Debunking Right-Wing Cowboy Cosplay: Texas's Radical Roots w/ David Griscom

About this episode

Adam Proctor interviews David Griscom about the radical history of Texas and its implications for current politics.

Adam sits down with David Griscom, host of The Jacobin Show and Left Reckoning, and author of The Myth of Red Texas (Nation Books, 2026), to excavate the buried radical history of the Lone Star State. They start with the present: Talarico's primary win and what class-war rhetoric is proving in Texas politics. Then they go back: the proletarianized cowboy, the fence-cutting wars against British and Northern capital, the Southern Farmers Alliance, the stolen populist election. The "California hypothesis" gets debunked. And the question by the end isn't whether Texas has a radical tradition; it's why nobody told you about it. Become a HWDI Sponsor and get access to this week's B-Side: Patreon: https://patreon.com/hwdipod Substack: https://substack.com/@hwdipod ★ Support this podcast on Patreon ★

People in this episode

Host: Adam

Guest: David Griscom

Topics covered

• Texas politics
• radical history
• class warfare
• populism

Keywords

• cowboy
• Southern Farmers Alliance
• Talarico
• California hypothesis

Sponsors

Patreon, Substack

Mentioned in this episode

Products: The Myth of Red Texas

Books & works: The Jacobin Show and Left Reckoning, The Myth of Red Texas

Places: Texas, the Lone Star State, California

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