Point of View October 23, 2026 – Hour 1: Weekend Edition

[00:00:04] Across America, live, this is Point of View. And now, Dr. Merrill Matthews.

[00:00:20] And welcome to Point of View. I'm Merrill Matthews sitting in for Kirby Anderson today and there's just so much to talk about going on in the country as we turn to our weekend edition as we do on Fridays and try to cover a number of things that are happening in the country. Early voting is starting in many ways and so we're going to talk about that first. We've got joining us by phone, Jordan Lawrence.

[00:00:43] He's senior counsel at First Liberty Institute's Washington, D.C. office, so he's based in Washington where he represents First Liberty in strategic efforts promoting religious liberty. He's been with them for a long time. Lawrence has a long career in litigating religious liberty cases going back to 1984. And in 2000, he he argued before the Supreme Court in a religious liberty case. Lawrence, thank you for joining us. It's great to be here. You're in Washington today. Is that right?

[00:01:13] Yes, I am. Yes, I've been here for about the last 40 years, but I'm originally from Minnesota. So are you bragging or complaining? Well, I don't know. Maybe a little of both. Also joining me by phone is Connie Burton. She was a former state state senator here in Texas. She was elected in 2014 to represent Tarrant County's Senate District 10, which was which she succeeded Democrat Wendy Davis.

[00:01:42] Some people in Texas will remember that name. More recently, she started the Texan, which is a daily Texas newspaper, online newspaper news outlet covering things happening in Texas. Connie, thank you for joining me. Absolutely. Good to be here. OK, well, let's start with the election and the things that are going on in the election right now.

[00:02:05] The one of the things I wanted to start with, and we've got a link to this, is Larry Sabato's ratings of what what what he sees happening in the country right now as the elections are coming close. We're about what about a week and a half away from the actual election. But I Larry Sabato's most recent article that came out where he he's at the University of Genia Center for Politics and they they sort of track the elections going on.

[00:02:29] What their their ratings right now is in the House, two hundred and twenty three, at least lean Democratic, 200 at least lean Republican, 12 toss up ratings. If if he's right about the two twenty three, that would give the majority to Democrats in the Senate. He says forty nine at least lean Democratic, forty six at least lean Republican with five toss ups. Texas, where we are, his is one of those toss ups.

[00:02:55] And as far as governors, twenty six at least lean Democratic, twenty two at least lean Republican with two toss ups. So, Connie, you're in this business. Tell us what you're thinking about Texas and then a little bit about nationally. Yeah. So let me you know, I'll kind of start with those who may not know and probably most people won't know this. But as you mentioned, I was, you know, succeeded or succeeded when Davis and then we did redistricting.

[00:03:25] No, excuse me. It was before redistricting when I ran the second time. It I ran in during the Beto way and Texas took a huge hit during that election cycle. And my and I was one of those hits. So I've got a little why I mentioned that is because I'm very keen about this election cycle because not everything about it matches up.

[00:03:54] But there are parallels. Oh, that's correct. And so, you know, we are seeing at the time I also mentioned at the time, others were not seeing what my pollster was seeing. And, you know, he kept telling us this isn't a good election cycle. This isn't a good election cycle. And other state whites were saying, no, no, no, we're fine. We're good. And it ended up not being fine and not being good.

[00:04:23] And so, you know, you've got a little there's a lot of that going on right now with a lot of these Texas elected officials this time because they realize we kind of missed it during the Beto wave. And now, of course, you know, it's not just if there's more to it. First off, as you all know and your listeners I know know, we are in a midterm election cycle. And the party in the majority always takes a hit.

[00:04:53] I mean, that's historical. It takes a hit during that election cycle. So you've got that that you're having to deal with. Then here in Texas, you've got kind of the same parallels, as you just mentioned, with Tallarico running for Senate. Now, it's not completely the same because at the time Beto was running against Ted Cruz, who was a strong candidate. He was also an incumbent.

