Latest / Balance of Power / Fmr. Biden National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan on Iran, Israel and Ukraine

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Fmr. Biden National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan on Iran, Israel and Ukraine · Balance of Power

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Speaker 2: On this first day post MoU expiration. Yes, the sixty
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Speaker 2: day memorando understanding in that ceasefire period in which there
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Speaker 2: was supposed to be a negotiation over the long term
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Speaker 2: deal to bring peace between the United States and Iran
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Speaker 2: or some form of it, is over, and yet no
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Speaker 2: new talks are on the books, and perhaps they will
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Speaker 2: not be if you listen to the words of the
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Speaker 2: President or read them on True Social Today, as he says,
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Speaker 2: there are no talks or conversations going on or scheduled
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Speaker 2: with the Islamic Republic of Iran. The naval blockade, he says,
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Speaker 2: remains in full force and effect. The straightuorform News is
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Speaker 2: open and operating. All water mines have been removed or detonated.
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Speaker 2: This is with the repeated suggestion he is made that
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Speaker 2: the US does indeed control the Strait via this blockade.
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Speaker 2: As we heard from him once again yesterday in the
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Speaker 2: Oval Office.
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Speaker 3: Then what am I get?
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Speaker 4: Deal? But they're not going to make the kind of
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Speaker 4: a deal that I feel is necessary. Look, we're in
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Speaker 4: there for one reason. Iran cannot have a nuclear weapon.
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Speaker 4: We control it with the blockade. We have a blockade.
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Speaker 4: We control it with the blockade. And I like the
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Speaker 4: idea of declaring it a territory.
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Speaker 5: The territory of the United States. We'll see if we
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Speaker 5: ever get that far. It's difficult to tell exactly what's happening,
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Speaker 5: As Kaylee mentioned, the President saying there are no talks
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Speaker 5: going on after Jared Kushner suggested otherwise. All in the
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Speaker 5: last twenty four hours and ahead of our conversation with
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Speaker 5: Jake Sullivan, we set the baseline with Tyler Kendall, who's
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Speaker 5: live on the north lawn of the White House. Bloomberg
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Speaker 5: Washington correspondent Tyler. The President also said that all water
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Speaker 5: mines have been removed or detonated. It was unclear until
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Speaker 5: this moment exactly what the status was. When it comes
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Speaker 5: to minds in the Strait, does that confirm that Iran
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Speaker 5: in fact did mine the Strait of Hormus.
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Speaker 6: It would appear so Joe, and we know that this
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Speaker 6: has been actually an ongoing issue in the Iran Oman talks.
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Speaker 6: Keeping in mind that a few months ago, when we
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Speaker 6: had first learned the updates, that Iran and Oman were
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Speaker 6: trying to figure out some sort of system when it
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Speaker 6: comes to monitoring traffic in the Strait of Hermus. One
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Speaker 6: of the ideas was to use that so called middle passage,
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Speaker 6: not the US coordinated route that hugs the coast of Oman,
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Speaker 6: not that route that hugs the coast of Iran. But
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Speaker 6: perhaps the biggest concern at the time was that that
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Speaker 6: middle passage had mines that had been laid. This does
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Speaker 6: appear to be part of President Trump's bid to reassure
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Speaker 6: that the strait is quote open and operating in his words,
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Speaker 6: but we also have to keep in mind the context.
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Speaker 6: Overnight we got confirmation from the UK Maritime Trade Organization
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Speaker 6: that one vessel was struck by an unknown projectile in
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Speaker 6: the Strait of Hermus, which prompted at least one casualty,
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Speaker 6: as well as for the Omani Coast Guard to conduct
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Speaker 6: a rescue mission for those remaining crew members aboard that ship.
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Speaker 6: So at this point, as you guys are outlining very
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Speaker 6: unclear exactly the status when it comes to the Strait,
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Speaker 6: but I will point out when we've spoken about it
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Speaker 6: before in this program, but it is something to watch,
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Speaker 6: the so called shuttling route, those shuttling vessels that turn
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Speaker 6: off their transponders, they go through the strait and then
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Speaker 6: once they make it through undetected, they transfer their cargo
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Speaker 6: to ships that are waiting just outside the waterway. But
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Speaker 6: Joe and Keiley, I bring that up because data analyzed
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Speaker 6: by Bloomberg shows that the UAES state owned oil company
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Speaker 6: has been the most successful at this. But people familiar
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Speaker 6: with the matter now tell Bloomberg that Saudi Arabia is
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Speaker 6: also going to start conducting these shuttle operations, but they
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Speaker 6: are expected to be more limited in scope, and of course,
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Speaker 6: interestingly enough are going to apply for Chinese refiners.
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Speaker 2: Well, that's something to watch, especially as we consider potential
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Speaker 2: economic screws that could be tightened against Iran and purchasers
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Speaker 2: of Iranian crude.
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Speaker 7: Tyler.
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Speaker 2: The Treasury Secretary Scott Bessett last week talked about announcements
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Speaker 2: that would be coming this week in terms of cutting
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Speaker 2: off Iran from the global economy. Do we have any
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Speaker 2: senses to whether that's still the plan when those announcements
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Speaker 2: might be coming.
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Speaker 6: At this point, Kaylee, we don't have that update from
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Speaker 6: the Trump administration the idea that they are going to
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Speaker 6: opt to tighten the economic pressure over say, restarting wide
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Speaker 6: spread military operations. Now. President Trump himself outlined that there
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Speaker 6: are not discussions, he says, currently with Iran, despite yesterday
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Speaker 6: saying that there had been discussions behind the scenes with
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Speaker 6: top levels of the IRGC, And I'll also give you
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Speaker 6: another headline from today Qatar's Foreign ministry saying that they
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Speaker 6: are currently focusing on getting the US and Iran back
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Speaker 6: to the negotiating table. At this point, there are questions
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Speaker 6: about exactly what the Trump administration can do to continue
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Speaker 6: that economic pressure, considering there have been so many waves
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Speaker 6: of sanctions that Iran has already weathered. But Joe and
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Speaker 6: Keley are analysts at Bloomberg Economics, have laid out a
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Speaker 6: few different options include targeting Chinese refiners of Iranian crued
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Speaker 6: as I mentioned, going after the so called shadow fleet,
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Speaker 6: and maybe following through with threats to impost so called
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Speaker 6: secondary tariffs on any countries that do business with Iran.
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Speaker 6: President Trump had previously floated that could come in at
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Speaker 6: a twenty five percent rate.
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Speaker 2: All right, Bloomberg's Tyler Kendel live on the north lawn
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Speaker 2: outside the White House. Thank you very much, And we
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Speaker 2: turn from outside the White House to someone who was
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Speaker 2: familiar with the inner workings and has advised a president
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Speaker 2: on national security issues, the former national security advisor to
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Speaker 2: President Joe Biden, Jake Sullivan, is joining us now here
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Speaker 2: on Bloomberg TV and Radio. We appreciate your time, sir,
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Speaker 2: and welcome to Balance of Power on this day that
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Speaker 2: I believe brings us to one hundred and seventy two
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Speaker 2: days since the war with Iran began. We now have
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Speaker 2: experts telling us here press openly describing this as a quagmire.
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Speaker 2: If you were still advising the president as to options
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Speaker 2: to end this quagmire, which ones are realistically left.
