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A
The Chase Inc. Business Premier card is a pay in full card with flexibility made for business owners who make things happen. Earn a total of 2.5% cash back on every purchase of $5,000 or more, plus earn unlimited 2% cash back on every other purchase, giving you unlimited earned potential to invest cash back into your business. Inc. Business Premier is part of a suite of credit cards from Chase for Business designed to meet your needs every step along the way. Learn more@chase.com businesscard Chase for Business Make More of what's yours Accounts subject to credit approval restrictions and limitations apply. Cards are issued by JPMorgan Chase Bank NA member FDIC Bloomberg Audio Studios Podcasts Radio news. You're listening to the Bloomberg Balance of Power podcast. Catch us live weekdays at noon and 5pm Eastern on Apple CarPlay and Android Auto with the Bloomb Business app. Listen on demand wherever you get your podcasts or watch us live on YouTube.
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B
All this counting down to the big primetime show tonight. Live from the White House. President Trump right around this time yesterday, announcing his plans to address the nation. And he will do so roughly eight hours from now. We'll bring you that address live here on Bloomberg TV and Radio with big questions about what he will be discussing with affordability, the key buzzword in town recently. The same reason why Donald Trump went to Pennsylvania ago and why J.D. vance went just yesterday. The president's been seizing on this term with his eyes on Democrats as well as we recall. Listen, they gave you high prices, they.
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C
Gave you the highest inflation in history.
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B
And we're giving you, we're bringing those prices down rapidly. They say, oh, he doesn't realize prices are, prices are coming down very substantially.
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C
But they have a new word, you.
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B
Know, they always have a hoax.
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C
The new word is affordability.
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B
I have no higher priority than making America affordable again. You can give up certain products, you can give up pencils you don't need $37 for your daughter.
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C
Two or three is nice.
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B
All right, I'm giving up my pencils. Is that what he will say tonight from the White House? Will it be a message about affordability, health care? Possibly. With what we've seen already today on Capitol Hill, we're going to get there in a moment. Republicans signing on a discharge petition to force a vote to extend Obamacare subsidies. Maybe it will be an announcement about the Venezuelan blockade he posted about last evening. It's quite a menu of options as we turn to Bloomberg Washington correspondent Tyler Kendall at the White House right now, joining us live from the North Lawn. Tyler, are we hearing anything from the president about this speech tonight?
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D
Yeah. Hey, Joe. Well, you really gave a good outline there that this could span a range of topics. We have been going off of an interview and preview that the White House press secretary gave yesterday where she said President Trump is expected to tout his policies from the last year, but that he could also preview new policies as it appears that the White House has been trying to dictate change that narrative as we head into the midterms, particularly around affordability, because as you're talking about, this has been that issue that the White House has, I think it's fair to say, been on defense over in the past few weeks after Republicans lost a slew of elections just last month. And since then, we've seen President Trump go out on the campaign trail, Vice President Vance go out on the campaign trail, and the administration push forward some new policy ideas, such as refloating, the idea there could be tariff revenue, rebate checks. So it's going to be something that we are going to watch very closely here how the president, president navigates this, considering we know in his speech in Pennsylvania last week he did veer off topic and hit on some other key issues that we know are important to his base, such as immigration policy, as one example. But you hit on it at the top of the show. We are going to be watching really closely. At least I am personally, what he says when it has to do with health care. Because while this president has given us some indications on the type of support, the type of plan that he would support, we know that he wants to see less subsidies going to insurance companies. He hasn't really weighed in when it comes to the plans that are circulating on Capitol Hill. And Joe, as you know, as of now, it looks like Congress is set to adjourn and leave town without extending those expiring premium tax subsidies under the aca.
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B
It would be a big deal if you gave some direction to the Republican conference this evening. Tyler, I have to ask you about this post on Truth Social because indeed, we're looking for details about Venezuela as well. We're now using the word blockade, or at least the president is. And we want to be careful here because semantics mean a lot of the president on social media. Venezuela, he writes, is completely surrounded by the largest armada ever assembled in the history of South America. It will only get bigger and the shock to them will be like nothing they have ever seen before. Tyler, is this about regime change, what's about to happen?