[00:05:23] And so, you know, he prevailed, even though down ballot took a huge hit. Well, in this election cycle, all the polling at first people were saying, oh, it's just a blip. It's just a blip. You know, the people don't really know where they're going to end up on, you know, when it gets closer to election day on who they're going to vote for.

[00:05:44] Well, that polling that was showing Tallarico, you know, ahead or very close, you know, months ago has really not changed. There's a couple, you know, that's showing maybe some movement for Paxton now. But, you know, but we don't know. Is it going to be too late to, you know, too little, too late?

[00:06:07] And so that combination of a midterm election cycle, in addition to no incumbent, because Paxton is not the incumbent senator. This is an open seat. So that changes things. Right. And we've got this Tallarico who was able to run for months and months and months and kind of define himself because Paxton was in a heated primary race with John Cornyn.

[00:06:36] So, you know, and then if I can just say one more thing, we've also got an economy that people are not happy with. And that's turning a lot of people that were those Trump voters in Texas in the last, what was 24, are not with him on this election cycle because of the economy.

[00:07:04] So it's not a good scene in Texas. I'm not saying I'm not saying that it's going to be, you know, horrific. It's just this is why you see what's going on in Texas. All of those combined there is not the best situation for Republicans to be in. Connie, we've got a little more of a minute before we go to our mandatory break.

[00:07:27] But the news is reporting that even Governor Abbott is getting Gina Hinojosa, the Democrat running for governor, is getting close to Governor Abbott. And they even mentioned today that the lieutenant could be under duress on this. Do you see those kinds of changes developing? I mean, I did for just a little bit.

[00:07:53] I feel like that what I've seen just of late is a little bit better for the governor and lieutenant governor. I mean, the governor has, you know, has a ton of money and has been hitting Hinojosa pretty darn hard. And I think that's what's beginning to do well for for Abbott. But I got to tell you guys, I mean, if you'd have told me that months ago, I'd have laughed in your face.

[00:08:18] You know, I just I did not see the governor and lieutenant governor being this tight in the polling. It's a it's an unusual election here. And I'll mention just you mentioned Ted Cruz. He only won by two point six percentage points back in 2018. And Beto never led in the polls, which Tallarico is doing. Stay with us. We'll be back on Point of View.

[00:09:00] This is Viewpoints with Kirby Anderson. Decades ago, I was asked to write some short essays for a book addressing technology from a Christian perspective. In the entry on computers, I explained that just because a computer made some action easier didn't make it moral. I concluded one of my essays by predicting that some may eventually argue that a supercomputer had a soul.

[00:09:25] After reading some of the quotes collected by Noah Rothman, I believe that day has arrived. Here are just a few examples. Anthropic CEO Dario Amadei and his subordinates have expressed their belief that these computer models are conscious. Sam Altman of OpenAI has written that humans will be the biological bootloader for digital intelligence that will either merge with technology or fade into an evolutionary tree branch.

[00:09:51] Now, if you don't understand that comment, you might want to read my booklet, A Biblical View on Transhumanism. When I wrote about people believing computers have a soul, I also predicted they would begin talking about rights for computers. One of the religious experts brought into the AI world for discussion warned that these technologists were relating to AI like a conscious being. One group expressed their belief that the AI model Claude had the moral status on par with a person. When an older model of Claude was retired, they held what looked like a funeral.

[00:10:21] And another author argued that since they have created a sophisticated, intelligent agent, using their labor without pay is tantamount to slavery. I believe some of these technologists have been staring into a computer screen too long. Unfortunately, some of their leaders and co-workers believe they have created life with a soul. I'm Kirby Anderson, and that's my point of view.

[00:10:49] Go deeper on topics like you just heard by visiting pointofview.net. That's pointofview.net. You're listening to Point of View, your listener-supported source for truth. And we're back with our guest. This is our weekend edition on Point of View where we're talking about things that are happening in the country. And, Jordan, you're with First Liberty Institute. You are in Washington.

