Cinema News: Texas, 2028 and Newsom

March 5, 2026 | View in browser

By Anita Chabria

Columnist

Hello and happy Thursday. I'm Times columnist Anita Chabria coming to you from the safety of Sacramento, where the current election cycle remains boring. But the Lone Star State, that's a different story.

Texas has voted in its primary, one of the earliest glimpses into the 2028 presidential election, and be certain that Gov. Gavin Newsom and every presidential contender were watching closely.

What did our Oval Office hopefuls learn?

Democrats want a hug. Republicans want a fight. Billionaires don't care about anything but themselves.

Let's break that down.

Dems love the soft sell

One of the great debates within the Democratic Party right now is whether the average voter wants a middle ground, or a bold progressive agenda.

Healthcare for all or just keep Republicans from killing off Obamacare? Forgive student loans or just prevent universities from caving to censorship and maybe bring down tuition costs while you're at it?

While some, like our own Newsom, are framing this divide as a need to step away from so-called culture war issues (I hate that term because we're really talking about civil rights), it's more about voter anxiety and exhaustion than actually wanting regressive policy.

The Texas win by can't-we-all-just-get-along state Rep. James Talarico over burn-it-down U.S. Rep. Jasmine Crockett (D-Texas) seems on the surface to provide a clue that voters want moderation in 2028. Crockett lost, pretty resoundingly, especially with white and Latino voters.

But the truth here is that that divide was really more about style than substance. Scratch the surface, and both Crockett and Talarico hold some pretty lefty positions, including healthcare for all, albeit in slightly different forms.

Leaving aside the obvious (and important) race lines that defined this battle (Crockett won among Black voters), the lesson might be that Democrats are scared and tired and want comfort — a big rhetorical embrace of unity.

They haven't lost their desire for things like universal healthcare, but also just want more talk about a future of America that isn't apocalyptic.

Talarico, a Presbyterian seminarian with a class-based message meant to appeal to moderates, was full of soothing optimism. His positions are left, but his speeches are like butter melting on warm bread.

"Loving your enemy is not just morally good, it is not just idealistic. It is good strategic advice," he said.

It was a winning taste of that sweet, lost America — the land of hope and dreams — that existed before President Trump made hate the norm.

MAGA goes more MAGA

In Republican news, the big primary of the night was the race between the four-term incumbent, Sen. John Cornyn, and his mega-MAGA challenger, Texas Atty. Gen. Ken Paxton (with Rep. Wesley Hunt a distant third).

Cornyn squeaked out a win but since neither of them scored more than 50% of the vote, they go to a May runoff to determine who will face Talarico in the general election.

This was a race about how far Republican voters were willing to go to the right. While Cornyn is hardly a moderate by most standards, he is considered an establishment Republican.

Paxton, on the other hand, can't get enough of Trump. After the 2020 election, which Trump lost, Paxton went hard on the false voter fraud conspiracy. He brought a case to the Supreme Court attempting to have Pennsylvania's vote thrown out so Trump could claim victory. When that didn't work, he ended up speaking at the Jan. 6 insurrection in Washington.

His politics come out of the tea party movement, and are ultra-conservative. When Roe vs. Wade was overturned, he gave his staff a paid day off. He's sued to stop women from having lifesaving abortions since then, and continues to pound the voter fraud drum, especially when it comes to voters of color.

And, in typical MAGA fashion, he comes with a multitude of scandals that none of his supporters seem to care about. He's been accused of bribery and securities fraud, among other allegations, and not long ago his wife filed for divorce on "biblical grounds."

I tell you all this because he almost won. And still might.

The only reason Cornyn avoided being trounced was money, money and more money. Establishment Republicans poured cash into this campaign like firefighters dousing a blaze. It should give folks pause that even with outspending Cornyn by vast sums (more than 70 million), Paxton came close with Republican voters.

Still, establishment Republicans, and those who care about winning over loyalty, are standing behind Cornyn because in the general election, he has a better chance of attracting moderate voters (though a Democratic win here is still a long shot).

But like all things in the Republican Party these days, this decision will come down to what Trump wants. Wednesday, Trump posted on social media that he will make an endorsement in this race soon, something he avoided doing in the primary.

"My Endorsements within the Republican Party have been virtually insurmountable!" he wrote, and for once he's not lying. "I will be making my Endorsement soon, and will be asking the candidate that I don't Endorse to immediately DROP OUT OF THE RACE!"

So, when Trump decides who Republicans can vote for, I'll let you know.

What about that AI money?

Lucky for Trump, most AI billionaires (Anthropic's Dario Amodei perhaps excluded) now love him for his pay-as-you-go approach to federal policies on the industry.

But that doesn't mean that these titans of our tomorrow are leaving their futures in the Orange Man's hands. Crazy sums of AI money were dumped into Texas and other states for these primaries, and it was just the beginning.

Super PAC Leading the Future, funded by OpenAI co-founder Greg Brockman, his wife, venture capitalists Marc Andreessen and Benjamin Horowitz and others, backed state candidates who don't back state AI regulation.

Public First, a super PAC funded in part by Amodei, backed candidates who want more regulation at both the state and federal levels.

And not to be outdone, California-based tech giant Meta, has at least four super PACs funded with about $65 million, fighting against candidates of either party who back state regulations on artificial intelligence.

But please don't expect a single ad on the issue of artificial intelligence now or, well, ever, coming from these guys. Oh no, the masters of the algorithm know us too well. Instead, all that money will be used to talk about the economy, the price of butter, literally anything other than AI.

So voters, it's on you to pay attention to the only thing that really ever matters in politics — where the money is coming from, and where it's pushing you to go.

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