Author: Sherry Sylvester

Every Friday morning, I join the Cardle & Woolley Show on 1370 Talk Radio in Austin to announce the week’s Winners & Losers. Texas lawmakers, who make just $7,200 a year, will be working over Memorial Day weekend to finish up the current session, but their counterparts in Congress, who make $174,000 annually, are off for the Memorial Day recess. Go figure. Here’s who made the list this week:

WINNER: Trump’s Big Beautiful Bill Clears House

As a constituent of one of the leading GOP critics of Trump’s reconciliation bill, U.S. Rep. Chip Roy, R-Texas, I am both familiar and sympathetic with the strong argument that the massive budget legislation dangerously increases both the debt and the deficit. But in my view, those arguments are outweighed by the critical need to ensure that Trump’s tax cuts are maintained and that tips and overtime will be tax exempt going forward. In tax reform, one goal for conservatives always has to be changing the culture so that taxpayers vividly see just how much of their money the government takes in taxes.

Ultimately, Rep. Roy voted for the bill, despite his continued concern that much more fiscal restraint is needed. He’s totally right about that, but remember that, aside from immigration, one of the best arguments against voting for Kamala Harris last year was her promise to let the Trump tax cuts expire. With this House vote, the odds are very good Republicans aren’t going to let that happen.

LOSER: Hillary Clinton Attacks Conservative Women

Not that anyone cares, but this week failed presidential candidate Hillary Clinton attacked, calling “most” conservative women “handmaidens of the patriarchy.” There’s no point in pushing back on such a stupid remark, but it is important to note that a woman who married her way into a political career has no room to talk about the patriarchy.

LOSER: Biden Cover-Up Still on Big Loser List

After Jake Tapper and Alex Thompson’s book, “Original Sin,” made a big splash last week, I assumed the issue of former President Joe Biden’s cognitive decline in office would finally rotate off Winners and Losers. Surely, that horse has been sufficiently beaten. But then the tapes of Biden’s deposition by Special Counsel Robert Hur were released and America could actually hear just how disoriented the former president was. His sense of time, his focus, his grasp on reality—all demonstrated that Hur had been right when he said that although Biden had broken the law regarding classified documents, he was so feeble and forgetful that no jury would convict him.

The Hur tapes further validated the information in Tapper’s book about how the White House staff misled the public about Biden’s competence. The Joe Biden revealed on those tapes was the same Joe Biden who his advisors said was sharp as a tack.

Finally, it wasn’t just conservatives who were asking, “Who was running the country?”

Then, just before that question could be seriously considered, Biden’s spokespeople announced that the former president has “Stage 4 prostate cancer that has metastasized to his bones.”

That is terrible news for the former president and his family and virtually everyone, including President Trump and Biden’s harshest critics in conservative media, have profusely and repeatedly expressed their concerns and offered their prayers.

Unfortunately for the Biden family, after the Tapper book and the Hur tapes, they are no longer trusted by anyone, so this awful news doesn’t just evoke sympathy, it raises more questions: Men his age are routinely screened for prostate cancer. If Biden wasn’t, why not?

Biden said he had cancer in 2022, but his staff said he misspoke. Did he? Did the family know Biden had cancer and not tell the country? Did Biden know he had cancer when he was insisting that he would run for re-election again? Did Jill Biden and Hunter know? Did his advisors, the so-called “Politburo” who were apparently making all the presidential decisions, know? Or, was Biden somehow unlucky enough to have a personal physician who missed a crucial point on the former president’s regular check-up? Texas Sen. John Cornyn has asked DOJ to investigate “potential violations of federal law regarding representations made to the general public about the president’s health.

Going forward, historians will undoubtedly debate whether the Biden cover-up was just a sequence of bad decisions made expediently, or if voters had unknowingly put a Richard III in the Oval Office where he and his advisors would do whatever it took to keep the White House.

In the short term, a good question for the media to ponder is how did the former president so completely destroy the public’s trust that even a tragic cancer diagnosis raises justified suspicion?

WINNER: British Prime Minister Keir Starmer

Starmer and the British Labour Party have been on the wrong side of immigration for decades, but when it finally became undeniably clear that they would stop winning elections unless they dramatically changed course, Starmer came out this week saying open immigration has created a “squalid chapter for the economy and the country,” adding that mass migration has turned England into an “island of strangers.”

Perhaps Starmer has been watching Trump or listening to Vice President J.D. Vance, but immigration issues in England finally upended British politics not only because importing cheap labor alienated the working class but also because such a high percentage of migrants are Muslim. Many British communities are no longer recognizable and this is also surely what Starmer was referring to when he said that the country’s open borders had created a “rise of forces that are slowly pulling the country apart.” Over 80 Sharia law courts have been established in England, where many Muslims adjudicate family law issues including marriages and divorces, outside the British legal system.

Unlike American Democrats, Starmer and his Labour Party understand that they only have their selves to blame for their immigration policies. Starmer is a human rights lawyer who spent his career blocking the deportation of foreign-born criminals and other illegal immigrants. But finally, as Prime Minister, Starmer has seen the light and is pledging to close the borders down.

