The Week Evening Review
The growth of 'Texit,' women's rights in Afghanistan, and precarity in Michigan

 
TODAY'S BIG QUESTION

Why is Texas secession having a moment?

It took a bloody civil war to convince most Americans to refer to the United States as a singular entity, rather than plural, reinforcing the nation's authority at the federal, not state level. 

Centuries later, secessionist agitation remains, growing more strident in Texas as a standoff between officials at the border has inflamed debate over who can set and enforce immigration policy.  

Nikki Haley amplified the secession debate this week, telling "The Breakfast Club" that "states have the right to make the decisions that their people want to make," though she later told Fox News "it's not about secession."

What did the commentators say? 
Texas' secessionist flirtation has "gone from a 'nod to it and ignore it' issue to one with a bit more urgency," said Texas Monthly's Dan Solomon. A recent Texas effort to vote on secession was thrown out over invalid signature allegations, but the Texas Nationalist Movement said leaders "fully intend to litigate" the rejection.

Movement leader Daniel Miller stressed to the Texas Tribune that "if Texas ever wants to truly secure its border" it must be as an "independent and self-governing nation." 

Secessionists point to Abbott's statement that Washington has "broken the compact between the United States and the states" — "strikingly similar" language to that used by slave states in their pre-Civil War push to secede, noted Slate. This "compact theory" has been rejected by Supreme Courts for centuries, meaning "Nikki Haley is wrong, as is anyone else who treats secession ... as legitimate," The New York Times' Jamelle Bouie wrote. 

Abbott's secessionist dalliance is "resonating powerfully with the GOP's far-right" and should be seen more through the lens of "politics" than "policy," argued Time's Philip Elliott.

What next?
While outright secession is almost certainly a non-starter, University of Texas historian Jeremi Suri told Texas Monthly he could "imagine a situation" in which Texas voted on the issue as a "negotiating tactic to push for" expanding its state rights.

Practically speaking, there are limitations. By leaving the United States, Texas would lose "billions in transportation funding" and see "millions of seniors" kicked off Medicare, per Newsweek. Texas independence would impose "exorbitant costs" on the state and its citizens, Solomon agreed. 

Nevertheless, this week former President Donald Trump endorsed Texas secession advocate David Covey, who is running for State House.

 
To continue reading this article...
Continue reading this article and get limited website access each month.
Get unlimited website access, exclusive newsletters plus much more.
Cancel or pause at any time.
Already a subscriber to The Week?
Not sure which email you used for your subscription? Contact us
 
in depth

The Taliban's ongoing attack on women's rights

Since the Taliban assumed power in Afghanistan in 2021, the group has made several changes to the country's laws. Many of those adjustments now limit women's autonomy, with some advocates deeming the rules a "gender apartheid." 

Curtailing women's education
The Taliban limited Afghan women's access to education, preventing their attendance past the sixth grade. The Taliban claimed that women's education did not comply with the group's interpretation of Sharia Law within Islam. The consensus among religious experts, though, is that Islam places equal value on men's and women's education, and the Taliban's ideology "partly comes from a specific school of 19th-century Islamic thought and partly from rural areas where tribalism is entrenched."

Roza Otunbayeva, head of the UN mission in Afghanistan, said in an email to the AP, "In a strictly gender-segregated society, how will Afghan women be able to get the most basic health care services if there are no female professionals to treat them?"

Restricting women's dressing options
In May 2022, Taliban supreme leader Mullah Haibatullah Akhundzada mandated that "those women who are not too old or young must cover their faces, except the eyes," BBC reported. The group's Vice and Virtue Ministry also acts as a morality police to enforce the rules and at times detain women not in compliance.

"Enforcement measures involving physical violence are especially demeaning and dangerous for Afghan women and girls," Otunbayeva told Al Jazeera. "Detentions carry an enormous stigma that puts Afghan women at even greater risk." 

Prohibiting women's employment
In addition to the restrictions on dress code, Afghan women saw employment opportunities falter. The Taliban banned women from working at the UN and NGOs. Women have been instrumental in humanitarian work in the region, and the ban could involuntarily cut necessary aid. 

