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New polls:  
Dem pickups: (None)
GOP pickups: (None)

New Jersey: No, the Longshot Did Not Win

Yesterday, the folks in the Garden State finally held the election needed to fill the U.S. House seat, NJ-11, that was left vacant when Mikie Sherrill (D) was elected governor. Here is the headline from The Hill:

The headline is:
'Democrats hang on to New Jersey House seat left open by Sherrill

Are we crazy, or does that imply it was a nail-biter? Like maybe the Republican was ahead for most of the night, and the Democrat came back to eke out a victory? Certainly, when we saw that headline, we had not yet seen the actual results, and we began thinking about what might explain a close election, given that all these other special elections in blue (and sometimes even in red) districts have been blowouts. But, in fact, it was not close. Democrat Analilia Mejia crushed Republican Joe Hathaway by just shy of 20 points, 59.6% to 40%. With 6% of the vote still uncounted, the final margin could end up anywhere between 19 and 20 points. We'll call it 19.5 for purposes of this item.

NJ-11 is D+5, so the Democrat here ostensibly outperformed the fundamentals of the district by 14.5 points. However, Donald Trump tends to screw up almost everything, and that includes the PVI calculations, which often make the Republicans look stronger than they are, because he outperformed pretty much every member of the red team in 2024. Probably better to look at the recent electoral history of the district (asterisk indicates an incumbent):

Year Dem % GOP % Margin
2016 38.9% 58%* R+19.1
2018 56.8% 42.1% D+14.7
2020 53.3%* 46.7% D+6.4
2022 59.0%* 40.2% D+18.8
2024 56.5%* 41.8% D+14.7
2026 (Special) 59.6% 40% D+19.6

Those results are rather... erratic, including the rapid shift from "very red" to "very blue." Presumably, the district has been basically blue for years, the GOP only held it for as long as they did because Rodney Frelinghuysen (R) was a well-known (and apparently popular) incumbent.

Meanwhile, here is the table we ran yesterday, of special elections held for the current Congress, with yesterday's result added:

Date District Dem margin 2024 Dem margin special Net
April 1, 2025 FL-01 -37 -15 D+22
April 1, 2025 FL-06 -30 -14 D+16
Sept. 9, 2025 VA-11 +34 +50 D+16
Sept. 23, 2025 AZ-07 +22 +40 D+18
Dec 2, 2025 TN-07 -22 -9 D+13
Apr. 7, 2026 GA-14 -37 -12 D+25
Apr. 16, 2026 NJ-11 +15 +20 D+5

So, Mejia's victory yesterday, while smashing, was not quite as smashing as the district's PVI might suggest. And it also featured the smallest blueward shift of the special elections thus far.

All of this said, she did win by nearly 20 points, and she scored the biggest win in NJ-11, by a member of either party, of the past decade. That means Mejia even outperformed an incumbent Sherrill, and by about 5 points as compared to 2024, which is the one election here that took place under the current district boundaries. So, we think you can still conclude that this result provides evidence of Democratic momentum.

That it was not a bigger win, like the others above, is presumably due to the peculiarities of the district and the race. Hathaway is not connected to Donald Trump in any meaningful way, and his platform is that of a Reagan Republican. Actually, truth be told, it's the platform of Bill Clinton. There are a lot of wealthy white suburbanites in that district, and some of them probably liked what they were hearing.

Meanwhile, the district has a sizable Jewish population, and Mejia's criticism of Israel was definitely a campaign issue (though note that she WAS endorsed by the liberal pro-Israel group JStreetPAC). Point being, we have no doubt that some Democratic-leaning voters took a pass on this one, or even voted Republican. And the larger point being that every House race is different. It's 435 House races, not one House race.

