Abdul El-Sayed Vs MAGA Mike Rogers in Michigan, With The Senate In The Balance (90 Days to Midterms)
And more results from last night’s primaries. Plus texting at-risk voters, Farm Bill goes before a Senate committee, a climate resource reborn and more
TOO LONG, DIDN’T READ
Primary night rundown: Let’s help Dr. Abdul El-Sayed secure Dems the Senate and Will Lawrence, Christina Hines, Sean McCann and Elaine Luria flip House seats
VoteRiders textbank to help at-risk voters beat the suppression TOMORROW at 7PM ET
Upcoming Senate action: Ag committee considers Farm Bill preserving SNAP cuts, Blanche anti-abortion agenda exposed ahead of floor vote, Paul seeks contempt resolution on Dr. Fauci
If you have questions, comments, and especially submissions for actions, please email us at roganslisttips@gmail.com!
HELP VOTERIDERS REACH AT-RISK VOTERS IN WISCONSIN TOMORROW
We’ve got another big set of primaries next week in Minnesota and Wisconsin. The latter in particular will set up a high-stakes general election – we’re strongly positioned to take down January 6ther, intern-berater and Trump lackey Derrick Van Orden in the House and have a few other seats we could flip in a big enough sweep, have a chance to flip flip one or both legislative chambers to earn a Democratic trifecta for the first time since Scott Walker’s gerrymander in 2010, and are likely going to have the chance to elect a fierce progressive gubernatorial candidate in a swing state.
Standing in our way are more than just the Republican candidates. The GOP used their power to pass some of the most invasive voter suppression laws in the country. We’re going to need to do the work to make sure folks can make their voices heard anyways. 💬 VoteRiders will hosting a textbank tomorrow night at 7PM ET to reach out to at-risk voters with information and assistance on how they can make their ballot count. Let’s sign up to help them here. 💬
JOIN THE LEAGUE OF WOMEN VOTERS NATIONWIDE DAY OF ACTION FOR VOTING RIGHTS
In honor of the 61st anniversary of the Voting Rights Act of 1965, a now-hollowed out crowning achievement of the Civil Rights Movement, the League of Women Voters is leading a Unite & Rise for Voting Rights national day of action this Saturday. The day’s activities will focus on increasing voter engagement, turnout, and education. There are several ways for us to get involved:
Let’s attend the Virtual Pep Rally that goes live TOMORROW from 3-4:30 p.m. EDT—we can RSVP to get reminders.
If we live near one of these Hallmark Events, let’s follow the links to RSVP:
Phoenix, AZ (statewide listening circles)
Berkeley, CA (voting rights day of action)
Atlanta, GA
Detroit, MI (poetry & politics)
Philadelphia, PA (community teach-in and action day)
Let’s use this map to find other events near us.
Let’s make sure we’re ready to vote and have plans to vote in the 2026 midterm elections.
FARM BILL PRESERVING SNAP CUTS SET FOR SENATE COMMITTEE CONSIDERATION THURSDAY
More than 4.5 million people have lost access to food assistance from the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) since Trump and the GOP’s MAGA murder budget was signed into law last July, including more than 1.5 million children. (See the impact by state here.) And some of the worst changes aren’t even in effect yet.
SNAP is typically reauthorized in the Farm Bill, and advocates have been pushing to use the current debate over a new one to put some food back on the table for American families. The Senate Agriculture Committee is set to consider their version of the legislation this Thursday. While we’ve successfully pushed them into delaying benefit cost sharing for the states, it’s only for one year, most of the administrative cost shift would kick in this October as scheduled and the other cuts to food aid are preserved.
