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Speaker 3: I'm going to go back to Iran now to the
Speaker 3: Middle East. That main store. We had President Trump having
Speaker 3: a phone interview with NBC News exclusively talking about the war,
Speaker 3: where it stands and where he sees it headed. And
Speaker 3: he said, quote Iron wants to make a deal, and
Speaker 3: I don't want to make it because the terms are
Speaker 3: not good enough yet.
Speaker 5: Christina, all right.
Speaker 2: Joining us now to discuss all this are Bloomberg's host
Speaker 2: of Horizon, Middle East and Africa, Jumana Brissecci, the AP's
Speaker 2: international correspondent Philip Crowther, who is live near the Strait
Speaker 2: of Hormuz, and Bloomberg's Washington's.
Speaker 5: Deputy Bureau Chief, Flora Davidson, who is actually in Tokyo.
Speaker 5: Thank you all so much for joining us. Philip, I
Speaker 5: want to start with.
Speaker 2: You because there were some pretty dramatic images overnight of
Speaker 2: smoke rising from a port that I believe is somewhat
Speaker 2: near you. Can you, I mean, Aroan had said that
Speaker 2: they believe some of these incoming missiles were fired from
Speaker 2: the UAE. Was this retribution for that? What has Iran
Speaker 2: said and how has the UAE responded?
Speaker 6: Yeah, this appears to have been retribution. This is the
Speaker 6: Alpha Jeira oil facility. It's just a few kilometers south
Speaker 6: from where we are here. About twenty four hours ago,
Speaker 6: there were two huge black plumes of smoke coming from there.
Speaker 6: This from two separate apparent drone attacks. Now these weren't
Speaker 6: drones that necessarily hit the plant directly, but that might
Speaker 6: have been shot down. It's called an interception, and that
Speaker 6: fragments thereof might have hit the oil facility led to
Speaker 6: a stop of at least some of the operations there.
Speaker 6: They appeared to be back up and running now. But yes,
Speaker 6: a retaliation, it certainly was, and what Iran has been
Speaker 6: saying and has been clearly singling out the United Arab Emirates.
Speaker 7: Where I am now.
Speaker 6: Right here is that they're saying that US attacks on
Speaker 6: specifically Hag Island, where of course Iran processes a very
Speaker 6: large percentage of its oil at its terminal, that that
Speaker 6: was attacked by the United States from the United Arab Emirates,
Speaker 6: from air bases or even from ports. So the reaction
Speaker 6: from Iran was to say that everybody should evacuate three
Speaker 6: big ports in the United Arab Emirates, and that includes
Speaker 6: the one we just mentioned, Al Fujaira also includes the
Speaker 6: biggest port in the whole of the Middle East, and
Speaker 6: there was a threat that there were going to be
Speaker 6: further attacks on those ports, again because Iran says they
Speaker 6: were US to stage US attacks on Iran. Iran is
Speaker 6: saying this without any proof, and indeed the US military
Speaker 6: hasn't even deemed it worthy of a response. Now, there
Speaker 6: haven't been any from the point of view of Iran,
Speaker 6: we should say successful attacks on those ports. There might
Speaker 6: have been some interceptions over the last twenty four hours
Speaker 6: or so, but there have been no direct hits. No
Speaker 6: fragments of drones or missiles have hit any facilities or
Speaker 6: anything in the United Arab Emirates over the last twenty
Speaker 6: four hours, and that in fact goes for most golf countries.
Speaker 6: There have been mass attacks of drones on Bahrain, for example,
Speaker 6: on Saudi Arabia as well, but the air defenses of
Speaker 6: most of these golf countries have been working well and
Speaker 6: increasingly well as this conflict continues.
Speaker 3: Jaman, I want to turn to you and go back
Speaker 3: to that comment from the President to NBC News just
Speaker 3: about the state of play in this war and where
Speaker 3: it might be headed. Lingering on that line that Iron
Speaker 3: wants to make a deal, but the President doesn't think
Speaker 3: the terms are good enough.
Speaker 7: Yet.
Speaker 3: What is your sense of what the President is hoping
Speaker 3: for once in terms of a deal and how far
Speaker 3: apart these two sides are at this juncture in the war.
Speaker 8: Well, it's also interesting to observe the evolution of his thinking.
Speaker 8: It was a couple of days prior I think he
Speaker 8: was calling for once again the unconditional surrender of the
Speaker 8: Iranian regime. But now he seems to be open once
Speaker 8: again to establishing a deal with them of some sorts.
Speaker 8: In that interview with NBC, he declined to give a
Speaker 8: lot of commentary on exactly what the conditions would be,
Speaker 8: but maintained, and this is a stance that the US
Speaker 8: has maintained even before the war kicked off, that Iran
Speaker 8: should never have the ability to develop a nuclear weapon. Now,
Speaker 8: from Iran's perspective, we've had a couple of notable figures
Speaker 8: from the regime speak out. We've had the Iranian Foreign
Speaker 8: Minister make some remarks in addition to President Posishcamp putting
Speaker 8: up a post a couple of days ago where they
Speaker 8: suggested their conditions to come to the negotiating table with
Speaker 8: the US would include a number on one, full recognition
Speaker 8: of Iran's quote legitimate rights without giving a lot of
Speaker 8: information on what exactly that means. Number two, reparations for
Speaker 8: damage is caused. And then number three, and this is
Speaker 8: probably the most important element, guarantees that a war like
Speaker 8: this will never happen again. So they are staking their
Speaker 8: own terms to go back to the negotiating table. Of course,
Speaker 8: their economy is massively buckling under this strain even before
Speaker 8: this war kicked off, and now there's the real threat
Speaker 8: of civilian infrastructure being targeted as well. Carg Island obviously
Speaker 8: a key lifeblood for them, but I would say from
Speaker 8: the perspective of the Iranians, we always said from the
Speaker 8: beginning this was a fight for their existence. It's an
Speaker 8: existential fight for them. And the fact that the US
Speaker 8: are now saying or no longer talking about regime change,
Speaker 8: but are saying, okay, we're ready to cut a deal
Speaker 8: and their eyes actually is a victory and they have
Speaker 8: sustained a lot of blows. Maybe they're losing militarily, but
Speaker 8: if they come out of this the other side still
Speaker 8: intact and still effectively leading the country, then they will
Speaker 8: deem that to be a victory. So I think, you know,
Speaker 8: there's still a lot of daylight between the two sides,
Speaker 8: and from the Iranian perspective, they will continue to inflict
Speaker 8: as many blows as they can, as much economic cost
Speaker 8: on these Gulf countries and on the global economy in
Speaker 8: order to somehow bring the US as well, closer to
Speaker 8: what they're asking for.
Speaker 2: Laura, I want to go to you now over in Tokyo,
Speaker 2: because the backdrop of all of this conflict is of
Speaker 2: course what it's doing to the world energy markets, what
Speaker 2: it's doing to global economies, and at the same time
Speaker 2: you have this Trump She Summit coming up, and there's
Speaker 2: a couple of.
Speaker 5: Things going on.
Speaker 2: There's US China talks about to happen or happening right
Speaker 2: now in Paris, and then you are in Japan for
Speaker 2: this there's economic secretaries.
Speaker 5: There as well.
Speaker 2: David just wrote down the name of the summit and
Speaker 2: I've already forgotten it, so can you please remind me
Speaker 2: the name of the Tokyo Summit. And they just kind
Speaker 2: of set the tage for us what's going on and
Speaker 2: where these two big countries are going to go and
Speaker 2: the backdrop of all this happening in the least, it's
Speaker 2: not it's on there somewhere.
Speaker 5: This is not a straight.
Speaker 7: But yeah, this is a summit.