One other lesson before we leave this one behind: Be careful what you wish for, because you just might get it. In the Democratic primary, AIPAC spent heavily on ads critical of then-frontrunner Tom Malinowski. He has actually been pretty pro-Israel in his career, but AIPAC wanted him to commit to being more pro-Israel. He did, but the attack ads did a lot of damage. Further, AIPAC is pretty radioactive with many voters these days, which is why the group has been using shell PACs in some races to obscure their involvement. Anyhow, the AIPAC ads did enough damage to Malinowski that Mejia was able to overtake him. And now, she's headed to Washington. That is definitely not what AIPAC wanted. Oops.

Next week, voters in Virginia and Florida will head to the polls to vote on some ballot measures, most notably the Virginia redistricting measure. Then, the calendar is pretty empty until May. (Z)

Fundraising News: ActBlue Is a Beast

There was a time, not too long ago, when fundraising was a somewhat useful proxy for polling. If a candidate, or party, raised more money, they likely had more momentum/enthusiasm behind them, and they had a better chance of victory.

Things are much more... murky these days. We've written about this a fair bit, but let's run down some of the main reasons in one place:

Citizens United: There's a lot of dark money in politics these days, and it's hard to find/keep track of it all. And even when the money trail is visible, it's kept in a separate "box" from donations given directly to political candidates. That probably makes sense with a PAC like Fairshake, which is a big pro-crypto PAC, and tries to support sleazeballs from both parties. However, a donation to Emily's List is basically a donation to the Democrats. A donation to Turning Point USA is basically a donation to the Republicans. But those donations are not treated as such, which surely skews the money picture.

The Grifter-in-Chief: On a related note, Donald Trump has all kinds of grifts going on that are not counted as "political donations." To take a very recent example, European steelmaker ArcelorMittal has just announced that it will generously donate the steel that will be used to rebuild the White House. Undoubtedly, there are no strings at all attached to that donation, and ArcelorMittal would never dream of asking Trump for special treatment when it comes time to calculate steel tariffs. In any event, all of that money that is flowing to Trump—either his own pockets, or those of his PACs—is NOT flowing to the Republicans who are actually up for election this year. Do these business and other concerns continue to donate to non-Trump Republicans at the same clip? Or do they have a "politics" budget for the year, and once they've decided it's better to spend it on buttering up Trump, do they close the vault? We do not know, but we think it is probable that Trump is soaking up at least some money that would otherwise go to 2026 candidates. Certainly, the under-the-table nature of it all also serves to obscure the money picture.

Those Were the Days: It used to be that the two national party organs, the RNC and the DNC, were THE hub for donations. You wanted to see the Republicans do well? Then you sent a nice check to the RNC, and trusted they would know the best way to spend that money.

There has been much attention paid this cycle to the fact that the RNC is swimming in cash, while the DNC is drowning in debt. We even wrote an item about it earlier this week; the RNC's balance sheet is about $100 million in the black, while the DNC's balance sheet is about $2 million in the red. That obviously sounds pretty bad for the blue team.

However—and this is just our intuition; we don't have any hard data to back this up—we suspect that the national party finances are not especially instructive anymore. We would guess that Republican voters, being members of the more traditional and conservative party, not to mention the party where voters are older, are more likely to do their donating the "old way" and to send their checks to the national organ. We would guess that Democratic voters, many of whom are furious with the DNC for various reasons, are more likely to choose alternate paths for their political donations.

All Politics Is... National?: Following on that, if you were in Wyoming in, say, 1980, it wasn't so easy to follow the Senate race in, say, North Carolina, or to send money to a Tar Heel State candidate you wanted to support. These days, it's easy to follow elections from thousands of miles away and—particularly if you're a Democrat and you use ActBlue, the Party's online fundraising platform—it's trivially simple to send money to favored candidates in faraway places.

The problem here, when it comes to using donations as a predictive tool, is that big financial hauls can give a false impression of how strong a candidate really is. If you are a Democrat in Wyoming today, and you want to invest some money in promoting your political party, it is far wiser to send it to Texas than to spend it at home. But, of course, you won't actually be able to vote in Texas. James Talarico (D) has just reported that he raised a staggering $27.1 milion in Q1. But the "money from all 50 states" problem makes it hard to know exactly what that presages for the general election.