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D
Well, Joe, you'll recall last week Bloomberg News had this incredible reporting, people familiar, telling us that we are about to enter into a new phase when it comes to the US Strategy against Venezuela, designed to get Nicolas Maduro to relinquish control. And that news phase started when the US Seized a foreign oil tanker for the first time last week since 2014. And now this latest move, you did mention semantics. It is important for us to make the distinction. According to Bloomberg Economics, this actually isn't a full blockade. This is what's known as a quarantine because it is narrowed into only sanctioned oil tankers. This does not extend to all vessels coming in and out of the waters around Venezuela. But this really does mark the latest escalation in the US Pressure campaign trying to now threaten to deny those important oil revenues for the country, which is already facing financial strain. So we're going to watch really closely how this ultimately does evolve, because it's not totally clear right now how this quarantine is going to be implemented when exactly it does start. But we're already starting to see potential buyers steered away. Right. Yesterday on the program, we spoke about how these four super tankers headed for Venezuela ultimately turned around and reversed course because the administration had been telegraphing that this move was going to happen. Joe, I'll point you to one other thing from our analysts at Bloomberg Economics, who we love to cite all the time. They say that when there is a pressure campaign, if that intended goal is not reached, there is normally only one direction of travel. And normally that direction of travel is up the escalation ladder.
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B
Well, pretty remarkable moment. We're in. Tyler, thank you so much. Tyler Kendall at the White House. The speech is set for 9pm Eastern time, as we mentioned. We'll carry it live here on Bloomberg TV and radio. Unclear what the venue will be, whether the president will be behind the Resolute desk in the Oval Office or somewhere else in the White House in the Cross hall, as he's been preferred to use more recently. He hasn't had a very heavy string of primetime addresses. Then again, this is a different White House. This is a president who addresses the nation just about every day, if not multiple times a day. What's happening now on Capitol Hill is important. If you're just joining us, we've seen a remarkable turn in the debate over extending Obamacare subsidies, realizing there will be a vote later today on a Republican plan that does not address Obamacare subsidies that may or may not pass and likely will with the Republican conference. Or will it be that easy? Because we saw a jailbreak earlier today with four Republicans who crossed the aisle in frontline districts in states including, well, it's just New York and Pennsylvania. If you're with us on Bloomberg tv, there's the lineup. Brian Fitzpatrick, Republican, Pennsylvania, Robert Bresnahan, Republican, Pennsylvania Ryan MacKenzie, Republican, Pennsyl, Pennsylvania and Mike Lawler, the Republican from New York, all sitting in districts that lean blue and wanted at least a vote on an Obamacare extension. When it became clear the speaker was not interested, they moved to a discharge petition that will force the vote. Those four brought that number to 218 and they are now in business right at this time. Yesterday I was talking about this matter with the chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, Jason Smith of Missouri, and asked him about the outcry from constituents that many lawmakers talk about. It doesn't seem that he's hearing from that many in his office. Listen, the person who would be calling me from Missouri would be someone on employer sponsored health care. And everything the Democrats is talking about has nothing to do with lowering the cost of of premiums for people who are on employee sponsored health care. And that's 164 million Americans. All that they're talking about is the 24 million people on exchanges. We need to lower the cost of health care. Every single American, not just the people on ACA. Mr. Smith, of course, is not in a frontline district and sees things differently than the four I just mentioned. We had the voice of a Democrat now in Congressman Suha Subramanian, the Democrat from Virginia's 10th district, with us live from Capitol Hill. Congressman, thank you for being part of our conversation today. This discharge petition will hit the floor. We will also go over the cliff. What happens then?
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E
Well, we'll see. I believe we'll be able to vote on this at some point. I don't know if it'll be before the end of the year, but I know that there are Republicans, more than four Republicans, who have supported the ACA tax credit extensions and understand that without them, health care costs will go up for millions of Americans, including many in their district. And so yes, we do have a cost issue when it comes to health care. Health care costs way too much right now. We need to do a lot to fix that. But the solution to the cost issue isn't what Republicans are putting forward, which is to take away care to a lot of people. Access to care, quality of care. That's their solution. And that's not a real solution because people will die under that solution. We have a solution where we can continue to figure out a long term solution, but in the meantime, also fund these tax credits that have been so essential to so many Americans getting health care access.