Speaker 9: It's largely between the US and Japan, but there's also
Speaker 9: about eighteen countries who are also participating with high level
Speaker 9: economic and energy officials from from the region to talk
Speaker 9: basically about critical minerals and energy. You know, that of
Speaker 9: course was important even before Iran. Now with the backdrop
Speaker 9: of oil prices spiking, this has really added a lot
Speaker 9: of urgency and intensity to these discussions. Of course, the
Speaker 9: deals that have been struck, you know, so far this
Speaker 9: weekend have been relatively modest in scale. You know, these
Speaker 9: are longer term arrangements. These are memory memorandums of understanding,
Speaker 9: things that won't really do anything to address the current
Speaker 9: situation at hand, but really set the stage for this visit.
Speaker 9: The Prime Minister of Japan, Takeyichi, is headed to the
Speaker 9: White House on Thursday. She has been quite critical of
Speaker 9: the US's stance in Iran, has questioned the legality of
Speaker 9: these strikes and said she plans to have a very
Speaker 9: frank and stern conversation with Trump. So this is, you know,
Speaker 9: kind of We're seeing a lot of posturing from allies
Speaker 9: in the Indo Pacific region looking to get in the
Speaker 9: good graces of the Trump administration with some of these deals,
Speaker 9: but looking to take a stronger, firmer stance when it
Speaker 9: comes to geopolitics.
Speaker 2: Our control room tells us it is the Indo Pacific
Speaker 2: Energy Security ministerial and business for it.
Speaker 5: I feel less bad for not having out the tide
Speaker 5: of my time.
Speaker 3: Well's right off the tongue, and we have Liezelda in
Speaker 3: the EPA administrator joining us from those talks here in
Speaker 3: a few minutes time, I should say. But of course,
Speaker 3: nothing is shaping the conversation about global energy more than
Speaker 3: the strait that we see behind Philip Crowther and Philip
Speaker 3: I go back to you and again reference that interview
Speaker 3: that was on NBC News or NBC News conducted with
Speaker 3: President Trump via telephone. He said, We're going to be
Speaker 3: sweeping the strait very strongly, and we believe will be
Speaker 3: joined by other countries who are somewhat impeded and in
Speaker 3: some cases impeded from getting the oil. I'm looking at
Speaker 3: that line. We believe, as he invokes China and France
Speaker 3: and Japan and South Korea and other countries, this is
Speaker 3: a war that largely has been prosecuted by the US
Speaker 3: and Israel, just the two of them. Now we have
Speaker 3: a president talking about the need for allies to reopen
Speaker 3: or get traffic flowing in that strait. Once again, your
Speaker 3: sense of the willingness of other countries to do that.
Speaker 3: Yesterday we had a conversation just about how little traffic
Speaker 3: you were able to observe in the strait behind you.
Speaker 3: Has anything notionally changed here over the last twenty four hours.
Speaker 7: First of all, it hasn't.
Speaker 6: There has not been any increasing traffic here because there
Speaker 6: is no deal, and it is still very much deemed
Speaker 6: too dangerous for any containerships, one of which we see
Speaker 6: behind us, but of course, more crucially for the world
Speaker 6: economic markets for oil tankers and those carrying liquefied natural
Speaker 6: gas to pass from the Persian Gulf through the Strait
Speaker 6: of Hormones to well, essentially where I am here, out
Speaker 6: into the wider world and bringing those commodities to the
Speaker 6: international market. Now back to what you mentioned, though, you
Speaker 6: know this has happened before in the Middle East, that
Speaker 6: the United States has more or less unilaterally gone to
Speaker 6: war and then in the aftermath is asking for help essentially,
Speaker 6: and in this case, what President Trump is doing, he's
Speaker 6: or maybe enticing other countries to get involved in what
Speaker 6: would boil down to an inter national coalition of warships
Speaker 6: to protect these ships going in and out of the
Speaker 6: Strait of Hormuz. Is he enticing them? Is he provoking
Speaker 6: them into joining him? Is he just basically saying this
Speaker 6: is a FETA complie. You need to now be part
Speaker 6: of this because it's your ships that are not getting through.
Speaker 7: And it is true, of course.
Speaker 6: These are countries and companies that are very much affected
Speaker 6: by a US Israeli war on Iran, and China is
Speaker 6: number one there because such a huge percentage of the
Speaker 6: oil that passes through the Strait of Hormuz goes to China.
Speaker 6: So in his post last night by President Trump on
Speaker 6: his social network on truth Social, he was naming countries specifically,
Speaker 6: not innocently, you know, there was a reason for this.
Speaker 6: France and the United Kingdom, of course, that's understandable. These
Speaker 6: are Western allies, but also Japan, South Korea, and specifically China.
Speaker 6: He wants them to be part of, well essentially a
Speaker 6: bit of an armada that would be led by the
Speaker 6: United States to protect these ships and get the traffic
Speaker 6: flowing through the Strait of hor Mows. Again, this is
Speaker 6: a lot easier said than done. While these Iranian threats
Speaker 6: to hit any ship that tries to go through that
Speaker 6: is in any way affiliated or allied with the United
Speaker 6: States and Israel or its allies, while those threats continue,
Speaker 6: well you have to presume that there could be Iranian
Speaker 6: attacks on warships as well.
Speaker 5: Jimana.
Speaker 2: Speaking of Israel, there's a report that's popped up in
Speaker 2: Semaphore that is exclusive saying that Israel has informed the
Speaker 2: US this week that it's running critically low on ballistic
Speaker 2: missile interceptors. As the conflict with Iran rages on, Israel
Speaker 2: has reportedly entered the current war already low on interceptors
Speaker 2: that were fired during last summer's conflict with Iran. Now
Speaker 2: this compliment's reporting from Bloomberg that UAE and Kutar were also.
Speaker 5: Running low on those interceptors.
Speaker 2: I do need to say both those countries have pushed
Speaker 2: back vociferously on that reporting. But I'm wondering if you
Speaker 2: have any sense of the veracity of these reports. If
Speaker 2: this is something countries in the region are worried about,
Speaker 2: I mean, it would make at this point, But what
Speaker 2: are they telling you?
Speaker 8: I think, you know, let's just go back to the
Speaker 8: starting point of all of this, which is the asymmetry
Speaker 8: of the military warfare here. I think I don't think
Speaker 8: there's a question that the US and Israel have military dominance,
Speaker 8: and in fact, if you go back to some of
Speaker 8: the comments at Central Command have said, they've said that
Speaker 8: they managed to eliminate around sixty to seventy percent of
Speaker 8: missile launchers in Iran, around sixty to seventy percent of
Speaker 8: their missile stockpiles. But at the same time, I think
Speaker 8: most of the region was taken aback at the sheer
Speaker 8: intensity and frequency of the strikes that came through from
Speaker 8: Iran onto these Gulf states and indeed onto Israel itself.
Speaker 8: I mean, just to give you the example of the UAE,
Speaker 8: they said that they have engaged in over one thousand,
Speaker 8: six hundred drones and three hundred missiles launched by Iran
Speaker 8: since the war began, and this was over two weeks ago. Now,
Speaker 8: as our colleague reporter was just saying, the interception rate
Speaker 8: for these projectiles is very high. It's between something like
Speaker 8: ninety two to ninety five percent, whether it's drone, drones
Speaker 8: or missiles. But there is a mismatch and costs, and
Speaker 8: this is something that Iran recognizes. They're capable of manufacturing
Speaker 8: these low cost drones in.
Speaker 5: A huge amount.
Speaker 8: They're estimated to be sitting on around fifty thousand of
Speaker 8: these drones, and they are costly to take down. And
Speaker 8: so the longer this war goes on for the more
Speaker 8: they are going to be questions about how long these
Speaker 8: air defense systems can hold up for I should I
Speaker 8: should say, however, that these GLF states maintain that the
Speaker 8: air defense systems at continue to have very high interception rates,
Speaker 8: and they are doing what they can to beef them up.
