Category: Winners & Losers

Every Friday morning, I join the Cardle & Woolley Show on 1370 Talk Radio in Austin to announce the week’s Winners & Losers. The tragedy of the devastating floods in Central Texas last weekend hang heavy over Texas now, as search and recovery continues. Texans have mobilized from all over the state to help in Kerr and the surrounding counties, once again demonstrating the “Texas strong” spirit of community and caring.

Here’s the list:

WINNER: Trump a Year after Butler

It has only been a year. Last July 13, then-presidential candidate Donald Trump was shot in Butler, Pennsylvania, narrowly missing a fatal blow from a would-be assassin. There was little doubt after that day that he would be re-elected, and he went on to transform the country and the world, engaging in the kind of leadership that had been sorely missing during the years of Joe Biden. The president will be in Texas today to talk with community leaders and survey the flood damage.

LOSERS: Flood Blamers and Haters

After the rivers over-flowed last weekend, it only took minutes for Trump’s enemies to swoop in and blame him for the flood deaths, charging that cuts to the National Weather Service had hampered their ability to get warnings out to the storm-affected areas. Even the weather service workers’ union says that wasn’t true. Still, there is a segment of the population who will undoubtedly go to their graves blaming Trump for the flooding.

Unfortunately, those predictable partisans weren’t the worst of it. Kudos to Houston Mayor John Whitmire who made sure the Bayou City was totally disassociated from Sade Perkins, who posted an ugly TikTok reel charging that the girl’s camp, where many young people were lost, was racist, and the response to the tragedy was only because the girls were white.

“If this were a group of Hispanic girls out there, this would not be getting this type of coverage that they’re getting, no one would give a f–k,” Perkins said. She went onto say that MAGA would be “happy to see LGBTQ kids floating down the river.”

Her sentiments were echoed by Christina Propst, a Houston pediatrician who said Kerr County MAGA voted to gut FEMA and MAGA voters got what they deserved. “May all visitors, children, non-MAGA voters and pets be safe and dry,” Propst said.

There simply are no words to describe these despicable individuals. It is important to note that these are not marginal crazy people. One is a physician and the other apparently showed enough competence to be appointed to a position in the city of Houston. Those who say this happens on both sides are wrong. I live in San Antonio, where, too often, bodies of illegal immigrants must be pulled from the back of an 18-wheeler after a failed smuggling attempt. Even the most vocal opponents of illegal immigration do not celebrate those deaths. This kind of hate among progressives is simply inexplicable.

WINNER: A-F Public School Ratings Finally Free for Parents to See

Giving every school a grade based on student performance is an old idea in education reform. I first heard it from former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, who called it the most consequential step they took in the Sunshine State to bring about change in public schools. Letting parents know how their local schools perform increases parent participation and involvement.

Texas attempted to follow Bush’s lead over a decade ago, but Texas teachers’ unions blocked A-F school ratings legislation at every turn, insisting that students would be traumatized if they knew they were attending a failing school. (Before A-F, Texas schools were rated either Pass or Fail). When A-F ratings finally passed in 2017, hundreds of schools sued the state to block the ratings from being made public. COVID-19 provided another excuse for delay, but this week the 15th Court of Appeals gave the Texas Education Agency the green light to release the latest reports—another important victory for parents.

WINNER: The End of the TSA Shoe Rule

In terms of quality of life, perhaps the best thing that happened to Americans this week was the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) decision to stop forcing people to take off their shoes while going through security to board a plane. The crazy shoe bomber (and time has shown he was crazy) got on an American Airlines flight in 2001 with some kind of explosive in his tennies, and the rest of us have suffered 23 years of TSA tyranny as a result. Now it’s over. Walk free, walk proud.

LOSER: Superman Loses the American Way

The latest actor to play Superman, a guy named James Gunn, has decided we are living in mean times here in America and his portrayal of the iconic hero needs to send a different message. That’s why in the new movie about the Man of Steel, Superman will not be standing for “Truth, Justice and the American Way,” he’ll be standing for the “human way.”

He probably won’t be able to leap tall buildings in a single bound either. Good to know Texas is working to take the movie business out of Hollywood. Box office predictions for the new Superman are not good.        

LOSERS: The Many Biden Cover-Up Stories

There is yet another book out about how the Biden team covered up the truth about his cognitive decline. Even though, like most Americans, I could see Biden was in no shape to run the country, these tell-all books detail the wide-network involved in pretending he was fine and the lies that were told. They are hard to put down.

The latest is called, “How Trump Re-Took the White House and Democrats Lost America,” and includes a fun snippet reporting how Vice President Kamala Harris told the Democrat governors that, regardless of what they thought, they had to rally behind Biden to save democracy. Then she dragged New York Gov. Kathy Hochul and Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz out in front of the White House to say “all the Democrat governors were behind Biden.”

Well, they weren’t and some of them got pretty angry—but none of them said anything at the time. Meanwhile, this week we saw Biden’s doctor, Kevin O’Connor, at a congressional hearing, take the Fifth when he was asked if he had been told to lie about the president’s health. He was also asked if he believed the president was fit for duty.   He didn’t answer that question either. He quickly scurried out of the Capitol, but he’s going to have to talk sometime. We can stand by.    

The Biden cover-up is a much bigger deal than Watergate or the Clinton scandals, but it’s going to take a long time to uncover it all. There will be more hearings, more books, probably some trials before it’s over, but no matter how it is resolved, it is going to be a great movie—one of those long Netflix series, like The Crown.    

WINNER: Sotomayor and Kagan Agree Executive Branch Can Reform Executive Branch

Supreme Court Justices Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan voted with the majority in an 8-to-1 ruling this week affirming the right of the Trump administration to reform the federal government work force. Although there can still be an appeal, specifically the court determined that the Trump administration’s executive order directing agencies to develop plans to reduce the size of the workforce is likely lawful.

Labor unions and local governments had taken the president to court, insisting that Congress must sign off before the federal workforce could be reduced.

Seriously? Congress? They actually said that, and a lower court backed them up. So did Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson. She could have made the loser list this week, but I wanted a couple left-leaning winners for balance.

LOSERS: Colin Allred, Beto O’Rourke and Joaquin Castro

In what was called a “shock poll” this week, U.S. Rep. Jasmine Crockett, D-Dallas, came out as the top choice for the Democrat U.S. Senate nomination in Texas over the more familiar names of former U.S. Rep. Colin Allred, D-Dallas, who was defeated by Sen. Ted Cruz last year, former U.S. Rep. Beto O’Rourke, D-El Paso, who has been defeated by Ted Cruz, Joe Biden and Greg Abbott and U.S. Rep. Joaquin Castro, D-San Antonio, who has never run for statewide office, but has been threatening to for at least 20 years.

In a University of Texas at Tyler poll this spring, 30% of Texas Democrats also said Crockett represented their “shared values.” This is the same Jasmine Crockett who has referred to Gov. Abbott as “Governor Hot Wheels” and stated that anyone who supports Trump is “mentally ill.” Plus, she’s been spotted pushing disabled people out of her way in order to board an airplane, so you have to wonder what values those Democrats are talking about.

