Month: October 2025

Every Friday morning, I join the Cardle & Woolley Show on Talk 1370 Radio in Austin to announce the week’s Winners & Losers. Today marks Day 31 of the government shutdown and it’s been 12 days since the big heist at the Louvre. In this special Halloween edition, here’s who made the list:

WINNER: Three More Years! Three More Years!

It won’t stop the “No Kings” crowd, which spend long and hateful days insisting that President Donald Trump is a dictator who will never leave office. But the President tried to put the issue of his running for a third term to rest this week when he told reporters that he won’t be a presidential candidate in 2028. Flying back from Asia on Air Force One he said: “…it’s pretty clear I’m not allowed to run.”

There are plenty of reasons for the president to have been cagey about a third term. Lame duck presidents simply aren’t as powerful as those who have the potential of another term ahead of them, but that pesky 22^nd Amendment is what it is.

The whole third term thing had become a distraction, and it’s good that Trump has taken it off the table, although the New York Times insisted yesterday that Trump’s plan to become a dictator is still moving forward.

In ruling himself out, Trump again reminded the media and their Democrat allies that Vice President J.D. Vance and Secretary of State Marco Rubio are coming up behind him, along with a half dozen other strong leaders, while they have virtually nobody on their bench, unless they can convince “The Rock” to run (see below).

WINNER: TPPF Sues Dallas on Death Star Violations

One of the many things Democrats have done in Texas to make sure conservatives keep winning elections is to hamstring the state’s big blue cities with dramatic “virtue signaling” regulations that reduce Texans’ freedom. To undo what has become a mess, conservatives passed House Bill 2127 in 2023, the so-called “Death Star” law, which, despite its name, only means that cities and counties “must rein in their regulations on Texas business that do not conform with state law.” The goal is to address overregulation and ensure that if it is against the law in Dime Box, it is against the law in Dallas, too.

Big D didn’t seem to get it, so this week, my colleagues at the Texas Public Policy Foundation sued the city of Dallas on behalf of several plaintiffs, charging that 83 local ordinances on a wide range of issues, ranging from minimum wage and labor regulations for city contractors to recycling guidelines to restrictions on drilling and producing oil and gas, did not comply with state law. These are the kind of job-killing regulations that have stifled growth and bankrupted coastal blue cities like San Francisco and New York for decades.

Dallas has also piled on a patchwork of noise and airport parking regulations, including their own rules for Uber and Lyft and a host of DEI-based laws, which they describe as “protections” for LGBTQ+ people, apparently unaware that it is illegal in America to discriminate against anybody in hiring, promotion and firing.

In filing the suit, TPPF Senior Attorney Matthew Chiarizo said, “Cities don’t get to pick and choose which state laws they follow…this lawsuit is about protecting Texans’ freedom to live and work without being smothered by layers of needless local regulation.”

WINNER: Light at the End of Shutdown Tunnel?

We can all hope that National Review columnist Jim Geraghty had the quote of the week on the shutdown when he said:

“We might as well amend the Constitution to make it official: A federal government shutdown remains in place until the nation’s air traffic controllers get tired of it and stop showing up to work.”

Geraghty notes that over half of Americans take at least one commercial flight a year and people begin to get anxious, then angry, when there are ground stops and flights start piling up like they did today because there weren’t enough air traffic controllers on the job.

The pilots are angry too and, like the air traffic controllers, they have called on the Democrats to vote for the GOP proposal to end the shutdown. The largest union of federal workers—which has always been part of the Democrat base—has also called on Democrats in the Senate to agree to the Republican compromise and end the shutdown, but the Democrat leaders in the Senate are refusing to budge.  

The Hill is reporting what they call “shutdown fatigue” in Washington, which could mean Geraghty is right that it all depends on the air traffic controllers.

Amid all the shutdown noise, CNN’s Caitlin Collins caught House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries in a big lie this week when Jeffries said that Republicans were refusing to talk with Democrats about shutdown issues. Collins noted that Jeffries had told her he had just talked to House Speaker Mike Johnson on the phone. When Collins asked who had called whom, Jeffries admitted that the Speaker had just phoned him to talk about a possible solution. Busted.

LOSER: Democrats Own “Fake But Accurate”

The term “fake but accurate” has deep Democrat roots, first employed by Texan pseudo-journalist and Democrat activist Dan Rather, back when he anchored the CBS News. In 2000, when George W. Bush was running against Al Gore for president, Rather ran with a story that Bush had falsely claimed to have served in the Texas National Guard.

According to Rather’s story, the former president never showed up for duty. Rather provided the nation with documents on CBS News that appeared to confirm the story.

In only a couple days, the documents were proved to be fake, but Rather, along with many of his colleagues in the media and most Democrats, continued to push the story, insisting that even though the documents were fake, the story was accurate. Rather was fired and the term “fake but accurate” will always be his tagline.

After the Democrat nominee for mayor of New York City, Zohran Mamdani, made a speech this week commiserating with his fellow Muslims about how much they suffered following the September 11 attacks, he pulled out a story from his personal life that also turned out to be “fake but accurate.” Mamdani said that his aunt had been afraid to ride the subway after September 11 because she got so many dirty looks, and she was afraid of violence.

Turns out his aunt wasn’t in New York at the time. Then Mamdani said it was actually his cousin, who is now deceased, but there’s no evidence anyone in his family was in New York City after the 2001 terrorist attack. Still, in a city that lost almost 3,000 people on September 11, Mamdani has doubled down on his insistence that Muslims were victims too, insisting that even if his story was “fake,” it is “accurate.”

LOSER: Democrats’ Brand Sinks as “The Rock” Beats Kamala

Granted, California Gov. Gavin Newsom, U.S. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-New York, and former Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg get bigger numbers, but a report on the betting markets shows that Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson edges out former Vice President Kamala Harris in support for the next Democrat presidential nomination. Johnson got polling support from 46% of voters a few years ago, and I’m betting most Americans are like me and loved him when he played the “Tooth Fairy,” in that kids’ movie. He’s an independent—says he has voted for both parties from time to time—so he might not even think of himself as a Democrat these days.

