Speaker 1: This is Bloomberg Business Week. I'm Carol Masser. Every day
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Speaker 1: The Fed holding rates near zero, no change in the
Speaker 1: bond buying pace, but this was widely expected. Here we
Speaker 1: are just two days after election. Let's talk a little
Speaker 1: bit about this decision or what we really need to
Speaker 1: see or expect to see from the Fed over the
Speaker 1: next few weeks. Let's get the Business Week agenda. Bloomberg
Speaker 1: News Global Economics and Policy Editor Kathleen Hayes is with us,
Speaker 1: and she is there in our Bloomberg Interactive Broker studio. Hey, Kathleen, Um,
Speaker 1: we weren't expecting any surprises, correct, Well, of course, it's
Speaker 1: hard to expect a suppress Now I know what you mean.
Speaker 1: We figured, look, they're they're kind of stuck with what
Speaker 1: they've got. Let me start though, by pointing something out,
Speaker 1: because right before two o'clock I noted there's a very
Speaker 1: small sell off today in bonds, but it's gotten a
Speaker 1: little bit deeper. For example, the benchmark tenure, which was
Speaker 1: down to thirty seconds, now down five thirty seconds. The
Speaker 1: thirty year was down one thirty second, it's down six
Speaker 1: thirty seconds. So maybe a little bit of upward pressure
Speaker 1: on yields is a disappointment because maybe nobody expected the
Speaker 1: Fed would say, hey, we're ready to start increasing our
Speaker 1: bond purchases, but they what they did repeat is hey,
Speaker 1: we're going to keep it where it is for now,
Speaker 1: which is a hundred and twenty billion dollars a month,
Speaker 1: eighty billion of treasuries, forty billion of mortgage backed securities.
Speaker 1: And because when you know, coming into the elections, when
Speaker 1: people were betting pretty heavily on a blue wave, that
Speaker 1: would lead to a lot of fiscal stimulus, more than
Speaker 1: if if Trump stayed in the White House, etcetera. We
Speaker 1: saw the curve steepening, we saw long term yields going up.
Speaker 1: But people we're saying, well, if nothing else. The Fed's
Speaker 1: got to make it clear that they're going to work
Speaker 1: against it if they have to. Well, what they're saying
Speaker 1: so far today is don't have to do it yet.
Speaker 1: So I think, Carol, this will be one of the
Speaker 1: big questions at the top of the list for j
Speaker 1: Powell when he starts that press conference at two thirty Eastern.
Speaker 1: And maybe he just didn't want to stir the pot
Speaker 1: in a in a week where the pot has been
Speaker 1: stirred a lot. And having said that, Kathleen, he you know,
Speaker 1: they fed another headline. They're going to continue to uh
Speaker 1: focus obviously and watch the virus. They said the virus
Speaker 1: will continue to weigh on economic activity. The virus to
Speaker 1: pose considerable risks to the medium term outlook. They say
Speaker 1: the overall financial conditions remain commitative, commodative, and they say
Speaker 1: weaker demand, lower all oil prices, holding down inflation, economic
Speaker 1: activity and employment have continued to recover. So that's kind
Speaker 1: of their snapshot picture. Well, they've been saying, I would say,
Speaker 1: pretty unanimously since March. Uh. In fact, you're making me
Speaker 1: think of when I interviewed Jim Bullard from the St.
Speaker 1: Louis FED and Rob A. Problem within two well one
Speaker 1: day and then the next one, uh, you know, and
Speaker 1: that was just after the emergency meeting where they started
Speaker 1: cutting raids and they said, it's all about the virus.
Speaker 1: You know, the unemployment headlines, the payrolls headlines don't mean
Speaker 1: as much as the virus headlines. I think that started
Speaker 1: to shift because the US economy is in recovery. The
Speaker 1: job recovery seems to have slowed down, but that focus
Speaker 1: till tomorrow. Right, Let's see if it continue, if the
Speaker 1: economy at least continue to create jobs or not a
Speaker 1: lot of people on unemployment, A lot of people go
Speaker 1: going on the longer term unemployment, so that's still not
Speaker 1: a positive sign. But that's about the virus. And that's
Speaker 1: another reason where the FED would say, until this health
Speaker 1: crisis is over, we can't we're not going to consider
Speaker 1: doing any change in policy. Right, and the FEDS saying
Speaker 1: that the path of recovery depending on the course of
Speaker 1: the coronavirus pandemic. They know, we know it, everybody knows it.
Speaker 1: But it does feel like Dave Wilson, come on in
Speaker 1: Bloomberg Stocks columnist and editor watching the equity it feels
Speaker 1: like equity markets kind of forgot that we are in
Speaker 1: the midst of a pandemic. This week, well, it sure does.
Speaker 1: I mean, you really saw a recovery from you know,
Speaker 1: when day remembered last week and stocks really took a hit.
Speaker 1: And today it's interesting because you know, the criticism about
Speaker 1: yesterday's advance is that you know, you have the SMP
Speaker 1: five hundred up more than two percent, and there are
Speaker 1: actually more stocks in the index down than up by
Speaker 1: some of the UH research I saw, I mean, that
Speaker 1: was the first time it ever happened. And so today
Speaker 1: what do you have, Uh, you know, SMP five hundred
Speaker 1: up more than two percent again this time around, though
Speaker 1: you have close to nine stocks up in the SMP
Speaker 1: bile hunted for everyone that's down. So it's clear that
Speaker 1: it's a blood based advanced this time around. Uh. You know,
Speaker 1: the s and people a hundred rising toward its highs
Speaker 1: of the day after the results of the FED meeting
Speaker 1: were released. And if you look what's going on today,
Speaker 1: it's a lot of the economically sensitive areas of the
Speaker 1: market kind of leading the way, notably raw material producers
Speaker 1: UH with gain for their index of four point seven
Speaker 1: percent at the moment, I mean all eleven of the
Speaker 1: main texts are higher, but the raw material producers certainly
Speaker 1: jump out of today's trading. Listen, Kathleen, I just when
Speaker 1: we think about Fed policy, you know, is it is
Speaker 1: there a possibility I was listening to a guest that
Speaker 1: David Weston head on, you know, the possibility that we
Speaker 1: go back into negative rates or the Fed will need
Speaker 1: to be more aggressive depending on where the economy goes. Well,
Speaker 1: they keep saying they have more tools up until now
Speaker 1: beneficials from J. Paul doesn't matter almost who you ask.
Speaker 1: They're not fans of negative rates. They go right to
Speaker 1: money market funds, for example, would really mess up that
Speaker 1: market if you, uh, potentially if you if you're going
Speaker 1: to move in that direction. Uh. And then beyond that,
Speaker 1: I think the thing people might start talking about more
Speaker 1: is yield curve control. Because if you want to officially
Speaker 1: add a tool, I mean, if you're buying bonds and
Speaker 1: you want to keep yields from right, you know, raising
Speaker 1: too much, that's yes start of I think it's kind of,
Speaker 1: you know, the precursor of Yelker control. But to take
Speaker 1: it a step further and to target, make a target
Speaker 1: for the tenure yield for example, and say we're going
Speaker 1: to make sure it doesn't go above that. That would
Speaker 1: be a step. I think the problem for the FED
Speaker 1: right now, or the challenge is that sure bring another
Speaker 1: tool in. As long as there's so many people unemployed
Speaker 1: and a lot of people don't want to go back
Speaker 1: to work, or their jobs aren't even there to go
Speaker 1: back to, etcetera, etcetera, etcetera. Any tool is going to
Speaker 1: have a tough time doing very much. But in addition
Speaker 1: though that, the bond purchases, I think people figure you
Speaker 1: can just flat out increase the amount. But it is
Speaker 1: as you started out the beginning, I think hitting at
Speaker 1: we're in an election week, not an election day anymore, right,
Speaker 1: and the middle of all this, the Fed's best bet
Speaker 1: is just to sit tight and wait for the December meeting. Well,
Speaker 1: and the one thing that we're going to talk about
Speaker 1: over the next few hours this split income, this split
Speaker 1: outcome that we could potentially see if Joe Biden gets
Speaker 1: the White House, if we have still a Republican Republican
Speaker 1: controlled Senate, that the chance of a big stimulus package
Speaker 1: is less likely. You know. So you you wonder, then
Speaker 1: the FED watching this and what what more can they do?
Speaker 1: And he can say and J. Powe will surely get
Speaker 1: I can't imagine j Pie not feeling like he could
Speaker 1: say today, well, no matter what happens, um, we still
Speaker 1: need stimulus. He could certainly repeat that. I you know,
Speaker 1: Mitch McConnell, who presumably maybe the SENTI majority leader or
Speaker 1: may not depending on all it goes, right, said when
Speaker 1: when they get back, when Congress reconvened, job one is
Speaker 1: going to be a rescue package. Now, the trillion dollar
Speaker 1: figure was on the table at one point, right, the
Speaker 1: five billion that he floated before the election seemed really light. Um,
Speaker 1: you know, so so I think I'm an optimist, Carol.
Speaker 1: So I think it may not be two point two trillion,
Speaker 1: which the Democrats have pushed hard for, lead by Nancy
Speaker 1: Pelosians just last seats and you know, Democratic seats in
Speaker 1: the House. But maybe maybe because something I could trillion.
Speaker 1: That's that's not nothing, No, it's not nothing. There's a
Speaker 1: lot of zeros in that number. Dave Wilson, just quickly
Speaker 1: tease your chart because it has kind of an election
Speaker 1: related I feel like our administration related theme. Well, it's
Speaker 1: all about private prison stocks. President Trump tried to prop
Speaker 1: up the industry not long after he got the into office.
