Love this. See end of video!

Simon we all really enjoyed talking to you as well. Thank you again for coming on and for a conversation so crucial to this moment!

Really enjoyed this timely and insightful conversation about the path forward with two dear friends... bsky.app/profile/wayt...

Really critical show for you all today with @simonwdc.bsky.social. We're at a moment of serious peril for this country. As the craziness ratchets up, our efforts have to also. An excellent ep to send to your less involved friends! 📺 youtu.be/bhMxRP1ugRw 🍎 podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/c...

"We're looking at congressional districts across the South & Southwest that have real Latino swing voters in them to make sure they understand just how extreme the impact of Trump's budget bill has been in gutting Medicaid & food assistance," Tory Gavito tells Axios. www.axios.com/2025/09/18/d...

Excited to join the Board of the Way to Win Action Fund, a 501(c)(4) that supports advocacy, organizing, and media interventions in critical states. With a full-scale fascist attack on progressive orgs and donors under way, we need groups like @waytowinus.bsky.social more than ever. waytowin.us

Seems like good advice to us.

Good analysis on the strategies that Democrats need to take to win back missing voters for the midterms and beyond. @ronbrownstein.bsky.social @torygavito.bsky.social @waytowinus.bsky.social podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/c...

I honestly do not care about some pundit’s opinion on what a government shutdown may or may not look like in an election a year from now. We are beyond that. Whatever can be done to slow down this speed run towards authoritarianism is necessary and should be done.

Trump cratering in new NBC/CBS polls, too "It’s all terrible for Trump. He is deeply underwater...and despite idiotic commentary from Dem analysts he is also deeply underwater on his invasion of US cities." Read @simonwdc.bsky.social. Discusses my new piece www.hopiumchronicles.com/p/our-recomm...

We're noticing another uptick in focus on voters who flipped from Biden in 2020 to Trump in 2024. This is an odd selective focus as they were roughly offset by the number of Trump to Harris voters, and there were roughly 3x as many skippers - Biden voters that sat out 2024. A 🧵 with research:

To get out of the wilderness, we have to identify who/what led us on the wrong path. Truly a must read not just about the conditions that led to 2024, but a strategy to fight back!

The only way to persuade someone of something is you tell them a story and make an argument that makes more goddamn sense than the other guys' story. It's all you can do. Pixar was right: story is king. Be friends with them or not, doesn't matter. To persuade you have to be persuasive.

Are you wondering if the electoral system is going to hold up in 2026? Couple things to consider. ✅ The distributed nature of the American electoral system makes it hard to turn off. ✅ It's held up for the specials so far. ✅ Joni Ernst retiring abruptly seems to indicate SHE thinks it will hold up.

So ICE is now fighting a drug war? And the Pentagon? And the Coast Guard? And DEA? And yes, this....

Winning elections takes more than math. The pro-democracy coalition has been losing the imagination battle. We (and many others!) have been working to turn this around. A look back at a few of the big-effort narrative ads we've made as one part of that effort.

(Funny how this is arguably also a storyline of recent years in politics, with data-driven optimizations and poll-tested message development having sent Democrats up a few blind alleys.)

NEW Charting the Way Forward with two absolutely fantastic organizers from NC and GA, connecting local and national struggles. If you have friends that think "the groups" are why Dems are struggling, please send them this one! 📺 youtu.be/61a0pwy-UsQ 🍎 podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/c...

NEW short take, @danancona.bsky.social with some thoughts on why depolarization and more bipartisanship aren't going to solve our problems, even though a LOT of voters are telling us that's something they want, and how feeble Democratic strategies generated this problem.

You can also hear @torygavito.bsky.social and @celindalake.bsky.social on KALW, with Daniel HoSang - on right now! Streaming here - www.kalw.org

"A new Way to Win poll, conducted with Lake Research Partners, offers a rarity for Democrats in this political moment: Hope," write @jenancona.bsky.social & @celindalake.bsky.social in USA Today Opinion. www.usatoday.com/story/opinio...

NEW Charting the Way Forward: 🫧🧨 BUBBLE DYNAMITE 🫧🧨 with @joesudbay.bsky.social, on how reality is starting to break through to the various DC bubbles, and how we all can accelerate this process. YT: www.youtube.com/watch?v=hBAC... Apple Pods: podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/c...

Just tried watching Ezra Klein’s latest NYT podcast episode on how the U.S. got to this point where vaccines are so politicized. It’s pretty clear that Klein and his guests—David Wallace Wells and Rachael Bedard—really do not understand why/how the political right turned on vaccines.

My team really is the coolest...

Yes!! Yes!

Good piece on @waytowinus.bsky.social's research with @celindalake.bsky.social on the Biden "Skippers" (folks who voted D in 2020 and sat out the 2024 election). This is a crucial group whose absence was decisive in Trump's win. 1/ campaignsandelections.com/industry-new...

