Gray Takes The Lead In CA-13, Steel Concedes To Tran! The Opposition Party Needs A Big Reform And Renewal Agenda

Happy Thanksgiving Everyone!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Note - since publishing this morning, Rep. Michelle Steel conceded CA-45 to Derek Tran! CA-45 has officially flipped red to blue….

Happy Wednesday everyone. A short Thanksgiving Holiday Hopium today. I had to write for we have good news - Adam Gray now leads in CA-13!

Here’s the latest count:

I know folks here have worked very hard on these two races and we can’t let up now. If you want to keep curing ballots in CA-45 and CA-13 (Adam Gray) sign up with our friends at Grassroots Democrats HQ who have been working non-stop since Election Day.

Here’s where our 15 endorsed House candidates stand today:

• Flips (5) - Whitesides CA-27, Tran CA-45, Gillen NY-4, Riley NY-19, Bynum OR-5

• Too Close To Call/Still Counting (1) - Gray CA-13, optimistic!

• Losses (9) - Shah AZ-01, Engel AZ-06, Salas CA-22, Rollins CA-41, Bohannan IA-1, Vargas NE-02, Jones NY-17, Altman NJ-07, Stelson PA-10

I remain very proud of the good we’ve done this past cycle. We made deeply strategic investments and got important wins in a tough year in AZ, NC, NE, WI and in these critical House seats. Of the 7 House seats have Dems flipped this cycle, our community aggressively backed 6 of them - George Whitesides CA-27, Tran CA-45, Tom Suozzi NY-3, Laura Gillen NY-4, Josh Riley NY-19 and Janelle Bynum OR-5.

If we win both the Gray and Tran races the House will be 220R-215D, and we will have picked up two seats net from the last Congress. With three vacancies due to House members leaving to join (or attempting to join - Gaetz) the Trump cabinet, House Rs will begin Congress next year at 217-215, a one vote majority in what has been a very factious and fragile Republican “Majority.”

If CA-13 flips the Hopium community will have played meaningful roles in electing 7 of the 8 House candidate who turned red seats blue this year. Let’s keep working it everyone, and head into Thanksgiving with this powerful reminder of the power of our work to turn close elections into wins!

Becoming The Ferocious Opposition - 1 Down, 3 To Go And Developing A Big Reform and Renewal Agenda - We had a good win last week when Matt Gaetz withdrew for AG and confirmed his decision to leave Congress. We still have three more dangerous nominees to knock out in the coming weeks. Here are two things you can do to help, today:

• Call your Senators and Representative to let them know your dissatisfaction with the rapist, fraudster, traitor and 34 times felon’s pick of Tulsi Gabbard, Pete Hegseth and Robert Kennedy; and to inform them of your expectation that they will leave it all out there on the playing field to block these profoundly dangerous nominations whether they have a vote on them or not.

• Contact the White House and ask President Biden to order the FBI to begin background checks into Trump’s nominees immediately.

Thanks to those of who have self-reported that you have taken these steps. We “do more and worry less” here at Hopium and given Trump’s early, dangerous actions we all need a whole of lot of doing right now.

Regular Hopium readers know that I’ve been advocating for Dems to adopt a broad reform and renewal agenda. I will be returning to this idea in the days ahead as we must together fashion a response to the coming Musk/DOGE assault on the Federal Government other than just defending the status quo. We too must be for modernizing and improving our government, but doing so in ways consistent with our vision and values. Here’s something I wrote this summer while Joe Biden was still in the race:

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After the rogue Robert’s Court’s assault on our democracy, it is very very clear that Democrats and Joe Biden need a big reform and renewal agenda. In my recent New Republic essay I wrote that Democrats should develop and campaign on a clear agenda to strengthen our democracy and tackle the corruption, extremism and rot (Roberts, Thomas, Alito) that has overrun our Capital:

If the primary job of the first term was about successfully getting America to the other side of Covid, the second term should be about mobilizing unprecedented resources around tackling the next two existential challenges of our time–countering climate change and accelerating the energy transition from fossil fuels, and ensuring that freedom and democracy prevail here in the United States and everywhere.

The president should talk directly and forcefully to the American people about the existential nature of these dual challenges, particularly the rise of what is perhaps the most serious threat we’ve ever seen to the American-led, rules-based order; and he should prepare Americans for what could be years or even decades of hot and cold conflict with authoritarians at home and abroad. The president began that process this year with his compelling speech near Valley Forge in early January.

As part that mobilization, we will need to keep our economy strong and prosperous, persistently proving that democratic capitalism remains the best system for human advancement; develop a long overdue national strategy to restore integrity to our daily discourse, making it far harder for authoritarian forces to manipulate and control speech in open societies; build greater governmentwide institutional capacity to advance pro-democracy initiatives here and across the world; and be direct in asking the American people, as President Kennedy once did, to become active partners in ensuring we prevail in these deeply consequential struggles in the coming decades….

