Speaker 1: You're listening to the Bloomberg Sound on podcast Catch us
Speaker 1: live weekdays at one Eastern on Bloomberg dot com, the
Speaker 1: iHeartRadio app and the Bloomberg Business app, or listening on
Speaker 1: demand wherever you get your podcasts.
Speaker 2: You've been robbing elbows with lawmakers all day, none of
Speaker 2: whom seem to know what's going to happen.
Speaker 3: Next, although they all seem to think that more than
Speaker 3: likely the government will shut down come that deadline of
Speaker 3: midnight SAT.
Speaker 2: So are we beyond likely? Can we start saying that
Speaker 2: the government shuts down in four days?
Speaker 3: Well, there were still a few. I talked to Congressman
Speaker 3: Brian Style being one. He said something similar to what
Speaker 3: he told us on this show earlier this week, which
Speaker 3: is that it's always darkest before the dawn, and it
Speaker 3: ain't done yet. It's just true, not yet down. We
Speaker 3: still have a few days to go. But it's just
Speaker 3: looking really, really difficult at this point.
Speaker 2: Show it is, and it's interesting that Speaker McCarthy is
Speaker 2: talking about a way forward. It says that they will
Speaker 2: avoid a government shutdown. First the spending bills, then they
Speaker 2: got a CR. But nobody can agree on the CR
Speaker 2: even in the House. Never mind the one that is
Speaker 2: moving in the Senate right now, the way he did
Speaker 2: react to that procedural vote in the Senate that sets
Speaker 2: up passage of a continuing resolution that would keep the
Speaker 2: government open. The Speaker doesn't want to do it the
Speaker 2: Senate's way.
Speaker 4: They're picking Ukraine over Americans. Look, I know there's problems
Speaker 4: out there. What Russia has done is wrong, and we
Speaker 4: can defend that. But we also watching happen right here
Speaker 4: in America right now. Why can't we deal with the
Speaker 4: border in our emergencies too?
Speaker 2: Getting back to the border, this is the new theme
Speaker 2: now that if you want to keep the government open,
Speaker 2: Joe Biden, you've got to deal with border security, even
Speaker 2: though this really hadn't been mentioned until twenty four hours ago.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and this is something that came up recurringly in
Speaker 3: my conversations with the Republicans in the House on the
Speaker 3: Hill today. Brian Style brought this up. Congressman French Hill
Speaker 3: of Arkansas brought up border as well, the idea that
Speaker 3: they can do a cr that has border security measures
Speaker 3: in it, and both of them suggested to me they
Speaker 3: might find support for that in the Senate, because when
Speaker 3: you have the likes of New York City Mayor Eric
Speaker 3: Adams talking about some of these issues with migrants. They said,
Speaker 3: Democrats may want to deal with this too. It seems
Speaker 3: like they think the Senate wouldn't necessarily consider a measure
Speaker 3: like that debt on arrival. But as you say, Joe,
Speaker 3: the Senate's got its own thing in the works, and
Speaker 3: the House doesn't seem very into that.
Speaker 2: We're talking about this like it matters with four days
Speaker 2: to go. I mean, at some point we're going to
Speaker 2: have to come to terms with reality here. I look,
Speaker 2: I don't know exactly how this is going to end,
Speaker 2: but it's starting to be inevitable. I guess that's why
Speaker 2: we wanted to talk to Michael Lindon because the next
Speaker 2: days here is the administration making decisions on what checks
Speaker 2: to cut. Before we get that Fartherugh, you've got some
Speaker 2: breaking news on the union in Detroit, and I just
Speaker 2: want to make sure that everybody hears about this because
Speaker 2: we're going to be seeing a visit from former President
Speaker 2: Donald Trump tonight speaking to these workers. We have a
Speaker 2: new deadline.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and this comes after Biden was with them on
Speaker 3: the picket line yesterday. Sean Fain once again the second
Speaker 3: week in a row. On Friday at ten am is
Speaker 3: going to hold a Facebook live stream and the UAW
Speaker 3: we understand, does intend to expand strikes on Friday barring
Speaker 3: major progress at the negotiating table. I'm not sure we've
Speaker 3: seen signs of major progress to this point, Joe, And
Speaker 3: the idea is we could see another escalation for the
Speaker 3: second week in a row with an announcement over Facebook.
Speaker 2: You know, it's been strangely quiet, even with the visits
Speaker 2: of Trump and Biden this week on negotiations. I wonder
Speaker 2: if Ford gets back on the list, if there's no
Speaker 2: further progress with Ford, if they're back in the doghouse
Speaker 2: last time, they were spared last time, and we could
Speaker 2: have another scaling up, as they say, of the stand
Speaker 2: ups this weekend agamp Boy Friday. So we're going to
Speaker 2: have another deadline to look forward to.
Speaker 3: Right, first, you expand the auto strike, huh, then you
Speaker 3: shut down the government, then everyone starts paying back student
Speaker 3: loans again. It's a triple whammie.
Speaker 2: Well, at least two of those we know are coming. Yeah.
Speaker 2: Michael Lindon, the former Senior Advisor of the President, executive
Speaker 2: Associate director of the Office of Management and Budget in
Speaker 2: the Biden administration, those are just like to have to
Speaker 2: make decisions when not all the money is available. Mike, Well,
Speaker 2: it's great to have you on Bloomberg. Thanks for being
Speaker 2: with us. They must be modeling or making decisions already
Speaker 2: inside OMB in advance of a potential shutdown. What's the
Speaker 2: conversation like behind closed doors right now?