Speaker 1: Didn't work out so well, and now you got the
Speaker 1: election results and things are getting worse for those stocks.
Speaker 1: All right, We're looking forward to that. Hey, team, thank
Speaker 1: you so much, really appreciated setting the agenda on this Thursday.
Speaker 1: Bloomberg News Global Economics and Policy Editor Kathleen Hayes back
Speaker 1: in our Bloomberg Interactive Broker studio and Bloomberg Stocks editor
Speaker 1: Dave Wilson. This is Bloomberg Business Week with Carol Messer
Speaker 1: from Bloomberg Radio. We're gonna bring you the latest on
Speaker 1: this week's election as the counting of the votes continues,
Speaker 1: the lawsuits continue, and we're all awaiting to find out
Speaker 1: who will take up at Pennsylvania Avenue come January. We'll
Speaker 1: joining me today as we go through it all over
Speaker 1: the next few hours. Kevin CEREALI He is Bloomberg News Chief,
Speaker 1: Washington correspondent of Bloomberg Radio and TV host. You know
Speaker 1: him well a Bloomberg sound on on Bloomberg nine and
Speaker 1: I one in Washington, d C. He joins us from there.
Speaker 1: Juno Rosso also with US legal analyst and host of
Speaker 1: Bloomberg Law on Bloomberg Radio every evening. He she joins
Speaker 1: us on the phone in New York. So, Kevin, let
Speaker 1: me kick it off with you. Where are we? I mean,
Speaker 1: Nancy Lione just gave us a good rundown of some
Speaker 1: of the key states and what's going on. But what
Speaker 1: are you watching? What are you hearing also from the
Speaker 1: Biden and Trump camps. Well, look, I think I think
Speaker 1: first things first, it's great to be here with you, Carol,
Speaker 1: great to have Ben. That beyond that, all eyes are
Speaker 1: going to be on Nevada, right and Clark County, Nevada,
Speaker 1: because that specifically where we're still getting some of the
Speaker 1: vote tallies. Now, last I checked, just before I came
Speaker 1: on air, I dove into the Bloomberg terminal and I
Speaker 1: looked at the actual vote tally. Uh and Joe Biden
Speaker 1: is leading by about twelve thousand votes. That's a razor
Speaker 1: thin margin. Uh. So beyond that, the president's former director
Speaker 1: of National Intelligence, Rick Renel, he is in Nevada right now.
Speaker 1: Uh and fully just breeched reporters and said, essentially, they
Speaker 1: are fully prepared to take this thing through the courts.
Speaker 1: They're making this legal argument essentially that they believe there's
Speaker 1: been a number of votes cast in Nevada by people
Speaker 1: from out of state, so they don't feel that those
Speaker 1: votes should be counted in the Nevada election. That's what's
Speaker 1: going on in that state. We should note just the
Speaker 1: electoral math right now. Joe Biden, based upon the Bloomberg
Speaker 1: Electoral map total is that two hundred and sixty four,
Speaker 1: which puts him just six electoral votes away a k a.
Speaker 1: The size of Nevada away from reaching the magic number
Speaker 1: of two hundred and seventy. The Trump campaign, for their part, UH,
Speaker 1: they have said that they're going to pursue legal action
Speaker 1: in Pennsylvania, in Wisconsin, UH, and even to some extent
Speaker 1: maybe even in North Carolina. So that's where things stand
Speaker 1: as of now. Obviously, as we've been reporting for the
Speaker 1: past week, really this week, we're urging patients caution as
Speaker 1: as we sort through all of this. But as we
Speaker 1: get the developments, will will break them in real time.
Speaker 1: I want to get to June, but just remind me
Speaker 1: Kevin d j T the president, where is he in
Speaker 1: terms of electoral votes right now? Well, right now he
Speaker 1: is still a couple of votes away. I believe the
Speaker 1: last I checked. It was to eighteen for for President Trump. Um,
Speaker 1: and uh so that's where he is right now, but
Speaker 1: he would have to win. He still has a shot.
Speaker 1: We should mention if he if he wins Georgia, North
Speaker 1: Carolina as well as Pennsylvania, that would put him, uh
Speaker 1: with a path. It's just you know, it's you know,
Speaker 1: they're gonna have to pursue legal action. Yeah, it's strict
Speaker 1: your path. I think that's safe to say. Yeah, exactly. So, June,
Speaker 1: come on in. I mean, you watch the legal world,
Speaker 1: you know it so well. Kevin talked about some of
Speaker 1: the lawsuits that we've been seeing fast, you know, fast
Speaker 1: and furiously crossing the bloomberg. You know, what do we
Speaker 1: need to know about the Trump team and the lawsuits
Speaker 1: that are out there, Well, they are filing a lot
Speaker 1: of lawsuits, that's the first thing you need to know.
Speaker 1: And they're filing them, you know, in a lot of
Speaker 1: these states where the vote is still being counted, or
Speaker 1: in other states for example like Michigan. And there are
Speaker 1: different reasons for the lawsuits, but most of the time
Speaker 1: they're being turned away by the it's for example, they
Speaker 1: tried to stop the ballot counting in Michigan yesterday, Well,
Speaker 1: a judge said, the essence of the count is completed.
Speaker 1: The relief is completely unavailable. So I think any of
Speaker 1: their any of their lawsuits to stop the count are
Speaker 1: going to have a lot of trouble getting through. And
Speaker 1: also a lot of these other cases you've heard. Kevin
Speaker 1: mentioned that there's that they are saying this in about
Speaker 1: Nevada Clark County. But a problem is they're making a
Speaker 1: lot of allegations, but when they go into a judge
Speaker 1: to try to prove them, they don't have the evidence
Speaker 1: to back them. So you're hearing all kinds of fraud allegations,
Speaker 1: but you know where is the fraud. They alleged that
Speaker 1: um in Georgia yesterday that a poll worker had put
Speaker 1: the votes that ballots that came in late mixed them
Speaker 1: with the votes of ballots that had come in on time.
Speaker 1: That was proven when it went before a judge not
Speaker 1: to be the case. And a lot of the poll
Speaker 1: observers actually they found that they look for things and
Speaker 1: they sometimes line things that really aren't there because they're
Speaker 1: they're looking. And then today President Trump said there was
Speaker 1: a huge victory in Pennsylvania in court. Do you know
Speaker 1: what that victory was. The pole observers from the Trump
Speaker 1: campaign were allowed to move from about thirty feet observing
Speaker 1: to sixty to six feet up turving, So it was
Speaker 1: And by the way, that's online anyway, so you can
Speaker 1: see it online. So that's not a huge victory, right.
Speaker 1: A lot of it goes to transparency, which is what
Speaker 1: the campaigns, both campaigns to be fair, have been pushing
Speaker 1: for all along in this process. I do want to
Speaker 1: bring into the conversation. It's been one of our go
Speaker 1: to voices on the campaign in the election, joining June
Speaker 1: and Kevin and myself as Bloomberg News political contributor and
Speaker 1: I own a college professor of political science, Genzano joining
Speaker 1: us once again from New Rochelle, New York. You and
Speaker 1: I we've been talking for a long time. We all
Speaker 1: have been um. But here we are Thursday, and there
Speaker 1: are expectations that this could go on for a few
Speaker 1: more days. When you look at where we are in
Speaker 1: the race, what comes to mind first and most well,
Speaker 1: you know, a bit still trying to grapple with the fact,
Speaker 1: as you mentioned, that we are now on Thursday and
Speaker 1: looking like we may not have results in for a
Speaker 1: couple of days. You know, going into this, we knew
Speaker 1: Pennsylvania may take until Friday. I was probably optimistic um
Speaker 1: that it wouldn't come down to Pennsylvania. But at this point,
Speaker 1: I think one thing that comes to mind is the
Speaker 1: idea that we are still waiting on results not just
Speaker 1: from Pennsylvania, but Nevada, Georgia, North Carolina, and of course,
Speaker 1: you know, depending on who you're listening to, some people
Speaker 1: haven't even been you know, quite satisfied with what's coming
Speaker 1: out of Arizona at this point. So the closeness as
Speaker 1: we sort of compare this historically to say a two
Speaker 1: thousand in many states, and the fact we're not just
Speaker 1: talking about one state where there maybe you were just
Speaker 1: talking about potential contests, legal challenges, but that we're talking
Speaker 1: multiple states, you know, quite a difference, and I think
Speaker 1: that speaks volumes as to where we are at this
Speaker 1: point in our country and how divided we are. Hey, Jeannie,
Speaker 1: it's uh Kevin here, and let me just correct something
Speaker 1: I recently said. Uh, Trump has two hundred and fourteen
Speaker 1: electoral votes. I want to be careful with this, so,
Speaker 1: uh Joe Biden has two hundred sixty four six votes
Speaker 1: away from the threshold of two seventy. President Trump has
Speaker 1: two hundred and fourteen electoral votes. That's where the map
Speaker 1: stands right now. And you can follow all of our
Speaker 1: election coverage. Mind you on election go on the Bloomberg terminal. Jennie,
Speaker 1: you mentioned Arizona, and I want to pick up on
Speaker 1: that because that has been a conversation that I've been
Speaker 1: having with my sources in the President's reelection campaign. They
Speaker 1: are really confident that once the math is settled on
Speaker 1: Maricopa County, that they will have the votes to win Arizona.
Speaker 1: Explain to us where things stand right now in this
Speaker 1: key battleground state that the networks and the associated press
Speaker 1: have called for, uh, Joe Biden at this point, UM,
Speaker 1: So you know, it's it's a fascinating situation in Arizona. UM.