WINNER: Four Polls Show Trump’s Positive Approvals are Up

Polls go up and down and President Trump’s high-energy approach to his job causes his ratings to be erratic. With the legacy media only headlining the low numbers, it’s sometimes hard to get a decent snapshot of what Americans are thinking. However, this week it is worth noting that four opinion polls showed the President with positive ratings at the same time. The Morning Consult Poll had Trump’s approval at 48, HarvardCAPS /Harris poll shows him at a net positive, Rasmussen has him at 50%, just like the Daily Mail/J.L. Partners poll.

LOSER: Grade Inflation in Grievance Studies Programs

While testifying recently in support of Senate Bill 37, the higher education reform bill authored by Sen. Brandon Creighton, R-Conroe and Rep. Matt Shaheen, R-Plano, I informed lawmakers that over 400 courses at University of Texas at Austin include gender in the title, 200 purport to be about race and 150 focus on identity. By comparison, less than a dozen courses focus on the Constitution, the Federalist Papers or President Abraham Lincoln. When one of the lawmakers asked why, I noted that students take these courses because they are frequently an easy “A.” The audience at the hearing was filled with faculty, mostly from UT Austin, who opposed the legislation and mocked my response, some by laughing and making derogatory comments out loud. One yelled out, “you need to take a course,” before the chairman gaveled them out of order.

But a study released this week by the America First Policy Institute confirmed that at UT Austin, activist-driven classes, “particularly those found in ethnic, gender, and identity-focused studies—are less academically demanding and contribute disproportionately to grade inflation.” In women’s studies classes, for example, 85% of students receive an A. TPPF is supporting legislation, House Bill 4234, that will make this transparent by noting on individual transcripts what grades are given in a class—so a student whose transcript reports an A will also be informed that 85% of the class also made an A.

SB 37 will restore the authority of Boards of Regents at state run college and universities in Texas and rein in the hegemony of faculty control over the courses that are taught.

LOSER: No Paris Trip for Harris County Judge

The Harris County Commissioners Court has voted against providing funds for County Judge Lina Hidalgo and four of her staff to travel to Paris on a “trade mission.” Hidalgo is a Democrat, and two Democrats joined with Republicans in giving a thumbs down to the Paris trip, noting that the Harris County budget has a deficit of at least $131 million.

Meanwhile, Houston Mayor John Whitmire announced he had no interest in going to France, and put out a budget this week that increases police pay without a budget deficit. Just saying.

LOSER: Man Takes Women’s Swimming Medals in Texas

Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton announced this week that he is investigating what happened at the U.S. Masters Swimming Spring Nationals when a man who says he’s a woman took first place in five events at the meet which was held in San Antonio recently. The man, Hugo Caldas, won the 50-yard breaststroke, the 100-yard breaststroke, the 50-yard freestyle, the 100-yard freestyle, and 100-yard individual combination.

According to a United Nations report “more than 600 biologically female athletes have lost at least 890 medals to transgender competitors in 29 sports. This is ok with U.S. Masters Swimming, but it is not allowed in Texas, so it is good Paxton is on the case.

WINNER: Texas Still No. 1 Job Creating State

This feels like old news, but Gov. Greg Abbott announced this week that the Bureau of Labor Statistics continues to show that Texas is the top job creating state in the nation. Texas added 37,700 jobs in April and over 215,000 jobs last year. Abbott adds that since he has been governor, over 2 million jobs have been created in Texas.

LOSER: Texas A&M Leads SEC in Coach Payouts

Meanwhile, we learned this week that that Texas A&M led the Southeastern Conference (SEC) in coach buyouts in 2024 with $27.5 million spent to buy out the contracts of losing coaches. A&M’s big number was driven by the $19.2 million the Aggies gave Jimbo Fisher in 2023. The University of Texas at Austin paid $7.2 million to buy out the contracts of losing coaches there.

WINNER: NBA Small Markets … and the Knicks

For those who don’t tune into NBA basketball until the playoffs, now is the time. We’re down to the final four—the East and West Championships, where small market teams—the Minnesota Timberwolves and Oklahoma City—are battling in the West and the Indiana Pacers are playing in the East. This is a big boost for teams in relatively small media markets. The once-legendary New York Knicks, who knocked off the reigning champions, the Boston Celtics, just the other week, are obviously in the biggest media market on the planet. All the teams are playing throughout the long holiday weekend.

Have a great Memorial Day!

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 & Woolley Show on 1370 Talk Radio in Austin to announce the week’s Winners & Losers. The clock struck midnight on Thursday and put the dream-killing Deadline Day in the Texas House behind us. Now, we have 17 days to go in the legislative session. But that’s just Texas. Lots happening in the rest of the world. Here’s who made the list this week:

WINNER: Donald Trump’s Middle East Barnstorm

President Donald Trump is returning home from a historic trip to the Middle East that has drawn praise from some Democrat experts and left many conservatives asking how he can fail to receive the Nobel Peace Prize. Trump is the first president to visit Syria in 25 years, where he announced he will lift sanctions against them, using the leverage to push them to join the Abraham Accords and normalize relations with Israel. One former Biden advisor said Trump’s moves are “unequivocally, the right thing to do,” adding “I don’t know why Joe Biden didn’t do it.” Trump also got $600 billion in new American investment from Saudi Arabia, as well as commitments from the United Arab Emirates and Qatar to increase investment. Plus, he secured the release of Eden Alexander, the last living American hostage being held by Hamas.