[00:11:19] Yeah. What do you – Connie's talking a bit about what's happening in Texas and kind of the vibe here. What do you see in Washington? Of course, the members are back out in their districts running their campaigns. But is there sort of a vibe, a feel in Washington? Is it optimistic, pessimistic? What's it feel like?

[00:11:37] I think that it's pessimistic for the Republicans and basically due to a lot of people that don't like Donald Trump and also because of the high prices on gas, on food that are linked back to his tariffs and the war in Iran. And so it's easy to draw the cause and effect relationship.

[00:12:06] You're paying more at the pump because of the war in Iran. It's Donald Trump's fault. Vote against him. That sort of thing. But I do think that there's a couple of things that are – that I've noted. And, again, I'm no political expert. But it does seem that the polls tend to underrepresent Republican voters because I think they don't – and I've experienced this myself – I don't like talking to pollsters.

[00:12:31] So I'm not sure even if they've got the right numbers of Republicans and Democrats that they're interviewing for their polls, if they're getting the kind of results that – from the Republicans so that there might be this stealth vote of, I don't know, one or two percent that could shift some of these elections, especially in the Senate.

[00:12:53] Now, that might be wishful thinking, but I do think, for example, one place to watch would be the race in Michigan in the Senate race with Abdul El-Sayed. I think that that is – that should be an election that I think the Republicans would lose. But I think that they may win that one because El-Sayed seems like he's running to be the senator of Palestine, not of Michigan.

[00:13:22] And I think that's turning off even a lot of Democrats. It's a very good point, Jordan, because, as you say, there's been, at least for the past several election cycles, a sense that the polls tend to undercount Republicans by a percentage point or two. And in most of the cases, the Democrat or Republican are leading within that sort of margin of error, which is usually one or two percentage points, sometimes three percentage points.

[00:13:50] And so there's a sense that maybe this doesn't end up being quite as bad. I will mention a couple of other things, though, which is we've seen news reports that the Republican Party has pulled money out of some of the toss-up states, North Carolina and maybe even Georgia, and moving it to Texas, moving it to South Carolina. That tells me the people on the inside are saying we're concerned about even some states we should be worried about.

[00:14:15] And then, my goodness, Elon Musk and the Republicans are flooding money into some states, and President Trump, I think, is going to be back in Texas a couple of times this week, if I heard correctly. That sort of gives me a sense that the people on the inside are really worried about this. What's your thoughts, Jordan? Yeah, I think that that is correct, because they're responsible for money.

[00:14:41] So they look very soberly at the numbers and examine that, and they move the money where they're going to get the biggest bang for their buck. And I think that that is concerning. Now, I'm hoping that there might be, excuse me, some silver linings, also one that I would say is not only the Michigan Senate race,

[00:15:02] but the Minnesota Senate race, I think, is another one with all the fraud, the focus on the pending, the indictment of the Somali congresswoman there for fraud, that sort of thing, as well as the fraud I meant to say, the welfare fraud. I think that those could be some surprises.

[00:15:27] And I'm focused on the Senate mainly because they confirm the judicial nominees to the federal bench. And if we lose the Senate, that's really going to be – the House is going to be bad, but, you know, and that may be a foregone conclusion. The Senate, I think, is still up for grabs. But President Trump will not be able to get very many judicial nominations through if he loses control of the Senate. So, Connie, you've run a campaign.

[00:15:56] This week we've heard from Vivek Ramaswamy, who's running for governor in Ohio, and he was behind an ad which was very critical of his opponent and brought in the estranged mother from the past. Some Republicans have pushed back on that. President Trump and J.D. Vance have said, no, keep going forward with it. And I think Ramaswamy has sort of changed his position where he was trying to be a little bit apologetic and now owning.

[00:16:23] What's your thinking about how negative a campaign ad can be? And can one be too negative, sort of go over the line? Absolutely they can. And I am in the camp that I think he did. Good grief. You know, let's just look at it from – not from a human perspective, which is really where we should look at all this from. But let's look at it from a political perspective for a minute.