“Everything we’ve learned from our research shows that these voters really want to vote for Democrats. They just want Democrats to want them,” Gavito said. “They want Democrats to act like they’re going to fight for them.” campaignsandelections.com/industry-new...

This sort of admission—the VP is involved in prosecutorial decisions, the "concerns" arise from political actors, and the administration knows they don't have probable cause—would have prompted the Founders to impeach everyone involved.

🚨WORDS DEMS SHOULD NOT USE🚨 The team had an emergency meeting (fine, it was 3 of us on a slack thread) and we realized that it's true, incrementally more inclusive language really IS a much bigger problem than letting the right use white supremacy to take $79T from the rest of us. Behold: our list!

“Gavin Newsom is doing something leading Democrats could and should have done a long time ago, but they were too busy listening to the wrong people.” @brianbeutler.bsky.social

If you are in line to dunk on the @thirdway.bsky.social list of Democratic Speech Police No No Words, please, STAY IN LINE. But a sort of serious point: even before the votes were counted last November, we knew we had BIG problems. And while Dems arguably use research in the wrong ways, we knew 🧵

This will be a good one.

“It would be naïve to call 2024 anything other than a reckoning on the Democratic brand,” Way to Win President @torygavito.bsky.social tells NYT. “To solve a brand problem, you need people talking about that brand — and that requires partisan dollars." www.nytimes.com/2025/08/20/u...

NEW Charting the Way Forward, feat. "Gen Z's Walter Cronkite," @aaronparnas.bsky.social! Maddie Medved hosts and dives into what life is like running the #1 news substack on Earth. Stick around for the 3 Media Things at the end! In all the usual places: Apple podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/c...

Thank you Ross!!

NEW Charting the Way Forward, with rising star ace researcher Caitlin Jury of @equislabs.bsky.social! MAGA is making big bets on Latino realignment, but it might not be so simple. YT www.youtube.com/watch?v=oZI2... Apple podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/c... Spotify open.spotify.com/episode/3fQB...

@netrootsnation.bsky.social 2025! It was so powerful to be in community with long time collaborators like and more, and make new friends in NOLA! Can't wait to see everyone again in Philly next year. @anatosaurus.bsky.social @murshedz.bsky.social @waytowinus.bsky.social @movementvoter.bsky.social

Happy Thursday, new Charting! We had on the charming and brilliant @pbump.com. Highlights include his takes on abundance, not just whether Dems need to run against the party but how, and why Dems need ambition. YT: youtu.be/vl7L9tpsFN4?... Apple: podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/c...

Should have held off my rant until I finished listening. See this exchange; they need to understand decades of conservative investment in media and persuasion is a real thing and giving them sustained cumulative advantage. The interesting question isn't why this is happening. It's how we counter it.

Quick short take on @thebulwark.com interview with Dan Osborn. Voters aren't asking for candidates that "share MAGA cultural resentments." They want to hear a clear story about why things feel so broken in this country and what we all can do about it, not more blaming trans kids and immigrants.

Like the Abundance folks I want government to work faster, but for people. In an era of extreme climate events, witnessing deregulation and lack of public infrastructure investment, particularly in "drill, baby, drill... build, baby, build" states like Texas, is to witness catastrophe.

How to Engage the 6 Million Dems Who Did NOT Vote in 2024: "We have to run a new generation of candidates who stand for something, and then we have to lay out an agenda." – @celindalake.bsky.social on @thenation.com podcast bit.ly/41ecjhA @waytowinus.bsky.social

IT NEEDS TO BE SHOUTED FROM THE ROOFTOPS THAT MAGA HAD A DELIBERATE SOCIAL ENGINEERING PLAN TO DEPORT LATINO FARMWORKERS AND FORCE BLACK PEOPLE TO DO FARM WORK BY GETTING RID OF SOCIAL WELFARE PROGRAMS

Republicans mess with Texas. @waytowinus.bsky.social President @torygavito.bsky.social & Latino political expert Kristian Ramos talk about why we need to pay attention to the over-the-top gerrymandering going on in the Lone Star State. chartingthewayforward.buzzsprout.com/2415376/epis...

*'Abundance' Is a Trojan Horse* The new centrism has a PR team—and it's selling deregulation in a hoodie —>>New Substack from @torygavito.bsky.social on how the abundance agenda creates a cycle of misery with the poorest paying the steepest price chartingthewayforward.substack.com/p/abundance-...

🧵—>>Statement from Way to Win President and 7th generation Texan Tory Gavito (@torygavito.bsky.social) on the Texas Republican power grab: "This brazen Republican power grab is nothing short of intentional racial discrimination—a clear assault on voters of color across the state of Texas. ...

This was a good one!

Dear Charting the Way Forward fans: the team is on retreat this week and the internet is pretty flimsy here on site, so we're taking the week off. We will be back next week with more intelligence from across the Dem/left family. Hope you're all getting to retreat a little this summer too. ♥️🗽

We're excited to have been able to chip in a little on this!

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