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Speaker 3: Well, the best option is obviously not realistically available, which
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Speaker 3: would be to go back in time and not start
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Speaker 3: this war in the first place, because President Trump really
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Speaker 3: has put the United States in a strategic cul de
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Speaker 3: sac with no clear way out. And really, when it
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Speaker 3: comes down to it, if you stare at it squarely,
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Speaker 3: there are two bad options. One is to keep this
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Speaker 3: war going with all of the costs to the global
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Speaker 3: economy and all of the risks of escalation and further casualties.
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Speaker 3: And the other is to cut a very very bad deal.
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Speaker 3: And really Iran is just simply upping the price for
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Speaker 3: that deal with each week that goes by, adding new
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Speaker 3: demands to what it would require to open the strait
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Speaker 3: of horn moves. And I think this is the horns
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Speaker 3: of the dilemma that President Trump is locked on, is
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Speaker 3: that to get Iran to actually step away from keeping
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Speaker 3: the straight closed, which it largely is right now despite
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Speaker 3: what he says, the United States will have to pay
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Speaker 3: a very steep price, I think in terms of frozen assets,
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Speaker 3: in terms of sanctions relief, potentially in terms of something
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Speaker 3: the President previously agreed to a very large fund for
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Speaker 3: the reconstruction of Iran. And at some point the President,
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Speaker 3: I think, is going to end up having to bite
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Speaker 3: the bullet and do a bad deal.
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Speaker 5: Jick, It's great to have you with us on Bloomberg.
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Speaker 5: I'm sure that you gamed out a lot of scenarios
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Speaker 5: involving Iran in your time at the White House. Did
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Speaker 5: the United States Did this administration underestimate this enemy?
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Speaker 3: There's no doubt about it. The notion that you would
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Speaker 3: conduct a regime change war, you would kill the top
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Speaker 3: leader in Iran, and Iran wouldn't react by throwing everything
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Speaker 3: it had back at the United States would have been
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Speaker 3: debunked immediately by any serious person in the intelligence community.
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Speaker 3: So the President should have known, and I think did
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Speaker 3: know from his intelligence community, that Iran would look at
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Speaker 3: closing the Strait of Hormuz, would look at hitting US
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Speaker 3: infrastructure across the Middle East, would look at attacking neighbors
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Speaker 3: in the Persian Gulf. And Iran has done all of
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Speaker 3: those things. And the minute the President decided that he
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Speaker 3: was going to launch a war, the end goal of
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Speaker 3: which was the removal of Iran's regime, which is existential
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Speaker 3: for those leaders, they were going to respond in an
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Speaker 3: existential way. And so I think it was not just
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Speaker 3: predictable we would end up where we are, but it
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Speaker 3: was predicted by a lot of people going back to
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Speaker 3: the beginning of this conflict.
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Speaker 2: Well, of course, the President says it wasn't just about
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Speaker 2: a decapitation at the top of Iran's leadership. He says
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Speaker 2: repeatedly and still does to this day, that the goal
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Speaker 2: is to have a denuclearized, non nuclear Iran. And when
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Speaker 2: you couple that with the president's statement on true Social
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Speaker 2: today that no talks with Iran or are ongoing or scheduled.
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Speaker 2: Can you reach that endgame on the nuclear program without
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Speaker 2: negotiations on it.
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Speaker 3: There's no way at the end of the day, the
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Speaker 3: only path to verifiably blocking Iran from acquiring a nuclear
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Speaker 3: weapon is a deal that includes intrusive insights in Iran.
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Speaker 3: That is something Iran would have to agree to. That
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Speaker 3: requires diplomacy, It requires negotiations. I do find it interesting
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Speaker 3: that you had Jared Kushner out saying there are talks ongoing,
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Speaker 3: and then you have the President twenty four hours later
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Speaker 3: saying there are no talks on going. These two things
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Speaker 3: can be squared by the definition of what talks are.
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Speaker 3: Informal contacts outside of the administration, are ways of passing
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Speaker 3: messages back and forth. Maybe that's what's unfolding, and that's
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Speaker 3: what Jared Kushner is referring to. But at the end
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Speaker 3: of the day, there is simply no substitute for the
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Speaker 3: United States sitting down with Iran, whether it's with mediators
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Speaker 3: or just simply directly as we did back in the
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Speaker 3: Obama administration and coming out with the terms of a
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Speaker 3: deal that does in fact put Alda on Iran's nuclear
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Speaker 3: program for the long term. But we've gotten so far
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Speaker 3: off course of that, because right now the main point
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Speaker 3: of friction is not actually the nuclear program, whatever President
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Speaker 3: Trump says. It's getting the straight open, and that's trying
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Speaker 3: to restore a status quo ante that existed before this
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Speaker 3: war kick off in February, before we even get to
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Speaker 3: questions about a long term deal on the nuclear file.
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Speaker 5: Well, as someone who has been negotiating with leaders in
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Speaker 5: the Middle East for years, I wonder your thought on
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Speaker 5: exactly how talks are being conducted, including people who don't
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Speaker 5: even work for the administration or the government. Axios today
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Speaker 5: invoking the name Tulsey Gabbert speaking with an Iraqi Kurdish
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Speaker 5: leader with close ties to the IRGC. The administration wanted
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Speaker 5: to reach out directly to the Islamic Revolutionary Guard COREP.
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Speaker 5: Through this intermediary, the US was delivering messages to an
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Speaker 5: IRGC commander. You've got Jared Kushner at the table who
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Speaker 5: does not have a clearly defined role. Is this the
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Speaker 5: beginning of our problem right now? Or is this somehow
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Speaker 5: part of a strategy.
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Speaker 3: I think there are two things going on here. One
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Speaker 3: I would lay at the feet of Iran, which is
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Speaker 3: that it has multiple competing power centers and a lot
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Speaker 3: of people jockeying for a voice in their decision making process,
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Speaker 3: and that does make it difficult to know exactly who
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Speaker 3: the right counterpart is. So I understand the administration's desire
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Speaker 3: to try to get in through multiple channels. But the
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Speaker 3: second thing that's going on here is you have an
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Speaker 3: administration that is basically a viscerated official forms of diplomacy.
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Speaker 3: You have a Secretary of State who isn't really participating
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Speaker 3: in any of the major files, whether it's Ukraine or
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Speaker 3: Gaza or Iran, and you've left a lot to these
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Speaker 3: informal mediators. Sometimes that can work, but I think more
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Speaker 3: frequently it creates the kind of circumstance we have right
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Speaker 3: now where we just simply haven't been able to get
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Speaker 3: traction on a negotiation in several weeks, and it's left
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Speaker 3: the United States in a very difficult position. It's also
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Speaker 3: meant that regional countries are feeling they need to step
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Speaker 3: up to try to broker something themselves, because of course
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Speaker 3: their interests are deeply implicated in this and what I
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Speaker 3: would expect will happen as we go on is that
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Speaker 3: these regional countries will try to cut their own deals
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Speaker 3: with Iran to make their lives a little easier, even
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Speaker 3: if over time that comes at the expense of the
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Speaker 3: United States.
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Speaker 2: Well, it raises the question of Oman, which President Trump
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Speaker 2: suggested yesterday the US would be willing to bomb if
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Speaker 2: it got in the United States's way. Do you see
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Speaker 2: Oman's interest at this point, especially when it pertains to
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Speaker 2: the straight of wour Mews as being misaligned with the
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Speaker 2: United States his own.
