Rep. Greg Casar, Hightower and Carlton Carl in 2024

Look up the word “mainstay,” and you’ll find such strong synonyms as backbone, linchpin, pillar, sustainer… and good right arm.

You might also find a picture of Carlton Carl, for he was all of those things throughout his decades of persistent, creative, and uplifting work in the trenches of the Texas progressive movement. In our state’s ongoing, feisty efforts to advance people power over moneyed elites, Carlton was at the heart of the struggle as a grassroots organizer, legislative strategist, journalist, scrappy fighter… and mainstay.

His most recent venture was to do something that more progressives should do: He moved to a Central Texas rural county considered to be conservative. There, in Caldwell County, he’s been successfully building a local political network around kitchen-table issues of progressive populism.

As a longtime friend and grassroots champion, Carlton will be sorely missed. But rather than merely missing him, let's emulate him! We need to celebrate and elevate the Carlton Carls of our movement—and recruit more of them. They are the steady builders of a durable democratic politics—the continuum that, over time, puts the progress in progressive. 

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