Michigan Primary: The Democratic Party’s Future. El-Sayed & Hasan Piker: It Will Be Extra Sweetening if Carville Leaves Our Party. Judge Jeanine’s Umbrella. Hormuz. Liberal Writer Asks: Should I Get a Gun? More
It’ll be a hot time in the political world tonight.
After the polls close tonight, we’ll know a lot more about the direction of the Democratic Party. Is it leaning socialist or towards the party’s old guard? A bellwether race: Michigan’s high-drama Senate nomination battle, which is “a fight for the Democratic Party’s future.” The New York Times’ thumbnail sketch:
The bitter, expensive race pits Dr. Abdul El-Sayed, a progressive former public health official, against Representative Haley Stevens, a centrist supported by party leaders. The winner will defend the seat of Senator Gary Peters, a Democrat who is retiring, in a battleground state that could determine control of the Senate. Along with Michigan, four other states are holding primaries on Tuesday: Kansas, Virginia, Washington and Missouri.
El-Sayed says, implausibly, that he is not a socialist. He has campaigned, however, with radical streamer and lightning rod Hasan Piker, who’s exhilarated by what he sees as El-Sayed’s chances tonight:
On the eve of his Senate primary, Dr. Abdul El-Sayed stumped with controversial lefty streamer Hasan Piker, who once claimed that “America deserved 9/11” — and delivered a final speech reflecting on the country’s flaws.
“I’ve been seeing a lot of clips of like white dude bros that are so stoked to vote for you in the f–king Democratic primaries,” Piker marveled about El-Sayed. “Like, these are people that normally never vote at all, let alone in a primary, let alone for a Democrat.”
The two also gloated over veteran Democratic strategist James Carville floating the possibility of leaving the party if Piker takes over. The streamer argued that the threat was “sweetening the deal.”
El-Sayed also touts the endorsement of Horace Sheffield III, an influential Detroit pastor and radio host who once heaped praise on Nation of Islam minister Louis Farrakhan. A video from 2018 that features El-Sayed advocating driver’s licenses for illegals has surfaced. Another race with big implications: Democratic Socialist Francesca Hong’s race for the Democratic nomination for Governor of Wisconsin is said to be DSA’s biggest test yet.
Embattled Democratic Committee Chair Ken Martin is having a hard time raising money. We’re learning more (via a New York Times scoop) about the DNC’s botched autopsy of the 2024 presidential debacle—the autopsy left out the most important chapter. You know what we need now to cheer us up? Kamala Harris! “This is your moment, Kamala Harris. America needs you,” suggests the Washington Post’s Kate Andrews:
Her political resurrection cannot come soon enough.
Some uplifting cheeriness is needed immediately.
“We each have light inside of us,” the former vice president told Don Lemon on YouTube in June. “And when we feel that and not allow an election or an individual to dampen that light, and instead let that light kind of carry us, in particular through moments of darkness, that we not only act on that hope, but we inspire that hope in each other.”
This is Harris’s gift to America’s political discourse. She is the antidote, the welcome comic relief amid today’s heaviness.
Ms. Must is betting that Judge Jeanine (Pirro) might be in need of some comic relief after President Trump accused the judge of “folding like an umbrella” after she concluded damage at the Lincoln Reflecting Pool was not caused by vandals. Her job is said to be safe—for now.
Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche, meanwhile, moves closer to confirmation as AG after GOP Senators Thom Tillis and John Cornyn dropped their objections after Blanche issued a formal statement that President Trump’s beloved $1.8 billion “anti-weaponisation” fund is dead. A Wall Street Journal editorial concludes:
The two Senators say they’re ready to confirm Mr. Blanche. Democrats will complain they should block him anyway, but since Mr. Trump can keep his man as acting AG, the question is realistic alternatives. And as Mr. Trump put it in his threat on Saturday: “Todd Blanche was a voice of reason!”
Not implausible. Messrs. Cornyn and Tillis got the Justice Department to bend, and it’s good to see Senators use their advise-and-consent power productively.
