Kamala Harris and a History of Vice Presidential Second Acts

Vice President Kamala Harris (D-CA)

One of the biggest questions in Democratic politics right now is what will Kamala Harris do next?  Harris, who ran for president in 2020, lost the primary, and then successfully won the vice presidency, wasn't supposed to be asking this question right now.  Just over a year ago, Harris was the heir presumptive to the 2028 nomination for the White House, the sitting vice president trying to valiantly save the Biden/Harris campaign.  But a few months later she was shoved into the shortest presidential race in decades for a major party candidate, and came up unsuccessful in 2024 when she pinch-hit for Joe Biden.

While Donald Trump (the exception to a lot of rules, and increasingly a lot of laws) successfully ran four years after losing the presidential election, generally failed presidential nominees do not get a second chance at the White House.  Recent presidential losers like Al Gore, Mitt Romney, & Hillary Clinton probably were still dreaming of the White House stationery when they conceded, but they didn't make a run, and while it's possible Harris will, I wonder if that time might've passed for her.  There is going to be a lot of pressure for Democrats to move on from the Obama/Biden years, and with most of the major figures of that era like Hillary Clinton & John Kerry nearing or entering their 80's, Harris is really the only plausible way to continue it...and I think the nation will be ready for her to step aside.  I also wonder if Harris, horrified by what Donald Trump is doing due to her inability to win the election (it was on the country too...but she has to carry it more than anyone), might not want the heat of potentially failing twice.

But that doesn't mean that she's done with politics.  Harris has put out feelers to run for Governor of California as a final chapter in her political career, and many insiders seem to think she'll make the plunge.  Were Harris to win, she'd be a heavy favorite for the office, and would be able to position herself as the leader of one of the world's largest economies, and also as a counterweight to the Trump administration in the largest state in the Union.  Her running, though, does bring up a question: how often to former Vice Presidents run for office after leaving the Naval Observatory?

I initially thought that this would be a pretty short list, given that former presidents almost never run for public office again.  While several went on to run for the White House again (not just Trump, but also Grover Cleveland, Teddy Roosevelt, Ulysses S. Grant, & Martin van Buren all made a play for the White House after losing or retiring), only three ran for public office again after leaving.  John Quincy Adams spent 17 years in the US House after his term as president, becoming the country's most famous abolitionist for a time (he also unsuccessfully ran for Governor & Senate while he was in the House).  John Tyler would serve on the Provisional Confederate Congress (and was elected to the Confederate House of Representatives but died before he could take office), forever destroying any sense of his legacy as the only former President to wholly support the Confederacy (even Franklin Pierce, who was deeply critical of Lincoln, didn't do that).  And finally there's Andrew Johnson, who would briefly serve in the US Senate in 1875 before his death from a stroke.

Vice President Walter Mondale (D-MN)

That's it-the top job is hard to get over, and taking another office is something that most politicians seem incapable of doing.  But the vice presidency, that's not the case.  Several former VP's would take on appointed positions, amongst them George M. Dallas, Charles G. Dawes, & Walter Mondale (who all became ambassadors), and Henry Wallace (a cabinet secretary).  But 11 vice presidents would run for public office (other than for POTUS) in the years following their time at #2.

The most common post-VP office to run for is the US Senate.  The world's most exclusive club comes with enough prestige that it doesn't feel like a "consolation prize."  John C. Calhoun served in the Senate twice after being VP (quitting briefly between the stints to become Secretary of State), while Hannibal Hamlin also did both, winning a Senate seat in 1869 (meaning he served alongside Lincoln's other VP Andrew Johnson in the Senate, and the two were actually sworn in standing next to each other), before becoming Ambassador to Spain as the coda on his career.  Hubert Humphrey spent most of the 1970's considering a second run for the White House from a vaulted place in the Senate (they invented the position of Deputy President Pro Tempore for him, an office no other person has held), and Alben Barkley died in the Senate after serving as Harry Truman's VP.  Perhaps the weirdest Senate sojourn for a VP was John C. Breckenridge, who did serve as Senator from Kentucky...before being forced out in shame when he joined the Confederacy, eventually serving as Secretary of War for the South.

Other former vice presidents took different tactics.  Harris would have Levi Morton, who became Governor of New York after being Benjamin Harrison's VP to model herself off of if she were to win the California governorship.  Meanwhile there's also Richard M. Johnson, who successfully sought a seat in the Kentucky House of Representatives before he died in 1850 just two weeks into his term.

Johnson, though, is also a cautionary tale: not all former vice presidents get glory when they run for a second act.  Johnson sought both a Senate seat and the Governor's mansion in Kentucky without victory before finally settling for the State House.  He's not alone.   Richard Nixon's famous "you won't have Nixon to kick around anymore" was not, as is frequently believed, said after his 1960 presidential loss, but instead his 1962 gubernatorial defeat to Pat Brown.  William A. Wheeler lost a Senate election in 1881, and 121 years later, Walter Mondale (asked to sit in for the late Paul Wellstone) became the most recent Vice President to lose when he lost a Senate election to Norm Coleman (making Mondale the only person in American history to lose an election in all 50 states).  Charles W. Fairbanks might be the oddest of all.  After serving as Teddy Roosevelt's VP during Roosevelt's second term, Fairbanks sought the Vice Presidency a second time in 1916, narrowly losing the office (and dying two years later).

All of this is to say, Harris is not unique, but instead would be joining a rich history if she were to run for an office after the vice presidency...even if she never again seeks the Oval Office.

David Hogg Takes on House Democrats

DNC Vice Chair David Hogg

Gun violence being a reason someone enters politics in America is sadly not an isolated situation.  For example, Reps. Carolyn McCarthy (D-NY) and Lucy McBath (D-GA) both got into politics in part because of experiencing gun violence in their own lives (McCarthy's husband was killed in a mass shooting, McBath's teenage son was shot at a gas station in Jacksonville).  So it is not surprising that David Hogg, who was one of the survivors of the Parkland High School shooting in 2018, eventually used that as a platform to make a larger difference when it comes to gun violence.  The Parkland High School shooting became notable in the media because it was arguably the first mass shooting in America where the victims became more famous in the long-term than the actual shooter, and no figure from this became more prominent than Hogg.  Hogg, in the years that followed, would go on to appear on Dr. Phil, and became an outspoken advocate against then-House Speaker Paul Ryan.  As a result of this, Hogg endured a lot of publicity, some of it harmful, including being accosted by future Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene.