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B
Well, it's interesting that you mentioned that because a solution is going be to have to follow a gap of some sort. Right. It's clear that we will go over the cliff. This discharge petition would bring a vote to the floor, I'm guessing, Congressman, correct me if I'm wrong, likely mid January. Then something's got to happen with the Senate. And I know that there's a, there's a bill over there that's not too far apart from what the moderates have been looking at in the House with a smaller extension and some eligibility requirements. When could there be a law? How long will voters need to wait?
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E
Well, remember, for there to be a law, the president needs to sign it. Right. And so, yes, The Senate needs 60 votes to pass it. This president has not shown a willingness, not only that, he shut down the government so that we wouldn't have a conversation about these tax credits. We had that conversation anyway, but he still refused to reopen the government and have this conversation about health care. So I am a little pessimistic about these tax credits passing, but I'm still going to push forward. I know my colleagues are not going to stop. Colleagues now both sides of the aisle are not going to stop until we make sure that health care is affordable for millions of Americans.
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B
Well, this is where I ask you what you're hearing, you know, behind the scenes, what's happening in the cloakroom when you talk to other Republicans, because clearly you already said it, it's more than four here. What would this vote look like if it actually hit the floor? How many Republicans do these four members speak for?
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E
Well, I know far more than four wants to vote for them. I would say dozens want to vote for them. But you know, the reality is when Donald Trump calls them, they switch their votes based on what Donald Trump says. Now we have four Republicans who have changed their tune. And so maybe that could embolden more to follow. But this speaker and this Republican Congress has followed whatever Donald Trump has said to do. The Epstein files, even by the end, he said to vote for. And so that's what they did. But you know, we're at a place now where Republicans are starting to break away from Donald Trump because they know that he's toxic to our country and to even their party.
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B
Well, I know he's also got a lot of loyal members up there, Congressman. So it was a pretty remarkable moment when so Many Republicans put their name on a discharge petition to release the Epstein files. We haven't talked about this for a minute because that got the clock ticking. I think it was 30 days. Friday's the day that the files are supposed to be released. And yes, the president did sign that discharge petition. Now, law. Congressman, you're on the Oversight Committee. Should Americans prepare for this release, or is there going to be some reason at the 11th hour why they are not made public?
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E
You know, my crystal ball is foggy. I will say this, that if they do release something, I believe it'll not be a full release, that it'll be a partisan release. They'll try to find Democratic names in it. But if the president hasn't released the files by now, I don't think he will release the full files like he promised he did during his campaign last year or that he's required by law to do now. I'm a little skeptical at this point. If they wanted to release the files, they could have released it well before this coming Friday. If they really wanted to be transparent with the American people, it is coming.
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B
At the last hour. Is there anything that the Oversight Committee can do to further compel the attorney General to make this public?
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E
Well, now, you know, the Oversight Committee, we have had a subpoena out for these files for four months now, and they gave us one production that was 97% public documents. The other 3% weren't that helpful. And then that was it. And then there was radio silence from them. Now we're at a point where this is law and so someone can go to court and the courts can compel the administration to release the files. And we'll see if the administration wants to ignore court orders. We've had that conversation this year before.
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B
Well, we're about, what, 4,872 hours away from that being the case. Congressman, you must have seen this Susie Wiles interview. I can only imagine the conversations among members of the Oversight Committee. The White House chief of staff telling Vanity Fair that the president was just wrong when he invoked Bill Clinton as being complicit in the sex trafficking scandal surrounding Jeffrey Epstein. She said there was absolutely no evidence pointing to that. Will we hear from the Justice Department that it's an ongoing investigation all the while and therefore these files cannot be released again?
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E
The Justice Department works for the president at this point. He controls it and he's going to try to control what's released and how it's released. Another thing that she said in that interview was Trump is in the files and that, you know, he and Epstein were friends and they were, I think, playboys together, a single playboys together. And so it's pretty clear that there was a close relationship there. And that must be part of the reason why he hasn't released the files. That's at least what, you know, what I see from my vantage point. But I'm glad she did that interview because it was pretty incredible how she said all the quiet parts out loud about this president.
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B
Well, interesting moment. He's going to be speaking to the nation this evening, Congressman, and I'm wondering your thoughts about another potential government shutdown. You're in Virginia teeming with federal workers who just endured the longest federal shutdown in American history. Is there anything the president can say this evening to get the health care debate back on track and keep the government from shutting down when we run out of money at the end of January?
