The Oklahoma State Capital

As Sooner fans, tantalized yet once again by the fleeting belief that this would be their perfect season—the first in twenty-five years—everything started to collapse, the day before the Texas game, as Oklahoma Governor Kevin Stitt’s video dropped.

In that video Stitt appeared to be performing some light policy cleanup, prompted by a just-received phone call from the “White House”, before notifying viewers that we were going to go beat those “shorthorns.”

To those Oklahomans who had a sense for divine judgment, Stitt’s clumsy mixing of sports with cleaning up yet another political misstep couldn’t help but activate that nagging, deep feeling that something was wrong and things weren’t going to go to plan: “There goes that perfect season.”

For some context.

It’s one of the things that certain red-state, flyover-country politicians just can’t figure out: how not to become the pawn of coastal media elites hungry for one more “Republican breaks with Trump” headline.

It’s an easy trap for them to fall into, as the savvy liberal journalist—who needs the ubiquitous “red-state politician breaks with Trump administration” story—likely knows that these self-indulgent politicians will run in to share their “wise” opinion on every consequential matter of public discourse with the fervor of a North Texas boomer hunting down a WinStar slot machine—the great revenge of the Chickasaws on the white man, ongoing and dramatic.

Case in point: Oklahoma Attorney General Gentner Drummond, who, though only in his first term, almost immediately contracted second-term-itis. Drummond has absolutely no perception of subject-matter discipline, constantly jumping from issue to issue, injecting himself into every just about every possible public discourse. From education policy to insurance rates to treasury investments—if it’s a matter of public policy, Drummond is going to use his platform as AG to make a fuss, usually pointlessly going on the attack in an apparent attempt to grab the mantle of populism, but time and again coming off as the grandstanding, high-society elitist that he likely is—one who insults the intelligence of true populists while awkwardly mimicking a thought process he clearly can’t actually internalize. He provided an epic example of this earlier this year when he appeared before those who are opposing the government-subsidized green energy invasion of rural Oklahoma in what would almost immediately prove to be a futile attempt to capture his share of the rising energy of the grassroots; it just didn’t work.

One can only imagine the tortured life of his campaign consultants—the best in the state—who wake up each morning tasked with the impossible: stopping Gentner Drummond from eviscerating his foremost opponent and gubernatorial challenger, Charles McCall—the one state official who, curiously enough, seems to hold a rare exemption from Drummond’s attacks.

McCall, who campaigns as a conservative, regularly attacks Drummond and recently released a poll showing that the two candidates are competitive. It’s a very sketchy poll from a pollster with a very sketchy background. How do you know if the poll is real? If it were, we can expect that Drummond—who has no qualms about attacking anybody and everybody in state government, at a moment’s notice, for the dopamine rush of a single press release—would overcome his consultants’ objections, and would already be eviscerating McCall, his foremost opponent, who has more spooky skeletons in terms of votes and bill sponsorships, such as McCall’s “Fed Coin” bill described in the last OSC opinion piece, than a Halloween pop-up store. Stay tuned to The Capital as we do our best to scratch the surface of some of these votes and how they reveal McCall’s true M.O.

But somehow, in some way, as McCall attacks Drummond, Drummond’s consultants are keeping him disciplined—no doubt saving the massive counterattacks for a day when they’re truly needed. Preferably, that’s after the Republican primary in June, when McCall—by far the weakest potential major challenger—squeaks into a runoff and becomes Drummond’s opponent. Keeping Drummond disciplined is an amazing accomplishment; it’s just too bad for those consultants that there’s no official general consulting Pollie Award category for “client impulse containment.” If there were, they would have the nomination for the Pollie CIC Award for the 2026 cycle.

Oklahoma’s governor, Kevin Stitt, doesn’t appear to have this same benefit of a strong consultant to keep his dastardly predilections in line. He’s suffering from a clear bout of second-term-itis—a debilitating condition by which a politician, addled by prolonged exposure to the narcotic of power and being “important” for too long, begins to insert himself into every public dialogue and, believing he is a great diviner of wisdom and prudence, starts becoming very aimless—with no definable brand or policy direction, and thus no consistent base of political support.

Such appears to have been the case a few days ago, when Stitt used his interview with the failing New York Times to unravel the goodwill he’d earned only days earlier, after making national news when the state caught a New York illegal immigrant driving with “No Name” listed as his first name on his CDL.

