Watch Hightower at the Texas Democratic Convention in Corpus Christi

Watch Hightower at the Texas Democratic Convention in Corpus Christi

Greetings, Lowdowners — Deanna here! Friday we told you [https://jimhightower.substack.com/p/friday-signpost-a-kitchen-table-in] what was coming: Hightower on the main stage at the Texas Democratic Party Convention, introducing Clayton Tucker [http://claytontuckertx.com/], the Lampasas rancher carrying the populist torch into this year’s fight for Texas Agriculture Commissioner. Well, it happened. And it’s everything we hoped it would be! Listen to that crowd roar as Hightower names the “six Bs” — bosses, bankers, billionaires, big shots, b******s, and bullshitters. That clip has been tearing up social media all weekend! Here’s the full five-minute speech: the introduction, the history, and Jim handing the mic to Clayton with the kind of send-off that doesn’t happen unless you’ve been in the fight together for a long, long time. This is the kind of thing you get every week as a Lowdown subscriber: not just the clip everyone’s sharing, but the full context behind it. Consider upgrading today if you can [https://jimhightower.substack.com/subscribe]! PS—I think my personal favorite moment is watching the ASL interpreter figure out how to translate “greedheads and boneheads.” Chef’s kiss! Transcript Announcer: Let’s welcome our former Texas Agriculture Commissioner, Jim Hightower. Hidey ho! As one former Texas Agriculture Commissioner, who came out of a progressive campaign with Ann Richards and Jim Mattox and Garry Mauro, a unity ticket. Now to the next era of victories by progressive forces, led by Clayton Tucker, James Talarico, Gina Hinojosa, right on down the line, a lineup of winners. It just makes me happier than a flea at a dog show to be standing up here, looking out at all you Democratic Party champions of economic fairness, you corporate greedwhackers, you Republican butt-kickers, as we rally to take Texas back from the GOP, from the GOP autocrats and plutocrats, so our team of grassroots Democrats can move Texas forward. We don’t want to go back. We want to go forward and forward with all the people of our state, not just the rich elites. And this November fight is a landmark populist battle, putting pitting the greedheads and boneheads who are the powers that be against the powers that ought to be, the ordinary work of day people of our state, the workers, the farmers, the teachers, the consumers. The everyday Texans who do the everyday work that makes Texas work. Now you might say, well, Hightower, what do you by the powers that be? Well here’s what I mean. I call ‘em the six Bs. They are the bosses, the bankers, the billionaires, the big shots, b******s and bullshitters. They’ve been running roughshod over us. They’re thinking they’re the top dog and we’re just a bunch of fire hydrants out here in the countryside. That’s why Clayton Tucker is so important. So important to this election, so important to the Democratic ticket, so important to Texas, a true son of Texas populism, a rancher raising goats out in Lampasas County. The very place where populism began, [https://jimhightower.substack.com/p/friday-signpost-a-kitchen-table-in] by the way, it was born in Lampasas County in the 1870s. He’s a rancher, been a kindergarten teacher. That’ll help him when he deals with the legislature. He’s a grassroots organizer, battling the data center billionaires. He even puts it right on his campaign button here. “Stop AI data centers.” Clayton Tucker. He battles the monopolists and the extremists. I’m gonna tell you that Clayton Tucker is gonna drive the Republican leaders crazy. Of course, that’s a pretty short drive for some of them. Most important, as Texas Agriculture Commissioner, Clayton will make us proud again, as so few office holders these days do. He comes out of West Texas. West Texas ranchers and the old cowboys out in West Texas used to have a saying. They said, “speak the truth, but ride a fast horse.” Clayton is going to speak the truth to the powers that be. And they’re going to call him, just as they’re calling Talarico and Gina Hinojosa and our whole Democratic lineup, they’re going to call them agitators. Agitators. What the hell is wrong with being an agitator? Agitation is what built America. So I’m here to ask you to join me in welcoming the People’s Agitator, Clayton Tucker, from Lampasas, Texas. Jim Hightower's Lowdown is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit jimhightower.substack.com/subscribe [https://jimhightower.substack.com/subscribe?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_2]