Hogg has since then become a prominent figure in left-leaning podcasts & activist rallies, even launching a Leaders We Deserve PAC focusing on "helping young, progressive candidates around the country get elected to state legislatures and the US Congress."  But it wasn't until 2025 that Hogg attained actual power in the political infrastructure.  In February 2025, Hogg became one of five Vice chairs of the Democratic National Committee, serving alongside DNC Member Artie Blanco, State Rep. Malcolm Kenyatta, Reyna Walters-Morgan (a prominent figure in Hillary Clinton's 2016 presidential campaign), and incumbent Nebraska Democratic Chairwoman Jane Kleeb.  While the other four have more traditional backgrounds for the position of Vice Chair, Hogg's victory was one for the activist class, which have spent much of the past decade focusing on the DNC, particularly blaming them for the failure of Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders loss of the presidential nomination in 2016 and 2020 (for the record, I can find no evidence that Hogg supported Sanders in either of those two campaigns...his most prominent political endorsement that I found is backing Tim Walz for the VP slot in 2024).

That activism and his youth were always going to make Hogg, a strikingly handsome 25-year-old man, an obvious source of headlines, which has been the case over the past week.  Hogg has stated that his Leaders We Deserve PAC intends to spend as much as $20 million to primary older Democratic incumbents in the upcoming midterms.  This is really unusual for someone representing the DNC, an organization whose primary focus is on electing Democratic nominees in various federal & state races, but because the nominees are almost always incumbents (and because the DNC is reliant upon support from incumbent members of Congress to help with their fundraising), it is atypical to spend money going against incumbents.  Predictably, this has invited a lot of backlash, much of it private given Hogg's sway (since incumbent members of Congress don't want to make themselves obvious targets for Hogg's money).  An Axios article did have an on-the-record quote from Rep. Hillary Scholten (D-MI), who at 43 is one of the youngest members of the House and therefore probably feels safer speaking publicly, saying this is "a disappointment from leadership...I can think of a million better things to do with twenty million dollars right now."

Hogg's message, it's worth noting, is catching a wave of momentum.  In the wake of Joe Biden's presidential loss, which many in the party blame in part on his inability to admit that he was too old to run for president, there are a number of progressive challenges to long-time, older incumbents popping up across the country.  Reps. Jan Schakowsky (age 80), Nancy Pelosi (age 84), and David Scott (age 79) are all getting primary challenges from candidates decades younger than them, though none of these incumbents have officially announced they'll retire (there are rumors all three will).  This comes in the wake of some more progressive members of the House being angry that Hakeem Jeffries did not do more to protect now-former Reps. Cori Bush & Jamaal Bowman last year to win their primaries against more moderate challengers (whom, it's worth noting, are now incumbents).

If you've been reading this blog a lot over the past year (bless you), you'll know that I have changed my mind a bit about valuing incumbency & experience over certain incumbents being too old to run for reelection.  I have seen, at this point, the effects of having incumbents who refuse to retire like Joe Biden, Dianne Feinstein, & Ruth Bader Ginsburg, and the long-term damage this can entail.  Had Reps. Sylvester Turner & Raul Grijalva not run for reelection in 2024 (both were over 70), it's possible that Speaker Mike Johnson would not have been able to pass some of his budget bills over the past month (made possible by their seats being empty due to their recent deaths).  I do think that challenging candidates because of their age can be the right call, all things being equal, and you would think that I would back Hogg's mission here.

But I don't.  I do not think it's appropriate for a leader within the DNC to be doing something like this, and I'm going to tell you why.  To begin with, you have to look at the messenger.  David Hogg's politics oftentimes feel cultivated on social media (not surprising for someone so young), and read more like they are intent on raising rage dollars & engagement clicks than on making a true difference.  Case in point is Hogg stating in November 2024, after the defeat of incumbent-Rep. Mary Peltola in Alaska "good riddance" due to Peltola's record on gun control.  Peltola, though, is the kind of incumbent who makes majorities.  She is to the right on gun control of both Hogg and myself, but she's also the only Democrat who could have conceivably won this seat.  Majorities are not made by invisible swaths of progressives who magically show up to win (we have seen, repeatedly, that when you run a "true progressive" in a red constituency that it ends up with them losing by a larger margin than a moderate...the myth of the "stay-at-home progressive" is largely false).  You need to have incumbents like Peltola winning.

You also need to have some faith in the DNC protecting incumbents.  I think that some fear-of-God in incumbents is a good thing...I have also seen what it has done to the Republican Party, basically destroying it from within.  There are situations (like, say, Rep. Ed Case of Hawaii) where they are far more moderate than their blue seat needs to be.  And there are situations like the incumbents I mentioned (specifically David Scott, whose health issues have made him MIA for much of the past year in Congress) that have absolutely no business running for reelection.  But the DNC's job is not to police primaries-it should be to build as large of a majority as possible.  I get that Hogg is doing this with his PAC's money (not the DNC's), but he chose to be a leader in the DNC-with that comes the expectation of living by the point of the DNC, winning us back majorities in both houses of Congress and the White House.  Spending time & energy on constituencies like Schakowsky's, Scott's, & Pelosi's is pointless since a Democrat will win there no matter what.  Instead, you need to get more Democrats like Peltola to win-Democrats fighting to take back purple & pink territory that will need a moderate to win (and as we saw during the first two years of Joe Biden's terms in office, a moderate Democrat is exponentially more valuable than a conservative Republican).  Hogg shifting the conversation to an internal struggle, one that will result in tens of millions being spent on infighting, is not the kind of leadership you expect from the DNC.  It's not a case of him taking an activist approach in a typically staid organization (which I could respect)...it's basically trying to use his position to further his own importance, but not to the benefit of the Democratic Party.  I am supportive of ushering in a new generation of leaders, and am open to some aspects of what Hogg is attempting...but not in this way, and given his current job, not with this leader.