Speaker 5: Yeah, that's right, and thanks for having me. Really appreciate
Speaker 5: being here. You're absolutely right. Whenever you approach the potential
Speaker 5: lapse in funding at the end of a fiscal year,
Speaker 5: at the end of a continuing resolution, OMB has to
Speaker 5: start going through the process of figuring out exactly what
Speaker 5: will actually shut down, what will continue at a reduced level,
Speaker 5: and what will continue sort of quasi normally. But it's
Speaker 5: really important to understand that a shutdown is going to
Speaker 5: be painful no matter what, no matter what decisions OMB makes,
Speaker 5: no matter how the administration chooses to interpret of some
Speaker 5: of its authorities. The government does an enormous amount of
Speaker 5: behind the scenes, under the radar, day to day kinds
Speaker 5: of activities and protections and programs that American people rely
Speaker 5: on every day. Maybe maybe they don't even realize they're
Speaker 5: relying on it, and they're going to realize when it's
Speaker 5: not there, or when it's way slower than they expect.
Speaker 6: It's going to.
Speaker 5: Hurt a lot of people. But you're absolutely right that
Speaker 5: the process of figuring that out begins well in advance
Speaker 5: of a potential lapse.
Speaker 3: So you say, Michael, that it is going to hurt
Speaker 3: a lot of people. And what I've heard continuously on
Speaker 3: Capitol Hill is that a shutdown is far less consequential
Speaker 3: than say, a default on the debt, a failure of
Speaker 3: the US government to meet its obligations, because the money
Speaker 3: comes back right as soon as the appropriation bills actually pass.
Speaker 3: Everybody gets their back pay. No harm, no foul. But
Speaker 3: are you saying they're actually there is a foul here.
Speaker 5: Well, well, they're definitely gonna be harm and foul, don't.
Speaker 5: I don't think it's the same as a default. That's true,
Speaker 5: but that doesn't There's a lot of things between apocalypse
Speaker 5: and no harm at all, and this is somewhere in
Speaker 5: those things. So it's not no harm, no foul. Some
Speaker 5: people will get back pay. Federal employees will get back
Speaker 5: put back pay after the shutdown presumably ends, but in
Speaker 5: the meantime, if it goes on a long time and
Speaker 5: you're a federal employee or you're a service member and
Speaker 5: you're you know, operating paycheck to paycheck and you don't
Speaker 5: get a paycheck one time, that that's going to affect you.
Speaker 5: That's going to affect how you you know, how you
Speaker 5: live your life. It may mean you miss a mortgage payment,
Speaker 5: or you miss a rent payment, or you have to
Speaker 5: call your kids childcare and say I'm sorry, I can't
Speaker 5: make I can't make the payments this month, and that
Speaker 5: has ripple effects. I will also say that contractors, federal
Speaker 5: contractors are not guaranteed back pay. That's not something that
Speaker 5: will necessarily happen. And there's all sorts of other consequences
Speaker 5: that are beyond pay. So, for example, the Small Business
Speaker 5: Administration is making loans every day to small businesses who
Speaker 5: need that assistance to make payroll or to expand or
Speaker 5: to make investments. They're not going to be able to
Speaker 5: process those loans during your shutdown. There those you know
Speaker 5: that small business owner is going to call up at
Speaker 5: its local SBA office and going to get a busy
Speaker 5: signal or going to get a message that's sorry, we
Speaker 5: can't answer the phone right now. That has broader implications
Speaker 5: for the economy as well. The truth is that the
Speaker 5: government shutdown will have consequences that are far reaching and
Speaker 5: sometimes in ways that we won't be able to predict
Speaker 5: until they happen, and when when they happen, people are
Speaker 5: going to be very unhappy.
Speaker 2: Well, i'll tell you this whole conversation has brought us
Speaker 2: a warning from Moody's this week, Michael. We talked to
Speaker 2: Mick mulvaney here on the program a couple of days ago,
Speaker 2: and he found that to be inappropriate, suggesting that even
Speaker 2: in a shutdown, we continue to pay our debt. What
Speaker 2: is the conversation like around that inside the administration.
Speaker 5: Well, the good news, there's good and bad news here.
Speaker 5: As is always the case, there are some requirements that
Speaker 5: the government will continue to pay under any circumstances, either
Speaker 5: because it's using a different form of funding. So we're
Speaker 5: talking about a government shutdown here, we're talking about the
Speaker 5: annual appropriations process, which funds a lot of the basic
Speaker 5: systems and protections and services that the American people rely on.
Speaker 5: But it doesn't fund things like Social Security benefits or
Speaker 5: Medicare benefits or interest payments on the debt, so those
Speaker 5: things would continue. There are some consequences, however, that are
Speaker 5: really important to remember. The Social Security benefits are funded
Speaker 5: by separate funding streams that are not affected by a shutdown.
Speaker 5: But the people who process those Social Security benefits, the
Speaker 5: Social Security Administration is funded by normal appropriations, process normal appropriations.
Speaker 5: And so those folks are going to go without a paycheck.
Speaker 5: Now they will continue processing those payments. But will there
Speaker 5: be consequences for morale, or for speed, or for efficiency. Yes,
Speaker 5: there will be, and it's should we shouldn't pretend that
Speaker 5: there won't be. Now, there won't be consequences on pay
Speaker 5: interest payments on our debt, but there will be these
Speaker 5: broad other consequences that it's very hard to predict exactly
Speaker 5: how they're going to turn out.
Speaker 3: Well, And it isn't a consequence as well, Michael, that
Speaker 3: all of this implementing the shutdown. Bringing the government out
Speaker 3: of a shutdown costs money too. This is something Congressman
Speaker 3: Mike Lawler, who is a Republican, one of the most
Speaker 3: vocal Republicans against a shutdown, one who says he would
Speaker 3: sign on to a discharge petition along with Democrats in
Speaker 3: order to get the government funded.
Speaker 1: If need Be.
Speaker 3: Says it's a myth that a shutdown saves money. It
Speaker 3: costs money. Can you just walk us through that.