In a previous editorial, OSC urged Stitt to focus on the basics—to cement his legacy by DOGEing state government, the opportunities of which are massive to those who are in the know, and to use the savings to double down on the plan to eliminate the state’s income tax; it’s the best chance Stitt has left available to him to cement a transformational legacy.

Specifically, Stitt was advised to avoid the “National Governors Association time waste” that has him consorting with blue-state politicians in a role sure to weaken and water down his red-state bona fides. Those national associations are almost always bad news. Being “important” and cultivating relationships with those who do not share local values has very little benefit, at the risk of greatly compromising the emotions and priorities of the red-state politicians who choose to play that game—a game that too often becomes: “See, I can show you that I’m the one red-stater who isn’t a barbarian; rather, I’m better than the others because I like to say things that are against Donald Trump from time to time.”

One can’t help but observe that this effect has been a powerful detriment for Oklahoma City Mayor David Holt, whose frequent virtue signaling has put him at odds—understandably so—with many grassroots across the state, but in national mayor circles likely has him on stage very cozy with some of the nation’s most prominent leftists, such as his recent appearance with the highly controversial and epically incompetent Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass.

This frequent interaction with the most prominent of the aggressive, grandstanding leftist politicians tends to dull the judgment of the red-state counterpart, and such was likely the case when Stitt, in his interview with The New York Times, made the bad decision to criticize Trump—and by proxy, the work of his fellow red-state governor, Greg Abbott of Texas—at the worst possible time: just days before the most important rivalry of the year, Oklahoma vs. Texas.

Stitt criticized Trump’s use of the Texas National Guard—a move by Trump to protect federal ICE agents who are absolutely under siege as they seek to save our nation from the illegal invasion of criminal alien gangs, including Tren d’Auga, who are moving in for their share of the action in the Chicago gangland area.

The lives and safety of those agents are in tremendous jeopardy on a daily basis. Reports now suggest that criminal gangs are putting bounties on their heads, and they cannot depend on the help of local police. Chicago police were specifically forbidden from assisting immigration officers even as gun-toting leftists reportedly assaulted them. This is one of the defining issues of our time—one that will dictate the survival of the American republic as we know it.

It’s clear that this is a hidden war. Criminal actors from Venezuela, likely with the assistance of the Venezuelan state, have exploited open borders to organize in blue-state Illinois, where they not only seem to have the protection of that city’s socialist mayor and grandstanding governor, but where the governor himself is threatening ICE law enforcement officers with future prosecution once the Democrats retake power in D.C.

Given all that is at stake, a clear-thinking red-state governor would know that— notwithstanding the need to discuss the principles of federalism and states’ rights, at the right time, in the right forum—an individual of good judgment would never have taken the bait from one of the most aggressive left-wing national publications.

Arrogant leftist “journalists” thrive on finding a red-state politician who is ready to “break with Trump,” and to the great embarrassment of all Oklahomans, Stitt took the bait—and, in a bout of incredible bad judgment, was all too eager to be that guy, even as the future of the American republic hangs in the balance.

The headline he provided: “Stitt Becomes First Republican Governor to Break with Trump on National Guard Deployments.”

Ouch.

In that article, posed in the most stately of poses for the NY Times photographer, Stitt went with the grandstanding, blue, Democrat Pritzker over Abbott and Trump. And that’s not all, he reportedly took it to the next level by suggesting other Republican governors would agree and side with his point of view. Stitt went with the grandstanding, blue, Democrat Pritzker over Abbott and Trump. And that’s not all, he reportedly took it to the next level by suggesting other Republican governors would agree and side with his point of view.

If Stitt had thought this through, he would have told that reporter he was not just in support of ICE but ready to support Abbott and send the Oklahoma Guard to gangland Chicago—because the whole nation is going to pay the price if the invasion of our nation is successful. But, in a tone-deaf inability to recognize the gravity of the situation, Stitt apparently told The Times that Oklahomans wouldn’t like it if the Illinois Guard were sent into Oklahoma and equivocated that to Abbott sending Texans to Illinois.

Perhaps Stitt should be asking Trump to nationalize and send in the Illinois Guard to help clean up the Mad Max post-apocalyptic dystopia of Tulsa—overseen by Oklahoma’s version of Chicago’s Brandon Johnson, “Brandon Johnson-light” Monroe Nichols—a referendum on years of Stitt’s social justice outlook on criminal justice policy, an incoherent approach disproven by hundreds of years of Western civilization’s learned experience.