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Speaker 3: Look, I think Iran, excuse me, Oman and the United
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Speaker 3: States both want to see the strait open. And Oman
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Speaker 3: has a deep and rich history of working as a
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Speaker 3: really honest broker in trying to help bring about agreements
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Speaker 3: between the US and Iran. When I worked on the
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Speaker 3: secret talks that first laid the groundwork for the Iran
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Speaker 3: nuclear deal in the Obama administration, where did those talks
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Speaker 3: take place in Oman? Oman played a critical role in
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Speaker 3: delivering the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action. They've played an
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Speaker 3: important role with the backing of the United States over
12:54
Speaker 3: the last few months trying to work out some modus
12:56
Speaker 3: vivendi to reopen the strait. So for President Trump to
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Speaker 3: turn around and suggest he is going to militarily attack
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Speaker 3: a country that fundamentally is just trying to bring about
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Speaker 3: a de escalation of the situation, I think this is
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Speaker 3: kind of par for the course and how the President operates,
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Speaker 3: But it is not a constructive way to work with
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Speaker 3: a partner that, yeah, it's not perfectly aligned with the
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Speaker 3: US because it has its own national interest, but fundamentally
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Speaker 3: wants to see an outcome that is similar to the
13:22
Speaker 3: outcome we want to see, which is the straight open
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Speaker 3: and traffic flowing once again, and even more importantly, an
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Speaker 3: end to the war and end to the risk that
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Speaker 3: this spills over in a more dramatic fashion going forward
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Speaker 3: with more suffering and death.
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Speaker 5: When we were preparing for our conversation, Jake, we saw
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Speaker 5: some reports in the wake of October seventh that President
13:42
Speaker 5: Biden rejected calls from Prime Minister Benjamin Nettan Yahoo to
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Speaker 5: launch strikes against Iran. Is that the case did benjaminett Yao,
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Speaker 5: who tried to start this war under the previous administration.
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Speaker 3: Well, without getting into sensitive conversations between two leaders. What
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Speaker 3: I have said in can continue to say, is that
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Speaker 3: Prime Minister Netnyah, who has tried to get multiple American presidents,
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Speaker 3: including President Joe Biden, to go to war with Iran directly,
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Speaker 3: to have the United States directly engaged in a war
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Speaker 3: with Iran. President Biden didn't do it. President Obama didn't
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Speaker 3: do it first President Trump. President Trump in his first
14:17
Speaker 3: term wouldn't do it. President Trump this time around did say, yes,
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Speaker 3: I will go ahead and start that war. And we're
14:24
Speaker 3: all seeing the consequences of that.
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Speaker 2: Well, So when we consider Netanyah, who then, especially the
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Speaker 2: ongoing questions of Lebanon and Israel's fight against Hesbola of
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Speaker 2: Gaza and the disarmament of Hamas, how much when it
14:38
Speaker 2: comes to the future trajectory of the Middle East is
14:41
Speaker 2: going to depend on the outcome of Israel's elections in October.
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Speaker 2: Is Netanyaho actually one of the larger impediments to peace.
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Speaker 3: Look, there's no doubt that he has continued to stoke
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Speaker 3: conflict and turbulence and wanted this war with Iran to continue,
14:56
Speaker 3: has continued to prosecute the campaign in Lebanon, is continuing
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Speaker 3: to resist the pathway to a full settlement that is
15:05
Speaker 3: being pursued with respect to Gaza. The question though, of
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Speaker 3: whether a different Israeli government would take a fundamentally different
15:13
Speaker 3: approach to the region, whether to the Palestinian people or
15:16
Speaker 3: to Lebanon or to rn I think is still very
15:18
Speaker 3: much an open question. It would depend on the character
15:20
Speaker 3: of that government. One thing I think that would change
15:23
Speaker 3: is that if you had a government that did not
15:25
Speaker 3: have these really radical far right extremists like Ben Gaver
15:29
Speaker 3: and Smotrich, you could at least push out of power
15:33
Speaker 3: some of the most extreme elements in Israeli politics today.
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Speaker 5: You know, the standoff in the Strait is resonating in
15:39
Speaker 5: the Korean Peninsula. Jake Sullivan, I'm sure you saw the
15:43
Speaker 5: President's announcement yesterday based on a his relationship with Kim
15:48
Speaker 5: Jong un, but b South Korea's decision to not assist
15:52
Speaker 5: the United States in reopening the Strait to justify his
15:56
Speaker 5: decision to crank down United States involvement in military very
16:00
Speaker 5: exercises off South Korea. With the South Korean military, we
16:05
Speaker 5: know how important this relationship is in the Indo Pacific
16:08
Speaker 5: and most recently here on Bloomberg. I think a lot
16:10
Speaker 5: of our viewers and listeners know how important South Korea
16:13
Speaker 5: is as a player in the memory chip space. Is
16:17
Speaker 5: President Trump making us more or less safe with this move?
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Speaker 3: Look, at the end of the day, the strength and
16:22
Speaker 3: health of our alliances going forward is going to be
16:25
Speaker 3: measured as much by economics and technology as it is
16:28
Speaker 3: by military deterrence. And as you just noted, South Korea
16:32
Speaker 3: is a vital partner to us in the semiconductor manufacturing
16:35
Speaker 3: supply chain and high bandwidth memory in the memory chip space,
16:39
Speaker 3: as you said, but in many other areas where South
16:41
Speaker 3: Korea makes massive investments in the United States and batteries
16:44
Speaker 3: and electric vehicles, helping to reindustrialize our country. We're in
16:48
Speaker 3: talks with them right now about building out a massive
16:51
Speaker 3: shipbuilding investment in which the United States could once again
16:55
Speaker 3: restore its capacity to build ships that we lost over
16:58
Speaker 3: several decades going back to the nineteen eighties. So to
17:01
Speaker 3: turn around and hit South Korea this way about something
17:05
Speaker 3: so coren existential to their security and ours basic exercises
17:10
Speaker 3: to make sure that we deter war on the Korean Peninsula,
17:13
Speaker 3: I think this is biting off our nose to spite
17:15
Speaker 3: our face. And President Trump is going to learn over
17:18
Speaker 3: time that continuing to treat allies in this way will
17:22
Speaker 3: come at a cost to the United States in the
17:24
Speaker 3: larger relationship. And I worry that it will come at
17:27
Speaker 3: a cost on these issues of economics and technology at
17:30
Speaker 3: a moment when we are competing vigorously with China and
17:33
Speaker 3: where our work with South Korea is so vital.
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Speaker 2: Well, so if the danger here, potentially Jake, is that
17:41
Speaker 2: other countries get drawn closer to China, and China obviously
17:45
Speaker 2: is watching all of this unfold from the Middle East
17:48
Speaker 2: to the end of Pacific and beyond. Is it Chijinping
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Speaker 2: that comes to Washington next month where he's intending to
17:54
Speaker 2: meet with President Trump at the White House on a
17:56
Speaker 2: stronger footing than the United States.