Speaker 5: He's absolutely right. It absolutely costs money. You end up
Speaker 5: having to incur costs that you wouldn't otherwise have to,
Speaker 5: You have to put off payments that might incur interest payments,
Speaker 5: you might there's all sorts of ways that, you know,
Speaker 5: you end up the government ends up being much less
Speaker 5: efficient if it's operating on a skeleton crew or having
Speaker 5: to decide which things to do it and put off
Speaker 5: and put off till later. There's certain things that the
Speaker 5: government does that save money, things like you know, investigating
Speaker 5: fraud and investigating waste that won't happen during a government shutdown.
Speaker 5: So he's absolutely right. It's going to cost money. It
Speaker 5: costs the economy, it costs individual families, and we should
Speaker 5: really be clear here that a shutdown is entirely avoidable here.
Speaker 5: Senate Republicans, Senate Democrats on board with a simple cr
Speaker 5: that would keep the government open. If that CR is
Speaker 5: on the floor of the House, it passes. The question
Speaker 5: is whether Speaker McCarthy will put that on the floor
Speaker 5: of the House or simply say no, my caucus doesn't
Speaker 5: want to do that, and so we end up with
Speaker 5: a shutdown.
Speaker 2: You know, Michael, we still remember the deal that was struck.
Speaker 2: You mentioned the debt ceiling and the avoidance of default.
Speaker 2: There was a big deal, a grand deal that involved
Speaker 2: weeks of agonizing negotiations, and you were in the room
Speaker 2: for some of them. President Biden was asked just yesterday
Speaker 2: about Speaker McCarthy as a trusted player here. He said,
Speaker 2: we made a deal, we shook hands. How come nobody
Speaker 2: remembers this orchestration around the debt ceiling limit. I wonder
Speaker 2: your thoughts on that, because that was the whole plan
Speaker 2: to prevent what we're going through now.
Speaker 5: That's absolutely right, and I appreciate you bringing that up
Speaker 5: because I was in the room. I was part of
Speaker 5: those negotiations, and I can tell you that part of
Speaker 5: that agreement was that we would avoid a government shutdown,
Speaker 5: that we would be able to have an appropriations process
Speaker 5: that precedes something close to normal. And the good news
Speaker 5: is that the Senate has actually been doing that right.
Speaker 5: They have been passing appropriations bills out of committee on
Speaker 5: a bipartisan basis. That align with that, with that agreement,
Speaker 5: and the Speaker and the House Republicans did more than
Speaker 5: just shake hands. They voted for it. One hundred and
Speaker 5: fifty Republicans in the House voted for that deal. It
Speaker 5: set top line levels, and then they proceeded to pass
Speaker 5: appropriation bills that completely ignore that.
Speaker 2: And now they're going to Kevin McCarthy cannot be trusted them.
Speaker 5: I think it's a I think my own view, and
Speaker 5: I was, like I said I was in the room,
Speaker 5: is that they were absolutely negotiating in good faith. I
Speaker 5: really do believe that. I think they intended to stick
Speaker 5: to that deal. And whether the tail is now just
Speaker 5: wagging the dog in the House Caucus and the Speaker
Speaker 5: can't get control of his most extreme elements or is
Speaker 5: unwilling to confront them, that may have changed. But I
Speaker 5: think that the Speaker was negotiating in good faith. I
Speaker 5: think the Speaker still has a chance to make good
Speaker 5: on that. We don't need a shut down here. They
Speaker 5: can give themselves more time, and they should do that.
Speaker 5: He should take that chance.
Speaker 3: Michael I caught up with Congressman french Hill up earlier
Speaker 3: today and he was talking about how the fact that
Speaker 3: we had a deal, we agreed to it. His direct
Speaker 3: quote was, and now we're relitigating it here with some
Speaker 3: in the Republican Party the operative word there being some. Realistically,
Speaker 3: we're talking about just a few members that are holding
Speaker 3: this up. Another Republican I spoke with Brian's Sisle said
Speaker 3: that this just shows that the spending process in the
Speaker 3: US is broken. How should it be fixed if this
Speaker 3: happens time and again?
Speaker 5: Well, it's an interesting point, and I couldn't agree more
Speaker 5: that what we have here is a problem with one
Speaker 5: faction in one party, in one chamber, and the Speaker
Speaker 5: is allowing that one faction to control whether or not
Speaker 5: we get to shut down, whether we have a shutdown
Speaker 5: or not, or get to keep the government open. And
Speaker 5: it's interesting that this year we did agree to a
Speaker 5: top line agreement. Well in advance of the deadline. The
Speaker 5: Senate has been proceeding according to the sort of normal
Speaker 5: appropriations process, passing individual bills out of committee on a
Speaker 5: bipartisan basis. It's the House has decided to go a
Speaker 5: different direction. I don't know that there's any process or
Speaker 5: deals that can fix something that's rotten inside one caucus.
Speaker 5: If the Speaker is not willing to confront that caucus
Speaker 5: and say I'm just not going to.
Speaker 6: Listen to you.
Speaker 5: There's a odd by partisan majority for appropriations bills that
Speaker 5: meet the terms of the deal that we all agreed to.
Speaker 5: He could still do that. There is a majority in
Speaker 5: the House to keep the government open and to pass
Speaker 5: appropriations bills.
Speaker 2: There's still a chance, says Michael Lindon, but it's not
Speaker 2: looking good. Many thanks Michael for your insights. We appreciate
Speaker 2: you bringing your first hand experience to us here on
Speaker 2: sound On with Kaylee Lines, I'm Joe Matthew.
Speaker 1: This is Bloomberg. You're listening to the Bloomberg Sound On podcast.
Speaker 1: Catch the program live weekdays at one Eastern on Bloomberg Radio,
Speaker 1: the tune in app, Bloomberg dot Com, and the Bloomberg
Speaker 1: Business App. You can also listen live on Amazon Alexa
Speaker 1: from our flagship New York station. Just say Alexa play
Speaker 1: Bloomberg eleven thirty.