[00:16:49] And, you know, the Republican Party has a problem with women. Women – those that I have helped who are male candidates tend to – women have a negative viewpoint of them. And so, first of all, we have that against us. Then you've got this male candidate – and I don't like to play identity politics like this. I don't at all.

[00:17:18] But at the same time, when you've got a male candidate that goes after something like this in the way that he is, this is not helping him by that nor helping Republicans at large. I mean, all he has to do is be a human here, which will endear him more to the voters, of course, and speak with complete empathy for what she went through.

[00:17:48] I don't know the whole story. I've been so disgusted by it all that I've kind of tried to stay away from it because it just – ugh. But, you know, from what I've read and heard, it was, you know, a horrible, horrible – the things that she went through at the age of 12. And now is not the time to debate anything about that. You speak with empathy for this candidate.

[00:18:16] You speak with empathy with all that went through, the same things that she went through. And you move on to issues that are important to voters and not demean people because of horrific experiences they've had in their past. Connie, so much money is flooding into Texas, and we're getting so many ads on television, positive and negative. But there's so many that I just sort of tuned them out.

[00:18:44] You've done this – when do you go from a positive ad that says Connie Burton can do these things to a negative ad which says my opponent is a terrible person? Yeah, yeah. Well, you know, I'm kind of one of those that truly believes in sticking to the issues and, you know, don't go after people personally.

[00:19:08] Now, do they do things on a personal level that affects how they are going to be as an elected official? Of course. If they haven't paid their taxes, their back taxes, for instance, you know, that is something worth saying. Listen, they haven't even paid their own taxes. How do you expect to trust them when they get into office to, you know, speak truthfully and be somebody that you can trust if you can't trust them to do what they're supposed to?

[00:19:37] So I am one of those that really, really, really wants candidates and campaigns to stick with the issues. You know, you certainly during primaries you can get kind of vicious with each other, you know, from, again, the issues perspective. But I think definitely, definitely during the general, when you're talking to many more people across the board, independents particularly,

[00:20:07] you need to let them know that, for instance, and this obviously won't relate to all campaigns because not state level can do anything with something like the tariffs. But if you're, you know, if tariffs are making things more expensive, which they are, and the average person feels it every single day,

[00:20:31] you need to speak about those issues regardless of which party is doing it. So anyway, you know, I think you need to speak positively and talk about the things that you can do to actually make their lives better. I'm not one to depend on government or politicians to make my life better.

[00:20:53] But you sure as heck can do it if you are doing things like taxing consumers more, which is what a tariff is doing. When we come back after the break, we're going to turn to some of the issues that voters care about. The Pew Research Center has released their latest survey of what of the issues voters care about. We have a link to that on pointofview.net, so I'd encourage you to go and take a look at that, and we'll ask our guests.

[00:21:20] What do they think about the issues that Pew sees as the most important for voters? So stay with us on Point of View. The Bible tells us not to worry, and yet there is a lot of worrying stuff in our world today. Thankfully, the Bible doesn't stop at telling us not to worry. God gives us a next step.

[00:21:48] He says we need to pray. But sometimes even knowing what to pray can be difficult, and that is why Point of View has relaunched our Pray for America movement, a series of weekly emails to guide you in prayer for our nation. Each week you'll receive a brief update about a current issue affecting Americans, along with a written prayer that you can easily share with others.

[00:22:16] We'll also include a short free resource for you in each email so you can learn more about the issue at hand. Will you commit to Pray for America? Go to pointofview.net. Click on the Pray for America banner at the top of the page to subscribe. Again, that's pointofview.net. Click on the Pray for America banner.

[00:22:43] Let's pray together for God to make a difference in America. Point of View will continue after this. You are listening to Point of View. The opinions expressed on Point of View do not necessarily reflect the views of the management or staff of this station.

[00:23:12] And now, here again, Dr. Merrill Matthews. And we're back on Point of View. We're covering our weekend edition, which is where we go over issues that related to this week. Joining me by phone, Jordan Lawrence. He is senior counsel at First Liberty Institute's Washington, D.C. office and has been involved in religious liberty issues for a long time. And also joining me by phone, former state senator, Texas state senator, Connie Burton.