Talking Pictures: My Super 8

I recently bought a new car (okay, recently being in November, so not actually recently, but it still feels new...also screw you Trump-you didn't get me on the tariffs on this one!), and it's been an adjustment (mostly in a good way) getting used to driving a vehicle that is galaxies more advanced than the car I bought 14 years ago. 

This includes listening to way more podcasts, a subject I don't discuss very much on this blog, because, quite frankly, I am super picky about podcasts.  I'll watch any movie (I don't like every movie, but I'm always happy to see any movie), but when it comes to TV, books, & podcasts, I tend to be a bit shier about giving my time and effort.  I think a lot of podcasts are too meandering, particularly those on film.  While there are situations where a podcast can truly hold your attention for longer than 2 hours...those situations are few-and-far between, and generally podcasts are not well-edited enough for me.

But the ones that I do love, I love hard, and with me now listening to them more as I drive, I have found that Talking Pictures is one of my favorites.  The show feels tailor-made for me.  Hosted by Ben Mankiewicz, who for the past 22 years has been one of the primary hosts on Turner Classic Movies, it has Mankiewicz doing in-depth, cinema-focused conversations (for roughly an hour...perfect length for a podcast) with different entertainment fixtures ranging from Jane Lynch to Alexander Payne to Mel Brooks.  They talk about their careers, which is fun, but frequently it's about the movies that inspired them.  Given that I have not had TCM for the past few months (I will be changing that in May, but had to go without so I could afford the car in the first paragraph), this has been a much-needed patch as TCM is basically the background noise of my house.

On the podcast, Mankiewicz asks what he calls the "Super 8" questionnaire (so named after a type of Kodak film that is generally used for independent or even home-made movies), where he queries the guests eight specific questions about their relationship with movies, and I thought this would be a fun way to add a little cinematic flair back to the blog given how much we've been doing politically here lately.  So without further adieu, here are my answers to the Super 8!

1. What's Your Most Memorable Movie-Watching Experience?

Mankiewicz generally makes a point of pushing the guests to say something they saw in theaters, which is where I would've gone with this anyway.  There are a number of film-watching experiences I can think of that really call out to me as being memorable.  Some are because of whom I went with-I recall watching my Grandpa John cry watching Apollo 13, something I only remember him doing twice in my whole life.  I loved going to Milk on opening night in the Uptown Landmark, with an entirely gay audience, and them getting up and giving a standing ovation during the movie when a Minnesota teen decides not to end his life late in the movie after seeing him intend to do so earlier in the picture.  And I think I'd also include waiting in line for certain films, which isn't something we do anymore, but made releases of movies like Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets, Brokeback Mountain, and Avatar feel like true events.

2. What is a Movie You Loved in High School?

I will own that the most memorable movie-watching experience that I probably ever had was also the answer to this question, so I saved it (I hate when the guests don't mix it up a bit...you make movies, you should watch a lot of them).  The first time I saw Titanic changed my life.  I remember buzzing about it during the intermission, on New Year's Eve, being absolutely thrilled at everything that had just came before it, and for months afterward it became my entire personality (I literally am typing this with a White Star liner Titanic poster right behind me).  I have seen Titanic six times in theaters, more than I have any other picture, and I suspect it will keep that title forever.

3. What is a Movie You'd Show a Date?

This is a weird question for me because I always feel like showing movies to guys I'm dating is such a bad decision.  The first date I ever went on with a guy was to Million Dollar Baby (the first movie I went with on a date with a girl is, and I'm not kidding about this, a movie called Fairy Tale: A True Story which may have been the most aptly named movie for a terrified gay kid trying to figure out how to get out of the date that I can possibly imagine), but in terms of showing a date, I have generally steered clear of this.  I think The Third Man or Laura is one of those movies that I show friends that want to know me better, and would probably be the best answer for this question.  I love film noir, and I think those two are about as good of movies as you can get, so I think either would be a good choice to test if he's really a good fit for me.

4. What Movie Makes You Cry Without Fail?

I do not think of myself as a particularly big crier...except when it comes to the movies.  I will cry over a lot of things, and sometimes not even movies that are particularly moving or meant to be cried at.  I cry at Once Upon a Time in the West and The Godfather just because I'm so impressed that a human being could make something so beautiful.  I used to test how early I would start crying while watching Life is Beautiful because it moved me so much (I will be revisiting that for the first time in probably 15 years next year for the OVP, so I'm curious if it holds up as I know it's a divisive film).  The longest I've ever cried at a movie is Before Sunset, which if I remember correctly I clocked at at least 10 minutes after the film had finished (for the record, the Lost finale, which I cried over the entire episode and for at least an hour or two after the first time I saw it, has Before Sunset licked).  But the movie I most consistently cry at would either be Casablanca (the "Le Marseillaise" scene) or The English Patient, specifically 2:10:45 into the film when Ralph Fiennes is carrying Kristin Scott Thomas into the cave (yes, I know the exact time...I used to put this on specifically so I could start crying when I was an emotional, more sensitive young man).

5. What Movie Makes You Laugh?

Okay, my brother used to make fun of me growing up because I have an aversion to comedies, and saying that I don't enjoy laughing, but I do, in fact, watch comedies on occasion.  The movie that most consistently makes me laugh is Clue.  I have also seen it more than any other movie for this reason (and it is the only movie I can say with confidence is can quote verbatim, give or take Casablanca).  Other movies that tend to make me laugh include Spy, which is one of two movies that I watch to ward off particularly bad Sunday Scaries (if you follow me on Letterboxd and see I logged Spy or Ratatouille to end the week, know that I'm having a rough one), and Bringing Up Baby, specifically the scene toward the end where everyone is in the prison ("Swinging Door Susie!").

6. You're a Thief.  There's a vast warehouse of every prop from every movie.  What do you steal?

Ooh, this is where I get basic, because it'd almost certainly be something from either Harry Potter, Lord of the Rings, or Pirates of the Caribbean (even if the first instinct I have is to steal the Maltese Falcon...honestly, at some point I might just buy a mock Maltese Falcon).  These are probably my three favorite film series collectively with more than 3 entries in the series, but even trying to pick specific items from the movies would be challenging.  For sure the One Ring would be the easy answer, and is probably the best answer, but I would also love one of the Pieces of Eight from Pirates of the Caribbean or Hogwarts a History from Harry Potter (provided it comes with something actually written in it).  But yeah...it's hard to top having my very own precious.