Especially after a new report came out this week from a group on the left stating that the messages that most people identify with Democrats, like protecting the rights of LBGTQ+ Americans and fighting climate change, only resonate with white liberals. If The Rock has a different message, like securing the border or fighting crime, he might quickly zoom past Newsom, Buttigieg or Ocasio-Cortez. Or perhaps he’ll decide to ditch the Democrats altogether. I’m going to watch that “Tooth Fairy” movie again to see if there are any clues there.

LOSER: The French Are as Dumb As We Thought

No one will ever have to suffer through the condescending attitudes and haughty sighs of the French when traveling in Europe again, now that we know they couldn’t even protect the crown jewels—including the necklace Napoleon gave to his second wife, Maria Louise. French security had so few digital cameras on the outside of the most famous museum in the world that the thieves were literally able to scale up the side of the building and climb through a window.

According to a New York Times report, police stationed near the Louvre were blind to the break-in, and the thieves—who turned out to be pretty sloppy too—knew how to get inside the glass jewelry cases because the museum manual told them what kind of disc grinder drill to use.

Fans of the old Pink Panther movies who have watched this for a week or so and assumed that a real-life version of Inspector Jacques Clouseau was somewhere on the job are going to be disappointed. Authorities think they have the thieves, but so far they don’t have the jewels.

LOSER: More in the “What’s Wrong with England?” Series

This week, the UK Edition of Glamour Magazine has nine men who think they are women on the cover. No actual women are pictured. There’s no more to say on this. Here’s the photo.

Happy Halloween—The Truth about the Salem Witch Trials

A few years ago, I wrote a piece about the Salem Witch Trials, making it clear that in the 17^th century, if you were a woman—or even a witch—the best and safest place in the world was in the American colonies. TPPF put it in the Cannon Online today, but here’s my personal backstory about the piece:

In the old Plymouth Colony General Court records, it is reported that in 1661 one of my ancestors, Dinah Sylvester, accused one of her neighbors, Goodwife Holmes, of witchcraft. Dinah said she saw Mrs. Holmes transform herself into a bear. This was 30 years before the more famous Salem trials, but the Plymouth Court quickly dispensed with the case. They got Dinah to admit she was lying. She pleaded guilty to perjury and was fined. Then the Holmes family sued Dinah for defamation, and Dinah lost that case too, which resulted in even bigger fines and court costs. She also had to issue a public apology.

Making a false allegation of witchcraft was very serious and nothing good happened to Dinah after that. Her fiancé broke their engagement and, unlike her brothers, whose life stories I can trace, it’s not clear exactly what happened to her—it’s all here in my Halloween op-ed.

Wreck ‘em, Hook ‘em

Texas A&M’s No. 3-ranked Aggies have a bye week, while the Longhorn are playing Vanderbilt in Austin. Vanderbilt moved up in the charts after beating Missouri last week in one of the most exciting games on Saturday, but I’m sure the Longhorns are ready for them. Texas Tech is at No. 13 and they play at Kansas State tomorrow afternoon. Hopefully, those of us who watch football on YouTube TV will be able to see it all.

Have a great weekend.

Sherry Sylvester is a Distinguished Senior Fellow at the Texas Public Policy Foundation, and the former Senior Advisor to Texas Lt. Governor Dan Patrick.

Sign up to receive this in your inbox every week at www.texaspolicy.com/9thandCongress.

Follow me on X @sylvester1630 and follow my podcast, the Sherry Sylvester Show on Apple, Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts.

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Every Friday morning, I join the Cardle & Woolley Show on Talk 1370 Radio in Austin to announce the week’s Winners & Losers. We are now officially in the second-longest government shutdown in U.S. history and the only thing Congress agrees on is that nobody trusts anybody enough to even begin to make a deal. Here’s who made the list this week:

LOSER: The “No Kings” Thing

It has never been clear what the “No Kings” message is supposed to mean. Of all the criticisms that could be hurled at the government, surely “No Kings” is among the most nonsensical. If we had a king, the government would not be shut own, MSNBC would be off the air and Elon Musk would be building a nuclear power plant on the moon.

Last Saturday I was visiting family in Portland, Oregon, where I passed a man on the street wearing a huge inflatable chipmunk suit. He was on his way to the No Kings march, carrying a sign that read “Constitutional Rights.” For him? For chipmunks? Seriously. What does “No Kings” mean?

WINNER: University of Texas at Austin & the Trump Compact

The University of Texas at Austin is reportedly still considering President Donald Trump’s “Compact for Academic Excellence, which gives universities the first shot at billions in federal research funds if they agree to take steps to transform the ideological culture that has dominated on university campuses for the past couple decades. It’s a pretty good deal, but so far, the University of Arizona, Brown, Dartmouth, MIT, the University of Pennsylvania, USC and Virginia have all given the president a thumbs down. Vanderbilt and UT are still considering the offer. Here is what those 7 universities that rejected Trump’s Compact are refusing to do:

Admit students based on merit – Trump’s Compact requires using standardized tests to determine who gets in. It prohibits using race, sex, ethnicity, or gender identity to admit students to the university, give them financial aid or hire anyone for a job. All those things are already illegal, of course.
Remain neutral on political and ideological issues. For taxpayer funded universities it seems like an easy call to just not take a side. Trump’s Compact also prohibits punishing or belittling conservative ideas on campus. Why just conservative ideas? Because no one is making fun of what progressives think. A survey conducted by the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (FIRE) among faculty members at 55 major universities found that only 20% of faculty members said a conservative would be welcome in their academic department. Almost 80% said another liberal would be welcome.
Commit to a five-year tuition freeze for American students. Spending is out of control at American universities. Administrative bloat has persisted throughout the pandemic and the protests. Between 1976 and 2018, full-time administrators and other professionals employed by academic institutions increased by 452%, while student enrollment grew by 78%. Capping tuition until they get a handle on that seems like a reasonable ask.
Cap the number of international undergraduate students at 15%. It’s only about 6% now—1.1 million international students. International students pay much higher tuition rates so universities are reluctant to cut off that cash cow. Current estimates indicate that international students pay about $44 billion in tuition to American universities.
Say What a Woman Is. The Trump Compact requires that universities give up the “gender identity” war and acknowledge there are only two genders. Hard to believe that some universities would forgo easier access to federal research funds rather than stop using they/them.
I have no insider knowledge on what UT will ultimately decide to do (I went to Oklahoma State), but I am rooting for the Longhorns on this one.