Speaker 2: We add the voice now with Congressman Seth Moulton. Always
Speaker 2: a pleasure to have the Congressman from Massachusetts with us,
Speaker 2: of course, the Congressman Moulton, a Democrat from Massachusetts who
Speaker 2: served for combat tours in Iraq, a marine combat veteran
Speaker 2: who brings a unique perspective here from the hill, and
Speaker 2: it's good to have you back. Congressman. I feel like
Speaker 2: maybe we've seen this movie before, although this one might
Speaker 2: be scarier than past episodes. What are you feeling. Are
Speaker 2: we shutting down in four days?
Speaker 6: Yes? I think we are. And I say that just
Speaker 6: because that's what my Republican colleagues tell me. And as
Speaker 6: you know, as you've just explained, it's all up to them.
Speaker 6: I mean, when you have the majority in the House,
Speaker 6: as Republicans do, and you elect the speaker who determines
Speaker 6: what we vote on, what bills actually come to the floor,
Speaker 6: including whether or not they're going to vote on bills
Speaker 6: to actually get out of this shutdown, then it really
Speaker 6: is dependent on them. That's where we are right now.
Speaker 6: And I thought your analysis of what's going on with
Speaker 6: Speaker McCarthy is is pretty accurate. You know, he could
Speaker 6: understand this, He could tell these extremists in his party.
Speaker 6: You know what, for the first time, I'm not going
Speaker 6: to listen to you. I'm not going to listen to you.
Speaker 6: I'm going to do the right thing for the country
Speaker 6: by bringing a compromised bill to the floor that both
Speaker 6: Republicans and Democrats can vote for to get us out
Speaker 6: of this mess, the same compromise bill that's already passed
Speaker 6: the Senate with both Democratic and Republican votes, and we'll
Speaker 6: do the right thing for the country. But he's not
Speaker 6: going to do the right thing for the country. He's
Speaker 6: going to do the right thing for himself to keep
Speaker 6: the gavel as speaker by putting us into a shutdown.
Speaker 2: The Speaker says, now that the border is the issue,
Speaker 2: It's interesting how the storyline has evolved over this course
Speaker 2: of time. He says that he needs to meet with
Speaker 2: Joe Biden and that if Joe Biden wants to keep
Speaker 2: the government open, he needs to shut down the border.
Speaker 2: How frequently are we going to hear the storyline change
Speaker 2: as we get closer to midnight on Saturday.
Speaker 6: I've a wild guess maybe twice a day with his character.
Speaker 2: Is that how you feel, though? I mean, are you
Speaker 2: getting these signals from the Speaker's office?
Speaker 6: Speaker McCarthy is completely out of control of his own conference,
Speaker 6: of his own Republican majority, and so what he's trying
Speaker 6: to do is come up with a different excuse a
Speaker 6: different reason why this hasn't happened to justify his continued
Speaker 6: effort to try to find some compromise that the extremists
Speaker 6: have already said they're not willing to accept. He's trying
Speaker 6: to drag it out by changing the story by saying, well,
Speaker 6: now I need to meet with the president over this.
Speaker 6: Now I need to meet with who knows, Maybe he'll
Speaker 6: say he needs to meet with one of the secretaries
Speaker 6: over that. He's just trying to drag this out to
Speaker 6: save his position.
Speaker 2: I've heard a couple of things over the past couple
Speaker 2: of days. You can tell me if they are true.
Speaker 2: Jim Clyburn, the congressman from South Carolina, told us yesterday
Speaker 2: here on Bloomberg that if Speaker McCarthy decided to work
Speaker 2: with Hakeem Jeffries that you're Democratic leader in the House
Speaker 2: would just have to say the word you guys would
Speaker 2: back a continuing resolution that is moving its way through
Speaker 2: the Senate or fine votes to come up with your
Speaker 2: own in the House. We also heard from another lawmaker
Speaker 2: who was with us yesterday who said Speaker McCarthy could
Speaker 2: pick up the phone right now and get this done
Speaker 2: if he's simply engaged with Haakim Jeffries. Is that true
Speaker 2: that Democrats are actually standing by to help him solve this?
Speaker 2: Even if this goes to a motion to vacate Matt
Speaker 2: Gates is still threatening to fire the speaker, Democrats could
Speaker 2: also be there to help him get through that. Is
Speaker 2: this a matter of simply reaching across the aisle Your
Speaker 2: party is ready to help.
Speaker 6: Yes, yes it is. That's a simple answer. Yes. Now
Speaker 6: let's pull it apart a little bit in terms of
Speaker 6: actually funding the government. Not only is what Jim Cliburn
Speaker 6: said true, but it's the way that these problems have
Speaker 6: always come to an end when Republicans control the House.
Speaker 6: They've shut down the government before, and it's always been
Speaker 6: Democrats who bail them out, who joined together with moderate Republicans,
Speaker 6: reasonable Republicans to support a compromise bill, just like the
Speaker 6: one that has already passed the Senate this week to
Speaker 6: get us out of this mess. So not only are
Speaker 6: Democrats standing here today, myself included, ready and willing to
Speaker 6: help to work together to do the right thing for
Speaker 6: the country, but that's what we've always done in the
Speaker 6: past when Republicans put us in this situation. It's only
Speaker 6: Republicans who threatened to shut down the government like this,
Speaker 6: and it's always Democrats who give the Republican majority the
Speaker 6: votes that they need to get.
Speaker 1: Out of it.
Speaker 6: Now on the second question, The second question is more
Speaker 6: interesting because this would be largely unprecedent for a Republican
Speaker 6: Speaker who got elected just with Republican votes to say,
Speaker 6: the only way I can keep my job is to
Speaker 6: get Democrats to help support me. Right, and if McCarthy
Speaker 6: want us to do that, Democrats are open to the conversation.