Winner: Back to Back Wimbledon

So we can watch the best tennis in the world this weekend following the perfect opening acts—Queen Camilla showed up to shake hands with all the tennis stars and legendary British actor Hugh Grant was spotted falling asleep. Probably ends any chance that he will ever be “Sir” Hugh Grant, but there will undoubtedly be some drama on the courts.

Have a great one!

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.

This Fourth of July weekend we will celebrate the 249th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence with fireworks and all the usual fanfare. As Texans, we should also take a moment to celebrate Spain’s big win in 1776, picking the American side in the war with England. Everyone knows France played a big role, but Spain also stood with the American patriots and people from New Spain (which back then included Texas), sent millions in cash, and thousands of longhorns, to help the cause. Ernesto Rodriguez, senior historian and curator at the Alamo, knows more about this than anyone. He joined me for my podcast this week, which you can watch here.

Here’s the week’s Winners and Losers List:

WINNER: President Trump’s List of Latest Wins

President Donald Trump continues his push to establish permanent residency in the winner’s circle. Trump won passage of his One Big Beautiful Bill, even after Democrats tried to talk it to death. The soon-to-be-signed bill will preserve the Trump tax cuts, which is great for everyone. If you haven’t read tax fighter Grover Norquist’s sign-off on the bill, it’s illuminating.

In case you missed it, the Mid-Year Federal Rules Tally was released this week, which found that Trump has instituted fewer new regulations than any president since they started keeping tabs. His edict that 10 regulations must die before a new one can be established seems to be working.

Trump shattered another record at the border one day this week when just 137 people were found trying to cross illegally, the lowest single day in 25 years.

Trump got great Supreme Court wins this week, and also in his civil suit against Paramount, which owns CBS News. Paramount is going to pay Trump $16 million after he sued CBS for doctoring its interview with former Vice President Kamala Harris to make her sound coherent.

Granted, Paramount only settled the case because it needs federal approval of a merger deal, and many in the media are pushing back at the precedent, saying CBS has the right to edit their stories any way they want. I get that point, but now that we know that the media, including CBS, was more than a little complicit in covering up former President Joe Biden’s cognitive impairment, I think we should raise the bar a little and demand that they stop doctoring tapes to make candidates they like look smarter than they are.

Alligator Alcatraz was a big hit this week too. You can buy a shirt and other merch on Amazon.

LOSERS: Democrats’ Lack of Pride

Speaking of the Fourth of July, how did we get to the point where only 36% of Democrats say they are extremely or very proud to be Americans? Did these folks miss the news last week when America’s B-2 Bombers ended a decades-old threat of nuclear war in the Middle East, and virtually all of Europe finally delivered a big thank you to the United States for NATO protections since World War II? Still, 92% of Republicans are proud to be Americans.

Gallup, which took the poll, notes that it’s all linked to Trump. Before Biden left office, 62% of Democrats said they were proud Americans.

But to get to the truly ungrateful, you have to go to Generation Z, where only 41% say they are proud of our country. Oh well, more hot dogs and apple pie for the rest of us!

LOSER: Lia Thomas and Other Men in Women’s Sports

There was no bigger symbol of the injustice of men competing in women’s sports than the University of Pennsylvania swimmer who changed his name to Lia Thomas and switched from swimming on the men’s team to the women’s team his senior year. The 6’1” Thomas, who grew up in Austin and attended Westlake High School, took home all the trophies after he started competing against women.

This week, UPenn signed an agreement with the US Dept. of Education that will force Thomas to give those trophies back. UPenn has agreed to follow Title IX and civil rights law going forward. Those laws prohibit men from competing in women’s sports. UPenn will also apologize, which is a big victory in the war against trans madness, but cold comfort for the women athletes whose college careers were ruined while they were forced to compete and share locker rooms with men.

WINNERS: Republicans in Congress

Speaking of a low bar, expectations have to be adjusted when you talk about Congress, but another poll this week found that approval of Republicans in Congress is up to 36%—the highest since 2011. Across the aisle, Democratic approval is down 12 points since February of last year, and stands at 27% among registered voters.

WINNER: HQ Texas

The latest analysis from CBRE Americas Consulting found that almost half of new business headquarters being established in the U.S. are in Texas. Dallas got almost 100 new headquarter operations last year, and Austin got 80. It’s not just people who are moving to the Lone Star State—it’s jobs.

LOSERS: New York City and New York State

A number of Democrats from all over New York came out over the weekend insisting that their nominee for mayor of New York City, Zohran Mamdani, denounce the term “globalize the intifada,” which is a rallying cry against Jews. Mamdani clearly has no intention of walking back the offensive statement. It’s his slogan and he’s sticking with it. Meanwhile, new reports indicate New York Democrats may have a bigger problem. New York Gov. Kathy Hochul may have used Medicaid funds that should have gone to cover hospital costs for sick New Yorkers to plug a billion-dollar hole in the always-overdrawn New York State budget. This is not unlike her predecessor, Andrew Cuomo, who was soundly rejected in the New York City mayoral primary at least in part because he let so many elderly people die during COVID-19.

Democrats always insist that the problems they have with voters are only about messaging, but actions are also important. Mamdani’s anti-Semitism and Hochul’s stealing health care funding to fix her bloated budget matter too.

Have a great Fourth of July!

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. There is absolutely no debate that President Donald J. Trump is a world-class winner this week. Here’s the list:

WINNER: Trump Should Get the Nobel Peace Prize

American presidents have been trying to rein in the theocracy in Iran for the last 40 years, using all kinds of threats, sanctions, sticks and carrots in an effort to get Iranians to stop developing a nuclear weapon. Last weekend, President Trump finally said, “Times up,” when it was clear Iran had no intention of backing down. In a massive display of American might—those B-2 bombers had never been in battle before—he blasted their program out of existence, ensuring that the largest state sponsor of terrorism no longer has the ability to develop a nuclear bomb.

He did so while expressing no malice toward Iran—urging them to focus on trade and building their economy instead of their jihad against Jews. At the same time, he was unequivocal that the United States will never abandon our commitment to Israel.

Trump’s F-Bomb statement—that Iran and Israel had been fighting so hard for so long that they don’t know what the f*** they are doing, —” not only succinctly describes how most of the world views the Middle East, it also made it crystal clear that he had no intention of joining that fight.

Former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, called Trump’s action “a shot in the arm for American credibility.” Rice served under George W. Bush, one of Trump’s harshest critics. The shift Rice saw in American credibility was immediately apparent in the NATO Summit this week, where every country in Europe except Spain finally agreed to substantially increase what they pay for their defense, no longer forcing the U.S. to cover most of the costs. This was a goal Trump set during his first term, but no one believed he had any hope of succeeding. Now he has.  

What happened to Iran sends a strong message to Russia and China about America’s strength and the principles that make up the Trump doctrine. “Kill all the Jews” can’t be anyone’s national mission statement, but his simple pleas to Iranian leaders to open some markets, make some money and “give peace a chance” has a whole new meaning in our current times.