Smart Money: The old saying advises, "Work smarter, not harder." Well, the modern-day political equivalent could be "Spend smarter, not larger." Of course a candidate or party or group would rather have more money than less. However, having way more money is not the mega-advantage it used to be, given that candidates who know how to use free and cheap alternatives (like eX-Twitter) effectively can cancel out the impact of expensive things like TV ads. The standard case study, at least of recent vintage, is the 2020 Maine Senate election, where Democrat Sara Gideon was awash in cash, and spent it all, and still lost to Sen. Susan Collins (R-ME) by more than 8 points (despite the polls saying it would be a barnburner). For an example from this cycle, Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX) and his good friends at the NRSC are outspending crooked AG Ken Paxton (R) something like 6-to-1, and yet Paxton is leading in nearly every poll, sometimes by double digits.

Asymmetric Warfare: Even if the two parties' balance sheets are similar, the tasks before them are definitely not. The RNC has more money on hand than the DNC. So too does the Republicans' Senate Leadership Fund, which has $166 million in the bank as compared to $75 million for the Democrats' Senate Majority PAC. However, the Republicans have to defend a much larger number of seats in 2026, thanks in part to the map just working out that way and thanks in part to the national environment. Texas is the poster state for this; the various GOP PACs have already spent nine figures to try to get Cornyn past Paxton. And they will have to spend a similar amount in the general (if Cornyn makes it) to try to get him past Talarico. And all that money will have been spent... just to try to maintain the status quo.

All of this is prelude to this note: We don't want to read too much into the Q1 numbers, which were due to the FEC last week, because the financial crystal ball is so murky. However, there are three assertions where we think we are on solid footing:

The Democrats Are Not in Trouble: In Q1, ActBlue brought in a total of $568 million. That is a record for Q1 of a midterm election year. It could be that the GOP is in a slightly better financial position, overall, and it could be that the Democrats are in a slightly better position, overall—we don't know, for the reasons outlined above. But it's clear that neither is in dire straits.

The Senate Is Definitely in Play: A whole bunch of that ActBlue money went to Democrats in the key U.S. Senate races. Here's a breakdown:

State Candidate Q1 Total
Alaska Mary Peltola $8.6 million
Alaska Dan Sullivan $1.7 million
Georgia Jon Ossoff $3.8 million
Georgia Mike Collins $1 million
Georgia Derek Dooley $0.65 million
Georgia Earl Carter $0.44 million
Iowa Ashley Hinson $2.4 million
Iowa Josh Turek $1.1 million
Iowa Zach Wahls $1.1 million
Maine Graham Platner $4.1 million
Maine Susan Collins $2.9 million
Maine Janet Mills $2.5 million
Michigan Mallory McMorrow $3 million
Michigan Abdul El-Sayed $2.3 million
Michigan Mike Rogers $2.2 million
Michigan Haley Stevens $1.9 million
New Hampshire Chris Pappas $3.3 million
New Hampshire John Sununu $1.1 million
New Hampshire Scott Brown $0.32 million
North Carolina Roy Cooper $8.4 million
North Carolina Michael Whatley $3.2 million
Ohio Sherrod Brown $10 million
Ohio Jon Husted $2.9 million
Texas James Talarico $27.1 million
Texas John Cornyn $2.7 million
Texas Ken Paxton $1.7 million

In eight of the nine races, the top Democrat has the fundraising lead, often by a huge margin. And in the ninth, Ashley Hinson's lead is not too big, especially if you add both of her Democratic challengers' totals together. Money and enthusiasm (especially out-of-state enthusiasm) aren't everything, but they aren't nothing, either. And the overall picture here is certainly a rosy one for the blue team.

It's a "Throw the Bums Out" Kind of Year: Thus far, with Q1 reports still trickling in (particularly from Republicans), nine incumbent House Democrats raised less money than one (or more) of their primary challengers. Eleven non-incumbent Democrats have raised $1 million or more in swing districts, seven of those eleven have outraised the incumbent Republican in their district. Some early indications that Democratic primary voters want new blood, and that Americans in general might agree.