Speaker 2: Okay, thank you Jamin Rossecchi, our Mid East anchor. We've
Speaker 2: also liked to thank Philip kurhller AP international correspondent standing
Speaker 2: out on that water for us. And Laura Davidson, of course,
Speaker 2: Washington Deputy BEARA Chief joining us from Tokyo.
Speaker 3: Stay with us for more on Bloomberg this weekend, right
Speaker 3: after this.
Speaker 2: All right, so right now, President Trump's National Energy Dominance
Speaker 2: Council is hosting an energy security firm in Tokyo. This
Speaker 2: was a conference that was planned before America struck Iran
Speaker 2: and is happening amid global economic turmoil.
Speaker 3: Shorting is now from Tokyo. Is the EPA Administrator Lee
Speaker 3: Zeldin on this Saturday. Great to have you with us.
Speaker 3: We're going to talk about the substance of the conversations
Speaker 3: you've been having here in just a moment, but I
Speaker 3: wanted to ask you first, remembering as I do, you
Speaker 3: as a congressman, you as a fellow New Yorker. You've
Speaker 3: talked an awful lot about the need for there to
Speaker 3: be endgames in military conflict, and you've brought that up
Speaker 3: in the context of your military service as well. Talking
Speaker 3: about a Rock and Afghanistan. As we look at this
Speaker 3: war entering the third week, I'm curious what you see
Speaker 3: that endgame as and if it's clear enough to you
Speaker 3: as somebody again who's served in the military.
Speaker 10: Well, obviously, my role serving as administrator of the Environmental
Speaker 10: Protection Agency is a bit different than serving Congress on
Speaker 10: the House Horna Affairs Committee. Have the utmost faith and
Speaker 10: trust in President Trump and his national security and foreign
Speaker 10: policy team. They have been conducting many successful strikes to
Speaker 10: achieve strategic objectives, taking out top high value targets throughout Iran. Consistently,
Speaker 10: that progress has resulted in all sorts of people who
Speaker 10: have been responsible for many attacks that have not just
Speaker 10: adversely impacted US interests in that region, but have killed
Speaker 10: and maimed US service members.
Speaker 7: As a now retired member.
Speaker 10: Of the United States Army, speaking from that perspective, just
Speaker 10: too many fellow soldiers have been targeted by OURGC and
Speaker 10: Iranian leadership over the course of my adult life. Since
Speaker 10: first going into the military in two thousand and three,
Speaker 10: seeing that justice brought to bear on behalf of all
Speaker 10: those United States service members that their veterans, those families.
Speaker 10: That is long overdue justice for many of these Iranian
Speaker 10: quote unquote leaders who are no longer alive.
Speaker 2: I do want to ask you about the summit that
Speaker 2: you're competing, and especially, you know oil prices about forty percent.
Speaker 2: Americans already feel like they're being squeezed. And I know
Speaker 2: that you're there partially to pitch to Asian countries because
Speaker 2: I heard John some of our other network friends why
Speaker 2: America would be a good resource for them for energy,
Speaker 2: why they should get our energy from US. But my
Speaker 2: question to you is many of those same nations, including Vietnam,
Speaker 2: Thailand and others, are feeling pressure from the constantly changing
Speaker 2: US tariff landscape, and they feel like the President is
Speaker 2: using that as a tool and changes depending on what
Speaker 2: he wants from foreign policy. So why should Asian nations
Speaker 2: trust the US as a consistent and dependable source of
Speaker 2: energy in the future.
Speaker 10: Well, the points is that you see these Asian companies,
Speaker 10: these Asian countries that have relied so heavily on the
Speaker 10: Middle East for their crude oil and the time that
Speaker 10: it takes, and the reliance on a route that in
Speaker 10: many respects a terrorist regime has been able to frequently
Speaker 10: disrupt or, at the very least threaten to disrupt over
Speaker 10: the course of years and decades. Now they start looking
Speaker 10: east to the United States, where we have been unleashing
Speaker 10: energy dominance here at home with new projects that are
Speaker 10: now on the horizon. President Trump has been advocating strongly
Speaker 10: for a new lit liquid lergy facility, a pipeline that
Speaker 10: would run alongside the Trans Alaska pipeline in Alaska. Crude
Speaker 10: oil in Alaska has the ability to have a lot
Speaker 10: more oil passed through it, and that route for sixty
Speaker 10: years with Japan, for example, has been able to deliver
Speaker 10: that crude oil to Asia. To japras I, how are
Speaker 10: you with freedom of navigation?
Speaker 2: Of course I'm sorry for but if I may, are
Speaker 2: you not getting any pushback that even if you make
Speaker 2: some of these deals and President Trump becomes displeased with
Speaker 2: these countries, he could claw back that energy.
Speaker 10: Well, what we just witnessed over the course last forty
Speaker 10: eight hours is that many countries in the Indo Pacific
Speaker 10: are gravitating towards the United States. We had over fifty
Speaker 10: billion dollars worth of deals with US companies. All the
Speaker 10: dialogue that has taken place has been with an understanding
Speaker 10: that by entering into new deals with the United States
Speaker 10: that allows them to reduce their reliance which was so
Speaker 10: heavily concentrated in the Middle East. And on top of it,
Speaker 10: it takes just a fraction of time to get that
Speaker 10: energy supply to Japan and these other countries, compared to
Speaker 10: twenty eight days to get it from the Middle East
Speaker 10: to take eight days.
Speaker 7: To get there from Alaska.
Speaker 10: So that is another dynamic, but just a lot of
Speaker 10: very robust, energetic, motivated conversation and engagement from the ministers
Speaker 10: of energy of all of these countries trying to cut
Speaker 10: deals with United States.
Speaker 3: Mister Minister rusually cutting deals, you might, for Christina say.
Speaker 3: At the top of this is of course the summit
Speaker 3: that was scheduled before the war began, and I'm curious,
Speaker 3: given what has happened here, how much that situation is
Speaker 3: kind of coloring the conversations that you're having with allies
Speaker 3: and companies at the summit. Over the course of this weekend.
Speaker 10: One of the topics that were discussed, one of the
Speaker 10: pillars of this weekend is about the supply chain, and
Speaker 10: for Indo Pacific countries, they are I think far more
Speaker 10: motivated they were talking quite frequently about wanting to diversify
Speaker 10: their supply chain, that they want to start looking elsewhere
Speaker 10: because they were relying too heavily on the Middle Eastern
Speaker 10: region for their supply chain now, so diversifying how they
Speaker 10: provide energy to their people. Some countries are further along
Speaker 10: and talking about nuclear, others relying more on L and G,
Speaker 10: others talking about coal. It really ran the gamut, and
Speaker 10: depending on which country we were sitting in for a
Speaker 10: bilateral or for meetings amongst all the energy ministers, diversification
Speaker 10: of the supply chain was not just a pillar going
Speaker 10: into this weekend, but something that was frequently talked about throughout.
Speaker 2: I have a couple of nuclear questions, but I do
Speaker 2: want to start with when we look at the possible
Speaker 2: consequences of a regime falling in Iran, one of the
Speaker 2: concerns we've been hearing from nuclear experts and security experts
Speaker 2: is how to secure and possibly transport out that rich
Speaker 2: geranium in that country. Is there a plan to do it,
Speaker 2: does it involve American boots on the ground, and what
Speaker 2: can you tell us about what's going to happen there.