Speaker 1: You know, again, we're looking at about six percent um
Speaker 1: have been counted already, and we see a very narrow
Speaker 1: lead for Joe Biden. UM about depending again on on
Speaker 1: what numbers and when they've been refreshed, that you're looking
Speaker 1: at about fifty point five percent to forty eight point one.
Speaker 1: It's a little bit bigger than some of the others
Speaker 1: but it's such a critical state because it has eleven
Speaker 1: electoral votes. And when some of the you know networks
Speaker 1: and others started calling it, as we talked about on
Speaker 1: Tuesday Night Box, and then later the ape started calling
Speaker 1: it a bit early, that really frustrated the president and
Speaker 1: his team. UM. And now we are looking to see nobody,
Speaker 1: as far as I have have said, and I don't
Speaker 1: want to misspeak because I'm trying to keep up with
Speaker 1: whatevere everbody is. But nobody, as far as I know,
Speaker 1: who called it has taken the call back, which is
Speaker 1: an indication that they feel pretty confident. But I do
Speaker 1: think that it is one of those cases where we
Speaker 1: will see legal challenge just from the President's team because
Speaker 1: Arizona is such a critical state for the president and
Speaker 1: his team. UM. The idea that that goes Biden. Of course,
Speaker 1: in two two thousand and sixteen, you had the president
Speaker 1: beating Hillary Clinton there about fifty one point one. We're seeing,
Speaker 1: if you believe the numbers of six percent reporting, receive
Speaker 1: almost a slip there with Joe Biden. So I think
Speaker 1: it's going to be one of the contested states. The
Speaker 1: president seems feels like they need that particularly since miss
Speaker 1: At least in my view, Michigan and Wisconsin seems so
Speaker 1: out of grasp to the president even legally at this point.
Speaker 1: But I don't want to misspeak on that. You know,
Speaker 1: we've talked about Arizona, Nevada, I mean those two counties,
Speaker 1: Clark in Maricopa. I mean, these are two of the
Speaker 1: largest counties in the US. So there's a lot of
Speaker 1: votes to process, no doubt about it, I do under Genie,
Speaker 1: depending on the outcome. One thing to remember here, you
Speaker 1: understand this process. You've studied a lot of elections. I mean,
Speaker 1: it's not uncommon, especially if there's a close race, you know,
Speaker 1: to go and check the count and confirm that the
Speaker 1: outcome is the outcome. Yeah, it's not unusual, but I
Speaker 1: think you know the fact Number one, what is unusual
Speaker 1: as we see so many states so closely, um, you
Speaker 1: know that are so close rather and the other thing
Speaker 1: that I think is a bit unusual is the idea
Speaker 1: that you would have so many legal challenges. I don't
Speaker 1: think we've seen anything like this, But historically, I don't
Speaker 1: think this is something we should be surprised at because
Speaker 1: this is to a certain extent where we've been moving
Speaker 1: since two thousands, you know, in the United States. Unfortunately,
Speaker 1: at this point elections have very much moved into the
Speaker 1: court system, and for a democracy, that is a big
Speaker 1: question to think about broader than just this election. Yeah,
Speaker 1: democracy can be messy. I do want to mention a headline.
Speaker 1: It was about half an hour before we came on
Speaker 1: air a Pennsylvania officials saying that most votes may be
Speaker 1: counted by today, so continuing to of course count them
Speaker 1: a June, come on in on this. You're listening to
Speaker 1: our conversation, Hi, Jennie, Well, we're just talking about Pennsylvania.
Speaker 1: Carol said that they're acting that most votes will be
Speaker 1: counted by today, and earlier today, Joe Biden's campaign manager
Speaker 1: said that Biden is closing in on Trump's lead and
Speaker 1: that by the end of the day, Biden is going
Speaker 1: to win by a sizable number of votes. I wonder
Speaker 1: if you think that's overly optimistic about Pennsylvania. You know,
Speaker 1: that's what I It's such a good question, because that's
Speaker 1: what I have and you know, we've long believed that
Speaker 1: those later votes, the mail in ballots, if you will,
Speaker 1: the absentee ballots with favor President sorry, Vice President Biden
Speaker 1: m because the Democrats had been so careful to get
Speaker 1: their vote out early and same day voting would favor
Speaker 1: the president to a certain extent. So I am not
Speaker 1: surprised to hear that. So it's gonna be not just
Speaker 1: when people voted, but where the vote count there, where
Speaker 1: they're still voting. And I think as we look like
Speaker 1: a place like Pennsylvania, that doesn't surprise me. Nor by
Speaker 1: the way, it doesn't surprise me that the vice president
Speaker 1: is going to get votes out of Georgia as discount continues.
Speaker 1: So based on those two factors, so when they voted,
Speaker 1: and where they were voting, where the vote count is
Speaker 1: still coming from, rather, I think it is not surprising
Speaker 1: that we see a narrowing of the gap. And you know,
Speaker 1: I wouldn't want to predict that Biden would overtake the
Speaker 1: Trump in Pennsylvania, but I you know, I think it
Speaker 1: is possible still at this point. And folks, if it
Speaker 1: sounds confusing, it's because it is right because the president
Speaker 1: is I mean, I mean, and it even for us
Speaker 1: and in this business. But I can't even imagine following
Speaker 1: along at home because there's just right now threats of
Speaker 1: legal action and we don't have really hard, hard data
Speaker 1: or hard documentation source material in front of us and June,
Speaker 1: I mean, I would put this question to June because specifically,
Speaker 1: you know, as it relates to the case that we
Speaker 1: saw go to the Supreme Court on October, right, the
Speaker 1: case that the new judge Amy Coney Barrett decided not
Speaker 1: to participate in because she was just a few days
Speaker 1: on the job. And honestly, we might be revisiting that case,
Speaker 1: which would allow for votes that are postmarked on election
Speaker 1: day to be counted in Pennsylvania for up to three
Speaker 1: days afterward. And that's what I hear a lot of
Speaker 1: my sources talking about. But the President has even uh
Speaker 1: given conflicting statements via social media on Twitter on this
Speaker 1: particular point. What don't we know specifically June about that
Speaker 1: uh Pennsylvania case. And June just got thirty seconds, and
Speaker 1: then we'll come back, Okay, this it's too complicated to
Speaker 1: do in thirty seconds, So I'll just say it's very complicated.
Speaker 1: Let's pick up with it on the other side, because
Speaker 1: there are a lot of indications that it may not
Speaker 1: actually get to the Supreme Court, but there are possibilities
Speaker 1: that it could and It depends on a lot of
Speaker 1: different factors. And just to remind everyone, this is about
Speaker 1: the Pennsylvania Supreme Court decision that ballots that were postmarked
Speaker 1: by election day could be received three days after election day.
Speaker 1: The Supreme Court did not touch that by a fourd
Speaker 1: or four vote, but some of the conservative justice has said, well,
Speaker 1: we can come back to this maybe after the election.
Speaker 1: So the possibilities, as Kevin mentioned, the possibilities there are
Speaker 1: that being a Bush v. Gore scenario, the possibilities are there,
Speaker 1: but there has to be basically a perfect storm of problems.
Speaker 1: The election has to be so close that Pennsylvania is
Speaker 1: the pivotal state that the election results depend on. The
Speaker 1: margin of the vote in Pennsylvania has to be the
Speaker 1: same or less than the number of ballots that are contested.
Speaker 1: So there's the number of ballots that are contested and
Speaker 1: we're counted, there'll be held, there are being held aside.
Speaker 1: That has to be greater than the margin that separates
Speaker 1: Biden and Trump so that it would change the election results.
Speaker 1: So you have to have all those things going on.
Speaker 1: Remember Bush v. Gore was about five seven ballots. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's pretty you know, we're really getting in the weeds.
Speaker 1: But we're understanding how this process works. G D, come
Speaker 1: on back in. You know. I do wonder how you anticipate,
Speaker 1: you know, the next few days kind of playing out,
Speaker 1: or is this that a possibility that we go into
Speaker 1: next week before we really know who is the winner
Speaker 1: for the White House? You know, I would expect that
Speaker 1: we would know sooner than next week. I would think
Speaker 1: that we should know if Pennsylvania does finish counting by
Speaker 1: the end of the day today, you know, into tomorrow,
Speaker 1: as we were originally told. Um, you know, we get
Speaker 1: results fairly soon. UM. And I don't want to misspeak
Speaker 1: out of Arizona Nevada. You know already Arizona, you know,
Speaker 1: has been called by the A P and others, and
Speaker 1: Bloomberg has gone with that call. Um. I think we
Speaker 1: should know because depending on who you are watching, Um,
Speaker 1: you know, Joe Biden is very close to that to
Speaker 1: sevent d mark. Now that's not to say that the
Speaker 1: president is not going to challenge those results. So I'm
Speaker 1: not suggesting that we're going to accept that yet, Jennie,
Speaker 1: and I think that raises such a great point, right
Speaker 1: because just earlier today Clark County registrar Joe Gloria, he's
Speaker 1: the official in Nevada who's overseeing all of this and
Speaker 1: this incredibly important, important battleground state right now six electoral votes.
Speaker 1: He's saying that it might take until Saturday or Sunday
Speaker 1: before the state's largest county, Clark County, Las Vegas. Clark
Speaker 1: County finishes their votes tabulations, so they might not official
Speaker 1: give officially give this to Standford the approval until this
Speaker 1: weekend out in Nevada. So they're taking their I don't
Speaker 1: want to say they're taking their time, but but according
Speaker 1: to him, he said at a press conference earlier today, quote,
Speaker 1: our goal here in Clark County is not to count fast.
