Beto O’Rourke, the woke Democrat politician from Texas who has lost multiple elections to both Gov. Greg Abbot and Sen. Ted Cruz, sounded off about President Trump in an interview on CNN, declaring that Democrats have to be “absolutely ruthless” in fighting President Donald Trump to get back into political power.
As backround, Beto became something of a hope for Texas Democrats in 2018, when he rose into prominence from being a mostly unknown congressman from El Paso during a close race against Sen. Ted Cruz, against whom he lost. Beto then lost a string of major elections in the next few years, including a major defeat against Abbot in 2022, meaning he suffered four major, expensive defeats in just 4 years. He then mostly faded out of the news.
Now he is back and calling for a “ruthless” fight against the president. Such is what he said during a Sunday, July 20, appearance on CNN’s “State of the Union” with Jake Tapper. Tapper kicked things off by asking about the ongoing redistricting battle in Texas, saying, “The Texas legislature, run by Republicans, their special session begins tomorrow. Democrats say they’re going to use whatever means necessary they can to block this redistricting effort but Democrats are in the minority, as you know. Realistically, what are the Democratic options to block this?”
Responding, Beto lost it over the Big Beautiful Bill, insisting that doing things like ending taxes on overtime and tips is benefiting the top 1% at the expense of everyone else. He said, “Donald Trump’s policies, whether it’s the Big, Beautiful Bill that’s going to take nearly 2 million Texans off of Medicaid or transfer nearly $1 trillion of wealth to the richest 1% at the expense of working families. His policies are deeply unpopular.”
Continuing, Beto insisted that because the BBB is so popular, the president is pushing for gerrymandering in Texas, saying, “He doesn’t want to face accountability from the voters, and he’s worried about keeping his very slim majority in Congress. So he’s trying to pick up five seats through this redistricting process in Texas.”
Beto then insisted that Democrats need to “fight back” by engaging in procedural delay, saying, “Now to your question about how we fight back, there are a number of things that we can do. One, the Democratic state legislators can deny their Republican colleagues a quorum to be able to move forward on this.”
Adding to that, Beto called on Gov. Newsom to engage in gerrymandering, saying, “There’s more that we can do. Governor Gavin Newsom in California has talked about a redistricting in his state. I think it’s time that we match fire with fire. I think Democrats in the past too often have been more concerned with being right than being in power. And we’ve seen the Republicans only care about being in power regardless of what is right.”
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Responding, Tapper ridiculously insisted that California was being fair and unbiased in its redistricting process, saying, “So you support the Newsom effort because California right now has an independent commission that does districts in as fair a way as possible in nonpartisan way as possible. You’re saying Democrats should, even though you don’t approve of it, Democrats should do it, too?”
That’s when the multi-time failure insisted that Democrats need to get “ruthless” in fighting Republicans, saying, “We have to get serious. We have to be absolutely ruthless about getting back in power. So, yes, in California, in Illinois, in New York, wherever we have the trifecta of power, we have to use that to its absolute extent. And then the last thing this may end up biting Republicans in the. You have the possibility that they will disperse Republican voters to make up these three or 4 or 5 new congressional districts and put those districts in play.”
Concluding, he said, “So in Texas, we’ve got to get out there and register and meet the voters who are going to decide the outcomes in these next elections. If they’re successful with this redistricting, our group powered by people is doing this right now on the ground. We can’t wait for 2026. We’ve got to do the work right now in 2025.”
Watch him here:
Featured image credit: screengrab from the embedded video