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Speaker 2: Doubt it is effectively right around the forty thousand level
Speaker 2: after it hit it yesterday, dropped briefly below where at
Speaker 2: thirty nine something. Now the stock market could be there
Speaker 2: and voter opinion about the economy could be so significantly.
Speaker 3: Lower than that, and we hear, you know, we know
Speaker 3: the deal here of the stock market is not the economy, right,
Speaker 3: so they say, But there's also a wealth effect that
Speaker 3: tends to move throughout the economy when stocks are doing well,
Speaker 3: that can cause companies to hire up, increase wages, and
Speaker 3: maybe help people downstream. It does sound like trickle down,
Speaker 3: I guess when you refer to it that way. But
Speaker 3: there's more at play here, and there's obviously a great
Speaker 3: story to tell for well, Joe Biden maybe, But then
Speaker 3: it brings us right back to this story from Bloomberg
Speaker 3: Economics today. We're just talking about it earlier Stuart Paul
Speaker 3: and his colleagues crafting a great piece of work here.
Speaker 3: That's part history lesson. I was just talking to Kaylee.
Speaker 3: I don't I don't know that I could have told
Speaker 3: you unemployment hit fourteen point eight percent in April twenty
Speaker 3: I just we lived through it. But it still looks
Speaker 3: like a typo when I see it. And Stuart writes here,
Speaker 3: the cumulative increase in consumer prices during Joe Biden's term
Speaker 3: likely will end up being higher than any other president
Speaker 3: in the past forty years. That's what we're talking about here, indeed,
Speaker 3: and Stuart joins us from World Headquarters in New York.
Speaker 3: It's great to see you, sir, a great work and
Speaker 3: glad to have you. A lot of folks are asking
Speaker 3: why the president cannot connect the dots, and it seems
Speaker 3: that you just did.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 5: It's interesting in poll after poll, especially in the swing States,
Speaker 5: if you ask, if you ask registered voters who they
Speaker 5: trust to shepherd the economy along if former President Trump
Speaker 5: whens in a landslide, it's about a ten to fifteen
Speaker 5: percentage point difference between president's Biden and Trump when you
Speaker 5: ask voters who they trust to shepherd the economy, and
Speaker 5: for some who are just looking at some of the
Speaker 5: headline economic figures, cumulative growth under President Biden is going
Speaker 5: to be about eleven percent through this term, right, and
Speaker 5: that smashes what Donald Trump had at just seven point
Speaker 5: four percent. To your point, it really is the cumulative
Speaker 5: inflation throughout President Biden's term, which is downstream of the
Speaker 5: reopening of the economy. A lot of stimulus that had
Speaker 5: been in the pipeline ends supply chain snaffoos, which are
Speaker 5: pretty far outside of his control. But if we end
Speaker 5: his term, if we end this term with the cell
Speaker 5: side forecast coming to fruition, it'll be cumulative inflation of
Speaker 5: about twenty one percent during President Biden's term. That compares
Speaker 5: to Donald Trump's just eight percent into historic average between
Speaker 5: Presidents Truman and Obama of about fifteen point one percent
Speaker 5: per four year period. So that's what's really resting on voters.
Speaker 5: That's what's on their minds right now. And in terms
Speaker 5: of what it means for the change in the typical
Speaker 5: voters lifestyle, we tend to focus on real disposable income growth,
Speaker 5: even though there's been such robust GDP growth during the
Speaker 5: Biden administration. During this term, cumulative real disposable income growth
Speaker 5: per person is likely to have just increased two point
Speaker 5: nine percent when voters go to the polls. That compares
Speaker 5: to twelve point four percent under Trump. So it's really
Speaker 5: no wonder that voters are looking to Trump as a
Speaker 5: better steward of the economy.
Speaker 2: Well in Stuart, Also, when we're considering the much more
Speaker 2: elevated levels of inflation we have seen during the Biden years,
Speaker 2: often what we hear from critics of this administration is
Speaker 2: because of that fiscal policy, all of that spending, all
Speaker 2: of that money getting dumped into the economy, that's what
Speaker 2: fueled inflation. Forget about anything on the supply side. But
Speaker 2: you guys point out in this piece how it wasn't
Speaker 2: just Biden that was sending out stimulus checks. Those happened
Speaker 2: during the Trump administration as well as massive tax cut
Speaker 2: and that those things, together with moves under the administration,
Speaker 2: are likely what contributed to this inflation. How many years
Speaker 2: back do we need to look to understand the dynamics
Speaker 2: of what was driving prices higher, say in twenty twenty two.
