Speaker 1: Bloomberg Audio Studios, podcasts, radio news. You're listening to the
Speaker 1: Bloomberg Balance of Power podcast. Catch us live weekdays at
Speaker 1: noon Eastern on AMMO, car Play and then broud Otto
Speaker 1: with the Bloomberg Business App. Listen on demand wherever you
Speaker 1: get your podcasts, or watch us live on YouTube.
Speaker 2: This time yesterday, we were talking about new ratings from
Speaker 2: the Cook Political Report, including a move for the Pennsylvania
Speaker 2: Senate race the incumbent Bob Casey against Dave McCormick to
Speaker 2: a toss up from Lean's Democratic and we were asking
Speaker 2: the question, is it possible that you could see a
Speaker 2: difference in the outcome of the Senate race in terms
Speaker 2: of what party wins and presidential? Could Trump win and
Speaker 2: Casey win, Could Harris win and McCormick win. And one
Speaker 2: of those states where it might be most likely that
Speaker 2: we see that kind of ticket splitting could potentially be
Speaker 2: in Ohio. It's now a bright red state, Joe. It's
Speaker 2: probably going to go Donald Trump unless something majorly unforeseen happens.
Speaker 2: And yet it's a Democratic incumbent that is vying to
Speaker 2: keep his seat there. A chair of the Senate Bank Committee,
Speaker 2: Shared Brown, who does stand a chance against his challenger,
Speaker 2: Bernie Marino. But this is an expensive.
Speaker 3: Race, could be the most expensive in the country. Here
Speaker 3: they've dumped five hundred million dollars into this contest already
Speaker 3: with two weeks to go.
Speaker 4: Remarkable. And you're right, Kaylee.
Speaker 3: This is Shared Brown, who we talk about a lot here,
Speaker 3: largely because of his chairmanship. He's featured prominently on Bloomberg
Speaker 3: TV and radio. The Real Clear Politics average gives him
Speaker 3: a little over a half percent, some of the others
Speaker 3: five thirty eight, little closer to one percent.
Speaker 4: But in a sea of red, that's actually doing pretty well.
Speaker 3: And Steve Dennis has an important story about this today
Speaker 3: on the terminal Bloomberg Congressional reporter with a great read
Speaker 3: in rust belt Ohio. He writes, a senator fights to
Speaker 3: hang on in Trump's turf.
Speaker 4: Stephen, thanks for being with us. It's good to see you.
Speaker 3: On balance of power. What if we can say Sharon
Speaker 3: Brown is doing well? What is he doing right?
Speaker 5: You know, he has a deep well of support among
Speaker 5: working class voters who have swung over to Trump, and
Speaker 5: especially in places like the Mahoning Valley which have seen
Speaker 5: huge job losses to Mexico, to China, a lot of
Speaker 5: shuttered factories and steel mills. There are a lot of
Speaker 5: voters there who have been voting for Shared Brown because
Speaker 5: he opposed those trade deals, and they see Trump and
Speaker 5: Brown as sort of simpatico on the trade issues that
Speaker 5: they feel like hollowed out their communities and their towns.
Speaker 5: Now the question is whether he can maintain that support
Speaker 5: among enough of those blue collar voters who are sort
Speaker 5: of voting Republican up and down the ballot more and more.
Speaker 5: You know, Brown's now the last Democrats standing essentially statewide.
Speaker 5: And if you look at a county like Mahoning County,
Speaker 5: where Youngstown is long a Democratic stronghold, you know, only
Speaker 5: one thirty five percent there. But Donald Trump won it
Speaker 5: outright in twenty twenty. And the last time Brown ran
Speaker 5: in twenty eighteen, he won by twenty himself. JD. Vance
Speaker 5: won it four years later by three. So there are
Speaker 5: a lot of these crossover voters that I've tried to
Speaker 5: talk to for about a week in Ohio, and and
Speaker 5: there are they're split. There's some who are now going
Speaker 5: the moreno, and there's some who are undecided, including the
Speaker 5: UAW shop chairman at the Ultium sales factory, exactly the
Speaker 5: kind of person that Brown's trying to appeal to that's
Speaker 5: at a plan that's benefited from billions of dollars from
Speaker 5: Joe Biden's you know climate law.
Speaker 2: Well, if we consider benefiting from dollar Steve, as Joe mentioned,
Speaker 2: this is a very expensive race, half a billion dollars spent,
Speaker 2: some forty million dollars spent by crypto pac money. Specifically,
Speaker 2: what difference is the money making?
Speaker 5: You know, if you if you go there, you talk
Speaker 5: to voters. They're being inundated with these attack ads going
Speaker 5: after Sharon Brown on things like transgender issues, which he's
Speaker 5: very upset about. Feels like these ads are lies. Moreno's
Speaker 5: also very upset about the ads against him, and it's
Speaker 5: just NonStop attack ads. Mostly. One of the issues that
Speaker 5: Brown also hopes will carry the day with some Trump
Speaker 5: voters is abortion rights. This is an issue where Ohio
Speaker 5: voted last year fifty seven to forty three to enshrine
Speaker 5: abortion rights in the constitution, despite the fact that it's
Speaker 5: a Trump state. So that's an issue where there are
Speaker 5: crossover voters that Brown's really trying to appeal to. And
Speaker 5: I did talk to one Trump voter a woman in
Speaker 5: just north of Youngstown who told me that she was
Speaker 5: offended by Bernie Moreno's comment the other day that sort
Speaker 5: of mocking suburban women who prioritize abortion rights, especially if
Speaker 5: they're over fifty. She didn't like that, you know. She
Speaker 5: said she's going to vote for Brown, trusts him, feels
Speaker 5: like he has done the right thing for workers there,
Speaker 5: and also cited the trade policies that Brown has supported
Speaker 5: in the past. So you know there are The question
Speaker 5: is how many of those voters are there. The polling
Speaker 5: suggests that Brown's not doing as well with Trump voters
Speaker 5: as he did six years ago when he won by
Speaker 5: more than six points, But could it be enough to win?
Speaker 5: And that's like the five hundred million dollar question.
Speaker 3: Here find the story on the terminal and online in
Speaker 3: russ Belt, Ohio, where Stephen Dennis just spent some good
Speaker 3: time reporting a senator fights to hang on in Trump's turf.
Speaker 3: I'm Joe Matthew alongside Kaylee Lines in Washington as we
Speaker 3: assemble our panel for their take on this and more
Speaker 3: stories today on the campaign trail. Genie Schanzano is with
Speaker 3: US partner, I should say, a political science professor at
Speaker 3: Iona University. Rick Davis, partner at Stone Court Capital. Great
Speaker 3: to see both of you here, Jennie. This is one
Speaker 3: of those states where Kamala Harris probably will not help
Speaker 3: the incumbent. There are sometimes when Kamala Harris can help
Speaker 3: being on stage, actually showing up to stump in person,
Speaker 3: and other times where it's actually more helpful to stay away.
Speaker 4: Is this one of them.
Speaker 6: Yeah, it probably is. And it's such a fascinating story.
Speaker 6: The idea that Brown could hold a state where Trump
Speaker 6: is you know, an all likelihood might win by ten
Speaker 6: plus or minus points. It's an incredible story. But yeah,
Speaker 6: she doesn't need, you know, Kamala Harris. Certainly Joe Biden
Speaker 6: out there. He's got to handle this on his own.
Speaker 6: As you just talked about.
Speaker 2: Well, it raises the question of how much in these
Speaker 2: battleground states, Ohio not being one, Rick, we could expect
Speaker 2: there to be a difference in the outcome of what
Speaker 2: party wins control of that Senate seat versus wins the
Speaker 2: presidential vote in these states. If you look at where
Speaker 2: there are contests in Michigan, in Wisconsin, in states like
Speaker 2: Arizona in Pennsylvania, which we talked about yesterday, do you
Speaker 2: expect that, in all likelihood, if Donald Trump is winning
Speaker 2: these states, that Republicans may be performing better than polls
Speaker 2: currently suggest in those Senate races.
Speaker 7: Well, it certainly has the potentially give you an uplift
Speaker 7: if the top of your ticket is, you know, winning.