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Speaker 3: Look, if you're in Beijing right now and you're advising
18:02
Speaker 3: Hi jinpingg and you're looking at a net assessment of
18:04
Speaker 3: America's capabilities in China's capabilities, you're saying to yourself, what
18:08
Speaker 3: does America have that we don't Well, one of the
18:10
Speaker 3: biggest things America has historically brought to the table in
18:13
Speaker 3: the competition with China is a network of powerful, robust
18:16
Speaker 3: alliances in both the Atlantic and the Pacific, and China
18:20
Speaker 3: has had a long term strategy of wanting to undermine
18:22
Speaker 3: those alliances, to weaken them, to divide the United States
18:25
Speaker 3: from its allies. And they're looking right now and saying, wait,
18:28
Speaker 3: President Trump is actually doing our work for us. And
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Speaker 3: I think it does mean that President She will come
18:34
Speaker 3: with a certain swagger in his step because he believes
18:37
Speaker 3: that they are making progress economically and technologically, they're making
18:41
Speaker 3: inroads diplomatically, and the United States is losing or is
18:44
Speaker 3: degrading one of the most critical assets that it has.
18:48
Speaker 3: I think the other thing that the President She has
18:50
Speaker 3: done over the course of the last year is shown
18:52
Speaker 3: that China has leverage. When President Trump slapped massive tariffs
18:56
Speaker 3: on China, they responded with the rare Earth export control
19:00
Speaker 3: and President Trump felt he had to back down and
19:03
Speaker 3: essentially made a huge concession in the trade war. So
19:05
Speaker 3: President She will have that in mind too when he
19:08
Speaker 3: comes to Washington next month.
19:10
Speaker 5: So much of your time in the Biden White House
19:13
Speaker 5: was spent on the war in Ukraine, Russia's war with Ukraine.
19:18
Speaker 5: That actually ties in to this larger conversation that we're having. Jake,
19:23
Speaker 5: we can't ask you about this. We can't not ask
19:27
Speaker 5: you about this before you leave. Because of the munitions
19:31
Speaker 5: that we have been spending on this war with Iran.
19:35
Speaker 5: We have left Ukraine now at this point with no
19:38
Speaker 5: patriot missile interceptors we understand, and the idea of providing
19:43
Speaker 5: a license for Ukraine to make its own seems to
19:46
Speaker 5: have been withdrawn by this administration. Have we abandoned Ukraine?
19:53
Speaker 3: Thankfully, we are still doing some of the critical things
19:56
Speaker 3: that are necessary to support Ukraine and its fight for freedom, independence,
20:00
Speaker 3: territorial integrity, namely continuing to provide intelligence. But in the
20:04
Speaker 3: opening days of the war, some of America's foremost bipartisan
20:08
Speaker 3: national security experts came out and said that starting this
20:11
Speaker 3: war with Iran is going to help Putin because it's
20:13
Speaker 3: going to mean we divert patriot missiles away from Ukraine.
20:17
Speaker 3: And Putin sees that, and so what's he doing. He's
20:19
Speaker 3: launching larger and larger salvos of missiles at Ukraine, knowing
20:23
Speaker 3: that Ukraine doesn't have the interceptors to be able to
20:25
Speaker 3: defend itself, and his goal this winter will be to
20:29
Speaker 3: plunge Ukraine into cold and darkness by taking out its
20:31
Speaker 3: electricity grid, taking heating offline, taking lighting offline, and we
20:37
Speaker 3: are leaving Ukraine naked to those kinds of attacks, and
20:40
Speaker 3: this too was very much both predicted and identified at
20:44
Speaker 3: the beginning of the war. Is a huge cost, and
20:46
Speaker 3: I do believe that we have unnecessarily expended these massive
20:50
Speaker 3: numbers of Patriot interceptors to fight a war that made
20:53
Speaker 3: no sense from the start. And you can see the
20:55
Speaker 3: immediate direct knock on effects for the people of Ukraine,
20:58
Speaker 3: who nonetheless are fighting incredibly bravely and effectively in Steyman,
21:03
Speaker 3: Russia on the front line, and frankly in taking the
21:05
Speaker 3: fight directly to Russia as well.
21:08
Speaker 4: Well.
21:08
Speaker 5: I'll tell you there were many days during the Biden
21:10
Speaker 5: administration where we wished we could have had this kind
21:12
Speaker 5: of time with you. Jake Sullivan. We appreciate your joining
21:14
Speaker 5: our conversation today on Bloomberg and we hope that it
21:16
Speaker 5: will not be the last. Jake Sullivan fivers live on
21:19
Speaker 5: Balance of Power. Thank you for the time. We're going
21:22
Speaker 5: to play everything we just talked about to the panel
21:24
Speaker 5: coming up next, and we've got a good one today,
21:25
Speaker 5: and John McCarthy and Jeff Burton stay with us on
21:28
Speaker 5: Balance of Power. We'll have much more coming up after this.
21:34
Speaker 1: You're listening to the Bloomberg Balance of Power podcast. Catch
21:38
Speaker 1: us live weekdays at noon and five pm Eastern on
21:41
Speaker 1: Apple Cocklay and Android Auto with the Bloomberg Business App.
21:44
Speaker 1: You can also listen live on Amazon Alexa from our
21:47
Speaker 1: flagship New York station, Just say Alexa Play Bloomberg eleven thirty.
21:53
Speaker 2: Keeping a close eye on what's happening in the Middle
21:55
Speaker 2: East as we think about potential endgames, if there is
21:57
Speaker 2: one to be found between the United States and Iran.
22:00
Speaker 2: We of course just spoke with the former National Security
22:02
Speaker 2: advisor to President Joe Biden, Jake Sullivan, who suggested that
22:06
Speaker 2: he sees the US as eventually going to need to
22:09
Speaker 2: accept a bad deal when it comes to Iran. And
22:14
Speaker 2: it's interesting to view Jake Sullivan's comments in the context
22:17
Speaker 2: of the polling we have just gotten out from Reuters
22:19
Speaker 2: and IPSOS in a poll that was taken August fourteenth
22:22
Speaker 2: through seventeenth, so this week, it found eighty percent of
22:25
Speaker 2: those surveys believe that the US involvement in Iran will
22:29
Speaker 2: go on for an extended period of time. That breaks
22:32
Speaker 2: down eighty seven percent of Democrats believe that and so
22:35
Speaker 2: two to seventy one percent of Republicans show and in
22:37
Speaker 2: this poll, overall, the president's approval rating, which tied of
22:41
Speaker 2: course to the conflict and also feelings about the economy,
22:45
Speaker 2: dipped to an all time low of just thirty three percent.
22:48
Speaker 5: Stark, we turned to the politics of war with our
22:51
Speaker 5: political panel, John McCarthy, Democratic Strategists, principle at Causeway Strategy Group,
22:56
Speaker 5: and Jeff Burton is with us the Republican Strategists, co
22:58
Speaker 5: founding partner at Maven Advocacy. John and Jeff, thank you
23:02
Speaker 5: so much. Jeff, I'll start with you on the word
23:06
Speaker 5: quagmire that keeps coming up here. The Washington Post fronted
23:11
Speaker 5: its coverage with that word in the headline. Today Jake
23:14
Speaker 5: Sullivan was talking about it, using that term as a
23:17
Speaker 5: point of fact. Is that what this is?
23:21
Speaker 8: I don't think it is. I think we have to
23:22
Speaker 8: be a quagmire is a lot longer than what we've
23:25
Speaker 8: been dealing with, which is just over six months. I
23:27
Speaker 8: think part of it is at the onset the Trump
23:30
Speaker 8: administration could have done a better job, for sure, messaging
23:33
Speaker 8: why we were going to war and Iran, why the
23:35
Speaker 8: conflict was happening, and that it may be more than
23:39
Speaker 8: two weeks to a month. I think expectations game really
23:43
Speaker 8: is hurting the messages messaging and hurting the Republicans here.
