Ground beef prices rose 9% in July from a year ago, while beef steaks rose 9.6%. Higher beef prices are good for U.S. cattle producers, allowing them to fetch higher prices for each head of cattle sold on the market. Conversely, U.S. consumers suffer from higher beef prices, which drive up grocery prices nationwide.

I worked as a Public Defender, and I want to tell you about a hallway. Every courthouse in Oklahoma has one. It is the hallway outside the courtroom where protective orders get heard. You learn to recognize the women who are sitting in it. They arrive early and sit facing the door. Often, they have a folder with photographs in it, text messages printed out, and a police report. You can sometimes hear them rehearsing what they are going to say to a judge they have never met about the worst thing that has ever happened to them.

In 2025, the United States collected $5.23T in revenue, and we are on track to collect nearly that amount again in 2026. According to USASpending.gov, the United States is set to spend $8.3T, which means the United States will borrow $3T, three trillion dollars, in just 2026 alone.

One year ago today, on August 16, 2025, we launched this campaign in Wayne, Oklahoma, with a simple belief. A belief that Oklahomans deserve a representative who will meet them where they are. This journey did not start in a consultant’s office; it began at my kitchen table and has evolved from a kitchen-table conversation about the state of our education and constitutional protections into a grassroots, people-led movement challenging the status quo in Oklahoma’s Fourth Congressional District.

August is a month marked by many milestones. Martin Luther King Jr. delivered his famed "I Have a Dream" speech, President Richard Nixon resigned due to the Watergate scandal, the Social Security Act passed Congress, and women were granted the right to vote with the passing of the Nineteenth Amendment. August is a critical month for American history.

Tom Cole has a war chest. We have people. Tom Cole has billionaire friends. We have grassroots donors. When Tom Cole took office in 2003, his estimated net worth was $2 million. From there, Cole’s net worth grew to an estimated $3 million in 2008, and is approximately $9 million today. Since taking office, Cole has raised and spent at least $1 million per election cycle, and has already spent more than $3 million in the 2026 cycle alone.

Oklahoma has always been defined by its land. Our farms, ranches, lakes, rivers, and open spaces are the foundation of our economy. And yet, farmers depend on water. Ranchers depend on healthy land. Hunting and fishing play roles in our economy. Living off the land is the Oklahoma way of life, and economic development shouldn't come at the expense of the very land that feeds us.

We need to talk about the escalating war with Iran. In June, Congress passed a measure directing the president to end the use of armed forces in Iran, yet the United States continues to spend billions of our taxpayer dollars on a war of choice, on a war no one wants. Trump said the war would be over in a few weeks, but we are seeing the beginning of a forever war.