The Farm Bill would need bipartisan support to get through the Senate. Unfortunately, given that 14 Democrats provided the necessary votes to pass it in the House, it may well get it. 🗣️ Let’s use this email tool and language from the Food Research & Action Center to let our senators know they need to draw the line and oppose any Farm Bill that does not restore SNAP. This is especially important for those of us with senators on the committee. 🗣️
In other Senate news, Todd Blanche’s nomination for attorney general cleared the Senate Judiciary Committee on party lines 12-10. Just hours after the vote, reports came out that he told religious conservatives on a White House call that he intended to act to roll back abortion access even in states where it remains legal, and promised that new restrictions on medication abortion were coming. Two Republicans, Lisa Murkowski and Bill Cassidy, remain undecided on his selection – Blanche likely only needs one of them for confirmation. The vote is likely this week. 🗣️ If we haven’t called our senators, let’s be sure to do so ASAP. 🗣️
Senator Rand Paul has also announced he will hold a vote before the Senate Homeland Security Committee to hold Dr. Anthony Fauci in contempt of Congress for refusing to cooperate with his witch hunt. If it passes, Paul plans to refer it directly to the Justice Department, end-running (possibly illegally) the need to proceed to the full Senate. 🗣️ If our senators are on this committee, let’s reach out and let them know we want them to leave Dr. Fauci alone. 🗣️
RESTORING ACCESS TO CLIMATE DATA DELETED BY TRUMP
The Trump regime has actively sought to make addressing climate change harder in every way it can think of. One of their tactics: taking down climate.gov, an official government site that distilled the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s research on this threat into easy-to-understand, free resources for the public. It was a treasure trove of data, reports, articles, and congressionally mandated national climate assessments, all effectively lost. Now the team behind it, fired by the administration, has brought it back. In June, they launched Climate.us, an independent, nonprofit climate information website that meets popular demand for reliable climate information - restoring the information from climate.gov and continuing to update it with new visuals, explainers and features. They’ve already won the National Center for Science Education (NCSE) Friend of the Planet award for 2026. ⚙️ Let’s spread the word about this resource to teachers, community leaders, policymakers and folks in our network, and consider donating to support this project. ⚙️
RUNNING DOWN THE RESULTS OF A BUSY PRIMARY NIGHT
First off, let’s talk about the campaigns that have been on everyone’s mind. We decisively defeated right-wing efforts to change the rules because they didn’t like the results, with their effort to hijack the Kansas Supreme Court with partisan elections earning less than 39% of the vote and their attempt to kneecap the process for passing citizen-initiated ballot initiatives being rejected by more than 80% of Missourians. (The Show Me State also rejected replacing the state income tax with a greatly expanded sales tax.) Thank you so much to all Rogan’s Listers who volunteered to make this happen! Now we can turn our attention to November, when Missouri will go to the ballot box again to consider yet another attempt at undoing reproductive rights. ☎️ We can volunteer to help stop the ban tonight and every Wednesday here. ☎️
No, but seriously, it was a big primary night. Here’s a quick rundown of the other results:
In Michigan…
The marquee race of the day was the battle for the Democratic nomination for Senate in Michigan, and after a late night of counting Dr. Abdul El-Sayed emerged as the winner. The former health director of Wayne County who literally wrote the book on Medicare For All, Dr. El-Sayed ran on a simple message of “money out of politics, money in your pockets, Medicare for All,” along with taxing billionaires, abolishing ICE, and ending unconditional military aid and weapons sales to Israel. Governor Whitmer and the Democratic leadership rallied behind his opponent, and he was massively outspent, with more than $63.9 million in ads for Rep. Haley Stevens against $7.3 million for him – even candidates who didn’t make it to Election Day poured more money in than him. He won anyways, with charisma, grassroots energy, and fierce economic populism, and won over critics in the process (read this column from Dana Milbank on how he got on board with Abdul.) In a time of rising Islamophobia, this son of Egyptian immigrants would be the first Muslim U.S. Senator in history.