23:46
Speaker 8: But I would absolutely not call it a quagmire. We've
23:49
Speaker 8: you know, Iran has been a state sponsor of terrorism
23:52
Speaker 8: for more than forty years, and every president has just
23:55
Speaker 8: played around. And you look at what they're doing now
23:58
Speaker 8: with giving drones to to Russia against Ukraine, what they've
24:02
Speaker 8: done in Yemen, Oman the Taliban, al Qaeda. There's a
24:05
Speaker 8: long history of Iran opposing a US and being an
24:10
Speaker 8: active partner in terrorism, and that's that's going to take
24:13
Speaker 8: a little bit longer to get rid of and make
24:16
Speaker 8: sure that we're safe.
24:18
Speaker 2: Well, your point, Cheff, is well taken that this has
24:20
Speaker 2: only been about a six month conflict. But John, I
24:23
Speaker 2: guess I wonder if a quagmire is so much about
24:25
Speaker 2: looking backward about the amount of time that has passed
24:28
Speaker 2: already or looking forward to no real end date in sight.
24:32
Speaker 2: The suggestion that this could go on for an indefinite
24:35
Speaker 2: period of time. Is that not what the eighty percent
24:37
Speaker 2: of Americans were suggesting in that Reuter's Zipsos poll.
24:41
Speaker 7: Well, I think that quagmire could kind of be applied
24:43
Speaker 7: to the entire problem that we have right now with
24:46
Speaker 7: the Trump presidency. You know, first off, great interview, and
24:49
Speaker 7: one of the things that I really took away from
24:51
Speaker 7: it was almost just the sense of temperament that came
24:53
Speaker 7: from Jake. You know, I worked with Jake. I think
24:57
Speaker 7: he's a brilliant mind. But one of the things, just
24:59
Speaker 7: the commonness and steadiness of that interview I think is
25:01
Speaker 7: such a contrast to what we see now. And I
25:04
Speaker 7: think one of the undercurrents about all the polls that
25:06
Speaker 7: you just shared, both in terms of support for the
25:08
Speaker 7: conflict and the president's approval rating overall, is that there's
25:11
Speaker 7: an overstimulation from the presidency. Most Americans don't want to
25:15
Speaker 7: sit and think about the president every single moment of
25:17
Speaker 7: the day. Donald Trump was elected to lower costs, He
25:20
Speaker 7: was elected to say that he would never start anew
25:23
Speaker 7: forever war, and he's basically not focused on the first
25:26
Speaker 7: and dove right into the second. So that's not going
25:29
Speaker 7: to go overwell with voters as we look towards the midterms.
25:31
Speaker 7: But I do think that the undercurrent going underneath all
25:33
Speaker 7: of this is that whether it's the conflict here, whether
25:36
Speaker 7: it's the conflict with the economy, the on and off
25:38
Speaker 7: again tariffs, this overstimulation and chaos benefits no one in
25:41
Speaker 7: his political party and is why his numbers are so low.
25:45
Speaker 5: Well, now that we're in months beyond weeks, there is
25:49
Speaker 5: a question about Congress's role in all of this. Lawmakers
25:54
Speaker 5: are on recess until after Labor Day, Jeff Senator Tim
25:58
Speaker 5: Kaine saying just yesterday in the last twenty four hours
26:01
Speaker 5: that he will file yet another war powers resolution when
26:04
Speaker 5: they return, but in this case to block the president
26:07
Speaker 5: from targeting Oman, which he threatened to do yesterday, to
26:10
Speaker 5: bomb Oman if it gets in the way of negotiations
26:13
Speaker 5: or the blockade. He told Fox he would bomb the
26:18
Speaker 5: s out of them. I'm just curious, once we get
26:21
Speaker 5: beyond primary season, and we're just about there with the
26:24
Speaker 5: contests that are taking place today, will there be more
26:27
Speaker 5: emphasis on having a say in war powers and an
26:31
Speaker 5: authorization of the use of military force from Republican lawmakers.
26:37
Speaker 8: I don't think that it'll really have anything to do
26:39
Speaker 8: with what happens in Congress. I think it'll be related
26:42
Speaker 8: to the messaging. Republicans need a better message on Iran.
26:45
Speaker 8: It's definitely hurting them with the voters right now and
26:49
Speaker 8: being able to be on message and have more focus.
26:53
Speaker 8: Like John said, I think that is somewhat hurting Republicans
26:55
Speaker 8: right now.
26:56
Speaker 6: I'm not real worried.
26:57
Speaker 8: They voted on any war powers resolution, and that's been
27:01
Speaker 8: voted on almost every week in the Senate over the
27:03
Speaker 8: last two three months, and you know, with very limited
27:07
Speaker 8: movement on that. So I wouldn't expect too much interest
27:11
Speaker 8: of that with It'll be voted on in September, but
27:13
Speaker 8: I don't think it'll really affect voters that much or
27:16
Speaker 8: pick up many Republicans.
27:20
Speaker 9: Well.
27:20
Speaker 2: So it raises the question John, of if there is
27:24
Speaker 2: a better way for Democrats to counter and show that
27:27
Speaker 2: they're opposed to the conflict and its ongoing nature. Do
27:31
Speaker 2: war powers votes really even get any oxygen? Does the
27:36
Speaker 2: everyday voter pay attention to that?
27:38
Speaker 7: You know, voters aren't blind, and the Republicans in Congress,
27:42
Speaker 7: especially in the House representatives, have basically handed the president
27:45
Speaker 7: of blank check since the start of this administration. Congress
27:48
Speaker 7: the Article one branch of the Constitution, you know, a
27:51
Speaker 7: co equal branch of government has certainly not behaved as such.
27:54
Speaker 7: There have been a few exceptions kind of in recent
27:56
Speaker 7: two months or so, where maybe some Senators have stepped
27:59
Speaker 7: forward to try and took abash on some of President
28:01
Speaker 7: Trump's more extreme ideas, like slush funds for January sixth participants.
28:06
Speaker 7: But by and large, the American people have looked at
28:08
Speaker 7: their members of Congress and said, you're not advocating for me,
28:11
Speaker 7: you're just closing up and siding up with the president.
28:14
Speaker 7: The title of the job is representative. People go to
28:16
Speaker 7: Washington in order to serve the people that they're elected by.
28:19
Speaker 7: And I think that you know, those members of Congress
28:22
Speaker 7: in swing districts who are Republicans that are looking at
28:25
Speaker 7: you know, gas prices up, grocery prices up, the spike
28:29
Speaker 7: in healthcare premiums. That's very hard to explain to your
28:31
Speaker 7: constituents back home other than just sitting and saying Donald
28:34
Speaker 7: Trump wanted me to do it, and that's not going
28:36
Speaker 7: to be something that they're rewarded for. Come November.
28:39
Speaker 5: Four dollars in success I said, national average today, Jeff,
28:44
Speaker 5: four dollars in six cents is the national average today?
28:48
Speaker 5: Does that number need to come down for Republicans to
28:51
Speaker 5: maintain majorities?
28:54
Speaker 7: Absolutely.
28:54
Speaker 8: The economy is judged on the street corner of that's
28:58
Speaker 8: gas prices. And you saw about a month to go
29:00
Speaker 8: before the Iran war picked up again, gas prices were
29:04
Speaker 8: coming down seventy five cents to a dollar, and it
29:07
Speaker 8: simultaneously happened with Republicans and Donald Trump's pull numbers going up.
