Episode 66 – What’s at Stake in 2024?

Welcome to the TRSA podcast. Providing interviews and insights from the linen, uniform, and facility services industry. Most Americans might not realize it, but they benefit at least once per week from the cleanliness and safety of laundered, reusable linens, uniforms, towels, mats, and other products provided by various businesses and organizations. TRSA represents the companies that supply, launder, and maintain linens and uniforms. And in this podcast, we will bring the thought leaders of the industry to you.

 

We’re back with another episode of the Linen Uniform and Facility Services podcast, interviews and insights by TRSA. I’m your host, Jason Risley. After learning about private equity investments in the health care laundry sector during the last episode of the podcast, we’re going to turn our attention to one of the most critical roles that TRSA plays on behalf of the industry, advocacy and government relations. TRSA recently hosted its 14th annual legislative conference in Washington DC where executives from member companies have the opportunity to meet with members of congress and their staff to discuss issues critical to the linen, uniform, and facility services industry. Thanks to everybody that made it to the event in DC for the meetings on Capitol Hill, as well as to celebrate the best and brightest in the industry at the annual awards dinner.

 

In addition to the Hill Day meetings and annual awards dinner, TRSA members also received briefings on the current political climate with an eye on the 2024 presidential election from keynoter and political analyst, Bob Cusack, the editor in chief of the Hill Newspaper. Cusack has covered policy and politics in DC for more than 15 years. He regularly appears as a political analyst on Fox, CNN, C SPAN, MSNBC, and ABC. On today’s episode of the podcast, Cusack shares his insights on what to expect in Washington as we move toward the 2024 presidential election this November. Well, thank you for having me again.

 

I see some familiar faces, some new faces. I just wanna quickly describe what the what the hill is. The hill dot com gets over a 100,000,000 hits per month, over 30,000,000 uniques, and we don’t and studies have shown, this is true, that we don’t care who’s up or who’s down. Studies have shown us right in the middle, kinda like the Wall Street Journal editorial page. I know their their opinion page is more conservative.

 

I personally don’t vote. I actually didn’t think there was a bias in the media until I got in the media, but that’s how we’ve grown over the years is that, again, if Republicans are up, okay, if Democrats are up, we call it like we see it. We like being the referee. Before I I I get going, I do wanna talk about where we are in history. As far as whatever you think of of Donald Trump, and I’ve interviewed him four times.

 

I don’t know him well, but I know kind of how he thinks, for those, 4 interviews. The first time I interviewed him, they said, you have 15 minutes and we asked tough but fair questions and we got 80 minutes. He knows how to play the media. Books are gonna be written about him for a couple 100 years and he has been counted out dozens and dozens of times. How is he back?

 

Especially after losing, he’s trying to become, the only president, since Grover Cleveland to win the presidency and to lose it and then to win it again win again. And I right now, he is the favorite, though it definitely is a a slight favorite. One of the things that I just have not seen a politician like him before, and a couple examples here is there had been a lot of speculation and murmur on the campaign trail. As you know, he won the primary basically, wire to wire about where Melania was, because she was not by his side. And as those murmurs kind of increase, what does Trump do?

 

He calls out Nikki Haley and asks where her husband is. Only Donald Trump could do that. Now he was serving abroad, but that was beside the point. I’ve never seen a politician who can take a a, like, a weakness or, you know, something that would be negative and then go on the attack. Ron DeSantis, as you know, he was the main guy that was going to be able to take down Donald Trump in a primary.

 

What does Trump do? He calls Florida lawmakers before DeSantis did, and he gets most of them on his side, which was a huge deal and started the momentum of his return, especially after January 6th, where certainly he was impeached for the 2nd time, was acquitted. If he had been, he would not been acquitted, he couldn’t run. When so he basically is very active. He he controls the narrative.

 

I think I mentioned last year that, during COVID, he called me because he was pissed off about a story. The story was totally fine, but he kinda gets in your head and and and that is that is his personal touch, and that’s what he likes to do. Where others, we saw this with Hillary Clinton in 2016. We tried to interview her. She she just wouldn’t do it.

 

He is not afraid of interacting with the media and he gets a lot of free media and that’s why it’s important, for him in politics, to constantly engage. Now that’s also can be a negative because as you know, sometimes he he goes too far. He went way too far in that first debate with Joe Biden. If he had not been like that in that first debate, he probably would still be, president now. The remaining agenda for 2024, not much is gonna get done.