The stakes could not be higher. This is a state that Trump won narrowly, and if the GOP flips this seat the climb to taking the Senate – and more than that, the 52 seats we need to account for John Fetterman – becomes extremely steep. Former congressman Mike Rogers, who has cheered on the Trump agenda every step of the way, including calling the MAGA murder budget a “monumental victory” and the Trump tariffs “an absolute win” and supporting their blocking a new bridge to Canada (one conveniently opposed by a billionaire donor), and would be a rubber stamp for MAGA. He’s long supported a near-total abortion ban. He has gotten rich on his political connections since leaving Congress. We need to come together and make sure Dr. El-Sayed is the next senator from Michigan. 🙋🏽♀️ We can sign on to his volunteer list here and bookmark his Mobilize page for upcoming opportunities to help here. 🙋🏻♂️
In the other headline statewide race, Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson easily won the Democratic nomination for governor in the race to replace the outgoing Gretchen Whitmer. Benson has been at the forefront of the fight for voting rights and election protection during the Trump era, winning a Profile in Courage Award for her refusal to back down in the face of MAGA threats and harassment after the 2020 election. She’s emphasized expanding universal pre-K to three-year-olds and taking on Wall Street investors and outdated zoning laws to lower housing costs. (She’s also made it clear she understands the importance of winning the legislature to make her agenda feasible.) She’ll be up against Republican Congressman John James, a loyal MAGA soldier in DC who’s backed a near-total abortion ban. 🙋🏽♀️ We can sign up to help her beat him here. 🙋🏻♂️
Michigan’s Seventh Congressional District went to Trump by just one point in 2024, and Republican Tom Barrett won it by less than four. It’s a top target for Democrats, and Barrett knows it, which is why he’s started doing things like voting against Trump’s Iran War after initially cheerleading for it. Before he remembered he was running for re-election, he helped get the MAGA Murder Budget over the finish line, and voted with Donald Trump 99% of the time in 2025… and 100% of the time with the Heritage Foundation, including on cutting foreign aid and the SAVE Act. He’ll face off against Sunrise Movement co-founder Will Lawrence (known on Substack as William Lawrence for Congress), a hardline progressive who has pushed Medicare for All, a one-year moratorium on data centers, a billionaire minimum tax, holding ICE and the Epstein class accountable and, naturally, investing in clean energy. ☎️ We can find upcoming phonebanks for Will here and more volunteer opportunities here. ☎️
Michigan’s Tenth Congressional District is being abandoned by Rep. James, and while it moved to the right in recent years it’s still just R+3 and should be competitive in November. The Democratic nominee will be Christina Hines, a special victims unit prosecutor who has run on taking on high prices by targeting corporate price gouging and surveillance pricing and backed raising the minimum wage and paid family leave. She’s also rejected corporate PAC money. Her Republican opponent will be Army captain and Trump endorsee Mike Bouchard. ☎️ We can sign up to phonebank for her on Tuesdays here. ☎️
In a race that’s gone a little below the radar, state senator Sean McCann will be the Democratic challenger against longtime Republican congressman Bill Huizenga in the Fourth Congressional District. Huizenga, despite his relative honesty about supporting Social Security cuts, doesn’t look especially vulnerable on his own merits, but his district is shifting left and Trump only won it by six in 2024. A poll conducted for McCann’s campaign in June actually had him ahead, within the margin of error. As a legislator, McCann helped expand Medicaid and access to pre-K in Michigan, along with working for universal free school meals. Let’s see if we can pull off an upset! ☎️ We can sign up to phonebank for Sean on Thursdays here. ☎️
In Virginia…
The state supreme court may have blocked us from using a map that favors Democrats in 10 congressional districts in Virginia, but Trump’s economic failures have left us with a chance for a 9-2 delegation even on the current lines. We now have our nominees in three seats we’re hoping to pick up.
