Morning all. Been a week! The proud plucky patriots of this remarkable community gathered last night for our weekly get together. It was a lively affair, as they all are. A video recording and rough transcript are above. Here is some of what we discussed:
Greater MAGA Continues To Weaken - Orban fell. Failed wars are doing significant harm to the political projects of Trump, Putin, Bibi. A flailing and unpopular Trump appears to be on the verge of formally accepting his surrender to Iran, perhaps driven by heavy pressure from the Gulf Arab states who are so desperate to return to normalcy and start rebuilding from the devastation of Trump’s failed and illegal war. This will be a blow to Bibi in Israel too as it establishes Iran as a far more powerful regional player, confirming what a strategic disaster the war has been for both the US and Israel.
It is becoming clearer every day what historic and undeniable fuck ups these three vainglorious, corrupt, and fanatical strongmen are.
Zelenskyy has become the leader of the Free World, Putin continues to lose his war, and Bibi’s coalition trails in the upcoming October elections (Oct 26):
While we have much work to do the weakening of these three is a critical step in our ultimate mission here which is to see a new birth of freedom here, and everywhere, in a world of predatory strongmen and oligarchs. And here we celebrate the wins when they come, acknowledge the progress we make each day - and the weakening of these three is clear undeniable progress everyone….
Trump’s Regime Has Failed And The Election Is Trending Towards Us - The signs of his failure and betrayal are all around us - failed war/higher prices/weaker America, tariffs/higher prices/damage to small businesses and farmers, gutted health care system/rising premiums, slower economic growth, slower job growth, a not ready for prime time new Fed Chair who bombed on his first big day, rising utility bills, millions losing SNAP benefits, rejection of the inhumanity and lawlessness of mass deportation, unprecedented corruption and disregard for rule of law, gilded statues/outrageous ballrooms/palaces in the sky. There is Trumpian failure, illiberalism, betrayal as far as the eye can see.
And Americans have had it with him and them, and are putting their trust and faith back in us. It is not just that their standing has eroded. Our standing has improved, and the country is ready to put us back into power, to give us a shot to govern and lead again. Let’s go through the data….
In recent polling Trump has crashed through floors and found new bottoms:
Consumer sentiment is lower today than it has been in 65+ years of tracking in the University of Michigan survey:
The generic ballot has started tilting into blue wave territory. In the Fox poll Dems were the first party to hit 53% in their polling in their 30 years of polling tracking back to 1996.
We continue to lead in most Senate battleground polls. My assumption is that as the party rallies around Abdul El-Sayed he will open up a modest lead against Rogers in Michigan. 3 new polls in Texas have Talarico up 2, 3, and 5…..
In poll after poll Democrats are now more trusted on the issues voters care about most. In this recent Fox poll we lead by 9 on the economy, a big lead, and the first time we’ve led on the economy in Fox News polling in 20 years:
Today the FiftyPlusOne/Strength In Numbers forecast has us with an 87% chance of winning the House:
And a 54% chance of winning the Senate:
What all this data and analysis tells us is that we have a shot to have the election we all want to have. Now we need to put our head down and make it happen, everyone!!!!!
A New Democratic Party Is Being Born, And Our Goal Should Be To Make It Better Not Just New And Different - We are clearly in a period of growth, evolution, change, experimentation as a pro-democracy movement, something that here we have welcomed and encouraged. Here is part of what I wrote to you the morning after the 2024 election:
I still think many on our side and in the establishment simply do not understand the nature of the conflict America finds itself in today. Trump and his global allies are playing a different game than we are used to. They have invented a whole new deeply illiberal game with all sorts of new pieces and rules. We have been slow, dangerously and recklessly, slow in recognizing how the rules of the game have changed.
It’s why whatever happens next, it is time for the Democratic Party’s generational wheel to turn and for new leaders who are not steeped in and hobbled by old ways to take the helm. We are facing a new battlefield, and more contemporary strategies, tactics, alliances and leaders are required in this next stage of the fight. Now is a time for re-invention, re-imagination, and risk-taking. We need to build a new politics for the American center-left, a more modern one, one more suited to the opportunities and challenges in front of us, a more “networked” one as my friend Joe Trippi would say.
But as we furiously build anew we must also retain our focus on what matters most right now, in this election, which is helping the 40-50 top Senate and House candidates win and take as much as power away from MAGA as we can. As the data shows above we are on cusp of having the election we all want to have and cannot lose focus. As we say in our new daily Hopium mantra:
There is nothing Trump and MAGA wants more than for us to be fighting with each other and not with him. We have one job now - elect as many of these wonderful candidates running for the House and Senate as we can. It’s where our focus must be. It’s a year of opportunity for us across the country. We must seize it, together.
Part of what I talked about last night was that as we build our new and better party, and win these mid-term elections, there are two urgent things we must work on, together, as a family:
Jews must become comfortable in the Democratic Party again, and the creep of antisemitism into our discourse must be confronted, and aggressively challenged
We must demand that those in the DSA who seek to become influential in the Democratic Party create a clearer and definitive break from the extremism and illiberalism of the DSA itself
On point one we will be bringing in guests in the coming weeks to help guide this community through a necessary conversation about where the line is between opposing the Israeli government and become anti-Jewish. There are too many people in our family who do not seem to know where that line is today, even here in the Hopium community. So we will help as we do here to inform, not inflame, and work to get us to a better place.
The second point is in my view is non-negotiable. The national co-chair of the DSA is an avowed communist, a Marxist-Leninist. The national DSA has backed Putin, Maduro, Hamas-Iran, arguably the most illiberal and repressive - and in two cases genocide-seeking - regimes in the world. This politics has no place in our pro-democracy big-tent. Be here, be part of our world, be progressive, be left, but create a political affiliation and movement that loses the ugly, extremist baggage of the national DSA.