WINNER: SOS Identifies Illegal Voters

Let’s hear it for Texas Secretary of State Jane Nelson, who announced this week that she had found 2,274 people on the voting rolls who are not citizens and should be ineligible to vote. Texas media has always insisted that non-citizen voters do not exist. They rolled that back a bit in reporting this story. The San Antonio Express-News said that the “number of potential non-citizens on the registration rolls is hardly indicative of widespread abuse. The 2,724 names account for just 0.01% of all the Texans who were registered to vote in the November 2024 election.”

Using that same metric, you gotta wonder why they didn’t say that 20,000 to 30,000 people participating in No Kings marchers in Texas over the weekend represented less than 0.01% of the state’s population and are “hardly indicative” of anything.

WINNER: Ted Cruz Goes After Christian Killings in Nigeria

Texas Sen. Ted Cruz introduced the Nigerian Religious Freedom Accountability Act this week to address the long history of Christian murders in Nigeria by the Islamic group Boco Haram. According to Cruz, “over 52,000 Nigerian Christians have been murdered by jihadists groups, including Boko Haram, and over 20,000 Christian churches have been destroyed in the last 15 years.”

Religious rights groups report that of all the Christians killed worldwide, 69% are from Nigeria. Reports from inside the country say that Muslims mostly target older women and children who cannot easily run away.

In contrast to Gaza, the media ignores this story. The State Department put Nigeria on a watch list in 2020 for what it called “systematic violations of religious freedom.” The designation was lifted in 2023 to avoid embarrassing former Biden Secretary of State Anthony Blinken before he visited Nigeria.

WINNER: World Has a New Moon

Well, actually they are calling it a “quasi-moon,” that reportedly has been traveling alongside Earth for decades, which makes you wonder why nobody noticed it until now. We’ve seen photos showing traces of water on Mars, hints of vast new galaxies beyond the Milky Way and hundreds of shots of UFOs from pilots who snap pics of space craft that are straight out of science fiction. But somehow this asteroid, named 2025PN7, has been orbiting just outside the door and nobody picked it up. Does anybody else think NASA has some explaining to do?

LOSER: Who Knows How Bad Big City Crime Is?

One familiar screed during the “No Kings,” protests came from city dwellers in New York, Chicago and Portland, who repeatedly insisted that their cities are safe and that Trump’s insistence that they need federal troops to help control crime and protect ICE is an over-reaction. Democrats support the “our cities are safe” delusion with crime statistics that the Dept. of Justice has revealed are increasingly problematic. The problem is not only underreported crime, it’s also policies that encourage undercharging for crimes. Here’s how it works: David Mazariegos was arrested in New York City last week for attacking a passenger on a subway train with a sword and ultimately beating him to death. Mazariegos had just been arrested in July for assaulting someone else, but his charge had been lowered to a misdemeanor so he got out of jail and NYC’s felony statistics didn’t go up.

Democrats reportedly are trying to get crime rates down before next year’s elections to re-assure their constituents in big cities that their neighborhoods are actually safe. The message is, “if you feel scared, you are just imagining it.”

LOSER: Texan Urges National Democrats to “Fight Dirty”

Sixteen people are running in a special election to replace the late Sylvester Turner in Houston’s 18th Congressional District. The district is likely to elect a Democrat, and one of the candidates, state Rep. Jolanda Jones, has said the problem in Washington today is that Democrats are losing because they play by the rules. If elected Jones promises to “fight ugly.”

“I am not a ‘when they go low, we go high’ [person]. I’m not that kind of girl. If they go low, I’m going to the gutter.”

U.S. Rep. Jasmine Crockett has long been following the Jones “fight dirty” plan, making a name for herself by calling Gov. Greg Abbott “Governor Hot Wheels” and President Trump a Nazi. Crockett said this week she is seriously considering a race for the U.S. Senate. Crockett is leading in the latest poll for the Democrat nomination that shows her at 31% in front of State Rep. James Talarico, D-Austin and perennial Democrat loser, Beto O’Rourke, both of whom are at 25%.

LOSERS: Off-Year Democrats May Die on Trans Issue Hill

The New York Times has profiled the two women who are running for governor in Virginia and New Jersey—the only two states that hold odd-year statewide elections. Both states are blue, but both races are now in single digits and there’s a lot on the line. According to Thomas Edsell at the New York Times, “if either Mikie Sherrill or Abigail Spanberger loses her bid to become governor in November, the Democratic Party is in trouble heading into the 2026 congressional elections.”

Andrew Sullivan is a virulent anti-Trump blogger, but he is always vigilant on the “trans” issue and he has a theory. He points to those tight elections in Virginia and New Jersey and says the Democrat candidates are losing ground because they are afraid to move away from supporting “rights” for biological men who think they are women. Voters in those two states—including Democrat voters—remain concerned about laws that support boys in public schools having access to girls’ sports teams and restrooms.

Sherrill, who is running for governor of New Jersey, has held her pro-trans ground, trying to stir up fear in the hearts of parents by saying: “…there are threats that “some Moms for Liberty type person [will] go out on soccer fields and try to check seventh-grade girls’ soccer teams for trans people…”

In Virginia, Abigail Spanberger, the Democrat candidate for governor, refuses to directly answer questions about boys in girls’ sports.