7. What is your Dad's Favorite Movie?

Movies are a big part of my family's ethos.  We generally go to a movie pretty much every time we're on vacation at least one night, and we used to do Saturday Movie nights where my parents would make a big bowl of Popcorn (it was in a giant pottery bowl that had "Popcorn is for Sharing" that my Dad bought for my Mom on their 9th anniversary).   But my dad famously won't commit to a favorite movie.  The only movie I've ever seen my dad get misty over (which he denies) is Mr. Holland's Opus, and the only time I've ever gotten him to commit to a favorite movie was (when I was a teenager and I ran an AFI List for my immediate family members) One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, a movie I sincerely doubt he's seen in the past 20 years.  The movie that I most identify with him, though, is the Lord of the Rings Trilogy, the only movies I know he's watched repeatedly in the past 20 years without my mom's prompting.

8. What is your Mom's Favorite Movie?

My mom, on the other hand, is very open about her favorite movies, and she has a lot of them.  Growing up, I thought that certain movies like Hoosiers, Sneakers, and Romancing the Stone were far more famous than they actually were because my Mom would watch them so often.  She's big on certain Classical Hollywood actors (specifically Doris Day), and is also a fan of some action-adventures.  Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade would definitely be a movie that I would name-check with her, and she has a soft spot for Disney (with The Little Mermaid being her favorite).  I think if I had to corner it down to one movie, though, it'd be While You Were Sleeping, which I remember seeing with my mom & brother on a Tuesday movie night trip to our local theater.  Tuesdays were golf night for my dad, and so my mom usually took us to the discount movie night, and saw whatever was playing at 7 PM during the summer (to our delight).  While You Were Sleeping was one of those movies, and is so engrained in our family lore that it's not really Christmas until someone says "these mashed potatoes are so creamy" at least once.

The Constitutional Crisis Has Arrived

First off, for those who are here just for the movies, I promise you that we will get to an actual film article soon (I'm nearly done with an OVP, hopefully right after Easter, as well as am not far off from a My Ballot), but we're getting another political article today.  It is a genuinely scary time in America right now.  Getting the most headlines are tariffs, primarily because these are bread-and-butter issues that impact Americans in their immediate lives-everyone can see if the prices of avocados and their smart phones are going up in real time, and watching that disappear from your bank account can be terrifying.  Donald Trump, in less than 100 days, has not just upended the world economy, but has removed America as the leader of the international financial world, leaving room for China & the EU to take our place.  That Trump is doing so despite clear frustrations from members of his own party like Ted Cruz & Thom Tillis and showing probable signs of mental health decline (his recent physical, where they made him look to be a marathon runner despite everyone being able to see, physically, that that is not the case, is almost comical if it wasn't reality) with continual word salad answers to questions, is kind of the point of this article.  "Who can stop Trump?" has become a very serious question that needs to be asked.

But it is not the focus of the article-that is on the deportations of a number of immigrants that were currently in the United States to other countries, including students that are being targeted for their political opinions.  Perhaps the most notable is Kilmar Abrego Garcia, a citizen of El Salvador who was illegally deported from the United States in mid-March.

First, let's get a couple of facts in order about Kilmar Abrego Garcia (age 29), and what is & isn't true about his status, given that there's a lot of misinformation about his case circulating right now.  Abrego Garcia is a citizen of El Salvador, though his brother Cesar, his wife Jennifer Vasquez Sura & son are all American citizens.  Abrego Garcia did illegally immigrate to the United States at the age of 16 (in 2011), and has lived here since then.  In 2019, he was detained by ICE on suspicions that he was a gang member with MS-13, a violent gang in New York (a place that Abrego Garcia has never lived).  Abrego Garcia was given protection by a judge from being deported (notably not being granted asylum) because of the threat of gang violence were he to return to El Salvador.  He has legally been in the United States since, though because he does not qualify for asylum, he does not have an immediate or assumed path to a green card or citizenship after a period of time.  He has reported to ICE yearly for a work visa.  To date, he has not been convicted of a single crime, either in the United States or El Salvador, and there is no evidence whatsoever (other than the accusation in 2019, which was unfounded given he has never lived in New York City) that he has any connection with a crime syndicate, including MS-13.

His deportation opens up a large amount of conversation.  For starters, while his specific status does not wholly prevent deportation, the immigration judge's case had stated that Abrego Garcia could not be deported to El Salvador, which meant that if ICE felt there was a compelling reason to deport Abrego Garcia, they needed to get permission from a judge to be able to do so, which they did not.  Abrego Garcia's case stands out as unique because it was the first situation where ICE did admit that they made a mistake in the case, stating that they were aware of Abrego Garcia's status, but that he was deported due to "administrative error."  Judge Paula Xinis, a federal judge in the District Court of Maryland, stated that the deportation was illegal, the matter of how Abrego Garcia was deported violated the initial immigration judge's ruling, and that he would be irreparably harmed if he were to remain in El Salvador, and the government needed to return him.  This was backed up by the a Fourth Circuit panel (unanimously), including by a judge appointed by Republican President Ronald Reagan, and then the Supreme Court unanimously called Abrego Garcia's deportation illegal, though it is worth noting that they said that the US needed to "facilitate" the release of Abrego Garcia.  The three liberal judges on the Court (Sonia Sotomayor, Elena Kagan, & Ketanji Brown Jackson) did write a separate statement to provide Abrego Garcia with all due process, and Sotomayor said that Chief Justice Roberts should not have issued a temporary stay that said that the deadline imposed by Judge Xinis had been missed (essentially Sotomayor & the liberal judges said that Abrego Garcia should be returned, and that Roberts was wrong for giving Trump an extension to return Abrego Garcia, as Xinis' order should've been followed).