LOSER: Qatar’s Big Texas Footprint

It is too soon to tell whether Qatar will be successful in gifting President Trump with a 747 to become the new Air Force One, but the story has lots of Texas connections. The plane itself was spotted at the San Antonio International Airport earlier this month and now is reportedly being repaired somewhere in Texas – either there, Waco or Greenville, near Dallas.

Texas Sen. Ted Cruz does not support the President’s taking the plane from Qatar, saying it will present significant “surveillance and espionage” problems. His colleague, Florida Sen. Rick Scott, has the same issues and goes even farther, saying he’d never fly in a Qatari plane because there’s no way to make it safe. Cruz and Scott are both on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and have long voiced concerns about Qatar because of that country’s connections to the Muslim Brotherhood and Al Jazeera, the Muslim news organization that frequently dishes out anti-Israeli and anti-American news stories.

Meanwhile, the conservative and usually reliable Powerline Blog says the plane controversy is just another smear job against Trump, noting that the “gift” is actually costing $400 million and will go to the Air Force, just like any routine transfer of military equipment. L3Harris, which works on lots of Air Force equipment, has facilities in Texas to do whatever retrofitting is needed.

The Free Press has a long piece on the ubiquitous presence of Qatar in the U.S., particularly on university campuses. Even after closing down Texas A&M’s engineering school in Qatar, Texas universities take more funding from Qatar than any other country, much of which has strings that allows the Qatari donors to direct how the funds are spent. Two of my TPPF colleagues issued a report on “foreign soft power” influencing Texas universities late last year. Reporting requirements are weak, but the study found that the University of Texas at Austin is the top recipient of Qatari funding and that Texas A&M had underreported funding received from Qatar by almost $400 million. The Texas House passed strong legislation this week that will require universities to more strenuously report foreign donations, but Qatar is not on the list of countries that are covered by the bill.

WINNER: America’s Military Academies Go Merit-Based

Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth has declared that the nation’s three military academies – West Point, Annapolis and the Air Force Academy – must now admit students based entirely on merit without regard to race, ethnicity or sex. The Supreme Court ruled in 2023 that all American universities that receive federal funds cannot give preferences to students based on their race, ethnicity or sex, but the military academies were excluded. Hegseth’s edict eliminates that exception. It is hard to argue with the notion that the military should be led by the country’s best and brightest – a decision that certainly does not preclude diversity.

LOSER: The Media’s “Original Sin”

All week, CNN host Jake Tapper has been talking about his new book, Original Sin: President Biden’s Decline, Its Cover Up and His Disastrous Choice to Run Again which has dozens of stories of what was going on behind the scenes as former President Biden’s advisors covered up the cognitive decline of their boss. If it wasn’t such a diabolical power grab, it would be heart-breaking to learn that the President’s doctor was so concerned about Biden’s steadiness on his feet that he felt a wheelchair would be needed to protect him from a fall. But, of course, advisors said a wheelchair was out of the question until after the election. They report that cabinet secretaries had virtually no contact with their leader and actor George Clooney was visibly shaken when Biden did not recognize him at the big California gala that launched Biden’s re-election campaign.

All of this is a herculean effort on the part of Tapper and his co-author, Alex Thompson, to shift the blame for the cover-up of Biden’s mental failings away from the media and declare that it was the fault of Biden’s staff. Unfortunately for the media, it’s too late. The whole country – and the world – saw what was going on. They saw the media fail to report that Biden went for months without doing a press conference, that he confused the names of world leaders, and would wander around aimlessly after speaking. He even had to be rescued by the Easter Bunny at the annual White House Easter Egg Roll. I talked with Texas media legend Ray Sullivan about the coverage of Biden’s decline this spring and he said bluntly that the “media committed suicide.” It’s their job to tell the truth. They didn’t.

WINNER: Kolkhorst Foreign Land Bill Passes the House

Sen. Lois Kolkhorst, R-Brenham, has led the charge on legislation to prohibit hostile countries from purchasing Texas land ever since she learned that a Chinese company with connections to the Chinese Communist Party had purchased 140,000 acres near Laughlin Air Force Base, east of Del Rio. Her legislation passed the Senate last session, but failed to pass the Texas House. However, this week, the bill passed the Texas House where members made it even stronger by giving the governor the right to expand the list of impacted countries if national security risks warrant it. This is a huge boon to Texas and national security.

WINNER: Women’s Bill of Rights Passes House

State Rep. Ellen Troxclair, R-Austin, passed House Bill 229, the Women’s Bill of Rights this week, which defines men and women based on the biological organs they are born with. The Texas Tribune’s report on the bill describes it as more Republican hegemony against people who insist they are a different gender than they actually are, but at least they gave Troxclair the last word from her speech on the Texas House floor:

“We’re a state that believes in truth, and we’re a state that honors the hard-won achievements of women, the women who fought for the right to vote, to compete in sports and to be safe in public spaces, to be treated equally under the law. But if we can no longer define what a woman is, we cannot defend what women have won. We cannot protect what we cannot define.”

