Trump-backed candidates – In two Texas runoff elections this week, Attorney General Ken Paxton and Mayes Middleton—both election-denying Republicans—survived tests of loyalty to Donald Trump, reinforcing a broader pattern in which candidates aligned with Trump are advancing while criti
When the runoff results came in, the message felt less like a debate over policy and more like a referendum on allegiance.
In two Texas races this week. Donald Trump-backed candidates moved into the top of the GOP ticket after defeating sitting Republicans in primaries. Attorney General Ken Paxton beat incumbent Republican Senator John Cornyn to become the Republican candidate for Senate. Cornyn. the newsletter notes. had served as a MAGA-aligned “dutiful” lawmaker in the Senate—but Paxton. whose time as Texas AG has been “marred by corruption scandals and rank extremism. ” is described as an election denier. The same write-up says Paxton received Trump’s endorsement and then won.
In the other Republican runoff. Mayes Middleton. also described as an election denier. defeated Republican Representative Chip Roy to become the replacement for Paxton as attorney general. The account adds that Trump did not endorse Middleton in that specific race. yet it still frames the outcome as another sign that Trump’s preferred political instincts run toward election denial and away from the more institutional. Trump-pleasing “servant” approach.
That dynamic is extended beyond Texas. The newsletter says GOP Representative Thomas Massie lost his primary last week after he called for the release of the Epstein files. It adds that Massie also opposed the Iran War. The piece then says Massie quickly left the country and was “spied this week vacationing with Marjorie Taylor Greene” in Costa Rica. noting that Greene also called for the release of the Epstein files and “didn’t even bother to run in a primary after she also pissed off Trump.”.
The through-line. as the newsletter depicts it. is that loyalty to Trump is being enforced without the kind of explicit violence that people associate with authoritarian control. Instead. the account argues. party discipline is collapsing into intimidation and compliance—capturing the sense that breaking with Trump can mean political disappearance even when the nation is facing other kinds of crises.
It’s in that atmosphere that the rest of the week’s developments are placed: not as separate stories, but as different manifestations of what the author describes as power moving in one direction.
Speaking of Paxton, the newsletter says the Texas AG is now coming after Discord. It reports that Paxton accused the online platform of being a “hunting ground” for child predators. The write-up explains that Discord is used primarily by gamers and is particularly useful for voice chatting during gaming sessions. It also argues that the more likely place for child predators is not Discord but Roblox. saying the author has tried to warn parents about Roblox multiple times.
From there. the account shifts to what it says the controversy reveals about political priorities among the “white-wing manosphere” online—describing Discord as a “safe space” for troglodytes in that world. while also noting that it can be safe for non-trolls if people join more thoughtful servers. The author’s framing is pointed: these voters. the piece says. can be more focused on hating “woke” Democrats than on noticing that Republicans are the party pushing regulations meant to bring gaming spaces under government control.
Election rules and election-denial disputes are not confined to Texas, either. The newsletter reports that South Carolina Republicans rejected a redistricting plan that would have erased the majority-Black district represented by Jim Clyburn. It calls that a rare post-Callais “victory” for Black folks. while also adding that it remains hard to draw a South Carolina map that weakens Clyburn but still protects Republican Representative Nancy Mace.
The author then turns to a different kind of political control: information. The newsletter says Trump apparently wants to make federal workers sign nondisclosure agreements as a way to prevent leaks. It says the author believes the idea is “flatly unconstitutional. ” while also noting that the Supreme Court “won’t agree with me. ” adding that the Court made staffers sign NDAs after the Dobbs leak.
Across the Supreme Court’s docket, the piece highlights Rutherford v. United States, where it says the Court’s decision came on Thursday. It describes the case as involving the First Steps Act and aiming to address mass incarceration. Two men, it says, had been sentenced to 32-year and 57-year mandatory minimum sentences prior to the act’s passage. The newsletter states that if they had been sentenced today, they would have likely received 14-year and 32-year sentences. It adds that they applied for compassionate release because of the disparity.
The account says the prisoners were denied compassionate release 6–3, with Justice Amy Coney Barrett writing the majority opinion. It says Barrett focused on the fact that the First Step Act was not made retroactive. The newsletter argues Congress could have made the act retroactive but did not.
But the author insists the “core legal issue” was an opinion from the U.S. Sentencing Commission. The Commission. the newsletter says. found that courts could look at disparities between the First Step Act and sentences issued before its passage when considering compassionate-release applications. The piece says Barrett and the Republican justices rejected that guidance and instead prohibited courts from considering such disparities.