Speaker 5: That's a great point, Kaylee. You know, folks tend to
Speaker 5: give the current administration far too much credit and far
Speaker 5: too much blame for what happens under their watch. Yeah,
Speaker 5: to any extent that the Trump era tax cuts allowed
Speaker 5: people to allowed people and companies to fortify their balance
Speaker 5: sheets and pile up cash that would then be that
Speaker 5: would then be sent out in a sort of rebuilding
Speaker 5: phase as the economy reopened. Undoubtedly that contributed. Similarly, the
Speaker 5: Trump administration distributed two stimulus checks. Biden it distributed one
Speaker 5: check early on in his term. And when those checks
Speaker 5: from President Trump were distributed, the economy was largely shut
Speaker 5: down to try to try to prevent the spread of
Speaker 5: COVID nineteen. So when there was that reopening, households were
Speaker 5: flush with cash. Similarly, households had the ability to refinance
Speaker 5: and at rock bottom rates. And so that's not anything
Speaker 5: really to do with the presidential administration, but it's the
Speaker 5: sort of thing that has a long lag in how
Speaker 5: in how it creates a buffer that wraps around the
Speaker 5: economy that can extend pretty far into the future, and
Speaker 5: we're seeing the effects of that with persistent inflation right now.
Speaker 2: Indeed, we are stort pall of Bloomberg Economics. Thank you
Speaker 2: so much for joining us. It's a great piece. You
Speaker 2: can check it out on the Bloomberg terminal as well
Speaker 2: as online. It literally, point by point show goes through
Speaker 2: different data points in the economy what they looked like
Speaker 2: under the prior administration and the current one and one
Speaker 2: thing we didn't talk about was mortgage rates as well
Speaker 2: under Biden. How much how much higher they are And boy,
Speaker 2: dona want to be homeowners like me?
Speaker 6: Know it?
Speaker 3: Well, that's a huge part of this. I mean, the
Speaker 3: home ownership is further out of grasp for young people
Speaker 3: than it was under Trump, and that is a big
Speaker 3: sticking point in this story.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and of course we're continually hearing that because of
Speaker 2: the high rates that might be something that is actually
Speaker 2: fueling inflation now because it's keeping mortgage rates higher, people
Speaker 2: can't afford to buy, so they're renting.
Speaker 6: Rental prices go up and there you have that shelter input.
Speaker 3: So imagine a world in which we need to cut
Speaker 3: rates to fight inflation.
Speaker 2: That's what kind of where we are is arguing today.
Speaker 2: David Weston spoke with him, and it's definitely an interesting argument.
Speaker 2: But of course, all of this factors into the fact
Speaker 2: that we are in an election year in the economy
Speaker 2: is going to be front and center on the minds
Speaker 2: of many voters as they are deciding whether they prefer
Speaker 2: Joe Biden or Donald Trump. And according to New York Times,
Speaker 2: pulling with Sienna, in the key swing states that ultimately
Speaker 2: will likely decide this election, and almost all of them,
Speaker 2: Donald Trump right now is winning. We go now to
Speaker 2: Don Levy of Sienna. He's joining us now here on
Speaker 2: balance of power. He's the Sienna College Research Institute Director.
Speaker 2: Don is great to have you back on the show.
Speaker 2: So obviously we've had a few days now to sit
Speaker 2: with the survey data. We know that Trump is leading
Speaker 2: Biden and almost all of the swing states. We know
Speaker 2: that Biden is losing support in key demographics, including black
Speaker 2: and Hispanic voters, young voters as well. How much of
Speaker 2: those dynamics are driven by the economy.
Speaker 7: Well, voters tell us it's the number one issue by
Speaker 7: more than a two to one margin over immigration. Ortion
Speaker 7: finishes third, far and away. The economy is the most
Speaker 7: important issue to voters right now. And as you pointed out,
Speaker 7: right now, about three quarters of voters you're telling us
Speaker 7: across the swing states that they think the economy is
Speaker 7: no better than fear or poor by at least twenty
Speaker 7: points in some states as much as twenty seven points.