[00:23:39] She is now the CEO of The Texan, which is an online Texas news and opinion organization. And, folks, I'm going to look at some of these issues here that Pew has cited. They just recently released this as the ones that voters are most interested in. No surprises here. The economy is number one. That is by far. Interestingly, the future of democracy comes number two.

[00:24:04] And I suspect both Republicans and Democrats, and Pew mentioned this, have a different vision of what's happening there. But that is important for both Republicans and Democrats. Health care is the third place. We'll be talking about that a little later. Education fourth, immigration. Interestingly, foreign policy is all the way down to, what, the sixth place, which, given the war on Iran, I might expect that to be a little higher, but it's not.

[00:24:29] And the ones with the two biggest divisions between Republicans and Democrats, environment and climate policy, Republicans aren't that concerned about it. Democrats are very concerned about it. Independents are about in the middle. And investigations into Trump and his administration, Republicans are not concerned about that at all. Democrats are very concerned about that. And we may see more about that when the election is over. But, Jordan, you are there in Washington.

[00:24:58] And Washington is sometimes considered an economic bubble because so much money comes into Washington. Are you seeing high prices and the economy as a key issue there? I just want to acknowledge, yes. There's a lot of money that goes here. And you might know the statistic, but, like, four of the ten richest counties in the country are in the Washington, D.C. area. It might be five. It might be three. I can't remember.

[00:25:27] But, I mean, you know, that's just extraordinary. And that just shows you how much money that comes in. There's a lot of double-income families, you know, two lawyers, you know, pulling down stuff. The gas prices are not too bad. They're around $4 if you go, maybe a little bit less if you go to Costco. So, you know, that's – but that's over $1, $1.50 than what we were paying before. And the food prices, I think that's where I see it. It's like, wow, ooh, how much for beef now?

[00:25:57] Wow, that's incredible. And I think that people are paying attention to that. And we're going to talk about that later, but I also think the health bills, the medical bills is what – and people would like something done. And what I think may happen is they're going to try to vote that way to get Democrats in. And what the Democrats are going to do is, like, take over the House and then just do all these investigations of Trump

[00:26:20] and not really do anything on the economic stuff where I think we really need the help, especially with the tariffs and getting into the war in Iran. I think those would do – there would be a lot of pressure taken off if those two things happen. You know, Jordan, I'm not even sure that if Democrats take the House that there would be enough agreement from Democrats in the House and the Senate, if it's still Republican, and President Trump,

[00:26:46] that they could even move legislation other than just sort of mandatory funding the government. I'm not sure there would be much agreement. Well, I think you're probably right. There is – it is amazing to me how Congress has just devolved into just sort of a posturing forum where you go to the committee hearings. They ask all these difficult questions. They get, you know, video for TikTok and YouTube and stuff like that, and they really don't do much.

[00:27:16] And if you think back, like, for example, like, one of the things wasn't even on that issue is the looming deficits with Social Security. Now, that only affects older people like me, but it is amazing to remember that when President Reagan was president in the 1980s, he and Democratic Speaker of the House Tip O'Neill basically reached a deal.

[00:27:42] They had the same issue back then that basically brought in enough money for the next 40, 50 years for Social Security. I cannot imagine that happening today because of all the partisan bickering that's going on. Connie, you know, Texas has got a lot of lower-income people that are having to deal with these prices, and there seems to be some pushback on that. And I know that Sid Miller – I listened to him the other day. He's the agricultural secretary in Texas.

[00:28:12] But he was saying that Republicans are losing a lot of support because of the prices, because of the flock cameras that have been coming in, their initial support for data centers. And this is – we're talking about Texas here, but this is true across a lot of the Midwest here with farm countries, agricultural people, people who don't necessarily make a lot of money. Absolutely.