Granted, the ceasefire may not hold, and Trump’s additional effort to end the fighting in Gaza may not be successful, but no world leader has pushed for world peace harder than Trump—in the Middle East, in Ukraine, in Asia. His name has repeatedly been floated for the Nobel Peace Prize. Whether he receives it has nothing to do with merit, of course, like getting all A’s at Harvard.

President Barack Obama received the Peace Prize in 2009, but it’s not exactly clear why. According to the Nobel Committee’s press release, Obama wanted to turn over international negotiations to the United Nations and embrace the fight against climate change—plus he was a big star who gave people hope. Trump’s record in just the last 10 days outshines that, but as I said, peace prizes aren’t awarded on merit.

WINNERS: John Fetterman and the 128 Democrats Who Voted Against Impeaching Trump

U.S. Sen. John Fetterman, D-Pennsylvania, continues to demonstrate statesmanship, this time by supporting President Trump for bombing Iran and saluting the U.S. military for their specular execution of the bombing mission. In the U.S. House, 128 Democrats voted with Republicans this week to table a resolution by Texas Congressman Al Green, D-Houston to impeach the president. Green insisted that Trump had dragged America into a war.

Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, R-N.Y., and Democrat Caucus Chair Pete Aguilar, D-California, voted with the Republicans. Just 79 Democrats voted to move forward with the impeachment.

WINNER: Wesley Hunt and Robert E. Lee

U.S. Rep. Wesley Hunt, R-Texas is certainly not the first guy to clearly explain why place names and statues of former Confederates and slave holders should not be removed, but his appearance on the left-leaning HBO show, Real Time with Bill Maher put his powerful argument in front of a new audience.

Hunt was asked if he supported re-naming Fort Lee in New Jersey from Fort Greg Adams—the name Biden gave it. Hunt, who is African American, said that when he attended West Point, he actually lived in the Robert E. Lee Barracks and every day as he walked through the portico, he noted that “we live in a hell of a country,” where somebody like him could live in a building named for a Confederate general and distinguish himself as a West Point graduate.

Hunt said, “I do not want to take down these statues and change the names of these buildings because they’re a reminder of what was. And if we don’t remember it, we are doomed to repeat it.” You can watch it here on the tape.

LOSER: Tucker Carlson Two Weeks in a Row

Hopefully, President Trump’s taking out Iran’s nuclear facilities seriously damages Tucker Carlson’s credibility. Carlson spent the days in the lead-up to the attack insisting that World War III would erupt following the bombing.

As reports came in that Iran had directed a few missiles to the U.S. airbase in Qatar Carlson taped his reaction and posted it on X, saying:    

“Ugh, this is just sad at every level.” He placed his hand over his heart and charged that Fox News had pushed President Trump to attack, insisting they would have to give an account on Judgment Day for their deeds.

Carlson also predicted that America’s attack on Iran’s nuclear facility was a “betrayal of Trump’s supporters,” and would “end Trump’s presidency.” Finally, he said that after the American strike, Iran could easily kill thousands of Americans, collapse our economy and push the price of gas to $30 a gallon.

Carlson will also be called to account on Judgment Day. He has now learned that he is not the leader of the America First movement—President Trump is. His huge misstep should remind his followers that what appears to animate Carlson most is his hatred of Israel.

LOSER: Big Apple’s Democrat Primary

For those who needed comic relief this week, we had the Democrat primary victory of mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani in the New York City Democrat primary election. Providing proof that there can be justice in our times, Mamdani trounced former New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo, whose actions resulted in the deaths of hundreds of elderly people during COVID-19 and who was forced to leave office because of sexual harassment allegations.

But Cuomo’s defeat is the only good thing about Mamdani’s victory. He’s an unapologetic anti-Semite who wants to “globalize the intifada.” Like lots of socialists who want to raise our taxes, he has wealthy parents—his father is a professor at Columbia and his mother is a filmmaker—whose own work history is thin. He worked on one of his Mom’s movies and was a rapper before he was elected to the New York State Assembly in 2020, where he earns $142,000 annually. He has promised to defund the police because they are “anti-gay and racist” and says he will create state owned grocery stores and make all bus rides free. Even in New York, this is laughable, which is why I am happy to remind everyone that the only relevant question in politics is “compared to what?”

In November, voters will be able to compare Mamdani to current New York City Mayor Eric Adams, who will be on the ballot as an Independent, and Curtis Sliwa (the founder of the volunteer group, the Guardian Angels, which fights street crime). He’s running as a Republican. And Cuomo will still be an option for voters. The former governor lost the Democrat Party nomination, but they have all kinds of “party lines” in New York. He can just pick another one and run on it.

WINNER: Drill Baby Drill

The Dept. of the Interior reported this week that the Trump administration has reversed former President Biden’s edicts against drilling on federal lands and drilling permits are running 44% ahead of where they were under Biden at this point in his administration.

As we have reported previously, Americans increasingly support the expanded production and development of fossil fuel energy sources. This is good for the country and good for Texas.

LOSER: Dallas Congresswoman Jasmine Crockett

I worry that I am partly responsible for increasing U.S. Rep. Jasmine Crockett, D-Dallas profile because she has been on the Loser List for months. Somehow, she always manages to make the cut. In response to Trump’s bombing of Iraq this week, she said that she understands the Constitution and knows that she is the one who should make the decision, or at least get a vote.

Well, no. Here’s what Crockett doesn’t understand about the Constitution and the President’s authority to take military action.

Apparently, it is not just those of us on the right who have had it with Crockett. This week she dropped her bid to become a member of House Oversite Committee when she came in fourth in a four-person contest. The House Democrat Caucus gave her a clear thumbs down.

WINNER: Alamo Beer Becomes a Reality

San Antonio’s Alamo Beer Company announced this week that Alamo Beer, which was featured for years on the cartoon sit com, “King of the Hill,” could soon be available in a refrigerator near you. It’s supposed to be released in Texas first, before it goes national, so watch for it.

WINNER: Oklahoma City Pulls it Off and Texas State Looks West

We will never know what might have happened if Tyrese Haliburton had not gone down with a torn Achilles early in game 7 of the NBA finals. But the Thunder got the big trophy in the final battle featuring teams from two of the smallest markets in the NBA.

Meanwhile there was news this morning that on Monday Texas State University will accept an offer to join the PAC 12 as the former West Coast conference undergoes a complete re-alignment. The New York Times reports this is a big win for the PAC 12, which desperately needs to get into the Texas football market. It doesn’t seem to matter to most people anymore, but for those of us who keep score, the new PAC 12 includes nine teams, only half of which are located near the Pacific Ocean.

What are you gonna do? 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. As the whole world watches to see President Donald Trump’s next step regarding Iran, here’s who made the list:

WINNER: President Trump’s Birthday Week
All but the totally deranged can see the positive impact of having a strong leader like President Trump in charge in the dangerously precarious situation we are currently facing. Even Europeans who don’t like his style see the value of having him at the helm. It is impossible to imagine how former President Joe Biden or Vice President Kamala Harris would have reacted to Israel’s attack on Iran.

