Morning all. Had our weekly get together with our paid subscribers last night. Excited to share it with you today. A recording and Substack transcript are above.
Three main messages this week:
The War Is Breaking Trump And The GOP - New polling this week shows Trump crashing into the mid to low 30s, intense opposition to the war, and Democrats with polling leads in Senate races in Alaska, Iowa Maine, North Carolina, Ohio - enough to flip the Senate.
The repudiation and rejection of Trump is comprehensive, across the board, and intense:
Republicans have responded to their deteriorating electoral chances by announcing enormous SuperPAC buys over the spring, summer, and fall. But I think they know, given our strong overperformances in elections of all kinds across the country, and our gutsy win in Virginia this week, that all these ads won’t be enough to save them. The path they are on is unsustainable. They were in bad shape before the war. The failure of the war, the soaring gas/fertilizer/diesel prices, have brought Trump’s failed Presidency deep into MAGA country. Their coalition is fraying, even prominent MAGA influencers and leaders have begun breaking with Trump. GOP hopes that the war would end quickly and the damage would be minimal was always wishful thinking. Trump has lost the war. There is no cessation without deep Trump humiliation. The weight of their deepening failure has thrust the Trump regime and Congress into utter chaos. Look at these headlines from their own media this morning, They can run but they cannot hide from the disaster they have wrought.
CNBC:
Fox News:
I think it is settling in throughout Republican circles that Trump is the crisis. Not Iran. Not Woke. Not Trans. And running with him at the top of the ticket without some kind of dramatic change is going to be very hard, perhaps impossible. For consider what Republicans are going to have to defend:
Votes for the war, higher prices, higher fertilizer/gas/diesel prices, global humiliation for the US
Votes for the tariffs, higher prices, slower economy, higher deficits, weaker small business and farmers
Votes to wreck out health care system, drive up prices, make care less accessible
Votes to make us more dependent on foreign oil and gas
Votes to reward the ICE terror force with tens of billions of dollars with no reforms of any kind
Votes to make the lives of regular people far harder while providing enormous tax breaks for oligarchs, billionaires and themselves
No political party in modern times has done so much to intentionally harm the American people and our national security, while simultaneously working to enrich themselves and their donors and weaken our fundamental rights and freedoms. We are in the strong electoral position we are in today without our campaigns having begun to use paid media to directly connect their opponents to this ruinous agenda which they have all voted for, repeatedly, and championed. So as bad as it is now for Republicans - and it is bad - it could get a lot worse for them in the months ahead. And they know this. And I am not sure they are going to let this all play out like this without forcing some kind of dramatic course correction on the sputtering, Epstein desperate, and wildly unpopular Trump regime.
Democrats Have An Extraordinary Opportunity To Expand Our Map This Year. We Need To Seize It - We are now competing in states outside what has been the recent national battleground for Democrats, places where we have not consistently one or even been competitive in a very long time. If one of our collective goals this cycle was to take power away from MAGA by winning in red states and red places, we have an extraordinary opportunity to do that now, and our family needs to be making major investments now, right now, to help seize this opportunity. Imagine us having multiple statewide wins this November in these states. It will be historic, powerful and do so much to weaken MAGA:
As People Get To Know Our Battleground Candidates A New And Better Democratic Party Will Become Easier To Visualize And Connect To - I think as we get closer to the election, and people across the country start meeting and learning about our terrific candidates, their understanding of what the Democratic Party is will move from the residual disappointment of our chaotic and failed Presidential campaign to something that looks far more like this:
For the abstract “Democratic Party” or Joe Biden are not on the ballot in 2026. These people are. And as we’ve seen in our series of recent interviews we have an awful lot of strong, passionate, grounded, and impressive people running this year, people who look like the future and not the past.
In a new must-read analysis released this morning G. Elliott Morris reports on how the Democratic Party brand has largely recovered from where we were a year ago as we put more distance from the failure of 2024 and our party leadership shows they have what it takes to fight and beat Trump - as we’ve been doing again and again across the country. Here is Morris:
For the better part of two years, the story about the Democratic Party’s image has been simple and unflattering: voters don’t like it. The party’s favorability rating has been underwater in nearly every major poll since the middle of 2024, and the party took another hit during last fall’s shutdown fight. Our new April 2026 Strength In Numbers/Verasight poll confirms this broad pattern: Democrats are underwater at 45% favorable to 48% unfavorable, a net rating of -3.
But Republicans are doing much worse. Our survey finds the Republican Party at 39% favorable and 55% unfavorable — a net of -16, with 42% of Americans saying their view of the GOP is “very unfavorable.” That number is 12 points higher than the equivalent figure for Democrats (30%).
We originally designed this survey to unpack a puzzle of party popularity. Last summer, our analysis of favorability polling found many left-leaning Democrats were critical of their party, dragging down its overall favorability rating even though many of these critics were still planning on voting for the party. We wanted to know whether this was still the case. It is, and we asked some specific questions to voters about what the party would need to change for its rating to improve.