Speaker 10: Yeah, that's a question that I as Administrative EPA would
Speaker 10: not want to answer on behalf of the President of
Speaker 10: the White House, the Department of War, Department of State,
Speaker 10: or Department of Energy, the transport of uranium out of Iran,
Speaker 10: any other aspects of your question our questions that I's
Speaker 10: EPA administrator wouldn't be appropriate to be the one answering
Speaker 10: great questions, but I would be the right person for
Speaker 10: the administration to answer that.
Speaker 3: Let me ask you something kind of complementary to the
Speaker 3: strikes on Iran, and that as we've see the administration
Speaker 3: open up those pipelines off the coast of California once again,
Speaker 3: and there are a lot of Californians who remember that
Speaker 3: oil spill back in twenty fifteen, that Refugeo oil spill,
Speaker 3: are worried about the integrity of those pipelines, and I
Speaker 3: wonder what your messages to them, as we hear from
Speaker 3: the governor of that state and others saying, look, this
Speaker 3: is something that shouldn't be happening right now in light
Speaker 3: of the fact that there are one hundred hundred, one
Speaker 3: thousand gallons barrels of oil that were spilled as a
Speaker 3: result of that back in twenty fifteen.
Speaker 10: Well, I mean it's always important to remember lessons learned
Speaker 10: of the past, to be leaning into new technology, to
Speaker 10: make sure that with new projects for extraction, for processing
Speaker 10: anywhere in America, that in the partnerships and in the
Speaker 10: requests for permits, and as this investment goes forward, that
Speaker 10: we are learning the lessons of the past, that we're
Speaker 10: doing it as safely as possible. I often talk about
Speaker 10: how I strongly believe that in the United States we
Speaker 10: tap into our own energy supplies so much safer than
Speaker 10: so many other countries elsewhere around the world. And that
Speaker 10: runs across the gamut on all different kinds of ways
Speaker 10: that energy is extracted. So, yeah, you know, to your question,
Speaker 10: which is which is a great one. It's important that
Speaker 10: when these projects, when these permits are moving forward, that
Speaker 10: we're doing it as responsibly as possible.
Speaker 2: I also want to ask you as you talk about
Speaker 2: US energy dominance. Obviously, the President and a lot of
Speaker 2: people have said the US should look more into nuclear
Speaker 2: One of the things your agency and the Primitive Energy
Speaker 2: have done is change some of the regulations for trying
Speaker 2: to build nuclear plants and nuclear reactors. That's had mixed
Speaker 2: results because it's trying to bring these plants online faster
Speaker 2: and solve this issue. But some of the criticism is
Speaker 2: it's taking away some of the safety concerns, including things
Speaker 2: like firearms trainings and emergency drills, which critics are saying
Speaker 2: could make these plants more vulnerable to theft of nuclear power.
Speaker 2: What is your response to that and do you have
Speaker 2: any concerns with lessening regulations around nuclear reactors.
Speaker 10: At no point since I was sworn in as administrator
Speaker 10: fourteen months ago, with any nuclear project that I've seen
Speaker 10: anywhere inside the United States, I seen anything but the
Speaker 10: highest level of competency brought to bear with very incredible staffers,
Speaker 10: many career staffers here at EPA, doing our due diligence.
Speaker 10: Trump's speed is about operating quickly. The way that we
Speaker 10: have implemented that directive from the President is one that
Speaker 10: I can very confidently say with eyes on many different
Speaker 10: nuclear projects across this country that they're being done extraordinarily competently,
Speaker 10: and quite frankly, the people the companies that are making
Speaker 10: the big investment, they have every motivation to protect that investment.
Speaker 10: And I would say the lot of these companies are
Speaker 10: breaking ground on projects with goals of breaking ground on
Speaker 10: many more projects. So it's almost a proof of concept
Speaker 10: when you know Ocklow in Idaho Falls, Idaho is breaking
Speaker 10: ground which they have recently done.
Speaker 7: They want to build many more.
Speaker 10: I can think of their project in Oak Bridge in Tennessee,
Speaker 10: as well as other states. Right now, there are a
Speaker 10: lot of retrofits, a lot of small modular reactors. There
Speaker 10: are a lot of nuclear projects. Yes, the permitting is
Speaker 10: going much faster under President Trump, but due diligence and
Speaker 10: competency has been all over from the government standpoint as
Speaker 10: well as from the investor standpoint.
Speaker 3: Mister administrator, thank you very much. That's Leezelden joining us
Speaker 3: from Tokyo, where the sun is setting as it rises
Speaker 3: here in New York. He's there for that inaugural into
Speaker 3: Pacific Energy Security Ministerial and Business Forum.
Speaker 7: Great to get his perspective.
Speaker 5: We appreciate him staying up lates eight thirty.
Speaker 2: I'm not sure if he's coming from or going to dinner,
Speaker 2: but we appreciate.
Speaker 5: Your doing, sir.
Speaker 2: Stay with us for more on Bloomberg this weekend. Right
Speaker 2: after this, and I.
Speaker 3: Mentioned that interview that President Trump did with NBC News,
Speaker 3: and coming out of that he said, we quote totally
Speaker 3: demolished Carg Island, that island off the coast of Iran,
Speaker 3: so important to that country's oil industry. But we may
Speaker 3: hit it a few more times just for fun. He
Speaker 3: continued in that interview and talked about the prospects of
Speaker 3: there being a deal between the US and Iran, saying
Speaker 3: that Iran has offered one, but it's not acceptable to
Speaker 3: the US side. We're going to talk about all of
Speaker 3: this with two congressmen, first, Adam Smith, the ranking member
Speaker 3: of the Armed Services Committee. Mike Lawler is going to
Speaker 3: join us after that conversation with Representative Smith. He's on
Speaker 3: the Foreign Affairs Committee. Congressman Smith, great to have you
Speaker 3: with us, of course, representing the ninth district in the
Speaker 3: state of Washington. I want to start with that comment
Speaker 3: that I just read, that comment that the President.
Speaker 7: Made to NBC News saying.
Speaker 3: That on the heels of hitting Carg Island, he might
Speaker 3: do it a few more times just for fun. And
Speaker 3: I wonder how that resonates with you as you think
Speaker 3: about what the endgame is here and what you've learned
Speaker 3: from the administration about how they intend to prosecute this
Speaker 3: war to its conclusion.
Speaker 7: Well, certainly the cavalier, non serious way in which President Trump,
Speaker 7: Secretary of Hegseth, and others have talked about this war.
Speaker 7: We have Secretary hegset talking about no quarter, which is
Speaker 7: basically a military term for no survivors, kill everybody. I
Speaker 7: think that attitude has really undermined our ability to build
Speaker 7: support and move forward. It's far from the largest problem
Speaker 7: with this war. I mean the largest problem is what's
Speaker 7: the plan, what's the strategy, what are we trying to accomplish,
Speaker 7: what's the path to achieving it? And how do we
Speaker 7: deal with the costs that are mounting by the day,
Speaker 7: certainly in terms of deaths, but the economic impact you
Speaker 7: referenced globally. What's the path here? I know we want
Speaker 7: to degrade Iran's capability militarily, but how much? And then
Speaker 7: the real goal at the start of this seemed to
Speaker 7: be to fundamentally change Iran's calculus, to make them less
Speaker 7: hostile to us, to Israel, and to the region. And
Speaker 7: there seems to be no progress on that aspect of
Speaker 7: the plan. So this war is continued. The cost is
Speaker 7: incredibly high. The President doesn't seem to have a plan. Meanwhile,
Speaker 7: they want to apparently try to convince America that this
Speaker 7: is some kind of fun video game that we're just playing,
Speaker 7: even as people are dying all across the region and
Speaker 7: the global economy is suffering from this. So yeah, I
Speaker 7: wish they were a little more serious in the way
Speaker 7: they explained such an incredibly important action that they are taking.
