Weatherford, Texas
“It’s not the heat, it’s the humidity.”
asserted
it → ’ → ?
When used to describe the outdoors, this phrase is scary enough.
asserted
phrase → use → outdoors
It conjures up visions of stagnant, swampy air, sweat that won’t evaporate.
asserted
that → conjure → air
But I had never really considered what it meant when applied indoors.
asserted
it → consider → what
I’d find out in Weatherford, as hundreds crowded into an un-air-conditioned warehouse area at the recently erected JRJ Construction building.
asserted
hundreds → find → building
Turns out it’s neither the heat nor the humidity that gets you, but the smell, a sort of moldering fetidity that lingers just above the crowd like smog.
asserted
that → turn → smog
It had been a journey to get inside the room: ninety minutes and some $40 of tolls headed west from Dallas to a few miles outside Fort Worth, followed by shuttle buses from the parking lot at the Parker County Sheriff’s Posse Rodeo Grounds & Event Center to JRJ, where I joined a winding line that took an hour before passing through the metal detectors.
asserted
that → get → detectors
Rather than zip in with members of the press, I had signed up for general-admission tickets—hey, I’m a Texas resident; maybe my vote could be swayed—and so got to mingle with my fellow voters before entering.
uncertain
vote → zip → voters
It was a bigger crowd than I expected, not huge by the standards of presidential rallies—but then, the president wasn’t here, and we were well over a thousand people strong for Trump’s backup act.
asserted
we → expect → act
I was a little surprised so many people had shown up to this rural locale, as it was the eighth time that either Trump or Vance has been in Texas for a midterm rally.
asserted
Trump → show → rally
And that’s all since the nearly unprecedented midterm convention in Dallas back in September.
asserted
that → ’ → September
Unable to handle the smog, I stepped outside to grab a bite (a pleasingly overstuffed chopped-brisket sandwich from the Tailgaters BBQ food truck, $13) and contemplate just how we got to the point where Texas is a genuine battleground state—at least for one cycle.
asserted
Texas → handle → cycle
Walking past the captive audience was a pair of merch vendors pushing carts full of garish Trump gear.
asserted
pair → walk → gear
(The highlight: an item that appeared to be socks emblazoned with Trump’s face and topped with a fringe of orange hair.)
asserted
that → appear → hair
“Don’t have a Trump hat, you’re pretty much a Democrat,” one of the barkers intoned.
asserted
one → have → barkers
Judging by the crowd, that seemed about right.
asserted
that → judge → crowd
Surprisingly, when I asked one of the swag sellers later what the most popular hat was, she said it was the pink fuzzy one.
asserted
it → ask → sellers
Men and women alike in Texas went nuts for them: “It’s different in Texas.
asserted
It → go → Texas
It struck me as an amusingly incongruous statement, given the tenor of the afternoon’s event, which featured speaker after speaker warning that James “Talafreako” was going to make your kids trans before forcing them to get gay-married to prove to the rest of the country that Texas could be made to submit to the liberal agenda.
uncertain
Texas → strike → agenda
I am only barely exaggerating.
asserted
I → exaggerate → ?
Jace Yarborough, the Republican candidate in Texas’s 32nd Congressional District, insisted that no one in the crowd would apologize for fighting “trans ideology.”
asserted
one → insist → ideology
Mays Middleton, running for state attorney general, insisted that “we gotta protect our kids from people like James Talarico.”
asserted
we → run → Talarico
Another politician, whose name I unfortunately missed but have chosen to think of as Rep. Grinds My Gears (R-Tex.), enumerated his “tired-of” list.
asserted
I → miss → list
Among the things he’s tired of: “the transgenders” and “Bibles being taken off shelves.”
asserted
he → ’ → shelves
JD Vance took the high road and instead focused solely on the administration’s many accomplishments.
asserted
Vance → take → accomplishments
Wait, sorry, I’m checking my notes: Vance joked that Talarico doesn’t need to grapple with his masculinity because “there ain’t a lot to grapple with” and that “Talafreako” was handpicked by devious Washington, D.C., suits because they thought he was more electable despite “talking about his favorite drag queens or how there are six genders or about how whiteness is a disease.”
asserted
whiteness → wait → queens
The rally put into stark relief the terms of the desperate Republican effort to stave off a generational defeat in Texas: It’s a campaign designed to stir fear and loathing, centered on a phantom menace.
asserted
It → put → menace
Texas Republicans’ biggest problem is that the largest Democratic constituency in the state has something real to fear, and it’s driving a huge surge in turnout.
asserted
it → have → turnout
MUCH WAS MADE OF THE SHIFT of the Hispanic vote toward Donald Trump in 2024, where some exit polls showed him capturing as much as 55 percent of the vote.
asserted
him → make → vote
It was one of those swings that could be considered surprising but not shocking, as the Texas–Mexico border was a complete disaster during much of the Biden administration, with waves of undocumented immigrants and phony asylum seekers washing up on the shores of border towns.
uncertain
waves → consider → towns
This led to increases in crime and decreases in feelings of safety and strained local public resources.
asserted
This → lead → resources
Legal immigrants and their families were mad, and wanted someone who would secure the border.
asserted
who → want → border
What they didn’t count on was an administration that secured the border and then weaponized ICE against American citizens and otherwise law-abiding illegal immigrants alike.
asserted
that → count → citizens
“It’s really scary here,” said Jackie Rosa, a Democratic strategist who is working on Bobby Pulido campaign in Texas’s 15th district, where the Tejano singer has built a shocking and consistent polling lead over incumbent Republican Monica De La Cruz.
asserted
singer → ’ → Cruz
“Regardless of citizenship status, if you’re Hispanic here, you’re seeing lawless ICE detentions.
asserted
you → ’re → detentions
Even citizens, people who are legally allowed to be here, like, it’s scary for young people.
asserted
it → allow → people
As my colleague Adrian Carrasquillo has chronicled in his newsletter, Huddled Masses, ICE has been weaponized to a shocking extent, even being used to settle neighborhood disputes—that is, when masked agents of the state aren’t illegally stopping people or executing protesters in the streets.
asserted
agents → chronicle → streets
Even those who felt that the border’s instability was a problem have watched in horror as ICE agents, desperate to meet deportation quotas set by head immigrant hunter Stephen Miller, started rounding up folks regardless of whether or not they were causing public disorder.
asserted
they → feel → disorder
“They were promised that ICE would be going after criminals,” Rosa said of Hispanic voters in the south of Texas.
asserted
Rosa → promise → Texas
“They believed that.
asserted
They → believe → that
…and 13 more, not listed.
The Aporia