Speaker 7: And we've seen in the last four maybe five elections
Speaker 7: for president that the national party candidate really decides the
Speaker 7: outcome of the down ballot races. Right, we have very
Speaker 7: few examples where we've had a Republican win like Trump
Speaker 7: did in sixteen. And you know, in a state where
Speaker 7: a governor is a Republican and the senator doesn't win,
Speaker 7: who's a Republican. I mean, we've become very homogeneous in
Speaker 7: our geography of politics, and so yeah, I think that
Speaker 7: this is probably a year that's not kind of incumbents
Speaker 7: in general. So we've seen incumbents struggle a little bit
Speaker 7: from both parties, I might add. And so the uplift
Speaker 7: that you're hoping is that the top of the ticket
Speaker 7: really drives turnout. I would say slightly different than in
Speaker 7: the past. The Republican parties offloaded its turnout mechanism to
Speaker 7: Elon Musk, so it doesn't have firm control over who
Speaker 7: gets turned out. So how would you like to be
Speaker 7: you know, the Bernie Moreno canet who isn't getting the
Speaker 7: cooperation from Musk because he's only doing turnout in places
Speaker 7: like targeted states, and he could use some of that
Speaker 7: money and effort done in Colorado.
Speaker 1: Way.
Speaker 3: Pretty fascinating dynamic here once again involving Elon Musk with
Speaker 3: a group of former Republican lawmakers, advisors, and Justice Department
Speaker 3: officials now sending a letter to Merrick Garland to investigate
Speaker 3: this sweepstakes idea that we talked about.
Speaker 4: Genie.
Speaker 3: He's giving away a million dollars a day. I still
Speaker 3: wonder how many Democrats end.
Speaker 4: Up capturing those checks.
Speaker 3: Is Elon Musk the most important person not named Trump
Speaker 3: or Harris in this presidential campaign?
Speaker 8: You know, he certainly is one of them.
Speaker 6: I would just add to the list. Know, not quite
Speaker 6: up there with Elon Musk, but Charlie Kirk is also
Speaker 6: supposed to be handling some of this turnout for the Republicans.
Speaker 6: And both of these are untested in this realm, so
Speaker 6: I have to see how they do. And I can
Speaker 6: just tell you this just off, you know, just from
Speaker 6: a conversation I just had with a student from Pennsylvania
Speaker 6: who said Elon Musk was at her high school and
Speaker 6: in order to enter the place you had to sign.
Speaker 6: So it's going to be interesting to see how these
Speaker 6: legal questions on this sweepstakes turn out. But I do
Speaker 6: think that it is an important issue to think that
Speaker 6: you now have a major party in the Republican Party
Speaker 6: at two weeks to go here, who are giving to
Speaker 6: the wealthiest man probably ever in the world, Elon Musk
Speaker 6: and then Charlie Kirk, the you know, the drivers, the
Speaker 6: keys to turnout for a very very close election. I
Speaker 6: would make me nervous if I was a Republican depending
Speaker 6: on them, if only because they are so untested in
Speaker 6: this realm.
Speaker 8: Well.
Speaker 2: Elon Musk, of course, someone we spend a lot of
Speaker 2: time talking about here on Bloomberg TV and radio, along
Speaker 2: with other figures in the Wall Street world, including the
Speaker 2: likes of Jamie Diamond, the CEO of JP Morgan Chase,
Speaker 2: with which The New York Times is reporting today that
Speaker 2: he privately supports Kamala Harris but is afraid to say
Speaker 2: so for fear of blowback if Donald Trump wins. He
Speaker 2: also is expressed in private, According to sources familiar with
Speaker 2: the matter, interest in serving in a Harris administration, perhaps
Speaker 2: as Treasury Secretary. Jeanie wouldn't make any difference to Kamala
Speaker 2: Harris's campaign at this point in the race. If Jamie
Speaker 2: Diamond were to express the support out loud and vocally,
Speaker 2: you know, I think.
Speaker 6: It may along the edges, although I have to say
Speaker 6: most of the people who would probably be listening and
Speaker 6: hearing and moved by that have already made up their mind.
Speaker 6: It can't hurt if he says publicly he supports her,
Speaker 6: But I think, you know, it's very clear that for
Speaker 6: him and his company, it is probably best not to
Speaker 6: do that. And I'm just thinking back to our conversations
Speaker 6: about McDonald's yesterday and Charlie Pellett telling us that they
Speaker 6: came out very swiftly to say they are gold, not
Speaker 6: red or blue, and I think that's probably wise and
Speaker 6: sage advice for a lot of these companies, because there's
Speaker 6: very little benefit to them to alienate either their customers,
Speaker 6: their shareholders, or quite frankly, the people who work for
Speaker 6: them by expressing support in that way.
Speaker 3: Rick, your well versus in the investment community, as a
Speaker 3: partner at stone Court Capital. What impacts would that have
Speaker 3: Jamie Diamond on your team this stage of the campaign.
Speaker 7: Well, you probably would have hoped that it had happened
Speaker 7: a long time ago, because obviously he is a blackbird
Speaker 7: in Wall Street. He brings other people with him, He
Speaker 7: brings an enormous amount of capacity to fundraise, and so
Speaker 7: that financing isn't going to be really that readily available
Speaker 7: in the last two weeks of the election. I think
Speaker 7: it adds a lot of credibility and seriousness to the
Speaker 7: Harris effort. And look, I mean, Wall Street a long
Speaker 7: time ago gave up this notion that capitalists don't play
Speaker 7: in politics. The only thing different between capitalists and politicians
Speaker 7: are politicians want money and capitalists want power, so sooner
Speaker 7: or later they converge. And that's what I think you
Speaker 7: see a little bit of Jamie Dimond doing right now,
Speaker 7: is seeing the potential for power.
Speaker 2: Well, as we think about Wall Street, it does remind
Speaker 2: us that Donald Trump is going to be spending time
Speaker 2: in New York this weekend of rally scheduled for a
Speaker 2: Sunday at Madison Square Garden. We've spent some time analyzing
Speaker 2: why exactly he would be spending any time not in
Speaker 2: a swing state at this point. But we also learned today, Rick,
Speaker 2: that Kamala Harris will be visiting a non swing state too.
Speaker 2: She's going to Texas on Friday, Houston, specifically to highlight
Speaker 2: abortion rights. Rick, is that a good use of her
Speaker 2: time just ten days out from election day?
Speaker 7: A complete and utter waste of a perfectly good campaign day.
Speaker 7: I mean, I really don't get it. There's no evidence
Speaker 7: for her that she's been able to dominate the media
Speaker 7: by just showing up in some you know, random place
Speaker 7: and driving news. She has a different problem than Donald Trump.
Speaker 7: Donald Trump can generate news from his toilet in mar Lago,
Speaker 7: it doesn't really matter where he is, and she needs
Speaker 7: to spend time in these these states that are swing states,
Speaker 7: and Texas is not a swing state. That senate race
Speaker 7: is not a swing senate race. She is wasting perfectly
Speaker 7: good time that is not readily replaceable in her campaign
Speaker 7: by showing up in Texas. Maybe it's a sot to
Speaker 7: trying to get more Hispanic vote, which she's doing today,
Speaker 7: you know, by doing a taping for thirty minutes for
Speaker 7: I think it's a Telemundo interview but the reality is
Speaker 7: spend time in Pennsylvania. You can't win without it.
Speaker 3: Kinney, She's got interviews today on NBC and then Telemundo.
Speaker 3: As Rick just mentioned off the trail, no big rallies today,
Speaker 3: We've only got a minute left. There's something I've been
Speaker 3: meaning to ask you both about That's been really interesting
Speaker 3: to see Kamala Harris using sound cuts the way we
Speaker 3: do here on TV and radio, playing clips of Donald
Speaker 3: Trump to make points during her rallies. He has now
Speaker 3: started using his own campaign ads to play as clips.
Speaker 4: Is this effective?
Speaker 6: I think it is effective for her. She's calling for
Speaker 6: those sacks, Joe, she wants them, and you know, hey,
Speaker 6: listen when she's gonna pull out stuff that she thinks
Speaker 6: is unhinged that he said, she thinks it's effective.
Speaker 8: And I would say I disagree with Rick.