Speaker 7: They believe that former President Trump is a better steward
Speaker 7: of the economy than his current President Biden. But one
Speaker 7: little interesting nugget that you hadn't mentioned in your earlier piece.
Speaker 7: The first question is survey that we asked across the
Speaker 7: ground days were how satisfied are you with your life today?
Speaker 7: We didn't specifically say the economy, we said your life.
Speaker 7: There the finding is a little bit upside down. We
Speaker 7: find that seventy four percent of voters across the six
Speaker 7: battleground states actually, despite the economy, say that they are
Speaker 7: satisfied with their life today. So there is a bit
Speaker 7: of a disconnect amongst voters that perhaps gives a little
Speaker 7: bit of hope to the Biden campaign.
Speaker 3: Speaking of hope for the campaign, Don welcome back.
Speaker 1: It's great to see you.
Speaker 3: Everyone should know Don Levy was rated the best polster
Speaker 3: in America by ABC News. And I bring that up, Don,
Speaker 3: because I keep hearing in Washington that the polls are wrong,
Speaker 3: that the samples broken, and that Democrats don't actually believe
Speaker 3: the numbers that we're seeing. Despite the incredible consistency through
Speaker 3: survey is not only your own, but others, other branded
Speaker 3: surveys that are in some cases finding the same results.
Speaker 3: How do you respond to those people?
Speaker 7: Well, we respond by doing our work, you know. Coincidentally,
Speaker 7: I'm at the American Association for Public Opinion Research conference
Speaker 7: right now. Every single pollster in America here, I've been
Speaker 7: talking to every single one of them this week, you know,
Speaker 7: and by and large, we're getting very similar findings across
Speaker 7: multiple different methodologies, multiple different ways to reach the public.
Speaker 7: I'm pretty confident in our numbers right now. That isn't
Speaker 7: to say that these are going to be the exact
Speaker 7: number on election day. But I think you know one
Speaker 7: thing I'll point out. For example, when you compare Biden
Speaker 7: versus Trump to the United States Senate races, we find
Speaker 7: that in for the states that we just pulled the
Speaker 7: Senate race, the Democratic candidate for the Senate is outperforming
Speaker 7: Joe Biden by at least a couple of points, as
Speaker 7: many as thirteen points in Nevada. So voters are not
Speaker 7: necessarily dissatisfied at present with Democrats, they're dissatisfied with Joe Biden.
Speaker 7: So I think our numbers are pretty good at this point.
Speaker 7: You know, the previous attack on US as an industry
Speaker 7: is that we underrepresenting Trump voters. So for now, the
Speaker 7: Democrats that turn around and say it's flipped upside down
Speaker 7: is certainly their prerogative. But I think right now we
Speaker 7: feel pretty good about the accuracy of our pulls.
Speaker 2: Well, Don, it's an interesting point you're making about how
Speaker 2: you are seeing stronger support for other Democratic presidents, just
Speaker 2: not the Democratic president or Democratic candidates, rather just not
Speaker 2: the Democratic presidential nominee. I guess it begs the question
Speaker 2: whether that's going to translate into a lot of split
Speaker 2: ticket voting, or if that's going to translate into a
Speaker 2: reverse coattails kind of effect and could actually be something
Speaker 2: that leads Joe Biden to outperform current expectations.
Speaker 7: Fabulous question. You know, we're going to have to continue
Speaker 7: to track at the sea. You take a state like
Speaker 7: Nevada that you know most likely voters. Right now, we
Speaker 7: have Joe Biden trailing about as many as thirteen points
Speaker 7: Jackie rose and the Democratic incompent in the United States
Speaker 7: Senate amongst likely voters is a break even ken Jackie
Speaker 7: Rosen pulled Joe Biden along or will the voters with
Speaker 7: their tickets right now in a poll, they're splitting their ticket.
Speaker 7: They continue to tell us that they hold Joe Biden
Speaker 7: responsible for the economy. They're looking for some sort of
Speaker 7: relief there. Whether he can generate that between now and
Speaker 7: the election day, whether there's another event, whether it's a trial,
Speaker 7: whether it's a debate. You know, we're going to continue
Speaker 7: to track that. But right now I would bet more
Speaker 7: on split ticket than I would on the reverse cotail theory.