Trump’s celebration of the 250^th Anniversary of the U.S. Army was a big hit (see below) and the notoriously left-leaning 9th Circuit Court of Appeals unanimously ruled in his favor over California Gov. Gavin Newsom, holding that Trump has the authority to dispatch the National Guard to California.

Cruz is Right, Tucker Carlson is Wrong
In case you missed it, U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, sat down with fringe-right bomb thrower Tucker Carlson this week to discuss whether President Trump should move forward with our bunker buster bombs and take out what’s left of Iran’s nuclear facilities.

There are lots of issues to debate here—including whether or not the bunker buster is adequate—but Carlson doesn’t care about that. His position is that Iran is not all that bad and the U.S. should mind our own business. Cruz rationally argued that Iran, the country that bankrolls Hamas and Hezbollah, and where “death to America” is the national slogan, should be stopped from developing a nuclear bomb.

Carlson, who has also praised the Russians for keeping Moscow so clean and has hosted Holocaust deniers and Nazi defenders on his podcast, attacked Cruz for supporting Israel. Carlson doesn’t appear to care that Iran’s prime directive is to destroy Israel, who they call the “Little Satan.” Guess who the “Big Satan” is?

Iran is not just engaged in an ancient regional conflict—Muslims against Jews—they are in a war to destroy Western Civilization. This is not Vietnam, Iraq or Afghanistan. For Carlson to condescendingly suggest that the situation is more complex than a war over good and evil is simply wrong. President Trump has given them a two-week runway, but he made the key point succinctly this week: “Somebody please explain to kooky Tucker Carlson why Iran can’t have a nuclear weapon.”

WINNER: U.S. Supreme Court Ruling against Gender Affirming Care
Hopefully, the ruling by the U.S. Supreme Court this week will result in the disappearance of the insidious term “gender affirming care” from the American lexicon. In a 6 to 3 ruling, the justices affirmed the right of Tennessee to bar parents from giving their children puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones and allowing them to undergo unneeded mastectomies and even castrations in an effort to change their sex.

That destructive mutilation is what “gender affirming care” is.

There have always been a tiny minority of people who suffered from gender dysphoria—believing they were born in the body of the other sex. Research continues to show that talk therapy is the most effective treatment for those individuals. However, over the last 20 years, the diagnosis has become far more common, giving the gay rights movement a new reason to raise funds after gay marriage was legalized and spawning a billion dollar industry of drugs and clinics across the nation to help children “transition” from one sex to another. According to an analysis by the Manhattan Institute, as many as 400,000 minors were diagnosed with gender dysphoria between 2017 and 2023.

TPPF took the lead in 2023 in helping pass Senate Bill 14, a law similar to Tennessee’s, which bans gender modification drugs and mutilation on minors in Texas. Now, 27 states have enacted similar bans—more than half—but the media is not likely to erase “gender affirming care” from its narrative anytime soon.

In this news report on the Supreme Court ruling in the Texas Tribune, note how the reporter defines gender dysphoria: “a medical condition related to the distress someone can feel when the sex they were assigned at birth doesn’t align with their gender identity.”

This distorted definition is diabolical, rooted in the unquestioned premise that sex is “assigned at birth,” instead of simply being reported based on reproductive organs. It also suggests that something described as “gender identity” is actually real.

At this point, I’d like to insert my regular appeal to the Texas media to please step out of the silo and read something cogent and fact based on the trans issue. This analysis by an expert at the Free Press would be a good start.

LOSER: No Kings March Proves There Are No Kings
A fake tweet was posted by somebody suggesting that Trump thanked all the No Kings protestors for making sure that no king took his place. He happily reported he is still the president.

Too bad it was fake, because, as a USA Today column pointed out this morning, the nationwide marches prove the point that democracy is alive and well in America. We don’t know how much the American Federation of Teachers spent to help promote the No Kings events, but they didn’t get much for their money. We got one more round of the usual low-grade street riots in Los Angeles, Seattle and New York, but it was mostly a big nothing burger. Meanwhile, the president’s parade in Washington, D.C., celebrating the 250^th anniversary of the U.S. Army, went off without a hitch. It got great reviews, even from critics at left-wing MSNBC who were shocked that there was no “dark, malevolent energy.”

WINNER: Conservatives are Happier
Data analyst Nick Silver may help explain that longing for “dark malevolent energy” from left-leaning MSNBC with some data he rolled out this week showing that conservatives are more mentally healthy than liberals. According to Silver’s data, something called the Cooperative Election Study, a 60,000 sample survey, found that “among people who report ‘excellent’ mental health, conservatives outnumber liberals 51-20. Liberals outnumber conservatives 45-19 among those voters who say they have ‘poor’ mental health.” There’s lots more detail including why men are unhappy with Democrats and why young women are just unhappy. We’ve seen findings like these before but Silver’s numbers are new. He talks about it all here on a podcast.

LOSER: New York City Will Get Leader It Deserves
With a week to go until the New York City mayoral election, the Big Apple is poised to select former New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo, who many believe is responsible for the death of hundreds of elderly people during COVID-19, then trying to cover it up, or Zohran Mamdani, a proud socialist who is strongly anti-Israel, as their next mayor. Billionaire Michael Bloomberg has poured over $8 million into Cuomo’s campaign. Bloomberg, like many Jewish New Yorkers, is undoubtedly concerned that Mamdani has refused to condemn the phrase “globalize the intifada.”

Brad Lander, who is also Jewish, and another of the 11 candidates for mayor, believes the phrase means “open season on Jews,” although he is hesitant to criticize Mamdani because he’s in third place. The Jewish population of New York City numbers 1.4 million—the largest Jewish community in the world outside Israel.

Meanwhile, Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vermont, and U.S. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-New York, are both backing Mamdani, so presumably they are OK with globalizing the intifada.

Naturally, New York City uses ranked choice voting in their local elections because … well who knows why. When New Yorkers go into the voting booth next week, they will vote for their top five choices for mayor. Does this system work for them?

It hasn’t yet. In the last mayoral election in 2021, they didn’t get the ballots counted for two weeks. The election is Tuesday. Can’t wait.

LOSER: California Leader Admits They Overreached on EVs
President Trump eliminated California’s electric vehicle mandate this week and a longtime leader of the California’s Air Resources Board admitted that the state only had themselves to blame for pushing to eliminate all fossil fueled cars in the state by 2035. Although Mary Nichols, who chaired the Air Resources Board for 17 years, doesn’t recant California’s anti-fossil fuel mantra, the admission that they over-reached is rare among Democrats these days—and it seems important to acknowledge.

LOSER: Jasmine Crockett Issues Nationwide Diagnosis
Compare that California reflection with Dallas Congresswoman Jasmine Crockett, who proclaimed that everyone who voted for Trump is “sick,” or “mentally ill.” Crockett told former broadcast anchor Katie Couric that:

“We’ve got a mental health crisis in this country because everyone, no matter how you affiliate yourself, should be against Trump, period. This is not partisan for me.”