Speaker 6: But we're not just going to support him and his
Speaker 6: extremists agenda. We're not just going to say, go back
Speaker 6: to being Speaker with the help of our votes and
Speaker 6: continue being subservient to these dangerous extremists in your party.
Speaker 6: What Speaker McCarthy would have to do is make a
Speaker 6: genuine deal with Democrats and say, no, I'm going to
Speaker 6: stop listening to the extremists. I'm actually going to govern
Speaker 6: from the center. I'm going to work to get things
Speaker 6: through the House in a bipartisan manner, rather than continuing
Speaker 6: to make bills more and more extreme to satisfy these
Speaker 6: crazy members on the far right. Now, that would make
Speaker 6: Speaker McCarthy a truly historic speaker. He could fund the government,
Speaker 6: He could lead us through the rest of his term
Speaker 6: as Speaker by doing a lot of good things, bipartisan
Speaker 6: things for the country, and Speaker McCarthy would even gain
Speaker 6: the one thing that he doesn't have, which is a
Speaker 6: good reputation. Sadly, I just don't know that he has
Speaker 6: the political courage or the wherewithal to actually do.
Speaker 2: All of that. Is that message being delivered, It must
Speaker 2: be to him.
Speaker 6: It is absolutely he understands this loud and clear. And
Speaker 6: there are even some people at the very beginning who
Speaker 6: knew Speaker McCarthy a lot longer than I have, even
Speaker 6: back in his days in the California Legislature, and have
Speaker 6: said he's fundamentally, or at least historically, a more moderate,
Speaker 6: reasonable person. He's always been pretty transactional, you know, not
Speaker 6: a transformative leader, not the most principled person on earth,
Speaker 6: but someone who's willing to work to get things done.
Speaker 6: But that's not the kind of speaker that he's been.
Speaker 6: He's been a speaker who's just trying to hold on
Speaker 6: to his job for dear life by doing whatever these extremists,
Speaker 6: these you know, people like Matt Gays ask of him.
Speaker 2: We're spending time with Congressman Seth Moulton, the Democrat from Massachusetts,
Speaker 2: of course, has taken a strong stand against the blockade
Speaker 2: of military promotions that's still in place by Senator Tommy Tuberville,
Speaker 2: the Republican from Alabama, joined us yesterday here on Bloomberg
Speaker 2: to talk about it. Congressman, I don't want to waste
Speaker 2: your time with a lot of soundbites, but it's important
Speaker 2: you hear what he said because it's been echoing around
Speaker 2: the capital ever since. I specifically asked him about his
Speaker 2: decision to vote against the confirmation of the new Chairman
Speaker 2: of the Joint Chief's Staff, C. Q. Brown. Of course,
Speaker 2: that vote went to the floor of the Senate because
Speaker 2: of his blockade, and that's an important appointment. If you're
Speaker 2: not familiar with General Brown, he's an African American and
Speaker 2: obviously the most powerful position here in the United States military.
Speaker 2: And I asked Senator Tuberville why he voted against the
Speaker 2: now Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, who he has suggested
Speaker 2: is quote unquote woke. Here's what he said.
Speaker 7: I think you'll do a good job. But I heard
Speaker 7: him say a few things that really didn't fit with
Speaker 7: me in terms of making our military better and better.
Speaker 7: You got to remember, you.
Speaker 2: Know, we have a free though specifically Senator.
Speaker 7: Well, we have a free country. We have things that
Speaker 7: we need to do to make sure that we can
Speaker 7: uphold and we can't do that without a great, hard,
Speaker 7: strong military. Now, I heard some things that he talked
Speaker 7: about about race and things that he wanted to mix
Speaker 7: into the military. Let me tell you something, our military
Speaker 7: is not an equal opportunity employer. We're looking for the
Speaker 7: best of best.
Speaker 2: I did oppress him a bit on that Congressman to
Speaker 2: put a finer point on what he means by race
Speaker 2: mixing into the military. I think he means diversity programs.
Speaker 2: You don't have to talk about Senator Tuberville, but I
Speaker 2: wondered if you could reflect on what you know about
Speaker 2: the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, General c Q. Brown.
Speaker 6: Chairman c Q. Brown is one of the most impressive
Speaker 6: military officers of his generation. I personally wrote a letter
Speaker 6: to the President of the United States recommending him for
Speaker 6: this job because I've been so impressed by him and
Speaker 6: by the way I've been impressed by him in the
Speaker 6: midst of a lot of other incredibly impressive officers, like
Speaker 6: the former commonat of the Marine Corps, David Berger, who
Speaker 6: has pioneered Force Designed twenty thirty, the modernization of the
Speaker 6: of the Marine Corps to meet the China threat that's
Speaker 6: led all the other services now. He actually worked very
Speaker 6: closely with a General Brown of the Air Force and
Speaker 6: have advocated for these modernization efforts together. But these are
Speaker 6: some of the best military officers that I've ever seen,
Speaker 6: and I think c Q. Brown is truly the best
Speaker 6: of the best. And I say that as a United
Speaker 6: States Marine veteran with four combat tours in Iraq. You
Speaker 6: just played audio from a senator from Alabama who was
Speaker 6: once a football coach. Apparently knows a bit about football,
Speaker 6: but does not know anything about serving in the military.
Speaker 6: He's never served himself, He's never made any sorts of
Speaker 6: sacrifices like that in his life. He doesn't understand the troops.
Speaker 6: He certainly doesn't understand what they go through, and he
Speaker 6: obviously doesn't understand what it takes to make the best
Speaker 6: military fighting force on Earth, which fundamentally is equal opportunity,
Speaker 6: because if we are going to get the best of
Speaker 6: the best, then we have to have an organization that
Speaker 6: gives equal opportunity to all applicants. If you didn't have that,
Speaker 6: then you would immediately be saying no, this segment of
Speaker 6: the population, they don't have the same opportunity to join
Speaker 6: the military. So if there are great women out there,
Speaker 6: or there are great Black Americans or whatever group this
Speaker 6: senator doesn't like, well, need not apply. We're not going
Speaker 6: to benefit from your talent in the United States military,
Speaker 6: and that will make the military a weaker force. So
Speaker 6: to me, this senator is very soft on national security,
Speaker 6: he's very weak on patriotism. And you know, maybe we're
Speaker 6: not supposed to say this, but he sounds like a
Speaker 6: racist to me. Hard to imagine this guy from Alabama
Speaker 6: being a racist, but that's certainly what it sounds like
Speaker 6: to this marine.