LOSER: Meanwhile, Democrats in New England

The off-year elections aren’t the only problem Democrats are facing. As I noted last week, the Democrat candidate for Virginia Attorney General threatened to shoot the Speaker of the State Assembly but none of his fellow Democrats have withdrawn their endorsements. This week’s story comes from Maine, where Graham Platner is up 20 points in a Democrat primary for a shot to run against longtime Republican senator Susan Collins, R-Maine. Platner, who has been endorsed by Sen. Bernie Sanders from Vermont, which is very close to Maine, fought off charges all week that he has a Nazi tattoo which he says he got while he was out carousing when he was a Marine. Platner has tried to cover up the tattoo, but now he’s being hit with old social media posts where he says he became a communist when he got older and that he doesn’t love America anymore. He also belonged to a group called the Socialist Rifle Association, saying you can’t beat fascism without a rifle.

And in New York City—which would be the eighth largest state if it were a state—Democrats are running a guy who currently calls himself a socialist: Zohran Mamdani.

WINNER: Trump Nominates Sen. Brian Birdwell Assistant Sec. of Defense

In a big win for America and for the Pentagon, Texas Sen. Brian Birdwell, R-Granbury, was nominated by President Trump to serve as Assistant Secretary of Defense. Birdwell is a retired Lt. Col. in the U.S. Army who survived the Sept. 11 attack on the Pentagon, suffering burns that took dozens of surgeries and years to recover. If you haven’t heard his story of the attack, you can listen to it here. Birdwell is a great American patriot and a respected leader in the State Senate who has worked tirelessly for the people of Texas. President Trump is lucky to get him in Washington.

Gig ‘em, Wreck ‘em, Hook ‘em

Texas A&M has climbed to No. 3 in the national rankings and is traveling to Baton Rouge to play No. 20 Louisiana State on Saturday night. Aggie fans should not read the New York Times, which is predicting an A&M upset, but we all know that the New York Times is wrong about almost everything. I’m betting on the Aggies

Still ranked 14th after their heart-breaking loss at Arizona State last week, Texas Tech plays Oklahoma State this week, and they are picked to crush them. But the Cowboys are now breaking records in response to their truly awful season. Last week they filled empty seats at Boone Pickens Stadium with the largest crowd of shirtless fans ever recorded, while Houston beat them. This week, they are going for the most banana suits in a Conga line. Watch for them between Red Raider touchdowns.

No. 22-ranked Texas is on the road, playing Mississippi State at 3:15 p.m. tomorrow. Texas is predicted to eke out a victory. Mississippi State is on a three-game losing streak.

Have a great weekend.

Sherry Sylvester is a Distinguished Senior Fellow at the Texas Public Policy Foundation and the former Senior Advisor to Texas Lt. Governor Dan Patrick.

Listen to Winners & Losers on Talk 1370, the Cardle & Woolley show, every Friday morning at 8:30 AM. Here’s the listen live link.

If you were forwarded this email, you can sign up to receive it every week at www.texaspolicy.com/9thandCongress.

Follow me on X @sylvester1630 and follow my podcast, the Sherry Sylvester Show on Apple, Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts.

Every Friday morning, I join the Cardle & Wooley Show on Talk 1370 Radio in Austin to announce the week’s Winners & Losers. In a week marked by an historic peace accord in the Middle East and Portland, Oregon’s naked bike ride to protest the National Guard in their city, here’s who made the list:

WINNER: Trump Really Deserves the Nobel Prize Now! 

Writing Winners & Losers on Friday is always a challenge in those weeks when President Donald Trump has accomplished something monumental early in the week because, by the end of the week, America’s left-leaning news establishment will have hopelessly distorted the event. There is no doubt that Trump brokered an historic peace between Israel and Hamas. During the broadcast of the meeting in Egypt where the ceasefire was signed, a CNN reporter noted that Trump’s appearance on stage with all the major players in the Middle East and the many European leaders behind him amounted to “pretty much the whole ball game.” She didn’t sound happy.

By Thursday, in a move that was not a joke, former President Joe Biden’s Secretary of State, Anthony Blinken, had the temerity to suggest that the Biden administration had actually laid the groundwork for the peace accord. Apparently, Blinken is unaware that many people believe that if Trump had been president instead of Biden, Hamas would not have attacked Israel and started the war in the first place. They also seem to have forgotten that their presidential candidate, Kamala Harris, could never quite bring herself to condemn Hamas for the attack, without also blaming Israel.

LOSER: Democrats Losing Shutdown Messaging War

In the beginning, it looked like the Democrats might have finally landed on an effective message for themselves by insisting they were shutting down the government to reduce health care costs—because people are increasingly concerned about the rising costs of medical bills. But we are now more than two weeks into the shutdown, and polling data shows that voters overwhelmingly blame Democrats for the shutdown. They don’t trust Democrats to address health care costs, or with any economic issue.

National Democrat leaders haven’t gotten the memo yet that their shutdown message is failing. They continue to filibuster incessantly.

WINNER: White House Says No to Texas GOP Ballot Ban

The Texas Senate Republican Executive Committee (SREC) ultimately did not pass resolutions this past weekend to censure Texas House Speaker Dustin Burrows and several other Texas Republican lawmakers, a move that could have resulted in their being blocked from the Republican primary ballot next year.

Although the SREC insists the high profile call didn’t matter to them, news circulated during the meeting that the White House was watching the livestream. Ultimately, White House Political Director Matt Brasseaux weighed in, saying the White House did not support banning anyone from the ballot. Reportedly, Brasseaux added that it should be up to the voters, not the executive committee, to decide which candidates will appear on primary election ballots.

One of the challenges of a democracy is to always affirm that voters are smart enough to know who they want to vote for. Last week, I reported that at least one progressive pollster believes Democrats should ignore what voters say in opinion polls because voters don’t know what they are talking about—so their opinions shouldn’t matter.

That kind of thinking could bring down Democrats—but it could bring down Republicans, too. What the White House political director said is a foundational principle that the SREC should reaffirm—anyone can run for office who is eligible, and voters get to pick the candidate who wins.

WINNER: Building Icebreakers in Texas

U.S. Senator Ted Cruz is a winner this week for getting a provision added to the big budget bill in July that will ramp up construction of the heavy icebreaker ships that are capable of navigating through the polar regions. Lots of countries increasingly care about the polar regions, not only for security reasons but also because of rare earth metal resources. Currently, China has four of these icebreaking ships and Russia has more than 40. The U.S. has two that are operational, including the Polar Star, which was commissioned in 1976.