Speaker 1: We want to make sure that we are being accurate.
Speaker 1: And he went on to say that they still have
Speaker 1: at least sixty three thousand, two hundred and sixty two
Speaker 1: ballots Carol, that they still have less account um and
Speaker 1: then coupled with all these legal threats that we're seeing
Speaker 1: coming from the Trump campaign, Yeah, it's pretty remarkable. So, Geenie,
Speaker 1: you know, when I watched this process, we've talked about
Speaker 1: it before, We're going to talk about this later, that
Speaker 1: maybe we need a better election process that maybe the
Speaker 1: electoral college has you know, it's time has um. What's
Speaker 1: your observations on this and what's the likelihood of something changing? Well,
Speaker 1: you know that it's it's such a good question. There
Speaker 1: are you know, obviously, the electoral college is part of
Speaker 1: our constitution. There are ways to get around, if you will,
Speaker 1: the electoral college without amending the constitution, because I don't
Speaker 1: see that happening anytime soon. We haven't amended the constitution
Speaker 1: since the early nineteen seventies. In this partisan environment, I
Speaker 1: think it would be tough to do. But we do
Speaker 1: have movements out there, like the National Popular Vote compact Um,
Speaker 1: which are closing in on this sort of back end
Speaker 1: way to get around it, which would be that a
Speaker 1: number of states totaling two seventy more or more electoral
Speaker 1: college votes agree to the compact um where they will
Speaker 1: follow the national popular vote winner. So if they make
Speaker 1: headway there, and I think I don't want to me speak,
Speaker 1: I think you're about seventy electoral college votes short of that.
Speaker 1: If they make progress there, if you have have enough
Speaker 1: states following the popular vote like that, then you know
Speaker 1: the idea that the electoral college winner wouldn't be the
Speaker 1: popular vote winner would be off the table. Do I
Speaker 1: think that's going to happen anytime soon? I think it's
Speaker 1: more likely. Um, you know, if we were to have
Speaker 1: a result this time where the popular vote winner was
Speaker 1: not the electoral college vote winner. If not, and Carol,
Speaker 1: that's not that I doubt it. Yeah, but that's where
Speaker 1: the divided government really gets interesting, especially on on changing
Speaker 1: things like the Supreme Court, because Republicans are looking like
Speaker 1: they're going to have a majority in the Senate and
Speaker 1: that means that is going to happen as far as
Speaker 1: all the people have been talking about court packing, and
Speaker 1: it was such a big question and Joe Biden was
Speaker 1: going to appoint a commission and without the Senate, there's
Speaker 1: not even a question about it. It's why we have
Speaker 1: to think about so many different things, especially when it
Speaker 1: comes to making change. Jeanie's know you're the best. Thank
Speaker 1: you so much, Bloomberg News political contributor and I own
Speaker 1: a college professor of political science. On the phone from Westchester.
Speaker 1: This is Bloomberg Business Week with Carol Messer from Bloomberg Radio.
Speaker 1: This is Bloomberg Business Week with Carol Masser from Bloomberg Radio.
Speaker 1: All right. This week's voting process. Man, we're all over it. Uh.
Speaker 1: It seems like it's similar to what happened in as
Speaker 1: many wondering, you know, has many of us wondering about
Speaker 1: how we elect presidents, and we're talking about the electoral college.
Speaker 1: This story, uh, this upcoming story that we're gonna talk about.
Speaker 1: It's in the new issue of Bloomberg Business Week magazine.
Speaker 1: It's about how we maybe need to make America boring
Speaker 1: again by fixing its dated system. That story reported by
Speaker 1: Bloomberg New senior international affairs reporter Mark Champion joining Kevin Silli,
Speaker 1: June Grosso and me. Mark joining us from London. Mark,
Speaker 1: it's great to have you here with us, so tell
Speaker 1: us about our system uh not doing so well? Huh, Yes,
Speaker 1: I mean it's in a way it's ironic because you know,
Speaker 1: this is the you know, a country that has the
Speaker 1: oldest constitutional democracy in the world, extremely rightly proud of it,
Speaker 1: the constitution. Uh, and yet the constitution is part of
Speaker 1: the problem in the sense that you know, this is
Speaker 1: an election system that has kind of become ossified and
Speaker 1: a lot of the problems that many many countries had
Speaker 1: and have gradually sort of worked out over the years,
Speaker 1: it hasn't really been possible to do that in the US,
Speaker 1: and so you have a system where, you know, just
Speaker 1: to take one example, we've had a lot of uh,
Speaker 1: you know, toxic debate really over voter I D and
Speaker 1: voter registration, with accusations that you know, it's a tools
Speaker 1: for suppression and all that sort of thing. Well, you know,
Speaker 1: in a country like India, which has eight hundred million voters,
Speaker 1: very complicated federal system, very complication complicated elections. UM, they
Speaker 1: have automatic registration at the age of eighteen. You're issued automatically,
Speaker 1: it's sent free in the mail to you a photo
Speaker 1: ID card which is matched to the electoral role. There
Speaker 1: simply isn't a problem. So there's a lot of structural
Speaker 1: issues like that that really come to the surface when
Speaker 1: the political atmosphere becomes very polarized and the debate becomes
Speaker 1: you know, poisonous, and that is really what's happened in
Speaker 1: the US. Mark I was really impressed with the system
Speaker 1: that you just talked about, the automatic registration system in India,
Speaker 1: But I wonder if anything like that would work here
Speaker 1: when we're in a country where even with you know,
Speaker 1: some government directives to wear masks that there are people
Speaker 1: who think that that intinges on their liberty rights. So
Speaker 1: I wonder if it would work here. Uh, well, that's
Speaker 1: it's a very you know, a good question and a
Speaker 1: good point. I mean, I guess the count that would
Speaker 1: be that a lot of states have implemented what amounts
Speaker 1: to automatic registration, um, you know, other states have not.
Speaker 1: And that kind of goes to a second issue with
Speaker 1: the US, which is quite you know, quite unusual in
Speaker 1: the US. Even federal systems like Canada, you know, Germany, UH,
Speaker 1: India and others, they have a single electoral authority that
Speaker 1: administers the election, sets the rules, determines when poll polling
Speaker 1: stations open, and not what the ballot design isn't all
Speaker 1: that it's it's done from one part of the end
Speaker 1: of the country to the other by the same organization
Speaker 1: applying the same rules. The US doesn't do that. The
Speaker 1: US Constitution gives the authority for the elections to individual states.
Speaker 1: Of what you have is a very different voting experience
Speaker 1: in you know, a state like Georgia from a state
Speaker 1: like Vermont. And in fact, when you know rankings are
Speaker 1: done where the electoral performance processes of UH countries across
Speaker 1: the world have put it under the microscope on different criteria,
Speaker 1: and you come up with the ranking. You know, Vermont
Speaker 1: is right up there with the best countries, the Scandinavias
Speaker 1: and and Scandinavian countries and so on. But George, as
Speaker 1: you know, way down in a completely different world, even
Speaker 1: not doing as well as the Republic of Georgia, the
Speaker 1: former Soviet Republic of Georgia. Well, I mean, with all
Speaker 1: due respect, actually I'll take that far back to the Soviets.
Speaker 1: I mean they don't have the best record of democracy
Speaker 1: and not apples to apples, right, but other But you know,
Speaker 1: but other countries have much better systems than we do.
Speaker 1: I mean, we have state by state, county by county,
Speaker 1: and it makes and you see what happens. Look at them.
Speaker 1: Look at the different results we're getting when and the
Speaker 1: different rules that are in place. I mean, I think
Speaker 1: it's needs reforming. Well, Mark, come on in, because reading
Speaker 1: through your story is you know there's someone you quote
Speaker 1: in it, and just as part of the problem is
Speaker 1: that the U S system is it's old. You know
Speaker 1: that it was drafted when there were no women judges.
Speaker 1: There were slaves in California, didn't exist. I mean, there
Speaker 1: were you know, we all talk about disruption. Systems need
Speaker 1: to be you know, revised, made better, and we could
Speaker 1: do that. They do, they do need to be revised.
Speaker 1: And you know Germany, for example, is constantly revising its
Speaker 1: electoral system and its constitution. It's just much easier to do.
Speaker 1: And then the sort of the irony is that, you know,
Speaker 1: Americans after the war were quite involved one way and
Speaker 1: another in h you know, helping the Jones with their constitution.
Speaker 1: But you know, the the American constitution itself is very
Speaker 1: hard to change. It has been changed not very many times. Uh.
Speaker 1: And you know it is you know, at times that's
Speaker 1: a great thing. At other times it's it's an obstacle.
Speaker 1: What does the United States do right? Mark? What does
Speaker 1: it do right? Well? Actually, the you know, it was
Speaker 1: quite interesting in listening to the the os CE, monitors
Speaker 1: for the Organization for Security in Corporation in Europe. They
Speaker 1: monitor you know, elections in all of their member states,
Speaker 1: the fifty seven afterm including the US. Every every member
Speaker 1: is committed to let these monitors come and look at
Speaker 1: their elections. And at the end, they you know, they
Speaker 1: say what was good, what was bad? And they give
Speaker 1: recommendations and on and one of the things that they
Speaker 1: said is that the really the spirit. So this is
Speaker 1: the spirit of all the people who are running the elections,
Speaker 1: the volunteers, the local officials. There's an army of people
Speaker 1: out there doing it. And the point that they made
Speaker 1: is that, you know, the reason this system works, you know,
Speaker 1: it is still a functioning democracy, is that all these people,
Speaker 1: you know, are you know, they're doing something they believe in,
Speaker 1: and that they are you know, fairly well trained, they
Speaker 1: know what they're doing. Uh, And so that works where
Speaker 1: they said that it falls down no easy feat, No,
Speaker 1: not an easy feat at all. And and it's sort
Speaker 1: of had to grow organically because it isn't just done
Speaker 1: by you know, a single organization that kind of can
Speaker 1: hone all of its you know, the wheels of its machinery.