Speaker 3: Harris, I want to get to what you know about
Speaker 3: the mission and the administration's sense of that mission. And
Speaker 3: we saw the news that the Administration plans to send
Speaker 3: the thirty first Marine Expeditionary Unit to the region to
Speaker 3: add to the number of service personnel who are there
Speaker 3: in the Middle East. Do you have a clear understanding
Speaker 3: of what those marines are going to do? And as
Speaker 3: you watch that unfold, what does it tell you about
Speaker 3: the direction of this conflict?
Speaker 7: Yeah, I have a clear understanding of what the options are.
Speaker 7: And look, we've been talking about this for a long time.
Speaker 7: There is no doubt that Iran is a major problem
Speaker 7: in the region, in the world, a threat to US,
Speaker 7: a threat to Israel. They support a variety of different
Speaker 7: violent extremist terrorist groups. How do you deal with that threat?
Speaker 7: So the Armed Services Committee for years now has been
Speaker 7: looking at options. I mean, what can you do what's
Speaker 7: militarily on the table. And there's always been two big
Speaker 7: problems with the military option. One the collateral damage. He
Speaker 7: hit Iran, it spreads, and that certainly happened. It's spread
Speaker 7: as far as anyone would have feared. The second problem is,
Speaker 7: can you really degrade them militarily to such a degree
Speaker 7: that it makes that cost worth the effort, And what
Speaker 7: we learned is really not. Because the Iranian regime is
Speaker 7: dug in, they are very very solid there, even as
Speaker 7: their leaders have been killed, they have a succession plan.
Speaker 7: There's ninety million people in Iran, they have a military.
Speaker 7: They not appear inclined to simply collapse. So the conclusion
Speaker 7: was the military option wouldn't accomplish those objectives, would blow
Speaker 7: up the region, cause all manner of collateral damage and escalation,
Speaker 7: and wouldn't ultimately accomplish the objective. Trump to to walk
Speaker 7: into that and to think that, a, we can degrade
Speaker 7: their military capability to such a degree that it makes
Speaker 7: it worth it, but if they can just rebuild it,
Speaker 7: I mean, that's the main problem with that. And then
Speaker 7: second he seemed to just sort of cross his fingers
Speaker 7: and say, well, gosh, if we hit him hard enough,
Speaker 7: they'll either collapse or they will simply be broken enough
Speaker 7: to do what we want. But there was never a
Speaker 7: clear path between all of this bombing and all of
Speaker 7: this destruction and getting to that change in behavior by Iran.
Speaker 7: That's the problem, and that's what we're experiencing right now.
Speaker 7: And I'd be interested to hear anyone who supports this
Speaker 7: war tell me what that path is at this point
Speaker 7: to fundamentally breaking and changing the regime. I don't see it.
Speaker 2: Do you think that goal is accomplishable without putting boots
Speaker 2: on the ground. One of the experts we spoke to
Speaker 2: this week said, there are two ways to go about this.
Speaker 5: You know, you can do a plumer long.
Speaker 2: Bombing campaign, but that doesn't give you as much input
Speaker 2: and impetus into what's actually happening on.
Speaker 5: The ground and could take longer.
Speaker 2: Or you can send in troops, but then again, you
Speaker 2: could get myired in another forever war.
Speaker 7: Yeah, sorry, thank you. I didn't directly answer the most
Speaker 7: important part of that previous question. And so we've done
Speaker 7: this bombing campaign and you want to try to do
Speaker 7: it on the cheap, And that's what a bombing campaign is.
Speaker 7: Now we've seen even the bombing campaign spreads, escalates, causes
Speaker 7: violence across the region. But now you're up against that reality. Okay,
Speaker 7: you haven't achieved the objective. What about ground troops And
Speaker 7: the problem with the ground troops again is you're going to
Speaker 7: need a lot to dislodge this regime. There are talk
Speaker 7: about more tactical efforts, smaller numbers of troops, and this
Speaker 7: is what the Marines could do. One possibility is you
Speaker 7: seed seize Karj Island to try to cut off that
Speaker 7: economic lifeline for Iran. But could you seize it, could
Speaker 7: you hold it? There's considerable questions about that. Maybe a
Speaker 7: small group of special forces can help spark a revolt
Speaker 7: with it Iran, but again there's no clear path to that.
Speaker 2: Would you support that? Would you support US troops going
Speaker 2: in and a lot of a capacity like that?
Speaker 7: Heavens no, No, Sorry, I do not, because I don't
Speaker 7: think it would be effective and I think it again
Speaker 7: would be an escalation, It would cost more lives, and
Speaker 7: I think you'd be able to dislodge regime. And that's
Speaker 7: the problem. And let me be clear. If I woke
Speaker 7: up tomorrow and this Iranian regime was gone, and we
Speaker 7: had in Iran that was working for the Iranian people
Speaker 7: and stopped all of the terrible stuff they were doing.
Speaker 7: I would be very, very happy. But the problem is
Speaker 7: there's no direct path to doing that and the cost
Speaker 7: of what Donald Trump has done without thinking that through,
Speaker 7: without having a plan to actually achieve the objective. So
Speaker 7: now you can achieve the objective, and you've caused an
Speaker 7: enormous amount of casualties, disruption, and escalation, not just in Iran,
Speaker 7: but across the region and across the world. So that's
Speaker 7: the problem I have with this approach.
Speaker 3: I want to ask you about the path forward here
Speaker 3: for lawmakers like yourself who opposed this military action. So
Speaker 3: we saw that vote on the War Powers resolution fail
Speaker 3: in both houses last week. How do you pick up
Speaker 3: the pieces from that world? What does opposition to this
Speaker 3: war look like going forward, both in the House and
Speaker 3: the Senate as you see it, you know.
Speaker 7: Certainly we need to speak out against it. For those
Speaker 7: who are against the war, give them a voice, give
Speaker 7: them an argument for why to do it. But I
Speaker 7: think from a practical standpoint, my goal is to stop
Speaker 7: the war because I think it's bad. It's bad posse,
Speaker 7: it's escalation, it's incredibly costly. It's devastating to aricon. We've
Speaker 7: seen gas prices go up, you know, fifty cents to
Speaker 7: a dollar. It's going to cause the affordability crisis. Don't
Speaker 7: want to get worse in this country, and I think
Speaker 7: the most sensible path to that is try to encourage
Speaker 7: the Trump administration and the supporters of this war to,
Speaker 7: however implausibly be able to declare victory and stop. Okay,
Speaker 7: try to begin to rebuild pieces. That I think is
Speaker 7: a plausible argument for the Trump administration. And then you
Speaker 7: hear Trump saying let's bomb them for fun. You hear
Speaker 7: Hegseth saying no quarter. You hear Trump saying they're willing
Speaker 7: to negotiate. But I'm not really in the mood. All
Speaker 7: of that is deep cause for concern. But the plan is, okay,
Speaker 7: declare victory and stop. If that can stop the war,
Speaker 7: that I'm more than willing to make that argument.
Speaker 2: Do you have any kind of read on the condition
Speaker 2: of the new leader of Iran, because we have this
Speaker 2: statement from Iran's foreign minister saying Mushaba Kamini is in
Speaker 2: good health and fully managing the situation, but we still
Speaker 2: haven't seen him what is your perspective and what are
Speaker 2: you hearing about whether he is in fact even a
Speaker 2: player at this point, I have no idea.
Speaker 7: Nobody knows, all right, So there is no answer to
Speaker 7: that question. I think the thing is, let's not get
Speaker 7: too excited about what the answer is to that one
Speaker 7: way or the other. Even if he is. Some hosts
Speaker 7: told me the other day he's in a koma and
Speaker 7: he's missing a limb. How he knows that, I have
Speaker 7: no idea. But let's say that the guy's completely incapacitated,
Speaker 7: he dies in a week. The statement that was put
Speaker 7: out was put out. If it wasn't put out by him,
Speaker 7: it was put out by the Iranian regime. It was
Speaker 7: put out by the people who are in charge of Iran.
