Every Friday morning, I join the Cardle & Woolley Show on 1370 Talk Radio in Austin to announce the week’s Winners & Losers. Texas House Democrats came home empty-handed, so you might say this week marks the end of an error. Here’s who made the list:
WINNER: Trump’s “No Apology” Tour on the World Stage
President Donald Trump is transforming the way diplomacy works and how the world sees America. The stature Trump has gained around the world is a complete reversal of former President Barack Obama’s apology tours. Recall that in 2009, Obama told the G-20 Summit that he hoped for some “restoration of America’s standing in the world.” The same year Obama apologized to France and Europe for America’s arrogance.
With Trump in office, America’s standing in the world is crystal clear, and nobody worries much about style issues like arrogance. That was demonstrated when seven European leaders rushed to Washington, D.C. last week to join him and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy for a follow-up meeting to Trump’s Alaska Summit with Russian President Vladimir Putin. In a session that would have taken previous presidents weeks to pull together, heads of state from Britain, France, Germany, Italy and Finland and the head of the European Commission dropped everything over the weekend and flew across the pond.
Trump’s Alaska Summit did not yield much—as Trump predicted—but it did allow him to orchestrate the B-2 flyover, a not-so-subtle reminder of how, just weeks ago, they had wiped out the nuclear threat from Iran and changed the balance of power in the Middle East overnight.
Meanwhile, the European leaders acknowledged Trump’s critical leadership in ending the war in Ukraine. Italy’s president told Trump “something had changed since he got involved” and Finland’s president said flatly that they would not be as far along as they are without Trump. Sure, the European leaders have questions about his approach, but one thing they do not question is Trump’s commitment to bringing peace—he hates war. Europeans also hate war, and they know Trump is absolutely willing to do whatever it takes to stop the fighting. That’s why they came to Washington.
LOSER: Texas Quorum-Busting Democrats Are Back
The quorum-busting Democrats returned to Texas on Monday with literally nothing to show for their antics. The Texas House passed the new map adding five more congressional seats that favor Republicans, just as we knew they would, and Democrats threatened to take that map to court—again, just as we knew they would.
House Democrats tried to create a little drama in response to House Speaker Dustin Burrows,’ R-Lubbock, requirement that the quorum busting Democrats be accompanied by a DPS officer when they leave the House floor. But considering that the House Democrats delayed legislative proceedings and cost taxpayers millions, Burrows’ demand is quite reasonable.
When state Rep. Nicole Collier, D-Fort Worth, refused to leave the Texas House floor in protest, she was treated like a hero by the progressive left. Former Vice President Kamala Harris called her personally to cheer her on, although we don’t know what wisdom the word-salad spouting former VP passed along.
Even some in the Texas media have noted that they don’t get what Collier is trying to prove. Reviewing the footage of her roaming around the House floor all night, one reporter claimed it was like watching the “bald eagle cam.”
WINNER: Dan Patrick IS Running for Re-Election
My former boss, Texas Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick, announced this week that he is running for re-election, which was a surprise to no one who has been paying attention. He made the announcement surrounded by state senators who are running for re-election, and several candidates for the state senate who he has endorsed.
Patrick has transformed Texas, championing and passing the agenda that the conservative majority of Texas supports from fighting property taxes—the homestead exemption was $25,000 when he came into office and it’s $200,000 for seniors today—to pro-life issues, border security issues, Second Amendment issues, law enforcement and bail reform issues, infrastructure, and public education. He’s been working to pass school choice since he got to Austin and now it is law. In his spare time, he saved the Alamo.
In reporting his re-election announcement, the Dallas Morning News called him the most powerful legislative force in Texas. A number of years ago, Texas Monthly wrote that “in the history of Texas, there has never been anyone like Dan Patrick.” Texans are lucky he is running again.
WINNER: The Truth on Illegal Immigration
Remember in 2023, when Fox News was the only place on television that was reporting the explosion of immigration at the border? Democrats and the legacy media downplayed the open border invasion and treated Trump and conservatives as racist xenophobes.
Trump won the election because the reality of the illegal immigration overcame the left-wing spin and now we have a study from the left that proves it. The prestigious Pew Research Institute just reported what we knew all along—there were 14 million new immigrants in the country in 2023, a fact they say led to Trump’s re-election. The study, reported by Axios, says:
“Economic upheaval and violence in Africa, Asia and Latin America – and the perception that Biden’s lifting of immigration barriers would make it easy to enter the U.S. – helped drive unprecedented migration, analysts say.”
Thank you, analysts.
LOSER: Court Ruling on Texas’ 10 Commandments Bill
U.S. District Judge Fred Biery temporarily blocked a new Texas law that would have allowed a copy of the Ten Commandments to be displayed in Texas public school classrooms. Gov. Greg Abbott signed Senate Bill 10, which requires that the Ten Commandments posters not be paid for with taxpayer dollars. Instead, volunteers can donate them to the schools.