Speaker 6: On Texas because she is closing on abortion and Texas
Speaker 6: is the epicenter of the abortion bands. She's got people
Speaker 6: like Katie Cox and other women victimized down there, and
Speaker 6: this is a critical part of her strategy. She started
Speaker 6: out the year talking about reproductive health and she's coming
Speaker 6: back to it. It's not a swing state, but it's
Speaker 6: an important issue.
Speaker 2: All right, Schanzano and Rick Davis, our signature political panel.
Speaker 2: Thank you both for joining us. We all have more
Speaker 2: ahead with the president and CEO of Vodo Lutina, look
Speaker 2: at that demographic specifically right here on Bloomberg TV and Radio.
Speaker 1: You're listening to the Bloomberg Balance of Power podcast Ken
Speaker 1: just live weekdays at noon Eastern on Applecarplay and then
Speaker 1: ron Oto with the Bloomberg Business app. You can also
Speaker 1: listen live on Amazon Alexa from our flagship New York station,
Speaker 1: Just Say Alexa Play Bloomberg eleven thirty.
Speaker 3: Thanks for being with us on Balance of Power, the
Speaker 3: Tuesday edition on Bloomberg TV and Radio. I am Joe
Speaker 3: Matthew alongside Kaylee Lines in Washington following the candidates on
Speaker 3: the trail today as Kamala Harris steps away from the
Speaker 3: rallies to stop down for a couple of interviews, one
Speaker 3: on NBC News, the other Telemundo, and it coincides. This
Speaker 3: is not an accident, of course, kayleie the decisions that
Speaker 3: are made at this stage of the game. We are
Speaker 3: two weeks out, two weeks from today. We know for
Speaker 3: a fact that Kamala Harris is trying hard to appeal
Speaker 3: to young black men, to young Latinos, and this has
Speaker 3: really become not only a gender gap, but a big
Speaker 3: age gap in this campaign.
Speaker 2: Absolutely, and Donald Trump is trying to court some of
Speaker 2: these voters as well, which is why we saw him
Speaker 2: holding a Latino focused roundtable in Florida earlier today. So
Speaker 2: it's certainly a key demographic, which is why we're paying
Speaker 2: such close attention to the pulling around this, including one
Speaker 2: that just hit yesterday from Voto Latino that looks specifically
Speaker 2: at the battleground states and finds sixty four percent of
Speaker 2: support among the Latino vote for Harris thirty one percent
Speaker 2: for Trump. But there's an interesting geographic breakdown here that
Speaker 2: we want to get into. Is this voting block, like
Speaker 2: all others, is not a monolith. So let's dig into
Speaker 2: the details now with Maria Theresa Kumar. She is VOT
Speaker 2: Latino President and CEO, joining us here on Balance of Power.
Speaker 2: Maria Theresa, welcome, it's great to have you. It's noteworthy
Speaker 2: to look at how the numbers are different depending on
Speaker 2: which battleground state we're looking at. In Michigan, for example,
Speaker 2: sixty two percent of Latino respondents VO support for Harris
Speaker 2: in Pennsylvania, that number is seventy seven percent at sixty
Speaker 2: six in Arizona. How are you looking at the geographic
Speaker 2: question here?
Speaker 9: That's the right question to ask because oftentimes the polls
Speaker 9: are national and we want to look specifically on what
Speaker 9: is mobilizing voters. Where I will share with you, we
Speaker 9: have never seen such enthusiasm by Latino voters or a
Speaker 9: Democratic candidate as we're seeing in Pennsylvania. Pennsylvania is actually
Speaker 9: in the pack at seventy seven percent. To give you
Speaker 9: an idea, in twenty twenty Biden, when you looked at
Speaker 9: generational divide among Latinos, he was at seventy percent and
Speaker 9: really didn't break that fever among young voters. So she's
Speaker 9: really pulling ahead. The place that we're finding that she
Speaker 9: is neck to neck right now in the Latino community
Speaker 9: is in Nevada, and I can share with you, Kayley,
Speaker 9: we were in Nevada over the weekend with partners in SCIU.
Speaker 9: We were door knocking, We were listening to the voters,
Speaker 9: and what we keep hearing is that for them, housing
Speaker 9: is the number one issue. To really appreciate it, Kaille,
Speaker 9: we were talking to one voter one potential voter, and
Speaker 9: he said, look, I am twenty four years old. I
Speaker 9: was three years ago I was paying seven hundred dollars
Speaker 9: in rent and now I'm paying over twelve hundred dollars
Speaker 9: in rent and my wages have not come up. So
Speaker 9: any way that the campaign can talk more about the
Speaker 9: fact that on their platform they are thinking of increasing
Speaker 9: three million individual low income housings under her platform, that's important.
Speaker 9: Talking about twenty five thousand dollars for first time home buyers,
Speaker 9: you're talking about someone in a different socioeconomic gap. It's
Speaker 9: not the one. That's not the message for young people.
Speaker 9: And I will share with you the biggest potential that
Speaker 9: both candidates have is like, how do you mobilize the
Speaker 9: young voter in the African americ community, young voter in
Speaker 9: the Latino community, Because it was the young voter in
Speaker 9: Arizona and in Nevada in twenty twenty two that basically
Speaker 9: secured a Democratic Senate because they were the last ones
Speaker 9: to vote. They were low propensity information voters. And so
Speaker 9: with less than twenty days out, now's the time to
Speaker 9: really for the candidates to talk to these voters specifically
Speaker 9: about the issues and try to break through that noise.
Speaker 3: Maria, I want to go back to April for a
Speaker 3: little context on your poll. As Kaylee mentioned, you found
Speaker 3: sixty four percent of respondents support Harris in the Swing States,
Speaker 3: thirty one percent Trump, five percent third party. In April, again,
Speaker 3: she had sixty four percent, Joe Biden had forty eight percent,
Speaker 3: Donald Trump right around where he is now, he had
Speaker 3: thirty three and there was a twelve percent reading for
Speaker 3: our FKA Junior. Our FK is out of the race,
Speaker 3: but it takes more than his votes to get Kamala
Speaker 3: Harris to sixty four percent. When you see an instant
Speaker 3: reaction like that by changing the top of the ticket,
Speaker 3: what is it about Kamala Harris that appeals to this community?
Speaker 9: Joe, you're incredibly astute. It was the first time that
Speaker 9: we had seen Latino voters actually shifting from Donald Trump
Speaker 9: to Kamala Harris. And one of the things that we
Speaker 9: were able to find in our Polly and our and
Speaker 9: our surveys was that these individuals her story appealed to them.
Speaker 4: She is the.
Speaker 9: First candidate that doesn't have to be explained what it
Speaker 9: means to have parents who have immigrant roots to navigate
Speaker 9: America as a multicultural, bicultural woman, and that in itself resonated.
Speaker 9: She also doesn't have to speak about the virtues of
Speaker 9: abortion access. What most folks don't realize is that in
Speaker 9: the Latino community, while the average age of a white
Speaker 9: voter is forty five years old, the average age of
Speaker 9: a Latino voter is thirty one. These are individuals, specifically
Speaker 9: women that are in their prime of their reproductive lives
Speaker 9: and they want to make sure that they have access
Speaker 9: to abortion care. So once she got on top of
Speaker 9: the ticket, they believed her when she said that she
Speaker 9: wanted to codify Roe versus Wade. In all our surveys
Speaker 9: that we find the number one issue is housing, the
Speaker 9: second issue is abortion access. And so in a place
Speaker 9: where you have ballot initiatives in Nevada, in Arizona, even
Speaker 9: in Florida, that is going to be I believe a
Speaker 9: stealth weapon in mobilizing a lot of these folks that
Speaker 9: might be soft right now, but that recognize that at
Speaker 9: the end of the day, it's going to be about
Speaker 9: abortion access in their local state.
Speaker 2: Well, Marie teria'sa Donald Trump has made attempts to tie
Speaker 2: some of these issues to the wider issue of immigration, suggesting,
Speaker 2: for example, that the flood of migrants that have come
Speaker 2: to the US or crowding out hospitals making it harder
Speaker 2: for people to access healthcare, that they're bringing up housing costs.
Speaker 2: Although economically, of course, that has been disputed, and there
Speaker 2: is a massive question about what the economic impact of
Speaker 2: mass deportation of millions of people who have not come
Speaker 2: here through legal means would mean for the US economy.
