Sunday Hopium - Musk Wounds Trump And We Get Troops In Los Angeles

If there is a national emergency it is Trump's failing and ridiculous Presidency

Morning all. Here we are. Events will likely overtake anything I write so will keep it brief……

First, Gina Ortiz Jones won a run-off election last night in San Antonio, Texas’ second largest city. Congrats everyone. Another good 2025 win for Democrats.

Next. Trump’s economic plan is failing. Countries are not agreeing to “trade agreements” with him or bending the knee. The markets have rejected his terrible, budget-busting reconciliation bill, America’s credit was downgraded and the bill is running into significant headwinds in the Senate. Trump continues to lose in court, daily, badly. His tariffs were declared illegal by two different courts. He had to bring Abrego Garcia home. Both Ukraine and Putin are openly defying him, making him look weak and feckless to the world. Musk emasculated him this week, openly calling for him to replaced by JD Vance, and also appears to have walked off with Stephen Miller’s wife.

As we learned in our new conversation with Joe Garcia Trump’s recent immigration escalation is creating a serious humanitarian and political crisis in South Florida. Yesterday, the political dam broke and prominent Republicans began openly and aggressively criticizing Trump for the incredible shitshow he’s created. From The Miami Herald this morning:

A Miami Republican who co-founded the group Latinas for Trump is condemning President Donald Trump’s mass-deportation campaign and blasting recent immigration enforcement actions as harmful. “This is not what we voted for,” State Sen. Ileana Garcia said in a statement on Saturday. “I have always supported Trump, through thick and thin. However, this is unacceptable and inhumane.”

The public remarks from one of Trump’s longtime supporters come as the president’s immigration policies cause stress and uncertainty in South Florida. Trump’s executive orders and the Department of Homeland Security’s actions have targeted hundreds of thousands of immigrants in the region, including Cubans and Venezuelans — communities that threw their support behind Trump during the November election, helping him win Miami-Dade County.

As top White House aide Stephen Miller reportedly demands 3,000 immigration arrests a day, federal agents in Miami and across the U.S. are swooping into courthouses to detain people and place them in quick deportation proceedings that don’t require a judge.

With Trump casting a wider immigration-enforcement net, Latino Republicans in South Florida are balancing their support for the White House and their constituents. Next week, Miami’s GOP delegation in Washington is slated to meet with Trump’s Homeland Security secretary.

“I understand the importance of deporting criminal aliens, but what we are witnessing are arbitrary measures to hunt down people who are complying with their immigration hearings—in many cases, with credible fear of persecution claims—all driven by a Miller-like desire to satisfy a self-fabricated deportation goal. This undermines the sense of fairness and justice that the American people value,” said Garcia.

Things aren’t going so well for Trump. The big blubbery baby man had a really bad week - his bestie trashed him to the world. A reminder of where he stands today in public opinion, from Civiqs:

And so what does he do to get himself back on track? He sends the military into to quell a “rebellion” of a couple hundred people in a largely Latino suburb of Los Angeles. We should view this ridiculous overreaction as a sign of profound weakness and comical tin pot dictator notions of “strength” and “virility.”

I followed the Paramount protests closely yesterday. Video of the protests were easily accessible. As the Los Angeles Police Department said in a statement last night they were peaceful.

Of course people are going to get a bit rattled and pissed when dozens of armed men in military-style uniforms show up in a residential neighborhood and fire tear gas and other “less lethal” munitions at folks. It was also a powerful reminder of how ill-equipped ICE and DHS are to start diving into workplaces and neighborhoods in heavily immigrant cities, and how hard it is going to be for Miller and Trump to clear out tens of millions of “those people” from the country.

Here’s a new statement from Governor Newsom out this morning called “Trump wants a spectacle and violence in Los Angeles” -

Last night, President Trump ordered the deployment of 2,000 National Guard troops in Los Angeles, using the excuse of protests against his immigration raids.