Speaker 2: I'm just going to leave that right there. Congressman Seth Moulton,
Speaker 2: we appreciate the time as always, Thanks for joining us
Speaker 2: today on what I know is a busy time on
Speaker 2: the hill, in a conversation you won't hear or see
Speaker 2: anywhere else. Thanks for being with us here on Bloomberg Radio,
Speaker 2: on satellite radio, and on YouTube. As we assemble our panel,
Speaker 2: Rick Davis and Jeanie Shanzano, I'm glad to say are
Speaker 2: back together Bloomberg Politics contributors, and I say we start
Speaker 2: right here. I also spoke, as I referenced earlier, with
Speaker 2: Congressman Jim Kleiber, and Marie and I both talked to
Speaker 2: him on balance of power. Immediately after our conversation with
Speaker 2: Senator Tuberville. We played that same remark for him, and
Speaker 2: here's what he said.
Speaker 8: He is the worst of the worst. I have never
Speaker 8: said anything like that before publicly anyway. Turberville, to me,
Speaker 8: it's just the worst of the worst. The people of
Speaker 8: Alabama ought to be embarrassed by that.
Speaker 2: That's the gentleman from South Carolina, of course, formerly in
Speaker 2: the Democratic leadership in the House, Rick Davis, where do
Speaker 2: we start here? We've talked a lot about Tommy Turberville,
Speaker 2: and he's clearly showing no signs of backing down. The
Speaker 2: chorus is getting louder urging him to do so. But
Speaker 2: if Chuck Schumer keeps bringing confirmation votes like this to
Speaker 2: the floor, what motivates him to stop?
Speaker 9: Well, look, I mean, there's no way to clean up
Speaker 9: the backlog because of Coach Tuberville. You have almost three
Speaker 9: hundred and fifty officers in the US military who have
Speaker 9: not been confirmed by the United States Senate. I mean,
Speaker 9: it's a ghastly number that's only going up every month
Speaker 9: when these promotions come due, and there's no ability for
Speaker 9: the Senate to act because of him.
Speaker 6: So let's be clear.
Speaker 9: The Senate is trying to confirm these on a case
Speaker 9: by case basis, But if they tried to confirm all
Speaker 9: of them this way, it'd be other six hundred days.
Speaker 9: It would take of legislative action with virtually nothing other happening.
Speaker 9: So that's not a trade anybody's willing to make. You know,
Speaker 9: the senator from Alabama has a lot to learn, as
Speaker 9: we've heard from Seth Moulton about the military, and if
Speaker 9: I were him, I would start to learn more than
Speaker 9: I talk because every time he has a conversation on
Speaker 9: this topic, he gets himself into trouble. It wasn't long
Speaker 9: ago we were reeling from his comments about why, you know,
Speaker 9: white nationalists should be given priority in the military. So
Speaker 9: I mean, if I were him, I would listen to
Speaker 9: the people of Alabama. He claims that that's what he
Speaker 9: puts is his top priority. Because I don't think the
Speaker 9: people of Alabama have these attitudes, Jeanie.
Speaker 2: I've seen a lot of comments on Twitter about this interview.
Speaker 2: You're going to see a lot more on cable news
Speaker 2: later because everybody's been grabbed a piece of this. And
Speaker 2: the most common remark I've seen is about saying something
Speaker 2: out loud? Did he just say the truth out loud
Speaker 2: without realizing it here about race in the military.
Speaker 10: He You know, I was so struck by this interview
Speaker 10: because what the senator said is that equal opportunity threatens
Speaker 10: our military. Our military is not an equal opportunity employer.
Speaker 10: I mean, just let that sink in for a moment,
Speaker 10: and maybe he should have a conversation with the Chief
Speaker 10: Justice of the Supreme Court, who, even when they overthrew
Speaker 10: affirmative Action to many people's dismay last term, exempted our
Speaker 10: military institutions. All of this while the military struggles to
Speaker 10: recruit young men and young women. So this is where
Speaker 10: we stand, and he is holding up these nominees and
Speaker 10: saying that the the Senate, at this point facing a shutdown,
Speaker 10: should take seven hundred hours, as your interview talked about,
Speaker 10: so that they can one by one hold these families
Speaker 10: and everyone else hostage while they debate each of these
Speaker 10: individual promotions. That is what the senator is talking about.
Speaker 10: And I think Representative Multon was very clear in his
Speaker 10: language and rightly so, about what this suggests about the
Speaker 10: Senator's views. And it is a shame not just for
Speaker 10: the people of Alabama, but for the people across the
Speaker 10: United States and our US military. You guys talked about
Speaker 10: that op ed in the Washington Post. Everyone should go
Speaker 10: back and read it. This is dismal.
Speaker 2: Three military service branch secretaries calling on Senator Tubberville to
Speaker 2: drop his blockade. Rick, you know General c Q. Brown.
Speaker 2: I wonder if you follow on Congressman Moulton's remarks, because
Speaker 2: this is a Trump appointed Secretary of the Air Force
Speaker 2: now Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, with a
Speaker 2: decorated career, a fighter pilot flew F sixteen's what else
Speaker 2: should we know?
Speaker 9: Yeah, as chief of the Air Force, he distinguished himself.
Speaker 9: There's absolutely nothing that I could add to the distinguished SETH.