Speaker 2: What is the right way to approach the immigration question
Speaker 2: for Latino voters? What do you hear from them?
Speaker 4: I think we might have lost our connection.
Speaker 2: All right, Well, it is something to consider, and we've
Speaker 2: had many conversations about this in recent weeks. Show the
Speaker 2: economics potentially of the kind of abortion policy Donald Trump
Speaker 2: or immigration mass deportation policy that Donald Trump is suggesting,
Speaker 2: what that would do to the workforce and labor supply
Speaker 2: and some of these exact states that we're talking about
Speaker 2: that do rely on undocumented labor to get a lot
Speaker 2: of work done.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think Maria is back with us speaking from
Speaker 3: vot Latina where she's president and CEO. Maria, if you
Speaker 3: can hear us, I wonder your thoughts on these economic
Speaker 3: impacts that Kaylie's talking about.
Speaker 9: Well, I think he most folks when they hear mass deportation,
Speaker 9: oftentimes they don't realize that policy itself would just ravage
Speaker 9: local communities. When you see the contributions of immigrants, whither
Speaker 9: they are on document or here with papers, they are
Speaker 9: a massive contributors to our social security, they are massive
Speaker 9: contributors to our treasury, coffers at the lake, at the
Speaker 9: state and local and national level. So that is kind
Speaker 9: of like a non starter, and it should be a
Speaker 9: non starter for every single American. My concern around the
Speaker 9: mass deportation though, is that even if it's not done
Speaker 9: in an official act, there will be plenty of folks
Speaker 9: that follow Donald Trump on the extreme that basically says, okay,
Speaker 9: I got a wink in a nod that folks that
Speaker 9: are that seem undocumented can be targets for racial harassment.
Speaker 9: And we saw that extensively, sadly when Donald Trump was
Speaker 9: at the White House with folks. Remember the l Passo massacre.
Speaker 9: It basically took a tweet from the president from the
Speaker 9: then president to encourage someone to jump in their car
Speaker 9: and drive ten hours and killed twenty three innocent Americans
Speaker 9: who happened to be of Mexican descent. But I do
Speaker 9: think that their opportunity on the Paris site is to
Speaker 9: divorce what's happening at the border and address the individuals
Speaker 9: that have been here for ten twenty years, that have
Speaker 9: been paying their taxes, that still don't have proper documentation
Speaker 9: because the system is fundamentally broken. All our polling shows
Speaker 9: is that when you focus specifically on that domestic policy issue,
Speaker 9: not only does it mobilize and encourage voters in the
Speaker 9: Latino community to vote, but it's also an essential issue
Speaker 9: among white, independent moderate voters. And sometimes people ask me
Speaker 9: why is that. I said, well, that independent moderate white
Speaker 9: voter might have a business where this undocumented person has
Speaker 9: been working with them side by side for decades, or
Speaker 9: they could be a spouse. And so it's really recognizing
Speaker 9: that we have to have a real conversation after the
Speaker 9: election around what it means to be American and what
Speaker 9: it means to have immigrants with among us, because it
Speaker 9: is America's secret sauce. It is the reason why we
Speaker 9: have a competitive advantage.
Speaker 8: Across the world.
Speaker 9: And you know, Kayley, you don't have to take my
Speaker 9: word for it. When you look at election interference that's
Speaker 9: coming from foreign from foreign folks. It is around the
Speaker 9: issue of immigrants and race, something that was widely underreported.
Speaker 9: What happened in Springfield, Ohio where you saw bomb threats
Speaker 9: that we're targeting local high schools in local schools, a
Speaker 9: good quarter of them came from from abroad. Those phone
Speaker 9: calls were coming from foreign interference, And it makes you
Speaker 9: It begs the question, why do folks want to disrupt
Speaker 9: the one of the basic economic engines of our country,
Speaker 9: That is that the contributions of immigrants to our economy
Speaker 9: every single day. And so I would encourage us to
Speaker 9: have that conversation post election, But I also think that
Speaker 9: it's vital for our economy to understand the contributions that
Speaker 9: these groups make every single day to our country.
Speaker 2: It's the reason we have just about a minute left here.
Speaker 2: But if there's going to be real immigration reform, I
Speaker 2: think we all know a lot of that has to
Speaker 2: come from Congress. Are you seeing the same kind of
Speaker 2: patterns in the down ballot races as you're seeing in
Speaker 2: the presidential race among Latino voters right now?
Speaker 9: So it's really interesting, even in April, if you look
Speaker 9: at our stuff in April and April, Democrats were overwhelmingly
Speaker 9: winning in the and in the down ballots, and so
Speaker 9: it says that there that the Latino community really does
Speaker 9: espouse a lot of democratic platforms, but they were very
Speaker 9: soft on the top of the ticket candidate, and so
Speaker 9: this is going to be very much neck to neck.
Speaker 9: I am curious to see what happens in the Senate
Speaker 9: because that is absolutely one that no one knows. You
Speaker 9: have test really having a hard time, I think putting
Speaker 9: it over the top. But is there going to be
Speaker 9: wiggle room where Colin Alred takes it away in Texas?
Speaker 9: And if he does, it's going to because of the
Speaker 9: Latino vote, and it's going to be because of the
Speaker 9: youth vote in Texas.
Speaker 4: Maria comes see us again.
Speaker 3: She's president and CEO of Voto Latino, an important voice
Speaker 3: in this campaign. Maria, Teresa Kumara, thank you so much
Speaker 3: for joining on Ballots of Power. The Fastest show in
Speaker 3: Politics continues as we turn our attention to the polymarket
Speaker 3: in crypto. Kayleie, an important conversation coming up next. We've
Speaker 3: got a lot going on today here on Bloomberg TV
Speaker 3: and Radio YEP.
Speaker 2: The chairman of the CFTC Roston Benham will be with
Speaker 2: us as he participates in the Bloomberg Global Regulatory Forum.
Speaker 2: That's straight ahead here on Bloomberg TV and Radio.
Speaker 1: You're listening to the Bloomberg Balance of Power podcast. Catch
Speaker 1: Just Live weekdays at noon Eastern on Eppocarplay and then
Speaker 1: Proudoto with the Bloomberg Business app. Listen on demand wherever
Speaker 1: you get your podcasts, or watch us live on YouTube.
Speaker 3: Two weeks to go as we watch not only the polls,
Speaker 3: but interestingly the poly market and what people are betting
Speaker 3: on here, what Wall Street thinks in the amount of
Speaker 3: money that at least some traders are willing to put
Speaker 3: on the outcome of this election.
Speaker 4: Kayley, it's already happening.
Speaker 3: Americans can legally wager millions of dollars on this campaign.
Speaker 4: But we've been reminding.
Speaker 3: Our audience, as we've heard from a lot of smart
Speaker 3: people on this program, that it takes very little to
Speaker 3: manipulate the outcome of a betting market like this. One
Speaker 3: big wager can skew this one way or the other,
Speaker 3: so it may not be worth comparing.
Speaker 4: It to a poll.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and this is a concern that the Commodity's Future
Speaker 2: Training Commission has raised about these politically oriented events contracts
Speaker 2: in the way in which these things could be skewed,
Speaker 2: but seef toce to this point, not one in court.
Speaker 2: As you mentioned, two court rulings have allowed these things
Speaker 2: to be trading with two weeks ago and till the election.
Speaker 2: And it's to the chair of the CFTC we turn
Speaker 2: to next. He is joining us from global headquarters in
Speaker 2: New York where he is taking part in Bloomberg's global
Speaker 2: regulatory for him and it is kind to spend a
Speaker 2: few minutes with us here on balance of Power on
Speaker 2: Bloomberg TV and Radio. Rust and Benham, mister chairman, thank
Speaker 2: you for being here. You have repeatedly said that the
Speaker 2: CFTC should not be an elections cop So what is
Speaker 2: your recourse going forwards? We are already seeing this happening.
Speaker 2: What do you expect could actually change in terms of
Speaker 2: how this kind of betting activity could influence American elections?
Speaker 10: Kayley and Joe, Thanks, it's great to be with you.
