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Can Texas Democrats finally break the Republican stranglehold?
A new poll out this morning is rocking Texas politics. Democratic state Rep. James Talarico is leading both his Republican opponents in the U.S. Senate race. Talarico’s up three points on Senator John Cornyn at 44 to 41. He’s up five points on the indicted Attorney General Ken Paxton at 46 to 41. The Texas Public Opinion Research poll surveyed more than a thousand likely general election voters. Talarico’s pulling huge margins with Black voters, Latino voters, and independents. Independents broke for the Austin Democrat by more than twenty points in both matchups. No Democrat’s won statewide in Texas since 1994. But with Trump’s approval cratering and Latino voters fed up with the economy and the immigration raids, Texas could finally be in play. If Talarico wins, the Senate map flips. Working people get a fighting chance.
Did Trump’s tariffs just eat your tax refund alive?
Two conservative economists just torched the White House’s biggest economic talking point. Phil Gramm and Michael Solon wrote in the Wall Street Journal that Trump’s tax cuts are a myth. Yes, taxpayers got back about 188 billion dollars in reduced tax liability last year from Trump’s One Big Beautiful Bill. But Trump’s tariffs collected 195 billion dollars over the same stretch. And those costs got passed almost entirely on to American consumers. The Bureau of Labor Statistics confirmed import prices didn’t drop. Foreign companies aren’t eating the tariffs. You are. And the Congressional Budget Office projects 2026 will be worse. Tariffs will hit 331 billion. Tax cuts only save you 230 billion. That’s a net tax hike on working families paying for tax breaks for billionaires. Even Republican economists are admitting it. The richest people in America are getting a windfall while you pay more for groceries, cars, and clothes.
Why is Trump’s DOJ indicting James Comey over a beach photo?
The Trump Justice Department indicted former FBI Director James Comey for the second time in less than a year. The charge this time? An Instagram post. Comey shared a picture of seashells on a beach arranged to read “86 47.” His caption read “Cool shell formation on my beach walk.” Trump and his people called it a threat against the president. A federal grand jury in North Carolina handed down the indictment Tuesday. Remember, Comey’s first indictment got tossed by a federal judge who ruled the prosecutor was unlawfully appointed. Trump fired Attorney General Pam Bondi earlier this month for not prosecuting his enemies fast enough. Now Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche is doing what Bondi wouldn’t. This is what banana-republic justice looks like. The President of the United States is using federal prosecutors to punish people who criticize him. If he can do it to Comey over a photo of seashells, he can do it to anyone. Including you.
UAE walks out on OPEC and hands Trump a win
The United Arab Emirates is quitting OPEC. Effective Friday, May 1st. After nearly sixty years of membership, the UAE announced it’s leaving the oil cartel and OPEC plus along with it. This is a body blow to Saudi Arabia and to OPEC’s grip on global oil prices. The UAE’s been pushing for higher production quotas for years. Saudi Arabia kept saying no. Now the UAE wants to nearly double its output, jumping from 3.2 million barrels a day to potentially 5 million. Trump has spent years accusing OPEC of, his words, ripping off the world. He explicitly tied U.S. military protection of Gulf states to oil prices. The UAE walking out gives Trump leverage he’s been demanding. The decision came just days after Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent backed an emergency dollar swap line for Abu Dhabi. More oil on the market eventually means lower prices at the pump. Whether American consumers actually see relief, though, depends on whether Trump’s tariff war keeps driving everything else higher.
Trump slaps his scowling face on your passport
The State Department’s finalizing plans to put Donald Trump’s scowling face on the inside cover of U.S. passports. The Bulwark obtained the images. Trump’s second inaugural portrait. Superimposed over the Declaration of Independence. With his signature in gold. No sitting president’s face has ever appeared on a modern American passport. No foreign passport features any sitting head of state. A Georgetown University professor of passport history called the move, his word, wacky. The State Department’s planning a limited run of 25,000 of these Trump passports. And it doesn’t stop there. His face is going on a new dollar coin. On National Park passes. On TrumpRx prescription drug websites. He renamed the U.S. Institute of Peace and the Kennedy Center after himself. He created premium Trump Card visas costing five million dollars. This isn’t patriotism. It’s a personality cult. American democracy doesn’t put dictators on its money. Trump’s working hard to change that.
The billionaire who gutted Maine now funds Susan Collins
Drop Site News just exposed how rotten our politics has become. A new super PAC called Pine Tree Results is running attack ads in Maine against Democratic Senate candidate Graham Platner. One of its biggest funders is Marc Rowan, the billionaire CEO of Apollo Global Management. From 2006 to 2020, Apollo ran two of Maine’s largest paper mills into the ground. The Bucksport Mill closed in 2014 right before Christmas, wiping out 570 jobs. The Androscoggin Mill in Jay closed in 2023, eliminating the last 230 jobs. Total jobs destroyed? More than a thousand. Apollo extracted 273 million dollars while bankrupting these companies, looting their assets, and walking away rich. Now Rowan’s writing checks to keep Susan Collins in office. Collins, who voted to advance Trump’s tax bill packed with private equity giveaways. Collins, who killed her own bill to close the carried interest loophole. Collins, the largest Senate recipient of private equity money in the last cycle. This is who Wall Street bought. And this is who working Mainers are fighting against.
And that’s the way it is, Today Tuesday, April 28, 2026. I’m Thom Hartmann.