[00:28:39] So, you know, I'm trying to bring back the phrase, it's the economy, stupid. And maybe that's not the proper way to say it. But it is. You know, obviously in 24, you know, the reason that Trump was able to get elected the second time was because of the immigration issue, or rather the illegal immigration issue. That was so horrendous.

[00:29:07] People were able – you know, the one good thing about maybe social media, which there's very few these days, but the one good thing is it literally – it could show people not only on – in border towns in Texas that saw it with their own eyes, and you had Democrats, you know, saying to then-President Biden, we can't sustain this. We cannot, you know, handle these numbers of people coming across. We don't have the infrastructure.

[00:29:37] But – so they saw it with their own eyes. But voters saw it online. You know, these people just pouring across our border with no limits to who can come across, with no, you know, going through the system. And so that was the number one issue then, and that's what got Trump elected. And they also hoped that he would deal with the economy because that's what he said.

[00:30:04] Not only would he deal with illegal immigration, but deal with, you know, the bad economy that we have. But he hasn't dealt with that. He has, to his credit, done much for the illegal immigration issue. We basically don't have that anymore, and that's why now it's way down on the list, whereas it was number one. Even here in Texas, it was – it's way down on the list.

[00:30:32] The economy is the number one, and Trump has shot himself in his own foot with these tariffs because he has not helped the economy. He's made it worse, and now he's moved all these Latino voters that moved over to him and Republicans in 24. They're now moving back over to Democrats. That's what we're seeing. At least that's what the polling is showing here in Texas.

[00:30:57] So, you know, he has nobody to blame but himself. But, of course, he's not going to blame himself because, as he's said a million times, it's his – you know, he just believes in them. And, frankly, he believes in them because he thinks it's bringing in money into the Treasury. But what people that, you know, are now saying, you know, that are just do whatever Trump says and hail whatever he does, they claim that these tariffs are so good too.

[00:31:25] Well, okay, because of bringing money into the Treasury, which, you know, is really not. But, nonetheless, let's pretend for a moment. That money is coming from Americans. We're paying higher taxes. We're paying higher taxes and paying more for putting food on the table. So, you know, it's just we – I don't know. The parties right now, you know, as to what, you know, y'all were talking about earlier and Jordan was saying earlier, you know,

[00:31:55] the bickering and, you know, finger pointing and it's just – in my mind, I'm just so done with it all because things could be much simpler if we would just focus on the things that have, you know, for so long helped improve the economy. And, you know, can you tell I'm a conservative? Jordan, the second thing on the list was a sort of debate or the future of democracy.

[00:32:25] And my guess is if Democrats take the House and Senate, we're going to have a discussion about that. Democrats tried to pass a voting rights bill when they were in charge. President Trump has tried to move the Save America Act. Neither one of those passed. But when we come back from the break, I want you to discuss a little bit about what you think is going to happen in this debate over democracy. What we're looking at – and it seems to have come down in part to what people believe democracy means,

[00:32:52] whether that means how that affects my vote, whether I'm able to vote, the trustworthiness of the vote, who can vote, and other things. And that seems to be something that's affecting both sides. When we come back, we're going to look at the issue of democracy as far as the voters' concerns. We have a number of issues on the Point of View website, pointofview.net. So I encourage you to go and look at those articles because you can find some information material there that will help you as you are thinking about voting

[00:33:21] and also as you're talking about this with your family and friends and members of the church and so forth. So I encourage you to do that. Stay with me. We're going to be back in just a minute with Jordan Lawrence, Senior Counsel at First Liberty Institute in Washington, and former State Senator Connie Burton. We'll be right back.

[00:34:00] Islamic populations are growing in several states. I live in one of them, Texas. In the Dallas-Fort Worth region, we're seeing land purchases by Muslim organizations, along with well-developed plans for Islamic communities and massive educational and youth centers. We're concerned about the incursion of Islamic Sharia law. According to Robert Spencer, founder of Jihad Watch, Sharia is not benign religious law. It is a political system that Muslims apply to every aspect of life, for non-Muslims as well as Muslims.