Speaker 10: And you know, as you said, a court district court
Speaker 10: in DC made a decision just over a month ago,
Speaker 10: and we did appeal to the Court of appeals for
Speaker 10: a stay on the actual contracts. Both were denied. We
Speaker 10: respect those decisions and you know, we will regulate those
Speaker 10: markets as we can as best we can. We are
Speaker 10: appealing the actual case on its merits. What we appealed
Speaker 10: for was a stay on the listing of the contracts
Speaker 10: and trading. That was refused. But we still are going
Speaker 10: to challenge the legal arguments on its merits and we'll
Speaker 10: see what happens there. That will take some time, but
Speaker 10: in the meantime, you know, we have registered entities, a
Speaker 10: number of them, who are listing these contracts. We're going
Speaker 10: to monitor the markets, We're going to surveil the markets.
Speaker 10: We're going to do everything we do that we typically
Speaker 10: do with registrants, whether it's the brokers, the exchanges, the
Speaker 10: data that we collect. And my position hasn't changed. I've
Speaker 10: said this many times. The position of the Commission has
Speaker 10: actually been pretty consistent for the better part of a
Speaker 10: decade that we don't believe listing event contracts on political
Speaker 10: elections is legal, but you know, while we have this
Speaker 10: ongoing legal challenge, will allow them, and we're going to
Speaker 10: do what we can to protect the integrity of the markets.
Speaker 10: As you mentioned in the beginning, This does pull us
Speaker 10: into being an election cop. Whether or not there's manipulation
Speaker 10: and fraud, you know, remains to be seen. But we
Speaker 10: will monitor markets, will take tips or any information we
Speaker 10: get from the general public, and will pursue any action
Speaker 10: as we do in any part of our markets.
Speaker 3: Well, so, mister chairman, you've got a little problem here
Speaker 3: that you never asked for. And I wonder if you
Speaker 3: could put a finer point on your ability to detect
Speaker 3: fraud in this system and the powers or authorities that
Speaker 3: you and your agency has to combat them.
Speaker 4: How do you go about this?
Speaker 10: Yeah, Joe, it's a good question. And you know, we
Speaker 10: have typical regulatory authorities over registrants. As I said, you know,
Speaker 10: we get to register the exchanges and the brokers, the individuals.
Speaker 10: We get a sense of how they conduct their business,
Speaker 10: and we're able to ask questions and do examinations, collect
Speaker 10: data to monitor trading patterns. And I think really that
Speaker 10: gets to the heart of your question in terms of
Speaker 10: anomalist trading patterns, in seeing what the data gives us.
Speaker 10: So much of our enforcement program across the board and
Speaker 10: in this space and traditional derivatives contracts is driven actually
Speaker 10: by information from the public and the market participants if
Speaker 10: they observe anomalies in trading or positions that may be
Speaker 10: skewed off of you know, sort of a supply demand
Speaker 10: price discovery. So well, we're going to treat these products
Speaker 10: in this current state we are right now as we
Speaker 10: would treat any other product. Obviously, you know, with elections
Speaker 10: being the underlying reference here, it is new for us
Speaker 10: to examine. But we're going to use the same tools
Speaker 10: and the same expertise that we've brought to derivative markets
Speaker 10: and commodity markets for decades. And you know, if we
Speaker 10: do see something or if we hear about something, we
Speaker 10: will pursue it. In the meantime, you know, we'll continue
Speaker 10: to vigorously fight the case in court and see what
Speaker 10: the outcome is and the appellate court. We have seen
Speaker 10: a fair amount of members of Congress weigh in on
Speaker 10: this publicly. I have had a number of conversations too,
Speaker 10: and I think there's a little bit of consternation from
Speaker 10: some not all, about what this means. And we've seen
Speaker 10: a broad listing of these contracts across just control of
Speaker 10: one body of the Congress, whether it's the House or
Speaker 10: the Senate. So these contracts will continue to grow and
Speaker 10: we're going to have to monitor them closely. And as
Speaker 10: I said, and as you mentioned, you know, this is
Speaker 10: not necessarily something I believe is are within our authority
Speaker 10: or legal but we will do the job given the
Speaker 10: court's decision.
Speaker 2: Well, and of course some people will have their bets
Speaker 2: proven write some won't. This election will have an outcome
Speaker 2: in the future of the regulatory authority of the CFTC
Speaker 2: could be influenced by election outcomes, not just at the
Speaker 2: presidential level, but also what you were just speaking to
Speaker 2: the congressional level, whether or not you get to continue
Speaker 2: forward as CFTC chair, Sir, do you expect any future
Speaker 2: chair will have the same struggles that you've had in
Speaker 2: regard to regulating crypto, for example, without guaranteed delineated authority
Speaker 2: given by Congress.
Speaker 10: Yeah, I don't think anything is going to change for
Speaker 10: my successors, whenever and whoever they may be. The fact
Speaker 10: of the matter is a number of these tokens are
Speaker 10: commodities under current law, and the CFTC is a derivatives regulator.
Speaker 10: We don't regulate underlying cash markets, whether it's in the
Speaker 10: agricultural space, the energy space, or the financial space. And
Speaker 10: this is technology, this is disruption, this is a new
Speaker 10: asset class. These things happen constantly over time, and I
Speaker 10: think it's just we're at an inflection point. And as
Speaker 10: you point out, Kayley, I've been sort of ringing the
Speaker 10: bell for a number of years now because we've made
Speaker 10: observations as the CFTC as chair myself about a growing market,
Speaker 10: a market that's proven to be sustainable, a market that
Speaker 10: has continued interest from both retail investors and institutional investors.
Speaker 10: And when you have those ingredients, I think it's really
Speaker 10: important that we react from a policy perspective. So we're
Speaker 10: doing what we can with the tools that we have
Speaker 10: at the CFTC, which is enforcement authority over fraud and manipulation.
Speaker 10: But what we don't have over these underlying cash markets
Speaker 10: is the traditional regulatory tools that we bring to traditional
Speaker 10: derivatives markets. That's registration, that's surveillance, that's examination, that's governance requirements,
Speaker 10: that's financial resource requirements, all of these components that have
Speaker 10: made in my view, American capital markets the best and
Speaker 10: the strongest in the world. We've seen a shift, I
Speaker 10: think in the sentiment of Congress over the past call
Speaker 10: it twelve months, certainly different than two or three years
Speaker 10: ago when I was first talking about this, and even
Speaker 10: five or six years ago when this first became an
Speaker 10: issue for the CFTC and I started having thoughts internally
Speaker 10: and discussing it. But I do think as we get
Speaker 10: into a new administration, a new president, and a new Congress,
Speaker 10: I think there's going to be an appetite given that
Speaker 10: sustainability of the asset class and the desire from a
Speaker 10: lot of retail and institutional investors to see a regulatory
Speaker 10: structure around crypto.
Speaker 2: Well, regulatory structure is one thing. Actual money to do
Speaker 2: that work is another. Mister Chairman. If Congress does not
Speaker 2: allow more allocation toward spending money in order to regulate crypto,
Speaker 2: how do you out the agency's resources to be dealing
Speaker 2: with that still relatively nascent market and all of your
Speaker 2: traditional obligations to traditional finance at the same time.
Speaker 10: Yeah, it's difficult. And you know, our markets are very
Speaker 10: large at the derivative markets, they're global markets, trillion dollar markets,
Speaker 10: and huge responsibility in terms of oversight and financial resilience,
Speaker 10: market resilience and financial stability, and that has been a
Speaker 10: point of frustration for me because we have a lot
Speaker 10: of new entrants in the space, in the crypto space
Speaker 10: that are coming to be registered as futures brokers and exchanges,
Speaker 10: but also this underlying market that is consuming a lot
Speaker 10: of our enforcement bandwidth. So it is a challenge. We'll,
Speaker 10: you know, use the resources we have we always have
Speaker 10: as an agency. Certainly, I think if there is new
Speaker 10: legislation coming down the road, I've vigorously advocated that any
Speaker 10: new authority would have to be paired with resources. But
Speaker 10: it does put the agency in a little bit of
Speaker 10: a difficult position where we are stretched thin you know,
Speaker 10: we're constantly dealing with new markets, new asset classes, new participants,
Speaker 10: and that is, you know, a product of growing market.