President Trump is giving Iran “one last chance” to sign a deal before “decapitation.” It feels as if we’ve been here before. Details are emerging about a cargo ship stuck in the Strait of Hormuz. Iran claims it is close to a deal with Oman for control of Hormuz—the deal would include fees. A U.S. official denied the report. There are conflicting signals about the Strait.
In “President Trump’s Triple Bogey,” Hugh Hewitt uses the way Trump golfs as giving hope that the U.S. will prevail in Iran. Walter Russell Mead, WSJ’s foreign affairs guru, uses the game of bridge to make the point that “Trump’s Unpredictability Has Costs, Too.” Gerard Baker, in the same outlet, predicts that Iran will be handed off to Trump’s successor (ugh) and also dings the president’s unpredictability:
Some see this endless back and forth as the enigmatic work of a pure genius…. Others see it as the derangements of a trapped and helpless man….
Ms. Must can’t stop thinking about Dr. Anthony Fauci’s pleading the Fifth 111 times in testimony aimed at ascertaining the origin of Covid 19. In “Covid’s Moral Injuries,” Meghan Cox Gurdon argues, “Strict lockdowns forced us to deny obvious truths.” Ms. Gurdon writes:
If you, like me, suffered profound moral injury five and six years ago you may have felt the old wounds throbbing this past week. It was hard to see Anthony Fauci demonstrate his contempt for Americans by pleading the Fifth Amendment and refusing to answer questions from members of Congress—even though he was pre-emptively pardoned for any potential alleged lies and crimes by President Biden. The sight of the smug little doctor, silent for once, was all the more galling alongside the release of diary entries he kept on his work computer that reveal what a preening, dissembling popinjay he was all along.
Like Dr. Fauci, former President Joe Biden got by (sort of) with denying obvious truths. Jonathan Turley writes in the Hill that the tapes Biden fought hard to conceal reveal that he confessed everything about his handling of classified material.
Special Counsel Robert Hur let President Biden off because he found him a “sympathetic” elderly man with a bad memory:
It is hard to see how any of that would present “a sympathetic, well-meaning elderly man with a poor memory.” It sounds more like a cynical, shrewd politician with poor ethics. It also sounds like it would have been a strong foundation for a prosecution.
Vice President JD Vance is seen as the potential frontrunner for the GOP 2028 nomination. That makes Bill McGurn’s Wall Street Journal column—”JD Vance ‘Fixes’ Capitalism”—this morning quite timely. McGurn writes:
Vice President JD Vance would seem to have little in common with J.D. Rockefeller (1839-1937), once the wealthiest man in the world. But the two Republicans have in common a belief that capitalism doesn’t work for the American people. Mr. Vance has little faith in market competition, which Rockefeller called “a sin.” …
Today Mr. Vance says that while [free market economist Milton] Friedman’s ideas might have worked “in a world where there are Christian guardrails on everything,” they are ill-suited for our more secular age.
If you’re interested in this, Peter Berkowitz had a fascinating article over the weekend about Patrick Deneen, the Notre Dame professor and Vance influencer, who also has reservations about classical liberalism.
Good news from our friend Dr. Sally Satel. “Med Schools Are Over Their Politics Fever,” Sally writes in the Wall Street Journal’s Free Expression section. “Students aren’t swearing to uproot ‘structural violence’ anymore. They’re taking the Hippocratic Oath,’ she reveals.
“Should I Get a Gun?” asks Larissa Phillips of The Free Press. “I’ve opposed them for most of my life. But right now, I’m considering getting a handgun,” Phillips admits.
“Will Republicans Renounce Max Miller?” asks a headline in the same publication. “The GOP congressman’s ex-wife has accused him of assault amid a custody battle. He has denied the claims and said he’ll stay in his race.” Miller’s ex-wife is the daughter of Senator Bernie Moreno.
“Is ‘Communist’ No Longer a Slur?” asks Victor Davis Hanson’s headline at American Greatness. We’ll know more about the answer after tonight.