Speaker 7: So the belligerence in that statement, the complete lack of
Speaker 7: the any sort of acquiescence as Trump had hoped, shows
Speaker 7: that whether this guy's alive or not, the people who
Speaker 7: are running are on are no closer to having a
Speaker 7: reasonable government there than they were at the start of
Speaker 7: this war. Arguably they're further away and even more dug.
Speaker 3: Yet, last question I have is just about money. And
Speaker 3: before this war began, you had a Pentagon asking for
Speaker 3: an extremely large budget one and a half trillion dollars,
Speaker 3: which I think will astonish a lot of people. I
Speaker 3: imagine some of your constituents as well. Is this administration
Speaker 3: going to get that from Congress? What's your assessment of
Speaker 3: the appetite to increase the defense budget to that size
Speaker 3: and scale.
Speaker 7: Yeah, that's a fifty percent increase in the defense budget.
Speaker 7: And by the way, that doesn't include the supplemental that
Speaker 7: they're talking about asking for to help cover the cost
Speaker 7: of this war, which is going to be in the
Speaker 7: tens of billions of dollars. No, that's not realistic. And look,
Speaker 7: we have a thirty eight trillion dollar debt and it's
Speaker 7: very frustrating to me that everyone talks about that. And then,
Speaker 7: oh my gosh, the Republicans when came writing into majority
Speaker 7: in Congress and President Trump got elected, this was a
Speaker 7: major issue. And then they voted for the Reconciliation Bill
Speaker 7: to add four trillion dollars to the debt by massively
Speaker 7: cutting taxes. You're going to massively cut taxes and then
Speaker 7: you're going to start a war and ask for a
Speaker 7: fifty percent increase in the defense budget. I mean, I
Speaker 7: don't think we need to do that even if we
Speaker 7: hadn't cut those taxes. But my god, how do you
Speaker 7: stand up in front of the American people and say
Speaker 7: we need a one point five trillion dollar defense budget.
Speaker 7: We had to go to this war and spend these
Speaker 7: ten million dollars, but we're not going to pay for it.
Speaker 7: We're going to cut taxes. We're going to drive the
Speaker 7: debt through the ceiling.
Speaker 11: I know, I'm as I'm a little bit speechless in
Speaker 11: terms of how do you justify that from any sort
Speaker 11: of economic standpoint. I wouldn't have cut the taxes and
Speaker 11: I wouldn't be going to war and.
Speaker 7: Massively increasing the defense budget. But to try to do
Speaker 7: both is just insane in my view.
Speaker 3: Gentleman from the ninth Congression District in Washington, Carson Adam Smith,
Speaker 3: the ranking member of the Armed Services Committee, thank you
Speaker 3: very much for your time on this Sunday, appreciate, Thank
Speaker 3: you so much.
Speaker 2: We want to go now to the other side of
Speaker 2: the aisle and the other side of the country and
Speaker 2: talk to Congressman Mike Lawler, a Republican from the great
Speaker 2: State of New York, and he serves on the Foreign
Speaker 2: Affairs Committee.
Speaker 5: Consman, thank you so much for joining us this morning.
Speaker 2: First of all, I think you were listening when your
Speaker 2: Democratic colleagues said he wishes they meeting this administration were
Speaker 2: a little more serious about all this.
Speaker 5: Do you agree or disagree with that?
Speaker 2: And I just want to give you a chance to
Speaker 2: react to anything else you heard your colleagues say.
Speaker 12: Well, I wish my Democratic colleagues were more serious about this.
Speaker 12: I mean, the fact is, fifty three of them voted
Speaker 12: last week not to declare Iran the greatest state sponsor
Speaker 12: of terrorism. So I think my colleague should be a
Speaker 12: little more focused on, frankly, the unseeriousness of his own party.
Speaker 12: And frankly, nothing he said was actually of substance in
Speaker 12: that interview that I just listened to. The fact is
Speaker 12: that everybody acknowledges, other than the fifty three Democrats that
Speaker 12: voted no, that Iran is the greatest state sponsor of terror.
Speaker 12: They have been the greatest impediment to peace and stability
Speaker 12: in the Middle East and in the region. We see
Speaker 12: with their belligerent response to this conflict where they are
Speaker 12: striking civilian sites in Arab states neighboring them, that Iran
Speaker 12: is the real threat here, and ultimately, after months of
Speaker 12: negotiation in which Iran refused to seed any ground with
Speaker 12: respect to its ballistic missiles program and its financing of terrorism,
Speaker 12: President Trump made a decision that every president said that
Speaker 12: they would, that they would ensure that Iran never got
Speaker 12: a nuclear weapon. And between last summer strikes and the
Speaker 12: decision to take military action here, President Trump is ensuring
Speaker 12: that Iran cannot have a nuclear weapon. That is paramount.
Speaker 12: And all of my Democratic colleagues, including Adam Smith, just said, oh,
Speaker 12: I hope it works out. I hope we get regime change.
Speaker 12: I hope, I hope. Well, hope is not a strategy,
Speaker 12: and you actually have to be willing to take action.
Speaker 12: And that is the fundamental problem and why Barack Obama's
Speaker 12: attempts at this and Joe Biden's attempts at this have
Speaker 12: failed so miserably, because hope is not a strategy. You
Speaker 12: actually have to be willing to take military action if
Speaker 12: you are going to impede their ability to use a
Speaker 12: nuclear weapon. The problem here was very simple. Iran was
Speaker 12: mass producing ballistic missiles at such a rate that if
Speaker 12: we did not intervene, if we did not stop it,
Speaker 12: they would have been able to develop a nuclear bomb
Speaker 12: and utilize it in short timeframe the Congressation.
Speaker 2: I haven't seen any evidence that shows that that breakout
Speaker 2: time was closer or more urgent this week, this month
Speaker 2: than it was last summer when the administration went after
Speaker 2: those nuclear sites. Do you have any information that those
Speaker 2: decis made a nuclear side, accords to administration rats.
Speaker 12: Yeah, okay, we have had classified briefs, and I'm not
Speaker 12: going to get into the specifics of the classified briefs,
Speaker 12: but the fact is that the administration and President Trump
Speaker 12: took decisive action last summer, striking three nuclear facilities. As
Speaker 12: everybody understands, Iran has enriched uranium that they are currently storing,
Speaker 12: and they were mass producing ballistic missiles at an alarming
Speaker 12: rate that would actually protect their ability to develop that bomb.
Speaker 12: Had we waited, had we allowed this to continue in perpetuity,
Speaker 12: it would have been almost impossible for us to take
Speaker 12: the necessary steps to prevent them from getting a nuclear weapons.
Speaker 12: So there was a decision that was made, and I
Speaker 12: support what the President decided in this moment to end
Speaker 12: the threat of a nuclear Iran, And for many of
Speaker 12: my colleagues on the Democratic side, the problem with them
Speaker 12: is they're in consistent on everything. Adam Smith was in
Speaker 12: support of efforts in Libya to remove Momar Gadafi. Adam
Speaker 12: Smith was supportive of Barack Obama's seven month bombing of Libya.
Speaker 12: Didn't say boo about it. So the problem is many
Speaker 12: of my Democratic colleagues care more about the fact that
Speaker 12: Donald Trump is president and it's Donald Trump making these
Speaker 12: decisions than they do preventing Iran from getting a nuclear weapon.
Speaker 12: And that's the fundamental problem.
