They Picked Another Senator

Mississippi finally did it!

I got emotional watching Scott Colom win Mississippi. Not just because of what that victory means, but because of what it proves: no state is hopeless, no community should be written off, and ordinary people can still change this country when we fight for them. That’s the mission behind Endless Urgency. We’re building independent media that challenges the right-wing propaganda machine, elevates leaders who actually give a damn, and refuses to let cynicism win. If you believe in that mission, become a paid subscriber for just $8/month and help us build something bigger.

Already a paid subscriber? Then like, share, and keep showing up in the comments. It matters more than you know.

---

I’m not going to lie to you: I was fighting back tears when they finally called the Mississippi Senate race for Scott Colom.

The first Black senator from Mississippi since Reconstruction. If you can watch something like that happen and not feel it deep in your soul, there’s something wrong with you. It’s a momentous victory, and it tells you how far this country has come, and where it’s headed.

Colom earned every bit of it. You’ve probably seen the ad by now. Cindy Hyde-Smith, a sitting United States senator, got asked about the price of beef and told people they should just pick another protein. That’s how out of touch these people are. Working families in one of the poorest states in the country are getting crushed at the grocery store, and her advice is to eat something cheaper. Let them eat chicken.

Colom’s response was perfect: Pick another protein? Pick another senator. And Mississippi did.

You’d think Republicans might take this as a sign. A state as deep red and as suppressed as Mississippi is, just sent a man like Scott Colom to the United States Senate. Any normal political party would stop and reflect on everything it’s done to hurt the American people and drive this country toward a cliff.

But they aren’t capable of that kind of introspection. So, as I’ve been writing to you all week, they’re doubling down on their very worst instincts.

They promoted Stephen Miller to Chief of Staff, which means more immigration aggression and more corruption. They named Jim Jordan minority leader in the House, a guy whose somehow more conservative than Mike Johnson. And they’re going on cable news and repeating the same handful of stupid talking points that lost them the midterms: trans kids, gas prices under Joe Biden, Donald Trump’s golden age of America.

I saw it up close yesterday on Newsmax. The MAGA pundit debating me said that every Democrat elected on Tuesday is a communist. Then he went further and claimed Abdul El-Sayed had said he wanted to seize the means of production from the floor of the United States Senate. I asked him to show me where. He couldn’t, because it never happened. So I told him to his face, on his own network, that he was lying. He didn’t like that. But, I do not care.

That’s where the Republican Party is right now. They’ve learned absolutely fucking nothing from this loss. They’re blaming the voters. They think that if they scream about trans kids even louder, and gaslight you into believing Donald Trump knows what the fuck he’s doing, that the economy is great for everyone, and that your struggles are your fault instead of the fault of the Republicans stealing from you, they’ll win.

It didn’t work last Tuesday, and it won’t work now. They’ll keep nominating candidates who are wildly out of step with their states because Donald Trump likes them, and that will continue to hurt the party.

---

Here’s why these victories matter so much to me. People like Scott Colom, Annie Andrews, James Talarico didn’t wait until winning looked easy. They stepped up when things looked hopeless because they believed their communities deserved better. That’s what we’re committed to elevating at Endless Urgency. We’re not here just to dunk on Republicans or celebrate election night. We’re here to expose the lies, challenge Democrats to deliver, and keep fighting for a country where working people can afford a decent life. For $8/month, you can help us keep telling the stories that the political establishment too often overlooks.

---

But honestly, I’m a lot less interested in them right now. I’m interested in us. And the thing I’m most excited about from last week isn’t just that we won. It’s how we won.

Almost every person who won one of these big Senate, House, and governor’s races started at a time that looked bleak for the Democratic Party. They ran against the media, the Republican Party and the internet, all telling us Democrats could never be anything.

I never believed that. I could see the destruction the Trump administration was causing, and I knew the pendulum would swing back. These candidates saw it too. They signed up anyway, before anyone knew a wave was coming, and that tells you exactly who they are. They believe in the power of this party.

Scott Colom is a prosecutor who looked at a state Democrats haven’t won statewide in a generation and decided to run anyway. You don’t make that choice for the career upside. You make it because you believe in an economy that works for everybody, in racial justice in a state that has fought it every step of the way, and in a better life for the people you want to represent.

The same goes for the rest of this class. Annie Andrews is a pediatrician who got into politics because she was tired of watching kids get hurt by policies written by people who’d never treated one. James Talarico is a former teacher who talks about faith and justice in a way that terrifies the Christian nationalists who think they own both. Josh Turek is a Paralympic gold medalist who knows what it means to fight for success. Troy Jackson is a logger from northern Maine who has spent his career taking on the corporations that screw over working people.

These people went through the wringer. They’re younger, closer to the issues, and in this for the right reasons. We’ve elected plenty of Democrats before. I’m not sure we’ve ever elected this many true believers at once.

Now comes a messy presidential primary with a million candidates, and I’m looking forward to all of it. We’ll debate, we’ll pick someone, we’ll rally behind them, and we’ll go fucking win. If we elect another class like this in ‘28, we’ll have an historic chance to make this country work for the working class again, root out the corruption in Washington, and end these stupid forever wars.

But none of this is guaranteed. The ground shifted under Republicans’ feet last Tuesday, and it can shift under ours just as fast if we don’t deliver. So we roll up our sleeves, we get shit done, and we make people’s lives better.

Mississippi picked another senator. Don’t let anyone tell you what’s impossible ever again.

If you want someone in your corner who’s going to keep swinging for the next two years, become a paid subscriber today. They’re not backing down. Neither am I.

With urgency,

—Mike