We often hear that the problem Democrats are facing is that they not only lost the presidency in 2016, but are getting trounced at the state and local level. Much has been written about that challenge, but we rarely dive into the weeds about solutions or shine a spotlight on successes.

What if I was to tell you about a county in a red state where Democrats won almost every slot on the ballot in 2016 (some for the first time in decades) and Clinton won by over 160,000 votes, after Obama’s margin was less than a thousand in 2012? That is exactly the story Andrew Cockburn tells us about Harris County Texas (Houston and the surrounding suburbs).

Cockburn credits the work of three women for those results: Michelle Tremolo, Ginny Goldman and Crystal Zermeno—two of whom met while working for the now-defunct organization ACORN. They created an organization called the Texas Organizing Project (TOP). Given that Texas has one of the lowest voter turnout rates in the country, the first order of business for TOP was to find out who was not voting.

Digging deep into voter files and other databases, Zermeno confirmed that Texas contained a “wealth of non-voting people of color.” Most of them were registered, but seldom (if ever) turned up at the polls. The problem, she noted, was especially acute with Latinos, only 15 percent of whom were regular voters. In her detailed report, she calculated precisely how many extra voters needed to turn out to elect someone who would represent the interests of all Texans: a minimum of 1.1 million. Fortuitously, these reluctant voters were concentrated in just nine big urban counties, led by Harris.

On Saturday night, #Donald Trump held an apparent re-election campaign rally in Florida. At one point, Trump invited an excited member of the crowd onto the stage with him, and now new information about the man in question is coming to light.

Trump fan
After just one month in office, President Donald Trump is already gearing up for his potential re-election in 2020. Holding a campaign rally in Melbourne, Florida on Saturday night, nearly 10,000 screaming fans of the president were in attendance. Trump then noticed Gene Huber and called him on stage, as the two shared a hug. Not long after the incident took place, Huber was interviewed on CNN and shared some interesting information about his feelings towards the commander in chief. The Hill elaborated further on the story on February 19.

"Mr. President, I've been with you for two years," Gene Huber said while being interviewed on CNN, before adding, "every single second, every day, I'm with you." Not stopping there, Huber went on to admit that he salutes and prays to a life-size cutout of the former host of "The Apprentice." "I've got a 6-foot cardboard box of President Trump in my house," he admitted, while noting, "I salute that every single day."

Continuing, Gene Huber explained his religious-like daily routine that he has with his Donald Trump cardboard box. "I tell him, Mr. President, I pray for your safety today," he said, while doubling down, "I'm not lying. I do that every single day." The Trump superfan said he thinks the billionaire real estate mogul is doing a "fantastic" job in the White House, and that there were "no words to describe" how well he is doing leading the country. Not long after the interview, a video clip circulated on social media where Huber was shown interviewing a Trump-talking toy.