Cruz’s legislative addition will result in the construction of seven more icebreakers, including three that will be built in Galveston, which Cruz boasts will create about 7,000 jobs. The contracts were awarded last week so everything is ready to go.

LOSER: Where Did the Non-Binary People Go?   

Among the many awful things that seemed to happen during COVID and the 2020 riots was that the number of young people who called themselves non-binary—neither a man or a woman—increased dramatically. If you haven’t watched it, comedian Bill Maher created an hysterical spoof in 2022 showing at on the current trajectory, by 2054 everyone will be gay.

But this week we got the news that an academic at the University of Buckingham has been looking at polls from around the U.S.—primarily university surveys—that show a substantial decline in the number of young people who call themselves non-binary. In some places it is as low as 2%, down from 5.2% last year, and the all time high of 6.8% in 2023. It’s a big loser for the trans community, but it is a big win for the obvious.

LOSER: California’s Billions on Homelessness

California has reportedly spent $24 billion to end homelessness, but they still have the worst homeless problem in the country. Tented homeless camps in Los Angeles and San Francisco have become infamous. I always assumed that the Democrats who run everything in the Golden State had just wasted billions of dollars targeted for homelessness on dumb ideas like buying needles for addicts and acquiring more land for the homeless to put up tents and cardboard shanties. But it turns out that that a couple of California homelessness moguls have been stealing millions from the state, using fake bank accounts to bilk the treasury out of as much as $26 million, which they allegedly used to pay off their credit card bills and buy luxury goods. The DOJ brought charges yesterday, so we’ll see what happens.

LOSER: Buc-ees No Longer No. 1

The University of Texas may have won the Red River shootout last week, but a couple of Oklahoma based convenience stores beat out Buc-ees as the nation’s top store in the latest surveys. Kwik Trip, headquartered in Wisconsin, is now the No. 1 quick shop store, while Buc-ees has toppled to the No. 5 place, a position it shares with Loves, which is headquartered in Oklahoma. Oklahoma based Quik Trip is No. 4. This relative dominance in the convenience store wars could provide some comfort to Sooner fans after the trampling they received at the hands of the Longhorns at the Cotton Bowl last weekend.

WINNERS: Hook ‘em, Gig ‘em, Wreck’em

The Longhorn victory over the Oklahoma Sooners in the Red River Shootout last Saturday put Texas back in the top 25. They are now No. 21 nationally and will take on unranked Kentucky tomorrow. Let’s be clear—for many fans, the only thing that matters is that the Longhorns beat Oklahoma and since that’s done, anything good that happens from here on out is just gravy, even if the early season was pretty rocky.

Meanwhile, Texas A&M has become a serious national contender, rising to No. 4, and Texas Tech Is also soaring up the charts, now at No. 7. The Aggies play Arkansas tomorrow afternoon, and the Red Raiders face Arizona State.

Hope your team wins! Have a great weekend.

Sherry Sylvester is a Distinguished Senior Fellow at the Texas Public Policy Foundation, and the former Senior Advisor to Texas Lt. Governor Dan Patrick.

Sign up to receive this in your inbox every week at www.texaspolicy.com/9thandCongress.

Follow me on X @sylvester1630 and follow my podcast, the Sherry Sylvester Show on Apple, Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts.

Every Friday morning, I join the Cardle & Wooley Show on Talk 1370 Radio in Austin to announce the week’s Winners & Losers. The government is still shut down, and members of the military won’t be getting their paychecks next week, but in case you were worried, the members of Congress (the same people who won’t even talk about ending the shutdown) will still be getting paid. Here’s who made the list:

WINNER: Trump’s Peace Plan in Gaza

No place on earth is trickier than the Middle East, but Trump’s Peace Plan has been accepted by both Hamas and Israel. And while details are still being worked out, the Wall Street Journal reports that both sides are hopeful and moving forward. Israel says it has withdrawn from parts of Gaza, and the 72-hour clock is now counting down for Hamas to release the hostages.

It is hard to imagine anyone but President Trump getting this done, although so far, accolades are coming reluctantly. A New York Times columnist reluctantly suggests that Trump could claim the right to a Nobel Peace Prize for the accomplishment, but, so far, only Pennsylvania Sen. John Fetterman from the Democrat side has given the President a high five.

Norway, the country where they award the peace prizes, expressed worry yesterday that Trump might throw a fit if he didn’t get the prestigious award. The leader of the socialist party in Oslo said the country should be prepared for anything, because Trump is so volatile and authoritarian. They want to make sure Trump knows that Norway doesn’t officially have anything to do with who gets the prize, in case Trump was thinking of invading or dropping a bomb or something.

This morning, the Nobel crowd announced that the Peace Prize would be awarded to Maria Corina Machado, who has been fighting the authoritarian regime in Venezuela. Machado immediately dedicated her award to the people of her country and to President Trump, for his “decisive support of our cause.” She clearly understands what matters better than the Nobel Peace Prize committee, which essentially said they don’t like the President’s style.

Apparently, style is a big part of the whole “peace prize” thing. The Peace Prize Committee ignored the guy who brought the Abraham Accords to the Middle East and laid the groundwork for the ceasefire agreement today while making such a big deal about giving the prize to former President Barack Obama in 2009 for doing nothing.

LOSER: Were Biden’s Antics Worse than Watergate?

The more we hear about what was happening while former President Joe Biden was in office, the more outrageous it becomes. This past week, emails surfaced from the CIA with Ukrainian complaints about how incompetent Biden’s diplomatic efforts were in regard to their country. Ukrainian leaders also didn’t trust dealings with Biden because of the highly questionable business activities of his son, Hunter. The kicker on these revelations is that Biden officials demanded that the CIA bury the Ukrainian emails.

We also learned this week that Biden and his henchmen ordered the monitoring of phone calls of eight Republican senators—including Marsha Blackburn of Tennessee, Josh Hawley of Missouri and Lindsey Graham of South Carolina. Some have said the outrage of a sitting president surveilling the phone records of members of Congress is worse than Watergate, and it clearly is. After all, Watergate was actually about stealing campaign plans—something that is pretty much standard practice today. Getting the phone records of members of the opposition party is a huge affront to all our Constitutional rights.