That's a lot of information, but if you're still following, Trump's response is why this is particularly scary.  A lot of what's happened in the past few months has been a situation where Trump did something illegal or outside of his powers, and while Congress has largely done nothing to stop it, the federal judiciary has (aided by largely Democratic Governors and Attorneys General).  You've seen this repeatedly, with everything from illegal firings in the executive branch to cancelled spending at the NIH to Gov. Janet Mills' suing for Trump withholding funds to her state.  This isn't a good process, but it is how the process is supposed to work when someone breaks the rules-checks & balances.  This situation, though, has the Trump administration questioning Xinis' authority despite the Constitution saying she has the power to be able to stop this, unless a higher Court (like the Supreme Court or the Fourth Circuit) overrules her, which has largely not been the case, save for Roberts' extension of the stay.  They have also put the case back in Xinis' Court to resolve this.  It is very clear to anyone that the Supreme Court's intention with their ruling is that Abrego Garcia should be brought back to the United States to receive due process in his deportation case, which would likely mean that (following the law) he could continue to maintain his residency his wife & child in Maryland.

Yesterday, though, Trump and El Salvadorian President Nayib Bukele, both openly mocked the case, stating that they have no intention of returning Abrego Garcia.  This is despite the Supreme Court ordering him to facilitate this return, and Xinis is demanding it.  This is the first real case of the Trump administration openly and flagrantly denying a Supreme Court order during his second term, and sets up a true, very black-and-white constitutional crisis.  The Constitution is very clear-the executive branch must follow what the Supreme Court says, and if they do not want to, they need to work with the legislative branch (Congress) to either pass a law to override the decision, or to impeach those justices.  The Constitution intended to make the executive branch the weakest (so that the President would not become a de facto king), and this is an exact reason for it-the executive branch getting too powerful will essentially end democracy.

Where we go from here is uncharted territory, and for all of the chatter online, it's not clear exactly what the best path is here.  While Republicans have been largely silent, Democrats have been loudly outspoken on this subject, with Sen. Chris van Hollen and Rep. Maxwell Frost both stating their intention to either meet with the El Salvadorian president or to go to El Salvador themselves to confirm Abrego Garcia's condition (it is worth noting that we have no evidence at this point that Abrego Garcia is even still alive, or if he is, what his treatment has been...perhaps one of the main reasons Trump is openly defying the Supreme Court is that he doesn't want the world to find out Abrego Garcia is dead, or if he isn't, to not have him sitting down with Lesley Stahl the second he arrives in America).  The Court could continue to make life hell for Trump (John Roberts & Amy Coney Barrett, and to a lesser degree Brett Kavanaugh & Neil Gorsuch, will be pissed that Trump is negating their power and could be vindictive in retaliation), but the real test here is that if Roberts doesn't find a way to bring Abrego Garcia to Maryland, we have essentially crossed the Rubicon into a dictatorship.  It will mean that the President can openly deport any person, including those protected by judicial order (or even, as Trump insinuated yesterday, US citizens) from the country with no recourse once that person has left the country to be able to protect them.  When Trump was elected, it was clear that he would pose a constitutional crisis at some point during his tenure, but I figured it would feel more like a trickle than an obvious, marquee-blaring situation like this.  If Kilmar Abrego Garcia is not brought back to the United States, the Trump administration has essentially made the federal judiciary powerless...and in the process, ended the American experiment started almost 250 years ago.

The Democrats (Still) Long Odds in the Senate

Sens. Susan Collins & Thom Tillis

Donald Trump has spent much of the past few months tearing up the US government, and in the past week, destroying the world economy, essentially ending America's reign as the leader of the free world, and for the first time in almost 160 years, risking us being left behind as a first world country.  This is a lot to take in, and lord knows if you've looked at your 401k in the past few days, you'll find out that you've essentially been working free for all of Trump's presidency based on the losses (I know I have at this point).  This is awful, and kind of hard to comprehend, and I don't really have the words for it.  As someone who has lived through two recessions (and if we're being honest, 2014-15 was a uniquely troubling time for my personal finances due to the sector of the economy I work in, so this feels like my fourth) and am only 40, it's harrowing.  Perhaps at some point I will talk a bit about how I now have a Recession Routine (one that has largely been dictated by greedy Republican men who overreached & all of us got punished-and that's true in the case of all of them!).

But today we're going to talk about something more familiar on the blog: the US Senate.  While I am waiting to see if or when the Senate puts forward a bill that will stop the tariffs (so far a bipartisan quartet of Rand Paul/Ron Wyden and Chuck Grassley/Maria Cantwell have put forward competing bills that will likely, in the end, end up being combined-I do feel semi-confident that this will get a vote in the Senate before this is done, even if the House is going to be a challenge, though Rep. Greg Meeks is working on that as well), it's clear that the electoral calculus has changed.  These tariffs, if you believe literally any economist and not a rambling 78-year-old man who has claimed to talk to Joan Rivers & Lee Iacocca (both dead) in the past year, you'll know that the tariffs are going to cause undue harm to the US economy, which historically has been very unpopular.  The US House was already going to be a stretch for the Republicans to hold in 2026 (they only have a 220-215 majority...even a blue puddle would be able to take that out in a midterm, much less a blue wave), but the Senate was always a challenge.  The Democrats badly screwed up in 2022 & 2024 by not beating Ron Johnson & Dave McCormick, and so they have to win 4 US Senate seats in 2026 instead of the much easier 2.  I thought I'd talk a little about that today, and exactly what it would take to win the US Senate.

There are a few ground rules that we should discuss when it gets to the math in 2026.  First, the Democrats need to hold all of their current seats.  This isn't as hard as you'd think it is.  While the offense for the year is brutal, the defense should be easy.  Democrats have open seats in Minnesota & New Hampshire, but this is the right time to do that (a favorable environment for the Democrats is a good place to bring in the new generation, and I'm hoping we see more of it in states like Illinois & maybe even Virginia), so I don't anticipate those move.  Same with the open seat in Michigan, a state Donald Trump won last year, but also that the Democrats held in the Senate (a miracle in retrospect), and in a traditional environment, this should hold.  The most vulnerable seat in theory would be Georgia, but that's predicated on incumbent Gov. Brian Kemp running (which is no guarantee, particularly with Gov. Chris Sununu declining this week in the wake of the tariffs...does Kemp want a career-ending loss on his shoulders when he has clear presidential aspirations?), and even then, Jon Ossoff is staking a very early money lead that will help him.  I think the Democrats are in a good position to hold all of their seats (there are no contests like Joe Manchin in 2024 where a loss is a foregone conclusion, or where they're even underdogs), which they'd have to do to have any shot at winning a majority.