LOSER: Austin Drops to Number 5

Despite all the gushy hype about Austin, Fort Worth is now the fourth largest city in Texas and Austin drops to number five with a population under a million, driven down by affordability costs, crippling traffic and expensive woke policies that have resulted in a sketchy downtown and regulation policies nobody wants to pay for. Houston remains the fourth largest city in the nation and the largest city in Texas with a population of 2.4 million.

WINNER: Texas Roadhouse Overtakes Olive Garden

Texas Roadhouse restaurants have finally beaten the Olive Garden’s 7-year winning streak to become the top casual dining restaurant in America. In what must also be a gratifying win for HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., the Texas Roadhouse has fearlessly battled Olive Garden’s “never ending breadsticks” and “never ending pasta,” to dominate by pushing protein over carbs in the family restaurant war.

Other Texas food winners this week include Texas Gov. Greg Abbott who has asked the U.S. Dept. of Agriculture for a waiver to allow Texas to restrict the purchase of highly processed and junk foods, like candy and soda, with Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) funds – what used to be called food stamps. A good move to help Make Texas Healthy Again.

WINNER: Women’s Flag Football

Axios Austin reports that Austin ISD is hosting the first girls’ flag football tournament this weekend, featuring Dallas cowboys quarterback Dak Prescott. The NFL is pushing flag football programs for girls across the country in a clear effort to expand the base of football fans. The 2028 Olympics will include flag football for both men and women. In Austin, they are calling it Friday Night Lights in May and it starts tonight at the Burger Athletic Center.

The rest of us have the NBA playoffs. 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 & Woolley Show on 1370 Talk Radio in Austin to announce the week’s Winners & Losers. With tariffs are coming down everywhere but China, and less than a month to go in the Texas legislative session, here’s who made the list:

WINNER: Catholics Weigh-in With New Pope

We used to say that every election was a fight for the hearts and minds of America, but now the biggest battle is for the hearts and minds of the world, which makes the election of a new Pope especially significant. A war is being waged against Western civilization, which is built on the principles of love, faith and freedom, rooted in Judeo-Christian faith. Catholics have chosen a leader they hope can fight that battle.

Everyone is scrambling to learn as much as they can about the first Pope born in America, Pope Lex XIV, who is a Chicago White Sox fan and has Creole roots in Louisiana, but who has lived most of his life outside America as a missionary. Catholics are the largest branch of the Christian church, with 1.4 billion members, and the Pope is an important symbolic world leader, even for those of us who are not Catholic. In his first sermon this morning, he shared his view that too many in the world are living in a kind of de facto atheism that robs lives of meaning, joy and respect for life. To see what that can lead to, just look at those folks who are once again on the Losers List—the Pro-Hamas Protesters arrested this week at Columbia who were circulating pamphlets glorifying an anti-Israel terrorist and ignoring edicts to stop hate and anti-Semitism. The same scene played out at Brooklyn College, where protesters crashed into campus buildings, hoisting Palestinian flags and chanting support for terrorists.

WINNER: UT Establishes School of Civic Leadership

Meanwhile, at the University of Texas, Gov. Greg Abbott, Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick and UT Leadership including Board of Regents Chair Kevin Eltife announced yesterday that they will build a new building for the School of Civic Leadership, established in 2023, to “grow citizens who understand the ideas and institutions that have made free, prosperous societies possible.”

According to the leaders of the School of Civic Leadership, its mission is to wrestle with the great ideas of the Western tradition and answer the critical timeless questions regarding the nature of justice, leadership and truth. Its scope of study includes “the best achievements and greatest difficulties of the American tradition in order to understand what it takes to preserve the blessings of liberty for ourselves and for others.”

According to the latest survey from the Foundation for Individual Rights and Freedom (FIRE) the ratio of liberals to conservatives at the University of Texas is 4 to 1, and almost half the students say they do not feel comfortable speaking out in classrooms or even among friends on campus. The School of Civic Leadership could not have come at a better time.    

WINNER: Marco Rubio

Remember when President Donald Trump used to call Marco Rubio “little Marco?” Now, of course, he calls him “Secretary Rubio,” as the Secretary of State who just got the added job title of National Security Advisor.

Trump speculated this week that while Vice President J.D. Vance is most often named as his obvious successor, Rubio would also be on the list as the possible next GOP president based on his stellar performance in the first 100 days. There are hundreds and hundreds more days until 2028, but it is still worth noting that, at least for now, Rubio made the short list.

WINNER: Texas’ Newest Star Base

It’s official. Voters, almost all of whom are employees at Elon Musk’s SpaceX’s launching site in South Texas, voted to become a Texas city on Saturday by a margin of 200 to 4. Following on that win, SpaceX got approval this week to do 25 Starship launches a year from the new city named Starbase, which is near Boca Chica. Musk first moved SpaceX and Twitter, now known as X to Texas to Texas in 2024. In addition, Musk’s son, X, lives here, which prompted Gov. Greg Abbott to recently quip that all Musk’s eXes are in Texas.

LOSER: No Prizes for the Pulitzers

It is not news that the Pulitzer Prize Committee is a leftist cabal. This year they gave an award to Pro-Publica—the activists who got people’s IRS records and then reported them. Their latest most patently egregious example is that the photo of the year was not the iconic shot of President Trump rising and raising his fist after he was shot in Butler, Pennsylvania, taken by AP Photographer Evan Vucci. Instead, the prize went to a photographer who got a photo of the president while he was on the ground after the shooting.

