Latest / Bloomberg Intelligence / Assad’s Fall, Hershey Takeover
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- 0:02Speaker 1: Bloomberg Audio Studios, podcasts, radio news.
- 0:08Speaker 2: You're listening to the Bloomberg Intelligence Podcast. Catch us live
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- 0:17Speaker 2: wherever you get your podcasts, or watch us live on YouTube.
- 0:23Speaker 3: Let's get back to the geopoliticis coming out of the
- 0:25Speaker 3: Middle East. The Syrian president Bashar Assad is now in
- 0:28Speaker 3: Moscow after rebel forces took control of Damascus over the weekend,
- 0:33Speaker 3: ending nearly a century of his family's rule. His toppling
- 0:37Speaker 3: is sending shockwaves throughout the Middle East and will be
- 0:39Speaker 3: a major blow to Russia in Iran, President Joe Biden
- 0:42Speaker 3: hailed Usad's fall in an address to the nation on Sunday,
- 0:46Speaker 3: and take a listen.
- 0:47Speaker 4: It's a moment of historic opportunity the long suffering people
- 0:51Speaker 4: of Syria to build a better future for the proud country.
- 0:55Speaker 4: It's also a moment of risk and uncertainty as we
- 0:59Speaker 4: all turn into question of what comes next.
- 1:02Speaker 3: All right, that was President Biden with some comments Sunday
- 1:05Speaker 3: regarding what's happening in Syria. Let's get some more analysis
- 1:08Speaker 3: on this unfolding situation. Aaron David Miller, Senior Fellow at
- 1:13Speaker 3: the Carnegie Dowmon for International Peace, joins us from Washington,
- 1:16Speaker 3: DC via zoom. Aaron, thanks so much for joining us here.
- 1:19Speaker 3: Do we have any idea who's in charge over.
- 1:21Speaker 1: There in Sirius in Syria?
- 1:24Speaker 5: Well, right now, it's thanks for having me. Right now,
- 1:27Speaker 5: it's Ahmadshara. Who's nam Da gary Ka, also known as
- 1:32Speaker 5: Abu Muhammadani al Jiulani, born in Saudi parents were originally
- 1:40Speaker 5: from the Golan Heights, which is why he took the
- 1:43Speaker 5: name Algulani. Formerly associated with both the Islamic STATEA and
- 1:49Speaker 5: Ol Kaida, He's evolved over the last five or six years,
- 1:53Speaker 5: running the province of Ibleb relatively inclusively, reaching out to
- 2:00Speaker 5: Kurds and to the Druis. You know, it's hard to know.
- 2:07Speaker 5: Rebelling is hard, Governing is frankly a lot harder. And
- 2:10Speaker 5: the track record here for overthrowing Arab authoritarians is not
- 2:15Speaker 5: terribly uplifting. Egypt, the Bark's gone, a more repressive authoritarian
- 2:20Speaker 5: military government replaced him. Tunisia ben Ali aspiring democracy and
- 2:27Speaker 5: now an authoritarian government. Saddam Hussein Iraq's pretty dysfunctional. A
- 2:34Speaker 5: lot of disappointments there. Yemen Abdala salav overthrown. The Huthis
- 2:40Speaker 5: are in charge of much of the country. Siria may
- 2:43Speaker 5: have a better chance. Headlines appear to be pretty good,
- 2:50Speaker 5: not a lot of repression and retribution. Yet Glani's thinking
- 2:55Speaker 5: as singing a pretty moderate tune invited the international press
- 2:58Speaker 5: in sending signals to the Alowi community in Latakia that
- 3:03Speaker 5: not interested in retribution. I guess, guys, the question will
- 3:07Speaker 5: be power sharing. It'll be power sharing, and it'll be
- 3:11Speaker 5: whether or not the Islamic principles and strictures of these
- 3:16Speaker 5: Asunni political Islamics can be reconciled a with the largely
- 3:22Speaker 5: traditional secular Syrian elite, and whether or not, you know
- 3:30Speaker 5: you can govern. Syria is broke, heavily indebted to the iraniance.
