Media Literacy Won't Save Us From Ted Cruz

Neither did Harvard Law.

As I started out today, I intended to write an article about how Texas Republicans are BIG FAT LIARS. All of these commercials on TV from the GOP are complete nonsense about transgender surgeries and raising taxes. I planned to explain why they are lies, how the Republican Legislature works, and who determines taxes in Texas, but then former Special Counsel Jack Smith testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee.

This is the quote I can’t stop thinking about:

“Our investigation developed proof beyond a reasonable doubt that President Trump engaged in serious crimes against our nation. If asked whether to prosecute a former president today based on the same facts, I would do so regardless of whether that president was a Republican or a Democrat. The charges against President Trump were the result of the evidence. Grand juries in two separate districts reached this conclusion based on his actions as alleged in the indictments they returned. Rather than accept his defeat in the 2020 presidential election, President Trump engaged in a criminal scheme to overturn the results and prevent the lawful transfer of power.”

What happened after that was four hours of Senate Republicans lying and spewing conspiracy theories, while Democrats called Trump a criminal and the hearing a farce.

Republicans are liars. Whether it’s Ken Paxton or Greg Abbott making commercials about how the Texas government functions, or whether it is Republicans in the Senate trying to still run cover for Donald Trump, there’s no truth and no accountability anywhere.

Years ago, back in 2020, my friends were protesting Confederate statues in rural Texas, and Oath Keepers and 3%ers showed up, armed to the teeth, because liars on Facebook told them “Black Lives Matter was coming to burn down their town. Back then, I would ask candidates, “What do we do about the epidemic of misinformation?”

They told me a lot of things. They talked about media literacy and funding NPR and PBS, but that was about misinformation, not lies. Paxton and Abbott know how our state government works. They’re lying and counting on everyone else not to know, and for the most part, they don’t. And the Republicans in Congress know they violated their oaths of office, but it’s still an act for the camera, and it’s personal.

It’s personal for Ted Cruz.

On January 6, 2021, along with Ken Paxton, Julie Pickren, sixteen other Texas Congresspeople, and funded by a slew of Texas billionaires, Ted Cruz helped Donald Trump, the then-45th president, try to overturn an election in the United States of America.

Yet those in charge dragged their feet.

In May 2021, the House passed a bipartisan, 9/11-style commission to investigate the attack, with 35 Republicans voting yes. Senate Republicans killed it with a filibuster. Pelosi formed a select committee instead, and Republicans spent the next two years calling it partisan.

Then Merrick Garland took a bottom-up approach. Rioters first, ringleaders later. The FBI didn’t open an investigation into the fake electors scheme until April 2022, about 15 months after the attack. The Washington Post found that top officials worried about looking partisan. Garland didn’t appoint a special counsel until November 2022, after Trump announced he was running again.

Jack Smith indicted Trump in August 2023, and Judge Tanya Chutkan set trial for March 4, 2024. When Trump claimed immunity, Smith asked the Supreme Court to skip the appeals court and settle the question quickly. The Court said no. Then in February it took the case anyway, which froze the trial, and heard arguments in April. It ruled on July 1, the last day of its term. In Florida, Judge Aileen Cannon postponed the document trial indefinitely, then tossed it entirely.

Then Joe Biden. He bombed the June 27 debate and then spent three weeks insisting he’d fight on. The first Democrat in Congress to tell him to quit was Lloyd Doggett of Austin. Biden dropped out on July 21, 15 weeks before Election Day. We know how the rest of it went.

The bad guys won.

In history, historians later look back at a big event and decide this was the beginning of that event; this was the end. For example, the road to the Civil War began with John Brown’s Raid on Harpers Ferry and ended when Washington pulled federal troops out of the South in 1877. The insurrectionists went home, took back their statehouses, and wrote Jim Crow into law for most of the next century. Harpers Ferry lit the fuse. Everyone who came after decided it wasn’t their job to put it out.

When historians look back at our time, they won’t only ask about January 6. They’ll ask about the people who held power afterward. The senators who killed the commission. The attorney general who didn’t want to look partisan. The justices who took their sweet time. The president who wouldn’t let go.

And they’ll ask, “What the fuck were the people in charge doing?”

Where do we go from here?

Presumably Democrats win at the federal and state level in November, while Trump and Crew enrich themselves like Saudi Arabian royalty on the backs of American taxpayers; an unnecessary war in Iran, climate scientists are predicting 500K deaths from this year’s El Niño, beef prices are going up; diesel prices are going up, and mortgage rates just surpassed 7%.

But the world has the first trillionaire, corporate profit margins sit near their highest levels since the 1950s, and global billionaire wealth surged to over $18–$20 trillion.

One thing most of us can agree on is that corruption has to stop, that the 99% has paid for the 1% at the behest of our government for way too long.

So, how do we fix things?

Luckily, smart people (probably in tiny rooms) are already thinking about this very problem. And they have a few ideas:

• Brennan Center - January 2026: Nine Solutions for Political Corruption

• Pew - October 2024: 5 Ways to Rebuild Trust in Government

• The Roosevelt Institute - October 2025: Building a More Effective, Responsive Government: Lessons Learned from the Biden-Harris Administration

• The Bulwark - June 2026: After Trump: Proposals for a Post-Authoritarian America

Mostly, they agree that trust in our government has collapsed and that it didn’t start with the orange one. Roosevelt blames decades of bipartisan disinvestment. Brennan says old corruption problems have come roaring back. The Bulwark says Trump tore down guardrails built after Nixon. But they all agree there’s no returning to normal.

Andrew Johnson pardoned the Confederacy on Christmas Day 1868. Donald Trump pardoned roughly 1,500 people charged in the Capitol attack on his first day back, including people convicted of seditious conspiracy. Same move, 157 years apart.

So forget fixing everything. Fix the part where lying and abusing power cost nothing.

A constitutional amendment moving the pardon power to an independent board of judges and experts. No pardoning yourself, your relatives, or your own people. Career civil servants shouldn’t be fired for political reasons. The Senate can adopt a rule allowing secret ballots for impeachment votes. And yes, ban congressional stock trading too.

Back in 2020, I asked candidates what we do about the epidemic of misinformation. They told me media literacy and funding PBS. That’s a fine answer for confused people.

Liars aren’t confused. Ted Cruz isn’t confused. Ken Paxton and Greg Abbott aren’t confused. They’re betting nothing happens to them, because nothing ever has.

What do you do about liars? You make it cost something at the ballot box on November 3.

• 35 days until the November election!

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• Last Day of Early Voting: October 30, 2026

• Election Day: November 3, 2026

• Did you know you can find links to all the previous Meet the Candidate articles on these lists?:

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