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E
Yeah, you know, the president can say, I want to work across the aisle to come up with a health care solution that's long term. And in the meantime, we can pass these tax subsidies to be able to help Americans afford health care. I think that alone will solve 90% of the problems we're having right now on Capitol Hill related to health care. I think the other thing he should do is try to figure out how to work together with us next year because otherwise 2026 is going to be a long year. I do not want a shutdown. I did not like this past shutdown, but we have to continue to fight for the American people.
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B
Well, 25 was a pretty long year, Congressman, so I guess we'll find out together. Thank you for being back with us, us on Bloomberg TV and Radio. Live from Capitol Hill, Congressman Suhas Subramanian, the Democrat from Virginia, with us here on Balance of Power. We'll have much more ahead with our political panel as well. Stay with us on Balance of Power. We'll have much more coming up after this.
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F
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- [16:47]
A
You're listening to the Bloomberg Balance of Power podcast. Catch us live weekdays at noon and 5pm Eastern on Apple CarPlay and Android Auto with the Bloomberg Business app. You can also listen live on Amazon Alexa from our flagship New York station. Just say Alexa, play Bloomberg 1130.
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B
They won't believe what's going on on Capitol Hill. We can't either. How many people have told us this was over, that we already went over the cliff, is what Troy Downing told us in our conversation here just a couple of days ago. But by God, I guess there's been another jailbreak. First it was Democrats in the Senate, remember, just enough to get the government to reopen. They crossed the leader. And now we have a Republican jailbreak in the House. Moderates in frontline districts, folks like Mike Lawler, the Republican from New York, other Republicans from Pennsylvania on here, Fitzpatrick and so on, who could be punished in the midterm election cycle for not extending Obamacare subsidies. Fitzpatrick, BRESNAHAN MacKenzie, meet Mr. Lawler. There's your four, if you're with us on YouTube. And so that forces a vote here. This is a done deal in the House. The question is, what happens after that? Because we are going over the cliff. And the Senate has no plans at least now, to take this up. In fact, a very similar plan has already failed in the Senate. This would extend Obamacare subsidies by three years. President Trump, by the way, has just touched down. He's on his way to Dover with the first lady, has just touched down at Joint Base Andrews. If something comes from his walk to the jet, if he decides to talk with reporters, we'll let you know. Want to play this to the panel, though, because we've got a live wire here. This happened just a couple of hours ago. When we woke up this morning, we did not know this would be our top story of the day, but it came from the speaker's decision to not bring this vote to the floor. So now he's being forced once again by the hands of his own membership. Bloomberg Politics contributor Rick Davis, our Republican strategist and partner at Stone Court Capital, is back just in time with us. And Arshi Siddiqui is here, Democratic strategist, former aide to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, the founder CEO of Bellwether Government Affairs. Great to see you both. Rick Davis, if you're one of these frontline Republicans, are you more concerned about your constituents than the angry phone call from Donald Trump.
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C
At this stage? Yes. Because you want to continue to get angry phone calls from Donald Trump over the next two years, which means you got to get reelected. And so that's going to come. First, we're already turning the page on this Congress. You're going to have a really intense midterm election cycle coming up. Advantage Democrats and these guys are scraping for their lives right now and that's why they've signed on to this discharge petition. Because as Lawler says, doing nothing is idiotic.
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B
Yes, he did. He used another word that we can't say on the air to describe the Speaker's decision to not bring this to the floor. We know that Mike Lawler doesn't like Obamacare and he never liked the idea of extending these subsidies. Is it his own personal belief that caused this to happen or he'll have a bigger revolt on his hands if he did bring this to the floor, the Freedom Caucus and all the rest.
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G
I mean, I think it just illustrates that on the ground this is such a huge issue in terms of how the cost of living crisis is impacting American families. So I think it really underscores a problem and there has been a little bit of a disconnect with a number of Republicans in terms of the saliency of this issue. There's a very easy way to do a, you know, a short term extension, a bridge to something bigger and litigate this in the election and to Rick's point, go into the next, you know, in next Congress with some decisions. But to go home for Christmas without doing this, I think is there's real political liability even with this vote. I think there's a serious conversation that at least must be happening to some extent about, well, if they have to vote on it, do they just let this die in January or do they just put something up, a one year extension, a clean extension to give that bridge to the midterm elections and bring.