- 3:36Speaker 5: Oil industry is muddled to two and a half billion
- 3:40Speaker 5: barrels a day. It pales before the larger producers, so
- 3:46Speaker 5: it's going to be a real heavy lift.
- 3:48Speaker 6: Syria borders what Israel, Lebanon, Jordan, Iraq and also Turkey.
- 3:55Speaker 6: Does the response by one dictate the response overall by
- 3:59Speaker 6: the others?
- 4:00Speaker 5: Well, you know, it's been the playground for external intervention
- 4:04Speaker 5: since the beginning of the Civil War. The Turks have
- 4:08Speaker 5: had a huge role to play, as you pointed out,
- 4:10Speaker 5: Iran Isabella, and of course Russia doesn't share contiguous borders,
- 4:15Speaker 5: but was the key broker and savior redeemer of the
- 4:20Speaker 5: outside regime when it was challenged in twenty fifteen. I
- 4:24Speaker 5: think that the prospects for external intervention is still there,
- 4:27Speaker 5: and by the way, the Israelis need to be definitely
- 4:30Speaker 5: put into the mix. Prospects or external invention are there,
- 4:34Speaker 5: but the real troublemakers the Iranians, I would argue the
- 4:40Speaker 5: Russians Isabella. They've been set back. There's more agency now
- 4:45Speaker 5: for Syrians to function and focus on Syria than at
- 4:50Speaker 5: any time in the last decade or so. The Turks
- 4:54Speaker 5: are now the big boys on the proverbial block, and
- 4:58Speaker 5: their motives are mixed here, but they will be the
- 5:02Speaker 5: great power, the regional power to watch.
- 5:05Speaker 3: All right, eron, Thank you so much for joining us,
- 5:06Speaker 3: Aaron David Miller, he's a senior fellow at the Carnegian
- 5:09Speaker 3: Dowmond for International piece joining us from Washington, DC. And
- 5:13Speaker 3: you know, one of the questions I have ongoing will
- 5:15Speaker 3: be what role with any will the US play and
- 5:18Speaker 3: how this thing develops, and we.
- 5:19Speaker 6: Did mention we will for the flow of refugees, which
- 5:23Speaker 6: from Syria has kind of shaped the political landscape.
- 5:26Speaker 3: Of Europe yep. And I'm just kind of seeing some
- 5:29Speaker 3: of the reporting today. You know, two and a half
- 5:31Speaker 3: million of refugees have gone to Turkey and some three
- 5:34Speaker 3: million to your point, John, So again a fluid situation
- 5:38Speaker 3: over there.
- 5:39Speaker 1: Will keep up with the reporting.
- 5:42Speaker 2: You're listening to the Bloomberg Intelligence Podcast. Catch us live
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- 6:01Speaker 3: Let's refocus on what is happening on the geopolitical front,
- 6:04Speaker 3: because clearly front and center for many investors, particularly what's
- 6:07Speaker 3: happening in Syria over the last several days. Kirsten Fontin
- 6:10Speaker 3: Rose joins US. She's a president of Red six Internationals.
- 6:14Speaker 3: She's also a Senior Fellow at the Atlanta Council and
- 6:16Speaker 3: was a senior director for the Middle East and the
- 6:18Speaker 3: last US administration. Kirsten, what's happening in the Middle East
- 6:23Speaker 3: and why is that happening now?
- 6:26Speaker 7: It's an interesting confluence of potentially unrelated events in the
- 6:32Speaker 7: Middle East that is all leading to things like Iranian
- 6:35Speaker 7: foreign policy imploding Russia's model of taking fringe groups from
- 6:40Speaker 7: zero to hero, imploding Israel's ability to potentially uproot the
- 6:46Speaker 7: threats it faces from several fronts increasing So we're Turkey's
- 6:52Speaker 7: diplomatic efforts that looked a little precarious beginning to pay off.
- 6:57Speaker 7: So there are a whole lot of effects coming out
- 6:59Speaker 7: of these potential unrelated events. In terms of things like
- 7:03Speaker 7: Iran's implosion. They've spent years arming other militaries and militias
- 7:08Speaker 7: to antagonize their adversaries, and now each of these is
- 7:12Speaker 7: being decapitated except for the Houthis in Yemen, and so
- 7:15Speaker 7: Iran is going to be forced to update its foreign policy,
- 7:19Speaker 7: and we should be watching them for the choices they make.