Speaker 1: It happens, uh, you know, organically, and grows up over
Speaker 1: the years in different ways, in different states. Um. And
Speaker 1: at times you know that it's normally that work fine.
Speaker 1: All through the twentieth century, it work fine, but you know,
Speaker 1: increasingly it's a problem. And that's really because of the polarization,
Speaker 1: and that presses down on the weaknesses in the systems,
Speaker 1: you know, the places where someone can you know, take advantage.
Speaker 1: And arguably you've seen that happen where several states, you know,
Speaker 1: with the mail in votes and so on, several states
Speaker 1: said well, you can't start counting until you know election day, uh,
Speaker 1: you know, whereas other states counted early and it was
Speaker 1: all dealt with. And now you have, you know, we
Speaker 1: have what we have with the prest thing that these
Speaker 1: mark we gotta run. I'm so sorry, but everybody should
Speaker 1: go online check out the magazine because it's a great read.
Speaker 1: I mean, it's a very different country when our forefathers
Speaker 1: created it, that's for sure. This is Bloomberg Business Week
Speaker 1: with Carol Messer from Bloomberg Radio. President Trump's legal team, Man,
Speaker 1: this has been an important issue we know of this
Speaker 1: election cycle. We've been anticipating the legal angle of the election,
Speaker 1: uh leading up to the election, and we continue to
Speaker 1: talk about it as a Trump's team in particular, has
Speaker 1: really flooded states with lawsuits as the count continues. Let's
Speaker 1: get into what we need to know on the legal front.
Speaker 1: Derek Muller is Professor of law at University of Iowa
Speaker 1: College of Law. He's taught courses in election law and
Speaker 1: federal courts and so much more. He joins us on
Speaker 1: the phone from Iowa City, Iowa. Derek, great to have
Speaker 1: you here with Kevin and June and myself. So when
Speaker 1: you look at this and here we are waiting for
Speaker 1: an outcome. We know that there are talks and of
Speaker 1: recounts and legal cases. What is it that you think
Speaker 1: is the most important when it comes to the legal
Speaker 1: story of election. Yeah, I mean it's a sort of
Speaker 1: flooding the zone right now. I think about you know, um,
Speaker 1: the three tracks happening right now. Um, but it's sort
Speaker 1: of an open question about how many, if any, are
Speaker 1: going to be decisive. Right. So there's the one track
Speaker 1: where there are lawsuits saying that the Trump campaign has
Speaker 1: been denied access to observe certain procedures in the election. Um,
Speaker 1: they want one of those in Pennsylvania today. That's an
Speaker 1: appeal and there's some others pending in other states to
Speaker 1: say we need to have our people in the building
Speaker 1: to make sure everything looks okay. Um. That might slow
Speaker 1: things down briefly, but it doesn't really change a whole lot,
Speaker 1: except unless the observers inject. The second thing is to
Speaker 1: think about sort of challenges to certain batches of ballots.
Speaker 1: So they've sued in some places in Georgia and Pennsylvania.
Speaker 1: To day, this county has had this particular procedure either
Speaker 1: UM with handwriting mismatch or the like that that wasn't
Speaker 1: sort of properly approved. They're not implementing it correctly. UM,
Speaker 1: so those might affect small batches of ballots. UM. So
Speaker 1: far they haven't. But that's sort of one potential thing
Speaker 1: to think about. And the third is the recounts. They've
Speaker 1: already indicated they like to recount Wisconsin. We'll see, we're
Speaker 1: sort of waiting for some final results, right. We have
Speaker 1: to finish account before we can get to the recount UM,
Speaker 1: and then we'll see what happens. But I think, you know,
Speaker 1: with all these things, that depends if it's if it's
Speaker 1: a Biden campaign appears to be substantially ahead in a
Speaker 1: large number of states. UM, at the end of these accounts,
Speaker 1: it's going to be very hard to succeed because you
Speaker 1: really got to get all your ducks in a row
Speaker 1: in all these places. So Derek lawsuits were dismissed in
Speaker 1: Michigan and Georgia, and today Pennsylvania Republicans withdrew their request
Speaker 1: for court order in a suburban county in near Philly
Speaker 1: where they accused officials of illegally allowing mail involves to
Speaker 1: be counted before election day. Now they're the losses. The
Speaker 1: one the one win that I see is the one
Speaker 1: you refer to. Where about access to the counting process?
Speaker 1: And could they get closer to watch six ft instead
Speaker 1: of the thirty ft. Do you see any other victories
Speaker 1: that the Trump campaign has had in lawsuits? Uh? No
Speaker 1: other victories so far, at least none, none that I've
Speaker 1: seen there. There Again, there are so many, it's hard
Speaker 1: to keep track. Um, but I think, yeah, the observer
Speaker 1: ones are interesting because they really are facts on the
Speaker 1: ground right there. They are the questions about, you know,
Speaker 1: was this observer doing something disruptive where they entitled to
Speaker 1: be there? Was it a timing issue, whatever it might be.
Speaker 1: And again the Pennsylvania Supreme Court is reconsidering that the
Speaker 1: challenge we just talked about, um for some of these
Speaker 1: other ones, saying you know, these ballots shouldn't be counted,
Speaker 1: they should be excluded. You know that they're not cured properly. Um,
Speaker 1: those might take a few more days because they're not
Speaker 1: as suppressing. Right, the observation has to be happening right
Speaker 1: now as they're counting, whereas if we've counted everything else
Speaker 1: and we're fighting over a smaller batch of ballots, those
Speaker 1: things might come you know, in the next week. So
Speaker 1: we'll see about that front. Um. But it's it's very
Speaker 1: hard that there's sort of again a lot of things
Speaker 1: out there, and it's it's hard to tell without getting
Speaker 1: deep in the weeds on the particular fact and the
Speaker 1: trustworthiness of the witnesses allegations and what the other side
Speaker 1: has to say about whether or not this is normal. Um,
Speaker 1: it's just hard to sort of make sort of broad
Speaker 1: based claims about whether any particular ones look look really
Speaker 1: good at this time. And just following up on there
Speaker 1: are several lawsuits that are talking about and requiring or
Speaker 1: want more access to the ballot process as you just described.
Speaker 1: But will those mean anything after the vote is counted?
Speaker 1: I mean, is there Yes, they want to get access,
Speaker 1: they want to see closer, But what happens after the
Speaker 1: ballots are counted? Does that where does that leave them?
Speaker 1: Is there any remedy for them? So not? I mean
Speaker 1: after they're counted. They're counted, right, So, um, you know,
Speaker 1: the observation there is is particularly important to make sure
Speaker 1: that teams are are counting ballots appropriately. So you know,
Speaker 1: I think I think it varies a little bit from
Speaker 1: state to state, but but most states have a process
Speaker 1: where there's already a bipartisan team who's supposed to be
Speaker 1: there counting the ballot, especially with absentee valts, they have
Speaker 1: to pull them out of the envelope and flatten them
Speaker 1: out and run them through their machine. Um. And then
Speaker 1: sometimes there's questions if the machine doesn't doesn't pick up
Speaker 1: on it, is it because the ballot was torn or
Speaker 1: miss or main gold or the different way? Did they
Speaker 1: use red pen instead of black pen and the machine
Speaker 1: didn't pick it up? And then there's some sort of question, well,
Speaker 1: how do we count this ballot? And usually again that
Speaker 1: bipartisan team reaches a consensus conclusion um. And so the
Speaker 1: observers are there just to make sure that everyone sort
Speaker 1: of complying with the law, that they're not sort of
Speaker 1: throwing out a batch of ballots or they're including ones
Speaker 1: that should have been excluded, and they can provide that
Speaker 1: opportunity to challenge. But but once the sort of challenges
Speaker 1: have sort of run their course and the ballots are
Speaker 1: run through the machine and add into those totals. I mean,
Speaker 1: it's really hard to unscramble the egg at that point, right,
Speaker 1: unless you can prove something systemic fraudulent across the state
Speaker 1: or in a broad way to undermine the election results,
Speaker 1: um the totals of the totals. So Derek, you're listening
Speaker 1: to that. I mean, it really gets down to the
Speaker 1: nitty gritty, but it does, you know, it makes me
Speaker 1: wonder as an American. And I thought about that because
Speaker 1: I actually walked to the polls. I wanted to. I
Speaker 1: like to see the process. But it does, you know,
Speaker 1: get to the question and begs, you know, the question
Speaker 1: of you know, how safe how a lie bull is
Speaker 1: our election process? You know? And I don't know if
Speaker 1: you can tell from past legal challenges and what's happening today,
Speaker 1: but what is your take on that? Yeah, I mean
Speaker 1: I think people feel pretty confident in the election systems
Speaker 1: is safe and secure on the various levels, right. I mean,
Speaker 1: we do the best we can. There's gonna be mistakes
Speaker 1: and problems that happen, and I think you know that
Speaker 1: press conference is a great illustration that, um, you know,
Speaker 1: sometimes it's the wrong form of a ballot. And one
Speaker 1: of the things in the United States that maybe is
Speaker 1: a little different from other parts of the world. We
Speaker 1: don't only just have fifty states running elections. In a
Speaker 1: lot of places, it's really county or sometimes even at
Speaker 1: local municipalities running elections, and they're making these decisions and
Speaker 1: sometimes problems arise. So one of the things they talked
Speaker 1: about in Georgia is there about four hundred ballots that
Speaker 1: we're on the wrong kind of paper to run through
Speaker 1: the machine, and so they have to duplicate them, which
Speaker 1: is they get a bipartisan team together and they refill
Speaker 1: out the ballots on a proper and a proper kind
Speaker 1: of ballot they can run through the machine. Compare it
Speaker 1: to the other one that everyone agrees that that was
Speaker 1: the voters intent run through the machine, and we counted up.