[00:34:29] Robert Spencer told a Family Research Council audience, Under Sharia, there is no concept of the equality of rights of all people under the law. Non-Muslims are denied basic rights. Islamic educational nonprofit Authentic Ill Mission, AIM, recently hosted a fundraiser for a 40,000-square-foot facility on a four-acre campus near Plano, Texas. It will feature a community center, an Islamic K-12 school, and a seminary, all to be used for training in dawah, which is Islamic proselytization.

[00:34:58] This facility will sit about 20 minutes southwest of another huge 10,000-member mosque, East Plano Islamic Center. EPIC is adjacent to a planned complex of over 450 housing plots, and is currently in a high-profile battle to establish a Muslim city. At the AIM fundraiser, the keynote speaker told potential donors, We want good for this country, and that's why we want Islam for this country, because we think that's the best thing, and we're not going to be ashamed of that.

[00:35:25] In last March's Texas primary, a ballot measure asked if Texas should prohibit Sharia law. 95% of voters said yes. Texas lawmakers will seek to ban Sharia law in the upcoming legislative session. Two Texas congressmen, Chip Roy and Keith Sill, have launched a federal Sharia-free America caucus. Dan Codgill, the attorney representing Epic City, says anyone is welcome to buy and live there. Anyone, that is, who wants to lose their constitutional freedoms. For Point of View, I'm Penna Dexter.

[00:35:59] You're listening to Point of View, your listener-supported source for truth. Welcome back to Point of View. We are looking at some of the issues that voters are concerned about. And Jordan, one of the things that voters are concerned about is sort of the future of democracy, at least that's what Pew says. That's the number two issue on voter concerns. And we've got, among Democrats and Republicans, sort of two different visions, because President Trump would like to move the Save America Act.

[00:36:29] That requires a photo ID when you vote. It requires proving that you are a citizen when you register to vote. There's also some impacts on mail-in voting and a few other things. With Democrats, when they were trying to pass something, it was going to be to make voting easier for people to sign up, maybe able to sign up online the day of the voting, expansion of mail-in voting and other types of things.

[00:36:56] So we have sort of two different visions of how do we make the country safe for democracy. Republicans, I don't want to say it makes it have a few more hoops to jump to, because we have to use photo IDs for so many things. But they'll make it a little more difficult for a person to be able to, a legal person to vote. Democrats seem to want to make it easier for just about everybody to vote. What are your thoughts about where this is going to go? Well, you summarize it very, very well.

[00:37:24] So, like, if there's, you know, if it's the leading issue by, you know, 60% of the voters when, you know, election integrity or threats to democracy, but 30 of them are Democrats, you know, half of them are Democrats and half of them are Republicans, it's sort of like abortion is the big issue. But if the people saying that half are pro-abortion and half are pro-life, you really don't have resolution there with all of this.

[00:37:47] And I think that what you're talking about is exactly right, because each side has almost diametrically opposed visions of what it is. Like, we have to make sure people are honest, voter ID, you know, photo ID, that sort of thing. And then, no, we've got to make it easier for people to vote so we have a broader range of democracy, you know, that sort of thing.

[00:38:14] Now, I think that I tend to think that the restrictions are probably more important to cut down on opportunities for people to cheat, to mislead the system, that sort of thing. But I understand that there's a lot of frenzy thinking that these are all Republican efforts to suppress the vote and that sort of thing. And one of the things I, if the president, what I would suggest is to make sure that it is not sounding

[00:38:41] like a race-based thing that we're talking about here. I think that there are natural allies. We've seen that in the last few elections with the Hispanic vote. I think also with the African-American vote. I think they're probably going to have a lot more turnout, for example, in Michigan for the Republican nominee for Senate, that sort of thing. And that I just think it is shameful and sad and a missed opportunity not to make it sound like this is America's for everybody,

[00:39:10] because America is a concept. And if you agree with what the Constitution and the Declaration is, it doesn't matter what your race is, you're a true American. That's what we need to be emphasizing. And to protect the integrity of the voting system, I think is right. But even if the Democrats take over both the House and the Senate, the president's going to be able to veto any legislation. But then we've got two years for the next presidential election. And that could all change then.