Axios claimed at the time that there was concern among some in the media that the photo of Trump raising his fist after he was shot was “free PR” for the then-presidential candidate. Other media even mused that had they thought about the impact of the photos sooner, they might not have distributed it so broadly.

It is hard to know which is worse—the fact that the Pulitzers ignored a photo that will obviously go down in history, or learning that some in the media actually said that had they thought about it, they might not have released the defiant photo of Trump at all.

LOSER: Jasmine Crockett

The latest on Dallas Congresswoman Jasmine Crockett is that one of her Republican colleagues spotted her at the Atlanta airport apparently jumping the line in front of disabled passengers to get on a plane. Crockett, who is angling for a new position on the House Oversight Committee, is clearly trying to be the new Democrat “it girl” and is making every effort to “out-AOC” AOC, (Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez). When President Trump pointed to Crockett as just one more example of the lack of serious people in the Democrat Party, Crockett went on X and replied that the president is “terrified of smart, bold black women.” 

Apparently Crockett didn’t notice what happened when fellow Dallasite Mark Cuban said Trump didn’t like to be challenged by strong, intelligent women. The blowback from strong, intelligent women who support Trump, including his chief of staff and others who work for him, was massive. As for black women, perhaps Rep. Crockett should take a look at the strong black women in this interview by CNN’s Van Jones.

WINNER: Van Jones Talks to Black People in South Carolina

If CNN wrote a news story about what their commentator, Van Jones, learned in South Carolina, where he went to talk to African Americans who voted for Trump, I couldn’t find it. But what Jones reported is worth taking a couple minutes to WATCH.

In speaking with several African American voters in Charleston, Jones said that most people thought of Trump voters as “white guys in red hats,” very unlike the black South Carolinians he was talking too who did not fall for any of the lefty dog whistles Jones laid out. He asked them their reaction to President Trump taking down Harriet Tubman’s picture for a minute, before it was put back up (a very big story on the left), but South Carolinians said that kind of thing isn’t important. He asked them about Trump supposedly removing Biden’s guidelines on how police should deal with black people. In response, one “bold black woman” told Jones that her husband was in training to become a law enforcement office and she is disgusted with the way police are treated. Another man said he voted for Trump because he is authentic. All of them said they had no regrets about their vote and would absolutely vote for him again. Perhaps Rep. Crockett should pay more attention.

WINNER: Paxton Sues Austin ISD for Teaching CRT

Attorney General Ken Paxton is suing Austin ISD for teaching Critical Race Theory (CRT) , a move that is causing the usual wailing and gnashing of teeth among public school educators who cannot seem to understand why they cannot continue to teach the often de-bunked 1619 Project on the sly, even after the Texas Legislature banned it from public schools.

CRT is an anti-American ideology based on the false notion that American was founded to further slavery and that every American institution is built on white supremacy. Consequently, the 1619 Project asserts that America’s real beginning was not at Plymouth Rock, but instead in 1619 when the first Africans arrived in Virginia. The mission of CRT is to pre-empt American history and discredit all other accounts of our past. CRT is not presented as just one theory, it is presented as fact, which is probably why some instructors at Austin ISD appear willing to not be truthful about teaching it in defiance of the law.

WINNER: Watching Sports

The Nielson Ratings, which told us what the country was watching on TV, are antiquated now, and a new system called Big Data Plus Panels is now giving us a much better picture of what Americans are watching. The answer is sports, all sports, and all the time. Forgot Netflix, Prime and the wars between Fox News and CNN. The only thing that gets all eyes glued to one screen is sports. Football draws far more than any other sport, but lots of folks are watching the second round of the NBA playoffs to see if the Knicks can really take down the champion Boston Celtics. They are up 2-0 in the series after two great games. Game 3 is tomorrow night.

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 & Woolley Show on 1370 Talk Radio in Austin to announce the week’s Winners & Losers. Somehow it is already May, and the Texas House will start working Saturdays tomorrow as they speed toward June 2. Meanwhile, the numbers on President Donald Trump’s first 100 days are dazzling—although the U.S. still does not own Greenland. Here’s the list:

WINNER: Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick Making Religious Liberty Great Again

President Trump went to the Rose Garden yesterday to announce he is establishing a Religious Liberty Commission that will be chaired by Texas Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick. Former HUD Secretary Ben Carson will serve as vice chair, along with dozens of other religious luminaries including Rev. Franklin Graham, NY Archbishop Timothy Dolan, Rabbi Meir Soloveichik and Dr. Phil.

In accepting the appointment, Patrick noted that despite America’s great heritage of religious liberty, people of faith were under attack during the four years of the Biden administration. He pledged to carry out the president’s mission to ensure that all believers are free to pray and worship God anywhere in this country.

Patrick is embarking on his mission at an interesting time in the war against faith. The U.S. Supreme Court has heard three religious liberty cases this term, including the one argued last week by a coalition of parents of faith in Maryland who were denied the right to keep their children out of LGBTQ+ classes. The Court considered a case in March in which the state of Wisconsin declared that Catholic Charities was more charities than religious, so they took away their tax exemption. This week, the Court heard the religious charter school case in Oklahoma.