Speaker 10: It's a product of increased retail demand and institutional demand,
Speaker 10: and I think that's a positive thing generally speaking. But
Speaker 10: I think it's important from a DC and policy perspective
Speaker 10: that we understand what is changing, how markets are evolving,
Speaker 10: and that the agencies evolve with markets. And that's not
Speaker 10: only from a personnel and expertise standpoint, that's an authority standpoint,
Speaker 10: and ultimately, to the point of your question, that is
Speaker 10: also a resource issue that we have to address as well.
Speaker 3: Well, mister chairman, it's great to have you with us
Speaker 3: today on Bloomberg TV and Radio. Speaking from the Crypto
Speaker 3: Frontier Chairman Ross Benham Commodity Futures Trading Commission.
Speaker 1: You're listening to the Bloomberg Balance of Power podcast kens
Speaker 1: just live weekdays at noon Eastern on Applecarplay and enroud
Speaker 1: Oro with the Bloomberg Business app. You can also listen
Speaker 1: live on Amazon Alexa from our flagship New York station,
Speaker 1: Just say Alexa play Bloomberg eleven.
Speaker 4: So how about the nine weeks log?
Speaker 3: That's what we're pointing to here, right? Why wait to
Speaker 3: talk about it? Bruce Melman, isn't everyone woke up Sunday
Speaker 3: and said what this six chart?
Speaker 4: Sunday?
Speaker 3: Then I started thinking, wait a minute, how many stages
Speaker 3: of grief are there? It turns out there five denial,
Speaker 3: then anger, bargaining, followed by depression and.
Speaker 4: At last acceptance.
Speaker 3: And it kind of frames what's going to happen between
Speaker 3: November sixth and January sixth. Of course, when the votes
Speaker 3: are certified here in Washington, that's a day that meant
Speaker 3: nothing to anyone before twenty twenty.
Speaker 4: Now it means a lot. And if you walk through
Speaker 4: the sixth chart.
Speaker 3: Sunday by Bruce Melman, it'll give you a sense of
Speaker 3: what we're in for.
Speaker 11: Here.
Speaker 3: We've talked about one hundred and sixty five lawsuits that
Speaker 3: have already been filed. Let's bring him in right now.
Speaker 3: He's partner at Melman Consulting, author of the Bruce Melman's
Speaker 3: Age of Disruption sub stack. If you haven't subscribed, you
Speaker 3: should so, Bruce, you got everybody upset over the weekend.
Speaker 3: How bumpy are these nine weeks going to be?
Speaker 11: Well? That remains to be seen for sure.
Speaker 12: And I think the point Laura made with you a
Speaker 12: moment ago is important.
Speaker 11: It's a three ring circus.
Speaker 12: And even if the presidential proves to be less dramatic
Speaker 12: than we all expect it might be, it's a very
Speaker 12: high likelihood we're not going to know who controls the
Speaker 12: House of Representatives and potentially whether there was a red
Speaker 12: wave or whether there's a blue check of balance in
Speaker 12: the House on a second Trump term were he to win,
Speaker 12: until some time in December. So the thesis is for
Speaker 12: those of us who feel like the Wednesday after the
Speaker 12: election will be the day of relief where at least
Speaker 12: we have certainty that may be the end of the
Speaker 12: column and the real beginning of the storm.
Speaker 4: Well, how true as you right?
Speaker 3: Getting past November fifth will reduce some uncertainty, but the
Speaker 3: intensity picks up during the subsequent nine weeks slog as
Speaker 3: we mentioned during this fraught window, Bruce writes, we'll lead
Speaker 3: to count the votes, conduct any recounts, certify results in
Speaker 3: state capitals potentially roiled by protests, all amids, partisan paranoia
Speaker 3: and allegations of Malfeasan's intense litigation and disinformation, a deluge
Speaker 3: accelerated by foreign adversaries makes me want to go back home, Bruce,
Speaker 3: But that is, of course what we're dealing with here.
Speaker 3: I want to seize on a couple of these, Starting
Speaker 3: with counting the votes your first chart, When might we
Speaker 3: know who won? How about the top of the ticket.
Speaker 3: It took us until Saturday last time. And the conventional
Speaker 3: wisdom is if Donald Trump wins, we might know that night.
Speaker 3: If Kamala Harris wins, we might wait till the end
Speaker 3: of the week.
Speaker 4: Is that how you see it?
Speaker 11: You know? Sure?
Speaker 12: At least one of the biggest questions is whether the
Speaker 12: polling has figuredured it out now. In Michigan, Wisconsin, and Pennsylvania.
Speaker 12: In twenty sixteen, they underestimated the Trump vote by about
Speaker 12: eight points on average. In twenty twenty, they underestimated the
Speaker 12: Trump vote by about four points. The polls are all
Speaker 12: too close to call, within the margin of error, although
Speaker 12: Trump has crept to where he is slightly leading, still
Speaker 12: within the margin of error, So it could be either
Speaker 12: way and the polling would be right unless the polling's
Speaker 12: off again by those sort of same amounts in the
Speaker 12: industrial Midwest. We may then, as in twenty twenty, having
Speaker 12: a call by the Associated Press.
Speaker 11: They called a day after the election. They called it
Speaker 11: for Biden.
Speaker 12: Obviously, Trump contested it and continues to contest it, notwithstanding
Speaker 12: a lack of evidence in court to cause anything to
Speaker 12: get reversed. In twenty sixteen, it took four days after
Speaker 12: the election to come to resolution.
Speaker 3: You just mentioned something important for the benefit of our audience.
Speaker 4: Here I poddled you.
Speaker 12: By the way I reversed sixteen to twenty. They were
Speaker 12: four into twenty twenty and one in twenty.
Speaker 3: Seve understood, yes, that's right, And it took us until
Speaker 3: Saturday right to learn about Joe Biden. So are we
Speaker 3: basing this on the AP call? Is that the voice
Speaker 3: of credibility, Bruce?
Speaker 11: It is a credible voice, it's not a voice of authority.
Speaker 11: So you know I'm old enough to recall.
Speaker 12: In twenty twenty, the AP called it for Bush, then
Speaker 12: they called it for nobody, Then they called it for Gore,
Speaker 12: then they called it for nobody. In two thousand days later, Yeah,
Speaker 12: two thousand we were done.
Speaker 11: That said. AP hasn't had.
Speaker 12: To reverse the call in the last multiple elections. They're
Speaker 12: careful to not want to make a call until such
Speaker 12: time as the remaining votes that are outstanding based upon
Speaker 12: who you know, who they are, the registrations and the
Speaker 12: counties give them enough confidence and enough insight to be
Speaker 12: able to appoint. So I personally tend to feel like
Speaker 12: once the AP has made a call, that's if it's
Speaker 12: not quite money to the bank, it's pretty highly reliable.
Speaker 4: Well that's right.
Speaker 3: It's about as close as you're going to get until
Speaker 3: they're really done counting here. And you wonder how careful
Speaker 3: they are going to be after last time, Bruce, are
Speaker 3: going to be beaten our Thanksgiving Turkey wondering when the
Speaker 3: AP is going to show up here to your point
Speaker 3: in your own six slide presentation, here, you're six charts.
Speaker 3: There are no trusted referees, which I think is what
Speaker 3: we're getting at here. You also point out recounts are
Speaker 3: rare and they rarely reverse outcomes. And therefore, back to
Speaker 3: our litigation tsunami that you talk about, will this election
Speaker 3: be decided in the courts?
Speaker 12: You know it could be decided in the courts, though.
Speaker 12: A recount is they've finished all the ballot, all the
Speaker 12: official ballots, and then it's just a matter of did
Speaker 12: you miscount it? And there's never been a presidential state
Speaker 12: that has been flipped changed as a result of a recount.
Speaker 12: There was one Senate, one governorship, one state auditor.
Speaker 11: But it's if you're not if it's.
Speaker 12: Not within just a few votes, it's just not going
Speaker 12: to get turned over or famously, the Arizona Republican Party
Speaker 12: hired a group that calls itself the cyber Ninjas to
Speaker 12: audit the vote in twenty twenty where Biden edged out Trump,
Speaker 12: and they came back and Biden's margin had slightly.
Speaker 11: Grown in edging out Trump.