The Taliban also closed all women's beauty salons in the country, which employed more than 60,000 women, according to BBC. Salons were employers of women and also one of the only women-only spaces in Afghanistan. "It could take years for the ban's consequences to hit Afghan men and trigger a groundswell of unrest," The Associated Press remarked. 

 
 

Statistic of the day

35M: The number of cancer cases expected globally by 2050, according to new research from the World Health Organization (WHO). This represents a 77% increase in cancer rates from the 20 million cases that were diagnosed in 2022. For low-development countries, the WHO is predicting increased cancer rates of up to 142%.
World Health Organization

 
 
QUOTE OF THE DAY

"If you met your partner on a dating app two years ago, you caught the last chopper out of 'Nam."

TikToker Keara Sullivan on the end of the golden era of dating apps, like Tinder or OkCupid, which have fallen out of favor with Millennial and Gen Z daters

 
 
Talking Point

Michigan could make or break Biden's campaign

Michigan is where presidential dreams live or die. Donald Trump surprisingly won the state in 2016. Joe Biden took it in 2020, but he might have a tough time repeating his performance. 

"Michigan Dems have a warning for Biden," Politico announced, as the president visited on Thursday. Arab American voters are a powerful bloc in the state, and many are angry about his support for Israel's war in the Gaza Strip. Michigan Arab leaders turned down an opportunity to meet Biden.

Which is why Biden spent the day instead campaigning at a United Auto Workers hall. "We're going to fight like hell" for Biden, UAW President Shawn Fain told union members.

Discontent over the Israel-Hamas war will make that task tougher. Michigan has become a "quagmire" for Biden, The Hill reported. Arab American voters feel "deep betrayal," per Rep. Debbie Dingell (D-Mich.), which means the state — and the presidency — is "up for grabs."

Fragility in the 'blue wall'
Michigan should be friendly ground for Biden, as The Associated Press noted it has "increasingly shifted Democratic." But the party's "largest base" is in Detroit's Wayne County, which is also home to a substantial number of those Arab voters. 

While Biden was meeting with UAW workers, Al Jazeera reported, Gaza war protesters gathered, some carrying "Genocide Joe has got to go" signs. 

On top of that, The Conversation pointed out that while the UAW has endorsed the president, rank-and-file workers might not go along. In 2020, 40% of those union members voted for Trump. 

'The level of concern is growing'
"Michigan is flashing warning signs," The Wall Street Journal reported. One thing working in Biden's favor, though, is that the state's Republican Party is a mess: Internal drama could "make Trump's turnout efforts in Michigan harder." Still, one Democratic strategist said, "the level of concern is growing and it should be."

"If Biden can't win Michigan, then forget it," Patrick Healy argued in The New York Times. It's the "swing state that matters the most." Michigan should be the easiest win in the "blue wall" given Democratic gains after the downfall of Roe v. Wade. Instead, Biden will really have to work. "Keep your eyes on those Biden trips to Michigan this year; there will be more of them."

 
 

Good day 🐦

… for a pigeon accused of espionage. After an eight-month detention, Indian police cleared a pigeon suspected of acting as a Chinese spy and released it into the wild. The bird bid began in May after it was captured with rings on its legs bearing what looked like Chinese words.

 
 

Bad day 💾

… for ex-CIA officer Joshua Schulte. The former CIA software engineer was sentenced to 40 years in prison for carrying out what was described as the biggest data leak in CIA history. Schulte was accused of leaking "reams of classified data" to WikiLeaks in 2016 and was convicted in 2022.

 
 
Picture of the day

A grand unveiling

Soccer player Arturo Vidal waves a sword as he parades around the field on horseback during his welcoming event in Santiago, Chile 
Esteban Felix / AP

 
 

Poll watch

About three out of four American adults can accurately discern real news headlines from fake ones, according to a new study from the American Economic Review. The research quizzed nearly 15,000 participants and found that 47% were able to confidently identify a real news story over a fake one.

 
 
Puzzles

Test your general knowledge with The Week's daily crossword, part of our puzzles section, which also includes sudoku and codewords.