That's the news for now. There may be more next week, as the rest of the numbers come in. That said, the candidates who raise real eye-popping amounts tend to announce early, to get a few free headlines. Most of the outstanding reports will be from candidates who underwhelmed, and are trying to sneak that in under the radar. (Z)

Legal News: In Court, Trump Has Lost His Mystique... if He Ever Had It

Donald Trump has an exceedingly thin skin. Whenever some media outlet publishes something he doesn't like, his first reaction is to sue the outlet for defamation. In many cases the outlet caves immediately and offers to pay him tens of millions of dollars to make the lawsuit go away. Nice work if you can get it. And this despite the fact that the lawyers for the publication being sued know very well that a defamation lawsuit filed by a famous person is hard to win (to protect freedom of the press). To win, the plaintiff has to prove that not only was the published statement false, but that the publisher knew that (or should have known that) and published it anyway despite knowing it was false. When Trump sued ABC, they made the problem go away for a bargain price of $15 million. CBS made a similar deal and settled for $16 million. This easy money taught Trump a lesson: If you are short of cash, just sue some media company and you'll get $15 million or so with no work.

One publication that decided not to make a contribution to Trump's retirement fund was The Wall Street Journal, which is owned by the crafty and frugal Rupert Murdoch. When it published a piece claiming that Trump sent a naughty birthday card to his pal Jeff Epstein, Trump sued the Journal, demanding $10 billion. Murdoch didn't cave. He just let it play out the way his lawyers undoubtedly told him it would.

Sure enough, Miami-based U.S. District Judge Darrin Gayles in the Southern District of Florida dismissed Trump's lawsuit against the Journal, News Corporation and Murdoch, finding that Epstein's best buddy did not "plausibly allege"a claim for defamation. The letter in question depicted a drawing of a naked woman and a note saying, among other things, that "every day is a wonderful secret."A few months later, the Epstein estate provided the entire birthday book, from which the letter came, to the House Oversight Committee. Trump continues to deny that the letter is his and insists he never "wrote a picture of a woman."The judge was not buying what Trump is selling. He noted that the Journal investigated the veracity of the letter and reached out to Trump for comment before publication. Remember, it is not enough for Trump to prove the letter is not real. He would have to prove that not only is it fake, but that the Journal knew that and proceeded anyway. That bar did not come close to being cleared here, especially since the card is not fake.

Trump can re-file the case since it was dismissed without prejudice, but if it survives another motion to dismiss, discovery should be interesting. Murdoch and News Corp certainly have the deep pockets to make this really painful for Trump. They could depose not only him but also Ghislaine Maxwell and anyone else associated with compiling the letters as well as anyone who saw the book or spoke to Trump about his contribution. It could get really ugly and result in lots of unwanted publicity courtesy a guy who just happens to own a media empire.

We wonder if the jig is up now for Trump. Next time he sues some publication for defamation, the lawyers there are going to bring this case up to show management and point out that if they fight, they will probably win, saving them a lot of money. This may not deter Trump from filing more suits, but it could stiffen the backs of the CEOs of the companies being sued and make them unwilling to simply hand over money to Trump. (V & L)

I Read the News Today, Oh Boy: Gerald Ford Was a Michigan Wolverine

When there is a need for bar trivia, one of (Z)'s favorite questions to pose is: "Can you name the five universities that have graduated both a Super Bowl-winning quarterback AND a U.S. president?" Per the headline, one of them is the University of Michigan—Gerald Ford being the president and Tom Brady the Super Bowl-winning QB to count that school as their alma mater. For readers who would like to try for the other four, we'll put the answer at the end of this item.

Anyhow, for last week's theme, we gave only one hint, but it was a good one:

A rhombicuboctahedron

That's a rhombicuboctahedron, for those keeping score at home.