- 7:21Speaker 7: For instance, will it double down on its militia model
- 7:24Speaker 7: and press its malicious in Iraq to stage work frequent attacks,
- 7:28Speaker 7: or is it going to build up the hooth these
- 7:30Speaker 7: capabilities in Yemen to interrupt shipping in the Red Sea,
- 7:33Speaker 7: perhaps even beyond the Red Sea to waters farther.
- 7:35Speaker 8: Northwest or south. Or is it going to.
- 7:38Speaker 7: Offer more support to groups like the Polisario in the
- 7:41Speaker 7: North Africa that it is supported before, or will it
- 7:44Speaker 7: completely flip flip the text on this and rush to
- 7:48Speaker 7: complete its fighter jet purses from Russia out of fear
- 7:52Speaker 7: that Israel may choose to hit them while they're down,
- 7:54Speaker 7: which is a realistic fear.
- 7:57Speaker 8: Again, we could see that it might.
- 7:58Speaker 7: Even be easier for Iran and the U to reach
- 8:00Speaker 7: a nuclear agreement now since one of the key sticking
- 8:03Speaker 7: points was the activity of Iran's militias that are now crippled.
- 8:06Speaker 7: So what'll we be watching to see how Iran plays this.
- 8:10Speaker 7: All we know so far is that it is confirmed
- 8:12Speaker 7: through foreign ministry statements that the supply route with which
- 8:17Speaker 7: it supplies weapons to Hibaala through Syria has been severed.
- 8:21Speaker 8: So this is to Israel's.
- 8:22Speaker 7: Advantage, and the Syrian foreign minister was part I'm sorry.
- 8:25Speaker 7: The Iranian foreign minister was part of a meeting in
- 8:27Speaker 7: Doha last Saturday in which several Arab foreign ministers joined him,
- 8:32Speaker 7: and they issued a joint statement calling for a ceasefire
- 8:36Speaker 7: and for a political solution in Iran. So it's interesting
- 8:38Speaker 7: to watch Iran now try to be part of a
- 8:41Speaker 7: solution instead of remaining part of the problem for all
- 8:44Speaker 7: the Syrians who are celebrating in the streets.
- 8:47Speaker 6: Was the murderous Assad regime ever a stabilizing factor in
- 8:51Speaker 6: that part of the world, And how do we gauge
- 8:55Speaker 6: whether or not the country has gone from the frying
- 8:58Speaker 6: pan into the fire.
- 9:00Speaker 7: To a certain extent, You're right, the Asad regime was
- 9:03Speaker 7: stabilizing only in the sense that it was predictable, and
- 9:06Speaker 7: many of the countries, including Golf States and Israel, at
- 9:09Speaker 7: some points, thought it was better to deal with the
- 9:12Speaker 7: devil they knew than deal with an unknown devil who
- 9:15Speaker 7: would potentially be an Islamist Jihada state as we may
- 9:19Speaker 7: be looking at now. So that fear led many of
- 9:22Speaker 7: them to think, if we can keep him in place,
- 9:25Speaker 7: we at least know what his redlines are, what his
- 9:28Speaker 7: capabilities are, and we don't see him making active moves
- 9:32Speaker 7: against any of us. He is simply enabling things that
- 9:36Speaker 7: threaten us, like housing Husbalah if you're Israel, or like
- 9:41Speaker 7: enabling the Captigone trade if you're the Golf or.
- 9:43Speaker 3: Jordan so Kirson, what role do you believe the US
- 9:47Speaker 3: should play, will play, if any, in Syria?
- 9:52Speaker 7: Well, right now we're watching the US administration really engage
- 9:55Speaker 7: in some diplomacy, trying to understand who the players are
- 9:59Speaker 7: and wanting to stay stay involved and up to date,
- 10:03Speaker 7: really urging for ceasefires, urging for things like humanitarian assistance
- 10:06Speaker 7: to continue to Syria.
