braxton winston, lee carter, welcome both of you to democracy now! let's begin with you. are delegate elect foror the 50th house district of virginia. you unseated the majority whip in the virginia legislature. you are a marine. you are a self-declared democratic socialist. you did not have the full support of the democratic party behind you, did you? how did you do it? >> we knew from day one that going up against a member of the republican party leadership in the south was going to be an actual battle. so we knew there was no way we were going to be able to spend more money than him. we tried into italy to avoid a fund-raising arms race, the more mainstream democratic party seems to love. they think the only way to win money than more republicans. we decided we were going to intentionally avoid that and just craft a message that people responded to. and go out there and build a coalition of groups that were invested in this race, you know, from the democratic socialist of america and our revolution, two groups that are more traditionally align with the democratic voter

the photo of braxton winston from last year shows him raising a fist in front of a line of riot police as he joined protest against the killing of keith lamont scott, an african-american father who was shot by charlotte police officer who was later acquitted over the killing. winston has promised to focus on economic development and police accountability. voters in northern virginia have elected 30-year-old democrat and marine veteran leigh carter to the state house of delegates. carter identifies as a democratic socialist. he defeated longtime, republican jackson miller, the state's majority whip. in texas, 47-year-old mexican citizen ruben ramirez cardenas died wednesday evening after prison officials injected him with a single, lethal dose of the drug pentobarbital. cardenas's execution came two decades after he was convicted of murdering his 16-year-old cousin. the execution came over the strong objections of mexican diplomats who say texas violated cardenas's due process rights, failed to consider conflicting testimony by witnesses at his trial, and refused to allow new dna testin