Speaker 12: So once you're at the recount point, you know the
Speaker 12: partisans take some hope that something will.
Speaker 11: Be found that will be profound.
Speaker 12: You know, even in two thousand with Bush v. Gore,
Speaker 12: ultimately the conclusion in the US Supreme Court was, you.
Speaker 11: Did the count You're done counting.
Speaker 12: You can't keep recounting because every time you run the
Speaker 12: ballots through the machines, some chads fall off. So you're
Speaker 12: changing it by recounting and recounting and recounting. You're done that.
Speaker 12: All said, Look, we've seen there's lawsuits. Democrats are trying
Speaker 12: to keep Cornell West off the ballot. They're trying to
Speaker 12: make sure Robert F. Kennedy Junior doesn't get off the ballot.
Speaker 12: Republicans are trying to question about voting roles and about
Speaker 12: you know, whether you can trust machines.
Speaker 11: And this is a full lawyer employment Act.
Speaker 3: It's gonna be Kamala Harris certifying these results. Isn't it
Speaker 3: playing the role of Mike Fence this time around?
Speaker 11: I mean it's a ceremonial role.
Speaker 12: So no, she doesn't have she won't be able to
Speaker 12: make a decision that changes anything. She's there as the
Speaker 12: presiding Officer of the Senate. But in legislation that got
Speaker 12: passed in twenty twenty two, the Electoral count Reform Act.
Speaker 12: They made a crystal clear that what President Trump asked
Speaker 12: former Vice President.
Speaker 11: Pence to do and Pence wouldn't do.
Speaker 12: You can't just say I've made the decision that I
Speaker 12: won and my boss won.
Speaker 11: You can't do that.
Speaker 4: No, you're correct, Bruce.
Speaker 3: But you also know how many people don't care, didn't
Speaker 3: read when that happened. We've talked about it a lot
Speaker 3: on this program. And then the optics are what they are,
Speaker 3: and perception becomes reality. Right, is your biggest hope in
Speaker 3: our last minute here that we got a landslide one
Speaker 3: way or the other?
Speaker 12: Well, sure, but you know that also would be attached
Speaker 12: to add Will mccraven throwing in as a third party
Speaker 12: and getting ninety percent of the vote.
Speaker 11: So my biggest hopes.
Speaker 12: Are already out the window. But I certainly think the
Speaker 12: worst thing for democracy would be in that nine week period,
Speaker 12: added mistrust, added allegations, things that can't be proven, candidates
Speaker 12: who simply don't accept when they lose that they lost,
Speaker 12: and god forbid going to a Congress that decides we're
Speaker 12: not going to certify because we don't like what happened,
Speaker 12: even though we don't have actual proof that anything else happened.
Speaker 4: Can't wait for November.
Speaker 3: Bruce, come back and talk to us after we survive
Speaker 3: the election and we get in the throes of the
Speaker 3: nine weeks log.
Speaker 4: Check out his sub stack.
Speaker 3: If you listen to this program, I think you'll probably
Speaker 3: enjoy it. Bruce Melman, Partner Melman Consulting. I'm Joe Matthew
Speaker 3: in Washington. We're going to go to ground coming up
Speaker 3: in the swing state of Pennsylvania.
Speaker 4: This is Bloomberg.
Speaker 1: You're listening to the Bloomberg Balance of Power podcast Ketch
Speaker 1: just live weekdays at noon Eastern on Epocarplay and Android
Speaker 1: Otto with the Bloomberg Business app. Listen on demand wherever
Speaker 1: you get your podcasts, or watch us live on YouTube.
Speaker 3: Coming to you live from our Washington, DC bureau every
Speaker 3: day here, but our eyes, of course are on just
Speaker 3: about everywhere else. As the candidates settle in for the
Speaker 3: next two weeks, and they've been there for the last
Speaker 3: two weeks, largely in the swing states, none more important
Speaker 3: than Pennsylvania, and we talk about the closing arguments for
Speaker 3: the presidential candidates. It's closing argument time for all of
Speaker 3: the candidates. That includes those for Senate and this is
Speaker 3: one of the most closely watched Senate races, and I believe,
Speaker 3: by far the most expensive Senate race in the country
Speaker 3: right now. Everyone freaked out yesterday when the Cook Political
Speaker 3: Report weighed in and move this race between the Democratic
Speaker 3: incumbent Bob Casey against Republican challenger David McCormick from Lean's
Speaker 3: Democratic to toss up. This is as close as it gets,
Speaker 3: prompting a whole new round of questions about tickets splitting,
Speaker 3: which most of the experts we talked to here on
Speaker 3: Bloomberg don't see happening in Pennsylvania. As for the closing arguments,
Speaker 3: Dave McCormick out with his This is the closing ad
Speaker 3: of the campaign, which he spoke directly to the camera
Speaker 3: to record at West Point.
Speaker 4: Let's watch and listen.
Speaker 13: The United States Military Academy, West Point. It gave me
Speaker 13: the code I live by duty, honor country. I'm Dave McCormick.
Speaker 13: Our country is stuck and we've got to make a change.
Speaker 13: Bob Casey's had eighteen years and he's never made a difference.
Speaker 3: He said, eighteen years and he's never made a difference.
Speaker 3: The closing argument there from David McCormick. Now, I'll bring
Speaker 3: you back to something I mentioned a little bit earlier,
Speaker 3: and that's the early vote.
Speaker 4: This is a big deal.
Speaker 3: Fifteen million Americans have already decided who to vote for,
Speaker 3: and in the case of Pennsylvania, thousands have already chosen
Speaker 3: between David McCormick and Bob Casey. In fact, we learn
Speaker 3: now among the few states, we can learn a lot
Speaker 3: in Pennsylvania, among the few states that track mail ballots
Speaker 3: by party registration, here's what we know. More than five
Speaker 3: hundred eighty thousand Democrats have already returned their mail ballots
Speaker 3: in Pennsylvania, compared with two hundred and fifty four thousand Republicans.
Speaker 3: This is why we keep hearing. And remember Pennsylvania doesn't
Speaker 3: start counting these till seven o'clock in the morning on
Speaker 3: election Day.
Speaker 4: They're putting them all on a.
Speaker 3: Shelf somewhere deep in the safe waiting for election day.
Speaker 3: That's why you will not likely have a call in Pennsylvania.
Speaker 3: That's why it will probably look like Donald Trump is
Speaker 3: winning early on, and he may be, but if he's not,
Speaker 3: that could change as the mail in votes are counted.
Speaker 3: Now This is where we start our conversation with an
Speaker 3: expert in Pennsylvania politics.
Speaker 4: Michael Berkman is with US.
Speaker 3: Director of the mcartney Institute for Democracy and Political Science,
Speaker 3: professor at penn State University, co host of the Democracy
Speaker 3: Works podcast.
Speaker 4: Michael, Welcome back to Bloomberg.
Speaker 3: It's great to see with everything that I just mentioned,
Speaker 3: knowing that it doesn't get closer than this. How many
Speaker 3: days are you going to wait for this race to
Speaker 3: be called in Pennsylvania?
Speaker 8: Well, you know it could. You're correct that this could
Speaker 8: take a while because the mail in ballots are going
Speaker 8: to come in heavily democratic as a did last year.
Speaker 8: I mean you said something like five hundred thousand. It's
Speaker 8: actually up to six hundred and fifty thousand Democratic ballots.
Speaker 8: I've already been heard in three hundred thousand Republican ballots.
Speaker 8: But it may be quicker than last year because improvements
Speaker 8: have been made, some money has been invested in better machinery,
Speaker 8: and the hopes that Philadelphia and Algany County is in particular,
Speaker 8: get those mail ballots counted quicker. You're correct the issue
Speaker 8: with fury and they can't open them until seven am.
Speaker 3: That's right, So give me your read. Let's go to
Speaker 3: ground in Pennsylvania. Because I'm sitting down here in Washington
Speaker 3: with a lot of people who think they know what's
Speaker 3: going on in your state. You can talk to us
Speaker 3: about the presidential race. They're tied at the hip, it
Speaker 3: seems to the Senate race. Is this a one or
Speaker 3: two point race in your view? Like the polls are showing.