- 10:08Speaker 8: The Donald Trump team has made it clear that they
- 10:10Speaker 8: don't do not think there's a.
- 10:12Speaker 7: US interest involved in getting engaged in this conflict right now,
- 10:17Speaker 7: They want to watch it play out. They are making
- 10:20Speaker 7: statements about Israel's right to definitely defend itself during all
- 10:24Speaker 7: of this against whatever may come, and they are making
- 10:27Speaker 7: statements about how this disavows Russia's promises to the region
- 10:33Speaker 7: that it is a strong security partner.
- 10:35Speaker 8: So you are seeing them way in on how they're
- 10:38Speaker 8: reading the.
- 10:39Speaker 7: Tea leaves, but not making any promises on a role
- 10:42Speaker 7: the US would play.
- 10:44Speaker 6: Does Israel use this now as the opportunity to address
- 10:49Speaker 6: all their security concerns as it related to the north
- 10:52Speaker 6: of the border.
- 10:54Speaker 8: That is the big question, It sure could.
- 10:56Speaker 7: The question that everyone is holding their breath on is
- 10:59Speaker 7: what will Israel do. We are already watching them this
- 11:01Speaker 7: week strike chemical weapons sites and stores of long range
- 11:05Speaker 7: missiles inside Syria to prevent either Iran back militias, Russia
- 11:09Speaker 7: or frankly unknown factions of HTS from taking possession of those.
- 11:13Speaker 7: And it's striking air defense radars, anti aircraft batteries, and
- 11:17Speaker 7: military aircraft on the ground in Syria as well to
- 11:20Speaker 7: ensure that the Israel can continue its operations to erase
- 11:24Speaker 7: weapons stockpiles that could threaten Israel in the future if
- 11:26Speaker 7: it did fall into these hands. And note also that
- 11:29Speaker 7: this would give them a clear path to fly over
- 11:32Speaker 7: Syrian airspace en route to Iran if desired. But we
- 11:36Speaker 7: could also see Israel choose a path where they work
- 11:39Speaker 7: with a new government in Syria to potentially establish peace
- 11:42Speaker 7: along their shared border. In fact, they may have already
- 11:45Speaker 7: made an overture to President Asad in Syria just before
- 11:49Speaker 7: his ouster, offering to encourage the US to throttle back
- 11:52Speaker 7: sanctions against him in exchange for him helping to halt
- 11:55Speaker 7: the flow of weapons from Iran to Hsbala through Syria.
- 11:59Speaker 7: And there's a hinge ready of the possibility that Israel
- 12:02Speaker 7: could also now reach out to HTS or the developing
- 12:06Speaker 7: transitional government inside Syria and in that the indication is
- 12:10Speaker 7: that HTS has deconflicted its operations near the Israeli border
- 12:14Speaker 7: in areas like Kunetra with the Israelis. So could this
- 12:18Speaker 7: paveaway for that border to quiet down and for peace there.
- 12:22Speaker 8: To be cemented.
- 12:23Speaker 7: Israel is logically concerned about Syria falling into the hands
- 12:26Speaker 7: of Islamist extremists and would not feel any peace was
- 12:30Speaker 7: secure as long as that ideology ruled Syria.
- 12:33Speaker 8: But peace on that border in the near to midterm.
- 12:36Speaker 7: Would definitely allow them to focus on things they need
- 12:39Speaker 7: to finish with Hamas and Husball up.
- 12:41Speaker 3: Hey, Kirsten, just about thirty seconds left. How big of
- 12:43Speaker 3: a blow is the fall of this Assad regime to
- 12:46Speaker 3: President Putin and Russia?
- 12:49Speaker 7: So the blow is that the Russian model is to
- 12:53Speaker 7: support unpopular dictators across the globe to gain access and
- 12:56Speaker 7: concessions to valuable resources in their countries. Syria was an example,
- 13:01Speaker 7: so or Niger, Mali, Burkina, Fosso, Central African Republic, and
- 13:06Speaker 7: Russia has relied on its air base in Syria to
- 13:08Speaker 7: fly people in and extracted gold.