The next phase is two specific states that are must-flips, both with their own set of problems but imminently winnable in the right situation: North Carolina & Maine.  North Carolina is probably the easier of the two to win, even if it's the redder state.  Sen. Thom Tillis, fighting for a third term, has never faced a blue wave year (North Carolina didn't have a Senate election in 2018), and there's still the possibility that he'll face a primary challenge, one endorsed by President Trump (who can't be happy about some of Tillis's comments about tariffs).  Tillis also is likely to face Gov. Roy Cooper in the general election (Rep. Wiley Nickel is clearly pushing himself as a Cooper alternative, but I doubt he stays in the race if Cooper runs, which I suspect he will).  Cooper is a very good opponent, one who won statewide twice with Trump on the ballot, and is different than the slew of governors trying quixotic bids for higher office (Larry Hogan, Phil Bredesen, Steve Bullock...it's a long list) in the past 15 years mostly because Cooper is doing so in a purple state.  I'll say this-at this point in the race I think Cooper would be favored to win.

Sen. Susan Collins in Maine is the only Republican representing a state that Kamala Harris won in the Senate, which should make her vulnerable.  Collins, though (unlike Tillis) has won in blue years-she managed to win races with both Obama and Biden winning her state, and while she avoided the one cycle she might've genuinely been vulnerable (I think she loses in 2018), she's going to get its sequel this year.  I think the biggest problem for Democrats against Collins isn't her very strong retail politicking skills (she's absolutely the most impressive politician in Congress in terms of crossover appeal), but that her inevitable ability to beat Democrats becomes self-fulfilling prophecy.  Already two high-profile Democrats (Secretary of State Shenna Bellows & Senate President Troy Jackson) have skipped her race, and are running for governor instead.  It's possible that others like Rep. Jared Golden soon follow.  Gov. Janet Mills has been flouted as a name, and she'd be an impressive candidate...if she wasn't 77-years-old (five years Collins' senior).  I maintain that, given Trump's unpopularity and Collins' being the only way for Maine voters (aka Harris voters) ability to send Republicans a message, that Collins is much more vulnerable than conventional wisdom dictates...but you can't beat her with nothing.  One of the major stars in the Maine Democratic Party needs to smell the opportunity (in a similar way to Chris Coons circa 2010) and try to get a promotion here (perhaps like Coons, jumping ahead of a candidate who would have been the nominee in an open seat circumstance).  Democrats have no realistic shot at the Senate without beating Collins (and honestly, they don't have a realistic shot of a majority in 2028 or 2030 without it either...this is too blue of a seat to let it be held by even a moderate Republican in a Senate that already doesn't give them any advantage).

Let's assume, though, that the Democrats pull this off-they hold every seat, and they beat both Tillis & Collins (if I was predicting the election as of right now, that would be my guess).  If this was all it would take, I'd say they were the favorites at this point...but they need two more seats to get a majority thanks to those aforementioned losses against Johnson & McCormick (the two states that stand out in the past 6 years as ones they badly biffed).  Beyond North Carolina & Maine, it's honestly slim pickings.  There are no other Republicans in states that Harris won by less than 5-points...hell, there are no other Republicans in states Harris won by less-than 10 points.  It is possible during midterms to win states that the other party won by more than 10-points but it's rare.  The last time it happened was in the 2010 midterm bloodbath for the Democrats, where they lost a gargantuan 7 seats leading up to & on election night, but only 3 (Mark Kirk in Illinois, Scott Brown in Massachusetts, & Ron Johnson in Wisconsin...yes, in 2008 Obama won Wisconsin by 14-points, it was a different era) were in states Obama had won by more than 10-points.  So if there are flips of this nature , they'll happen in states that are unexpected (Brown & Kirk, in particular, were not expected to win those races this far out), and likely in states that the party has little chance to hold onto in a subsequent election (i.e. flukes).

This means that it could end up being in states that were much kinder to Joe Biden than Kamala Harris (Florida, Ohio, Iowa, & Texas are all states Biden lost by less than 10-points but Harris didn't, and all four have Senate seats up next year).  It could be a situation where the tariffs hit agricultural states worse than average, and you see places like Iowa, Ohio, Kansas, & Nebraska get hit hard.  There's also the possibility that the "threaten to turn pink" (i.e. red states that have shown some blue-trending signs in the past decade) states could flip as well.  This occurred in Virginia in 2006 to flip the Senate, and there are a few of them this cycle (Texas, Kansas, & Alaska, specifically).  And of course, Massachusetts being on the 2010 list is telling because they could happen in states that aren't open yet; an unexpected death or resignation of a senator in a purple state would upend the map in the way Ted Kennedy's did in 2009 or John McCain's seat did when it flipped & got Democrats a Senate majority in 2020, two years before it would've been up normally in 2022.

Recruitment will play a role here-Democrats, in particular, probably need high-profile candidates in Ohio & Texas just to keep up from a money perspective if nothing else as a fluke in those elections would still require tens of millions of dollars compared to cheaper states like Alaska or Iowa...but it won't matter as much as you'd think.  No one thought of Scott Brown, Ron Johnson, Kay Hagen, or Jim Webb as particularly standout candidates, and indeed in all of those races there were other candidates who would've been the first-choice.  Waves sometimes find rockstars (Hagen & Johnson, in particular, were clearly more talented than a fluke candidate usually is), but they also carry all boats, and in a situation where a wave is big enough to win a Senate majority for the Democrats (something I still see as unlikely), it will probably bring along some names that we don't know yet.  So while I don't think the Dems can take the Senate...I'm now watching those long-shot states to see if some random state legislator or city councilor is about to become one of the most powerful people in America.

The Baffling Laziness of Donald Trump

A few times a year, I buy a lottery ticket.  It's always a Powerball or a Mega Millions, and it's usually driven by either a rough week at my day job or the number being so crazy that it's cracked into my worldview.  For those few days between the purchase and the drawing, I will secretly fantasize about what it'd be like to win.  To pay off my house, to travel the world, to buy an RV & fly first class to Europe...to take all of my friends to Harry Potter World for my birthday, and to give out checks to the people who matter most to me so that they can have that moment of bliss.  And then the drawing happens, and of course I don't win, and those dreams get tucked away for the next time I decide I want to spend $2 daydreaming for a bit.