Speaker 1: Huh.
Speaker 4: Fascinating.
Speaker 3: There was a great story of Politico this week that's
Speaker 3: keeping a lot of people up at night done about
Speaker 3: what happens in the world of a tie two sixty
Speaker 3: nine to two sixty nine, nobody gets two seventy, Joe
Speaker 3: Biden and Donald Trump neither winning the electoral College, and
Speaker 3: this thing goes to the House of Representatives. This is
Speaker 3: the kind of stuff that gets journalists talking. We can
Speaker 3: stop down on a contested convention if you want. I'll
Speaker 3: do whatever you want here, don But I wonder if
Speaker 3: that is something that you see as a plausible scenario
Speaker 3: that we're going to be talking talking about in November.
Speaker 7: Well, we see it as a possible scenario Right now,
Speaker 7: the three more southern battleground states Georgia, Arizona, Nevada are
Speaker 7: all with sizeable leads for Donald Trump. The three northern
Speaker 7: states remaining about a toss up.
Speaker 1: We have.
Speaker 7: Biden up in one of those three states, Michigan. But
Speaker 7: assuming that Biden manages to pull off a victory in
Speaker 7: the three northern states, Trump the three southern states, then
Speaker 7: at this point the tiebreaker would be Nebraska two. So
Speaker 7: I think it's a plausible scenario that we can have
Speaker 7: a tie. But at this point we're going to concentrate
Speaker 7: on measuring public opinion and we'll add up to score later.
Speaker 2: I just have to say the prospect of a tie
Speaker 2: as a journalist who will have to day how we
Speaker 2: figure out who won that.
Speaker 3: Cancel the plans for November. It's our job to keep
Speaker 3: pulling you to that line, Don, even if you don't
Speaker 3: want to talk about it, we'll at least try to
Speaker 3: do our best.
Speaker 7: Well, I'm sure that we're going to ask voters about it.
Speaker 6: Boy, I'm sure that you will.
Speaker 2: Don Levy of Siana College, always great to have you
Speaker 2: here on balance of power. Thank you so much. And
Speaker 2: of course it's not just about the headline figures in
Speaker 2: the polls. Okay, Trump is leading Biden. It's about who
Speaker 2: Trump is leading Biden with, or rather where Biden might
Speaker 2: be losing support, which is to advantage Trump. Trump's gain
Speaker 2: including Hispanic voters.
Speaker 3: Sure exactly, Black voters.
Speaker 2: Young voters, the coalition that Biden is going to need
Speaker 2: if he wants another term in the.
Speaker 3: White House, voters who brought him to the dance in
Speaker 3: twenty twenty. As we discussed earlier, the speech at Morehouse
Speaker 3: is going to be looked at very closely. The President
Speaker 3: just wrapping I believe rem Mars at the African American Museum,
Speaker 3: one of the great pieces of architecture and sites of
Speaker 3: history here in the nation's capital.
Speaker 1: You're listening to the Bloomberg Balance of Power podcast can
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Speaker 1: State j Just Say Alexa playing Bloomberg eleven thirty.
Speaker 3: The Friday edition on Bloomberg TV and Radio. I'm Joe
Speaker 3: Matthew Indeed alongside Kaylee Lines here in Washington, d C.
Speaker 3: And Kaylee we are coming off of a wild episode
Speaker 3: in the US House that some are describing as a
Speaker 3: new low. Speaker Mike Johnson already had his hands full.
Speaker 3: This is an oversight hearing, and when we think oversight committee,
Speaker 3: you and I have talked a lot about the membership
Speaker 3: on that committee, Marjorie Taylor Green, Alexandri Costio Cortez. I
Speaker 3: don't think I need to say anymore. If you watch
Speaker 3: the video here, this was pretty ugly stuff. An argument
Speaker 3: broke out, got super personal. Speaker Johnson says the hearing
Speaker 3: was not a good look for Congress. We've got to
Speaker 3: take the emotion out of these things and deal with
Speaker 3: the issues on their substance. I think we may, however,
Speaker 3: be far beyond removing emotion from politics right now in Washington.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's fair to say, this was, of course a
Speaker 2: late night hearing. It started with a comment from Jorie
Speaker 2: Taylor Green on another member of the committee's appearance. It
Speaker 2: kind of all devolved into chaos from there. The chairman,
Speaker 2: Jim Comer, had difficulty getting things back on track. But
Speaker 2: in some sense it just underscores the difficulty with decorum
Speaker 2: we have seen in the House of Representatives.