And here is the solution, courtesy of reader P.A. in Redwood City, CA:

Every headline has to do with the number 26: As for the clue, it's a picture of a rhombicuboctahedron, which has 26 faces.

Yes, indeed. And from this item's headline, Michigan was the 26th state.

Here are the first 60 readers to get it right:

  1. J.S. in Huntington Station, NY
  2. Z.K. in Albany, NY
  3. G.W. in Avon, CT
  4. M.W. in Altea, Spain
  5. M.K. in Seattle, WA
  6. P.L. in Skövde, Sweden
  7. K.R. in Austin, TX
  8. M.J. in Oakdale, MN
  9. D.D. in Highland Park, IL
  10. C.J.W. in Hamilton, NY
  11. M.A. in Soquel, CA
  12. J.T. in Providence, RI
  13. H.B. in Santiago, Chile
  14. R.N. in Cleveland, OH
  15. P.A. in Redwood City
  16. P.K in Marseille, France
  17. K.G.W. in Lafayette, IN
  18. C.D.K. in Yorkshire, England, UK
  19. R.S. in Landing, NJ
  20. M.T. in Simpsonville, SC
  21. P.R. in Havertown, PA
  22. P.R. in Kirksville, MO
  23. J.E. in Gilbertsville, PA
  24. E.S. in Providence, RI
  25. D.B. in Pittsboro, NC
  26. D.S. in Fort Collins, CO
  27. R.S. in Landing, NJ
  28. M.S. in Canton, NY
  29. P.R. in Kirksville, MO
  30. M.M. in Dunellen, NJ
  1. D.E. in High Springs, FL
  2. T.V. in Dinwiddie, VA
  3. D.K. in Bethesda, MD
  4. G.K. in Blue Island, IL
  5. T.C. in Danby, NY
  6. K.H. in Albuquerque, NM
  7. G.M. in Arlington, VA
  8. S.K. in Ardmore, PA
  9. D.P. in Washington, DC
  10. B.J.L. in Ann Arbor, MI
  11. A.G. in Plano, TX
  12. D.B. in Glendale, CA
  13. G.M. in Arlington, VA
  14. J.B. in Waukee, IA
  15. B.L. in Ferndale, MI
  16. J.W. in Folsom, CA
  17. M.M. in Charlottesville, VA
  18. K.H. in Golden, CO
  19. P.C. in Austin, TX
  20. G.S. in Basingstoke, England, UK
  21. D.P. in Mt. Rainier, MD
  22. S.S. in Lucerne, Switzerland
  23. R.P.E.H. in London, England, UK
  24. P.J. in Quakertown, PA
  25. J.B. in Royston, England, UK
  26. G.N. in West Windsor, NJ
  27. J.N. in Zionsville, IN
  28. G.M.K. in Mishawaka, IN
  29. M.V. in Oak Park, IL
  30. J.I. in San Francisco, CA

The 60th correct response was received at 9:30 a.m. PT on Friday.

For this week's theme, it relies on one word per headline, and it's in the category Literature. And Movies. For a hint, we'll give you this: ABCDFGHIJKLOPQRSTUVWYZ.

If you have a guess, send it to comments@electoral-vote.com with subject line "April 17 Headlines."

Oh, and the other four universities? The U.S. Naval Academy (Jimmy Carter and Roger Staubach), Stanford (Herbert Hoover and John Elway/Jim Plunkett), Miami of Ohio (Benjamin Harrison and Ben Roethlisberger) and Delaware (Joe Biden and Joe Flacco). It is presumably just a coincidence that all five of the presidents served only one term (or less, in Ford's case). (Z)

This Week in Schadenfreude: Not-Exactly-Instant Karma

"The wheels of justice grind slowly, but they grind exceedingly fine," goes the old saying. And this week, there was an excellent reminder of that, as John Eastman was officially disbarred Wednesday, and will no longer be able to practice law in his home state of California.