Crockett, who has referred to Texas Gov. Greg Abbott as “Governor Hot Wheels,” also said that the only reason Trump was elected is because he is an “old white man.” So how do you define that “mentally ill” thing again?

LOSER: Oligarchy Tour Comes to Texas
Sen. Sanders will be in Amarillo on Sunday along with former Texas Congressman and frequently losing Democrat candidate Beto O’Rourke and Austin Congressman Greg Casar. Sanders had been drawing big crowds around the country warning people of the dangers of oligarchy, but enthusiasm seems to have cooled, with many of his fellow Democrats suggesting that he stop because nobody knows what “oligarchy” means. It will be fun to see how it goes in Amarillo.

WINNERS: Lakers, Caitlin Clark and the NBA
The Lakers sold for a record $10 billion this week, the most ever paid for any sports franchise, while WNBA star Caitlin Clark reaffirmed her star power. After Clark was out for five games with an injury, TV viewers declined, but proving that the “Caitlin Clark effect” is still magic, once she was back on the court, the audience returned.

Meanwhile, the NBA finals between the Oklahoma City Thunder and the Indiana Pacers are all tied up at three games each. They will take it to Game 7 on Sunday 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. While the battle between Donald J. Trump and Elon Musk rages on (I’m betting on Trump) and since the Texas Legislature has closed up shop for the season, here’s who made the list:

WINNER: Israel Gets Forces Iran Back to the Table 

Israel’s strike on Iran’s nuclear facilities last night, Operation Rising Lion, is a strong and unequivocal statement of many things—most , most bluntly, that Iran cannot be allowed to have a nuclear bomb. Now it is time for them Iran to get back to the negotiating table with Trump and face reality.  Israel took out three of their top commanders, which is a hint that regime change might also need to be on their the agenda.   

Trump admits he was in conversation with Israel about their plans, which is why the U.S. moved our diplomats out—and  – and why the President continues to make it clear Israel has his support.     

The whole world is watching how this plays out.   The Free Press is providing the most thorough and thoughtful coverage.      

WINNER: Trump and Abbott Get Ahead of Rioters 

Protesters are continuing in Los Angeles, Texas and all over America with big plans for the weekend. It all looks like a movie we have seen before.   Rioters are burning cars, destroying police cars and vandalizing stores in Los Angeles, while CNN insists that the protests are “mostly peaceful.”  

President Donald Trump deployed the National Guard to California to quell the riots, so Gov. Gavin Newsom took him to court. California Gov. Gavin   Newsom won the first round, but a U.S. District Court sided with Trump on Thursday so the troops, as well as the Marines, will stay in California for now.   

Texas Gov. Greg Abbott has deployed over 7,000 Guard troops to Texas cities after they were successful in containing protesters earlier this week, including guarding the Alamo, the Shrine of Texas Liberty, in my home town of San Antonio.  

Most political strategists note that the protests help Trump and increase support for his policies because they focus on immigration, crime and public order— – all winning issues for the President. Waving Mexican flags, another frequent feature of the protests both in Texas and California, brings a confusing message to an anti-deportation event, (even the New York Times can’t figure it out), but there you have it.   

Many dumb comments have been made in blue states and cities about all this, but Brandon Johnson, Mayor of Chicago, wins the prize, saying that sending in the National Guard to respond to the protests indicates that some people will not accept who won the Civil War. Johnson suggests Trump is acting as if the Confederacy won the war.  

It’s hard to know where to start on that one.   

WINNER? Background Notes on Redistricting   

Reportedly, the Trump team is suggesting that Texas hold a Special Legislative Session to re-draw the state’s congressional map. Who knows if that will happen, but here’s what we do know:   Redistricting, re-drawing the maps that comprise the districts of members of Congress— – has always been a process where political parties try to gain a numbers numerical advantage in representation by drawing lines that divide their opponents’ voters and maximize the voting impact of their own voters.     

It is called “gerrymandering” and it was not invented by Texas Republicans— – or any Republicans.  It is named after Eldridge Gerry, founding father, former governor of Massachusetts and Vice President under James Madison, who approved a congressional map that looked like a salamander to provide an advantage to the Federalists. Gerrymandering has been with us for the whole American ride, so the incessant proclamation by the left that it is a “threat to democracy” is, quite frankly, ridiculous.    

Congressional districts are drawn using the numbers from the most recent census, and that is where the partisan fight starts. When Joe Biden took over the 2020 Census, he reversed former President Donald Trump’s decision that the census would only count citizens who would be represented in the United States Congress. Biden believed non-citizens and illegal aliens also should be represented, so he had them counted as well.   

The census count has lots of political history too. George Washington asked Thomas Jefferson to take a census, so they the country could go to Europe boasting 5 million residents to help them make their case for credit.  When Jefferson came back to Washington to say he only counted  3.5 million new Americans, he also said that he suspected the newly freed people didn’t want to sign up for anything. Washington agreed and they told the Europeans there were five 5 million Americans.  

Which brings us to today, where the red states like Texas, filled with conservatives and refugees from blue states who are fed up with high taxes and woke policies, gained most of the new congressional seats in the last census while the two big blue states, New York and California, lost seats. This was the first time in American history that California had lost seats.    

So that’s why the Trump administration would like to take another look at it.  It is not anti-American, it’s not a threat to democracy. It’s just what Americans do. We’ve always done it. Here’s a Texas Tribune story on it, which doesn’t explain any of that.    

WINNER: CNN’s Polling Guy 

I heard someone on Fox News gloatingly report that CNN had fewer than 400,000 viewers in the previous week, which is bad in some ways because they don’t get the frequent polling reports from Harry Enten, the CNN polling guy who frequently lays out data showing support for conservative policies while a stunned CNN anchor looks on.   

This week, he talked about the 40 point swing Trump gained in the last election with immigrants— — voters who were born in other countries— — going from +32 for Democrats in 2020 to +8 for Republicans in 2024.  Here’s Enten’s tweet on it. 

No group has become more hawkish on immigration & shifted to the GOP than immigrants.

Immigrant voters
-Trust more on immigration in 2020: Dem +32 pt to Now: GOP +8 pt
-Net fav of immigrants here illegally: +23 pt in '20, -6 pt in '24
-Trump's vote: 36% in '16 to 47% in '24! pic.twitter.com/YebaSvfL7D

— (((Harry Enten))) (@ForecasterEnten) June 10, 2025

LOSER: DNC Leader Cries Because He’s Losing Control of His Party 

Does it seem ironic to anyone else that Democrats are spending $20 million trying to figure out how to talk to American men while Ken Martin, head of the Democratic National Committee, reportedly was on the verge of tears on a leaked call with other party leaders, complaining that his vice chair, David Hogg, is undermining him because he wants to kick all the dead wood out of the party.  

Martin reportedly choked up and said, “I don’t know if I want to do this anymore.” Wait! There’s no crying in baseball…uh, politics.     

Part of the $20 million the Democrats are spending figuring out how to talk to men is on polling, where I am sure they will learn that essentially crying and saying that you want to go home is not a sign of strong leadership.    

