Democrats refuse to flinch.

August 6, 2025

On Tuesday, US Senator John Cornyn and President Trump threatened to send the FBI to arrest Democratic state legislators who fled the state to break quorum in the Texas legislature. See Texas Public Radio, Donald Trump says FBI 'may have to' get involved in ending Texas quorum break. The threat was blatantly unconstitutional and pathetically desperate. Democrats refused to flinch. Indeed, the threats seemed only to embolden Democratic state legislators.

As Democratic Texas legislator Texas Rep. Armando Walle said,

The price to pay [for breaking quorum] pales in comparison to the rights of everyday people, everyday constituents that we represent proudly. Not scared. Not scared at all. Come and take it.

See Fox 4 Dallas-Fort Worth, 'Come and take it': Texas Dems in MA say they aren't scared of quorum break arrests

Per the Fox 4 report,

Texas Sen. Carol Alvarado (D-Houston) likened the quorum break to the game of Texas Hold 'Em, saying the leaders were "holding the line on democracy."

"Today, President Trump said that he was entitled to five more seats in Texas, five more Republican seats. And we're here to say nobody's entitled. The people of those districts are entitled to those seats."

So, if Trump and Senator Cornyn believe that their threats are working, they are confusing courageous Democrats with cowardly Republicans who have surrendered their dignity, pride, and integrity to Trump.

Trump's notion that he is “entitled” to additional seats in Congress because of his 2024 win is the stuff of absolutist despots who cannot discriminate between themselves and the state. King Louis XIV never said, “L’État, c’est moi.” He didn’t have to. His actions demonstrated that he considered himself to be the state (his deathbed revisionism notwithstanding).

The same is true of Trump. Such absolutist thinking led to the end of the French monarchy and will lead to the end of MAGA extremism and the Republican Party that collaborated with the only US president to attempt a coup.

California is actively exploring its options for countering Texas’s gerrymandering. Doing so would require approval from the state legislature and California voters, but in the current climate, I would not rule anything out. See ABC News, Texas and California joust for political advantage, with Trump power and US House majority in play.

A reader asked me to summarize the various potential outcomes if every state attempted mid-decade redistricting. I don’t have the data to respond to her question, but I do have a general intuition that red state legislators gerrymandered to the maximum extent possible in 2020.

Because the population in many states is static or declining, there is no upside in redistricting six years after the last redistricting. Moreover, population growth is occurring in metropolitan areas of many red states, limiting the ability to gerrymander.

But in some states, such as Texas, demographic changes in the post-pandemicpopulation provide a potential opportunity for the pickup of seats in a mid-decade redistricting. In California, the non-partisan redistricting in 2020 left some Democratic seats “on the table” that could be recaptured by an overtly partisan workaround.

As I noted yesterday, the optimal outcome is for the efforts in Texas to fail, followed by a collective coming to our senses that results in passage of a national redistricting scheme that does not depend on state legislatures. See, e.g., the Freedom to Vote Act proposed by Democrats in 202. But until national reform happens, Democrats are right to continue their efforts to counter anti-democratic gerrymandering with reciprocal redistricting intended to preserve democracy.

Marc Elias published an essay in Democracy Docket, No quorum, no problem — Texas Dems hit back that I found comforting in its long-term view. Marc is on the front lines of the fight to save democracy through litigation. Marc sees his litigation efforts as a way “to buy time for democracy to be saved through the political process.”

So, too, with the legislators in Texas and other states who are fighting against Texas’s bad-faith partisan gerrymandering to satisfy the demands of an anti-democratic president who believes he “deserves” to win more House seats because of his 2024 election win.

Marc Elias writes,

All the brave Texas legislators can do is buy time for democracy to be saved through the political process. They can create the conditions for Democrats to rally behind them and chart their own courageous path forward. They can cause Republicans to have second thoughts and pressure their party to retreat.

If that sounds overly optimistic, consider this: when Democrats and the pro-voting community proposed nonpartisan redistricting reform legislation in 2021, not a single House Republican supported it. Yesterday, two Congressional Republicans said they would support legislation banning partisan gerrymandering. One even introduced a bill that would nullify any new maps — including the one proposed in Texas.

So, as Democrats across the nation attempt to combat Trump's demands for new House seats, we should recognize those actions as temporary defensive maneuvers to buy time for a broader and more permanent redemption of democracy. That is sacred work, even if it feels like we are fighting in the trenches.

In doing so, we are following in the footsteps of General George Washington, who disliked using guerrilla war tactics to fight the British. But after his initial losses in conventional battles, he adopted the tactics necessary to win. So, too, must we.

GAO again rules that Trump's withholding of funds violates the Impoundment Control Act

For a fourth time, the General Accounting Office has ruled that Trump's withholding of federal funds appropriated by Congress violates the Impoundment Control Act of 1974. See STAT, Trump NIH cuts violated federal law, GAO watchdog office says.

Per STAT,

The independent congressional watchdog said that in terminating over 1,800 NIH grants in response to President Trump’s executive orders directing agencies to cut off federal funding for equity-related activities, the administration illegally withheld funds.

In addition, the GAO found that the NIH’s $8 billion shortfall in new and continuing awards between February and July amounted to an illegal withholding of obligated funds.

Trump was impeached in 2019, in part, for illegally impounding funds appropriated by Congress for the defense of Ukraine. The current widespread withholding of funds by Trump should result in his impeachment, conviction, and removal from office.

The media is giving Trump a “free pass” on this issue, reporting only the amounts withheld by Trump without also reporting that his actions violate the Constitution and the Impoundment Control Act.

Tell a friend—or better yet, put that fact on a protest sign next time you join a pro-democracy rally!