These legal battles always bring out the usual atheist blather that Americans should not have to be exposed to anything involving faith or belief. However, it is interesting to note that some prominent atheists are taking a decidedly different stand these days. Tom Holland, Louise Perry and even notorious atheist Richard Dawkins have been saying of late that the values Christianity brings to a culture, which have been the bedrock of Western civilization since Christ died 2000 years ago, are a positive force for good, even if you don’t believe in God.

As a believer, it is hard to understand why seeing that good does not lead to a deeper exploration of faith. Still, it is important that even atheists recognize that cultures that are rooted in Judeo-Christian values are stronger and better for people than cultures that aren’t.

Lt. Gov. Patrick lives his faith and has written eloquently about the ways it has transformed his life and the lives of those around him. With his leadership at the Presidential Commission on Religious Freedom, all people of faith will be able to live their faith and tell their stories.

WINNER: Trump’s First 100 Days

We have been reflecting on the first 100 days of Trump 2.0 since Day One and when the milestone finally arrived on Wednesday, the scorecard was official—143 Executive Orders, 100,000 deportations of illegal criminals and almost zero illegal crossings at the southern border. DOGE found billions of dollars in government waste, and billions in federal funds were pulled from anti-American academic institutions. The Gulf of America is a thing and Europe has been repeatedly reminded who is paying their defense bills. Froot Loops won’t have those garish colors anymore and freedom has come for plastic straws.  

Trump did all this and more while receiving almost exclusively negative media coverage from ABC, CBS and NBC, which were followed by the Washington Post and, of course the two government funded outlets, National Public Radio and the Public Broadcasting Service, which he defunded today. The Media Research Center found that out of 1,841 statements made by journalists, anchors, reporters, and experts during evening news broadcasts from January 20 to April 9, a total of 1,692 of the statements—92%—were negative.

For just one example, left-wing media routinely trash Trump’s open cabinet meetings, but at a minimum, they illustrate just how broadly Trump sees his scope of work. The contrast with the lethargic Biden administration, where everything happened behind closed doors, is stunning.

WINNER: Trump Defunds PBS and NPR

In an Executive Order late Thursday night President Trump directed the Corporation for Public Broadcasting to stop giving federal funds to National Public Radio (NPR) and the Public Broadcasting Service (PBS). In a masterful statement that will be difficult for elite journalists to refute, Trump’s EO read:

“Government funding of news media in this environment is not only outdated and unnecessary but corrosive to the appearance of journalistic independence.”

It was that easy. Makes you wonder why it took so long, since many of us have advocated for de-funding PBS and NPR for decades. Both media outlets only get a small portion—10% to 15%—of their funding from taxpayers, so they won’t go away, but it will be fun to watch how they change going forward. Do stodgy, elitist news shows have a future?

LOSER: San Marcos City Council’s Anti-Israel Resolution

San Marcos, which for many is a wide place in the road between Austin and San Antonio, made big time news this week when a couple City Council members decided to step into international affairs and proposed a resolution calling for a cease fire in the Hamas war in the Middle East, an arms embargo against Israel and the recognition of Palestinian sovereignty.

Gov. Greg Abbott immediately threatened the city with the withdrawal of state grant funding because the move violates Texas law prohibiting boycotts against Israel. The council members’ wordy resolution calls Israel’s response to the Oct. 7, 2023 Hamas attack a “genocide” and accuses Israel of “apartheid and illegal occupation of Palestinian land.”

The proposal made quite a scene at the San Marcos City Council meeting, with dozens of pro-Palestinian supporters waving signs. Testimony continued until 1 a.m., and although no vote was taken, news reports say it had votes to pass. This outrageous City Council meeting shows how the ignorance of academia can poison a community. Sleepy San Marcos, of course, is home to Texas State University, where according to FIRE, the ratio of liberals to conservatives is 3 to 1, and 76% of the students say it is sometimes acceptable to shout down a speaker you don’t agree with. Apparently, anyone who knew anything about what is actually going on in the Middle East was shouted down.

LOSER: Texans Paying for Illegal Immigrant Health Care

According to a report by the Texas Health and Human Services Commission, over 31,000 illegal immigrants visited Texas hospitals in 2024, including 22,000 who went to emergency rooms. The state estimated the cost of those visits to be $121.8 million, which doesn’t count the time lost by Texans who had to wait for care or who could not be given care because of overcrowding. Texas has borne these less-visible costs of illegal immigration for decades, and Gov. Abbott was right to ask the state to start keeping records. No one is surprised by these numbers. It’s another cost of open borders.

WINNER: Sen. Ted Cruz Passes Revenge Porn Bill

The fact that any bill passes in Washington is big news, but this past week, Texas Sen. Ted Cruz’s legislation to ban non-consensual posting of nude photographs, including AI generated shots, passed the House. It now awaits President Trump’s signature, which is very likely since First Lady Melania Trump went to the House to lobby in support of the Legislation. Cruz spoke out about the devastating impact of fake images on teenagers, especially girls, as well as what phony postings can do to families and children. The fight against this kind of thing from AI has undoubtedly just begun, but Cruz has staked out a spot on the moral high ground.