Speaker 1: So it's it's sometimes just a long slog to get
Speaker 1: through this process. But I think, you know, for the
Speaker 1: most part, we get over those hiccups. We make it through,
Speaker 1: and we're gonna see we're gonna see a total h
Speaker 1: you know, hopefully in the in the weeks that come.
Speaker 1: I think the two thousand election educated the majority of
Speaker 1: Americans about the electoral college and the popular vote, and
Speaker 1: I think that this election is educating people about the
Speaker 1: patchwork of different regulations Derek, in terms of every state
Speaker 1: having a different process, and we've talked about the negatives
Speaker 1: of that process, but it really does bear to keep
Speaker 1: in mind about the benefits of that process. From the
Speaker 1: national security perspective. I think back to before the two
Speaker 1: thousand and eighteen mid terms when there was a widespread
Speaker 1: briefing for the media of run by the nonpartisan intelligence
Speaker 1: community officials, just as they elaborated upon the significant national
Speaker 1: security risks that local governments, local municipalities actually face, and
Speaker 1: that it makes it much more difficult for a hostile
Speaker 1: foreign actor, there be Russia or iron or China, as
Speaker 1: we've seen in this election, efforts to do so for
Speaker 1: them to hack into a smaller system versus having to
Speaker 1: do it for for one blanket uh uniform concrete systems.
Speaker 1: So I think that that bears keeping in mind as
Speaker 1: well when when all of this is said and done
Speaker 1: from a legal perspective, Derek, and based upon history, what
Speaker 1: has the previous elections, what was for example, the most
Speaker 1: previously litigated election do we know, um, and and how
Speaker 1: do you think this might change course for future elections? Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's it's certainly interesting to think about the comparison of
Speaker 1: pre election eight challenges and post election dight challenges. And
Speaker 1: to be frank, I think this election will will blow
Speaker 1: out all records on both fronts. On the on the
Speaker 1: pre election side, right, COVID really did a number, I mean,
Speaker 1: we had hundreds of lawsuits understatement of the year. COVID
Speaker 1: really did a number, hundreds of them, right. Um, Now
Speaker 1: it's worth you know, thinking about, you know, on the
Speaker 1: post election day side of things. Yeah, I think the
Speaker 1: Trump campaign again it's sort of flooding the airwaves with
Speaker 1: sort of uh with with lawsuits all over the place
Speaker 1: on a lot of a lot of matters. Something you know,
Speaker 1: in Florida in two thousand we talked about Bush versus Gore,
Speaker 1: but I mean there were you know, at least thirty
Speaker 1: lawsuits filed at various stages by various folks voters, um,
Speaker 1: you know, interested groups, federal court, state court all over
Speaker 1: sort of challenging these things, challenging various sort of things.
Speaker 1: You just kind of all got channeled into the one
Speaker 1: case of Bush versus Gore that was the ultimate sort
Speaker 1: of daniumon if you will, of what happened there. So UM,
Speaker 1: it's it's interesting in the United States because elections have
Speaker 1: traditionally been something reserved of the political process. To be frank,
Speaker 1: if there were disputes about elections, UM, it was really
Speaker 1: something that Congress resolved. Congress resolved the election of eighteen
Speaker 1: seventy six, one of the most contested elections in American history.
Speaker 1: Congress resolved the tie of the election in eighteen hundred
Speaker 1: rights because it was it was that sort of a process.
Speaker 1: But you know, since Bush versus Gore, we've increasingly looked
Speaker 1: at litigation and said, you know, maybe that's you know,
Speaker 1: that that's an attractive place rather to me thinking about
Speaker 1: about how to resolve these disputes and whether it was
Speaker 1: John Kerry's you know, attempt that never went through about
Speaker 1: challenging Ohio in two thousand four, versus the recount efforts
Speaker 1: by Jill Stein, you know, the Green Party candidate who
Speaker 1: funded recounts in Wisconsin. In UM, there's sort of people
Speaker 1: have been eyeing, you know, whether or not at the
Speaker 1: right time for the next sort of stage of lawsuits,
Speaker 1: and this is just I think, um, as the as
Speaker 1: accounting drags on, we're just going to see Seymour lawsuits
Speaker 1: sort of crop off. If that's the case. And Derek,
Speaker 1: I just wonder your your reaction, because as I keep
Speaker 1: watching all these many many little press conferences from local officials,
Speaker 1: local election officials, it seems what impresses me is how
Speaker 1: serious they are, how that everyone is taking this really
Speaker 1: seriously and they're really trying to follow all the rules
Speaker 1: and regulations. They haven't found any kind of fraud. They
Speaker 1: haven't found an election worker who did something wrong or
Speaker 1: ballots that were put in the wrong place. It seems
Speaker 1: like they're really doing what they have to do, and
Speaker 1: that that's why most of these lawsuits are going to
Speaker 1: fail in the end. Yeah, So, I mean I think
Speaker 1: at a high level, I think that's right. You know,
Speaker 1: there's no question that we've seen instances of poll workers
Speaker 1: who have committed fraud, right and those they happen, they're
Speaker 1: out there, there's examples of it. They're they're rare, but
Speaker 1: they're out there. Um, you know, ballots haven't been found.
Speaker 1: Although to be fair, so far, it seems like in
Speaker 1: places like Pennsylvania, they are stumbling across some they haven't
Speaker 1: found earlier. But I mean again you here and there. Yeah,
Speaker 1: but you have to think about the scope, right, Yeah,
Speaker 1: we've had if there if some of these states have
Speaker 1: been having mail in ballots for over a month. I mean,
Speaker 1: I don't know how often you spent you step foot
Speaker 1: into your local city hall or county government building. You know,
Speaker 1: they're often sort of these older buildings where they're sort
Speaker 1: of workers who are crammed on top of each other
Speaker 1: and filing cabinets and in them closets in the basement, right,
Speaker 1: and if you're getting stacks and stacks of mail, it
Speaker 1: sometimes gets shoved aside if it was back September thirty
Speaker 1: when you got this match. So it's it's a sort
Speaker 1: of all the kinks in the process working themselves out
Speaker 1: at this stage as we're trying to you know, the
Speaker 1: perfect problems are just magnifying everything. Yeah. Yeah, you don't
Speaker 1: have the staff in the building who are processing these
Speaker 1: ballots are looking at them with that sort of regularity
Speaker 1: in sight. Now, absolutely, I think, I think, But but
Speaker 1: I think you're right, you've exactly had the nail in
Speaker 1: the head that there hasn't been sort of an allegation
Speaker 1: of sort of widespread fraud. Right, we don't see any
Speaker 1: sort of evidence that there's someone's cooking the book somewhere. Um,
Speaker 1: you know, maybe we'll find an isolated incident or two
Speaker 1: well after election day, but so far the process, I
Speaker 1: think you're right. The local officials take it very seriously
Speaker 1: and want to do the right thing. And let's remember,
Speaker 1: you know, for many states, you know, mail in ballots,
Speaker 1: they've been doing this for years, so they do have
Speaker 1: those systems in place to be fair. Though the sheer
Speaker 1: volume of the mail in ballots, uh this year has
Speaker 1: certainly been something that I think a lot of folks
Speaker 1: weren't necessarily used to. So, Uh, the counting continues. We're
Speaker 1: gonna get back to this discussion in just a moment.
Speaker 1: Do you want to remind everyone it is a Fed Thursday,
Speaker 1: wrapping up a meeting today, the Federal Reserve keeping policy
Speaker 1: steady rates on hold asset buying unchanged. Having said that,
Speaker 1: we're just about forty minutes away from the closing bail
Speaker 1: on this Thursday, and equities bouncing around a little bit,
Speaker 1: but pretty steady and just off their highs of the session.
Speaker 1: That accounts to or that amounts to about a two
Speaker 1: percent gain on the S and P five hundred Dow
Speaker 1: Jones Industrial Average up five hundred forty six points, also
Speaker 1: up almost two percent, and the NASDAC definitely uh the outperformer.
Speaker 1: The NASDAC up point than three hundred points, good for
Speaker 1: a gain of two point six per cent. Alright, let's
Speaker 1: get back to our discussion. So, Derek Mueller, I mean,
Speaker 1: if you could change anything that to make this a
Speaker 1: more secure process so that we don't necessarily have this
Speaker 1: legal wrangling um or legal questions in the future, what
Speaker 1: would we need to do because I think having brought
Speaker 1: up a really smart, an important point that as we
Speaker 1: try to keep our elections secure, that maybe they are
Speaker 1: more secure you know by the states, you know, really
Speaker 1: overseeing these processes. But it does create then a multitude
Speaker 1: of systems right in the process. So how could we
Speaker 1: make it better and safer maybe or more uh reassuring
Speaker 1: if you will, on a legal basis. Yeah, I think
Speaker 1: there's a few things for us to think about going forward,
Speaker 1: and I would hope you know. The problem is they're
Speaker 1: they're sort of the bipartisan efforts, but they often get
Speaker 1: swallowed up in the partisan efforts as Congress wants to
Speaker 1: do sort of what their side wants, whether it's a
Speaker 1: voter I D or or you know, whatever it might be. UM.