Speaker 8: It feels very close, and I have no reason to
Speaker 8: believe otherwise. And I'm not surprised to see the Casey
Speaker 8: McCormick race getting closer. You know, McCormick didn't have quite
Speaker 8: the name recognition that Casey does. Casey is quite the
Speaker 8: well known name in Pennsylvania, so not surprising that he
Speaker 8: had a big lead early on. But I think we're
Speaker 8: seeing it converge closer to where the presidential election is,
Speaker 8: and I suspect we'll see that in other states as well,
Speaker 8: where senate candidates and the presidential.
Speaker 4: Race seem to be diverged.
Speaker 8: Because you made an important point at the top, and
Speaker 8: that is just simply not a lot of split ticket
Speaker 8: voting anymore.
Speaker 4: So talk to me about that. That's the narrative.
Speaker 3: You know, everybody's going to leave stuff blank, and we
Speaker 3: remember what happened in Georgia, and we're seeing wild potential
Speaker 3: for tickets splitting in Arizona.
Speaker 4: Why is Pennsylvania an exception?
Speaker 8: Well, I mean spliketts vote is split ticket voting could
Speaker 8: occur just in you know, ten thousand votes, and it's
Speaker 8: going to make a huge difference. So even if there's
Speaker 8: not a lot of it, it could still make a
Speaker 8: big difference. But just looking back at twenty twenty, we
Speaker 8: simply didn't see a lot of split ticket voting between
Speaker 8: the Senate races and where Biden was. Now you're gonna
Speaker 8: have It's going to be different in states where you
Speaker 8: really have flawed candidate. It's I think Arizona is probably
Speaker 8: in that category. But McCormick is McCormick's a strong candidate,
Speaker 8: as is Casey, So I expect it's going to trap
Speaker 8: pretty closely to what we see in the presidential race,
Speaker 8: which is very close.
Speaker 3: It's really interesting when you talk about Pennsylvania and people
Speaker 3: remember the old James Carvill line that you've got you know, Philadelphia,
Speaker 3: Pittsburgh and Alabama in between or something like that, something
Speaker 3: like how how nimble have these candidates been in addressing
Speaker 3: the very different types of communities and demographics throughout the state.
Speaker 3: We talk about it like it's one place, but it's not.
Speaker 8: No, it's not. And you know, the old Carville line
Speaker 8: has a lot of truth to it. There is a
Speaker 8: lot of areas of Pennsylvania which are quite rural or
Speaker 8: small towns or you know, older industrial areas, and that's
Speaker 8: what Carville was referring to. But you know, in my view,
Speaker 8: this election actually decided in the suburbs outside outside Philadelphia
Speaker 8: and Pittsburgh, and suburbs are much more competitive right now.
Speaker 8: Choice is a large issue in these suburbs, especially with
Speaker 8: the women voters. So I'm my eyes around Bucks County
Speaker 8: and some of the suburban areas now. Having said that,
Speaker 8: what we're seeing the candidates, do you know, Harris, as
Speaker 8: Biden did, is spending more time out in Republican areas
Speaker 8: just trying to cut those vote margins down. I think
Speaker 8: that's a good strategy on her part. And McCormick as well,
Speaker 8: has been pretty much all over the state as far
Speaker 8: as I can see.
Speaker 3: So you're in state College, yeah, you drive fifty miles
Speaker 3: in any direction. Who's winning the lawn sign war?
Speaker 6: Is it?
Speaker 4: Trump?
Speaker 8: Oh? Without a doubt it's Trump. That's the Trump McCormick territory.
Speaker 8: Once you get outside of State College. I mean that
Speaker 8: part of Carvill's characterization of the state is absolutely correct.
Speaker 8: You know, you get outside of states relatively blue and
Speaker 8: you're in a stee of red. But what I don't
Speaker 8: think Carvill had quite right, you know, going back, what
Speaker 8: is that in nineteen ninety two is that the suburbs
Speaker 8: have become much more of a battleground within Pennsylvania.
Speaker 3: Tod the McDonald's stunt play because it was aimed at
Speaker 3: the very area you're sitting in here, and people say, wait,
Speaker 3: he didn't really make anything. He was in there for
Speaker 3: five minutes. They closed the restaurant. But those optics work
Speaker 3: for a lot of people, Professor.
Speaker 8: Do they?
Speaker 11: I don't know.
Speaker 8: I had visions of Michael Cocka's riding around in a
Speaker 8: tank a little bit because.
Speaker 4: It was Oh man, you know I drew that comparison
Speaker 4: in advance. You're the first person who said that, is
Speaker 4: that what happened? He put on the helmet in your view.
Speaker 11: Bit.
Speaker 8: I mean, it seemed really incongruous to me. Donald Trump
Speaker 8: working on a McDonald's. I mean, I know he likes McDonald's.
Speaker 8: But who am I to say it could have been
Speaker 8: an effective stunt. He got certainly got a lot of
Speaker 8: play on it. I agree with you, it didn't get
Speaker 8: it didn't get slammed down quite like Michael Decoccus did
Speaker 8: at the time.
Speaker 3: But you see him shaking those fries. Ceci, he did
Speaker 3: it like he meant it. Producer. Cec says stolen wage
Speaker 3: worker valor professor.
Speaker 4: He didn't want to take the question on the minimum wage.
Speaker 4: Was that a missed opportunity?
Speaker 8: And that is part of it, isn't it. I mean,
Speaker 8: if you're going to do something like that, then it
Speaker 8: seems like that's the kind of issue that you would
Speaker 8: be prepared to really talk on. At least that's what
Speaker 8: people that work in McDonald's, that's probably what they're thinking about.
Speaker 8: He also put extra salt on the fries, but that's different, different.
Speaker 3: Well, he says he really loves the salts. That we
Speaker 3: did learn that yesterday. You know one of the things
Speaker 3: that jumped off the page, Well, I guess on one
Speaker 3: of them. We had fries in here. We talked about
Speaker 3: it so much the other day we couldn't help this
Speaker 3: is really interesting. Del Volpe op ed in the New
Speaker 3: York Times. Of course, you know he's Harvard, he's working
Speaker 3: with the campaign now, but he's running against the grain.
Speaker 4: And I wonder your thoughts on this.
Speaker 3: Among men eighteen to twenty nine, he writes, Harris's favorability
Speaker 3: rating is forty four percent, seven points higher than Biden's
Speaker 3: and thirteen points higher than Donald Trump's.
Speaker 4: Is the sample broken for young people?
Speaker 11: You know, it's.
Speaker 8: The poli of young people. Is tough because when you
Speaker 8: start to read cross tabs within the national polls or
Speaker 8: even the state poles, you're dealing with pretty large margins
Speaker 8: of errors. So, for example, the Harvard poll shows pretty
Speaker 8: strong support for Harvard. I guess for Harris. I guess
Speaker 8: that's the pull you're mentioning, right, the vaultyople that Yes,
Speaker 8: that's right, that's right. Yeah, that's the pole you're mentioning.
Speaker 8: So that's continuing to show strong support for Harris. I
Speaker 8: go with that more than I do some of the
Speaker 8: cross tabs. Having said that, I do think there are
Speaker 8: issues with younger men in particular and Kamala Harris, where
Speaker 8: Donald Trump seems to have particular strength there, and his
Speaker 8: clearly targeting a lot of his campaign towards them. The
Speaker 8: problem is they're very low propensity voters, so you're taking
Speaker 8: a risk that these people will turn out to vote.
Speaker 8: I mean, young men are probably the least likely group
Speaker 8: of people to vote.
Speaker 4: Fascinating.
Speaker 3: I'm really glad we got to spend some time with
Speaker 3: Michael Berkman. Thank you Michael for being with us as
Speaker 3: we get the view from Pennsylvania, more specifically from the
Speaker 3: center of the state. There really interesting director the McCartney
Speaker 3: Institute for Democracy and political science professor at penn State University.
Speaker 3: It's got a podcast called Democracy Works. Thanks for listening
Speaker 3: to the Balance of Power podcast. Make sure to subscribe
Speaker 3: if you haven't already, at Apple, Spotify, or wherever you
Speaker 3: get your podcasts, and you can find us live every
Speaker 3: weekday from Washington, DC at Noontimeeastern at Bloomberg dot com.