In just the past few days we’ve seen leaders of the new more muscular left distance themselves from this illiberal, extremist politics - a welcome development. Bernie Sanders called for Abdul El-Sayed to distance himself from Hasan Piker. Bernie refused to endorse Francesca Hong, a DSA member running for Governor in Wisconsin who is comically running as fast from her old DSA views as she possibly can (this stuff never works). William Lawrence, a DSA member who just won his House primary in MI-7, said yesterday that he let his DSA membership lapse a few weeks ago. People are running away from the DSA brand for it is poisonous politics, antithetical to the core beliefs of our pro-democracy movement, and can be used by Trump and the right to tarnish all our candidates in an election we are on the cusp of winning.
Be left, be progressive, but do not bring the DSA and all of its outrageous baggage into our vibrant, virtuous, pro-democracy family.
That’s what we talked about last night. It was a meaty discussion, and I am proud that we can have hard, challenging conversations here at Hopium. Hope you will watch, share it with others, hit like so more will see it, and yes, my friends, it is now time to do what we do here at Hopium…..
Fight With Everything We Got For Freedom And Democracy People!!!!!
Winning The House and Senate In 2026
Special Fund To Rush Troy Jackson $100,000 By August 10th - Donate Today! | $80,100 raised, $50,000 original goal, $100,000 new stretch goal | Friends we hit our original $50,000 goal in the first 24 hours of this new campaign to get Troy Jackson the resources to staff up, build out his campaign, and beat Susan Collins. Amazing - thank you all!
We aren’t stopping here - this early money really matters, and I want to now try to get to $100,000 by Friday, August 7th. We can do this people, and be sure watch our new interview with Troy.
Our Winning The House Campaign - $1,056,300 raised, $1,250,000 goal (new stretch goal) - Donate | Donate to all twelve of our initial wave of House challengers with a single contribution split twelve ways | Get to know Jamie Ager (NC-11), Christina Bohannan (IA-01), Paige Cognetti (PA-08), Rebecca Cooke (WI-03), Elaine Luria (VA-02), Sean McCann (MI-04), Jo Mendoza (AZ-06), Chaz Molder (TN-05), Jonathan Nez (AZ-02), Janelle Stelson (PA-10), Shannon Taylor (VA-01), and Sarah Trone Garriott (IA-03) by watching our recently recorded Hopium interviews.
Friends, if these twelve courageous candidates win, the House will flip, even with Callais and their rancid mid-decade redistricting. So eyes on the prize here everyone!
Winning The House - The Second Wave Fund (Newly Expanded) - $253,100 raised, $500,000 goal - Donate | We’ve launched a second House fund, one supporting candidates who’ve emerged from recent primaries and need a bit more help. Our newly expanded list now features Rebecca Bennett (NJ-07), Bob Brooks (PA-07), Cait Conley (NY-17), Johnny Garcia (TX-35), Bob Harvie (PA-01), Dr. Richard Pan (CA-06), Denise Powell (NE-02), Bobby Pulido (TX-15), Manny Rutinel (CO-8), Dr. Amish Shah (AZ-01), Randy Villegas (CA-22), and Marni von Wilpert (CA-48).
A donation to the Second Wave Fund is split evenly among these twelve, and more as other worthy candidates emerge from their primaries. Our total above includes money we’ve raised for directly for each candidate. You can watch interviews with those who’ve interviewed so far here. We are off to a great start here everyone!
Winning The Senate - $636,100 raised, $1,000,000 goal - Donate | This new fund splits a single donation to our six candidates must likely to flip a Senate seat this November - Sherrod Brown (OH), Roy Cooper (NC), Troy Jackson (ME), Mary Peltola (AK), James Talarico (TX), and Josh Turek (IA). Our working total includes what we’ve raised for these six so far through direct donations to their campaigns. You can watch our interviews with each of these great candidates and/or contribute directly to any of them directly here.
Expanding The Map - Investing And Winning In Key Battleground And Expansion States
Winning Georgia - $29,100 raised, $300,000 goal - Donate | This new fund splits a contribution three ways among Senator Jon Ossoff, gubernatorial candidate Keisha Lance Bottoms, and the Georgia Democratic Party
Winning Iowa - $31,400 raised, $300,000 goal - Donate | Our Winning Iowa fund splits a contribution three ways - to Josh Turek for Senate, to our gubernatorial candidate Rob Sand, and to the Iowa Democratic Party
Winning Maine - $79,600 raised, $75,000 goal - Donate | We set up this fund to help the Maine Dems get through our nominating process. With this community’s strong response we put up almost a third of the resources needed for what became a very successful process to pick a nominee. We had a big return on this investment - thank you all!
Winning Ohio - $185,100 raised, $300,000 goal - Donate | Our campaign splits contributions evenly among Sherrod Brown, the Acton-Pepper ticket, and the Ohio Democratic Party and its terrific Chair, Kathleen Clyde
Hopium’s Audacious Expansion Fund - $643,100 raised, $1,000,000 goal - Donate | Join our campaign that has helped expand our map by investing in the Democratic Parties of Alaska, Florida, Iowa, Maine, and Texas, all now central battlegrounds in the 2026 election | Contribute to all five state parties with one contribution split evenly among these five critical battlegrounds | Catch interviews with the five intrepid state chairs leading their troops into battle this year - will get you fired up!
Keep working hard everyone. We have a country to save, and elections to win, together! - Simon
