Afternoon/morning all. Congrats again on a remarkable No Kings Day celebration. Millions and millions showed up in small towns and big ones to call for a better day for this great country. Yesterday’s post features reports, photos and videos from Hopium community members across the country. Get to it when you can, and thank every one of you who marched, protested, sang and waved your flag this weekend.
This morning I sat down with Maryland Senator Chris Van Hollen, an old friend, for a wide ranging conversation about this moment of in a time of national emergency. We dive into his successful effort to bring Kilmar Abrego Garcia home; his fight to preserve science, research and our public health systems; we get his reaction to the assassination of a Democratic leader in Minnesota, the assault on Senator Padilla and Trump’s fascistic immigration escalation; and hear his thoughts on where we are now with the reconciliation bill. A recording and transcript is above.
We end the interview with him urging us to keep contacting Senate and House offices to stop the rancid reconciliation bill, and with me thanking him for his inspirational leadership in a challenging time for the nation. Get to the conversation when you can - it’s a great way to kick off this next chapter for all of us after No Kings.
Related Hopium Materials
My latest video and written analysis on why I think the growing sense that the Trump project is failing is driving his dramatic immigration escalation. Also catch my new discussion with Stuart Stevens, one of the smartest and most interesting commentators in American politics today.
Trump’s Escalating Migrant Terror Campaign Is Unpopular, Out Of Control, Inhumane and Doing Enormous Harm To The Country - a comprehensive look at Trump’s immigration escalation and his new commitment to forcibly remove 10-15m people from the country.
New interviews with former Rep. Joe Garcia on how Trump’s immigration escalation is playing in Florida (not well) and with prominent Mexican-American journalist Leon Krauze on what he saw on the ground in Los Angeles last week (not good). These interviews are essential viewing for those who want to go deeper into the issue.
A new interview with Stand Up For Science’s Colette Delawalla on why we must keep fighting Trump and Kennedy’s extraordinary assault on science, research, academia and public health.
Remember you can find all of my interviews/podcasts on the Hopium site under Podcast and on YouTube, Apple Podcasts and Spotify.
Hopium is also now posting on Instagram, TikTok and Twitter. You can also always find me on Bluesky where I post frequently throughout the day.
Another Bad Poll For Trump - A new poll from highly regarded data guy G. Elliott Morris shows how degraded Trump now is (this data is very consistent with the data we saw last week). -14 job approval, deeply underwater on the issues that matter most, in negative territory now on immigration and deportations.
We also have a large lead in the generic ballot:
Friends, Trump is stumbling, and we just have to keep working as hard as we can now……
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Stop The Reconciliation Bill - Job One for us this summer remains fighting Trump’s ruinous economic agenda. We need to keep calling every day and demand our leaders vote down the reconciliation bill and roll back Trump’s terrible tariffs. This is the big, definitional battle of the summer and we need keep working it every day. Those of you in states with Republican Senators have a particularly important role to play in the coming weeks.
Get The Military Off Our Streets, Fight Trump’s Inhumane Immigration Escalation - Contact your Rep and Senators to demand they fight Trump’s illegal use of the National Guard and Marines in California. Encourage Democrats at all levels of government to a stand with Governor Newsom and the California - for Trump is not just attacking California, he is attacking the rights and freedoms of all of us.
Own The Fourth, The Flag And Patriotism - To keep our momentum going after this weekend’s No Kings events I encourage to explore ways of Owning The Fourth and make our Independence Day an ugly one for our mad wannabe king. We heard from Hopium community member Deborah Potter last week about her work advancing “resolutions of disapproval” in New Mexico. Will have more on that for you in the coming days.
Stand Up For Science - Sign on to the critically important Bethesda Declaration and watch my interview with Stand Up For Science’s Executive Director Colette Delawalla. Signing on to the Declaration is one concrete way you can take action today.
Here’s a possible script to use to fight the reconciliation bill and tariffs. Use whatever works for you:
I am calling to urge you to vote against the reconciliation bill and to roll back Trump’s terrible and illegal tariffs. Together these actions have raised taxes on all of us and will explode the deficit - things Republicans have always told us they did not believe in.
But your agenda is also causing all of us to “pay more and get less” for every day things including our health care; people to loses their jobs; and the economy to slow - all so you can give your rich donors a huge tax break. Your plans will weaken this great country and are an extraordinary betrayal of everything you promised during the campaign - which was to help people like me, not Elon Musk, get ahead.
Your plans are ones of sabotage, surrender and betrayal and I urge you to abandon them and to work with Democrats to find a better way.
Please self-report your activities to our daily paid subscriber chat. These reports help inspire all of us to do more and fight harder!
Growing Hopium - We’ve set a goal of trying to grow the Hopium community from the 151,000 we are now to 175,000 by Labor Day. Do what you can to encourage your friends, family and colleagues to become a summer subscriber to Hopium, free or paid. To encourage the growth of our community annual paid subscriptions are 10% off through Labor Day and we’ve launched a new referral awards program too. So you can earn months towards a paid subscription by bringing in new subscribers to the Hopium community!
Keep working hard all. Proud to be in this fight with all of you - and a fight it truly is - Simon
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