John, the results are in: The voters of Texas elected the next member of the Squad in TX-35, Greg Casar, and sent Jessica Cisneros to a runoff against "Big Oil's Favorite Democrat" Henry Cuellar in TX-28.
These races confirm that the Green New Deal is popular from Austin to oil country and that voters care about climate action — especially in the wake of the historic and unprecedented Texas Freeze. Our movement has never been more powerful, even in a year of immense disillusionment — but we can't let up now.
Can you rush a split contribution of $10 or any amount right now to Sunrise and Jessica so we can keep up the momentum and power our runoff GOTV organizing through May? There's a lot of work to be done if we're going to take down corporate money once and for all:
We'd be remiss if we didn't take a moment to celebrate Greg's win. He's an organizer who ran on a Green New Deal, on a Green New Grid, and who was on the frontlines of his community when the Texas Freeze hit. In an election that wasn't infiltrated by oil and gas lobbyists, the community made their voices clear and decisively voted for the Green New Deal candidate.
And while it's true — and maybe a little frustrating in this moment — that Jessica is headed to another (runoff) election, it's still a damn win.
It was always going to be an uphill battle for us to take on one of the most anti-choice, corporate, and corrupt Democrats — and yet, the power of people over money has never been clearer. We made nearly one million voter contact attempts in TX-28 alone, and our movement is more energized than ever.
To the other corporate Democrats like Henry Cuellar, who continued to take fossil fuel money despite the ever-worsening, deeply felt climate crisis in Texas: Just know that when you sell out your community to oil and gas executives, we'll come for you.
This is only the beginning. We have two more months of organizing for Jessica ahead of us — and what we're able to accomplish depends on your continued grassroots support. Split a contribution between Sunrise and Jessica Cisneros today to fuel our runoff election efforts and help us elect another Green New Deal champion to Congress.
In solidarity,
Sophia, Sunrise