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B
That to the floor of the Senate.
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E
You mean bring it?
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G
I would, I mean, honestly, I think in leadership it's, it's a live question on whether they should think about whether they could actually bring something up in the House and not have the discharge petition force our hand. And the only way they can do that is with the president's blessing, as you know.
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B
That would be a moment and look, he might call for that tonight. Rick, I'm just curious how far you can see beyond the valley here. When you were working for John McCain, he was part of any number of gangs of eight or six or whatever to solve a major crisis here. Now that this has happened, is that the next phase as opposed to John Thune taking this and throwing it on the floor? There's John McCain right now as we speak. Rick, does this Become a conversation where Senators and members of the House get together behind the scenes and craft something new that can then be voted on in both chambers.
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C
You know, I would say, and you know, not to over simplify the situation, but the days of having major personalities with power outside of leadership in the Democratic and Republican parties in the Senate has, has waned a lot. There used to be great lines of the Senate who never held leadership, but who could put together deals any time that would be honored by the leadership. Right. And whether it was a Democratic group led by Ted Kennedy or a Republican group led by John McCain, sometimes it's easier for them to do a deal like that than it is the leadership itself because they're balancing a lot of other interests. It's very hard these days to see that happening. Kudos to Susan Collins for using her perch as chairman of the Appropriations Committee, Very, very powerful Senator to try and craft something, you know, around this. Of course, she's running for reelection and a tough election year, so a lot of motivation on her part too. So, yes, I could see a gang of six emerging in the Senate to try and bridge this because even if this discharge petition passes, a three year extension is not something the Senate wants to vote on. And so I do think the question is, can they find some common ground where, you know, there's a shorter extension, maybe some limitations on enrollment and then send that back to the House for final approval. And I think if something like that did happen in the Senate, you would get House approval.
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B
Okay, there you go, Rick. Just made it nice and clean for us. Nice and simple. These four names, Arshi, Fitzpatrick, Lawler, Bresnahan, McKenzie speak for how many other Republicans do you think?
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G
I think this is very much front and center, a moderate marginal district issue because I think in other districts, as we know, they are so heavily tilted Republican, there's a lot of latitude and the Affordable Care act has become so ideological on the Republican side. I remember there were some internal discussions, buzz about whether Democrats were making it too easy for Republicans by solving the ACA problem, by pushing it. But it's just turned out that this is, there is such a strong contingent that wants to, you know, really weaken and repeal the ACA. We've seen 70 votes, as you know.
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B
That's right, Rick. The President speaking to the nation this evening and you know, we're all going to spend the whole day trying to figure out what he's going to say. It does present an opportunity for him, does it not, to speak to this and give direction to his own Party.
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C
I think. So he has assiduously stayed out of this issue, which is a little bit surprising because he's had firm command on virtually every legislative item that's happened in the last year. And so, yes, it does give him a chance to signal. But I'm not even sure Donald Trump has the level of power today that he had even just a few months ago to get something through the House. I mean, conservative Republicans have staked out a very hard position that adding another $70 billion in the deficit is a bad strategy by extending these ACA subsidies for three years. And they're really grumpy about doing anything. It looks like we're signing on to Obamacare. And so I think that's one of the reasons why Trump has said nothing. And I wouldn't be surprised that it doesn't get a lot of discussion other than, you know, we need to replace Obamacare tonight, which is what everyone's been saying in the Republican Party for almost two decades.
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G
He did try to say something, though. Remember the week of Thanksgiving, he was floating, maybe putting something out there and got pushed back.
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B
He suggested there might be a deal. Does a move like this maybe warm him up to this idea again?
- [25:48]
G
I think possibly. And I think the other piece here is that I think if you the notion of a one year kind of bridge, a clean one year bridge, you then get, that's the bipartisan aspect of this. You don't need the hardcore debt Democrats who want the three years. You don't need the hardcore Republicans who want to focus on, you know, repealing and replacing aca. So you come into this like this, the center to pass policy.
- [26:13]
B
So we can do this a couple of ways, the way Rick just described here with the Susan Collins Bill. Maybe we get back to something that looks like a negotiation, a compromise, maybe a new law is written, or we continue down the road we're on now where the only way you get to the floor is through discharge petition, the only way you move new money or fiscal policy is through reconciliation, and maybe we extend that. The only way you move a bill in the Senate is to kill the filibuster. Is that what's coming next?
