Welcome to this episode of the award-winning Best of the Left podcast. Today we trace a pattern that repeated across half a dozen states this primary season. Working class candidates running on the cost of living beat the opponents party leadership handpicked and funded. It looks like ordinary election news, but it's more pieces of a larger

shift already underway, away from a politics of left against right, and toward a new era

of the elite versus working people. For those looking for a quick overview, the sources

providing our top takes in about 50 minutes today include All In With Chris Hayes,

The Rational National, More Perfect Union, Breaking Points, and Slate.

Then, in the additional deeper dives half of the show, there will be more in four sections.

Section A, reading the primary map, section B, the Platner Reckoning, Section C, the Texas

Senate fight, and Section D, Defending the Vote, and the Longview Reckoning, Section C, the Texas Senate fight, and Section D, defending the vote,

and the Longview. And now, on to the show.

Trump's war and the resulting Trump economy are terrible politically for Donald Trump and the Republican Party.

Last night in Maine was a great example.

Leading up to the primary, you may have seen.

There was a lot of hand-wringing, reasonable concern about the Democratic Senate candidate

Graham Platner, especially in the national media.

Platner, of course, not a perfect candidate.

He has got more baggage than a lot of Democrats would prefer.

But he has what voters clearly think is a strong message.

He's centered his campaign around a narrative of personal redemption and progressive populism,

as well as a posture of ironclad resistance towards the Trump administration.

And all of this is taking place against a backdrop of what's going on in the country

and the world and the state of Maine where the material conditions aren't great.

Donald Trump's big ugly bill has been a nightmare for rural communities.

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