Every Friday morning, I join the Cardle & Woolley Show on Talk1370 Radio in Austin to announce the week’s Winners & Losers. Texas is wrapping up the first week of early voting with massive lines all over the state. According to Longhorn Derek, the only person who knows anything real about what is going on in the midterms — 2.3 million Texans have voted — more Democrats than Republicans at the beginning of the week, but GOPers are beginning to close the gap. There’ll be more numbers later today. Meanwhile, here’s who made list:

LOSER: University of Texas Faculty Dressed in Black

According to a story in the Houston Chronicle this past week, about 20 faculty members at the University of Texas at Austin, all members of the American Association of University Professors (AAUP), dress up in black and walk across campus every day at lunch time to protest what they call the “death of academic freedom” on the 40 Acres. Their entire list of complaints is enumerated in a new million-word article in Texas Monthly lamenting what they call the “conservative takeover” of the University. These “demonstrations” have been going on for a while, but one AAUP member whined that University officials have not reached out to the AAUP protestors to ask about their “grievances.”

The AAUP has been wailing and gnashing their teeth since 2023 when Texas closed down DEI offices at UT and other public universities in Texas. After the university governance reforms passed last session, via Senate Bill 37, the AAUP entered a permanent state of hysteria, but nobody was listening to them, so they came up with this dressing in black stunt. Setting their hair on fire is undoubtedly next.

The Texas AAUP doesn’t really represent anyone. Their website says they have 2,700 members statewide on 100 campuses, public and private. That number isn’t even a blip of a percentage of the almost 102,000 people who teach, just at Texas public universities. The 20 or so AAUP members who are demonstrating on the UT campus also are barely a statistical trace of the 2,900 professors who teach full-time at UT and another 500 or so who teach part time.

The Texas AAUP continues to insist that ending DEI and removing requirements for “grievance studies” classes like gender studies and lesbian migration patterns are scaring good faculty away from UT, but that claim was also debunked this week by UT administration, which revealed that they received over 12,000 applications for just 94 job openings.

Still, anytime any professor decides to leave Texas for any reason, the Texas AAUP will call a reporter and, like the Houston Chronicle or Texas Monthly, they’ll usually write a story about the “brain drain” or “exodus” of Texas faculty. This simply is not happening at UT or any of the Texas flagships as Texas higher education reforms are recognized as the national model for returning rigor and trust to our universities. No clue how long before the Texas media figures that out.

WINNER: Texas Crime Fighters

Aaron Reitz, U.S. Attorney for the Southern District, announced an indictment this week of the Fort Bend County Tax Accessor Collector, Carmen Patrice Turner, who is charged with theft of federal funds and wire fraud. Texas Bullpen has the most colorful write-up, noting that the Tax Accessor-Collector was charged with paying county employees to do personal work for her, including taking care of her mother. She was also funneling money to one of her “baby daddies,” who was sending her kickbacks from Chicago. The investigation was a joint operation with the Houston FBI, the Texas Rangers and the Harris County DA. There will be trials, of course, but we’d also like to know who is optioning the movie rights.

LOSER: AOC redefines “Girls’ Girl”

U.S. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-New York, apologized to a self-identified transgender person on the campaign trail this week for Democrats who have come out in opposition to boys playing in girls sports and other policies that support men who say they are women. Although almost 80% of Americans oppose men in women’s sports, AOC says that’s wrong. She says, “the right to choose over our bodies is the right to choose over our bodies.” Huh?

WINNER: A Good Economic Story Ignored in Texas?

The Wall Street Journal reported yesterday that unemployment claims dropped to an almost 60-year low in mid-October, suggesting that the low job growth rate reported in September was a blip. The WSJ report said that the data indicates that oil prices and the war in Iran has caused “no material stress to the labor market.”

At the same time I got that email alert with the unemployment claims story, I received this headline from the Dallas Morning News: Texas shed thousands of jobs in September, lowering 2026 growth forecast. The “news report” is basically a rehash of the September jobs report, which came out three weeks ago. No clue why the folks at the Dallas Morning News thought they should re-write it and run it on the first week of early voting.

Almost makes you think those folks who believe Democrats are collaborating with the media to depress GOP enthusiasm and turnout are right. Why else would the media fail to report good economic news in the days before an election?

WINNER: Florida issues an arrest warrant for Raul Castro

It seems like every week we see more data showing that young Americans are increasingly enthused, not just about socialism, but also communism. That is why it is important that the state of Florida issued an arrest warrant last week for Raul Castro, brother of Fidel, who ordered an air-to-air missile to strike down two civilian planes in 1996, killing four people. Reportedly, Castro believed they were carrying out a humanitarian mission, even though the aircraft were traveling away from Cuba and received no warning despite contact with Havana air traffic control. Castro, who is 93, is no longer head of the Cuban Communist Party, but it is important for the young admirers of communism to learn how these ruthless regimes actually operate.

WINNER: Long Shot Baseball Fans

The World Series starts today so if there are any fans of Tampa Bay or the Milwaukie Brewers out there, the long wait is over. Neither team has ever won the World Series before, so we know we’ll get a first-time champion when it’s all over.

WINNER: The Red Raiders of Texas Tech

While the dreams of Longhorns and Aggie fans seem to be crumbling, the undefeated Red Raiders of Texas Tech face off against Cincinnati tomorrow at 11 a.m. The Red Raiders are ranked No. 8 nationally. The No. 19 ranked Texas Longhorns are playing Ole Miss tomorrow in Austin, and Texas A&M, which fell off the ranking charts a while ago, is traveling to Alabama to play No. 13 Crimson Tide. We should note that another Texas public university, the University of Houston, is ranked No. 14 and will play No. 10 ranked Utah. After what happened last week, there is absolutely no way to know what to expect anywhere, but it should be a good Saturday.

Have a great weekend!

Listen to Winners & Losers on Talk 1370, the Cardle & Woolley show, every Friday morning at 8:30 a.m. Here’s the listen live link.

If you were forwarded this email, you can sign up to receive it every week at www.texaspolicy.com/9thandCongress

Sherry Sylvester is a Distinguished Senior Fellow at the Texas Public Policy Foundation and the former Senior Advisor to Texas Lt. Governor Dan Patrick.