Flashback to 8 weeks ago, when I made my first public post responding to factual inaccuracies from Ruben’s campaign with sources showing they were blatant lies. I guess the celebratory tone was warranted after all, huh?
I’ve spent the last two months here on this Substack battling a very loud PR machine surrounding Ruben Becerra’s campaign. But I didn’t do it alone. And I definitely wasn’t the first.
Representative Erin Zwiener had the guts to stand up for herself publicly when she was shut out of conversations around water policy. This isn’t the first time I’ve watched her “step out of line” to do what she believed was right, despite the vitriol and mockery thrown at her online by people folks want to dismiss as bots, trolls, or Republicans — but the truth is, some of them were fellow Democrats too.
And she didn’t placate them. She didn’t toe a line. She was guided by something larger than internet approval, and that’s what a true public servant should be. Watching her speak up inspired me to start asking questions again, to dig deeper, and to pay attention.
City Council Member Alyssa Garza gave me the confidence and moral support to keep going. She has never softened her opinions for comfort, even in moments where we ourselves disagree, and I deeply respect that. More importantly, I respect how connected she is to the actual heart of this community. Her guidance, friendship, and fearlessness carried me through more moments than she probably realizes. She is one of the strongest women I have ever known, and San Marcos is lucky to have her.
Janice and I graduated from San Marcos High School together — I won’t say when because wow. We weren’t friends then. She was on student council and popular; I was the nerdy drum major. But after debating each other online about who-even-knows-what a decade ago, we eventually developed a mutual respect for each other. And honestly? Her humor, companionship, and hot tips are part of what made the last two months actually fun. She truly cares about this community and this world as much as I do. And, she owns the coolest shop in town.
Then there were the women who slowly found their way into this journey through messages, phone calls, comments, and quiet conversations: Louie, Michelle, Meredith, Kelly, Erin, and so many others. Smart, thoughtful, impressive women who helped prop up not only Michelle Cohen, but my voice too. I’m genuinely humbled to have crossed paths with them.
It was *women who ran this campaign. And women who shifted the energy so much that, in roughly 8 weeks, the electorate swung by nearly 1,500 votes and Dr. Michelle Gutierrez Cohen WON the Democratic nomination last night.
That’s huge in a runoff with turnout this low.
People showed up not because of some giant propaganda machine or negative campaigning.
Not because somebody “won the algorithm.”
Because these women did the hard work of propping each other up and standing up for what they believed was right.
They convinced people who mattered.
They changed minds quietly.
They challenged narratives that had started calcifying into accepted truth.
And they did it with wit, humility, honesty and grace.
That matters.
What appears to have happened last night was not a wave. Or a revolution. It wasn’t even really an ideological rejection because both candidates share the same progressive values.
It was more fascinating than that.
The runoff electorate shrank dramatically from March. Tens of thousands of casual and occasional voters disappeared. Students left for summer. Movement energy softened. The electorate became a more concentrated reflection of the people who actually live in Hays County and were paying attention to nuance.
The precinct data actually showed Becerra’s strongest precincts retaining voters at surprisingly high rates. His machine looked operational. But the people inside that machinery appear to have decided they wanted something different.
People weren’t storming toward a new movement.
People were stepping away from spectacle.
Modern local politics increasingly rewards the performance of moral certainty over the practice of governance itself. The politician becomes not merely an administrator, but the emotional vessel for a community’s frustrations, fears, and aspirations. Every conflict escalates because the identity of the leader becomes inseparable from the identity of the movement.
But it’s not enough to just be a symbol.
Eventually, local government has to reassert itself as local government, or it will fail.
And that may be the most important takeaway from this runoff for the party to remember going into November.
Because for all the noise surrounding modern politics, we may have proven something very old-fashioned:
When they go low, we go high. But NOT silently. And with receipts.
*with the support of some rad men too— gotta give credit where credit is due; but it’s the women I’m highlighting because of how patriarchal politics tends to be.