29:12
Speaker 8: That's going to happen, and if it needs to happen
29:15
Speaker 8: for Republicans to be able to do well and have
29:17
Speaker 8: a chance of keeping the House and their majority in
29:20
Speaker 8: the Senate, for sure.
29:21
Speaker 7: And I'd just like to.
29:22
Speaker 8: Mention again on the House and Senate floor. Going back
29:26
Speaker 8: to the last point that John Bayner, former Speaker of
29:29
Speaker 8: the House, was in Congress for almost thirty years, he
29:31
Speaker 8: said it best that only two times in his whole,
29:33
Speaker 8: entire entire terms did the House floor ever really make
29:38
Speaker 8: it into the public mind. It's more about the overall
29:41
Speaker 8: what's happening than one thing. And that's why I don't
29:43
Speaker 8: think the war powers vote really makes much difference, because
29:46
Speaker 8: there's so much information for voters to take in that
29:48
Speaker 8: what happens with one vote is very has very limited impact.
29:54
Speaker 2: Well, when we consider the way in which voters are
29:56
Speaker 2: thinking about this conflict. Yes, how it's impacting them at
30:00
Speaker 2: economically with prices at the pump is one consideration, but
30:03
Speaker 2: we've also seen it create even more blowback against Israel
30:07
Speaker 2: John and the net and Yahoo government. We could see
30:10
Speaker 2: that on display in the primaries today in Florida with
30:12
Speaker 2: a few Democrats who are vying to stay in Congress.
30:16
Speaker 2: How complicated is that issue for your party?
30:19
Speaker 7: You know, it's something that Democrats are going to have
30:21
Speaker 7: to deal with. You know, some of these things are
30:25
Speaker 7: conversations that I think are best had in the majority.
30:27
Speaker 7: I don't think that writ large, this is something on
30:29
Speaker 7: the mind of every single Democratic voter. You know, people
30:32
Speaker 7: have to run in races that are local to them,
30:34
Speaker 7: So if this is something that's relevant for their community,
30:37
Speaker 7: I think it's a worthwhile conversation to be had amongst
30:39
Speaker 7: their community about who they want to send to the Congress.
30:42
Speaker 7: But at the same time, you have Donald Trump saying
30:44
Speaker 7: things like, you know, Americans are going to pay a
30:46
Speaker 7: teeny bit more so that a very bad country couldn't
30:49
Speaker 7: have a weapon. I think that American people are incredibly
30:52
Speaker 7: patriotic and Americans are willing to shoulder that burden. But
30:55
Speaker 7: it's on the president to be able to explain to
30:57
Speaker 7: them what the off ram for all of this is.
31:00
Speaker 7: The conflict in the Middle East spurring this affordability crisis
31:03
Speaker 7: is going to fundamentally be the issue that this election
31:05
Speaker 7: is about. People want to know what he's going to
31:07
Speaker 7: do to bring down their cost of living. That's what
31:09
Speaker 7: it's going to be about.
31:11
Speaker 2: All right, John McCarthy and Jeff Burton our political panel today,
31:15
Speaker 2: Thank you so much, and we'll have more ahead on
31:17
Speaker 2: the primaries in Florida and beyond today when our colleague
31:19
Speaker 2: Bill Ferries joins us. Will also be joined by the
31:21
Speaker 2: Democratic nominee for governor of Texas, Gina Yinojosa, will be
31:25
Speaker 2: joining us next on Bluebirk Team and Tredia.
31:27
Speaker 5: Stay with us on Balance of Power. We'll have much
31:29
Speaker 5: more coming up after this.
31:35
Speaker 1: You're listening to the Bloomberg Balance of Power podcast. Catch
31:39
Speaker 1: us live weekdays at noon and five pm Eastern on Apple,
31:42
Speaker 1: Cockley and Android Auto with the Bloomberg Business Up. Listen
31:45
Speaker 1: on demand wherever you get your podcasts, or watch us
31:49
Speaker 1: live on YouTube.
31:51
Speaker 5: Happy Primary Day. It's like Christmas morning around here. On
31:56
Speaker 5: Balance of Power. We've got three states in play, Alaska,
31:59
Speaker 5: Whyom and Florida. So we've got some drama here, Kaylee,
32:03
Speaker 5: Look no further than the nineteenth district. This is currently
32:07
Speaker 5: represented by Byron Donalds, who is by all accounts on
32:11
Speaker 5: path to become the first black nominee for governor in
32:15
Speaker 5: the state of Florida. He's considered the front runner potentially
32:18
Speaker 5: of the general election as well. But who do we
32:20
Speaker 5: replace him with in the nineteenth The headline at Greg
32:24
Speaker 5: Juro's analysis from Bloomberg Government Kaylee ex convicts and cast
32:28
Speaker 5: offs flock to Florida for wild GOP primary. Some are
32:33
Speaker 5: calling it the clown car. You've got a number of
32:36
Speaker 5: folks who have run for office in other states. If
32:40
Speaker 5: you like electoral drama, this is where you find it.
32:43
Speaker 2: Yeah, there's no shortage of that in today's primaries, not
32:45
Speaker 2: just in the race for Byron Donaldsy, but considering Florida
32:49
Speaker 2: is voting with a new House district map in place,
32:52
Speaker 2: there are a lot of other contested races to watch
32:55
Speaker 2: as well, as Democrats try to retain seats in Congress
32:59
Speaker 2: in districts that are now much more plus Trump than
33:02
Speaker 2: the ones that they were sitting in earlier. You also
33:03
Speaker 2: have Corey Mills in the seventh District who doesn't have
33:06
Speaker 2: the backing of President Trump, doesn't have the backing of
33:08
Speaker 2: Governor Ron DeSantis in Florida, doesn't even have the backing
33:11
Speaker 2: of many of the members of his congressional delegation from Florida.
33:15
Speaker 2: So let's get into all of these now as we
33:17
Speaker 2: turn to Bill Ferries Bloomberg, new senior editor, who is
33:20
Speaker 2: covering all their things midterms for US. So, Bill, I guess,
33:23
Speaker 2: pick your poison in Florida, whether it's one of the
33:26
Speaker 2: House races or the gubernatorial race. What could we learn
33:30
Speaker 2: in the ultimate a count when the votes come in.
33:34
Speaker 10: Yeah, we're going to be seeing some interesting dynamics playing
33:37
Speaker 10: out on both the Republican and the Democratic side. You
33:40
Speaker 10: talked about that race for governor Byron Donald's. He should
33:44
Speaker 10: handily win that contest. He's got one hundred million dollar
33:47
Speaker 10: war chest, he's got a big, big backing from people
33:51
Speaker 10: like Ken Griffin, But he does have eleven other candidates
33:54
Speaker 10: to run against, including some far to the right of
33:58
Speaker 10: his own candidacy. So the whole tug and push and
34:02
Speaker 10: pull within the Republican Party between what we're saying calling
34:05
Speaker 10: maga and ultra maga is going to play out in
34:08
Speaker 10: that race, it just takes a plurality to win, so
34:11
Speaker 10: he doesn't need to get fifty percent, but a lot
34:14
Speaker 10: of people are going to be looking to see how
34:15
Speaker 10: strong of a candidate he is after tonight's primaries. If
34:20
Speaker 10: he gets over fifty percent, that'll be a big win.