This comes on top of what we learned last week, about Biden requiring flash cards with photos to remember who he was talking to—Hillary Clinton, Sen. Chuck Schumer, D-New York, Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Illinois. There’s no way to know whether he understood that he’d signed off on going after the phone records of the GOP lawmakers. But if he didn’t sign off, who did?

WINNER: Texas Tech and UT Audit of Gender Identity Classes

Let’s be clear, gender identity isn’t a real thing. The idea that individuals are born neutral and turn into males or females depending on how they are reared is, frankly, nuts. Gender identity advocates believe that girls are girls because their parents encourage them to behave like girls. Presumably, if their parents encouraged them to behave like boys—they’d be boys. Their core belief is that your gender is “arbitrarily assigned at birth.”

Most Texans don’t agree, so the recent winning move by Texas Tech and the University of Texas at Austin to examine the so-called “gender identity” classes on campuses is long overdue. Last year, during the debate over the passage of Senate Bill 37, a cursory review of the course catalog at UT revealed over 400 courses with the word “gender” in the title.

That’s because once you accept the premise that gender is arbitrary, it permeates every aspect of study—the role of gender in the agricultural patterns of southwest America—the role of gender in defining color-blindness in dogs, whatever. A new curriculum emerges and dozens of gender theory professors are required to teach it. It’s a grift. It’s a racket. Good for Tech and UT for going after it.

WINNER: Abbott Edict on Crosswalks

Gov. Greg Abbott let Austin and other cities know this week that government-sanctioned graffiti like we see in Austin including the Gay Pride crosswalk and Black Lives Matter messages have to go. The city of Austin authorized these “decorative street markings” over the past several years, but, as Abbott rightly points out, taxpayers don’t want their money being used for activist ads that they are forced to stare at while they are waiting in traffic—which they almost always are. Street propaganda is not unique to Austin. Most Democrat cities, including Houston, have them.

So far, the neither Gov. Abbott nor TXDOT have suggested the activist ads are a safety hazard, so perhaps cities could get entrepreneurial and sell the space to make much needed cash. You could imagine: “TURN LEFT HERE FOR THE BEST TACOS IN TOWN” in bright red and yellow.

LOSER: Watching Progressives Continues to Entertain

I so wanted to read a news report on a national conference of progressive Democrats entitled “Democrats Still Have No Idea What Went Wrong,” that I signed up for a free trial to Atlantic Magazine, a premier left-wing publication, to learn what happened at an conference called Persuasion 2025 in Washington, D.C., last week. (I intend to unsubscribe before they charge me, but even if I miss the deadline, I gained some interesting intel).

Austin Congressman Greg Casar, chair of the Progressive Caucus, told the group that they all had to stop blaming progressive policies for the loss of the 2024 election, even as data was circulated by another Democrat pollster showing that the ad revealing that former Vice President Kamala Harris supported sex change operations for inmates in prison (She’s for They/Them, He’s for Us) resulted in a 2.7% shift among Independent voters—a margin that amounted to victory for Trump in seven swing states.

Since the election, we have seen a few news reports of Democrats trying to regroup. California Gov. Gavin Newsom admitted it isn’t fair to have boys playing girls’ sports and Rahm Emanuel wrote a Wall Street Journal op-ed bluntly telling Democrats they need to totally re-think their stance on education. So-called “sane Democrats” like Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro and Maryland Gov. Wes Moore have become fixtures on many podcasts and news talk shows, but they are exceptions, not the rule.

According to the Atlantic, the Persuasion 2025 conference makes it startlingly clear that the stereotypes about progressive Democrats are actually true—they may love humanity, but they can’t stand people. They ignore opinion polls, insisting it doesn’t matter what people think. They think voters are simply wrong and paying attention to polls is “pollingism.”

One progressive pollster, Anat Shenker-Osorio, challenged the idea that the way to win elections is to find people who support your ideas and get them out to vote. Shenker-Osorio says that’s all wrong:

Conventional wisdom says to meet people where they are. But on most issues, where they are is unacceptable.

“Unacceptable,” is a little bit nicer than “deplorable,” but the sentiment is the same.

UPDATE WINNER: Cell Phone Ban Update

After a rocky start last month, Alamo Heights School District, in San Antonio reported this week that the school system will abide by the state cell phone ban on students, prohibiting phone use from bell to bell. Alamo Heights was one of several large San Antonio school districts that had initially defied the state ban on cell phone use for students in classes, creating a ridiculous loophole by interpreting the law to mean that students were only restricted from using their phones during class. They could still use them before, after and between classes, at lunch and virtually anytime they were out of the classroom—totally defeating the purpose of the ban.

Whether it was pressure or the fact that the cell phone ban is proving to be very popular among students, Alamo Heights has reversed course.

Northeast School District, also in San Antonio, continues to ignore the ban and the Texas Education Agency (TEA) is investigating this refusal by professional educators to do what is best for kids. Northeast ISD has essentially said to the State, “You are not the boss of me.” TPPF and many others worked hard to pass this important legislation. Stay tuned.

LOSER: Sentence in Kavanaugh Assassination Attempt

It was outrageous this week that the man who attacked Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh was only sentenced to eight years for the crime. It is also outrageous that the media seems to have completely forgotten he is a man.

It is not completely clear how Nicholas Roske became Sophie Roske during the time he has been awaiting trial for the attempted under of Kavanaugh, but virtually all the legacy news reporting this week on the sentencing said that Kavanaugh was attacked by a woman, even though the person who traveled from California with a knife and a Glock to kill Kavanaugh was a man.

During the sentencing, Roske became the victim in the story when the judge said that one reason the sentence was so light is Roske will be held in a male prison. The judge noted that life for “trans woman” is particularly difficult in male prisons, suggesting that eight years should count for more—like dog years or something.