Friday Signpost: A Kitchen Table in Lampasas, Then and Now

Greetings, Lowdowners—Deanna here! Last week we gave you the pesticide hearing story [https://jimhightower.substack.com/p/my-lead-off-witness-was-willie-nelson]— Willie Nelson, Barbara Jordan, and a fight Hightower and his team won by building a movement before he ever needed the movie stars. This week, we’re going back further. All the way back to where the whole populist tradition in this country actually started. Here’s Hightower telling it: in the 1870s, four farmers in Lampasas, Texas, were getting squeezed out of existence. Railroads gouging them on getting crops to market. Bankers gouging them on their mortgages. So they did the only thing they could — they sat down around a kitchen table and started talking about it. That conversation didn’t stay in Lampasas. It spread to neighboring counties, then across Texas, then into 43 states. It elected U.S. senators and members of Congress. It built cooperative banks and grain storage so farmers didn’t have to sell at the bottom of the market just to survive. Historians call it the Populist Movement [https://jimhightower.substack.com/p/the-deep-lowdown-issue-1-what-is]. Hightower calls it people figuring out they had to organize or get run over. We’re telling you this story right now for a reason. Tonight, Hightower’s on the main stage at the Texas Democratic Convention [https://www.texasdemocraticconvention.com/], introducing a candidate he’s worked with for years: Clayton Tucker [https://www.claytontuckertx.com/], who’s running for the same office Hightower once held — Texas Agriculture Commissioner. Clayton’s from Lampasas. No one planned that. Texas just keeps producing people who grow up with that kitchen table in their blood and decide to do something about the Powers That Be. Clayton’s campaign is built around the same basic fight those four farmers were having: rural Texans getting run over by power they have no say in. Corporate data centers draining water and electricity from small towns that never got a say. Federal regulators sitting on tools Texas ranchers need right now to fight the New World Screwworm, leaving the state to fight it understaffed and underequipped while the threat spreads. Different villains, same basic math — somebody with more power than you, making decisions about your land and your livelihood from somewhere else. Almost a hundred and fifty years on, same county, new fights, same fight. This is the kind of connection-the-dots storytelling our paid subscribers get from us regularly — the history that explains the present, not just the outrage of the week. If you’ve been thinking about upgrading, this is a good week for it [https://jimhightower.substack.com/subscribe]. Thanks for being in the fight with us, as always! Jim Hightower's Lowdown is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit jimhightower.substack.com/subscribe [https://jimhightower.substack.com/subscribe?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_2]

Is Your Lush, Green Lawn Killing Mother Nature?

Sometimes, little things can be a big deal. For example, in considering ways to help protect Mother Earth from global environmental rampages by us humans, look out your window. In many cities and most suburbs, chances are you’re looking at a lawn – a grass-carpeted yard that looks almost the same as the one next door, the one next to it, etc. Some see a lush expanse of green grass as the ultimate in landscaping beauty, and some even consider a well-manicured lawn to be a measure of one’s moral character. Beauty and piety aside, though, the spread and intensification of “lawn culture” has become an environmental extravagance that is already unsustainable in whole sections of our country, and it adds up to a steadily-increasing burden on Earth’s essential resources. Grass itself is natural, but keeping it alive across thousands of square miles is not, for it requires a deluge of chemicals and endless rivers of water applied again and again, yard after yard, trying to keep these plots green. And – O, the irony! – their “green” includes eliminating bees, butterflies… and, well, nature. One statistic tells the tale: Americans use more than 10 times more poison per acre than all of America’s farmers use on their crops. Just glance around you, and you’ll see the grass lawn imperative at work throughout your community – it surrounds local schools, “greens-up” corporate complexes, spreads across college campuses, forms miles of golf courses, etc. This is not a diatribe against grassy plots, which can be natural joys. But let’s get real, get creative, and get in touch with the full balance and beauty of nature. You can promote ground cover sanity right where you live with native plants, xeriscaping, organic methods, rain gardens, and “re-wilding” your yard with things like prairie grass. For help, go to Rewild.org/Rewild-Your-Life [http://Rewild.org/Rewild-Your-Life]. Jim Hightower's Lowdown is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit jimhightower.substack.com/subscribe [https://jimhightower.substack.com/subscribe?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_2]