But our polling also shows that this puzzle — Democrats being more unpopular than Republicans because of intra-party disaffection — has now resolved itself. When we ask voters whether they think Democrats or Republicans possess certain character traits, Democrats win on nearly every one we tested. Independents dislike Republicans roughly three times as much as they dislike Democrats. Even voters who say they have an unfavorable view of the Democratic Party often plan to vote for Democrats anyway. And when Democrats’ own voters complain about their party in their own words, the complaint is not that Democrats are too liberal or “weak and woke”, it’s that they’re not fighting hard enough, particularly against Donald Trump.
I will be returning to this new, powerful work from Morris in a separate post, for it deserves more attention than I can give it today. But this analysis is very consistent with our commentary about the need for Democrats to better understand the role of weak and strong - and not just traditional policy issues - in how voters perceive us. Part of my read of this new Morris analysis is that Democrats would benefit from two things: 1) fighting Trump on more fronts, and sending a very clear message - as we did in Virginia this week - that we are strong enough to fight, and win, and deliver for the American people 2) announcing a simple, clear agenda of what we will do and fight for when we get back into power.
Yes, all of this is very consistent with the counsel we’ve been offering here for some time, and should be familiar to regular Hopium readers.
That’s some of what we talked about last night. Watch the video. Hit like for hitting like brings the post to more people. Share it with others you think might be interested, and now, in the spirit of this proud, plucky, and patriotic community……
Let’s Get To Work Everyone!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Winning The Midterms, Competing In Red States and Red Places, Expanding The Map
Hopium’s Winning The House Campaign (2026) - $602,900 raised, $1,000,000 goal (new ambitious, audacious even, q2 goal) - Donate to all twelve of our endorsed House challengers with one click | Get to know Jamie Ager (NC-11), Christina Bohannan (IA-01), Paige Cognetti (PA-08), Rebecca Cooke (WI-03), Sean McCann (MI-04), Jo Mendoza (AZ-06), Chaz Molder (TN-05), Janelle Stelson (PA-10), Shannon Taylor (VA-01), and Sarah Trone Garriott (IA-03) by watching our recently recorded Hopium interviews. Interviews with Jonathan Nez and Elaine Luria coming soon!
If you are looking for inspiration watch a few of these interviews - I promise these great candidates will get you excited about our opportunities this November! For it is simple - if we win these twelve races the House flips. Period.
James Talarico For Texas - $60,300 raised, $250,000 - Donate | Volunteer and Learn More | Enjoy my inspiring interview with Rep. Talarico as he fights to turn Texas blue
Mary Peltola For Alaska Senate - $85,800 raised, $250,000 goal - Donate | Volunteer and Learn More | Enjoy my uplifting conversation with Mary Peltola as she fights to turn Alaska blue
Winning Ohio - $124,500 raised, $250,000 goal - Our new campaign splits contributions evenly among Sherrod Brown, the Acton/Pepper ticket, and the Ohio Democratic Party | Donate today and help us turn this critical 2026 battleground blue | Watch my new discussions with Ohio Lt. Gov candiate David Pepper and Ohio Dem Chair Kathleen Clyde
This total includes $21,00 sent by a Hopium community member directly to each of our three Buckeye State partners!
Hopium’s Audacious Expansion Fund - $527,500 raised, $1,000,000 goal (new stretch goal) - 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 | Catch interviews with the five intrepid state chairs leading their troops into battle this year - will get you fired up! | Contribute to all five state parties with one contribution split evenly among these five new battlegrounds
Many thanks to two generous Hopium community members who have audaciously donated $20,000 to each of our five state parties over the past two years.
Roy Cooper for NC Senate (2026) - $106,400 raised, $250,000 goal - Donate | Learn More | Volunteer | Enjoy my new discussion with Gov. Cooper as he fights to turn North Carolina blue
Jon Ossoff GA Senate (2026) - $168,800 raised, $250,000 goal - Donate | Learn More | Volunteer | Enjoy my inspiring conversation with Senator Ossoff
Advocate For The Hopium Agenda/Pass Resolutions Of Condemnation In Your Community
There are a few more ways to go to work in the coming days - call your leaders and advocate for elements of our working, ever evolving Hopium Agenda, and bring resolutions that condemn our Mad King and lets facts be spoken to a candid world to your state or local government.
Here’s our working Hopium Post-Iran Disaster Agenda:
Work to end this new gulf war and Trump’s Imperial global ambitions
Support Ukraine and Europe, not Russia
Roll back the new, illegal tariffs
Rescind the Trump tax cuts, claw back the extra ICE funding, fund the IRS so it can collect the taxes the rich are hiding from us
Launch a major anti-corruption, renewing democracy campaign, one that ensures accountability for the crimes and treason committed, limits the political power of our emerging oligarchy, and strengthens democracy here and everywhere
Make the US a clean energy superpower, fight for true energy independence, and lower utility and energy prices for the American people
Rein in ICE, end Mass Deportation
End Trump’s destructive war on science, research, our health scare system and our public Health
Make clear to American farmers that we want to end the failed war, repeal the terrible tariffs, find legal pathways for farm workers, and make health care and energy more affordable
This week our calls should clearly focus on reining in the illegal war in the Middle East and ICE here at home, and rescinding the tariffs that are doing so much damage to our economy.
And please use the paid subscriber chat to self-report the good trouble you make each day.
Keep working hard all. We have a country to save and an election to win, together! - Simon