The Freedom from Religion Foundation sued the state and said in court that, “the state of Texas has no right to dictate to children how many gods to worship, which gods to worship, or whether to worship any gods at all.”
Nobody disagrees with that, but it misses the point. The Ten Commandments is an historical document that provides the foundation for most of the legal systems in the western world.
Texas is not dictating that a child be religious, it is fulfilling its public education mission to ensure that children don’t grow up ignorant, and a child who doesn’t know about the Ten Commandments is ignorant.
A year or so ago, I wrote an op-ed about a CBS 5 Austin news story where the reporter said Texas parents were worried that changes in the Texas public school curriculum to expand cultural references, including some from the Bible, would force students to learn about the “Sermon on the Mound.”
Even though several baseball jokes appeared in the comment section following the news report, it took almost 24 hours before anyone at CBS 5—presumably including many former Texas public school students—corrected the error to read Sermon on the Mount.
There’s lots of cultural ignorance going around. It is impossible to understand what happened in the development of the world—from ancient times to current history—without being familiar with the Ten Commandments.
Judge Biery predicted the issue would go to the Supreme Court.
WINNER: Public School Cell Phone Ban
My teenage granddaughter glared at me when she learned that the Texas Public Policy Foundation (TPPF) helped pass Texas’ new cell phone ban in public schools. She believes it is a great injustice to her because, in her view, the purpose of the ban must be to stop students who are using ChatGPT to cheat, which, of course she would never do.
Kids don’t get it, but it’s not about cheating, it’s about getting their attention spans back. Data shows most kids check their phones 100 times a day—focus and concentration is impossible. Cell phone bans improve school performance and also force kids to actually interact with each other. If this conversation is also going on in your family, you should read TPPF’s research summary on cellphones here.
LOSER: Pride Week in Austin
Officials from Austin Pride told Axios Austin that they have lost many corporate sponsors for their annual celebration this weekend and are strapped for cash. This year’s celebration is themed “Silence = Death,” and comes just as the Texas Legislature passed legislation that will prohibit men and boys from entering women’s and girls’ restrooms—which Austin Pride calls an attack.
LOSER: U.S. Rep. Lloyd Doggett Blinks
On Texas’ new congressional map, U.S. Reps Lloyd Doggett, D-Austin, and Greg Casar, D-Austin, ended up in the same district. Doggett blinked first and announced this week that he will not run in a primary against Casar. Doggett is 78 and has served in Congress for 30 years. Casar is 36 and was elected chair of the Progressive Caucus. He is also a member of “The Squad” and the faction of his party which is working to push old Democrats out of Congress.
LOSER: Water Fountains Signs in Virginia
Virginia’s Lt. Governor Winsome Earle-Sears, a Republican, is currently running for governor to replace Glenn Youngkin, who is term limited. Earle-Sears, who is African-American, was speaking in Arlington, Virginia last night at a local school board meeting. Mandating separate restrooms for boys and girls was on the board agenda, so a pro-transgender rally erupted outside the meeting where a woman held up a sign that read: “If trans can’t share your bathroom then blacks can’t share my water fountain.”
The woman clearly had no idea how offensive her sign was, but leaders from both parties quickly denounced the statement, although the Arlington Republican Party sent the sign-carrier a thank-you note because it revealed so much about who progressives really are.
It is surprising that this issue is still under debate in Virginia after the infamous case in Loudoun County in 2021, when a teenage boy dressed in a skirt, entered the girls’ bathroom and raped a female student. School officials had been reluctant to confront the boy because he said he was transgender. He was convicted as a juvenile.
WINNER? Oklahoma Sooners Selling Tickets to Press Conferences
In the latest example of what college football will be like in the NIL era, the Oklahoma Sooners announced this week that they are selling tickets to the post game press conferences. Two tickets will cost close to $700 for the Michigan game but will be a little cheaper when they play Auburn at home.
To raise money to help pay players and stay in the game, the Sooners are also selling pregame photos on the 50-yard line, the high five tunnel, game ball delivery and halftime field access. As I have reported before, President Trump is working to stop all this in college sports, including ending the bidding wars that make non-stop fundraising critical for every team and protecting non-revenue producing sports and women’s Title IX sports.
LOSER: Make Cracker Barrel Great Again
In an unprecedented move, California Gov. Gavin Newsom followed Donald Trump, Jr. and a country-wide tsunami of conservative critics who roared back after the new Cracker Barrel restaurants CEO, Julie Feiss Masino—who apparently missed the whole Bud Light Dylan Mulvaney fiasco—changed Cracker Barrel’s logo, removing the old country guy and the barrel. She also announced she was going to tone down the country feel of the restaurant—get rid of the clutter. Shares of Cracker Barrel have dropped 12% so far.
In these polarized times, it is hard to imagine any issue that could bring us all together. Who knew it might be Cracker Barrel.
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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