Speaker 3: And what can be a dysfunctional body when it comes
Speaker 3: to lawmaking. If you can't even get people to treat
Speaker 3: each other with respect, how are you going to compromise
Speaker 3: on lawmaking?
Speaker 6: Fair enough, although some lawmaking is still happening.
Speaker 2: In fact, just yesterday, a bill that had passed in
Speaker 2: the House passed in the Senate related to how the
Speaker 2: SEC makes rules for accounting for cryptocurrency on bank's balance sheets. Essentially,
Speaker 2: it was a rule that makes it a lot harder
Speaker 2: and more expensive to be a custodian of crypto. It
Speaker 2: passed the Senate with a bipartisan vote, more than sixty votes.
Speaker 2: It has been, though promised a veto from the White House.
Speaker 2: But it raises this wider question of the fate of
Speaker 2: legislation that the House is going to be voting on
Speaker 2: next week. Crypto market structure is going to be up
Speaker 2: for a vote, and I'm pleased to say joining us
Speaker 2: now is Congressman Wiley n a Democrat from North Carolina
Speaker 2: who serves on the House Financial Services Committee. Congressman, great
Speaker 2: to have you here on balance of power. Welcome to
Speaker 2: Bloomberg Television and Radio. I know that you have focused
Speaker 2: a great deal on crypto throughout your tenure in the
Speaker 2: House thus far. How confident are you that this bill
Speaker 2: is going to pass a full floor vote after it
Speaker 2: made it out of committee.
Speaker 8: Well, first of all, I just want to say how
Speaker 8: glad I am that you're not asking me about Marjorie
Speaker 8: Taylor Green.
Speaker 4: In the oversight.
Speaker 1: Thank you for that.
Speaker 8: I am excited to talk about policy and the bipartisan
Speaker 8: work we're doing in Congress to get things done. And
Speaker 8: you know, if you're looking for good examples of a
Speaker 8: bipartisan cooperation, our work in the House Financial Services Committee
Speaker 8: on Digital assets is just that. This bill the fit
Speaker 8: for the twenty first Century Act, the first ever you know,
Speaker 8: a regulatory structure for digital assets, is coming to the
Speaker 8: floor of Flora vote next week. I was part of
Speaker 8: a group of six Democrats who worked with my Republican
Speaker 8: colleagues and committee to move this bill. Similar group of
Speaker 8: Democrats in the Ag Committee as well, so we're gonna
Speaker 8: get a vote next week. I'm very excited because we
Speaker 8: are operating on a hundred year old security law, securities
Speaker 8: law for this industry, and we need to get regulations
Speaker 8: in place. We need to protect consumers and that's what
Speaker 8: this bill does.
Speaker 3: Commerce but it's good to have you back. We haven't
Speaker 3: asked you about Marjorie Taylor Green yet, But as far
Speaker 3: as Crypto is concerned, what does the White House not
Speaker 3: understand on this legislation?
Speaker 8: You know, I think the White House had a great
Speaker 8: executive order on Web three. I think, you know, Gary
Speaker 8: Gensler and the SEC are really at odds with a
Speaker 8: lot of others in the administration.
Speaker 4: So I've been.
Speaker 8: Very frustrated with Gary Gensler and the SEC's regulation by
Speaker 8: enforcement and frankly just open hostility towards Crypto.
Speaker 4: So we're seeing that play out.
Speaker 8: I was part of a group of twenty one Democrats
Speaker 8: who voted for the SAB one twenty one cra on
Speaker 8: the House floor last week. But just yesterday we saw
Speaker 8: twelve Senate Democrats agreeing with us that the SEC is
Speaker 8: way out of line and out of step, including Senator
Speaker 8: Schumer as part of that group of twelve Democrats.
Speaker 4: So I think that's a great message.