Speaker 9: Molton in his evaluation of CQ. Brown's incredible career in
Speaker 9: the military. And we should all be proud of the
Speaker 9: fact that the military can take someone like CQ. Brown,
Speaker 9: mold them into the leader that he is, and have
Speaker 9: the wherewithal to be able to supply the president with
Speaker 9: a number of people who all are high quality and
Speaker 9: incredibly experienced and incredibly committed to the safety of our
Speaker 9: nation in the world as a choice for the Chief
Speaker 9: of the Joint Chiefs, and to actually to mean the
Speaker 9: job by saying, well, his only job is to advise
Speaker 9: the president, as if that's not an important job. And again,
Speaker 9: I mean, it's almost hard to even respond to some
Speaker 9: of the really foolish things that coach Tuberville has to say.
Speaker 9: I mean, maybe if he feels more comfortable with football analogies,
Speaker 9: there are lots of jobs for coaches in the NFL,
Speaker 9: maybe that's his next employment.
Speaker 2: Boy, Gdi Shanzey. No, there's another lawmaker on Capitol Hill
Speaker 2: staging a single man's stage against something. I don't even
Speaker 2: know how to say it, a lone lawmaker's blockade. In
Speaker 2: this case, it's Matt Gates, the congressman from Florida who's
Speaker 2: holding up the budget process. I actually asked Tommy Tubberville
Speaker 2: about him last night. Says he supports what Matt Gates
Speaker 2: is doing. Gates took to the floor to talk about
Speaker 2: the most recent I guess lack of negotiation in the
Speaker 2: House and the idea that Speaker McCarthy and other Republicans
Speaker 2: might consider a continuing resolution. He's looking to fire the Speaker,
Speaker 2: as we know. Here's what he said.
Speaker 11: The one thing I'd agree with my Democrat colleagues on
Speaker 11: is that for the last eight months, this House has
Speaker 11: been poorly led and we own that, and we have
Speaker 11: to do something about it. And you know what, my
Speaker 11: Democrat colleagues will have an opportunity to do something about
Speaker 11: that too, and we will see if they bail out
Speaker 11: our failed speaker I yielded back.
Speaker 2: We will see. We talked to Congressman Malton about that,
Speaker 2: and we got an instant reaction, by the way, from
Speaker 2: Speaker McCarthy about what he's been hearing recently from the
Speaker 2: gentleman from Florida.
Speaker 4: Have you seen Matt and what he said about me
Speaker 4: when we first started this look at people have got
Speaker 4: to get over personal differences. I'm focused on America. I
Speaker 4: think that's where America's looking right now as well. He
Speaker 4: never voted for me to start out with. I don't know, zoo,
Speaker 4: he's changing his position. He said a lot of things,
Speaker 4: and we waded through. The one thing I will always
Speaker 4: tell you is I'm never going to give up on
Speaker 4: America and that's where my focus is going to be.
Speaker 2: My goodness, Genie, just imagine where we're going to be
Speaker 2: by the time Friday night arrives. And it's clearly inevitable
Speaker 2: that the government will be shutting down. Matt Gates can't
Speaker 2: wait to drop that motion to vacate is going to happen.
Speaker 10: You know, I think it's not a question of if.
Speaker 10: It's a question of when. I mean, similar to the shutdown,
Speaker 10: it's not if anymore. It is when and if Democrats
Speaker 10: table it, if they help the speaker survive. And we
Speaker 10: heard Representative Multon tell you that that may be a
Speaker 10: good thing for Kevin McCarthy. But imagine this, he survives,
Speaker 10: let's go beyond this shutdown. What happens then? How could
Speaker 10: he manage a Republican caucus if his survival is dependent
Speaker 10: on the Democrats. I think the House at that point
Speaker 10: would grind to a halt. So it is going to
Speaker 10: be a very very interesting few months, let alone just
Speaker 10: the next week. And I disagree with my friend Rick Davis.
Speaker 10: Please Rick, do not send Tommy Tupperville to the NFL jeepers.
Speaker 10: Let's put him someplace else, but don't have him in
Speaker 10: the NFL.
Speaker 2: I'm not sure that would have happened anyway, But I'll
Speaker 2: tell you what, Rick, I I'd love to know where
Speaker 2: your head is, what you're hearing from you of friends
Speaker 2: and appropriations on the Hill. Because the Senate is advancing
Speaker 2: a continuing resolution, it does appear dead in the House.
Speaker 2: But I find it just amazing and ironic that as
Speaker 2: we now connect this to a border dispute, Speaker McCarthy says,
Speaker 2: this is about border security. If the President wants to
Speaker 2: keep the government open, he's got to come to terms
Speaker 2: with this. But the Republican Homeland Security Appropriations Bill actually
Speaker 2: cuts funding for the agencies that secure the border. So
Speaker 2: if those Republican members who are blocking all of this
Speaker 2: got what they wanted, there'd be less money at the border.
Speaker 2: Can you help me make sense of it?
Speaker 9: Yeah, Sadly, I think it's got a lot more to
Speaker 9: do with polling than it does to do with policy.
Speaker 9: The reality is Kevin McCarthy started this entire shutdown sequence
Speaker 9: by saying the government's spending too much and it is
Speaker 9: I mean, there's no doubt about that, and he's been
Speaker 9: successful in negotiating deals with the President to rein in
Speaker 9: some of that spending, and of course the President thought
Speaker 9: he had a deal, and none of this should be
Speaker 9: happening because we should be basically marking up all these
Speaker 9: appropriation spills to the number that they agreed to and
Speaker 9: passed in the United States House of Representatives. But then
Speaker 9: an ABC poll comes out and it shows that most
Speaker 9: Americans actually think that a shutdown is on the backs
Speaker 9: of the Democrats, not the Republicans, and that immigration is
Speaker 9: creeping up in the importance of the American public because
Speaker 9: you have a crisis at the border again.
Speaker 12: So what do they do.