WINNER: Columbus Day “We’re Back, Italians”

The long travail is finally over—Columbus Day is back, just in time for “Columbus Day.” Trump officially proclaimed the end of politically correct “Indigenous Peoples Day,” today and the country can now move forward out of the murky confusion.

Winners & Losers: Red River Shoot Out, Aggies & Raiders

Perhaps the less said the better about the Red River Shootout and the battle for the Golden Hat tomorrow as the undefeated Oklahoma Sooners, ranked No. 6 in the nation, come to the Cotton Bowl to face the Longhorns (who barely came out of The Swamp alive last week). Texas, with a record of 3-2 has dropped out of the top 25 national rankings and Oklahoma is picked to win it—but you never know in a rivalry game like this so Hook‘em. Kickoff is at 3:30.

Meanwhile, Texas A&M, ranked No. 5 in the nation, will play Florida, but they are in College Station. Texas Tech continues to move up the charts, now at No. 9. They are playing Kansas.

Hook ‘em! Gig ‘em! Wreck ‘em!

Have a great weekend.

Sherry Sylvester is a Distinguished Senior Fellow at the Texas Public Policy Foundation and the former Senior Advisor to Texas Lt. Governor Dan Patrick.

Listen to Winners & Losers on Talk 1370, the Cardle & Woolley show, every Friday morning at 8:30 AM. Here’s the listen live link.

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Every Friday morning, I join the Cardle & Woolley Show on 1370 Talk Radio in Austin to announce the week’s Winners & Losers. As we begin October, the Democrats have shut down the government, which is never great news. But hey, Texan Elon Musk amassed $500 billion this week, cementing his spot as richest guy in the world, and we have three Texas football teams rated in the Top 11. Here’s who made the list:

WINNER: Trump Picks UT for “Compact on Higher Education Excellence”

Adding a carrot to his approach for reforming higher education in America, President Donald Trump and Education Secretary Linda McMahon announced this week that nine universities, including the University of Texas at Austin, have been offered the opportunity to sign a “Compact for Academic Excellence in Higher Education.” The Compact will give the selected schools priority access to federal research funds if they agree to operate under guidelines that will ensure free speech and open inquiry, as well as freezing tuition for five years, capping the percentage of international students and clearly defining the two genders.

Trump and McMahon clearly understand that American universities have generated the ideologically based and wrong-headed academic thinking that has fueled woke policies over the past two decades, weakening and destroying many American institutions and corporations.

Reforming universities will require the strong, no-nonsense approach the president has already employed to end anti-Semitism and race and gender-based admissions and hiring at places like Harvard and Columbia, but it will also require universities to develop operating principles based on open debate, merit-based achievement and a focus on successful student outcomes. Because Texas has led the way nationally in higher education reform by both ending DEI on campuses and reining in the hegemony of faculty by returning campus leadership to university regents, our academic leaders are ahead of the game.

UT System Board of Regents President Kevin Eltife said that the University is honored

to be part of the Trump higher education reform initiative. The other schools that are included are University of Arizona, Brown University, Dartmouth College, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, the University of Pennsylvania, the University of Southern California, Vanderbilt University and the University of Virginia.

Many UT faculty members are not happy. Their American Association of University Professors (AAUP) spokesperson predicts that Trump’s efforts will destroy the university, and in an unprecedented twist, the Texas Faculty Association insists that President Trump can’t control federal research funds because they belong to American taxpayers. This is rich, considering these are the same faculty members who have screamed throughout the last two legislative sessions that Texas lawmakers have no authority over state universities despite the billions in Texas taxpayer dollars that go to college campuses every year. UT President Jim Davis and Provost William Inboden are breaking new ground every day over at the Forty Acres. There’s no question the Longhorns are up to this challenge.

WINNER: Greg Abbott Shuts Down Sharia Law in Texas

It wasn’t a big news story this week, but Gov. Greg Abbott took an important stand in Houston when he affirmed that there is no place for Sharia law in Texas. Responding to reports that a Houston imam was trying to force some Muslim-owned businesses to stop selling alcohol and pork and conform to Muslim religious practices, Abbott said, “To be clear, Texas law and Texas courts govern those businesses and those neighborhoods. No ranting imam can change that.”

If you think Abbott may have been over-reacting (the Houston Chronicle accused him of using right-wing fear tactics), consider that in Dearborn, Michigan, when a resident challenged the Muslim mayor’s move to rename a city street after a Hezbollah terrorist, he was ejected from a City Council meeting and called a racist and an Islamophobe.

In Great Britain, some reports indicate that almost a hundred Sharia councils have been established, allowing Muslims to marry, divorce and file wills outside regular British civil law. This is the exact opposite of assimilation. Abbott is right to make it clear that Texas law prevails.

WINNER: The “Bathroom Bill” is Now Law in Texas

The last and maybe the only big victory by the left in Texas came in 2017 when Democrats, working with their allies in the media, defeated the Women’s Privacy Act, which they pejoratively called “the bathroom bill.”

Back then, the left and the media were successful in creating a narrative that portrayed women and girls who wanted private restrooms and locker rooms as stupid bigots. They ridiculed Texas State Sen. Lois Kolkhorst, R-Brenham, a former NCAA athlete, who understood what was at stake better than anybody. Had the media listened to Sen. Kolkhorst, they would not have been so surprised about the outcome of the 2024 presidential election.

Perhaps the most disgusting memory from that time was the ad, “I Pee with the LGBT.”  It was not only gross, it deployed phony economic fear tactics by insisting that Texas would lose over a billion dollars in tourist dollars if the legislation passed. It didn’t happen.

Abbott signed Senate Bill 8 into law this week, and violators will be fined $25,000 for the first offense. That’s great news, but it is important to remember how long we had to fight just to ensure that in Texas, women and girls could have their own public restrooms.

LOSER: Hegseth Sounds like Attila the Hun

Secretary of War Pete Hegseth should be a winner this week for calling in American generals from all over the world and making it clear that ending wokeness in our military is his top priority. No more race- and gender-based promotions or DEI, no more sex change operations and drag shows, no more gay pride flags flying over American bases. It is a good thing that the key takeaway from his unprecedented meeting of military leaders in Quantico, Virginia on Tuesday is that America is done with all that.