One is likely to find that, once nationalized under Trump, the vast majority of Illinois guardsmen share Oklahoma values, not Chicago values—and that the National Guard sergeant from Cambria, with a legacy that traces back to the Illinois frontier fights of the 19th century, such as the Woods Creek Massacre, won’t likely care too much about checking the Creek Nation citizenship status of the Mad Max crime boss who likely operates in north Tulsa with a sense of McGirt-infused impunity.

But worse, Stitt decided to take the bait during Oklahoma–Texas week—a time when all wise Oklahomans know they need to shape up any foibles in their personal lives to ensure they are on the righteous side of every matter during this important weekend with their hated southern rivals. For sure, they know that to commit a moral offense during OU-Texas week is to risk failure in one of the most consequential matters of their lives: beating Texas.

So, on this week of all times, Stitt chose to opine on the “wrong” that the first Texas, Abbott, committed by trying to protect those who are in the process of putting their lives on the line as they try to save the American republic from invasion by the worst of the criminal element.

Ouch.

Now we know why the events of that weekend turned out the way they did.

Those with a sense for justice can’t help but suspect that Stitt’s great sin of bad judgment is now being felt by Sooner fans everywhere.

Now, sports is sports, and there’s always next year to beat Texas and get that perfect season. It’s been twenty-five years, so waiting just one more is doable. But perhaps what will become known as Stitt’s greatest misstep became crystallized this last week, as the public spokesperson for Stitt’s appointee to the position of state education superintendent seemed barely capable of suppressing her glee as she announced to the world that the state of Oklahoma would no longer be providing Bibles to common-ed classrooms.

It’s now clear that Stitt, by joining former education superintendent Ryan Walters’ deranged critic Gentner Drummond and the state’s legislative uniparty in attacking on Walters—who had been elected by the people by a greater margin than Stitt—has now brought about a return to the lackluster, status quo days of Joy Hofmeister’s leadership.

Some may have argued that Walters was rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic, trying to save a public education system dominated and controlled by teachers’ unions with a collective ideology left of Marx, arrogant university-trained-and-brainwashed professional administrators who are cashing out while burning down the education system to the great detriment of those trapped inside of it, and local board members are elected and controlled by the status quo—i.e., a lost cause.

But Walters genuinely appeared to be a naive believer who thought he could return the system to the innocence of a time past—when teachers and administrators truly knew and understood the foundational principles of Americana and Western civilization, motivated by a desire to serve regardless of personal financial benefit, foregoing personal riches for the calling of ensuring the next generation was more knowledgeable of and better prepared to act on those principles than the last.

To that effect, Walters was in the business of fighting the windmills—attempting to restore that innocent ethos against all odds: a hostile education establishment, a uniparty legislature, an attorney general clearly attempting to sabotage him all the way, and then finally, the merciful coup de grace—Stitt, who replaced Walters’ board with a set of goofy Walters-derangement-syndrome drama actors.

In short, it was Stitt himself who sabotaged the last best hope for saving the public education system—and the return of that ancient book of wisdom, provided by the Creator Himself, to transform the lives of so many innocent minds which are forever shaped by their interaction with that system.

It’s not hard to imagine that the conspiracy-minded of future generations will look back on Stitt’s actions and suggest that he was part of the plan to destroy public education in Oklahoma—to the benefit of his private education political allies. That he purposely sabotaged the system’s last great hope in favor of a boorish, status-quo appointment who is already showing himself to be in line with the lethargic governance of Democrats Sandy Garrett and Joy Hofmeister—the establishment, status-quo actors who have held sway over the system for 28 of the last 36 years, or 80% of the time—and to whom, if we are to pin the woes of the state’s common education system on the superintendent of education position, are the most clearly responsible for those woes.

It’s heavy stuff—and quite ironic considering Stitt’s particularly pious presentation at last week’s Turning Point USA rally in Norman.

So, as the great Republican governors’ primary of 2026 continues to mature and the next governor is selected, the current group of candidates should watch and learn from the ever-accumulating number of missteps made by Stitt in his second term. That person should resolve that if elected to two terms, they will endeavor to become the first Republican governor in the state’s history to finish their second term in a stronger position than their first; and perhaps to send Stitt a quick thank you, for thoughtfully lowering the bar so significantly as he makes his exit from the governor’s mansion.