…..The president should commit to making progress in at least two other areas during his second term—cleaning up a city and a democracy that have been weakened by corruption and illiberalism of all kinds, and raising American life expectancy so it is again at the level of peer nations’.

I think Joe Biden should promise to clean up the city he has so long been a part of. Among the things we can tackle are the influence of foreign money, the need to raise ethical standards at the Supreme Court, eliminating the debt ceiling and the ability to shut down the government, and the wild abuse of Senate holds on nominations. Perhaps Biden could set up a commission to make broader recommendations on how to modernize and reform a city desperately in need of it.

Such an agenda is not just needed and necessary, but we know from polling that tackling “political corruption” is a high priority for two of our most important target groups - independents and young people. If President Biden were to lead the charge it would be a way of taking his many years here - experience, wisdom, understanding of how DC works - and turning the issue of his age into a powerful weapon against the Republicans.

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In 2017 while still running my think tank NDN I wrote about one possible big reinvention - the creation of a new Department of Jobs, Skills and Economic Development. An excerpt:

Much of the structure of the government of the United States was designed and built in the middle part of the last century. The creation of the Department of Homeland Security in the aftermath of 9/11 was the last big structural change. In a time of rising global competition and technological change, it is time to fashion a new government department focused solely on creating good jobs for Americans, and helping American succeed in a new world of work that requires very different skills. Let’s call it the Department of Jobs, Skills and Economic Development.

It is remarkable to consider that the executive branch of our government has no one person or department truly responsible for creating good jobs for the American people, and ensuring our workers have the skills to succeed in a changing world. These responsibilities are scattered throughout the federal government, residing in the Departments of Commerce, Labor, Treasury, Housing and Urban Development, Education and Agriculture, the United States Trade Representative, the Export-Import Bank, the Overseas Private Investment Corporation, the Small Business Administration and throughout the White House itself. A new Department of Jobs, Skills and Economic Development would consolidate these many disparate activities and programs in a single place, allowing for greater efficiency but also far greater strategic focus and coordination. The process of building the Department would force a debate about all the programs it would inherit, and whether they are working or can be improved. Redundant or under-performing programs could be eliminated, freeing up resources for higher priority projects. It would be a powerful department, but also should by design be a modern and skinny one — lean and mean.

I toss these ideas out there for to be a successful opposition we have to do far more than oppose, and respond to their agenda. We must have one of our own and fight like hell for it, everyday. Part of what we will be doing here in the coming months is talking about what such a new agenda might look like.

What Happened, What Comes Next - Our approach to the big post-election conversation has been to go slow, listen and learn, and right now I still have far more questions than answers. Here are some resources for you to dive into the big post-election conversation over the long Holiday weekend:

• Notes on 2024 And What Comes Next (11/20/24) - In a new detailed post and comprehensive video released I offer my latest thinking about what happened in 2024 - the ugly and the encouraging.

• In this post and video I offer my heartfelt thanks to the members of this community who left it all out there on the playing field this cycle.

• I’ve written a series of related post-election posts on the need for us to get louder here, here, here and most recently this one on how we need to get far smarter in how we strategically contest the right’s information superiority in our campaigns. Both the Trippi and the McGowan/Pfeiffer conversations below also speak to this urgent need, and exciting opportunity.

To help us learn from others throughout the family, I’ve launched a new What Happened, What Comes Next discussion series. Here are the first four of those talks, along with 2 relevant segments from my fall Closing Strong series with Tara McGowan and COURIER Newsroom:

• Anderson Clayton - On Our Impressive Downballot Wins in North Carolina

• John Della Volpe - On Trump’s Gains With Young People

• Joe Trippi - On The Power Of Networks And The Need To Build Our Own

• Rep. Abigail Spanberger - On Winning The Virginia Governors Race in 2025. Learn more about Abigail | Volunteer | Donate To Her Campaign | We have already raised $9,200 towards our $100,000 goal!

From Closing Strong:

• On The Need For Pro-Democracy Media - With Tara McGowan and Dan Pfeiffer.

• Beyond MAGA Creators - Russia’s influence on the Republican Party runs deep with Stewart Stevens and Jiore Craig.

I’ve also set up a thread for paid subscribers to offer their thoughts on what this wonderful and plucky community should do next. I’m grateful for the many comments we’ve received so far. Weigh in if you can in the coming days, and note that an annual Hopium paid subscription is now 10% off through the end of the year for those who may want to sign up or give a bit of Hopium as a holiday gift. Paid subscribers should sign up for our next get together on Wednesday, Dec 4th at 7pm ET. Lots and lots to talk about!

Have a great Holiday break all and see you in a few days! Simon