The wildfire fighter who just might flip Montana

                      

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Presented by the AFT Welcome to The TNR Blue Book: What is this Blue Book? It’s our new daily newsletter that covers Congress and much more, but with a distinctly TNR twist: Our focus will be strictly on Democrats, liberal and progressive groups, and the fight to take back power and save democracy. Every morning, you’ll get a rundown of late-breaking news, what Democrats on Capitol Hill are thinking, quick hits on what you need to know nationally, the latest on what’s coming out of the think tanks and activist groups, short interviews with progressive newsmakers and authors, and more (including some humor and political trivia!). There’s nothing else out there like it.  The Morning Line GOOD MORNING, HERE’S WHAT’S HAPPENING: Today, Rand Paul hauls Anthony Fauci up before the Senate committee he chairs to … well, to what? To settle an old score, basically. You can read a bit about all that here. The basic ideas today seem to be (1) to embarrass Fauci, who does seem in some recently released pandemic-era diary entires to have been impressed by the parade of celebrities suddenly fawning over him, and (2) to gin up some kind of bogus perjury charge against him. Six years after the pandemic, MAGA still wants the guy behind bars.   PASS THE POPCORN: Now we have calls for Donald Trump’s impeachment emanating from … Alex Jones? Yep. In a rant to his 4 million X followers, Jones said Trump should be bounced from office "for attempting to re-implement the national draft and launch a total ground invasion of Iran." Rant away, Alex.   JUST CHECKING IN ON THIS: Polymarket Dem 2028 presidential chances, as of this morning: Gavin Newsom, 19 percent; Jon Ossoff, 13; Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, 13; Kamala Harris, 9; Pete Buttigieg, 6; Josh Shapiro, 5; Mark Kelly, 3. Harris, of course, leads most polls, but that’s presumably on name recognition. And where’s Andy Beshear?   INTERESTING READ OF THE DAY: Edward Luce in the Financial Times on Trump’s waning influence in the world: "Power is the ability to shape the world to your advantage. This should not be confused with constantly declaring how powerful you are."   TEN STATES, EH?: The Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, helmed this cycle by Kirsten Gillibrand, announced a plan to spend $40 million in 10 battleground states, including Alaska, Iowa, and Florida. Wait—Florida? What’s happening in Florida? Well, Marco Rubio left for Foggy Bottom, and Governor Ron DeSantis appointed someone named Ashley Moody, who is right now a U.S. senator. She will likely face retired Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman, brother of Virginia Democratic House member Eugene Vindman. The primaries are August 18. By Michael Tomasky

