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Trari › Washington Week PBS
Video taking off 43x its usual first day

"Bush is a four-letter word in Texas": Washington Week's Austin special

Jeffrey Goldberg's panel asks whether a Texas Senate race could decide control of Congress, and what Trump does if Republicans lose it.

Channel: Washington Week PBS Story of Trari Newsroom

Why this story? The video opened at a pace of 161,415 views a day, 43 times a normal first day on this channel (3,746).

The Fight to Control Congress | A Special Washington Week with the AtlanticThe Fight to Control Congress | A Special Washington Week with the Atlantic

Things we can learn from the video

Press to jump

  1. 3:20Goldberg raises Trump's turn against Ukraine, including Russian diesel purchases and cut Starlink access.
  2. 10:28Leibovich argues Trump's indifference to embarrassment is a trait other Republicans cannot copy.
  3. 15:10Smith on Texas: no Democrat elected statewide since 1994, now a competitive Talarico-Paxton Senate race.
  4. 25:04The panel asks whether voters who backed John Cornyn will support Paxton or stay home.
  5. 41:13Smith expects gridlock and deal-making if Trump faces a Democratic Congress in his final two years.
  6. 49:20Goldberg and Salama discuss NATO and South Korean doubts about American security guarantees.

Evan Smith has a blunt way of describing the Texas Senate race: "James Talarico is running ahead of a generic Democrat, and Ken Paxton is running behind a generic Republican." On a special edition of Washington Week with The Atlantic, staged before a live audience at Austin PBS, that sentence turns a national question into a local one.

Jeffrey Goldberg moderates, with Smith and The Atlantic's Mark Leibovich, Ashley Parker and Vivian Salama beside him. The full broadcast drew about 160,000 views in its first day. The channel's regular videos usually start with a few thousand.

Smith, the founding editor of The Texas Tribune, reminds viewers that Texas has not elected a Democrat statewide since 1994. He argues that Trump's backing of Paxton over John Cornyn reshaped the race ("Cornyn would have won"). The open question is whether Cornyn's voters show up for Paxton or stay home. He also traces how the party's old guard has fallen out of favor at home, which is where the line "Bush is a four-letter word in Texas" comes from.

Money gets its own argument. Smith says Republicans "lit hundreds of millions of dollars on fire" on culture-war ads in a year still dominated by the economy. Parker adds that such ads hurt Kamala Harris by making her seem detached from household costs, and that high prices now leave Trump exposed in a similar way.

The first stretch is about Trump. Salama walks through his long-held grievance with Ukraine's leadership, and Leibovich calls shamelessness one of his "superpowers," which his would-be heirs cannot simply copy. For a Democratic Congress, Smith predicts gridlock and bargaining: the four most important words, he says, will be "Art of the Deal."

Two clips from the same broadcast, "Is a blue wave coming, and how will Trump react?" and "Trump's Ukraine U-turn," also started far above the channel's usual pace. The clip's description notes that early voting in Texas begins on Monday.

Published on Trari

Where next?

More from Washington Week PBSThis week on the channel +839K views this weekKansas complicates the midterm map on Washington Week PBSJeffrey Goldberg's October 9 panel brings Carrie Dann, Adam Harris, Jonathan Karl and Annie Linskey into the discussion of control of Congress.Channel: Washington Week PBS · Story of October 11, 2026 Also in News networks and broadcastersVideo taking off 10x its usual first dayA Putin headline leads to Lavrov's "World War Three" claimTimes Now World's fast-starting broadcast attributes its central statement to Russia's foreign minister in the description, despite naming Putin in the title.Channel: Times Now World · Story of October 24, 2026 A different discovery todayVideo people are talking about 11x its usual commentsZelenskyy tells Steven Bartlett why he needed "ammunition, not a ride"In a nearly two-hour conversation, Ukraine's president moves from sleepless nights and grieving parents to Bucha, Paddington Bear and the morning the invasion …Channel: The Diary Of A CEO · Story of October 24, 2026

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The facts
Subscribers
244,000 ▲ 1,000 this week
Channel views, last 7 days
782,265
Channel views, pace per day
75,678 (on a normal day: 106,267)
Video published
October 17, 2026
Video views so far
180,634 (less than a day online)
Video views, pace per day
156,955

The numbers

The full Austin broadcast started dozens of times faster than the channel's usual regular video, and two of its clips drew large opening audiences too.

the video's first day
usual first day here
3,746
this video
161,415
subscribers
244,000
▲ 1,000 in the last 7 days
total views
70,562,437
views per day
75,678
typical day: 106,267
the video
views
180,634
likes
2,892
days online
1
subscribers: this channel and similar channels
The Globe and Mail
264,000
The Root
261,000
RTÉ News
254,000
RNZ
251,000
Washington Week PBS
244,000
Royal Exclusive
242,000
As of October 18, 2026 · Data source: Trari Social News, Trari Traffic Trends and Ranking Platform, Google YouTube
Subscriber, view, like and comment counts are YouTube's. Rates, usual days, rankings, comparisons and categories are Trari's own calculations.
Developed with YouTube

💡 Test your knowledge

Evan Smith, a panelist on the Austin special, was the founding editor of which news outlet?