Granted, Hogg has been the General George Custer of his party— – the only guy with any new ideas. Unfortunately, they are all bad. For example, he wants to replace all the “dead wood” in the party with people like U.S. Rep. Jasmine Crockett, D-Dallas, who he says “is the kind of leader the Democrats need.”   

Crockett, who is vying to become the Texas AOC, frequently appears on the Texas Loser List, not only because of her ugly reference to Gov. Greg Abbott as “governor Hot Wheels,” but also for her strong stands against ICE and in support of open borders as well as her insistence that men who say they are women should be allowed to play in women’s sports.  

Not sure what happens to her efforts now, following the news this week that Hogg is stepping down from the DNC. It’s not exactly clear why he’s leaving, but according to the New York Times, one reason is they had too many male vice presidents…which tells you something.    

LOSERS: Democrats Become Permanent Residents on the Wrong Side  

In addition to siding with people who are burning cars in their streets, California’s Democrat governor, Gavin Newsom decided to sue the U.S. Dept. of Justice, saying the Golden State wants to continue to allow boys to play in girls’ sports.    

California’s Interscholastic Federation rules allows students to declare what gender they are and then compete in those sports.   

Newsom is waffling on this, having said in March that he doesn’t think it’s fair to let boys play girls’ sports, presumably after seeing polling that shows 80% of Americans oppose it.  

But maybe Newsom has joined other Democrats who don’t seem to care what regular people think. Axios posted some other polling numbers this week that they say were provided to the Senate by the White House regarding the Big Beautiful Bill, showing other areas where Democrats seem committed to sticking with the wrong side:       

• Ending taxes on tips polled 77% support — 18% oppose 
• Cutting taxes on overtime pay: 74% support — 18% oppose 
• Making Trump’s tax cuts permanent to avoid a 22% tax increase: 53% support 34% opposed 
• Hiring more ICE/border patrol officers: 55% support — 40% oppose 

• Ending federal coverage of gender-affirming care: 54% support — 39% oppose  
• Ending Medicaid benefits for unauthorized immigrants: 52% support — 39% oppose  

LOSER: Biden’s Afghan Evacuation 

Trying to figure out how Biden will once again make the losers list has almost become a drinking game. If you recall, last week Biden insisted that he was the guy in charge of the auto-pen and had signed every pardon, every law, every order— – which would presumably include the order to evacuate Afghanistan.  

This week, we have a report revealing that there were 55 people in that chaotic airlift out of Kabul who were on the terrorist watch list.  No one will ever forget watching the tragedy of that plane going down the runway with people trying to hold onto the wings, knowing they were as good as dead if they didn’t get out. To learn that 55 of the people who made it out safely were on the terrorist watch list (with another 22 who were added to the list later) is just one more awful fact we must swallow from the long list of really awful things that happened while Biden was president.   

A Biden bonus this week. Former Vice President and Democratic Presidential nominee Kamala Harris is also is a loser for blaming Trump for the riots in Los Angeles.  

WINNER: Trump Beats the AP 

The U.S. Court of Appeals in Washington granted President Trump a stay in enforcement of a lower-court ruling that the administration had to let the Associated Press (AP) into the White House briefing room and back on Air Force One.  The Trump team took action because AP persisted in referring to the Gulf of America as the Gulf of Mexico. Trump has broad support on this because it’s not just dead-naming the Gulf.  AP style dictates lots of wacky woke stuff like “birthing person,” for mother and the capitalization of Black for African Americans, while keeping the little “w” for white.    

According to the ruling, “the First Amendment does not control the president’s discretion in choosing with whom to speak or to whom to provide special access.” 

Here’s the write-up on the ruling by the Associated Press, which calls the ruling an “incremental loss,” and includes their differing opinion.     

LOSERS: Chinese Smuggle in Wheat Blight  

In a story that will make a great movie script, a couple of Chinese researchers were arrested this week at the University of Michigan when it was determined they were likely engaging in “agro-terrorism” by bringing a fungus into the U.S. that would cause “head blight” killing crops like wheat, barley and rice.  

As my TPPF colleague, Chuck DeVore, wrote this week, Texas recently passed legislation designed to halt the advance of the Chinese Communist Party in Texas. Texas also passed higher education reform legislation that prohibits state colleges and universities from accepting gifts and grants from countries that are adversaries of the United States. What happened in Michigan with the researchers who were on the university staff is not a one-off. It is a routine strategy employed by the Chinese to infiltrate the U.S.       

WINNER: Trump/Musk Update   

Trump continues to be the best bet to come out a winner in his battle with former White House advisor Elon Musk. Musk folded pretty quickly, actually, saying mid-week that he regretted some of the really ugly things he’d said about the President, adding that he hoped the two could talk. Trump hasn’t agreed to a talk yet, but he was nice, so Musk sent him a heart emoji.  Of course, Fox News is on top of this story.  

WINNER: Texas Wins Women’s College World Series 

The Lady Longhorns defeated Texas Tech this week to win their first Women’s College World Series.  The victory is especially sweet for the Longhorns, who were defeated by Oklahoma the last two years— – and also for the rest of us, who are so proud that the top two teams in the Women’s World Series are both from the Lone Star State.

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. While the battle between Donald J. Trump and Elon Musk rages on (I’m betting on Trump) and since the Texas Legislature has closed up shop for the season, here’s who made the list:

WINNER: The Texas Legislature Passes Fewer Laws

Following each Texas legislative session, there’s always a period of celebration for new laws that have been added to the books, as well as requiems for the bills that didn’t make it. Some great bills passed, (Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick has a list of big wins) and some equally great and important bills failed. Still, conservatives can take comfort in a report from the Texas Tribune that found that the Legislature passed the lowest percentage of bills this session since 1991, the earliest data available. 

According to the report, only 13.9% of the 8,719 bill that were introduced by lawmakers in both chambers this year made it to Gov. Greg Abbott’s desk. Capitol veterans are speculating about why that might be, but who cares? Texans haven’t consistently elected a conservative majority for the last 20 years because they want a bunch of new laws. There’s a reason the Texas Legislature only meets every two years for 140 days. 

LOSER: Joe Biden Says He Did It

After President Donald Trump ordered an investigation into whether former President Joe Biden’s aides were using an autopen to sign documents that Biden didn’t know about, Biden issued an outraged statement saying, “I made the decisions about the pardons, executive orders, legislation, and proclamations. Any suggestion that I didn’t is ridiculous and false”

So now the investigation can be expanded to determine who wrote that statement. 

Unfortunately for Biden and his collaborators, the train has left the station on his competency issues, driven by the hundreds of people who told the “guys who wrote ‘Original Sin’” and others that he was incapable of doing much during a great deal of his time in the Oval Office. It doesn’t really seem fair to keep putting him on the Losers List, but there’s not another category that fits. 

WINNER: Texas Bail Reform

Gov. Abbott, Lt. Gov. Patrick and House Speaker Dustin Burrows are big winners for passing Senate Joint Resolution 87 which will automatically deny bail to repeat offenders who have committed a violent felony. This important legislation would have automatically become law if it had received a 100 votes in the Texas House, but unfortunately, it fell three votes short, so it will be in the ballot in November, where there is virtually no doubt that Texas voters will approve it.