What I can’t figure out is why the Secretary of War didn’t follow up that terrific news with a blueprint for the military that reflects the vision of President Trump.

From his first day in office, President Trump has re-defined America’s leadership role in the world, leaving no doubt that we are the most powerful country on the planet and that he is committed to using that power to end wars and stop killing people. He’s said it dozens of times, making clear he wants all countries to prosper, even countries we don’t like. That’s why the international response to Trump has been so positive.

But Secretary Hegseth didn’t echo the President. Instead, he often sounded like Attila the Hun:

We fight to win. We unleash overwhelming and punishing violence on the enemy. We also don’t fight with stupid rules of engagement. We untie the hands of our warfighters to intimidate, demoralize, hunt and kill the enemies of our country. No more politically correct and overbearing rules of engagement, just common sense, maximum lethality and authority for warfighters.

I don’t know who the Secretary of War is talking to, but I am the widow of a professional military officer who was on the ground in Vietnam. I have a military family and I live in Texas’ “Military City.” I am also the daughter of a World War II veteran who fought in four theatres of war, and I can tell you that principled American solders don’t say things like, “We unleash overwhelming and punishing violence on the enemy …and intimidate, demoralize, hunt and kill the enemies of our country.”

Nowhere do words matter more than when talking about war. Hegseth needs to start sounding like Trump and less like the bad guy in a cheap action movie.

LOSER: Trust in American Media Drops to New Low

It has become a cliché to say that the media has lost its credibility, but it is important to look at the latest survey numbers from Gallup to see exactly what is happening. According to the Gallup data, only 28% of Americans say they trust the media. Half of the people who call themselves Democrats (51%) say they believe the media is mostly accurate—a percentage that has not changed much over the past decade, but the 28% nationwide is a real drop.

In the late 1990s, over 50 percent of the entire country, regardless of political party, believed the information they got from mainstream media was mostly accurate. Today, only 8% of Republicans say they trust the media, the first time GOP trust has dropped to single digits. For Independents, only about 27% say they trust the media—also an all-time low.

WINNER: Free Press Founder Takes Over CBS

Apparently CBS has taken a long look at those Gallup poll numbers, because it is now official that Free Press founder Bari Weiss will be taking over CBS as Editor in Chief.

The move had been rumored for weeks as CBS staffers have cowered in fear that they might be called on to address their biased views. Weiss, who left the New York Times editorial page in 2020, saying she was tired of being bullied by liberals, established a newsletter on Substack that quickly became one of the most reliable news sources in the country. She features writers from across the political spectrum and zeroes in on cultural issues in ways traditional media ignores or distorts.

It will be interesting to see what Weiss does with a major broadcast network. But to get an idea of the bias you won’t find in the Free Press, just read this morning’s news report from the Washington Post on Weiss taking the helm at CBS. It is loaded with slanted commentary and snarky cheap shots even though it’s on the “news” page.

LOSERS: Those Defending Texas Teachers Fired Over Charlie Kirk Comments

The Texas Tribune reports that legal experts are “troubled” that the Texas Education Agency (TEA) is investigating over 300 reports sent to them by parents pointing to teachers who commented negatively following the murder of Charlie Kirk. FIRE (Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression) is concerned that the free speech rights of teachers are being trampled, and the teachers’ unions are calling it a Republican plot.

But this report by The Texan on what the fired teachers actually said makes it absolutely clear there is no gray area here. Those who were fired went on a public platform and said Kirk got what he deserved in being killed for the beliefs he spoke about on college campuses.

The fired teachers did not say, “I disagree with Kirk,” or “Here’s what Kirk was wrong about,” or even, “I disliked Charlie Kirk because he was an awful person.” Instead, the teachers sounded like Antifa protesters, insisting that anybody who said what Charlie Kirk said deserves to be shot.

Parents don’t want anyone who thinks that people deserve to be shot for what they believe teaching their children. We will see what else unfolds as the TEA investigations continue, but Commissioner Mike Morath is a hero for taking a stand.

LOSER: Big City of Austin Tax Increase on November Ballot

It was heartening to see the Austin American-Statesman editorialize this week about the outrageous 20% local tax increase that the city of Austin has put on the November ballot. Apparently, among other things, some Austin City Council members believe their election entitles them to a free lunch. The Austin City Council can frequently be spotted wasting money big time, but now we know they are also careless with taxpayer dollars behind the scenes.

My TPPF colleague, James Quintero, knows more about the fight against wasteful local spending and tax increases than anyone. You can read his analysis here.

LOSER: X on Passports

In 2021, former President Joe Biden declared that those who are confused about what sex they are could simply mark “X” on their passport application. President Trump overrode this idiocy with an Executive Order shortly after he returned to office and now Sen. Roger Marshall, R-Kansas, has a bill that will codify Trump’s edict into law so that the only options available on passport applications are male and female. It makes sense that if you can’t figure out what sex you are, you probably shouldn’t be allowed to travel.

WINNERS: Well, Fingers Crossed

As mentioned above, Texas has three teams in the Top 25 in the AP poll as we begin October and week 6 of the season. The University of Texas at Austin, which is ranked No. 9, plays unranked Florida tomorrow at 2:30 p.m. Texas is predicted to win by a touchdown, but the big speculation is how quarterback Arch Manning will hold up under the pressure he continues to receive as a result of his last name. He certainly has had some moments, but we’ll see how he does against the Gators. They are playing in Florida.

For some, the only thing that matters is that Texas A&M is ranked higher than UT, so we want to acknowledge that. At No. 6, the Aggies are the heavy favorite over Mississippi State. They play tomorrow night in College Station. It’s an SEC matchup, so anything can happen.

Meanwhile, the Texas Tech Red Raiders are ranked at No. 11 in the AP poll and are No. 1 in the Big 12. They travel to the University of Houston tomorrow night where they are expected to wallop the Cougars. Kickoff is at 6 p.m.

Hook ‘em! Gig em! Wreck ‘em!