Speaker 8: And my hope is that Gary Gensler will see the
Speaker 8: writing on the wall and rescind SAB one twenty one.
Speaker 8: He has the ability to do that, and really what
Speaker 8: he's doing is making, you know, putting the President in
Speaker 8: a very difficult position forcing him to choose size. He
Speaker 8: is not serving President Biden's best interests. So what he
Speaker 8: can do is he can withdraw it and work on
Speaker 8: the custodial banking peach, which is really the big policy
Speaker 8: point here that we want to get right so that
Speaker 8: you know, we have you know, bitcoin ETFs.
Speaker 4: We want our US.
Speaker 8: Highly regulated banks to be able to custody those assets,
Speaker 8: and he's prohibiting them.
Speaker 4: From doing that.
Speaker 2: Well, Congressman, you were there speaking of the twelve Democrats
Speaker 2: in the Senate who decided to vote in favor of
Speaker 2: this legislation yesterday, and I wonder what your message is,
Speaker 2: as a Democrat who is not running for reelection to
Speaker 2: those that are, and how they should be considering crypto
Speaker 2: in their policy considering, say, the chair of the Senate
Speaker 2: Banking Committee, Shared Brown, is.
Speaker 6: Very vulnerable in Ohio.
Speaker 2: He's running against a pro crypto advocate in Bernie Marino.
Speaker 2: There is tens of millions of dollars in crypto super
Speaker 2: pac money that could be mobilized against candidates like him.
Speaker 2: Is it a mistake for incumbent Democrats not to be
Speaker 2: pro crypto?
Speaker 6: Right now?
Speaker 8: I think it's a mistake for this to become a
Speaker 8: partisan issue. Twenty percent of registered voter's own crypto. Know
Speaker 8: this industry is not going away. And the message I
Speaker 8: have is, whether you love crypto or you hate crypto,
Speaker 8: you should want to have regulations. That's our message is Democrats.
Speaker 8: That's what the work I'm doing in a bipartisan way.
Speaker 8: Does we provide regulations for this industry?
Speaker 4: And we don't. What I don't want to see is
Speaker 4: this become.
Speaker 8: A partisan political issue because Web three should not be
Speaker 8: at all.
Speaker 3: Congressman, I'm not going to ask you about Marjorie Taylor
Speaker 3: Green specifically, but when we look at the whole story
Speaker 3: here and what's been happening in the House of Representatives,
Speaker 3: the breakdown in decorum, the dysfunction that so many people
Speaker 3: talk about. People should know that you're a freshman congressman
Speaker 3: who's in fact in his senior term. You're leaving the House,
Speaker 3: and we can get into the reasons why. But I
Speaker 3: wonder if A you're happy to be leaving because of
Speaker 3: the environment that you're surrounded in the workplace culture, if
Speaker 3: we can call it that in the US House, and
Speaker 3: B if you're on your way out of this body,
Speaker 3: right now you can do anything you want. Are you
Speaker 3: doing the risky business dance and the rotunda?
Speaker 8: Like?
Speaker 3: What do you do when you have free reign on
Speaker 3: your way out the door?
Speaker 8: Well, you know, I am not retiring voluntarily. My district
Speaker 8: got jerry mannered away from me.
Speaker 4: I love this job.
Speaker 8: I have a lot more work I want to get done,
Speaker 8: so we're working twice as hard to get things done
Speaker 8: while I'm still in Congress.
Speaker 4: There's future elections for me.
Speaker 8: But the point that I think is really important for
Speaker 8: anybody watching the chaos and confusion that we see playing
Speaker 8: out in Congress, there is one thing to blame, and
Speaker 8: you can put your finger right on it, and as
Speaker 8: clear as day, it's extreme partisan jerrymandering. I got elected
Speaker 8: to Congress and a Republican seat. It was a slightly
Speaker 8: Republican seat, could have gone either way. I won by
Speaker 8: three points because pro democracy Republicans made their voices heard
Speaker 8: and voters had a real choice, And jerry mannering is
Speaker 8: wrecking Congress. Less than ten percent of the seats are competitive.
