Dave Vorland

This is the final Cook Political Report rating pre election. Dems won every "Likely D "seat. They won every toss up seat. They won or are ahead in 7 of the 18 "Lean R"'s, they won 7 of the 17 ""Likely R". Dems won all their likely or safe seats, Dems also picked up 2 "solid" R seats.

First in @thehill: Chamber of Progress unveils its to-do list on tech for Dems. @ProgressChamber @adamkovac The memo points to numerous state bills around AI transparency, like NY's RAISE Act, and Illinois's S.B. 315 thehill.com/policy/technolog…

It’s great to celebrate these wins, but we have to remember why we won. These historic results are a cry for help from millions of American families that are struggling. Families hurting from Trump’s war and tariffs that have raised costs, from the gutting of health care. We have to remember why we have this opportunity to lead and need to focus on what we can do to tangibly help these families.

I have been holding my tongue about something that happened during the Ohio gubernatorial race. I refused to speak while the election was underway because I did not want my words mistaken for an attempt to influence anyone’s vote. But now that the election is over, I have something to say. For nearly twenty years, my ministry has taken me among the homeless, the abused, the exploited, and the forgotten. I have sat with victims of sexual violence and witnessed the lifelong wounds of childhood trauma. What Vivek Ramaswamy’s campaign did to Amy Acton was among the most morally repulsive things I have witnessed in American politics. They took a woman whose stepfather was indicted for raping her when she was twelve years old and featured her mother, from whom she had been estranged for nearly fifty years, in a political advertisement attacking her credibility. The advertisement challenged Acton’s account of her childhood without mentioning the sexual abuse allegations or the circumstances of that estrangement. When people expressed their horror, the campaign defended it. Imagine examining another person’s childhood suffering and fractured family relationships, then deciding those wounds might help win an election. Anyone who has worked with survivors of childhood sexual abuse understands the painful realities of denial, betrayal, shame, and estrangement. A child growing into a successful adult does not erase what happened. Nor does a parent’s denial make that suffering disappear. I find it equally disturbing that an elderly mother, whom Acton herself described as unwell, was brought into this spectacle. Whatever her own struggles or responsibility for the past, exploiting that fractured relationship was grotesque. To everyone who defended this, consider the message you sent to survivors. To the young woman whose family refuses to believe her. To the man who has carried the shame of childhood abuse for forty years. To the frightened child who has yet to tell anyone. What did you teach them about the value of their suffering? I am a priest. I believe in repentance, forgiveness, and redemption. But none of those things requires me to pretend that deliberate cruelty is anything less than a grave moral failure. Your political allegiance does not absolve you of moral responsibility. You do not get to set aside your conscience during an election and retrieve it afterward. If your loyalty requires you to defend the exploitation of a childhood sexual abuse survivor, your loyalty has become an idol. And if your conscience cannot recognize the wrong here, examine what political tribalism has done to it. This is not about Republicans or Democrats. We have a choice as a people: continue excusing cruelty from our preferred political camp, or summon the courage to condemn it wherever it appears. Amy Acton deserved better. Every survivor who watched this unfold deserved better. And God help us if we have reached the point where winning an election matters more than protecting the dignity of a wounded human being.

1. Convince Roy Cooper to run in NC 2. Finally unseat Susan Collins in Maine 3. Hope Sherrod Brown can pull off a comeback in Ohio 4. Somehow win Texas? Get Peltola to run in Alaska? 🤷‍♂️ teapaw.org/nick_field90/status/18…

Top of the Democratic agenda on day 1 needs to be a pause on advanced AI development, regulation of this out of control industry, and a ban on artificial superintelligence.

National exit (sample: 79,668) -- Importance of issues to your vote: GOVERNMENT CORRUPTION Crucial/Major - 90% Minor/No factor - 10% COST OF LIVING Crucial/Major - 89% Minor/No factor - 11% IRAN WAR Crucial/Major - 74% Minor/No factor - 26% IMMIGRATION ENFORCEMENT Crucial/Major - 73% Minor/No factor - 27% AI & DATA CENTERS Crucial/Major - 56% Minor/No factor - 44%

Big, big thanks to our network of hundreds of citizens in Silicon Valley committed to take back our Congress—and our country.

Pro-Innovation House Democrats -- candidates endorsed by @sliccardo's Innovation for Good PAC -- have won 39 out of 40 races called so far. The new Congress is going to have a strong bench of pro-innovation Dems. samliccardo.com/candidates