(There’s more on those who blocked the bail reform effort below.)

WINNER: Texas Anti-ESG Legislation

TPPF played a lead role in passing legislation in 2021 that would block state investments in firms that required companies to adhere to Environmental Social Governance (ESG) programs that oppose fossil fuel development. This week Comptroller Glenn Hegar announced that once-notorious BlackRock is no longer on the ESG “Blacklist.”    

In fact, Hegar’s office said that no American banks remain on the blacklist, although several European firms including UBS Group, BNP Paribas, and HSBC are still blocked from doing business in Texas. 

The anti-fossil fuels movement appears to be coming to an end. Ruy Tiexiera has a great piece in the Free Press this week entitled “Americans Love Fossil Fuels,” where he explains why the issue will continue to be a loser for Democrats. And according to left-leaning Pew Research Center, while most Americans support expansion of alternative fuel sources, they don’t want to give up fossil fuels and don’t support policies that mandate that.

LOSER: KJP is No Longer a Democrat

Many of us wondered what it must be like to have a job like former President Biden’s press secretary, Karine Jean-Pierre, who had to stand up every day before cameras and say things she must have known were not true.

We are going to find out what it was like very soon. Jean-Pierre has a new book coming out entitled “Independent: A Look Inside a Broken White House, Outside the Party Lines,” where she says she’s left the Democrat Party because they “betrayed” Biden. 

Jean-Pierre may have picked a good time to jump ship. Democrats continue to hemorrhage supporters (see item about men below) and the Democrat National Committee has been forced to sell $5 chances to meet President Barack Obama.

WINNER: U.S. Supreme Court Says Reverse Discrimination is Real

In a unanimous opinion authored by Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson, the Supreme Court has ruled that a straight white woman does not have a higher burden of proof to claim employment discrimination simply because she is in a “majority group.” Marlean Ames claims she was passed over for a promotion at the Ohio Department of Youth Services for a gay person.  

The Court confirmed that federal civil rights law demands equal treatment of all individuals, while the New York Times reports that, until now, most courts believed that men and white people should not be treated quite as equally as everyone else. 

This ruling is one more victory in support of merit-based hiring decisions.   

LOSER: Update on Democrats and Male Voters  

Democrats were among last weeks’ losers, when we noted that they are spending $20 million for the much-mocked “SAM Project,” which stands for Speaking to American Men. Because Democrats lost so many male voters in 2024—the gender gap is at an all-time high at 13.4%—their goal is to examine the “syntax, language and content that gains attention and virality in male-dominated spaces online.”    

Among other things, they are devoting $6 million to examine “gamified messaging,” (love that term) to see the kinds of ads that are most effective during games.

We now know that Texas’ own Colin Allred, recently defeated by U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz, is a big player in the SAM initiative. According to Illyse Hogue, one of the group’s leaders, the challenge is to change “the sentiment that young men are reporting, namely that Democrats don’t care about them, and even if they did, they can’t get anything done.”  

LOSER: Texas House Democrats Blocking & Blowing Up   

At the bill signing ceremony on Bail Reform, (see Winner above) Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick called out the names of the Harris County Democrats who made up a large percentage of the 40 Democrats who voted against bail reform, blocking the two-thirds majority needed to immediately make it law to deny bail to repeat violent offenders. 

If you watched the final hours of legislative debate in the Texas House, you could see Texas House Democrats standing on the wrong side of another issue that 80% of Texans support. They filibustered for over an hour in outraged opposition to the final passage of Senate Bill 12, which removes so-called “Diversity, Equity and Inclusion” (DEI) programs in public schools. SB 12, also prohibits, among other things, school sponsorship of Gender and Sexuality Alliance (GSA) clubs, a point that made the Democrats explode, especially when the author referred to them as “sex clubs.”

Rep. Rafael Anchia, D-North Oak Cliff, claimed GSA groups are actually more like 4-H or Girl Scouts, ignoring the fact that the GSA website includes materials encouraging discussions of how students might want to handle not only same sex relationships, but also open or polyamorous relationships or simply sequential sexual activity. Keep in mind, these clubs aren’t only in high schools, they are also in some middle and elementary schools.

Rep. Erin Zweiner, D-Driftwood, said Republicans were passing SB 12 because they were “afraid their children would grow up queer” and she flatly proclaimed that SB 12 was “hate.”

Rep. Jolanda Jones, D-Houston, told her fellow lawmakers that she is a lesbian who lives in a world that isn’t safe. She said Republicans had put her “at the end of the barrel of a gun,” the entire legislative session. 

Rep. Jessica Gonzalez, D-Dallas, said that children are gay at birth, although it’s hard to see how her logic works when she and her party repeatedly argue that gender is only “assigned at birth” and children must be allowed to decide later if they are male, female or something else. 

Rep. Gene Wu, D-Houston called his Republican colleagues “monsters” for supporting the bill and proclaimed that parents “will beat and kill their own children rather than let them be who they are.” Wu also accused Republicans House members not only of having bullied kids who were different from them when they were in high school but of teaching their own children to abuse kids today. There’s more. You can watch the whole debate here, just replay the tape starting at 3:42.

These outraged Democrats are the same people who carried all the water for the Texas teachers unions this session in their fight to block school choice, even though barely half of Texas kids can read at grade level. Democrats opposed allowing the parents of minority and marginalized students who are trapped in failing public schools in Texas to be able to choose a school where their children would have a chance to learn to read and do math, but they support school sponsorship of sex clubs. 

Amazingly, they still wonder why they don’t win elections in Texas. 

WINNER: Pacers Come Back Again

It’s June and we have made it to the NBA finals, which should be interesting after last night’s game where the Indiana Pacers came back after being down 15 points to beat the Oklahoma City Thunder. This is the fifth time in the playoffs that the Pacers have resurged after being that far behind. Game 2 is Sunday 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. With Elon coming home to Texas and the state Legislature finally nearing the end of the thousands of bills it has considered over the last 140 days, here’s who made the list:

WINNER: Texas Property Taxpayers

If you watch social media (which I don’t recommend) you will see that there is a small but noisy crowd of Texans who spend their days repeating on X that Texas lawmakers are doing nothing to lower property taxes. They label any spending on anything else—like education, water or dementia prevention—as frivolous. But when the sine die gavel goes down for the last time on the 89^th Regular Legislative Session on Monday, the Legislature will have added over $10 billion more in property tax relief to the $51 billion they have approved over the last decade. In addition, the homestead exemption is up to $140,000 for every property taxpayer. And for seniors and the disabled, the exemption is $200,000. That means that $140,000 to $200,000 is subtracted from the value of your house before taxes, and for a large percentage of Texans (about half in the state’s largest county, Harris) their property tax bill will be zero.

My tax policy colleagues at TPPF break down the details here along with a reminder that it is local governments that impose property taxes. They need to be watched every minute.