 
 
The Week recommends

'Fourteen Days' by The Authors Guild, edited by Margaret Atwood and Douglas Preston (Feb. 6)
In what sounds like a bibliophile's dream group project, 36 writers gathered to collaborate on what The Guardian called "a spirited Decameron-style collection of shaggy dog stories and tales of lost love." Set in a Lower East Side apartment building at the beginning of the Covid-19 pandemic lockdowns, a cast of neighbors trade stories to pass the time. 

Helmed by editors Margaret Atwood and Douglas Preston, the contributors list is a who's who of the literary elite, including John Grisham, Celeste Ng, R.L. Stine, Tommy Orange and the editors themselves. "Fourteen Days" is an "immensely enjoyable product of an immensely unenjoyable time," The Guardian explained. 

'Ours' by Phillip B. Williams (Feb. 20)
Poet Phillip B. Williams's "transcendent" debut novel is "a surreal saga set in the antebellum South that looks at the complex nature of freedom," Time noted. After a conjurer named Saint wreaks havoc on Arkansas plantations, she establishes a safe haven for the formerly enslaved and their families just north of St. Louis. After decades of keeping the evils of the outside world at bay, the people living there "begin to worry that they’re experiencing a different kind of subjugation," the outlet added, 

"Ours" is a "gorgeously written, evocative saga of Black American survival and transcendence, blending elements of fantasy, mythology and multigenerational history," per Kirkus Reviews. The story may challenge you to "keep up with worldly and otherworldly happenings."

 
 
INSTANT OPINION

Today's best commentary

'How AI is transforming the way political campaigns work'
Micah L. Sifry in The Nation
Artificial intelligence tools are transforming "how political campaigns work," says Micah L. Sifry in The Nation. Early concerns focused on "deep fakes," like the phony Joe Biden robocall that urged people not to vote in New Hampshire's primary. Such disinformation indeed could start "upending elections." But AI also could change "the practice of campaigning itself," potentially replacing phone-bank volunteers and even professional campaign managers, and threatening to turn candidate pitches into "blatant pandering and manipulation."

'The Senate's false hope of a grand bargain meets its Trumpy demise'
Susan B. Glasser at The New Yorker
"The carnival of stupidity that is a Donald Trump-led Republican Party remains the most distracting show on earth," Susan B. Glasser at The New Yorker. "Trumpier corners of the internet" hyperventilated over conspiracy theories about pop megastar Taylor Swift's support for President Joe Biden. This overshadowed the "debacle" of Republicans doing Trump's bidding by tanking a deal linking Ukraine  funding to a border crackdown, even though Republicans "were the ones who demanded it in the first place."

'Washington's welfare uniparty'
Kimberley A. Strassel in The Wall Street Journal
So much for "spending discipline," says Kimberley A. Strassel in The Wall Street Journal. "Four months after decapitating their own speaker for a supposed lack of conservative principle, House Republicans this week" collaborated "with Democrats to pass a welfare blowout." The $78 billion spending deal included expanding the child tax credit "and its availability to parents who don't pay income tax" — Democratic priorities — "proving again that Congress is incapable of anything beyond redistributing other people's money."

 
 
WORD OF THE DAY

rooftoppers

Thrill-seeking content creators who "scale the tallest buildings they can find" and the subject of the new documentary “Skywalkers: A Love Story”

 
 

In the morning

Tomorrow, you can read top highlights from The Week magazine in our Saturday Wrap, from analysis on Trump's struggle to build a coalition with independents and moderates to a writeup on "The Holdovers" star Dominic Sessa.

Have a great weekend and thanks for reading,
Summer

 
 

Evening Review was written and edited by Theara Coleman, Nadia Croes, Catherine Garcia, Harold Maass, Scott Hocker, Justin Klawans, Kelsee Majette, Joel Mathis, Summer Meza, Devika Rao, Rafi Schwartz, Anahi Valenzuela and Peter Weber, with illustrations by Stephen Kelly and Julia Wytrazek.

Image credits, from top: Illustration by Stephen Kelly / Getty Images; Matthew Chattle / Future Publishing via Getty Images; Drew Angerer / Getty Images; Imagesines / Getty Images