The Sydney Sweeney News Cycle Proves That Democrats Simply Can’t Win

This is your TPM evening briefing.

Aug 05, 2025

*Sydney Sweeney. (Photo by Stuart C. Wilson/Getty Images)*

If you’re lucky enough to have missed it, here’s the skinny on the Sydney Sweeney news cycle from hell: American Eagle put out an ad starring the actress that features a jeans/genes double entendre (“Genes are passed down from parents to offspring,” she says in the ad. “My jeans are blue.”). Cue an online freakout from people arguing that the ad is a Nazi/white supremacist/eugenicist dogwhistle.

As far as I’m aware, not a single elected Democrat has chimed in on the “scandal” — but it doesn’t matter. We’ve now entered week two of the ad permeating the coverage over on Fox News. President Trump has weighed in supportively, cheering that Sweeney is a “registered Republican.”

“This warped, moronic, and dense liberal thinking is a big reason why Americans voted the way they did in 2024,” tweeted White House spokesperson Steven Cheung in response to criticism of the ad.

“Typical leftist dishonesty – acting like conservatives started this fight and how petty we are to be commenting on a woman in a jeans ad. Now what got us here again?” right-wing commentator Megyn Kelly sniped in a spat with Pod Save America’s Jon Favreau.

He responded: “How we got here: a few random posters claimed the Sweeney ad is Nazi propaganda and then the White House and ultimately the President weighed in. Name a Democratic politician who complained about the ad.”

This is a dynamic endemic to our politics, a perfect crystallization of a problem that dogs Democrats in every culture war controversy. My shorthand for it goes: “The left and the right are clashing over x. The left is an Oberlin sophomore and the right is the governor of Texas.”

In order to balance out the extremism of the Republican Party, the media and Republicans themselves need an equally extremist figure on the left. As they rarely get that from elected Democrats, they’ll often content themselves with people vaguely “leftist,” even if they aren’t part of the formal Democratic Party, much less wield any influence over it. College kids are one of the favored stand-ins in this equation, since it’s fairly easy to catch a 19-year-old saying something dumb or histrionic, and comparable power isn’t a necessary prerequisite.

The Sydney Sweeney “debate” is this dynamic in a microcosm: The supposed “leftists” here, as Favreau points out, are random social media users. Their combatant on the right is … the President of the United States.

Actual Democrats absenting themselves from this argument doesn’t matter. Fox News and Trump can squeeze days and days of content out of covering the deranged Democrats who hate “beautiful women” because of so many years of more respectable commentators conflating institutional Democrats with anyone ostensibly of the “woke left.” Since Democrats could never police the messaging of everyone with a liberal worldview, the right will never lack an eyeroll-inducing left-wing posterchild to prop up and gleefully attack.

— Kate Riga

Texas Dem Arrest Warrants Become Fodder For Cornyn-Paxton Campaigns

Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX) took the matter of whether federal law enforcement will get involved in Texas Republican officials’ efforts to arrest elected Democrats for fleeing the state into his own hands on Tuesday. In a letter to the FBI, Cornyn urged FBI Director Kash Patel to help locate and arrest Texas Dems who fled the state to delay a vote on Republicans’ midcycle redistricting gambit.

It was the biggest news of the day on the Texas Dems front — that is, until Attorney General Ken Paxton announced he would pursue court rulings against the Texas Dems who fled to deny the GOP a quorum if they didn’t return by Friday. He said he would pursue rulings “ensuring that their seats are declared vacant.”

While it remains an open question whether the Trump administration will involve itself in Texas Republican officials’ civil warrants for the arrest of Texas Democrats — and whether such a maneuver would be legal in the first place — it’s important to look at the events unfolding today through the lens of Cornyn’s reelection. Paxton has mounted an aggressive challenge against Cornyn and is popular among Texas Republican voters. Both are hoping for an endorsement from President Trump, too.

Cornyn sent his letter to FBI Director Kash Patel just a day after Paxton admitted in a podcast interview that it might not be too realistic to act immediately on Gov. Abbott’s threats, which have included declaring Texas Dems’ seats vacant and charging those who fled the state with felony bribery charges. As I noted yesterday:

“We’d have to go through a court process, and we’d have to file that maybe in districts that are not friendly to Republicans,” Paxton said in a Monday interview with Benny Johnson. “So it’s a challenge because every district would be different. We’d have to go sue in every legislator’s home district.”

Cornyn and his campaign posted tweets Tuesday morning attacking Paxton for saying the arrests and vacancy declarations might be difficult to carry out — just before Cornyn released his letter to the FBI. Hours later, Paxton announced he’d get the courts involved in declaring the Dem seats vacant.

— Nicole Lafond

Dems Big Choice

The deadline to fund the government for the next fiscal year is rapidly approaching. Following the lengthy August recess, lawmakers on Capitol Hill will only have a few weeks to find a way to fund the government. With the filibuster in place, the Senate GOP will need Democratic votes to avert a government shutdown.

As we outlined in a new piece published today, Senate Democrats will have to make a decision soon that could set up an internal fight similar to what played out earlier this year when Democrats ultimately helped Republicans pass a bill to keep the government open.

Senate Democrats can decide that they will strike a deal with Republicans despite the White House’s ongoing assault on the legislative branch and its power of the purse. Dems would likely ask for assurances that the executive branch will spend money how Congress appropriates it to support the regular appropriations process — though it’s likely too late for that — or some form of a continuing resolution.

In those cases at least a group of Democrats would be giving the Republicans the votes they need to avoid a government shutdown since any legislation to fund the government requires 60 votes.

Democrats can also choose to stand up to the ongoing impoundment by the Trump administration and follow a recent urging from Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) refusing to vote for any legislation unless the White House guarantees that funds will be distributed as appropriated and congressional Republicans will stand up to the executive’s attempt at overreach.

— Emine Yücel