Good News: Wind Energy Now Surpasses Blowhards of Dirty Energy

Once upon a time, conservative ideologues opposed government interference in the holy magic of the marketplace. Take energy policy, for example. Right-wing cheerleaders of fossil fuels demanded that government must keep its fat thumb off the scale of free market competition between Big Oil and those frilly new “alternative” sources of energy. Where did those market “purists” go? Into the White House, the Cabinet, and Congress – where they’ve mutated into big government bullies, attacking renewable energy enterprises while hyping and subsidizing the corporate profiteers of dirty energy. Trump himself hasn’t merely put his thumb on the scale, he’s hauled his entire hulk onto it! For example, this month he lavished a $700-million gimme of our tax dollars to prop up coal production [https://apnews.com/article/trump-coal-mining-power-plant-climate-electricity-0a7126d66de97b10f32eaa39b1af669f], a dirty fuel the market is abandoning. Wait, there’s more: he paid another 700+ million of our dollars to Invenergy [https://www.nytimes.com/2026/06/17/climate/trump-wind-farms-cancel-millions.html], an offshore wind energy firm – not so it could produce electricity, but to cancel four wind farms it had planned to build. Yes, he paid the company to not produce wind energy! Trump declared that even though wind power is less costly than coal, he found windmills “ugly.” So, here’s my advice to the wind industry: Gold-plate your turbines and label them “Trump Towers.” And maybe stage a series of cage fights on some of them. Trump is all about hype and spectacle – so there you go. Meanwhile, the actual marketplace is loudly saying “no” to fossil fuels and YES! to renewables. Get this: Wind now routinely surpasses coal as a supplier of electricity to America. And, last month, solar power also surpassed coal. Political bullying aside, renewables are the future. Do something! At a time when the federal government is actively dismantling progress on climate change, the NDRC is calling for states to lead the way—and tracking the work that’s being done. Start with this news update [https://www.nrdc.org/bio/dawone-robinson/we-cant-afford-slow-down-climate-action] from them, and then take action [https://www.nrdc.org/take-action/toolkits]. Jim Hightower's Lowdown is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit jimhightower.substack.com/subscribe [https://jimhightower.substack.com/subscribe?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_2]

"My Lead-Off Witness Was Willie Nelson": Inside One of Hightower's Biggest Fight as Ag Commissioner

Greetings, Lowdowners—Deanna here! This summer, we're doing something a little different. Over the next few weeks, we're opening the gates a bit — giving free subscribers a taste of some of the exclusive stories, video, and behind-the-scenes Hightower that paid subscribers get regularly. If you've been on the fence about upgrading [https://jimhightower.substack.com/subscribe], consider this your invitation to see what you've been missing. To kick things off, I spent a day with Hightower in Austin last month, beer in hand at ABGB [https://theabgb.com/], talking with him about fifty-plus years of fighting the b******s. We’ve got a summer’s worth of material to share with you, and I wanted to kick things off with the one that shows what organizing really looks like. Here’s the setup: Hightower’s Agriculture Commissioner, and he’s just put forward the most progressive pesticide regulation in the country. The pesticide lobby is furious. So they get the governor to introduce legislation to gut his authority and make his office appointed instead of elected. Standard playbook—except for what happened next. The hearing room they’d booked was tiny. They had to move it to the House Chamber because Hightower’s first witness was Willie Nelson. His second was Barbara Jordan. His third was the chairwoman of the Dallas Republican Women’s Organization, who didn’t love the idea of pesticides in her kids’ food either. Not one committee member would make the motion to pass the bills. They lost without a vote. Here’s the part I actually wanted to talk to him about, though: the celebrities weren’t the strategy. They were the payoff. Hightower’s team spent six months before that hearing building an actual coalition—farmers, farmworkers, consumers, local press. Willie and Barbara Jordan showed up because there was already a movement there to show up for. “They are the punctuation point of a movement that has already been built and is moving,” he told me. “Their presence encourages the movement,” but it doesn’t replace it. It’s a lesson that’s aged exactly zero days in forty years: you don’t win by getting a famous person to show up at your rally. You win by doing the unglamorous work first, and then the famous person shows up because there’s something worth showing up for. It’s your support [https://jimhightower.substack.com/subscribe] that enables us to keep bringing the outside in, to keep sharing the ways we can fight together and have fun together. We know times are tighter than ever, and it makes your support mean even more to us. Thank you! Jim Hightower's Lowdown is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit jimhightower.substack.com/subscribe [https://jimhightower.substack.com/subscribe?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_2]