Speaker 1: They pivot and.
Speaker 9: Say, hey, look at read the ABC poll. We need
Speaker 9: to be talking about immigration this week, not spending, And
Speaker 9: so the pivot occurs. The reality is none of this
Speaker 9: gets us any closer to shut down, And unfortunately, most
Speaker 9: of the people I know on Keppel Hill have told
Speaker 9: me that there's not enough impetus to actually force a
Speaker 9: confrontation with the Freedom Caucus and therefore maybe elicit a
Speaker 9: a recall of the Speaker and then get the Democrat support.
Speaker 9: So I'm afraid we are, like everybody else's commented, headed
Speaker 9: to a shutdown. And maybe then and only that, do
Speaker 9: these kinds of pressures start to weigh on the leadership
Speaker 9: of the House.
Speaker 2: Rick reminds us there was a deal, Genie. I hate
Speaker 2: to keep bringing this back up myself, but the whole
Speaker 2: point of the debt ceialing deal was so that we
Speaker 2: would avoid all this madness. And the view from the
Speaker 2: White House is just that Joe Biden said, we made
Speaker 2: a deal, we shook hands, and they're not going to
Speaker 2: cut another deal with Speaker McCarthy. Does the Speaker have
Speaker 2: any credibility with this administration now?
Speaker 4: No.
Speaker 10: It's very tough because that was a hard fought deal,
Speaker 10: and we heard over the weekend the Secretary of Transportation
Speaker 10: saying we all gave up a lot in that deal.
Speaker 10: That wasn't a deal the White House wanted, It wasn't
Speaker 10: what Democrats wanted, but both sides gave. They shook hands.
Speaker 10: And Kevin McCarthy, because to seth Moulton's point, he cannot
Speaker 10: control these five to ten conservative members, has backed down
Speaker 10: from that in a desperate attempt to save his job.
Speaker 10: And where we are now is that he is trying
Speaker 10: to point fingers at everybody else, from the Senate to
Speaker 10: Senator Schumer to the President. The reality is he needs
Speaker 10: to point fingers where they lie in his own caucus,
Speaker 10: and he needs to stand up, and he needs to
Speaker 10: be willing to say I will walk away from his job,
Speaker 10: just like his Speaker Bainer and just like Speaker Ryan
Speaker 10: before him on the Republican side, because this caucus is
Speaker 10: at this point ungovernable and we are all suffering as
Speaker 10: a result of it.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's amazing. We always talk about how we're in
Speaker 2: uncharted territory here, but the fact of the matter is
Speaker 2: there's a lot of history repeating itself and that could
Speaker 2: continue for the Speaker. Rick Davis and Geni Shanzino. Glad
Speaker 2: we've got both today. Our signature panel on sound on
Speaker 2: it's debate night. We're going to turn to that next.
Speaker 1: You're listening to the Bloomberg Sound On podcast. Catch us
Speaker 1: live weekdays at one Eastern on Bloomberg, the iHeartRadio app
Speaker 1: and the Lower Business app, or listen on demand wherever
Speaker 1: you get your podcasts.
Speaker 2: A government shutdown likely in just four days, it's always
Speaker 2: good to know our elected representatives are working on solutions
Speaker 2: on the issues that matter, like chocolate milk in schools.
Speaker 2: Enter Congressman Tom Tiffany, the Republican from Wisconsin. I guess
Speaker 2: read the journal of the American Dietetic Association, as he
Speaker 2: referenced on the floor, read that removing flavored milk from
Speaker 2: schools results in kids while drinking less milk. And this
Speaker 2: member of the Dairy Farmer's Caucus delivered a message from
Speaker 2: the House floor, complete with a sign, come and take it.
Speaker 12: Milk is full of rich nutrients that support bone growth
Speaker 12: and development, and millions of children enjoyed drinking it. We
Speaker 12: should not be funding rules that would limit our children's
Speaker 12: access to delicious and nutritious products like milk. I urge
Speaker 12: my college to vote yes on this bipartisan amendment, and
Speaker 12: I reserve.
Speaker 2: He even had his own version of the come and
Speaker 2: take it flag, which swapped out looking at the picture
Speaker 2: of it here swapped out the cannon for a carton
Speaker 2: of milk. Rick and Genie surely want to weigh in
Speaker 2: on this, Genie Shanzano. It's the cause of our time,
Speaker 2: I guess, chocolate, milk and schools.
Speaker 10: That's right, Joe and Joe, do you know today is
Speaker 10: National Chocolate Milk Day. So how appropriate that you are
Speaker 10: talking about this drink invented in Jamaica. Although I have
Speaker 10: to say I disagree with the representative. It has a
Speaker 10: lot of sugar. It needs to get out of kids' schools.
Speaker 10: I'm sorry. I'm sorry to disappoint, but you know it's
Speaker 10: gotta go.
Speaker 2: Spoken like an educator as you are, Genie. He's introduced
Speaker 2: by the way, Rick, the milk is indisputably liked by kids.
Speaker 2: Act or twenty twenty three, known to some simply as
Speaker 2: the Milk Act. Will it pass?
Speaker 11: You know?
Speaker 2: I hope.
Speaker 6: So.
Speaker 9: I know you don't need dairy, and I know that
Speaker 9: sugar's bad for you, but I want momentum. I want
Speaker 9: chocolate milk in the schools. That was a reason I
Speaker 9: went to school was to get a chocolate milk. And
Speaker 9: so I mean, yes, disappoint so many school age children.
Speaker 2: Always the best time with Rick Davis and Genie Shanzano,
Speaker 2: even in times like these. Thanks for listening to The
Speaker 2: Sound On podcast. Make sure to subscribe if you haven't already,
Speaker 2: at Apple, Spotify and anywhere else you get your podcasts,
Speaker 2: and you can find us live every weekday from Washington
Speaker 2: DC at one pm Eastern Time. At Bloomberg dot Com