Robert Kennedy Cancels $500 million in vaccine development funds

Speaking of the illegal withholding of funds, Robert F Kennedy has unlawfully canceled more than $500 million in vaccine development funds appropriated by Congress. See The Independent, RFK Jr cancels $500M in vaccine development after ‘listening to the experts’.

The cancellation was directed at mRNA vaccines of the type that avoided millions of deaths due to the Covid pandemic. Per the Independent,

HHS announced Tuesday it would start winding down its vaccine development projects that use mRNA technology by canceling contracts and pulling funding for some vaccines that are being developed to fight respiratory viruses such as COVID-19 and the flu.

The development of mRNA vaccine technology is one of the most important scientific developments of the last two decades. Kennedy, a prominent antivaxxer, listened to fake “experts” who believe that only “natural” vaccines—based on live viruses—should be approved by the FDA. See FactCheck.org, Kennedy Repeats False and Misleading Claims in Confirmation Hearing.

The mRNA Covid vaccines are estimated to have saved 2.5 million lives globally, with 9 out of 10 of those lives being people over the age of 60. See JAMA Health Forum, Global Estimates of Lives and Life-Years Saved by COVID-19 Vaccination During 2020-2024 | Health Policy.

In withholding funds appropriated by Congress, Kennedy is engaging in the same conduct that the GAO ruled was illegal when performed by Trump. By acting unilaterally, Kennedy is destroying hundreds of millions of dollars of in-process research that might prove essential in saving us from the next global pandemic. Moreover, live-virus vaccines are not recommended for immunocompromised persons. For them, the availability of mRNA vaccines may be the difference between life and death.

Tell a friend—or better yet, put these facts on a protest sign next time you join a pro-democracy rally!

Trump team selectively leaks self-serving lies from Ghislaine Maxwell.

ABC News is reporting that Ghislaine Maxwell did not implicate Trump during her kid-glove interview by Trump's former criminal defense lawyer, Todd Blanche. See ABC News, Ghislaine Maxwell told DOJ Trump never did anything concerning around her: Sources.

The interview itself was an outrage. Todd Blanche is hopelessly conflicted in conducting an interview that should have been designed to learn the truth, but was staged to clear Trump. Moreover, Blanche has done nothing to fact-check statements from the convicted child sex trafficker, who was also indicted for perjury. See Sealed Indictment | US v. Ghislaine Maxwell (Counts Five and Six, Perjury).

Critically, Maxwell was indicted for perjury for allegedly lying about the very questions that Todd Blanche asked her during the interview. The following is a screenshot from the indictment listing the questions that formed the basis of the perjury charges in Counts Five and Six of the Indictment:

Trump, Todd Blanche, and his Epstein crisis handlers apparently believe that the American people are idiots who will accept a staged interview with an indicted perjurer as the final word on Trump's involvement (if any) in Epstein’s crimes. They couldn’t be more wrong.

And when Trump's DOJ releases Maxwell’s answers to Blanche’s questions, they will discover that the interview will only result in more questions. This scandal isn’t going away—because so many of the victims are available to contradict the self-serving denials of a convicted child sex trafficker.

Opportunity for Reader Engagement

Force Multiplier is inviting you to join them for a Zoom on Thursday, August 7, at 7 pm ET to hear from three of the most vulnerable House Democrats. Although Donald Trump won their districts, Gabe Vasquez (NM-02), Jared Golden (ME-02), and Don Davis (NC-01) held their House seats in 2024. How did they do it? How will they do it in 2026? What will be different this time? Donate and Sign Up here

Concluding Thoughts

The August congressional recess is typically a time for members of Congress to meet with their constituents. That should be especially true this August, when congressional Republicans should be out “selling” lies about the Big Ugly Bill—and Democrats should be telling their constituents the truth about the bill.

It is doubtful that congressional Republicans will meet in a forum where their constituents are free to express their opinions about Trump's tenure, the big ugly bill, and the overall performance of congressional Republicans.

We should always avoid the “tyranny of the anecdote,” in which single events are over-interpreted. But the congressional recess is starting very badly for at least one congressional Republican who decided to meet with his constituents in a town hall format. See NYTimes, A G.O.P. Congressman Faced Hometown Voters. It Wasn’t Pretty (Accessible to all.)

In this case, the anecdote may fairly represent reality. Videos of Republican members of Congress getting hammered by their constituents are becoming a meme. What we are NOT seeing are videos of happy Republicans telling their congressional representatives, “Thank you for cutting Medicaid, medical research, FEMA, NOAA, for imposing tariffs on retail goods, and for terrorizing long-term friends and neighbors with thuggish ICE raids.”

In short, the thoughts and emotions that you are likely feeling are being displayed on your television screens. That is validating--and encouraging. Much of the daily reporting in the legacy media merely catalogs Trump’s unlawful and cruel actions. What is missing from that reporting is how Americans are feeling about those developments. Those feelings matter because they will motivate turnout in 2026. And if the hostile reception of Rep. Mike Flood in Nebraska is any indication, Americans will be motivated in 2026 like never before.

None of this means that we can relent or relax. But it is helpful to me to know that my feelings of outrage and offense are shared by Americans across the nation who give voice to those feelings whenever congressional Republicans come out of hiding.

The good news is that in November 2026, congressional Republicans will have nowhere to hide, and everyone will be able to express their feelings in the most effective way possible—our votes. It doesn’t get any better than that!

Talk to you tomorrow!

Daily Dose of Perspective

Messier 101 is a beautiful “face-on” galaxy that is 21 million miles from our home galaxy. M101 is about 2.5 times larger than the Milky Way and contains about a trillion stars.

Enjoy!