber will become tied

They are already getting in the mud a bit here by trying to stop the session until the special election. They have made a lot of moves here to block Republicans. They swore in dems early so that they could block quorum and they did so in secret to catch Republicans off gaurd, Gov Tim Walz called the special election as soon as possible despite republicans trying to push the date further out, they had the Democratic secretary of state declare no quorum was met so that they have great merit for legal challenges if republicans try and ignore the law, etc.

Edit: also the Minnesota Secretary of State just came out and said they intend to file suit to challange Republicans ignoring his declaration of no quorum and adjournment

https://www.sos.state.mn.us/about-the-office/news-room/secretary-simon-statement-on-opening-session-of-the-minnesota-house-of-representatives/

Burrows (R-Lubbock) emerged as the “establishment” candidate, favored by representatives who have long served in the Legislature and are willing to work with their Democratic counterparts—a notable difference from Cook, who supported not appointing any Democrats to positions of power within the legislative body’s committees.

The texas state house has 83 Republicans and 67 Democrats for reference

Article seems to suggest that the government might be trying to make these plans without ByteDance’s knowledge

It’s unclear whether ByteDance knows about the Chinese government’s plans and TikTok and Musk’s involvement in the discussions, the report said. Senior Chinese officials are debating contingency plans involving TikTok’s future in the U.S. as part of larger discussions about working with President-elect Donald Trump, the report added.

A TikTok spokesperson said in an email to CNBC, “We can’t be expected to comment on pure fiction.” X didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.

Some platforms might be redeemable and worth that fight, others I fear are beyond saving in their current form

There’s an algorithmic component here though that is going to make anything like that extremely uphill

Meta has to want to follow Musks as example explicitly. If he look at Musk, that’s a worrying trajectory. Elon Musk specifically boosts his own posts on Twitter over others even if you don’t follow him. He downranks anything with the word cisgender. He boosts accounts that pay him for checkmarks and has taken those checkmarks away from people who criticize him

Helpful links on how to delete stuff that’s meta owned

Permanently Delete Your Facebook Account

Permanently delete or deactivate your Instagram account

Deleting your WhatsApp account

He already was found guilty on 34 counts by a jury in May. This is about his sentencing

That’s not what the article said. Read the next paragraph. They vote to let it go to the floor where they plan to vote against it there

Voting to print the bill means we have the chance to debate it, challenge it, and vote against it on the record with our colleagues

States laws will matter a hell of a lot. When roe was overturned things immediately fell to the states. That’s the most likely way the court would overturn gay marriage should they go for it

In terms of trans rights that is unfortunately more true lately, yes, though historically any transphobic dems have lost their primaries. We can and should challenge there again

Democrats have made serious effort to codify a lot of marriage equality at state and federal level specifically to try to push back against this kind of stuff

For instance, the federal resepct for marriage act

RFMA officially repealed DOMA and requires the federal government to recognize same-sex and interracial marriages, codifying parts of Obergefell, the 2013 ruling in United States v. Windsor, and the 1967 ruling in Loving v. Virginia

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Respect_for_Marriage_Act

State level intatives have removed bans from many state laws and constitutions such as California

Democrats in Virginia are trying to pass constitutional ammendments to remove it right now that they have a majority in both chambers. They removed bans from the state law already

And so on

Stop with the “both sides” here

Edit: and to clarify if you were reading only the pull quote, the very next paragraph is about how they are voting against this resolution when it gets to the floor

They are already pointing out how it’s a distraction. The media just gives all the preference towards hearing Trump, so you didn’t hear them calling him out

Everyday Americans are fed up with the high cost of living.

Stop the foolishness about Greenland, Panama or the Gulf of Mexico.

Let’s solve the problems that matter.

https://bsky.app/profile/hakeem-jeffries.bsky.social/post/3lfasm4akss2c

What does renaming the Gulf of Mexico have to do with lowering the cost of living in America?

Absolutely nothing.

https://bsky.app/profile/hakeem-jeffries.bsky.social/post/3lf66dkh2uc24

5% isn’t often but it does happen - even if it has to take a lot of pushback to happen. For one example of a plan modified to be a bit less bad after pushback

U.S. Senator Rick Scott on Friday revised his plan to end all federal programs after five years to exclude the popular Social Security and Medicare programs, after enduring weeks of mounting criticism from Democrats and his fellow Republicans.

[…]

While Scott’s plan did not directly call for an end to the Social Security and Medicare plans for older Americans, it had not specifically excluded them until he changed his position on Friday.

https://www.reuters.com/world/us/republican-us-senator-rick-scott-drops-plan-cut-social-security-medicare-2023-02-17/

No, people didn’t vote for policy here. They voted for a person

I mean Project 2025 only had a 4% approval (and a 57% disapproval rating) but obviously that wasn’t reflected in how people voted

People really did believe his lies that he wouldn’t do that kind of stuff

Don’t assume it’s universally true on all issues. Horrible people can randomly turn out to care on random issues you’d never think they would even if they’re horrible 95% of the time. Or maybe can be convinced because of selfish reasons

Maybe you are, but the media tends to only hold on to a few things at a time. He wants to make it his stupid things like “Gulf of America” instead of “Gulf of Mexico” take up that spot. Not his insane pick for departments, not his plans for cutting social security, etc.

Authoritarian leaders do this all the time. They’ll even use it to hide their actual expansionist plans. They’ll threaten all kinds of people that they have no real intention of doing anything to so that actual military movments are drowned out as just noise

We have to be much more strategic about when we raise hell otherwise you’ll appear to be the boy who cried wolf and won’t be taken seriously. We can’t be at defcon 1 at all times or it loses all meaning

If you focus on every single one as gospel you’ll be tripped up both ways. He is a walking contradiction of statements

In his first term he told North Korea there’d be “fire and fury like the world has never seen” and then the next minute was cosying up to him in a summit

He says anything and everything. He is certainly expansionist don’t get me wrong, but focusing on individual statements will lose you the picture of where he is serious and where he isn’t

Focus on who he appointments, what actions they take, what executive orders he signs, what he does with the military, etc.

None of this is new. Trump repeatedly brought up buying greenland during the first term when it was a suitable distraction from some other issue

Focus more on his actions, less on his words. If you focus only on his words you’ll miss the bigger picture and miss what he really intends to do

Calling your senators is one simple place to start

Indivisible has some listed if you want something more focused

https://indivisible.org/take-action-now