LOSER: Democrats 100 Days Under Trump 2.0

So far, the Democrat opposition hasn’t been able to get any footing against President Trump in the first 100 days, probably because they spend most of their time defending men who say they are women and trying to keep illegal alien criminals in the country. A move to impeach the president fizzled before it started this week. Meanwhile, former vice presidential candidate Tim Walz said this week he was picked to run because he could “code talk to white guys,” and former Vice President Kamala Harris, currently the leading contender for the Democratic nomination in 2028, gave her first speech this week talking about how elephants band together during earthquakes. Finally, ActBlue, the Democrats’ primary fundraising machine, which has long been the gold standard in raising campaign money, is being investigated for big time fraud. As we start the second 100 days, all thumbs are pointing down for the Democrats.

LOSER: Harvard

For those keeping score in the Trump versus Harvard battle, first Trump took away $2.2 billion in federal funding. Then Harvard roared back with a lawsuit (even though it is a private school) and all the other Ivy League schools rallied around it, pledging to join in the fight against Trump’s war against academia. Next, Trump threatened to take away Harvard’s tax exempt status and then Trump’s budget, just released today, slashed funding for higher education. Unfortunately for Harvard, in the middle of this fight, a report was released by the university itself showing how the school suppressed diversity of thought and pushed political agendas. Harvard’s president called the report “painful and disappointing,” but most everyone else sees it as no surprise. This is the same university that gave us Claudine Gay.

WINNER: Tommy Tuberville Speaks Out on NIL

Texan Cody Campbell, who chairs the Texas Tech Board of Regents, is the national thought leader on reforming college sports, starting with NIL and the transfer portal. Campbell has pointed out that college sports not only provide a lifeline for thousands of athletes, they also are a vital part of American life and culture that fuels economic vitality in college towns across the nation. The current NIL system threatens all of that, including the non-revenue producing sports—that’s everything except football and men’s basketball. Women’s sports, Olympic sports, college baseball, soccer, track, gymnastics, will not survive under the current system. Yesterday, former coach and Alabama Sen. Tommy Tuberville got on board, calling on Trump to push for college sports reform sooner rather than later. Let’s hope the president puts this on his list for the second 100 days.

That’s a wrap. 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 & Woolley Show on 1370 Talk Radio in Austin to announce the week’s Winners & Losers. Today marks President Donald Trump’s 95^th day in office, while the Texas Legislature has knocked out 102 of the constitutionally allotted 140 days in the regular odd-year session. Here’s the list:

Winner: Education Savings Accounts Come Just in Time

When the always-eloquent Senate Education Chairman Brandon Creighton, R-Conroe, rose in the Texas Senate Chamber to concur with the version of Senate Bill 2 that had passed the House, he noted that the Texas Education Freedom Act will transform education in our state—expanding options and restoring hope for thousands of children in our state. After overcoming three decades of resistance from education bureaucrats who repeatedly made it clear they care more about their jobs than their students, the bill now goes to Gov. Greg Abbott’s desk for his signature.

Loser: Too Many Texas Public Schools

Those bureaucrats were working down to the wire to keep the truth from Texas parents about how poorly many of our public schools are performing. Yesterday, after overcoming a lawsuit from more than 100 school districts, the Texas Education Agency (TEA) released school ratings for 2022-23 school year which revealed that one in five Texas public school students attend a school that is rated D or F. These ratings are particularly galling for those who spent the last 102 days watching the school choice battle at the Capitol and hearing teachers’ unions and their Democrat water-carriers insist that letting parents choose the best school for their child would destroy public education in Texas.

Looking at the ratings, you have to wonder how much worse it could get. Despite state spending that hovers close to $100 billion, the number of F-rated schools increased from 4.5% to 7.6 percent in 2022-23. TEA says it evaluated 8,539 public schools; 19.3% received an A, 33.6% got a B, 24.7% a C, and 14.8% received D’s. So the flip talking point is that only one in five students goes to an A-rated school.

The school districts that had sued to stop release of the ratings had charged that TEA had changed the rating system in the five years  since the last A-F school grades were last released. But after the 15th Court of Appeals ruled TEA could inform parents about how their kids’ schools were performing, the ratings showed both the scores the school would have received using the old ratings as well as the new rating system. Many grades dropped a few points with the new standards, but some schools scored higher with the new criteria. You can view the available ratings here. TEA still cannot release the ratings for the 2023-24 school year because school officials have filed a separate lawsuit. In other education news, California is considering allowing community college students to sleep in their cars because housing is so expensive.

Loser: Federal Regulation

Those who insist that Elon Musk is over-doing it with his war on waste, inefficiency and over-regulation should take a look at the report that came out last week from the Competitive Enterprise Institute, which found that federal regulations cost $1.2 trillion annually, about the same as Americans pay in federal income tax. According to the report:

US households pay on average $16,016 annually in a hidden regulatory tax, which consumes 16 percent of income and 21 percent of household expenses.

These household outlays exceed expenditures on health care, food, transportation, entertainment, apparel, services, and savings. Only the costs of housing, which stand at $25,436 annually, exceed regulation.