Speaker 1: I think first, you know, despite the fact that there's
Speaker 1: this decentralization, the Election Assistance Commission with the Department of
Speaker 1: Homeland Security and and UH, Director of National Intelligence and
Speaker 1: others have really worked very hard to help think about
Speaker 1: making sure that our critical systems infrastructure in the United
Speaker 1: States is secure, that it's going to be resilient in
Speaker 1: the phase of attack. That they're certifying election systems and
Speaker 1: ensuring that while states have choices, their choices within sort
Speaker 1: of a suite or a variety of options. So I
Speaker 1: think that's that's one important thing to think about going forward,
Speaker 1: whether that there should be some maybe more uniformity, but
Speaker 1: really more just sort of oversight to ensure that the
Speaker 1: states are doing this appropriately. Another thing is we think
Speaker 1: about the sort of ballot processing thing with with you know,
Speaker 1: these states. You know, one of the problems that happened
Speaker 1: is especially in Wisconsin and Pennsylvania, you had Republican legislatures
Speaker 1: with Democratic governors really fighting fighting a lot about about
Speaker 1: this process, including the process of UM processing ballots ahead
Speaker 1: of election day. States like Florida after two thousand really
Speaker 1: got their act together. They they they let up, you know, uh,
Speaker 1: clerks start looking at the ballots early, not not to
Speaker 1: count them, just to make sure that the voters are
Speaker 1: eligible and that the signatures match and everything right. That
Speaker 1: was good. I mean, if you saw Governor Jeb Bush
Speaker 1: tweeted out, you know, yesterday that he was glad they
Speaker 1: got their act together and fixed things. Um. So I think,
Speaker 1: you know, I think there might be a place in
Speaker 1: the United States to think about some of these little
Speaker 1: tweaks about you know, maybe encouraging states because Congress has
Speaker 1: robust authority both in terms of giving states cash to
Speaker 1: run elections and in its elections authority for congressional elections
Speaker 1: to say you should start, you know, opening in the
Speaker 1: non envelopes, you know, the Friday before the election, Like
Speaker 1: that's a that's a standard we're going to put in place.
Speaker 1: And I think some of these standards could be non
Speaker 1: controversial bipartisan solutions. Um. There's just going to be a
Speaker 1: question of whether there there's an appetite for that in Washington,
Speaker 1: d C. So I heard some people say, I don't
Speaker 1: remember where it came from. I can't give anyone credit
Speaker 1: that the postmark, the postmark, that smudge is going to
Speaker 1: be the hanging chat of the elections. Have you seen that,
Speaker 1: because that can be a factor in a lot of
Speaker 1: these states. Yeah. And even more to the point, the
Speaker 1: one case that you know still lingering before the Supreme
Speaker 1: Court is out of Pennsylvania, where they would accept those
Speaker 1: ballots postmarked on election Day up through tomorrow Friday, but
Speaker 1: also those ballots that don't have a postmark at all. Right, Um,
Speaker 1: I think rethinking how the Postal Service handles ballots, and
Speaker 1: not just in volume, but in terms of the speed
Speaker 1: of delivery and so on is another sort of pressing
Speaker 1: concern for the next Postmaster General or for Congress and
Speaker 1: its oversight function. Um. You know, Congress had some hearings
Speaker 1: where they sort of dragooned the Postmaster General that to
Speaker 1: sort of fight about this stuff late summer. Um, there's
Speaker 1: a federal jodge in Washington, d C. Who's sort of
Speaker 1: been micromanaging the Postal Service sort of on a day
Speaker 1: by day basis. Um. You know, those are not long
Speaker 1: term solutions and they're not sort of in the benefit
Speaker 1: of the national interest. Right, So I'm not a postal
Speaker 1: service expert, far from it, but it is something I
Speaker 1: think that will require a little bit of oversight, you know,
Speaker 1: going forward. Yeah, well that's for sure you might have
Speaker 1: to become one maybe maybe. Alright, good to leave it
Speaker 1: on that now, Derek, thank you so much. I'll appreciated.
Speaker 1: Derek Muller, Professor of Law, University of Iowa College of Law,
Speaker 1: joining us on the phone from Iowa City, Iowa. This
Speaker 1: is Bloomberg Business Week with Carol Masser from Bloomberg Radio. Well,
Speaker 1: this election, once again we saw a Democratic presidential candidate
Speaker 1: collecting more popular votes than his Republican opponent. We know
Speaker 1: it's not over yet, where of course contingent and watching
Speaker 1: what happens when it comes to the electoral college. But
Speaker 1: when it comes to the popular vote, you know, it
Speaker 1: kind of begs a question, why can't Republicans win that
Speaker 1: popular vote? Writing about it is Bloomberg opinion columnist Jonathan
Speaker 1: burst Bernstein. He kind of asked that question in his
Speaker 1: latest column. He covers and writes about politics and policy.
Speaker 1: He's taught about it at the University of Texas and
Speaker 1: San Antonio. He joins us on the phone from San Antonio, Texas. Jonathan,
Speaker 1: good to have you here with Kevin and June and myself.
Speaker 1: First of all, give us some history when it comes
Speaker 1: to the popular vote and Republicans. Well, Democrats have now
Speaker 1: won the popular and you're gonna, I expect you're gonna
Speaker 1: hear a lot of this from Democrats in the next
Speaker 1: several weeks. Um. From up through this year, Democrats have
Speaker 1: won the popular vote in all but one time, seven
Speaker 1: out of eight, which is the best streak anybody, any
Speaker 1: party has ever had in US history. So it's it's
Speaker 1: pretty impressive in just on the raw note numbers itself,
Speaker 1: when you look at them more carefully. One of the
Speaker 1: things I said in the column is, you know, it
Speaker 1: sort of breaks down a little bit. Some of them
Speaker 1: they weren't weren't a lot of runaway wins as there
Speaker 1: were forced a Republicans during the Reagan Bush era, Nixon
Speaker 1: Reagan era, UM. And you know, had Democrats taken the presidency,
Speaker 1: say in in two thousand, one hour or one a
Speaker 1: very very narrow popular vote margin, they might well have
Speaker 1: lost it, say in eight, and you might have had
Speaker 1: a couple of big Republican wins. So one thing I'm
Speaker 1: saying is it may not be all that it really seems. So, Jonathan,
Speaker 1: are you saying that, what's your opinion about whether the
Speaker 1: presidential vote, because of the elector all vote, it doesn't
Speaker 1: match the popular vote, and whether there should be changes
Speaker 1: in the system so that the popular vote does mirror
Speaker 1: who the president is. Well, it's a great question because
Speaker 1: you know, traditionally in the United States history, there hasn't
Speaker 1: been this split that we saw in the when Trump
Speaker 1: got elected. Um, usually the winner of the electoral college
Speaker 1: is the winner of the popular vote. It's only happened
Speaker 1: a handful of time, however, two of those were fairly
Speaker 1: recent in two thousand. Even then, though in two thousand
Speaker 1: it was basically a tie both ways, so there wasn't
Speaker 1: that much of a thing there. Um, it looks like
Speaker 1: this time the electoral college is probably gonna wind up
Speaker 1: on the same side as the popular vote. So you know,
Speaker 1: it makes a lot of people like a big fuss
Speaker 1: about it. There's a good case to be made that
Speaker 1: we shouldn't have the electoral college, but most of the
Speaker 1: time it doesn't actually make that big difference. So in
Speaker 1: terms of where things go though, and I just want
Speaker 1: to catch everybody up to speed, because we have we
Speaker 1: do have some some new developments. According to CBS News,
Speaker 1: CBS is reporting that Jared Kushner is looking for there
Speaker 1: to be some type of spokesperson for the president's legal team,
Speaker 1: akin to James Baker, that they're looking for and we
Speaker 1: should also know. And I think this is really important
Speaker 1: folks to keep in mind as we have these conversations
Speaker 1: about the legal cases, as we also have these cases
Speaker 1: they have the conversation about the electoral college, is that,
Speaker 1: in essence, one of the president's entire strategy right now
Speaker 1: is dependent upon whether or not this thing comes down
Speaker 1: to one or two states. Right now, it's there's a
Speaker 1: handful of states where the votes haven't been counted. Whether
Speaker 1: it's Arizona, Americopa County, which has been trending left and
Speaker 1: some networks have called for the Democrats. If it's out
Speaker 1: in Arizona, uh there, it's coming down to Clark County.