WINNER: Trump Transparency, Global Impact and the Harvard Visa Fight

Politico reported this week that Trump held 111 press appearances in his first 138 days in office. In terms of transparency, no other president is even close. The fact that Trump is out there every day talking about what he’s done and what he wants to do is a dramatically stark contrast to the revelations that continue to roll in from the book, “Original Sin,” which Rolling Stone describes as “the plot against the American voter.”

If you thought you had heard it all, “Original Sin” authors Jake Tapper and Alex Thompson continue to reveal discussions they had with dozens of people who say Biden frequently did not recognize his cabinet secretaries and people who had advised him for years and he couldn’t even pull off a 10 minute off the record conversation with a few big donors. Any time Americans saw him, everything he said, from the “thank you” to the “good bye” was scripted.

Biden-gate far rivals any presidential scandal in our lifetime including Watergate and Clinton and Lewinsky. The authors, of course, have their own share of blame for the cover-up and they are currently out on tour with their book—they will be at the LBJ Library in Austin next month. But while Congress figures out how to make sure this never happens again, we have to assume Tapper and Thompson are also discussing movie deals. It could be a blockbuster. What Hollywood actress wouldn’t kill for the role of Jill Biden?

Cease fire negotiations aren’t going well just now in the Israeli-Hamas war, but we need to give President Trump another spot on the Winners list, based on a report from released hostage, Omer Shem Tov, who said that Hamas was rooting for Kamala Harris in the presidential election last year and that once Trump was elected, Hamas began treating the hostages better. Shem Tov, who said he was being starved, noted that after the election, he started getting food and that he was beaten and spit upon less. He attributed the change to Hamas awareness that Biden was no longer at the top and Trump was in charge. Recall that Biden (or somebody in the White House) first pledged to solidly back Israel until protesters on college campuses made it appear that many Democrats were more sympathetic to Hamas, so they began to back-peddle.

Finally, it’s not clear whether Trump will win his battle to revoke the visas of international students at Harvard, but it is an important fight because it will help illuminate the large presence of international students on campuses throughout the country, some of whom are involved in sensitive research. This comes on top of Secretary of State Marco Rubio’s pledge to revoke the visas of students with connections with the Chinese Communist Party. About 7,000 of Harvard’s students come from other countries, for 23% of the total student population.

WINNER: 10 Commandments Bill Passes

Headline after headline blazed across Texas media outlets last weekend over the passage of a law that will require a copy of the 10 Commandments to be displayed in every public school classroom across the state. Speaking against the bill, State Rep. James Talarico, D-Austin, who the Dallas Morning News called a seminary student, said he believed the goal of the bill was to create more Christians, apparently unaware that the 10 Commandments are in the Old Testament.

The 10 Commandments are not only the basis of English and American law, they are also a foundational document for most of Western Civilization. It is inexplicable why hanging a copy in public school classrooms was viewed as a big deal by Texas media. The question that should have been asked is why it wasn’t there before.

LOSER: Democrats, especially Austin Congressman Greg Casar

U.S. Rep. Greg Casar, D-Austin, is very excited about the prospects of his fellow lawmaker, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-New York, who is currently barnstorming the country with U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders talking about “Fighting Oligarchy.” Casar leads the Democrat Caucus in the U.S. House. Happily for conservatives on the other side, lots of people are showing up at these oligarch rallies to hear AOC and Sanders, even as their party has a 27% approval rating, the lowest in over 30 years. The rallies are boosting AOC’s profile for a U.S. Senate run against New York Senator Chuck Schumer, or even a presidential bid.

In other Democrat news, this week somebody leaked that the Democrat Party is now planning to spend $20 million to study “the syntax, language and content that gains attention of male voters,” who they lost in droves in 2024. They call it the SAM Project—(Speaking with American Men). Yes, $20 million seems like a lot—but it appears they have no faith in the male voices of Sanders or Casar.

WINNER: It’s Official — Texas Knows What a Woman Is

We know what a man is too. State Rep. Ellen Troxclair, R-Lakeway, was already on the winners list for her bill that clarifies the law to ensure that men and women are defined by the reproductive organs they are born with. Now her bill, sponsored by Sen. Mayes Middleton, R-Galveston, in the upper chamber, is on its way to Gov. Abbott’s desk for his signature.

The Texas Tribune reports that the ACLU and assorted “experts” around the country are apoplectic—read the story—about the legislation, which also requires that people put their actual sex on their driver’s license and other official documents. They do not mention the outrage most of us feel that Texas actually needs to pass a law to protect women from men who pretend they are women.

LOSER: NPR Mourns Thousands of DEI Officers

Gotta love a story from National Public Radio (NPR) this week reporting that thousands of DEI jobs are being eliminated in corporate America. NPR’s Morning Edition profiled a sad, unemployed DEI officer who calls the current job market for people with DEI skills a “toxic wasteland.” NPR acknowledges that the decline of DEI came even before Trump’s early executive orders banning DEI in many areas as businesses realized that divisive DEI programs were not strengthening their work force or improving the bottom line.

What is particularly gratifying about this story is that the primary mission of DEI professional groups has always been to create more DEI jobs. There has long been speculation in both business and higher education that DEI professionals increased their job count by exploiting, and even creating what appeared to be strife or discord in businesses and on college campuses so they could swoop in and claim to be the solution.

A decade later with no problems solved, businesses came to the conclusion that DEI divides employees and even customers—remember what happened with Bud Light. No one should be sad to see DEI coming to an end anywhere.

WINNER: Texas DEI Bill in Public Schools

As for DEI in public schools, Senate Bill 12 has passed both chambers and is currently in conference committee. Anyone who doubts whether the legislation to end DEI in public schools is needed should look at what is happening in some California schools. Before they were stopped, a program in the San Francisco United School District (SFUSD) called for “grading for equity.” Equity grading eliminated any requirements that student attend class or do homework. Students would only take one test, where answering 80% of the questions right would result in an A. A C would only require getting 41% right. Just 21% was a passing grade on the test, which the student could take as many times as they needed in order to pass.

This all came from a DEI guru, Joe Feldman, who insists that actually grading students on what they know only highlights the student’s failures. Feldman’s answer is not to teach more students to read and write, it is to make them unaware that they have failed so they won’t feel bad.

San Francisco had to put the program on pause because parents—and even the Mayor of San Francisco—were outraged. However, other schools in California are using “equity grading,” although none reports anything other than “mixed results.” Ya think?

LOSER: Claudine Gay is Still at Harvard

Anti-DEI advocate Corey DeAngelis reminded us this week that former Harvard University President Claudine Gay, who was exposed for plagiarism and being soft on anti-Semitism before she was forced to step down, is still working at Harvard. Gay earns about $900,000 annually. Here’s her webpage, which notes she was the 30^th president of Harvard.

WINNER: Texan Wins the Spelling Bee

Faizan Zaki, a 13 year old from Allen, in Collin County, won the Scripps National Spelling Bee last night, correctly spelling the word éclaircissement after 21 rounds. This is the fourth time Zaki, who is an Indian American, has competed in the National Spelling Bee. He was runner-up last year. There is a great profile of him here.

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.

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