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Inside Washington The wildfire fighter who just might flip Montana By Emma Janssen Missoula, Montana, is part of a congressional district Dems are looking to flip. | Justin Sullivan/Getty Images Smoke jumper and union organizer Sam Forstag, running in a shocking dead heat against Republican Aaron Flint in the fight for Montana’s 1st district according to the latest poll, just became one of the most progressive candidates in the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee’s Red to Blue program. On Tuesday, the DCCC added Forstag along with four other candidates to the program, which lends support to Democratic candidates who are running to unseat a Republican in competitive districts.   Forstag, DCCC chair Suzan DelBene said in a statement, "puts his life on the line to protect his neighbors and community from wildfires. Deeply committed to Western Montana, Sam is the kind of authentic, dynamic leader that working people want fighting for them in Washington." Forstag became the official Democratic candidate after winning the primary on June 2.   The other candidates added to Red to Blue on Tuesday include Arizona state Representative Amish Shah in Arizona's 1st congressional district, Pia Dandiya in Florida’s new 22nd congressional district, Iowa state Representative Lindsay James in the 2nd congressional district, and Jake Johnson for Minnesota’s 1st congressional district. That brings the number of Red to Blue candidates to 30.   Forstag now joins Randy Villegas, who is running in California’s 22nd congressional district, in representing the party’s insurgent left in the DCCC’s program. The DCCC originally endorsed Villegas’s moderate opponent, Jasmeet Bains, stirring up controversy and claims that the party was protecting moderates. A similar scene played out in Maine’s 2nd congressional district, where Matt Dunlap, the state auditor, won his June 9 primary over DCCC-backed State Senator Joe Baldacci. After his win, the DCCC added Villegas to the Red to Blue program. But the DCCC hasn’t yet done the same for Dunlap.   Forstag is backed by progressives like Senator Bernie Sanders and Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, but also has the endorsement of a handful of Republican former electeds in Montana. He’s also supported by former Democratic Senator Jon Tester, who won the district in 2024 despite losing the state. The district, established in 2023, includes liberal college towns Bozeman and Missoula. In recent years, tens of thousands of Washington, California, Colorado, and Oregon residents have moved to Montana, which some think could make the state more liberal—although the jury’s still out.   In the general election, Forstag is facing Aaron Flint. Flint is 46, and Forstag is 32; whoever wins the election will be the first non–baby boomer to represent the state in Congress in three decades. Both Flint and Forstag attended the University of Montana, and both served as student body president. Forstag went on to fight fires and now is vice president of the National Federation of Federal Employees Local 60, representing around 800 U.S. Forest Service workers; Flint joined the National Guard and now works as a radio host.   While Forstag highlights his endorsements from progressives, Flint campaigns against them: "AOC, Mamdani, and Bernie want to flip the House and turn the US socialist. Eliminate private property, ban pickups and fossil fuels, put men in little girls’ locker rooms, and re-open the borders for illegal aliens and deadly drugs," Flint’s website reads.   The two are vying to replace Republican Representative Ryan Zinke, who took the seat in 2023 after a brief, rocky tenure as secretary of the interior under President Trump’s first administration. (Zinke resigned his post at the Interior Department after 18 federal investigations—most of them ethics-related—were initiated against him in under two years.) Zinke and Trump quickly endorsed Flint when he registered to run.   Polling suggests a tight race. Forstag and Flint each have 44 percent of the vote in an Impact Research poll of 500 likely voters conducted in late June. Libertarian candidate Nick Sheedy was supported by 5 percent of respondents, and 6 percent remain undecided. Another poll, from early May, showed Flint up five points against Forstag.   Flint is hoping to ride the state’s red tendencies to victory, and he very well may: The seat is still rated "likely Republican" by the Cook Political Report. But, if Forstag pulls off a victory, it will be a win for both the DCCC and its progressive critics, who are eager to prove that candidates like Forstag can appeal in rural, redder areas. ADVERTISEMENT TODAY at TNR.COM Former Federal Trade Commissioner Alvaro Bedoya on how the proposed Paramount-Warner merger would kill off "below-the-line" (i.e., non-glam) workers in the film and TV industry … Perry Bacon on whether progressives can win in swing states … Hafiz Rashid on Trump’s 40 winks at Lindsey Graham’s funeral.