- 13:11Speaker 8: And other minerals out.
- 13:12Speaker 7: So it's been more than even just the relationship with Syria,
- 13:15Speaker 7: and it's access to that naval base in Tartuose that
- 13:18Speaker 7: puts it so close to NATO and on the med
- 13:20Speaker 7: But now their operations in Africa and other places are
- 13:23Speaker 7: curtailed because of their reliance on that air base in Syria.
- 13:26Speaker 8: So to what extent in the long term this.
- 13:28Speaker 7: Will be curtailed depends on the relationship it develops and
- 13:32Speaker 7: the deal it strikes for use of the airbase by
- 13:34Speaker 7: whatever government is stood up in Syria. We also now
- 13:38Speaker 7: see Turkey saying it will not allow Russian vessels to
- 13:41Speaker 7: pass through the dark kneills until.
- 13:42Speaker 8: Russia makes peace with Ukraine.
- 13:44Speaker 7: So the fall in Syria is also impacting Russia's ability
- 13:47Speaker 7: to wage war in Ukraine.
- 13:48Speaker 3: All right, Kirsten, thank you so much for joining us.
- 13:50Speaker 3: Kirsten fontin Rose, President of Red six International, again the
- 13:54Speaker 3: latest on a continuing developing story in Syria and in
- 13:58Speaker 3: the Greater Middle East. I guess the one constant is turmoil.
- 14:03Speaker 3: It seems uncertainty change in that part of the world,
- 14:07Speaker 3: and we'll keep an eye on that.
- 14:10Speaker 2: You're listening to the Bloomberg Intelligence Podcast. Catch us Live
- 14:14Speaker 2: weekdays at ten am Eastern on Affo cardplaying Android otto
- 14:17Speaker 2: with the Bloomberg Business App. Listen on demand wherever you
- 14:20Speaker 2: get your podcasts, or watch us live on YouTube.
- 14:25Speaker 3: I'm Paul swinging your live here in our Bloomberg Interactive
- 14:27Speaker 3: Brokers studio. We're streaming live on YouTube as well as
- 14:30Speaker 3: ahead over YouTube dot Com search Bloomberg Podcast and that's
- 14:32Speaker 3: where you'll find this. Let's start off with a little
- 14:33Speaker 3: m and a nice busy Monday. I like that Mandalize
- 14:37Speaker 3: said Tamola takeover us chocolate maker Hershey, this is gonna
- 14:41Speaker 3: be a big deal.
- 14:41Speaker 1: I mean Hers, She's got a market cap.
- 14:43Speaker 3: Have like forty billion, another ten billion of debt, so
- 14:45Speaker 3: fifty billion of market for enterprise value. Jen Bartasha, she
- 14:48Speaker 3: covers as part of the world for Bloomberg Intelligence on
- 14:51Speaker 3: the retail side. Hey Jen, why is Mandalize considering this
- 14:55Speaker 3: deal for Hershey?
- 14:57Speaker 1: Hi, Paul.
- 14:58Speaker 9: So really, when we look at the deal, it's about
- 15:00Speaker 9: how are they going to prop up sales? How are
- 15:02Speaker 9: they going to continue to grow share? And they've been
- 15:05Speaker 9: very open that tacking on to their portfolio is one
- 15:08Speaker 9: of the methods that they do in order to really
- 15:12Speaker 9: continue to grow as a company. But this is a
- 15:15Speaker 9: big deal and so it would have to be really
- 15:20Speaker 9: it's really considered a transformational deal at this size.
- 15:23Speaker 6: Can you explain to everybody this mysterious entity known as
- 15:26Speaker 6: the Hershey Trust and how they can have to cooperate
- 15:30Speaker 6: in this?
- 15:31Speaker 9: Absolutely? So, Hershey is you know, has a long history,
- 15:36Speaker 9: and you know about eighty percent of their shares they
- 15:41Speaker 9: have a dual clust share structure, and about eighty percent
- 15:45Speaker 9: of voting shares are held by the Hershey Trust, which
- 15:48Speaker 9: means that they have to approve any kind of deal.
