Hopium Chronicles Podcast

Simon Rosenberg

In-depth discussions with leaders working to preserve American democracy. Original recordings from the Hopium Chronicles Substack.

  1. 2D AGO

    Meet Sarah Trone Garriott, Minister, Iowa State Senator, And Proven Winner Ready To Flip IA-03

    Greetings all. Excited to introduce you today to another one of our compelling House candidates on the front lines of the 2026 elections - Sarah Trone Garriott, Iowa State Senator, Lutheran Minister, community leader, and a proven winner who is well-positioned, with our help, to flip IA-03 blue this November by defeating the Republican incumbent Zach Nunn. Senator Trone Garriott is one of the twelve candidates in our Winning The House campaign, a collection of candidates most likely to flip red House seats blue this year and retake the House for Democrats next January. Here are two excerpts from our conversation: Iowa is experiencing some pretty deep harm from the policies of this administration. And my opponent, our congressman, has supported all of it. He voted for the Medicaid cuts that are already closing rural clinics in my district. The small town of Ottumwa lost their clinic, and now people have to drive 45 minutes to find primary care. He voted repeatedly to allow the president to impose these chaotic tariffs, and those are harming our farm economy. Just destroying the markets for soybean farmers especially, but they're raising costs on everything that people buy in our state. And this war in Iran has been very costly for Iowans. It's at the gas pump. Fertilizer prices are skyrocketing right before spring planting, but [it’s] also very deeply, personally costly. We lost two Iowa service members in the first week, and they were folks from my district. Literally just down the street from each other. It's been a really difficult time for us. And this administration is making things worse. I'm going to Washington so that I can make things better for my neighbors. I want to lower the cost of living. I want to increase healthcare access. I want to bring an end to this costly war. Keep working hard everyone - Simon

    13 min

  2. 3D AGO

    Meet Mayor Chaz Molder, Our Experienced, Hard-Working Candidate Running In TN-05

    Friends, excited to bring you another conversation with one of our compelling candidates on the front lines - Chaz Molder, Mayor of Columbia, TN who is running to flip TN-05 in Middle Tennessee. Mayor Molder is one of the twelve candidates in our Winning The House campaign, a collection of candidates most likely to flip red House seats blue this year and retake the House for Democrats next January. Here’s an excerpt from our conversation: Well, and more importantly, Simon, from my perspective, Andy Ogles has betrayed the fifth congressional district. Andy Ogles campaigned on lowering costs and bringing down prices. You mentioned fertilizer… it’s up over 40 percent. I live and am raising my family and am mayor of a community called Columbia, Tennessee, just south of Nashville. It’s where the Tennessee Farm Bureau Federation state headquarters is located. I drive past the state headquarters of Farm Bureau on a daily basis, with not only leaders in that organization, but also farmers. They’re struggling, they’re worried, they don’t want a handout, they want to do their job and do the work and they don’t want to have to worry about external factors such as diesel being over $5 a gallon. So I have some firsthand knowledge relative to the agricultural sector. As you also know, Nashville being a part of this district is a hub for the healthcare industry. And so there are a lot of issues on healthcare that are very important to this region and that we are continuing our focus on in this campaign. And it’s why we’re resonating across this district. Keep working hard all - Simon

    13 min

  3. APR 16

    The Trump Regime Is Rotting, Decaying, Crumbling, Unraveling, Falling Apart (New Analysis)

    Friends, last night I got together with members of our proud, plucky, and patriotic community at Hopium Chronicles for a special edition of our weekly gathering, something I called The Fall Of Orban Dance Party. While there wasn’t a lot of dancing there was plenty of celebration. For Orban’s dramatic fall is major blow to Trump, Vance, Putin, and the Greater MAGA project, and another sign of the decay, rotting, crumbling and weakening of the Trump regime. That’s the major message in my presentation this week - the Trump project is failing, floundering, and falling apart. Trump was already in a weakened position due to the failure of his economic strategy, the harms he has brought to farmers and small businesses across the country, the rejection of his ICE terror regime/mass deportations, our collective revulsion at the Trump-Epstein scandal, his unprecedented corruption, and his cuts to health care and food assistance programs while giving his friends enormous tax breaks. He was already historically unpopular, and Democrats have been overperforming and winning elections of all kinds across the country, even in red states. Then he launched an illegal, unpopular, and failed war in Iran, one that has thrown the whole world and our own economy into a profound crisis. Keep working hard all - Simon

    28 min

  4. APR 14

    Closing Strong On Vote Yes With Virginia's Inspiring Speaker, Don Scott

    Greetings all. Excited to share a new interview held yesterday with Don Scott, Speaker of the House of Delegates in Virginia. Speaker Scott reviews the very productive legislative session they’ve had this year with their new, bigger majorities and a new Democratic Governor, Abigail Spanberger. They have gotten so much done in such a short period of time, and put this new power they have to good use for the people of Virginia. It’s wonderful to hear him review the progress they’ve already made this year. But the bulk of our discussion is about Vote Yes, the April 21st ballot initiative to redraw Virginia’s map to fight back against Trump’s illicit mid-decade redistricting power grab. Speaker Scott was instrumental in getting this initiative on the ballot, and provides us an update on the campaign. The bottom line - he is optimistic, but of course we cannot take anything for granted and need to keep working it everyone. Enjoy this conversation with one our nation’s most capable legislative leaders, volunteer for Vote Yes (head to my corresponding Substack post), and let’s go win this one - Simon