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Outside Washington AI deepfakes enter a Connecticut judicial race By Heather Souvaine Horn Bridgeport Mayor Joseph Ganim, one of two politicians deepfaked in a recent ad | Arnold Gold/Connecticut Post/Getty Images The Democratic primary for probate judge–yes, for probate judge–in Bridgeport, Connecticut, has taken a disturbing turn. Attorney Mark Bradley, challenging incumbent Paul Ganim, recently released a campaign video that "appears to use artificial intelligence to create synthetic versions of Mayor Joe Ganim and Probate Judge Paul Ganim, complete with fake voices delivering dialogue neither man actually spoke about raising taxes and stealing money. The videos seem to be created using still photos, one of which appears to have been used without permission from CT Insider’s archive," CT Insider’s Jordan Nathaniel Fenster reports. Contacted by Fenster, Bradley didn’t deny that the video was synthesized with AI and included fake quotes, but claimed "nothing in the messaging of my ads are false or misleading." Make of that what you will.   Fenster notes that while state lawmakers have debated a bill to regulate AI-generated campaign videos, they haven’t actually passed one. ELSEWHERE A shocking new poll from Texas Public Opinion Research has Democrat James Talarico up by five percentage points over Republican Ken Paxton for the U.S. Senate seat, at 45 percent to 40 percent. Even more surprising, the Texas Tribune’s Gabby Birenbaum reports: "TPOR’s poll found Talarico leading among voters who do not have a college degree—a group that has consistently favored Republicans in Texas and across the country—and dominating among independents, less than a quarter of whom said they planned to vote for Paxton." Caveat: This poll is something of an outlier, particularly in the cross-tabs. A New York Times/Siena poll previously found an eight-point advantage for Paxton among voters without a college degree. Birenbaum fairly notes that, while formally nonpartisan, TPOR is headed by Democratic strategist Luke Warford.    Civil Eats’ Rebekah Alvey looks at which Trump-era funding cuts, specifically, have made the current cyclospora outbreak—the "largest in history," causing thousands of cases of "explosive diarrhea"—harder to fight. Surveillance cuts come out looking particularly foolish.   Stateline’s Nada Hassanein reports on the troubling rise in preteen suicides, and discusses experts’ recommendations at both the personal and political levels. These experts aren’t sure what’s driving the uptick, but Covid-19, sleep disruptions, education trends, lack of unstructured outdoor time, and social media (and general media) use are all floated as possible factors. The Ideas Factory By Heather Souvaine Horn Public Citizen releases a "legislative guide to bolstering resilience and promoting affordability through state resilient home retrofit grant programs." These policies, the organization says, could help homes withstand wildfires and storms and limit property insurance costs.   The Southern Poverty Law Center is suing the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers on behalf of Alabama Rivers Alliance, Black Warrior Riverkeeper, Healthy Gulf, Ogeechee Riverkeeper, and Savannah Riverkeeper over two natural gas pipeline projects recently greenlit via a "federal permitting process they say allows major natural gas pipeline projects to avoid detailed environmental reviews and adequate public input," the Alabama Political Reporter reports.   In case you missed it: Earlier this week, Open Markets Institute published a report on how consolidation in the container shipping industry has led the U.S. to rely on "container cartel of six foreign carriers not only to stock store shelves and support businesses, but increasingly to provide military sealift capacity during national emergencies," in the words of Arnav Rao, the institute’s transportation policy analyst. "That should ring alarm bells for anyone who cares about economic resilience, national security, or fair competition."

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In Closing BOOK OF THE WEEK Oxford University Press, 272 pp., $34.99 America's Middle East: The Ruination of a Region By Marc Lynch WHY NOW: The book came out late last year, but between Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s visit to Washington on Tuesday and the continued chaos of Trump’s war on Iran, Lynch’s arguments are going to be on a lot of minds this week.    THE GIST: Lynch, Lisa Anderson neatly summarized in Foreign Affairs, "argues that the heady ambitions of the unipolar moment permitted American policymakers, Democrats and Republicans alike, to pursue the imposition of a U.S.-centric order without the resolution of the central conflict in the region—that between the Israelis and the Palestinians."    CRUISING THE INDEX: Lynch, a professor of political science and international affairs at George Washington University and longtime blogger, covers a lot of ground in this sweeping—and cutting—summary of U.S. policy in the Middle East since the 1970s. Although the book was published shortly before the U.S. began an all-out war with Iran, Lynch covers the U.S.-Israeli strikes in the early summer of 2025 as part of the Trump administration’s larger effort to reshape the Middle East. His attention to the role the U.S.-Israeli relationship played in those efforts is particularly bracing.   TNR’S QUICK CRITICAL ASSESSMENT: Lynch persuasively argues that U.S. efforts to shape the Middle East have failed on both policy and humanitarian grounds. He’s particularly persuasive on the latter. "It took me a long time to accept the ultimate core of the problem, but after decades of close observation it became unavoidable," he writes in the preface. "What America doesn’t seem willing to accept is that people in the Middle East are actually human beings. US actions over decades suggest that it does not consider Arab or Muslim lives to matter as much as American or Israeli lives." As the U.S. and Donald Trump drag out a senseless war on Iran with well-documented civilian casualties, this argument will likely resonate with a lot of readers. By Alex Shephard POLITICAL TRIVIA QUESTION OF THE DAY Continuing with the Electoral College theme for one more day: Since 1980—that is, the last 12 presidential elections—how many times has the Democrat carried Florida, and when? Yesterday's question and answer: Q: What was the biggest Electoral College landslide in U.S. history? A: FDR over Alf Landon, 1936, when Roosevelt won 523 of 531 electoral votes. Ronald Reagan in 1984 (525 out of 538) and Richard Nixon in 1972 (520 out of 538) came close. Of course, James Monroe won almost unanimously in 1820, but he really didn’t have an opponent.

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