The newsletter characterizes that as a refusal to consider reality: the Commission said judges could think about the “gross hypocrisy of one sentence versus another,” and Barrett effectively, the author writes, told judges they are not allowed to consider disparities.
Elsewhere in the week’s coverage. the newsletter mentions a Hawaii case involving a tourist from Washington State who was captured on video throwing a large rock at an endangered sea lion. The lawyer for the tourist is said to have claimed the client was trying to protect sea turtles. The author says they have seen the video and do not see any sea turtles. calling the act a “giant asshole” move and expressing hope the person is prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.
It also reports that UC Berkeley’s law school has adopted what it calls “the most restrictive AI ban we’ve seen in higher education,” saying students are prohibited from using AI even to check their grammar. The author says they are no fan of using AI in law but feels Berkeley has gone too far.
And on the policy culture surrounding new medical and social realities, the newsletter includes a personal segment. It references Grace Ginsburg’s intensely personal essay in The Nation about her decision to take GLP-1s. The author does not summarize the essay. but says they have been on GLP-1s for over a year and that they lost about 50 lbs. The piece describes a shift in day-to-day mobility—saying two years ago the author needed a cane for longer walks. and that last summer they walked over 100. 000 steps at Disney World with comfortable shoes as the only assistance.
The author also writes about social feedback: people treating them better and saying they seem “happier. ” despite the author describing themselves as still despondent about trying to eke out a living under white-wing fascism. The newsletter frames that as a feedback loop based on appearance. saying the author’s view of their own self didn’t change.
Finally, the newsletter’s news “unrelated to the current chaos” turns to a legal dispute in the gaming industry. It says that in 2021, Krafton, a South Korean games publisher, bought the independent games developer Unknown Worlds for $500 million. Unknown Worlds, it adds, is known for making Subnautica.
The newsletter says Krafton included a promise of a $250 million bonus to Unknown Worlds founders and core staff if the developer hit certain revenue targets within five years, and that Unknown Worlds began work on Subnautica 2.
By 2025. the newsletter says. it became clear Krafton made a terrible deal. while also stating that Subnautica 2 was “probably” going to hit most or all of the revenue targets needed for the bonus. It then reports that Krafton CEO Changhan Kim went to ChatGPT and asked how to get out of the contract. and that when lawyers told him there was no way out. he asked AI how to breach it.
The newsletter says ChatGPT advised firing the founders and delaying the release of Subnautica 2 to avoid paying the bonus. and that Kim then did those things. It reports that the makers of Subnautica 2 sued. that a trial required all the ChatGPT activity to be disclosed. that a judge ordered the founders reinstated and the game released. and that the judge also extended the timeline for the revenue targets through June 2026 to account for Kim’s shenanigans.
The piece says the judge ordered Krafton to pay a bonus amounting to $3.12 for every $1.00 in revenue. up to the $250 million cap. It states that Subnautica 2 was released on May 14 for $30 on Steam and that the game sold over 4 million copies in under a week. It adds that this performance “far outpaces” more expensive games referenced as Resident Evil 9.
It concludes by saying Subnautica 2 will almost certainly hit all revenue targets and force Krafton to pay the full $250 million bonus. which the founders have indicated will be shared with staff that helped make the game. The newsletter also says the judge still hasn’t ruled on what damages the Unknown Worlds founders are entitled to.
Taken together. the week’s stories—runoff elections in Texas. pressure tactics inside party politics. lawsuits and court rulings that control what judges can consider. and even a breach attempt in a video game contract—are arranged in a way that makes one pattern hard to miss: power is being enforced through compliance. and the cost of stepping out of line appears. again and again. to be the loss of opportunity.
Donald Trump Texas politics Ken Paxton John Cornyn Mayes Middleton Chip Roy GOP primaries election denial South Carolina redistricting Rutherford v. United States First Step Act Discord UC Berkeley AI ban GLP-1s
So basically it’s loyalty tests now? Wild.
I didn’t even read all of it but I saw Paxton and Middleton and thought “here we go again.” If Trump endorses them and they win, that’s just politics, not some big loyalty thing, right? Or maybe it is, idk.
Paxton beating Cornyn doesn’t shock me. Cornyn always seemed like he’d fold the second Trump stared at him lol. But how does “loyalty test” even work in a voting booth? Like did they ask people to swear an oath or something? Sounds exaggerated.
This is what happens when half the state treats elections like a TV show. They call it “election denial” but I swear I saw clips where people said it was all about fraud and court stuff, and now they’re just moving on. Middleton beating Chip Roy… I mean Roy seems more normal, so why’d he lose if voters cared about policy? Seems like it was just who had the loudest MAGA message, not actual results.