This is relatively out-of-character for me, this occasional lottery ticket purchase, as I am by-and-large a very practical person when it comes to how I run my life.  I sometimes think that people confuse responsible with "not fun" (and perhaps sometimes, even with me, with good reason), but I do think of myself as a fun person...but I am confident I'm a responsible person.  When it comes to the standards I hold for myself, they are pretty high, and I pride myself in working hard to achieve them.  If I have a goal, I do the work to reach it, and I rarely give up if I don't get there right away.  I am planful when it comes to goals, writing them down, systematically crossing them off each month (we talked about this a lot here if you're into this, as I have a lot to say about the matter).  

And I am very conservative with my finances.  I never spend money I don't have, and I make a point of trying to save money when I can.  I do financial audits of what I spent cash on at least a couple of times a year, trying to see where I can trim some of the fat.  I'm not cheap (I like quality things), but I am also someone that is willing to save to get them, and am willing to make sacrifices to do it.  I sleep in my guest bedroom basement all summer, for example, to save on air conditioning costs, and rarely eat out.  I wear the same clothes for years at a time-if a shirt has entered my house, my friends will be stuck seeing it on me for the next decade.  I enjoy spending money on treats like books & movies, and set aside a little each month to do that, but by-and-large pretty much every dollar that leaves my house has gone through a screening, an allocation so that it won't come back as a surprise that I need that money later in the month.

However, the way that I spend my paycheck has never influenced my politics.  For starters, while I have frequently gone with less because I couldn't afford more (and have had months where I was barely making ends meet as an adult), I have been very blessed (knock on wood) in terms of my financial security in my life.  I do not have rich parents, but I never worried about where my meals were going to come from when I was growing up, and while I paid the bulk of my student loans, I'll own I didn't pay all of them by myself.  I have never been laid off (again, knock on wood) but I am aware that this is something most people experience in their lives and at some point I could well also; both of my parents, deeply hard-working people, were laid off at some point in their careers-half of all Americans experience it during their lifetimes, in fact.  I am extremely responsible with my money, but I'm not dumb-I know that because of bad luck (medical, occupational, etc) people have problems outside of what they can do in front of them, and so I support programs like unemployment, Medicaid, WIC, & SNAP because I know that there but by the grace of God go I.

What I've never understood, though, is laziness as an excuse...or wanting something for nothing.  I buy that lottery ticket to daydream, not as something that I actually think I deserve to win.  When "wanting something for nothing" is used in a political sphere, it's usually Republicans criticizing Democrats, but I've long thought it should be the other way around.  I think things like free community college or free health insurance are great ideas-we all pay in, we all get the rewards.  It's why I support public education, libraries, Medicare, & Social Security.  What I have never understood is trying to blame your problems on excuses, and trying to cheat your way to the top, oftentimes either at the chagrin of other people, or by stupidly thinking you have a magical formula that no one else does.

This, more than maybe anything else about Donald Trump, I have long found an impossible thing to wrap my head around.  Donald Trump is easily the laziest person I have ever seen in American politics, and I don't just mean this in the conventional sense (though given how often he golfs & eats McDonald's, it's also true there).  I'm talking about his inability to want to come up with actual solutions to problems.  This week he introduced tariffs that will essentially destroy America's international reputation, much of our financial infrastructure, and risk us becoming a second world country akin to what happened to Russia in the decades after the fall of the Soviet Union.  Trump is not doing this because it's logical, and he's not doing it because it's based on a specific ideology.  He is doing this because he is so utterly convinced he is a genius, a man of vision, that anything he says must end up being true.  That Trump has never done any actual work to become a visionary or an intellectual, living off of his father's money and declaring bankruptcy six times, getting married three times & literally not even bothering to write his own bestseller.  He has coasted his entire life...even the show that launched his comeback bid that resulted in him taking the White House, The Apprentice, was based on the genius of producer Mark Burnett, not Trump.

The idea that this man might have all of the answers, that he might be a genius, that his message has any resonance baffles me.  The concept of being so out-of-tune with your own day-to-day life that you can find this type of laziness appealing, that you think it could even be a good idea...it hurts my brain it's so foreign to me.  I believe in hard work...nothing about MAGA is hard work.  It's not even selfish-that would at least make sense.  Virtually every person in America is going to suffer from these tariffs...hell, virtually everyone in the world will suffer from them, and not a single one of his supporters can come up with a valid, fact-based argument as to how this will help them (mostly because there isn't one).  They either seem convinced that their lives were so miserable under Obama & Biden that nothing else could possibly be worse, or they are gleeful at the prospect of people that they hate (i.e. Democrats) also suffering along with them.

I just...I've never been that miserable.  I've never hated someone so much that I actively was willing to ruin my life just to make theirs bad too.  I've never been so lazy as to think that other people are the cause of every single injustice and misery in my own personal life.  I've never had so little wherewithal to assume that "playing the victim" was the only card in my deck.  I get that society can shape our destiny...again, this is why I support social safety net programs, because I get that we cannot completely control our fate.  But every day I think about the consequences of my actions, and how they will impact not just those around me, but also my life, and how I can work to make it better.  And I've never actively risked everything in my life to throw a "Hail Mary" pass that everyone in my world was saying was a cataclysmically bad idea...without any clue of what would even happen if it somehow connected.  

Trump's economic decisions this week are the actions of a madman, someone so bereft of accomplishment that he has spent decades trying to scream "look what I did!" to things he had no hand in achieving...an empty life, one without any sense of genuine pride or valor.  But that this is appealing to so many people in this country, that so many people admire his lack of work ethic & logic, and view it as aspirational...I'll never quite get over it.  It will always feel alien to someone who, sometimes to a fault, always believes that the only path forward is the one that you're willing to walk yourself.

5 Thoughts on the Wisconsin Supreme Court Elections

Well, it's Tuesday, and while we didn't have a primary last night, we did of course have a major election in Wisconsin (arguably the most important election this year, give or take the gubernatorial race in Virginia in November).  Given the turnout, a lot of Wisconsin voters thought so too, so let's dive into our Wednesday Morning Quarterbacking with my 5 thoughts on last night's race.