34:22
Speaker 10: But it's the same thing for Democrats. You've got some
34:24
Speaker 10: progressivesm incumbents fighting each other. You've got Debbie Wasserman Schultz
34:28
Speaker 10: down there in the twentieth district. That's going to be
34:30
Speaker 10: a race. I think people are watching very closely to
34:34
Speaker 10: see if she can after jumping districts following that redistricting,
34:38
Speaker 10: whether she can pull off a victory. And what has
34:42
Speaker 10: been a district that has been run by black lawmakers
34:47
Speaker 10: for decades now, So a lot of great dynamics playing
34:50
Speaker 10: out and Florida never disappoints.
34:52
Speaker 6: Well.
34:52
Speaker 5: I'm glad that you mentioned that because, as Kayley introduced,
34:56
Speaker 5: it reminded us this is a Republican re drawn congressional map.
35:00
Speaker 5: It's made life complicated for incumbents like the aforementioned Debbie
35:04
Speaker 5: Wasserman Schultz. How difficult is it going to be to
35:07
Speaker 5: predict the outcomes in some of these races? Because you've
35:11
Speaker 5: got incumbents in a strange land.
35:14
Speaker 10: Yeah, you have incumbents in a strange land. You don't
35:17
Speaker 10: have a lot of great palling. But remember when Ron
35:20
Speaker 10: DeSantis went ahead and pushed forward with that redistricting, the
35:24
Speaker 10: goal was to give Republicans a four seat edge in
35:28
Speaker 10: the state. A lot of Republicans were uncomfortable with that change.
35:31
Speaker 10: And we're not going to know whether that really pays
35:35
Speaker 10: off for the Republicans until November, but a lot of
35:38
Speaker 10: Republicans felt like their solid districts were getting watered down
35:42
Speaker 10: a little bit to try to try to help Republicans
35:46
Speaker 10: gain an advantage in some of these Democratic districts. So
35:48
Speaker 10: it's not just Democrats scrambling. There are a lot of
35:51
Speaker 10: nervous Republicans wondering what the vote totals are going to
35:53
Speaker 10: look like tonight.
35:56
Speaker 5: Really interesting, Bill, Thank you, it's great to have you,
35:58
Speaker 5: Bloomberg News senior editor helping us get ready for another
36:03
Speaker 5: primary night. This is going to be one of the
36:04
Speaker 5: last big ones here on the campaign trail, so we'll
36:08
Speaker 5: be paying very close attention. You'll have a lot to
36:10
Speaker 5: distill with these races tomorrow.
36:12
Speaker 2: It looks like indeed we will we can't forget about
36:14
Speaker 2: Alaska with the Dan Sullivan's plural Dan Sullivan.
36:17
Speaker 5: Did we decide Dan's Sullivan? Yes, exactly right. This great
36:21
Speaker 5: confusion for some on the ballot up there. They even
36:23
Speaker 5: have the same looking logo. It's a little hard for
36:25
Speaker 5: me to decipher.
36:26
Speaker 2: Yeah, And will it have an impact in the results
36:28
Speaker 2: tonight and determining which Dan goes up against Mary Patola,
36:31
Speaker 2: we'll see exactly.
36:33
Speaker 5: We have a great opportunity to spend some time with
36:35
Speaker 5: someone who's in the fight here in Texas. Gina Enojosa
36:40
Speaker 5: is the Texas state representative who's the Democratic candidate for
36:43
Speaker 5: governor and is actually in Washington today. I'm delighted that
36:45
Speaker 5: you can come see us here on balance of power.
36:47
Speaker 5: You know, we have this conversation Democrats and blue dogs
36:51
Speaker 5: all the time. This is going to be the year
36:53
Speaker 5: that Democrats flip Texas and then for some reason it
36:56
Speaker 5: doesn't quite work out that way. Give us a sense
36:59
Speaker 5: of the psychology that Democrats have right now in Texas
37:04
Speaker 5: and the opportunity that might lie ahead in November.
37:07
Speaker 11: Yeah, something special is happening in Texas right now.
37:11
Speaker 9: And I understand we've had.
37:13
Speaker 11: Our hearts broken before about Texas as Democrats. But what
37:17
Speaker 11: is happening is different this time. I will tell you
37:20
Speaker 11: James Tellerico and myself, we're Chris crossing the state and
37:23
Speaker 11: what we see is this energy for a change. It
37:25
Speaker 11: is not that people are suddenly Team Democrat. No, people
37:30
Speaker 11: are just whatever this is, we don't want it.
37:32
Speaker 9: There is this.
37:33
Speaker 11: Anti incumbency fervor in Texas and Greg Abbott has been
37:38
Speaker 11: in statewide office thirty years, as governor for twelve years,
37:42
Speaker 11: He's the most entrenched incumbent there is and so it
37:44
Speaker 11: creates this opportunity for my campaign and frankly for Democrats
37:48
Speaker 11: in Texas well.
37:50
Speaker 2: So when you talk about this anti incumbent forever, do
37:52
Speaker 2: you see a single issue as being the primary driver
37:56
Speaker 2: of that, and if so, what is it?
37:57
Speaker 11: I will say that right now, data centers are an
38:00
Speaker 11: issue that has gotten a lot of attention, especially in
38:03
Speaker 11: our rural Republican areas where what has happened is data
38:08
Speaker 11: centers have descended into the rural Republican areas. There's almost
38:11
Speaker 11: been like a gold rush really of data centers coming.
38:15
Speaker 11: Greg Abbott gave them very rich tax break so they
38:17
Speaker 11: don't pay any tax. For instance, on electricity that they consume.
38:21
Speaker 11: We're losing about a billion and a half dollars a year.
38:23
Speaker 11: But the reason why rural Texans don't like it is
38:26
Speaker 11: because there are no rules in these areas. They're in
38:30
Speaker 11: what we call the unincorporated areas, right. Their local officials
38:33
Speaker 11: have no way to regulate these data centers.
38:36
Speaker 9: They don't have street lights, they don't have.
38:38
Speaker 11: Paid firefighters or ems, and these hyperscale data centers have
38:42
Speaker 11: emerged in their communities and people just feel helpless. They
38:47
Speaker 11: want to see it at the table to decide if
38:49
Speaker 11: and how these data centers come.
38:50
Speaker 5: So do you see eye to eye with Greg Abbott
38:52
Speaker 5: on this? Who came first on this one? Or is
38:55
Speaker 5: this truly a bipart is an issue?
38:57
Speaker 6: Now?
38:58
Speaker 11: No, So Greg Abba refuses to call a special session
39:02
Speaker 11: to pass laws to protect Texans against data centers.
39:06
Speaker 5: His review of data centers does not impress you as
39:09
Speaker 5: a controlling approach to this.
39:11
Speaker 11: No, He's reviewing himself is all he is doing. Without
39:14
Speaker 11: laws in place, there are no real protections. We all
39:17
Speaker 11: understand that. Come November fourth, the day after the election,
39:20
Speaker 11: his letters to himself, his audits of himself, those go away.
39:24
Speaker 11: He's received twenty million dollars from data centers in this
39:26
Speaker 11: campaign cycle.
39:28
Speaker 2: Okay, So if you don't buy his pause for an
39:31
Speaker 2: audit notion, do you support the idea of a general
39:35
Speaker 2: moratorium at least for a certain period of time. If so,
39:38
Speaker 2: for how long.