- 15:51Speaker 9: And this is really just because Hershey as a company
- 15:55Speaker 9: is that Hershey Trust uses money from Hershey in order
- 15:59Speaker 9: to support charities, right, and so the approval of the
- 16:03Speaker 9: trust is required. But in addition to that, Pennsylvania law
- 16:07Speaker 9: also requires that the Office of the Attorney General be
- 16:10Speaker 9: provided with notice of a deal, and that office has
- 16:13Speaker 9: the ability to stop a transaction if they think that
- 16:16Speaker 9: the fiduciary obligations of the trust will not be met.
- 16:19Speaker 9: So there are a lot of steps structurally in place
- 16:24Speaker 9: that could make such a takeover of Hershey really difficult.
- 16:28Speaker 3: All right, what does our anti trust analyst, Jennifer Ree,
- 16:31Speaker 3: what does she say about this deal with the DOJ,
- 16:33Speaker 3: the FTC and all the regulars DC, will they allow
- 16:35Speaker 3: this deal to go through?
- 16:36Speaker 9: Well, that's the other that's the next stumbling block. You know,
- 16:39Speaker 9: the FTC has been really reticent with regards to big deals,
- 16:45Speaker 9: especially in the last two years. When you look at
- 16:48Speaker 9: market share, which is really one of the things that
- 16:50Speaker 9: their decision would hinge off of. Hershey has has over
- 16:54Speaker 9: thirty seven percent of the US market share and Chocolate
- 16:58Speaker 9: Mandal's has just under two percent, So again you're not
- 17:02Speaker 9: combining two huge market shares, but together it would it
- 17:06Speaker 9: would continue to be the largest market share in the
- 17:09Speaker 9: United States, and that is higher than what Mars has
- 17:12Speaker 9: as well.
- 17:12Speaker 6: They trying to do this before Ray they did.
- 17:15Speaker 9: They tried this in twenty sixteen, and back in twenty sixteen,
- 17:19Speaker 9: the enterprise value of Her She was only twenty five billion.
- 17:22Speaker 9: Today it's, as Paul said at the opening, you know,
- 17:25Speaker 9: closer to fifty billion. So you know it's they walked
- 17:29Speaker 9: away last time because they weren't able to get all
- 17:32Speaker 9: of the approvals in place, and the cost wasn't they
- 17:36Speaker 9: weren't able to offer the premium that her She was
- 17:38Speaker 9: looking for. So there are a lot of questions of
- 17:41Speaker 9: whether this deal would actually go through and if an
- 17:44Speaker 9: offer could be made that would be tempting enough for Hershey.
- 17:47Speaker 3: All right, Jen, thanks so much for joining us at
- 17:49Speaker 3: Jen Bartasha. She covers all the retail stuff for Bloomberg Intelligence.
- 17:52Speaker 3: Give's some thoughts on this deal, Mondo Liz taking a
- 17:55Speaker 3: look at Hershe system.
- 17:56Speaker 6: I'm thinking chocolate covered maccheese.
- 17:58Speaker 1: Sure, why not? That could be a new thing. You
- 18:00Speaker 1: got a product extension, you know.
- 18:03Speaker 3: I pitched the Hershey Trust a billion times a sell
- 18:05Speaker 3: and it got nowhere.
- 18:07Speaker 1: So I'll be intering to see who and you had
- 18:08Speaker 1: it in finally get Yeah, who finally gets paid.
- 18:10Speaker 2: Here you're listening to the Bloomberg Intelligence Podcast. Catch us
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- 18:25Speaker 2: York station Just Say Alexa, playing Bloomberg eleven thirty.
- 18:30Speaker 1: More newsflow Here today, we're going to stay on top
- 18:32Speaker 1: of it.
- 18:33Speaker 3: A marine veteran who used a chokehold on an agitated
- 18:36Speaker 3: subway rider was acquitted Monday in a death that became
- 18:40Speaker 3: a prison for differing views about public safety, valor, and vigilanteism.
- 18:44Speaker 1: Let's break it down.
- 18:45Speaker 3: We have Miles Miller joining us here, a Bloomberg's managing
- 18:48Speaker 3: editor here in our studio.
