This is the first email I’ve sent you from outside Substack, and I need a little help from you to make it land.
Substack was sending you all kinds of emails that weren’t from me, and that’s not treating the readership with respect. So we built our own email service at A Fight Worth Having, and from here on that’s where these come from. The posts will still go up on Substack if that’s where you like to read them. You just won’t be getting emails from me through Substack anymore.
Moving a list this size onto a new system is the kind of thing Gmail and Yahoo treat as suspicious until it’s proven otherwise, and there’s one thing you can do about that.
Reply to this email. That’s the big ask today. “Hey Corbin.” “Wazzup.” “Glad to be here.” Anything at all. Replies are how the email providers learn these messages are wanted, and that’s most of what keeps them out of spam. If you’ve got more than that to say, say it. Tell me something I’ve written that stuck with you, or what you want covered heading into the midterms, or where you think I’ve got it wrong. I’ll be reading them.
You don’t need to sign up again. You’re already on the list and these emails stay free. The newsletter comes out Tuesday, Thursday, and Sunday. Every email has an unsubscribe link at the bottom. No hard feelings if you use it, and you’re welcome back anytime.
Now for some updates.
The first is an AI conference in San Francisco this November, put on by the folks at New Consensus. I’ve worked with these people since the first Bernie campaign and all the way through Brand New Congress, Justice Democrats, and AOC. They’re some of my nearest and dearest friends and some of the most politically aligned people on the planet.
Two days imagining what the future looks like if AI turns out to be as transformative as fire, or the industrial revolution, or something as basic as the internet. AI ownership, AI as a public good and service, and an economy restructured around providing the things people need, which is one of the big topics I write about here all the time. You can sign up and read more about it here.
Next is the SuperPAC. Since February I’ve been writing, researching, going on TV, podcasts and radio trying to get my message out. I’ve also been building tools for me and the movement.
One I’m super excited about is completely in-house polling capability. A few months ago I wanted to poll three congressional districts, Missouri 1, New York 15, and Arizona 4, and I wanted people’s opinion on Hakeem Jeffries and Chuck Schumer, whether they wanted them replaced as leadership next term. A lot of pollsters refuse to ask that. One of them told me, “I’m not going to ask a question that will upset Leader Jeffries while he’s having his morning coffee.” I had to build my own.
Too many pollsters are also less than curious about what people really think. They’re not asking deep, thoughtful questions about which policy prescriptions people are excited about, what they want out of their government, their economy, their society. I’m genuinely curious about those answers.
We tested the process in the Rhode Island and Delaware primaries, and our last test came in within the margin of error. I feel confident rolling out more polling this cycle through the general, then testing it further on Election Day in November. If it holds up, we’ll have built something incredibly useful for the candidates who start running in 2028.
We’ve also built a tool that generates the clips you see on all our social media. Snapstream quoted us about $80,000 a year. We’re running it in-house for less than $5,000. That’s the tip of the iceberg of what we’ve made for ourselves.
If you want to do more than hit reply, there are three things that help:
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Sign up to volunteer with A Fight Worth Having.
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Follow along on YouTube, Instagram, Facebook, X, and TikTok. I do a lot of television and other appearances and we put the clips up everywhere. If something we post speaks to you, send it to somebody you know.
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Donate. This runs on donations. We don’t charge for anything.
Last thing is gratitude. You’re the reason these arguments made it into The Nation and onto television, and you’re the reason this move off Substack is going to work. Thanks for sticking with me through it, and for whatever time you can give today to help it land.
Thanks again,
Corbin Trent
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