Come and Take It, Twenty Years On: The Establishment War, the Mission, and Who a Congressman Really Serves

Daniel Miller opened this Late Night Coffee Talk running on fumes after an all-night migration of the TNM web properties to new servers, but the week gave him plenty to work with. He announced the launch of the Texan Arise campaign, a free training effort led by executive vice president Nate Smith and chief of staff Daffany Armor that will travel the state to prepare campaign volunteers, with the first sessions set for New Braunfels and Round Rock. He pointed viewers to his Texas News podcast interview with Republican primary candidate John Buchet as the clearest picture available of the real fight in Texas politics, the war between the grassroots and the entrenched establishment that surfaced in the Montgomery County revolt against figures like Carl Rove and Kevin Brady.

Much of the night circled back to a single theme. Advocacy organizations, campaigns, and churches are perpetually short on two things, manpower and money, and the TNM is no exception. Miller was candid that he draws no salary, works as a technical consultant to put food on the table, and personally covered the organization server bill last month. That framing set up his answer to a viewer asking whether the TNM holds savings or investments. The honest reply was that nearly every dollar that comes in goes back out, with only a small emergency reserve and no investment portfolio, though he conceded an endowment would be ideal someday.

The heaviest exchange came from a question about a potential congressional candidate who described the President as his boss. Miller used it to explain why the TNM will not endorse anyone running for federal office and why that idea inverts the entire constitutional order. The states created the federal system, not the reverse, and a member of Congress answers to the constituents who elected him, not to the executive branch. A candidate who thinks otherwise, Miller argued, is describing a collapse of the separation of powers and an early warning sign of why the federal system is broken. He closed by tying the recent eruption of political violence, the ICE facility attack and the Charlie Kirk killing, to federal intransigence, and called on viewers to recapture the spirit of the Gonzales defenders ahead of next week Come and Take It anniversary on October 2nd.

Questions answered in this episode

• Once Texas is a free and independent country, would it be able to deport figures like Jasmine Crockett? Miller explains that sovereign control over borders, immigration, and citizenship is the right of every self-governing nation, and that no federal fix is permanent because it can be undone with the stroke of a pen.
• Does the TNM have savings and investments? Almost everything that comes in goes right back out, with only a small emergency reserve and no investment portfolio.
• Is the mission of Texas to preserve the spirit of the United States Constitution and Bill of Rights and to stand as a Christian nation? Miller separates TEXIT, which is only the process, from the organization mission, reads the TNM mission statement aloud, and traces Texas own constitutional DNA back to 1836 and 1776.
• If a congressional candidate calls the President his boss, who do US representatives and senators actually answer to? Their constituents, not the executive, and treating it otherwise signals a dangerous collapse of separation of powers.
• What are Miller thoughts on the grassroots effort to memorialize the TNM at the new Alamo Visitor Center with a star or a paver? He was visibly moved, noting the organization turns twenty in November and calling the tribute humbling and a fitting mark of how far the movement has come.