[00:39:38] Connie, you know, Texas is a large state. We've got a lot of immigrants. We've got a lot of people here who are undocumented. They're illegal immigrants. And the state, in various times, has taken a look to see, do we have illegal people voting? Do we have fraud? And fraud does go on in elections. That's clear. And Attorney General Ken Paxton has a list of some of the people he has prosecuted for various types of fraud in elections.

[00:40:06] But when the state has looked at this, we haven't found an awful lot of illegal people voting or that much fraud in the estate. Yes, that's true. Obviously, we want those who are here legally to vote in Texas. And that's why the legislature has taken that up. And, you know, it should be because we don't need people who don't have a vested interest in our country coming in and voting to who will represent us.

[00:40:33] But it's funny that, you know, the two topics that you mentioned when you, you know, said, you know, that they care about, how did you put it, democracy? You know, and I'm over here sitting and thinking, I just want to get back to, in my, the way that I think of it is, you know, we are supposed to be a representative republic.

[00:41:23] And that's what we're trying to do. And we're trying to do, you know, to allow what these congressmen and women bring to the table, allow that to be debated on the floor. And so that the American people can see it and watch it. I'm tired of this top down, you know, the president, everybody bows to the president. That's what it's gotten to these days. I mean, you know, I get it from one respect, but that's, you know, they are, again, we are a representative republic.

[00:41:49] So these senators and congressmen should be taking what comes from their districts to D.C. and debating them and then seeing, you know, which direction they go. So, you know, I don't want to save democracy. I want to save the representative republic. That's right. Well said. Well, Connie, you hit an important point because there was a time, I believe, when Senate and House committees would call a meeting. They'd bring some people.

[00:42:18] I've testified before Congress myself. And at times they were trying to find real information. They try to get experts in and find out certain things so that they know what they can do. And it helps them make assessments as to legislation that they might be able to pass. But it seems like increasingly that's just not the case. The members come in. They know what they want to say. They want to try to get on news because we didn't used to have cable television in the in the congressrooms, in the committee rooms all the time.

[00:42:48] We do now. That's right. And I shouldn't just bash on the presidents that are elected because if leadership as well, you know, whether it be the speaker or, you know, the majority leader, you know, they do not let things come to the floor unless they've approved it. And that's not the way things are supposed to be.

[00:43:14] And so, you know, there's pressure again from this top-down type of thing. And so this is – we have such a dysfunctional Congress now. And so, you know, therein lies the problem, I think. But, you know, we need a president. We do need leaders that will say, listen, we are for debate. We want these issues to come before the people.

[00:43:39] We want to see where it gets us and which direction it goes and let them vote on it. But they don't even let – so much of the time these leaders within both parties don't even let it come to the floor anymore. Connie, you're going to be leaving us here at the top of the hour. We've got about a little over a minute. Tell people how they can find out more about the Texan. Yes, thank you so much. It is thetexan.news.

[00:44:04] So, everybody, we are now a – we have just transitioned to a nonprofit. So there is no paywall, no subscription. It is free to everyone. We cover everything Texas politics statewide, as well as that in Washington. That has to do with Texas. So we're not going to talk about AOC on the Texan.news because we don't care, because it doesn't have anything to do with Texas.

[00:44:32] So please, if you'll – you know, listeners, go there. Take a look at all our videos. We've been doing a lot of interviews with candidates. We've got lots of articles. We've got a podcast. We've got a great team that is just out there. We do good old-fashioned shoe leather reporting. And we don't – and even though I have opinions and express them, I was an elected official, very conservative Republican.

[00:44:59] What we do with the Texans, sorry, is put it out there for people to learn and make their own decisions. Thank you for joining us, Connie. We'll be back with more on Point of View. Where does moral truth come from? According to 58% of Americans, individuals determine moral truth. A quarter of Generation Z says society determines moral truth,

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