In the First District, Henrico County Commonwealth’s Attorney Shannon Taylor will be our challenger against Republican Congresswoman Rob Wittman. While Republicans scream about being tough on crime, Taylor has actually done it, making her jurisdiction a statewide leader in prosecuting sex traffickers and pioneering programs to support victims. She’s rejected corporate PAC money and endorsed a stock trading ban and tougher penalties for members of Congress caught stealing taxpayer funds, along with breaking up corporate monopolies. Wittman, by contrast, voted for the MAGA murder budget even after promising he wouldn’t because it cut Medicaid – perhaps because, as per this analysis by Accountable.US, he could personally benefit from as much as $60,000 in tax breaks from the bill. This district voted for Trump by just five points and should be competitive. 🙋🏽♀️ We can sign up to volunteer with Shannon here and find future opportunities on Mobilize here. 🙋🏻♂️
In the Second District, former Democratic congresswoman and Navy veteran Elaine Luria will get a rematch with GOP Rep. Jen Kiggans, who you may remember facing calls for resignation in May after she endorsed racist comments directed at House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries during a radio interview. Kiggans has given us plenty of reasons to want her ousted in her actual work, too, voting for the MAGA murder budget after pledging to protect Medicaid and then voting against an extension of the ACA tax credits after advocating for it. Luria is similarly emphasizing an anti-corruption agenda and was a champion for offshore wind during her time in Congress. Kiggans narrowly unseated Luria in 2022, but this is a swingy district widely regarded as a toss-up. ☎️ Luria has her general election effort up and running, and we can sign up to phonebank for her on Tuesdays and Thursdays here. ☎️
The Fifth District is a tougher climb, an R+6 district that Winsome Earle-Sears carried against Abby Spanberger by eight points last fall. But it’s the sort of reach seat that Democrats could flip in a wave election, and we’ve got a great candidate against unremarkable first-term MAGA Republican Congressman John McGuire, who unloaded BlackRock stock after Congress passed a ban on corporate investors owning single-family homes and is now invested in SpaceX. Tom Perriello flipped another deep-red seat in this area back in 2008, and he didn’t run away from his values after he won. He provided a crucial vote for the Affordable Care Act while pushing for the public option, and fought to hold Wall Street accountable even when party leadership resisted. It cost him his job, and he then went on to serve as a diplomat and work for nonprofits to protect rural health care and expand Medicaid. He’s been an advocate for doubling the minimum wage and stopping pipelines, and was a leader among statewide Democrats in refusing corporate donations. He’s run hard an affordability and against the tariffs and the Iran War. 🙋🏽♀️ We can find opportunities to volunteer with Tom here.🙋🏻♂️
If we want to help targeted races statewide, the coordinated campaign has phonebanks every Wednesday at 6PM we can sign up for here, and Center for Common Ground is reaching out to Black Virginians to get them out to vote on Tuesday evenings – we can take a shift here.
And of course, if you’re still looking for even MORE ways to help Democratics and progressive values win in these midterms, check out our continually-updated action page here!
👀 KEEPING AN EYE ON… 👀
NEWS: Domestic abuser and Republican congressman Max Miller will not drop out - volunteer to help Brian Poindexter beat this monster
NEWS: ICE arrests record 51,000 of our friends and neighbors in July, collects DNA of nearly one million people in 2025
NEWS: Trump deployment of National Guard in Washington to cost $1.4 billion extra - tell Congress to free DC
NEWS: Wired reports US military test of experimental GPS jammer kills pilots, nurses on medical flight
WEBINAR: The National Homelessness Law Center reviews the impact of Trump’s anti-homeless executive order one year in
COMMENTARY: Michele Hornish on putting the dollar-amount costs of right-wing government in context
COMMENTARY: Noah Berlatsky on the troublingly unacknowledged frequency of genocide as legally defined
National week of action against automatic license plate readers August 16th-22nd
Public comment on ANOTHER effort to politicize American science, grants through August 24th; learn more from Science Fight Club August 14th
Looking for more ways to get engaged in the midterms? Here’s a full list!
The Trump regime is trying to crush dissent and pro-immigrant advocacy - stand with targeted activists including VC Defensa, the Prairieland defendants, the Spokane 3, University of Michigan pro-Palestine organizers, the Minnesota 15, and lawyers for unaccompanied migrant children
Hotel workers in Seattle and transit workers in Mississippi are on strike, refinery workers in Indiana are locked out - show solidarity!
We will not stop demanding justice for Kohen Wiley - keep pressing Senatobia officials to release body cam, dash cam and Walmart surveillance footage of his killing
Pressure Vermont business park to evict ICE spy center and help Louisiana activists block a new children’s concentration camp