Speaker 8: The other ninety percent are only going to go to
Speaker 8: whoever wins the Democratic primary or the Republican primary. That's
Speaker 8: how members of Congress are designed right now is they
Speaker 8: are just mainly here to win their Democratic primary, win
Speaker 8: their Republican primary. That's why you see all these food
Speaker 8: fights and the crazy stuff you see in oversight, because
Speaker 8: that's their focus.
Speaker 4: Less than ten percent are truly competitive. We won one
Speaker 4: of those.
Speaker 8: So the answer is non parts and independent redistricting. That
Speaker 8: would totally change the face of Congress. You would get
Speaker 8: so many more people who are just focused on getting
Speaker 8: things done and working to cross the aisle. Well, that's
Speaker 8: what we need a lot more of, and we're going
Speaker 8: to have fewer and fewer seeds that are like that.
Speaker 4: We're losing mind.
Speaker 8: That's one example, and it's the thing that we got
Speaker 8: to change if we want to get sanity back in Congress.
Speaker 3: Were you going to go on the road with Dead
Speaker 3: and Company now that you have the time on your hands.
Speaker 3: I remember distinctly the tribute you made to the grateful
Speaker 3: dead on the floor of the House about one year ago.
Speaker 4: You can own it now, Congressman, No, A thousand percent.
Speaker 8: You know, I saw you two at this sphere. I
Speaker 8: know Dead and Company is going to be.
Speaker 4: At the sphere. I hope get out there to see them,
Speaker 4: you know, And you know, I know J.
Speaker 8: Powell is definitely a fan and has not had his
Speaker 8: last Dead and Company show as well.
Speaker 3: All right, well, we'll look for you on the vacuum
Speaker 3: cleaner during the space jam at the sphere. Congressman, it's
Speaker 3: great to have you back with us here. On balance
Speaker 3: of power Wiley Nickel, the Democrat North Carolina's thirteenth district,
Speaker 3: And that's the whole point there, actually really interesting point
Speaker 3: he made, Kaylee, on how partisan jerry mandering leads to
Speaker 3: more dysfunction like we saw last evening in Congress. You know,
Speaker 3: Jack Fitzpatrick has to bear through this every day up
Speaker 3: there in person.
Speaker 2: He does the dysfunction and whether or not it leads
Speaker 2: ultimately to real legislating, which has been harder to come
Speaker 2: by in this Congress. It has been historically unproductive. But
Speaker 2: theoretically there is still more work that they could do
Speaker 2: through the remainder of this year, specifically before September thirtieth,
Speaker 2: when we're going to have to have the whole spending
Speaker 2: fight over again and.
Speaker 3: Think we'll actually do a budget this time.
Speaker 2: Well, let's be honest, probably not. But Tom Cole, the
Speaker 2: chair of the Appropriations Committee, is at least setting out
Speaker 2: some numbers overnight.
Speaker 3: Yeah. Oh, and Jack has this. Of course, that's Jack
Speaker 3: Fitzpatrick's beat appropriations at Bloomberg Government, and I believe he's
Speaker 3: with us right now.
Speaker 1: Jack.
Speaker 3: Are we really going to have a regular order budget
Speaker 3: process going into the next fiscal year with an election underway?
Speaker 3: Or am I just making you laugh?
Speaker 9: They are going to try to get started. How far
Speaker 9: they make it through the process is another question. I
Speaker 9: would say that Tom called the new Appropriations Chair even
Speaker 9: as he put out a markup schedule and said here's
Speaker 9: what we're going to spend on each of the twelve
Speaker 9: bills acknowledged, he would be, in his words, shocked if
Speaker 9: they got everything done by September thirtieth. Even if the
Speaker 9: House is productive, the Senate tends to move slowly. It's
Speaker 9: an election year. They still haven't agreed in a broad
Speaker 9: way on how much money they want to spend overall
Speaker 9: on defense and non defense. So this puts a lot
Speaker 9: of pressure on the lame duck. The expectation is you
Speaker 9: try to make as much progress as you can and
Speaker 9: then basically whoever has a better day on election day
Speaker 9: can decide do we want to have a quick compromise
Speaker 9: in the lame Duck, or do we want to drag
Speaker 9: this out into twenty twenty five and try to use
Speaker 9: more votes that we're getting in the next Congress to
Speaker 9: get a better deal. So there's going to be a
Speaker 9: lot of pressure on the lame Duck and some soul
Speaker 9: searching from whoever wins and whoever loses in terms of
Speaker 9: getting a final vote, and in the meantime they're going
Speaker 9: to try to make some progress, but it's it's an
Speaker 9: uphill battle this year.