Judge Susan Crawford

1. Susan Crawford & Jill Underly Win

As you can imagine, the big headline last night was a major win for the Democrats, as Judge Susan Crawford held the blue majority in the Supreme Court while Democrats also reelected State Superintendent Jill Underly.  Crawford's win had been telegraphed if you looked at polling, and she pulled off an impressive victory (vote margins are still being ironed out, but as of this morning she was up by 10-points with 95% reported).  Wisconsin was the closest state in the nation this past November, with Donald Trump winning the state by less-than a point (the only state in the nation to be decided by such a thin margin), and so this is a rebuke of Donald Trump as much as it is a win for the Democrats.  Though this is a hold for the Democrats, it also solidifies a majority that the party achieved a few years ago after almost a decade of trying to regain the majority on the Court.

Judge Rebecca Bradley

2. The Republican Math Gets Harder for the Court

That majority is much stronger right now, and Republicans are about to have a mess in the Supreme Court.  It's hard to put into words how much the GOP needed a win here, but I'll give it a shot.  Wisconsin Supreme Court justices serve 10-year terms, but because there's 7 of them they are up most years, and those elections always take place in the Spring.  Though they are technically non-partisan, they are essentially D vs. R races at the end of the day.  The next Democrat up is Rebecca Dallet in 2028, but between then and now Republican incumbents Rebecca Bradley (in 2026) and Annette Ziegler (in 2027) will be up for reelection, and then again in 2029 Brian Hagedorn (the final Republican on the Court) is up for reelection.  In order to get a majority in 2028, the Republicans will need to win three consecutive elections, and to extend it, they'll need to win a fourth in 2029.  That's difficult math, particularly given that Bradley, specifically, will be up during a Trump midterm year (historically good for the Democrats), and is the most conservative member of the Court.  Incumbent justices almost always win, but Bradley would be the best way to test that given she's the biggest lightning rod on the Court (and it's possible we're in an era where these types of races function in the same way as partisan ones).  If the Democrats beat Bradley, the Republicans won't have a shot at getting a majority unless they win every race for the rest of the decade (Jill Karofsky is up in 2030, and they'd need to beat her as well).  This becomes a big deal because the Supreme Court has a big say in redistricting the past 20 years, and the state legislature (which was largely gerrymandered for much of the 2010's and until Janet Protasiewicz's win in 2023) will be redrawn with a much more liberal Court, potentially helping Democrats gain control beyond just the Court.

Rep. Derrick van Orden (R-WI)

3. Congressional Redistricting Comes into Focus

When the Democrats won the Supreme Court last cycle (in 2023) they redrew the state legislative seats, but it did not appear that they had time or the bandwidth to redraw the congressional seats (to be fair, given the veto override threat to Gov. Evers, redrawing the state legislature was more important, though given how close the House ended up, it's probable that had they redrawn the congressional map, the House would be 218R-217D right now).  But now, that math has changed.  Wisconsin is a difficult state to draw fairly, as it should have a 4R-4D congressional delegation, but most of the state's Democrats live in Milwaukee or Madison, meaning that you usually end up with 6R-2D, and those two Democratic districts are deep blue.  But if you wanted to, you could draw a map where Milwaukee & Madison are split in half, and have four relatively safe Harris seats.  This might not ultimately impact the House math in a fair way (similar to 2024 where NC GOP outdid Dems in Alabama & Louisiana finally getting fair maps, the Ohio GOP is certain to redraw, potentially imperiling Marcy Kaptur, Emilia Sykes and/or Greg Landsmann, so best bet it's probably a draw), but this would provide a counter as Ohio is near certain to happen.  Reps. Bryan Steil and Derrick van Orden seem the likeliest options given van Orden nearly lost already in 2024, and Steil is in the a seat bordering Milwaukee (which hosts a county, Racine, that Crawford managed to flip last cycle despite Kamala Harris losing it by 6-points in 2024).  I would imagine it'll be a top House Dems priority in the coming months to get new maps here.

Elon Musk

4. Elon Musk Feels the Pain

Elon Musk has been in the headlines behind a lot of the Trump administration's decisions over the past few weeks while Donald Trump has been off harassing the Kennedy Center & putting tariffs on penguins, and he has been behind-the-scenes in Wisconsin.  Musk donated $20 million to getting Republican Brad Schimel a victory, including giving away $1 million prizes to two GOP voters which feels like it violated a lot of ethics laws (and likely became grounds for a future lawsuit), and it didn't do him a lick of good.  Musk & Trump have both been sending signals that the billionaire could be leaving his perch in the White House soon (and certainly the stock market for Tesla could use less of a MAGA glare from Musk...though after today no one's stock is looking shiny).  But yesterday proved that while Trump might still be an asset on the campaign trail, Musk certainly is not...which gives the famously duplicitous Trump a way to stab-in-the-back when he needs to (no one lasts forever in Trump's circle...the guy's on his third wife for a reason).

Rep-Elect Randy Fine (R-FL)

5. Florida Proves It's Not a Fluke

Wisconsin was the headline last night, but it wasn't the only place where Republicans dramatically under-performed, as special elections to fill the seats left vacant by Matt Gaetz & Mike Waltz were also held, and they were perhaps even more brutal for the Republicans than Wisconsin was if you look at the numbers.  In the 6th district, where Republican Randy Fine was admonished last night by President Trump for how badly he did, he under-ran Trump by 16 points, an enormous gap, but not nearly as bad as Jimmy Patronis in the 1st, where he under-ran Trump by 22-points (Patronis lost Escambia County, home to Pensacola, a county that hasn't given a majority of its votes to a Democratic presidential candidate since John F. Kennedy in 1960).  It's worth noting that, with Rep. Elise Stefanik being forced to drop her bid to be UN Ambassador due to Trump's fears (which he said publicly) that her seat could go blue, that that risk was confirmed on Tuesday.  Had the Republicans under-ran in NY-21 (Stefanik's district) by as much as Patronis did, they would've lost the seat (and given that Stefanik's seat borders Canada & is disproportionately impacted by tariffs, that seems plausible).  The Republicans are now in a situation where seats that Trump won by 20-points are now at risk, an insane place to be given that if that uniformly happened, they'd have less than 150 seats in the next Congress compared to their current 220.