- [26:44]
G
I wouldn't go as far as the filibuster because I do think there's some, still some institutionalists in the Senate that would protect that, hopefully. But obviously we've seen the president has been very opinionated on that front. And, you know, in this, this era that we're living in, all roads lead back to Donald Trump.
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B
Rick, what was going on in the offices of Republican members in the House of Representatives today. How is it that we get four? Exactly how does this stuff work? Because people hear stories like this and they will. Wait a minute, how did this land on the penny? These guys called around and said, look, I'm going to sign on to the petition so you don't have to. How does it work like this? And how many other Republicans do they represent?
- [27:22]
C
Yeah, there's a lot of self awareness amongst the membership. They know who's talking to the Democrats about signing on petitions like this. And nobody wants to be the extra vote. Right. Why pay the price? And so, yeah, there's probably a couple of calls. I know Congressman Valdodano from California would probably been an extra vote and said yesterday publicly that he was inclined to sign up. And I'm sure someone called and said, hey, we got four, you don't need to walk the plank. And so he gets the vote that he wants without having to actually look like he's jumping ship to do business with the Democrats. So yes, there is a ballet going on in the House of Representatives these days and it's not the Nutcracker.
- [28:08]
B
Well put as ever. Big thanks to our great panel, Rick Davis and Arshi Siddiqui. Stay with us on Balance of Power. We'll have much more coming up after this.
- [28:20]
F
These days it seems like AI agents are just about everywhere you turn, every field and every function. But without identity, you can't trust they'll serve your business instead of jeopardizing it. Fortunately, OKTA helps you get identity right by securing your AI agents identities, giving you a single layer of control, a single standard of trust. So whether an AI agent supports a single user or your entire enterprise, with Okta you'll turn risk into opportunity. Secure every agent, secure any agent. Okta secures AI.
- [28:53]
A
You're listening to the Bloomberg Balance of Power podcast. Catch us live weekdays at noon and 5pm Eastern on Apple CarPlay and Android Auto with the Bloomberg business app Listen on demand wherever you get your podcasts or watch us live on YouTube.
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B
Thanks for spending part of your Wednesday with us. You staying up late tonight? You're watching this live. I read this morning this is the big Survivor finale tonight. They still have Survivor and the President's gonna interrupt it. We're wondering if he has something to say. We're also remembering how difficult it used to be for former presidents to get on in prime time. Maybe the honeymoon is still on. Barack Obama, Joe Biden. Not always so much to get roadblock coverage. It's not Just Bloomberg, by the way. And yeah, I'll be up late with you. Fox. Yes, fox, NBC, cbs, abc, FOX News, cnn. Yeah, Bloomberg TV and radio all taking this thing live in prime time. Starts at 9:00'.
- [29:53]
C
Clock.
- [29:53]
B
God, that's late for me. But, you know, I'm old. I do prefer the hours of 12 to 5 that we try to keep on a regular basis. But in all seriousness, this is a big question about why now and what's he going to talk about? Could it be affordability? Look no further than the latest polling from Ipsos with our friend Cliff Young standing by to join us. The headline, he sends us these great decks. The headline, economic Concerns Resurgence. There he is. Cliff Young from ipsos. Welcome back to Bloomberg. It's great to see you, sir.
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H
Yeah, it's great to be here.
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B
Scroll down here. And I see consumer confidence remains muted. And more importantly, the economy reemerges as the main issue facing America today. I don't know when it ever faded. I know it was confused a lot with immigration and other big issues on the campaign trail. But we could argue the economy is what brought Donald Trump back into the White House. Is it what will bring Democrats into power on Capitol Hill?
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H
Well, it was a critical issue that Donald Trump surfed in 2024. He won the 2024 elections, as you said, Joe, based on the economy, more specifically, inflation. And for the first little bit, the first, let's say, semester of 2025, the issue wasn't the economy. It became political threats to democracy, political extremism. They kind of outstretched the other issues. A lot of it had to do with the friction that the Trump administration was causing, especially when it came to tariffs and doge, for instance. But in the last little bit over the last month, our polling has shown that threats of democracy has dropped by the wayside. And it's the economy front and center. And more specifically, based on a lot of the polling that we're doing, what keeps reemerging? Affordability. Affordability.