Eastman is the law-professor-turned-MAGA-warrior who played a central role in the unsuccessful scheme to try to overturn the 2020 president election result. The problem there is that, as a member of the bar and an officer of the court, Eastman had a duty to uphold the law to the best of his ability. Scheming to overthrow the government is not exactly consistent with that duty, so he joins Rudy Giuliani in the "we used to be lawyers" club.

The important thing here is that it may have taken a while—close to 6 years—but justice was done. That does not always happen with the crooked people in Trump's orbit, but at least it happens sometimes. And we suspect it will happen with greater frequency and greater speed this time around, because Trump's powers are waning, and because the offenses are more egregious. For example, while it took Eastman half a decade to lose his license to practice law, we would not be terribly surprised if former "Attorney General" Pam Bondi lost hers before Trump is even out of office.

And the even MORE important thing is this: Eastman's fate is a reminder, to those who break the law in service of Trump, that doing so constitutes a great professional and personal risk. First, because once Trump no longer has a use for a person, he isn't going to do much to help them with their difficulties. Eastman was left to mount his own defense, pay his own attorney, and now he will pay the fine that was assessed against him. Second, because even if Trump does lift a finger to help (and that's the most you're going to get), he's kind of like the Headless Horseman—his powers have very strict limits. Trump actually did try to "pardon" both Eastman and Giuliani for election-related offenses, but the pardon was useless because they did not and do not face federal criminal charges, and a presidential pardon is irrelevant in civil cases, in state cases, and in Bar proceedings.

Maybe, just maybe, this will cause a few Trump underlings to think twice about the choices they are making, and to behave a little less corruptly. (Z)

This Week in Freudenfreude: The California Gambit?

We believe we said we'd provide an update as to how (Z) dealt with Cesar Chavez in lecture, once that lecture came up. Well, this week was the week.

For background purposes, understand that in this segment of the History of California, there are a series of lectures on ethnic and cultural groups—Native Americans, Asian Americans, Mexican Americans and African Americans, in that order. They all follow a similar template:

  1. Story of key figure(s), which serves as an introduction to the lecture
  2. History of that group in California, roughly from the Gold Rush to the mid-20th century.
  3. Discussion of some historical methods question, appropriate to that particular group
  4. Story of one or two key historical events centered on that group
  5. Bringing the story of that group up to the present day

Before this week, the Mexican-Americans lecture looked like this:

  1. Story of Cesar Chavez and Dolores Huerta
  2. History of Mexican Americans after the Californio era, with a focus on segregation.
  3. Discussion of autobiography as a historical source—strengths and weaknesses
  4. In-depth discussion of the Zoot Suit Riots of 1943
  5. The United Farm Workers and other post-war activism (MEChA, UNO, etc.)

The new version of the lecture was altered in two ways. First, at the end of the introduction, a portion was added about the new revelations, how they very definitely clear the "this is the truth" bar, how this was a common phenomenon in activist movements like this, and why women like Dolores Huerta remained silent—they feared they would be disbelieved and very possibly persecuted, and they also did not want to hurt the movement.

Second, the section on autobiography was tossed, and replaced with a section entitled "Historical Villainy," with the focus being "How do historians deal with people who are reprehensible, but also important?" There were three parts to that section:

  1. It is easy, in a college classroom, to deal with someone who is evil, and who did evil (but important) things. Like, for example, Adolf Hitler. It is really not that much harder, in a college classroom, to deal with a bad person who did important things that were not evil—a person like George Washington, or Christopher Columbus, or Chavez. You discuss the important thing or things they did, you make sure to give a frank (though possibly brief) of their misdeeds, and that is that. This is necessary all the time in a California history course—Junípero Serra, David Starr Jordan, Hiram Johnson, Earl Warren, Jerry Voorhis, Richard Nixon, etc.

  2. By contrast, (Z) has no idea what you do with younger students, because he has only ever taught at the university level. The students in the class, many of them aspiring teachers, gave their thoughts. The general consensus was that you have to tell the full story, even to younger students, albeit in an age-appropriate way. It is also useful to give parents a heads up when you are going to deal with touchy topics.