Speaker 2: Well, as you talk Jack about the kind of differences
Speaker 2: in opinion over defense versus non defense spending, it's worth
Speaker 2: pointing out that in the top line figures that were
Speaker 2: released by Chairman Cole yesterday, the bills would follow spending
Speaker 2: caps set in the twenty twenty three deat Limit law
Speaker 2: that equate to one percent increase for dispense spending a
Speaker 2: six percent cut for non defense funds.
Speaker 6: We're still talking about that debt.
Speaker 2: Limit deal that then nobody wanted to follow and then
Speaker 2: everybody ultimately basically ended up following. Anyway, when things were
Speaker 2: all said and done, are we relitigating this over again?
Speaker 1: Yeah?
Speaker 9: Yes, they are continuously re litigating the twenty twenty three
Speaker 9: debt limit deal, which is almost funny at this point
Speaker 9: because the debt limit suspension lifts in January, so by
Speaker 9: the time they're done arguing over the twenty twenty three deal,
Speaker 9: they'll have to start negotiating another one to avoid a default.
Speaker 9: There was the deal that was written into the law
Speaker 9: that allows for a bigger increase for defense and cuts
Speaker 9: to non defense. But then you may remember there was
Speaker 9: a side deal between Democratic leadership and Kevin McCarthy, who's
Speaker 9: no longer speaker, to allow more to basically keep it
Speaker 9: even the idea, the handshake deal was just a one
Speaker 9: percent increase for both defense and non defense, so parody
Speaker 9: between the two House. Republicans are saying, well, that wasn't
Speaker 9: written into the law specifically, so we're not doing it,
Speaker 9: and we're cutting more money from non defense. There's not
Speaker 9: a lot of middle ground here. There's not a lot
Speaker 9: of meeting in the middle between Republicans and Democrats, and
Speaker 9: that fight is going to have to play out for
Speaker 9: probably a number of months before there's a reckoning again,
Speaker 9: probably in the lame duck.
Speaker 3: Jack, I've got to ask you about this meltdown on
Speaker 3: the Oversight Committee hearing that we saw last night. We
Speaker 3: were talking about it with the congressman before you joined.
Speaker 3: I'm not going to quote what was said. Marjorie Taylor
Speaker 3: Green instigated this. We had two members of Congress yelling
Speaker 3: at each other, criticizing their personal appearances, and things got
Speaker 3: pretty ugly here, to the point where the speaker had
Speaker 3: to issue a statement. If this happened or prior speakers
Speaker 3: Nancy Pelosi, maybe John Bayner, wouldn't these people be brought
Speaker 3: into the Speaker's office and reprimanded. What's going to happen here?
Speaker 9: Maybe? Maybe not? You know, you look specifically at the
Speaker 9: Marjorie Taylor Green story. When she was first elected, she
Speaker 9: had made a number of comments that led to a
Speaker 9: fight over whether she would serve on committees. She is
Speaker 9: now on a committee. She kind of allied herself to
Speaker 9: some extent with Kevin McCarthy, not necessarily tied closely to leadership.
Speaker 9: But it's a bit of a sign of the times
Speaker 9: that even when there is a push to keep members
Speaker 9: off of committees for one reason or another, those pushes
Speaker 9: don't always succeed, and in a very very narrow majority
Speaker 9: that Republicans have in the House, even if they feel
Speaker 9: one of their members is doing something inappropriate, they may
Speaker 9: rely on their votes and may have to work with them,
Speaker 9: not indefinitely, as we saw with George Santos, but sometimes
Speaker 9: for a long time. So there are a lot of
Speaker 9: factors that play into that, and Marjorie Taylor Green seems
Speaker 9: to almost be at the top of the list of
Speaker 9: members who have tested the limits of leadership's patients.
Speaker 2: All right, Jack Fitzpatrick, Congressional reporter for Bloomberg Government, always
Speaker 2: covering the.
Speaker 6: Chaos for us, Thank you so much.
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