Speaker 3: Congress, you said just a moment ago that hope is
Speaker 3: not a strategy. I'm going to quote from something that
Speaker 3: the President said the NBC News yesterday, quote Hopefully China, France, Japan,
Speaker 3: South Korea, and the UK and others that are affected
Speaker 3: by this artificial constraint will send ships to the area
Speaker 3: so that the horror MOUs strait will no longer be
Speaker 3: threat by a nation that has been totally decapitated Therein,
Speaker 3: it does seem like hope is the strategy for the president.
Speaker 3: As we look at the total traffic, explain how it's president.
Speaker 12: Yeah, the President is in touch with these nations. Remember,
Speaker 12: China is the greatest purchaser of Iranian petroleum, and.
Speaker 3: Yet we're are the straight remains closed and we see
Speaker 3: Entergy likes.
Speaker 7: Me to finish.
Speaker 12: If you'd like me to finish, let me actually speak.
Speaker 13: Thanks.
Speaker 12: So the fact is China is the greatest purchaser of
Speaker 12: Iranian petroleum. They're the ones that benefit most from the
Speaker 12: Strait of Horror moves being open. Uh so, yeah, it's
Speaker 12: in China's interest, it's in some of our European allies
Speaker 12: interests for the Strait of Horror moves.
Speaker 7: To be open.
Speaker 12: Remember, we don't get oil from Iran. We have crippling
Speaker 12: sanctions on iranium petroleum. Iran's illicit oil trade is what
Speaker 12: has funded terrorism around the globe, and we have been
Speaker 12: cracking down on that. I'm last year last Congress, I
Speaker 12: passed the Ship Act alongside Secretary of Rubio when he
Speaker 12: was in the Senate to crack down on the illicit
Speaker 12: oil trade. Obviously, we want the Straight of Horror moves
Speaker 12: to be open. That is why the President has taken
Speaker 12: aggressive action against Iran's naval fleet, obliterating it as well
Speaker 12: as going after their military capacity and capability on carg Island.
Speaker 12: So we are taking necessary measures to push back against
Speaker 12: the Iranian regime and their efforts to block the Strait
Speaker 12: of Horror moves. But it is also incumbent on some
Speaker 12: of our allies and adversaries, many of whom benefit from
Speaker 12: trade coming through the Strait of Horror moves to engage.
Speaker 12: And I think the President is not only engaged in
Speaker 12: that conversation, but he's making the point that it is
Speaker 12: in their best interests as well to engage on this matter.
Speaker 2: Hikriston, I want to ask you about the cost of
Speaker 2: this conflict, not just the financial cost, but also the
Speaker 2: human toll. There has been a lot of loss of life,
Speaker 2: including American soldiers, and one of them I believe is
Speaker 2: from your district. There's an NYPD officer from who died
Speaker 2: in Kuwait supporting this operation. What are you hearing from
Speaker 2: your constituents. Have you spoken to this family and are
Speaker 2: people concerned that as this goes on, even if they
Speaker 2: support the president, even if they support the objectives, they
Speaker 2: may not be willing to commit more American lives to
Speaker 2: this operation.
Speaker 12: Well, anytime we have military engagement, the loss of life
Speaker 12: is tragic. The loss of our men and women in
Speaker 12: our armed forces is tragic, and our heart breaks for
Speaker 12: their families. I have spoken to his widow, and we
Speaker 12: will certainly be doing everything in our power to support
Speaker 12: the family. There is a go fundme that has already
Speaker 12: raised well over one hundred thousand dollars to support this family,
Speaker 12: including one hundred thousand dollars donation by Bill Ackman, and
Speaker 12: I thank him for that in support of this family.
Speaker 12: But this is obviously always a very difficult time anytime
Speaker 12: you have the loss of our soldiers. We saw the
Speaker 12: refueling you know airplane the other day go down and
Speaker 12: six soldiers lost in that. It's tragic, and certainly that
Speaker 12: is something that the military does everything in their power
Speaker 12: to guard against and prevent the loss of life. But
Speaker 12: this is certainly a conflict in which we are trying
Speaker 12: to stop evil. We are trying to prevent a nuclear
Speaker 12: weapon from being used in the Middle East or around
Speaker 12: the globe and cause mass casualty. You see how Iran
Speaker 12: has responded belligerently, striking civilian targets in neighboring Arab states.
Speaker 12: They launched hundreds of ballistic missiles at Israel last year
Speaker 12: and the year before. The fact is, this regime needs
Speaker 12: to be defeated, and President Trump and our armed forces
Speaker 12: are making a necessary, difficult, but necessary decision to take
Speaker 12: out the threat corkuson.
Speaker 3: I want to ask you lastly. You sit on the
Speaker 3: Fort Affairs Committee, as we've mentioned, but you're on the
Speaker 3: Financial Services Committee as well, and we have this news
Speaker 3: on Friday that a judge it's struck down. What the
Speaker 3: US attorney in DC hope to do, which is to
Speaker 3: issue subpoena is a get information from FED chair Jerome
Speaker 3: Powell and from the FED Reserve as well visa vi
Speaker 3: his chairmanship. We heard from Tom Tillis, the Senator from
Speaker 3: North Carolina who's threatened to withhold FED nominations as a
Speaker 3: result of that investigation, that he continues to do so.
Speaker 3: In light of what's happened here, do you think it's
Speaker 3: in our interest, in the country's interest for these investigations
Speaker 3: to continue if it does involve holding up the nomination
Speaker 3: of Kevin Warsh to be the next VEED chair.
Speaker 5: Look, I'd like.
Speaker 12: To see Kevin Worsh confirmed expeditiously. I think it's imperative
Speaker 12: that he come in as chairman. Jerome Powell will still
Speaker 12: be on the FED board. But from my vantage point,
Speaker 12: I don't think this is the best use of time
Speaker 12: and resources. I've said that previously. Should there be an
Speaker 12: investigation into how the rebuilding of the Federal Reserve building
Speaker 12: went billions of dollars over budget? Sure, and they should
Speaker 12: get to the bottom of that and have a full
Speaker 12: understanding of that. But I don't think that at this
Speaker 12: moment requires a criminal investigation of Chairman Pale, and I
Speaker 12: think frankly, we need to move forward with a new
Speaker 12: FED chair And.
Speaker 2: Chris and Mike Lauler, thank you so much for joining us.
Speaker 2: A mutual friend tells me you're a big Oscar fan,
Speaker 2: So I hope you get a chance to relax and
Speaker 2: watch that tonight and maybe we can have you back
Speaker 2: and talk about your picks and whether you.
Speaker 5: Got them or not.
Speaker 4: Stay with us for more on Bloomberg this weekend right
Speaker 4: after this.
Speaker 2: Welcome back to Bloomberg this weekend. I'm Christina Raffini here
Speaker 2: with David Gera. This Sunday is not only Oscar Sunday,
Speaker 2: it is also Selection Sunday.
Speaker 5: That's right.
Speaker 2: It is a big deal for college basketball.
Speaker 3: Fans like me with conviction.
Speaker 5: You know how good I am at.
Speaker 2: The sports ball, but I do like a bracket. I'm
Speaker 2: not gonna lie, I know nothing about them, but this
Speaker 2: is fun.
Speaker 3: This is fun for all March Madness kicking off this
Speaker 3: week tonight. We're gonna find out which teams have made
Speaker 3: it to the Big Dance, and here to help us
Speaker 3: figure out who those teams are likely to be so
Speaker 3: you can put them in your brack. And I don't
Speaker 3: know how you select your team cure chair based on mascot.
Speaker 2: Based on color schemes, although you know what, sometimes that
Speaker 2: works as well as people have Actually that's true.
Speaker 3: It's the host for a business of sports podcast for
Speaker 3: Nesta Prodermo Joints. It was noting along with us, she
Speaker 3: might have a more sophisticated calculus than you when it
Speaker 3: comes to picking her team is We'll get into that
Speaker 3: in just a monte. Butanessa, great to have you with us.