Winner: J.K. Rowling and Texas Stand Up for Women

J.K. Rowling, author of the beloved Harry Potter series, has been brutally besieged for years because she refused to bend the knee to those who insist that men who declare themselves to be women actually are women. In addition to death threats, cancellation and hate attacks—Scotland passed a law targeting her that would make it illegal to “stir up a hate crime.” Several of the actors in the Harry Potter movies denounced her—rendering those films unwatchable now for those of who care about facts and science.

But Rowling finally won the war when the Supreme Court of the United Kingdom declared this week that there are only two biological sexes—an important ruling, for the British were the first to perform sex change operations and then became the first to halt them after research showed that they were hurting patients instead of helping them.

Meanwhile, Axios reports that Texas legislators have filed more legislation reining in men who say they are women than any other state, as if that’s a bad thing. In all, 120 bills have been filed here, twice as many as Missouri, which is in second place. Texas legislators have already passed laws that prohibit boys from playing in women’s sports. New proposals seek to ensure women’s privacy is protected in public restrooms and locker facilities, and it would prohibit individuals from changing the sex on their birth certificates or other official documents, as well as making sure teachers can’t be fired for using the wrong pronouns. There’s a nationwide Trans legislation tracker here.

Winner: U.S. Rep. Henry Cuellar, D-Laredo

Another week has passed, and as far as anyone can tell, the national strategy of the Democrats is to focus on poor gang members who beat up their wives and, of course, men who say they are women. The New York Times asked several old Democrats how the party got its momentum back after big losses in the 1980’s. They have lots of theories, but Laredo Congressman Henry Cuellar gets specific when he made it clear what Democrats should not be talking about. He noted that the South Texas border communities he represents don’t care about Kilmer Abrago Garcia, who Trump deported: “With all due respect, when you’re talking about bringing somebody—and I know there were due process questions—that was in Maryland, and now El Salvador. I don’t know if that’s the right issue that Democrats should be focusing on right now.”

Winner: No Bike Lanes Bill

Anyone who doubts the importance of Sen. Paul Bettencourt’s legislation to halt bike lanes in Texas cities needs to visit Portland, Oregon and talk to business owners there who were driven out of the downtown core of that formerly beautiful city when bike lanes virtually stopped all car traffic from moving.

Portland is known as the one of the worst sites of the Black Lives Matters riots in 2020, which destroyed many parts of the downtown, but residents with a longer memory will tell you that the bicyclists, who are a loud and powerful lobby, did as much or more damage to Portland by closing down traffic lanes and making bike lanes and bicycle travel the priority. Similar efforts are underway in the Austin now, where traffic is stifled by more and more encroaching bicycle lanes, most often with no bikes in them. Blue cities have always been anti-car for no good reason other than they don’t like them. Bettencourt is right to fight back.

Winner: Houston May John Whitmire

Speaking of blue cities, Houston Democrats are up in arms because Houston Mayor John Whitmire attended a fundraising event for U.S. Rep. Dan Crenshaw, R-Houston. Democrats accused Whitmire of undermining the “values and mission of the Democrat Party…” which, as noted above, appear to be the fight for men who think they are women and keeping violent gang members in the country. Whitmire served as a Democrat in the Texas House for 10 years and the Texas Senate for 40 years—literally 50 years in the Legislature—where he was always a tireless voice for his party. Since he has been mayor he has also been attacked for standing in support of the Jewish community and making sure the Houston Police Department cooperates with ICE in arresting illegal aliens. Most folks think he is focused on “values and mission.”

Winner: COVID “Lab Leak” Website

The left-wing media went nuts when the Trump administration took down all the COVID information websites and replaced them with a big blaring headline that reads COVID LAB LEAK, detailing the origins of the virus. Years of lies about COVID, the denials, the intolerance of dissent, along with the loss of freedom and lives, all had a traumatic impact on most every American. Changing the websites and setting the record straight will help Americans remember never to go so far off course again.

Loser: Joe Biden’s $300K Speaking Tour

Each week we wonder how long we will be able to keep former President Joe Biden on the Losers List—but here he is again. Granted, there is some humility in Biden’s thinking that he would get $300,000 to make a speech—former President Barack Obama gets $400,000, but the word is that bookings are not going that well. In his first official public speech since the election, the New York Post reports that he referred to black children as “colored kids,” which charitably can be called anachronistic if not offensive. This speech should not be confused with Biden’s recent trip to Harvard after Trump announced he was withdrawing federal funds to the Ivy League school. While there, Biden reportedly referred to Ukraine as Iraq, dropped his ice cream bar and departed suddenly—but then, they weren’t paying him.

Winner: Hail to the Chief

President Trump has weighed in on the school mascot controversy in Massapequa, New York, where the state government is demanding that Massapequa High School stop using a “Chief” as their mascot. It’s part of the Empire State’s overall Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI) policies.

The school board in this old suburban town with an ancient Native American name argued in a federal lawsuit that they are victims of government overreach and that their First Amendment rights are being violated. Their state representative has proposed a legal carve out for Massapequa, but they should get rid of the whole law.

Trump called the change “ridiculous” and an affront to our great Indian population. He asked Education Secretary Linda McMahon “to fight for the people of Massapequa on this very important issue,” adding “LONG LIVE THE MASSAPEQUA CHIEFS!”

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.