- 18:50Speaker 1: Miles, what's going on here? Give us a background of
- 18:52Speaker 1: the story.
- 18:53Speaker 10: Yeah, so this goes back to May one, twenty twenty three.
- 18:57Speaker 10: Jordan Neely and Michael Jackson, impersonator is on a train
- 19:01Speaker 10: and he's begging for money. And it starts out with
- 19:04Speaker 10: just begging for money and then it turns into something
- 19:07Speaker 10: which Daniel Penny, a former marine, found threatening. He decided
- 19:12Speaker 10: to a place nearly in a chokehold to restrain him
- 19:16Speaker 10: and it wound up taking his life. Now, you know,
- 19:20Speaker 10: in covering, you know what happened after that. He you know,
- 19:22Speaker 10: obviously there was a video of it and all of that.
- 19:25Speaker 10: He didn't initially get charged. He then was charged days
- 19:29Speaker 10: later after protests. And when he was charged, he was
- 19:32Speaker 10: charged with initially manslaughter and criminally negligent homicide. Now manslaughter
- 19:37Speaker 10: and criminally negligent homicide. So what happened on Friday is
- 19:41Speaker 10: that the jury told the judge that they were hopelessly
- 19:43Speaker 10: deadlocked and could not come to an agreement on that
- 19:47Speaker 10: tougher charge being guilty of manslaughter.
- 19:49Speaker 6: And boy did this touch of nerve. I mean, just
- 19:51Speaker 6: walking in midtown yesterday, the number of free Penny stickers
- 19:55Speaker 6: on lampposts elsewhere. Being in the subway confronted by someone
- 20:00Speaker 6: who may be mentally unstable, the threat there as a
- 20:05Speaker 6: subway rider, as an individual, it just enhanced by that atmosphere.
- 20:10Speaker 10: Yeah, and the jurors ultimately decided today that his actions
- 20:13Speaker 10: weren't criminal when he held Jordan Neely in that choke
- 20:17Speaker 10: hold to prevent what he thought would be danger to
- 20:20Speaker 10: other people in that car. The jurors came to that
- 20:24Speaker 10: decision this morning. He was acquitted, and there were cheers
- 20:27Speaker 10: outside of the court. There are people there in support
- 20:30Speaker 10: and in protest to him. In fact, Jordan Neely's father
- 20:33Speaker 10: was inside the courtroom shouted, had to be removed by
- 20:36Speaker 10: court officers.
- 20:37Speaker 6: How much of this, in your opinion, sort of mirrors
- 20:41Speaker 6: We have to go pretty far back. But the subway
- 20:44Speaker 6: vigilantic case in the form of Bernie Getz.
- 20:47Speaker 10: Yeah, you know, I was in the courtroom the day
- 20:50Speaker 10: that Daniel Penny was brought in the day he was
- 20:53Speaker 10: let out of the Fifth Precinct, and that comparison had
- 20:56Speaker 10: been made by so many legal scholars, and it would
- 20:58Speaker 10: appear again today that you know that this was a
- 21:02Speaker 10: determination by these jurors that in fact, this was a
- 21:06Speaker 10: case of a person trying to step into help and
- 21:08Speaker 10: they felt that he was just trying to help and
- 21:11Speaker 10: he didn't mean to take this person's life, and drawing
- 21:14Speaker 10: obviously comparison, Sabernie gots so.
- 21:16Speaker 3: This case, this, according to the eightp the case amplified
- 21:19Speaker 3: many American fault lines, among them race, politics, crime, urban life,
- 21:24Speaker 3: mental illness, and homelessness. Mister Neely was black, mister Penny
- 21:29Speaker 3: is white. Did the judge even acknowledge that type of stuffer?
- 21:34Speaker 3: Is they trying to really stay here?
- 21:35Speaker 10: You know, they stayed to the merits of this case.
- 21:38Speaker 10: I think that, you know, obviously outside the courtroom and
- 21:40Speaker 10: the windows were open in the courtroom today and throughout
- 21:43Speaker 10: the trial inside the courtroom, you could hear the chance
- 21:47Speaker 10: of people who were on both sides of the divide here.