Let me be totally clear about what is happening here.

We have been working closely with law enforcement. There is no unmet need. The President is attempting to inflame passions and provoke a response.

He would like nothing more than for this provocative show of force -- and Pete Hegseth's absurd threat to deploy United States Marines on American soil – to escalate tensions and incite violence.

These are not people who have some deep conviction about protecting law enforcement. This is a President who failed to call up the National Guard when it was actually needed -- on January 6th -- and then pardoned the participants as one of his first acts as president.

They want a spectacle. They want the violence.

They think this is good for them politically.

That is why White House aides were posting pictures of Trump getting popcorn last night.

This is not the way a civilized country behaves. It is completely deranged behavior.

To the people of Los Angeles and across the country who are protesting these immigration raids:

Don't give them the spectacle they want. Never use violence. Speak out peacefully and in large numbers.

I know many of you have been watching the news about this, so I thought it important to reach out.

Thank you for reading,

Gavin Newsom

So here we are. Trump is throwing himself a military parade on his birthday this week and sending in the military to quell a “rebellion” in Los Angeles that the LAPD - no left wing organization - said was peaceful. I know all of this is a dramatic and dangerous escalation, and bad things are going to happen as Miller and Trump act on their authoritarian fantasies. But there is also something so profoundly ridiculous about everything that is happening right now, and we cannot for one moment allow any of this to become normal or acceptable in this great country. Trump is weak not strong; a loser not a winner; a big blubbery baby man, and anything, anything but the “strong man” he so desperately imagines himself to be.

Stay safe all. I’ll be updating our work together tomorrow to account for the events of the past few days but job one remains killing the reconciliation bill and doing everything we can to prevent Trump from falsely declaring a national emergency to ram this rancid bill through Congress in the coming weeks……

Now, Let’s Get To Work - In last Saturday’s post I offered up some initial ideas of what our summer was going to look like. Please check it out if you haven’t gotten to it yet.

Job 1 for us this summer is 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.

Here’s a possible script for contacting your offices. 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.

I know many of you are involved in the June 14th No Kings events, town halls, Telsa take downs and all the other in person activities that have taken off of late. Thank you, and do keep working it everyone. I am still encouraging our community to explore ideas for how we can Own The Fourth and make our Independence Day an ugly day for our mad wannabe king. Hopium Merch is coming soon, and be sure to check our robust Events schedule as new events are being added daily. I look forward to seeing folks tomorrow night in Jupiter, Florida at a Palm Beach Country Democrats’ event with David Jolly.

Please self-report your activities to our daily paid subscriber chat. These reports help inspire me and all of us to do more and fight harder.

There are three additional efforts we’re working on now:

1 - Help Abigail Spanberger Win Virginia - Simply, the Virginia elections are the most important elections we have this year, and we must win them. We have narrow majorities in both legislative chambers and while our candidate Abigail Spanberger has a modest lead in current polling, this is going to be a close election where our money and volunteer time can make a real difference. If you are to give to only one candidate or election this year it should be this one. Here’s a link to do so today……

To learn more about Abigail check out my new discussion with her, watch her new TV ad, or head over to her campaign website We have now raised over $122,000 towards our June 30th goal of $200,000 - thank you all! We need to keep working it everyone!

2 - Support The Hopium House 7 - We’ve begun our work to help flip the House next year by supporting and shoring up the 7 newly-elected battleground House Dems we helped elect last year. Catch our interviews with Reps Derek Tran, Janelle Bynum, Tom Suozzi and Laura Gillen and give to all 7 through a single donation on our ActBlue page. Learn more about this important effort here.

We’ve already raised over $123,000 towards our $200,000 June 30th goal - great work everyone!

We also have ongoing campaigns to raise money for the new DNC, support the North Carolina Democratic Party and to thank Senator Cory Booker for his spirited leadership in a time of enormous challenge.

3 - 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 too!

Keep working hard all. Proud to be in this fight with all of you - Simon