39:39
Speaker 11: I have called for a moratorium until the legislature can
39:42
Speaker 11: meet to pass laws to protect Texans. And the legislature
39:46
Speaker 11: could meet today. Greg Abbott has the sole authority to
39:49
Speaker 11: end this data center madness. I've called on Greg Abbott
39:53
Speaker 11: to call a special session of the legislature.
39:55
Speaker 9: He's called many before.
39:56
Speaker 11: Remember he called one fort decade redistricting last year. To
40:00
Speaker 11: call special sessions so we can come together and pass laws.
40:03
Speaker 9: But what should those laws look like? Well, there's a
40:06
Speaker 9: lot to do.
40:06
Speaker 11: I will say that we know that there can be
40:11
Speaker 11: good jobs in making these data centers.
40:13
Speaker 9: I talk to.
40:13
Speaker 11: People who build them, and it's good pay, so I
40:16
Speaker 11: don't want to dismiss that. But then there are also
40:19
Speaker 11: data centers that are shipping in workers to build these
40:22
Speaker 11: data centers, and that's not about creating jobs. They should
40:25
Speaker 11: be American union jobs first of all, that are building these.
40:29
Speaker 11: They should not be subsidized. The taxpayers should not have
40:32
Speaker 11: to be paying for this. They're owned by the richest
40:34
Speaker 11: men in the world. They should pay for themselves. We
40:36
Speaker 11: need some regulations on water, on electricity, and finally, that
40:40
Speaker 11: end product of AI that is supposed to replace all
40:43
Speaker 11: of us in the workplace, right, we need some real
40:46
Speaker 11: constraints there, some bright lines about we shouldn't use AI
40:49
Speaker 11: to replace teachers, to replace nurses, to make life or
40:53
Speaker 11: death decisions, or decisions about our health.
40:55
Speaker 5: We're getting ready for the news anchor bots to show up,
40:58
Speaker 5: so let us know when we have to worry about that.
41:00
Speaker 5: But is this the deciding issue in your campaign?
41:03
Speaker 9: No, But it is the latest example, the one you've
41:05
Speaker 9: seized on.
41:06
Speaker 11: Well, it is the latest example of Greg Abbott doing
41:09
Speaker 11: the bidding of the moneyed interest, the special interest in
41:12
Speaker 11: not the people of Texas. And so it is one
41:13
Speaker 11: that people have kind of grabbed onto.
41:17
Speaker 2: Well, let's talk about some other animating issues that we're
41:20
Speaker 2: seeing nationwide, and I'm curious how you're seeing them play
41:23
Speaker 2: out in Texas and immigration, for example, we're fresh off
41:25
Speaker 2: of a primary we saw in Minnesota where, of course
41:27
Speaker 2: there were the two fatal shootings of American citizens by
41:30
Speaker 2: ice and the establishment candidate who had backed the Lake
41:35
Speaker 2: and Riley Act, ultimately lost to a far left challenger.
41:38
Speaker 2: With immigration as the issue, I wonder how you are
41:42
Speaker 2: approaching that issue in Texas and if you also see
41:45
Speaker 2: the kind of fissures between the far left and moderates
41:49
Speaker 2: to approach that policy specifically.
41:51
Speaker 11: What I see in Texas is really we're just all
41:54
Speaker 11: on the same page.
41:55
Speaker 9: We want something that makes sense.
41:56
Speaker 11: They just shot and killed aman in Houston, Texas who
42:00
Speaker 11: on his way to work. An unmarked car pulled over
42:04
Speaker 11: this man, Salgado ad Ajol, who is on his way
42:07
Speaker 11: to work, and shot first and asked questions later.
42:11
Speaker 9: They killed him. In an environment like that, nobody is safe.
42:14
Speaker 11: People are mad about these ice raids that are going
42:17
Speaker 11: after people who've been in our country twenty years, hard working,
42:20
Speaker 11: law abiding. We all want border security. Yes I'm from
42:23
Speaker 11: the border, of course I want border security. We don't
42:26
Speaker 11: want people crossing into this country who mean hiss harm.
42:28
Speaker 11: At the same time, we should not be treating people
42:31
Speaker 11: who've been in this country twenty years, who are abiding
42:34
Speaker 11: by the law, who are part of our communities, part
42:36
Speaker 11: of our families. Many of us come from mixed status families.
42:39
Speaker 11: My own mother was born in Mexico. But so border security. Yes,
42:45
Speaker 11: what is happening with these ice raids is making us
42:47
Speaker 11: less secure and not more so when.
42:48
Speaker 5: We delineate between those two the way that you just did.
42:51
Speaker 5: Does this administration deserve credit for securing the border?
42:54
Speaker 11: I will say there are a few crossings at our
42:57
Speaker 11: Mexico border because of what Trump has done.
43:00
Speaker 9: Yes, he does.
43:00
Speaker 5: Has that made Texas safer?
43:04
Speaker 9: Likely?
43:04
Speaker 11: Yes, likely it has made Texas safer in that sense,
43:08
Speaker 11: but less safe when it comes to these ice rays
43:11
Speaker 11: in our community.
43:11
Speaker 5: But the impact on the economy though, the impact on
43:13
Speaker 5: the job market, Yeah, we're watching many jobs go unfilled
43:17
Speaker 5: because of this.
43:19
Speaker 11: Absolutely, there is no plan, right, there is there has
43:22
Speaker 11: been in Texas a lot of undocumented labor. That's just
43:26
Speaker 11: the reality, right And now that these people have been
43:30
Speaker 11: detained and deported, these immigrants who are just showing up
43:32
Speaker 11: to their jobs have been detained and deported, they're not
43:35
Speaker 11: people to do the jobs, and there is no plan,
43:38
Speaker 11: and that is a real problem.
43:39
Speaker 9: I will also say about the security issue.
43:42
Speaker 11: We have a district attorney in Harris County who says
43:45
Speaker 11: he has child sex abuse cases he cannot prosecute because
43:48
Speaker 11: the witnesses are too afraid to come forward or have
43:50
Speaker 11: been detained or deported, so that makes us all less safe.
43:53
Speaker 2: We just have a minute left. I want to get
43:55
Speaker 2: to public schools. As we've seen takeovers in certain areas,
43:58
Speaker 2: Austin could be next. What's wrong with Texas's public schools
44:01
Speaker 2: and how do you propose to fix it?
44:02
Speaker 11: We need a back to basics approach. I had a
44:04
Speaker 11: press conference last year with Maga. Mom's with me for
44:08
Speaker 11: my bill, which is my plan to let's wipe clean
44:11
Speaker 11: all the grift, all the vendor contracts that are really
44:14
Speaker 11: to Greg Abbott's donors. Use that money to pay our
44:16
Speaker 11: teachers to be amongst the highest paid in the nation.
44:18
Speaker 11: We have to put money back into the classroom, not
44:21
Speaker 11: into bureaucracy in Austin, not into these grifting vendor contracts.
44:25
Speaker 2: Do you need to raise taxes to do that as well?
44:27
Speaker 11: Absolutely not. We are a high tax state in Texas.
44:30
Speaker 11: We pay very high property taxes under Greg Gabbott. There's
44:32
Speaker 11: the money, there aren't the priorities.
44:34
Speaker 2: All right, We'll leave it there. Thank you so much
44:36
Speaker 2: for joining us. She's the Democratic candidate for governor of Texas.
44:39
Speaker 2: Gina Inajosa.
44:43
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44:47
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44:56
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