- 21:50Speaker 10: And in fact, they called for a mistrial today, the
- 21:52Speaker 10: defense team because they said that was going to you know,
- 21:55Speaker 10: that was going to make sure the jury wasn't impartial,
- 21:57Speaker 10: and it they actually turned out the other way. The
- 21:59Speaker 10: jury found that in this case, Daniel Penny did not
- 22:04Speaker 10: mean to do this. And it's actually it's really interesting
- 22:07Speaker 10: because there was a case just like this in Brooklyn.
- 22:09Speaker 10: Another guy was threatening people on the train. This other
- 22:13Speaker 10: guy went up to him, confronted him, and the Brooklyn
- 22:18Speaker 10: DA said, there's no case here. This was a guy
- 22:20Speaker 10: who was trying to do the right thing. The guy
- 22:21Speaker 10: wound up dying, and you know, it drew parallel to
- 22:24Speaker 10: this case. The only thing is in both the race
- 22:27Speaker 10: of both of those people who were the same in Brooklyn,
- 22:30Speaker 10: in this case it was different, and it was obviously
- 22:32Speaker 10: a charge environment.
- 22:32Speaker 6: Well what was the makeup of the jury here? And
- 22:34Speaker 6: did they all say they were frequent users of the subway?
- 22:38Speaker 10: You know, I looked at a sketch, you know, I
- 22:40Speaker 10: looked at the sketch of the jurors and it was
- 22:42Speaker 10: a it was a mix of New York City and
- 22:45Speaker 10: you know, they questioned, do people, you know in their
- 22:48Speaker 10: wardier process, do you take the subway? Do you know
- 22:51Speaker 10: anything about this case? It's kind of impossible to find
- 22:53Speaker 10: a jury that didn't know anything about this case because
- 22:55Speaker 10: it was a fever pitch when this happened.
- 22:57Speaker 6: So we pivot real quick and get the update on
- 22:59Speaker 6: the United Health Group executive Brian Thompson his murder in Midtown.
- 23:04Speaker 2: Yeah.
- 23:05Speaker 10: So this morning in Altuna, Pennsylvania, police there held a
- 23:10Speaker 10: man for questioning a connection with this shooting. The man
- 23:13Speaker 10: was in a McDonald's in Altuna, Pennsylvania for some reason.
- 23:17Speaker 10: I think he was trying to pay for something at
- 23:18Speaker 10: that McDonald's and had to show an ID. He had
- 23:20Speaker 10: multiple fake IDs. People at that McDonald's called local police.
- 23:24Speaker 10: When they called, and they and they came. They found
- 23:27Speaker 10: that this man had multiple identifications and a gun with
- 23:30Speaker 10: a suppressor on him. Police from the NYPD are headed
- 23:34Speaker 10: to Altuna, Pennsylvania right now. It would make sense that
- 23:38Speaker 10: this person who's being questioned could be the same person, because,
- 23:41Speaker 10: of course they believe he took a bus out of
- 23:43Speaker 10: the bus terminal in Washington Heights. One of the roots
- 23:46Speaker 10: that you can do is go to Pennsylvania. They had
- 23:49Speaker 10: been searching all weekend for the gun, and if this
- 23:53Speaker 10: is correct, if police are able to boil this out,
- 23:56Speaker 10: it would appear that that gun wasn't in Central Park,
- 23:58Speaker 10: but rather on him of course, his weekend. They found
- 24:00Speaker 10: a book bag they believe linked to him and some
- 24:03Speaker 10: other evidence, but they had not been able to find
- 24:06Speaker 10: definitive DNA leading them to the suspect.
- 24:09Speaker 1: Miles, thank you so much for joining us. Appreciate your reporting.
- 24:12Speaker 3: Miles Miller, Bloomberg Managing Editor, keeping us up to date
- 24:16Speaker 3: on breaking news throughout the day and a lot.
- 24:18Speaker 1: Going on here. We appreciate getting a few minutes of
- 24:20Speaker 1: his time.
- 24:21Speaker 2: This is the Bloomberg Intelligence Podcast, available on Apple, Spotify,
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