- [31:40]
B
Affordability, yeah. It's amazing. As the President refers to that as a Democratic hoax, it's hard to argue with what you're seeing here. His approval rating saw a little bit of a bump in December. It's still underwater, though.
- [31:52]
H
Yeah, I wouldn't say it's underwater like, so where is he right now? It's about 43% or so. What does that mean?
- [31:58]
B
His account is underwater anymore?
- [32:00]
H
Well, I don't call it underwater. Others may call it, I see it as, you know, marginal. If you dip below 40, then you're in a really bad place. A sitting President at 40% approval rating has about a 50% chance of winning the next election. That's just a proxy for your ability to push forward your agenda. At 43, you're not in a great place, but you're not in a terrible place. An incumbent wants to be in the mid-40s, but what we can say is he only approved a point or so. But tariffs are rearing their ugly heads. Americans are beginning to feel that on the margins. And I would expect in Q1 of next year the tariff issue to really have an impact.
- [32:38]
B
So 40 is the new 50. Just kidding. The President's approval when it comes to cost of living. There's a headline in here here asking whether he's losing the MAGA base. What do Republicans think about the economy?
- [32:51]
H
They think it's not doing so well either. I mean, they are across the board. Americans of all stripes, all colors, all places really feel the economy has taken a hit. More specifically, affordability. When you look kind of peel the onion away, who is he losing? On the one hand, he's losing those that lean Republican. They're not staunch MAGA people, but they lean Republican. They voted for him in 2024. He brought them in the coalition. They do not feel like their lives have improved. In addition to that is less affluent Americans, minorities, younger Americans, all of them are feeling the pinch.
- [33:26]
B
The jobs report we saw yesterday, the highest unemployment rate in four years. Black unemployment specifically, above 8%. Are we starting to connect the dots on what this speech might be about tonight?
- [33:39]
H
Well, he definitely has a problem. And the Republicans more specifically have this problem, have this affordability problem. Americans not only are worried about that, they're in a surly mood. They don't feel like the administration has taken action on it. Now, the question is, will this speech be about the issue of affordability directly? Will it be perhaps trying to focus the American population on another issue like Venezuela? We have to wait and see. But without a doubt, the administration has hit choppy waters.
- [34:07]
B
What are you learning about about Venezuela? What do people think about what's going on down there?
- [34:11]
H
It's just sort of middling. You know, overall, Americans don't like foreign intervention, especially maga. Yeah, they. Especially maga. They voted for him to like to take American troops out of harm's way. They don't want a muscular foreign policy. They don't like Gaza, they don't like Ukraine, and they really don't like Venezuela. Now, I wouldn't say they are rejecting it, but it's a Very, very lukewarm, vanilla feel for it. Nothing that an administration would want when and if they go into harm's way.
- [34:41]
B
Boy, it speaks to the whole national security America first issue when it comes to this president. Does a speech like tonight move the needle on an approval rating or do not enough people watch this in real time anymore? I mean, I just went through this Alphabet soup of networks. Most people, let's be honest, are going to watch this on Chopped up on Twitter tomorrow morning, right?
- [34:59]
H
Yeah, it's all going to be on X. They're going to be looking at it there. But these sorts of speeches typically never had an impact, is that right? With general, with public opinion in general. Where they have an impact is among elites. So it's signaling to donor. Donor class, signaling to sort of political leads that you're taking the action they expect that you're aligning in certain ways. Typically a speech like this does that. We'll have to wait and see.
- [35:21]
B
Running numbers on the ballroom. You see, the ballroom is going to get more expensive. I'm being half serious here. But this idea of private funding, funding, crony capitalism, whatever your headline's going to be here, $400 million in private funding raises a lot of questions. Do people care about this or is this inside the Beltway talk?
- [35:41]
H
No, it goes to the notion that the system's broken. You know, super majority of Americans believe the system is broken. The details are less important. The fact that the administration's focus on something that no one would say was important and it's front and center.
- [35:56]
B
Center.
- [35:56]
H
It's very symbolic. It's not good. Is it a death knell? No, but it doesn't help.
- [36:01]
B
When you go to the big White House Christmas party this year. Check on the East Wing for us and let us know what's going on.
- [36:06]
H
I will be. It'll be quite cold there.