  3. Though (Z) has much experience dealing with controversial figures in class, Chavez was extra difficult, for numerous reasons. The students in the class were able to infer those reasons, even before (Z) volunteered them. In no particular order: (1) The news about Chavez is fresh, and everyone is still adapting to it; (2) Chavez' victims, at least many of them, are still alive; (3) There is a race and class component here that is not present with someone like George Washington, (4) Chavez' crimes happen to connect with what is looking to be the dominant social issue of our time, namely #MeToo and the long-overdue reckoning over sexual misconduct and sexual violence perpetrated by powerful people against those not able to resist.

You have to have something to put on screen for each part of the presentation, and for the third and final portion of the "historical villainy" section, (Z) did a screen capture of the Los Angeles Times' report about how all the various Chavez monuments and memorials are being stricken. (Z) did not notice, until the slide was up on the big screen, that at the moment he screen-grabbed it, there was a breaking news story... about Eric Swalwell. So, it was two lechers for the price of one. One might call that serendipity, if Chavez' and Swalwell's misdeeds were not so odious. If anyone wants to see a (low-res) version of the PDF, it's here.

That leads us to the pi**ing contest that went on in the Senate yesterday. John Cornyn has introduced a bill that would shut down the Cesar E. Chavez National Monument in California. The bill was brought to the floor of the Senate by unanimous consent, but actual passage was blocked by Sen. Martin Heinrich (D-NM), because he believes that the monument needs to be re-imagined, not destroyed. In Heinrich's view, Chavez should be removed, but the story of the farm workers should stay. Otherwise, the Senator argues, you'll be left with nothing that honors the workers' story. Sen. Mike Lee (R-UT) was outraged by all of this, and shared a characteristically thoughtful Mike-Lee-style comment, accusing Heinrich of an Epstein-style cover-up.

We think that Heinrich's position, which he explained clearly and with patience, is very reasonable. You can certainly bet big money that if a monument to a brown person is reduced to dust, this presidential administration will not rush to make a replacement. Meanwhile, we are not 100% certain what the motivations of Lee and Cornyn are, but we very seriously doubt that they are primarily motivated by their desire for justice for the victims of sexual crimes. After all, they've been pleased to turn a blind eye to the aforementioned Epstein matter. The name of the Cornyn bill, the No Funding to Honor Crime Scenes Act, does nothing to move us off of that position. That's a show-horse name, not a work-horse name, and one designed to whip people into a lather, especially since Chavez' crimes obviously did not actually take place at the monument that currently bears his name.

And that, at long last, brings us to the actual subject of this item. While the Senate has been posturing, the legislature of California—you know, the state that is allegedly a badly run mess—is actually doing something useful here. Shortly after the Chavez news broke, several members of the state legislature, with Assemblymen David Tangipa and Juan Alanis taking the lead, have put together a piece of legislation called The Rural Farmworker Women's Health Act.

The bill is simple, and is modest in its aspirations. It would instruct the California Department of Public Health to partner with local nonprofits to provide women fieldworkers with free menstrual hygiene products. Sometimes, these workers are laboring many miles from any sort of restroom or store, and are not in much of a position to carry a purse or backpack. They might also not be in a position to afford these items.

The only thing that surprises us about this legislation is that it's necessary, and was not implemented years ago. Barring some hitch that does not occur to us, we almost cannot imagine the bill failing to secure passage, and to get the signature of Gov. Gavin Newsom (D-CA). Readers will notice that we did not put the party affiliations of bill sponsors Tangipa and Alanis, the way we would normally do. We deliberately did not look them up, because we'd really like to believe that this is something that goes beyond politics, and that both Republicans and Democrats in California can agree upon. And we think that this legislation, which will serve to do some small-but-real good in the lives of the very population that Chavez victimized, is a really great response to these new revelations. A tip of the hat to the two Assemblymen and their co-sponsors.

Have a good weekend, all! (Z)


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