    12 min

  5. APR 13

    Meet Rebecca Cooke, Our Terrific Candidate Running In WI-03

    Greetings everyone. Excited to bring you another conversation with one of our compelling candidates on the front lines - candidate for US House Rebecca Cooke who is running to flip WI-03 in Western Wisconsin. Cooke is one of the twelve candidates in our ⁠Winning The House⁠ campaign, a collection of candidates most likely to flip red House seats blue this year and retake the House for Democrats next January. Here’s an excerpt from our conversation: Part of my why… why I decided to run originally… was because we lost our farm, and knowing the dairy economy and how that’s been impacted over decades. [What is] kind of adding insult to injury is what this administration has continued to do to our agricultural industry. Tariffs, reciprocal tariffs have really had a huge impact on our soybean farmers, which is a more than billion dollar industry in the state of Wisconsin. And so I’ve been talking with a lot of folks, farm bureau people that I don’t know necessarily would have met with me before. But it’s not just the crop prices that are a real big issue for a lot of folks. Growing up, our family, a lot of times was on and off of health insurance, depending on if my mom got a job in town that had it. And so, the Affordable Care Act is something that I know a lot of farmers have relied on. And I’ve been talking to people that have seen their premiums increased from $400 to $1,300 a month or $40 to $400 a month, which is it’s, I mean, they’re getting squeezed sort of everywhere between crop prices, the insurance premiums, and then I think with the war in Iran and the increased pricing with fertilizer, diesel prices… it’s kind of like they’re just getting knocked around every which way. And there’s really no relief. Keep working hard all - Simon

    15 min

  6. APR 13

    Meet Shannon Taylor, A Prosecutor And Battle-Tested Candidate Running To Flip VA-01 Blue

    Friends, excited to introduce you all to Shannon Taylor, prosecutor, fighter and a proven winner who is well positioned to flip VA-01 blue. In 2024, Trump won VA-01 by 5 points (Downballot); the Cook Partisan Vote Index has it R +3; and the Republican incumbent, Rob Wittman received 56.4% of the vote in 2024. So this is a Republican leaning district that is exactly the kind of district we can and must flip to take back the House this November. If the Virginia redistricting initiative, Vote Yes, passes on April 21st Taylor will end up in a new district, but that one will be competitive too. So the money we are raising today will go into a battleground district, either this one, or a new one. Keep working hard everyone - Simon

    21 min

  7. APR 9

    The Crisis The World Faces Today Is Trump (New Analysis)

    Friends, sharing my weekly presentation last night while attending some meetings in New Orleans. As I do each week I tried to take a step back from the crush of news to evaluate where we are in the fight for freedom and democracy, and against MAGA and Trumpism/Putinism. Here’s this week’s assessment: Trump is an irredeemable failure, a historic betrayer of this great country, an addled and arrogant old man who should be removed from office, or at the very least our leaders must now mount a major effort to wrest power away from him and force a national course correction along the lines of our agenda. Our current path is unsustainable and we cannot wait until January of next year to find a new and better path. This war in the Middle East is the greatest mistake by an American president in our history. We’ve come out of it far weaker, and Iran far stronger. Our discourse is only just beginning to acknowledge the magnitude of the geopolitical and economic disaster this one man has caused, lawlessly and recklessly, acting without Congress and our allies. For we now in a global crisis - Trump, and his quisling enablers in Congress and the Supreme Court. Republican 2026 campaign strategists have come to recognize that the fall out from the war has put their majorities in both chambers in jeopardy, and have announced two big campaigns - a Trump effort starting in May, and a fall campaign led by the Senate Republican SuperPAC. My assumption is the House Republican SuperPAC will soon announce their fall campaign, and combined these three efforts could amount to $1 billion in total, an extraordinary sum of money in a mid-term election. That they are committing this much money, and starting the first campaign so early (in May), shows how much trouble they understand themselves to be in. It also tells us that the real election, when the ads starting flying, begins in a few weeks not in a few months. The 2026 general election is here now, and we need to help our candidates and party committees prepare for what is going to be a savage battle with a failing and desperate Republican Party. Winning these midterms by the biggest margin possible is job one for all of us now. Keep working hard all - Simon

    33 min

  8. APR 7

    The Bottom Is Falling Out For Trump - A New Discussion With Stuart Stevens

    Friends, as we all prepare for whatever it is the Mad King is going to do today, I'm sending along my talk with Stuart Stevens from yesterday afternoon. As we do when we get together each month we cover a lot of ground - Trump’s declining poll numbers, the failure of his war, Senate Republicans hitting the panic button, Vance’s disgusting trip to Hungary, the courage of the Ukrainians, and much more… Keep working hard all - Simon

    45 min
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5
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40 Ratings

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In-depth discussions with leaders working to preserve American democracy. Original recordings from the Hopium Chronicles Substack.

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