Speaker 3: Let me ask you, first of all, just rif what
Speaker 3: what colors this season's NCAA tournament. We see a lot
Speaker 3: of ads for sports betting, for instance. It does feel
Speaker 3: like we've kind of entered a new terrain or iteration
Speaker 3: of March Madness with the advent and legalization of sports betting.
Speaker 13: I mean, it's absolutely one of the biggest, you know,
Speaker 13: things of the year, one of the biggest betting events
Speaker 13: on the calendar. It's actually bet on more than the
Speaker 13: Super Bowl. Considering the amount of games that March Madness has. There's,
Speaker 13: you know, a prediction of three billion dollars over three
Speaker 13: billion dollars when we bet on this year's March Madness,
Speaker 13: and that only includes sports books, not even considering prediction markets,
Speaker 13: which is now one of the biggest things that people
Speaker 13: are really getting into this year.
Speaker 2: Is that taking some of the fun away from this?
Speaker 2: I mean, my introduce to March Madness is like a
Speaker 2: college pool, a bunch of cash. You're talking to people
Speaker 2: you never talked to in your office. It was like
Speaker 2: adorable in its sketchiness. I don't know the fact that
Speaker 2: it's been commodified. Are people still I mean, obviously three
Speaker 2: point three billion dollars people are still enjoying it. But
Speaker 2: has it changed the vibe of March Madness to something
Speaker 2: a little bit more serious?
Speaker 7: I don't think so.
Speaker 13: I think, you know, it's almost exactly what we want,
Speaker 13: what they want, and what we've already been doing with
Speaker 13: filling out your bracket, like you were saying before, I mean,
Speaker 13: people just throw random things in there, so it's the
Speaker 13: same thing with betting on the game. You're hoping that
Speaker 13: Cinderella story, that that eleven seed is going to come
Speaker 13: through and make it to the Elite eight or the
Speaker 13: Final four. And I think really what it's doing is
Speaker 13: giving people exactly what they were already writing down their brackets,
Speaker 13: but it's giving them an opportunity to actually make money
Speaker 13: on it.
Speaker 14: And it's just really the same exact thing.
Speaker 13: Just now they're making money on it, and the sports
Speaker 13: books are very happy as well.
Speaker 3: I want to get your counselor on who we should
Speaker 3: be looking to for maybe some of those Cinderella stories.
Speaker 3: So yesterday I was having a beverage of my choice
Speaker 3: and watching the Vanderbilt Florida game. Very exciting. Vanderbilt won
Speaker 3: that unexpectedly. So we've had these conference tournaments happening. Who
Speaker 3: are you looking at? Who stands perhaps to surprise all
Speaker 3: of us here as we look ahead to March badness.
Speaker 13: You know, I went to du Kane University, so I'm
Speaker 13: a big fan of the A ten and A ten. Actually,
Speaker 13: you know, they're one of the conferences that actually usually
Speaker 13: kind of get in there, and they have about three
Speaker 13: or four seeds, so I'm a little bit of a
Speaker 13: homer in that way. But if you are filling out
Speaker 13: your brackets, if you are looking to play to bet,
Speaker 13: usually those eleven seeds that we'll see today in selection
Speaker 13: Sunday who those will be, But usually those eleven seeds,
Speaker 13: those twelve.
Speaker 14: Seeds are the ones you want to put your money on.
Speaker 2: Obviously, lots of money, lots of interest. But I have
Speaker 2: been informed because I am new to Bloomberg. There's something
Speaker 2: called Bloomberg's Bracket for a Cause. This is the eleventh
Speaker 2: year and the website goes live this week. Explain what
Speaker 2: this is and why we do it and how much
Speaker 2: money is raised.
Speaker 13: Yeah, So Bloomberg Bracket for a Cause is something that's
Speaker 13: been going on for over ten years. CEOs, investors, hedge
Speaker 13: fund managers, they all come together, they pledge twenty thousand
Speaker 13: dollars for exactly what we're talking about. They're filling out
Speaker 13: their brackets and they're also just raising money for charity,
Speaker 13: which is amazing. Whitney Wolf heard. Actually, the founder of
Speaker 13: Bumble has won the last two years in a row,
Speaker 13: and you know she's raising money for Baby to Baby
Speaker 13: I think, which is a organization that helps child poverty.
Speaker 13: And I've written the story and I've talked to some
Speaker 13: of the investors and they actually have a little bit
Speaker 13: more of a hedge than you know, me and you
Speaker 13: filling out our brackets because they see it as a investment.
Speaker 13: They see it as looking at you know, those little
Speaker 13: things that they look to in the market. They're doing
Speaker 13: that exact same thing when they're filling out their college brackets.
Speaker 2: Essa, How could someone possibly have more like interest and
Speaker 2: analytics and filling out brackets than me, as we've already
Speaker 2: established as I choose by cute magus mascots and color choices.
Speaker 5: But all right, I'll give you that on that note.
Speaker 3: My last question kind of looking at the zeitgeist, looking
Speaker 3: at this moment, I've heard from a few friends that
Speaker 3: they're going to rely on AI to help pick their
Speaker 3: brackets this year, and I'm thinking, like, maybe that's going
Speaker 3: to be a phenomenon here as well. Yeah, I mean,
Speaker 3: like that could tell you a good deal. I imagine
Speaker 3: just about like past not the past performance is a
Speaker 3: guarantee of future success. But are you hearing that as well, Vanessa?
Speaker 3: Like is that a thing as well? People using AI
Speaker 3: to kind of figure out what they're going to put
Speaker 3: in their brackets.
Speaker 14: It's absolutely something that people a tool that people use,
Speaker 14: and it's.
Speaker 13: It's helpful obviously, Like you know, coaches use it sometimes
Speaker 13: to try and figure out.
Speaker 14: What their game plan is going to be.
Speaker 13: But at the same time, I think AI knows just
Speaker 13: as much as everyone else does in terms of March Madness.
Speaker 13: They I mean, they call it that for a reason.
Speaker 13: You know, Cinderella's stories happen every year. But the reality is,
Speaker 13: you know, number one seeds tend to win.
Speaker 3: We haven't talked about the women's bracket yet. Yukon seemingly unstoppable.
Speaker 3: Yet again, we talk about the success of brackets for
Speaker 3: a cause, and it's Winter year after year, Yukon winter
Speaker 3: year after year, hear and looking like they're in a
Speaker 3: very strong position going into the women's March Madness as well.
Speaker 14: It's an amazing story for Yukon.
Speaker 13: I mean, you know, they won last year with Paige
Speaker 13: Becker's and she finally got her ring, and now Azy
Speaker 13: Fudd trying to do the same thing as she goes
Speaker 13: in her last year before she goes.
Speaker 14: To the WNBA. They're undefeated, they're looking extremely strong. But
Speaker 14: I also wouldn't put it past.
Speaker 13: UCLA is another team that I would really look at,
Speaker 13: with Lauren Betts also doing the same thing in one
Speaker 13: of her last years before she goes to the WNBA.
Speaker 3: Vanessa, great to talk to you. Vanessa Prodmo, the host
Speaker 3: of the Business of Sports podcast here at liberg News,
Speaker 3: reports in the Business with sports as well. Good luck
Speaker 3: for sank you so much.
Speaker 5: I'm gonna sit us. I'm gonna send you my bracket.
Speaker 5: You can get me thumbs up and some down. Yeah,
Speaker 5: you feel like that market ap. Please I gotta beat David.
Speaker 5: Please help me.
Speaker 3: We'll see we shall see you.
Speaker 2: Thanks for joining us on today's Bloomberg This Weekend podcast.
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