- [36:07]
B
I believe that's true. Wide open, Cliff. Thank you, Cliff. Young Ipsos with us live in Washington. Okay, that sets the baseline. Remember this conversation at 9:00, clock tonight, 90130, when the President starts speaking. I'm still curious about the venue. Is this an oval address?
- [36:22]
D
Yes.
- [36:23]
B
It's not. Not his preferred venue, maybe. We've got the podium set up in the Cross Hall. I don't know. We'll get an office pool going on that in time for the late edition of Balance of Power. I'm Joe Matthew in Washington. Thanks for being with us here as we turn to Wall street, of course. Well, the markets are going to be watching this too, but more specifically We've got a lot of concerns about the AI unwind as Charlie Pellet tells us every 20 minutes that these things keep reaching lower hour. We've also got our eyes on crypto though. Yeah, that's down to risk off. You've got a Vix at 17. The only thing moving higher ironically is oil which has been in the tank lately. Good opportunity to check in with Christine, our managing editor for Bloomberg Markets Live blog, Christina Kino in the Fishbowl live in New York. Christine, what's going on here? Are we going to set a floor? I thought we were supposed to have a Santa Claus rally.
- [37:15]
A
I know, Joe, there's a lot of things that are really getting in the way. That Santa rally, rally and today specifically once again, AI worries coming back to the fore primarily because of news tied once again to Oracle. So I think the latest is again concerns around its ability to deliver on these data centers. Now that we've heard about Blue Owl pulling out from one of the deals that they have the Oracle trying to raise our investors that they're going to be able to deliver this. Remember also that the last, I guess bout of air worries that we got was also tied to news about Oracle Coal potentially having to delay some of its delivery of these data centers due to shortages regarding manpower and things like that. But overall, you know, this is really just adding up to, okay, is the trade still going strong or not? And you know, that's just putting a bit of a damper in the Santa rally that we were supposed to have.
- [38:07]
B
Yeah, well, it's like the old saying, you know, when America sneezes, the world catches a cold and Oracle sneezing. The question is whether it should be looked at in the same way as all the other companies in this space. Right, Christine? I mean, the balance sheet at Oracle is a big question right now. The company's taken on an enormous amount of debt in trying to facilitate the build out of all these data centers. But we've got another important name coming after the bell. And I'm wondering what you're looking at when it comes to Micron technology because its memory products are used in all these same data center buildouts, but it's also not laying out billions and billions of dollars the way Oracle is.
- [38:42]
A
Absolutely, Joe. And you're exactly right. Right. It really is all about the balance sheet questions and Oracle seems particularly vulnerable to that. I think the good news is that, you know, people are starting to recognize, okay, there's a bit of a differentiation here based on balance sheets, based on free cash flow abilities that a lot of the hyperscalers, like a lot of big companies involved in this isn't necessarily a problem for them. And I think now we're starting to see that divergence in the trade. The winners and the losers. Right. As far as Micro is concerned, I mean, yeah, big focus of course is whether they're going to be, you know, what their capex looks like for the year, whether they offer guidance that is good enough for investors. But these days good enough means you have to clear that bar, right? That's already high in terms of expectations. You have to clear that with a wide margin for investors to consider it good enough. So we'll see if Micron is able to do that tonight.
- [39:38]
B
Well, that's a great point. Is there any truth to this broadening out narrative here? We hear this so often, Christine. I'm sure you start rolling your eyes after a while, but you know, the RSP is actually pretty close to all time highs here. And you know, maybe we focus a little bit too much on these stocks because other parts of the market are feeling the love, right?
- [39:56]
A
Yeah, absolutely, Joe. I mean we have seen more signs of a broader stock rally, right? A lot of kind of more traditional names, consumer discretionary names even. That owes a lot of it to the fact that we have seen, even though it's been a mixed bag of data this week since we finally got data, is still pointing to a resilient consumer. Right. And so I think that's benefiting a lot of these kind of more traditional stocks.
- [40:22]
B
I was supposed to ask you about Medline. We got a big ip, the biggest one of the year. Christine, I know you're going to be watching and we will too. Thanks for listening to the Balance of Power podcast. Make sure to subscribe if you haven't already at Apple, Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts. And you can find us live every weekday from Washington D.C. at Noontime eastern@bloomberg.com.
- [40:43]
F
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- [41:40]
E
Com.