ON THE DEMOCRATIC PROTESTS IN TEXAS AND NEBRASKA. You’ve seen reports about the unpopularity of the Democratic Party these days — stories with headlines such as “Democrats Get Lowest Rating From Voters in 35 Years.” It’s true: Large numbers of voters disapprove of the party and, even though they don’t love Republicans either, trust the GOP more to handle many basic issues.
On the other hand, some elements of the Democratic Party are filled with passionate intensity. We’re seeing two examples of that now.
The first is in Texas. Gov. Greg Abbott (R-TX) called a special session of the legislature this summer to deal with the question of redistricting, which is, of course, always a contentious topic. In Texas’s case, the legislature is dominated by Republicans, who have an 88-62 majority in the state House and a 19-11 majority in the state Senate.
Rather than deal with a defeat on redistricting, which would result in more Republican congressional seats, Democrats in the Texas House decided to flee the state to block a vote. The rules of the 150-member Texas House require a two-thirds quorum, that is, 100 lawmakers, to be present to do business. The 88 Republicans can’t do that by themselves — they have to have at least 12 Democrats show up.
Instead, House Democrats boarded a chartered jet and fled to Illinois, where Gov. JB Pritzker (D-IL) welcomed their arrival. And not just welcomed — Pritzker, who wants to be president and believes Democrats have not been aggressive enough in resisting President Donald Trump, had his staff assisting the Texas Democrats for weeks. “This is a righteous act of courage,” Pritzker said.
It was also an audacious blockade of … democracy. In one beautifully ironic moment, the Texas House Democrats posted a photo of themselves outside their private jet wearing T-shirts that said “LET THE PEOPLE VOTE.” Of course, they were acting to prevent a vote in the legislature, not allow one.
We have seen maneuvers like this before. In 2011, Wisconsin Democratic legislators fled the state to stop legislation they didn’t like. They stayed away for weeks, but in the end, the bill was passed. The Democrats lost, but the point was to get publicity and create at least the temporary appearance of widespread public support for their action. That’s what’s going on in Texas now.
The second example of Democratic intensity is in Nebraska, where Rep. Mike Flood (R-NE), of the state’s 1st Congressional District, held a town hall Monday evening. It’s a Republican district. Flood has been elected twice, with 58% of the vote in 2022 and 60% in 2024. Trump won the district in 2016, 2020, and 2024, most recently with 56% of the vote.
Nevertheless, the crowd at Flood’s town hall seemed a little one-sided. Annie Karni, a reporter for the New York Times who was there, posted on X that the huge crowd — “I’ve never seen a crowd like this for a town hall for a House member” — gave a “full standing ovation for a question that accused Flood of being a fascist.” At another point, Karni posted, “This is complete mayhem. Entire auditorium of 700+ people are chanting TAX THE RICH.” And finally, “The town hall ends with Mike Flood thanking the crowd for coming, over jeers of VOTE HIM OUT. VOTE HIM OUT.”
So what was that about? A few points. One obvious observation is that the majority of voters in the district who support Flood and Trump did not come to Flood’s town hall. That’s not a big surprise — it took place in Lincoln, not in the more rural areas of the district.
It also seems unlikely that many Republicans of any stripe attended. It is generally safe to assume that a Republican crowd does not break out into chants of “tax the rich”. They also don’t call Trump a fascist. The same is mostly true for independents and moderate Democrats. So, without doing a detailed census of every attendee, it’s probably safe to say that, as far as the political spectrum is concerned, they were the type of people who call Trump a fascist and chant “tax the rich.”
Now, the political commentariat will debate what significance the event might have. Already, Politico Playbook has called the crowd “a stand-in for the 2026 electorate.” That’s unknowable at this point, but it is certainly what Democratic strategists would want you to believe: The public’s anger at Trump and his party, the story goes, is boiling over and will result in a huge victory for Democrats in next year’s midterm elections.
Maybe that will happen. It’s impossible to say with a lot of confidence for Trump, because while he is a second-term president, he is not a consecutive second-term president, and it’s hard to know if that will have any effect. But the president’s party usually loses seats in midterm elections, and with Republicans’ narrow, narrow advantage in the House, it is more likely than not that the GOP will lose control of the House.
But if Republicans do lose the House, it will not be due to the “Trump’s a fascist,” “tax the rich” chanters who showed up at Flood’s town hall. It will be due to more moderate voters losing faith in Trump and his party’s ability to solve the problems they were elected to solve. What happened in Nebraska, and in Texas, too, is just show business.