September 21, 2018

Here’s the Most Memorable Moment of the First Texas Senate Debate

“True to form.”

Beto and Ted

Tom Fox/Dallas Morning News/Associated Press

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If you wanted to summarize Friday’s Texas Senate debate between Democratic Rep. Beto O’Rourke and Republican Sen. Ted Cruz in just one exchange, it would probably be the last one. Just before closing statements, at the end of an often-contentious 50 minutes, the moderators from the Dallas Morning News and NBC’s Dallas-Fort Worth affiliate asked each candidate to say something nice about the other.

O’Rourke said he believed Cruz was working sincerely to make the world better for his young kids. Here’s Cruz’s response:

“True to form.”

The next debate is on September 30th in Houston.

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WE CAME UP SHORT.

We just wrapped up a shorter-than-normal, urgent-as-ever fundraising drive and we came up about $45,000 short of our $300,000 goal.

That means we're going to have upwards of $350,000, maybe more, to raise in online donations between now and June 30, when our fiscal year ends and we have to get to break-even. And even though there's zero cushion to miss the mark, we won't be all that in your face about our fundraising again until June.

So we urgently need this specific ask, what you're reading right now, to start bringing in more donations than it ever has. The reality, for these next few months and next few years, is that we have to start finding ways to grow our online supporter base in a big way—and we're optimistic we can keep making real headway by being real with you about this.

Because the bottom line: Corporations and powerful people with deep pockets will never sustain the type of journalism Mother Jones exists to do. The only investors who won’t let independent, investigative journalism down are the people who actually care about its future—you.

And we hope you might consider pitching in before moving on to whatever it is you're about to do next. We really need to see if we'll be able to raise more with this real estate on a daily basis than we have been, so we're hoping to see a promising start.

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