Speaker 1: But you've also got North Carolina, Georgia, Pennsylvania. And if
Speaker 1: it if it sounds a little bit discombobulate, discombobulated, it's
Speaker 1: because it is. And when I talk to sources Jonathan
Speaker 1: burn Steen on the president's reelection campaign. They're not even
Speaker 1: right now all speaking from the same talking points or
Speaker 1: from the same legal playbook because they don't know which
Speaker 1: specific lawsuit in order to come down with. So how
Speaker 1: is that muddying the waters of the president's argument? Just
Speaker 1: from an analytical standpoint, not a political one, and analytical
Speaker 1: standpoint about why there's so much confusion right now around
Speaker 1: the president's strategy. And Jonathan just got about a minute here,
Speaker 1: that's pretty simple. There is no strength to the president's
Speaker 1: legal argument. There just isn't. Um. You know, the votes
Speaker 1: are proceeding normally. Um, this is how it's supposed to
Speaker 1: work in many cases, for example Pennsylvania. It's working slowly
Speaker 1: because Republicans set it up to work slowly. But the
Speaker 1: truth is, at the end of the day, the president
Speaker 1: doesn't really have much legal case, and if the states
Speaker 1: go the way it looks like they will, it's he's
Speaker 1: not going to have a very practical chance, even if
Speaker 1: the courts were very generous to him. Maybe that's why
Speaker 1: Rudy Giuliani is making the statements for the legal team
Speaker 1: instead of Baker. Yeah, I mean the other half of
Speaker 1: this is that the president seems to be doing his
Speaker 1: legal close election strategy the same way, the same sort
Speaker 1: of half asked away he does policy in the White House,
Speaker 1: So you know that's what you get, Hey, Jonathan, I
Speaker 1: want to pick up on something Um Kevin mentioned, and
Speaker 1: we were talking about just the inability of really even
Speaker 1: the Republican Party to kind of all be on the
Speaker 1: same page. And I wonder, And we've got a story
Speaker 1: coming up a little bit later on. It's the cover
Speaker 1: of the magazine about Trump is Um and just Donald
Speaker 1: Trump's impact on politics and the Republican Party. No matter
Speaker 1: what happens in terms of the White House, it's here
Speaker 1: to stay. But I do wonder about the inability of
Speaker 1: maybe all Republicans to kind of feel the same way
Speaker 1: about the direction of the party impacts that popular vote. Well,
Speaker 1: you know what I would say is hurting the party
Speaker 1: more than anything else, is that the president's um that
Speaker 1: they've had have had a real difficult time staying popular
Speaker 1: because they've had a real difficult time governing. You know,
Speaker 1: if you look at Donald Trump, he's been below water
Speaker 1: for four years in his approval ratings. The last pub
Speaker 1: looking president before that, George W. Bush, was briefly very
Speaker 1: very popular after the September eleventh of text. Let them
Speaker 1: spent the last four five years of his administration, of
Speaker 1: his two terms underwater, he was able to win re election.
Speaker 1: We have the majority of the popular vote, only one
Speaker 1: who's done it. But he still was unpopular. So you know,
Speaker 1: Republican presidents have been unpopular their last nine years in office.
Speaker 1: If you add in the last year of the first
Speaker 1: George Bush, they've been unpopular for I don't know. I
Speaker 1: got to interrupt though, because he's got approval rating with Republicans, Jonathan,
Speaker 1: I mean, the president held together the Republican Party, so
Speaker 1: I hear you on the sense. I mean, look, he
Speaker 1: you know, it's it's still he he has a very
Speaker 1: real chance of losing re election. But Republicans picked up
Speaker 1: seven seats in the House. Mitch McConnell, we were all talking,
Speaker 1: Oh is Amy McGrath gonna upset Mitch McConnell on track
Speaker 1: would potentially be the lead d of the of the
Speaker 1: Senate again. Lindsey Graham won re election. JOONI earns despite Trump,
Speaker 1: but I gotta I gotta tell you this is such
Speaker 1: and I gotta really be candid here. When I talked
Speaker 1: to Republicans This conversation that we're having is totally divorced
Speaker 1: from I'm gonna say reality, because there are so many
Speaker 1: Republicans that I talked with who say, even if President
Speaker 1: Trump doesn't win re election, that the way he's changed
Speaker 1: this party on trade policy, on manufacturing, on foreign policy
Speaker 1: has totally He is the new Republican establishment, whether people
Speaker 1: like it or not. And that's just the fact that
Speaker 1: made me true. That's that's separate from the question of
Speaker 1: is he popular among the population at large? And the
Speaker 1: truth is he isn't. And you know, he wasn't in
Speaker 1: sixteen managed to fluke out of electrical college vote win. Anyway,
Speaker 1: he isn't in He's gonna wind up losing by a
Speaker 1: larger majority in the on the popular vote. And you know,
Speaker 1: he is really popular among the Republican Party. They had
Speaker 1: huge turnout this time. That's to his credit. But you know,
Speaker 1: at least that shows that he's very popular within his party.
Speaker 1: But beyond sort of that group, you know, yes, he's
Speaker 1: very popular with his strong supporters. Beyond that, not so much. Jonathan,
Speaker 1: what's your take on let's say Trump loses the election,
Speaker 1: will he go away? Will he leave the political scene
Speaker 1: or will he continue to dominate the Republican Party. You
Speaker 1: know that you have to get inside somebody's heads. So
Speaker 1: I don't know that any of us can answer that.
Speaker 1: I do think that it's absolutely true there he has
Speaker 1: very very strong supporters. So if he wants to, he
Speaker 1: very well could you know, be the dominant voice in
Speaker 1: the Republican Party for the next four years um, assuming
Speaker 1: he loses, and he very well could run for the
Speaker 1: presidency again and perhaps even get the nomination. That is
Speaker 1: very hard to help because it mostly depends on what
Speaker 1: he himself decides to do. Is he is that what
Speaker 1: he wants to do with his life at you know,
Speaker 1: his care an age in the current situation, or not.
Speaker 1: And it's very hard to tell. If it's not him,
Speaker 1: there'll be somebody who, you know, there'll be a series
Speaker 1: of people, some of whom will sound more or less
Speaker 1: like him. But I don't think anybody's gonna sound exactly
Speaker 1: like Donald Trump. But I think it's I think it's
Speaker 1: really interesting in the sense. But and I know people
Speaker 1: who are listening are gonna, you know, don't swerve off
Speaker 1: the road. But I think what the Republican Party is
Speaker 1: going to have to decide and I don't want to
Speaker 1: get too far in hypotheticals while people are still counting votes.
Speaker 1: But regardless of any time a presidential nominee loses the election,
Speaker 1: will the same thing happen to Donald Trump what happened
Speaker 1: to Hillary Clinton, which was there was a freezing out
Speaker 1: of Hillary Clinton. And and I think it's going to
Speaker 1: be more difficult for Republicans to really do this, especially
Speaker 1: when you look at a key battleground state like Florida
Speaker 1: that Trump won, Ohio which he won and and look,
Speaker 1: I mean there's an argument to be made that again,
Speaker 1: he was able to defeat the Bush contingency of the
Speaker 1: Publican Party in the primary, and so he's in there.
Speaker 1: He's in there to stay. I just I don't see
Speaker 1: him going away, based upon my reporting for the past
Speaker 1: several years, I do not see it. Folks. He's getting old, though, Ken,
Speaker 1: I mean, your sons are his sons are his daughter
Speaker 1: is different. That's a different story now that that's a
Speaker 1: good question. I mean, Jonathan, Jonathan, do you see a
Speaker 1: kind of a Trump political legacy here or or or
Speaker 1: you know what? I think one of the key variables
Speaker 1: is and it's it's something we don't know is what
Speaker 1: will conservative Republican aligned media do if Trump, you know,
Speaker 1: assuming Trump loses, which is what it looks like going
Speaker 1: to happen. Um, will they decide to give him and
Speaker 1: his family and his strongest you know, his former White
Speaker 1: House eights and all that their platform or are they're
Speaker 1: going to move on? And I think that that has
Speaker 1: to do with some individuals and what they think, and
Speaker 1: has to do with some profit questions with various media outlets,
Speaker 1: and you know, I think, yeah, that's who The key
Speaker 1: variable is not so much the politicians, not so much
Speaker 1: rank and file Republicans, but the people who make Republican
Speaker 1: aligned media. What are they going to think? Because he's
Speaker 1: been a money maker for them, they may stick with him,
Speaker 1: but they may also decide to move on. It's hard
Speaker 1: to tell. It's gonna be interesting to see what the
Speaker 1: progressive media does as well, especially you know, when you've
Speaker 1: got it should bide and ultimately when I mean, how
Speaker 1: do they cover AO see, how do they cover the
Speaker 1: far left and the democratic socialist movement? I don't think
Speaker 1: we know that, Carol, No, I don't think we know
Speaker 1: that either, right and time will certainly tell on that.
Speaker 1: I also do think it's interesting and kind of provocative,
Speaker 1: I know, reading in this morning, Kevin, I don't know
Speaker 1: if you saw a June or Jonathan. You know this
Speaker 1: whole idea that if indeed President Trump doesn't get a
Speaker 1: second term, now does he come back in four years? Right?
Speaker 1: Which is which is? Which is a possibility. I mean,
Speaker 1: we are definitely living in interesting times, and I do
Speaker 1: wonder about what is the soul of the Republican Party
Speaker 1: because I agree with you, Kevin that, I mean there's
Speaker 1: been nobody like it feels like Donald Trump, who has
Speaker 1: really kind of riled up the base. Yeah, and then
Speaker 1: I mean, I just keep going back to approval rating
Speaker 1: amongst the about all the Republicans he's lost though, Kevin,
Speaker 1: think about the Lincoln Project and all these died in
Speaker 1: the wool Republicans who have turned against the party because
Speaker 1: of him. But it's interesting to look at them turn
Speaker 1: out and just see how many have been riled up
Speaker 1: and how many have come who hadn't maybe voted for years,
Speaker 1: that showed up. I'm sorry, Kevin. Yeah, And I'll just
Speaker 1: say I think I think that we've we talked a
Speaker 1: lot about the Republicans, but there's no question Democrats are
Speaker 1: going to have some party reconciliation to do as well.
Speaker 1: All right, gotta leave it there, um, Jonathan. Thank you
Speaker 1: so much, Bloomberg opinion columnist Jonathan Bernstein. Check out his
Speaker 1: latest column. He can find it on the Bloomberg terminal,
Speaker 1: of course, always at Bloomberg dot com. Joining us on
Speaker 1: the phone from San Antonio, Texas, Thanks so much for
Speaker 1: listening to Bloomberg Business Week. Download the podcast on iTunes, SoundCloud,
Speaker 1: or at Bloomberg dot com, and be sure to check
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