 

We actually saw in in the last election, a fair amount got done in 2022 in the midterm election, which was and a lot of people including me thought it would be a big red wave. Well, there was like a maybe a ripple. It was red, but it wasn’t a huge, wave. So now I don’t think there’s gonna get much done. What is the administration and the senate democratic led senate focused on?

 

Well, number 1, the administration is definitely focusing on regulations. I know you guys track EPA and DOL. I actually used to cover, Department of Labor. They wanna finalize as many regulations because they do not know, if if Biden’s gonna be president next year. Same thing with nominations.

 

The senate is very likely to flip, so it’s gonna be a lot tougher even if Biden does win, which is a fairly big if. But if he does win, he’s probably gonna have to deal with a Republican senate. So they wanna get all the nominations they can, and I I don’t know if you’ve seen it this week, but there’s a lot of democratic building pressure, for justice Sotomayor to step down so Biden could replace her while he’s still president and they have a democratic senate. So I don’t think she’s gonna step down. I think she’s almost 70 or she is 70.

 

She wears a mask still, so there’s been some concern about her health, but I don’t expect her to step down. But basically, everybody’s angling for the election. So whether that’s conservatives or liberals or centrists or people up for reelection, it’s all about November. Okay. The the parties are struggling.

 

Both parties have major flaws right now. Trump controls the GOP. We’ve seen that. He he basically, I mean, he helped push out, speaker Kevin McCarthy. He got rid of the RNC chair who was actually kind of an ally, to him and and he replaced her.

 

And he just recently pushed out Mitch McConnell. Mitch McConnell is going to not he’s gonna remain in congress, but those 2 don’t get along. And, overall, that is something that even though there are a lot of Republican critics of Trump, he has remolded the party in a way I’ve never seen. He’s getting a lot more blue collar voters. He’s doing well with minority voters better than he than he was in in 2020.

 

Biden has been trying to move a little bit to the middle after kind of embracing the left and certainly his first couple years. As I said, Trump and McConnell can’t stand one another, but Republicans totally blew their chance to win the senate in the last election. And why? Because they recruited some bad candidates like Herschel Walker, and Trump endorsed a lot of candidates who did won the primary. His his endorsement in the primary is very powerful, but they lost to general.

 

This time, even though the establishment and Trump do not get along, they have kind of put their differences aside to get better senate candidates. And I’ll talk more about the senate in a bit. Both parties, are struggling with unity. Obviously, speaker Johnson has a small majority as does Chuck Schumer. Speaker Johnson, it remains to be seen if he’s going to finish the year as speaker.

 

If he brings a Ukraine bill to the floor, Marjorie Taylor Greene is in all likelihood I think that’s gonna be the trigger for her to seek another vote to oust the speaker. A lot of Republicans do not want that to happen because they wanna retain the house, and as speaker Johnson said, they wanna build their majority, not lose it. Battle for the house. Let’s talk about that. Now we had 3 weeks where we didn’t have a speaker.

 

Just remarkable, we didn’t have a speaker. You know, people do remember big events, and certainly when I get text from people who are not insiders like me and they’re talking about politics, that’s when it’s broken through the bubble. Like, actually real people are paying attention. And I got a lot of text about when they didn’t have a speaker, for 3 weeks. So I think that is gonna hurt them and I think it especially will hurt them if they try again to get rid of another speaker.

 

A lot of high profile Republicans like Mike, Gallagher, Republican from Wisconsin, I think is one of the more, respectable, admired members said, I don’t like it. I’m basically leaving. They tried to get him run for the senate. Nope. He’s he’s leaving the house.

 

He’s already left the house and he’s, leaving the senate. He said he was not gonna run for the senate. So, yeah, congress is broken. Democrats are still getting used to the post Pelosi era. She’s still hanging around.

 

She’s running for reelection yet again, but she’s obviously not the top, Democrat in the house. The good news for Democrats as far as winning the house. Well, a lot of the competitive seats are in California and New York. Now those are in either slightly conservative or slightly democratic or right down the middle districts, but, republicans are very good generally speaking at showing up for midterms. But when you when you have a presidential election, you’re gonna have a lot more people especially in definitely blue states of New York and California.

 

So that that turnout is going to help, Democrats even though there’s a lot of questions about how many Democrats are actually gonna be turning out for Biden. But there will be a lot more Democrats, voting in 2024 than they voted in 2022. So they could steal back some of those seats they lost in 2022. The the crime issue, generally speaking, in 2022 did not work for Republicans, but it worked in my home state in New York. Republicans cleaned up in New York, and so they gotta win back a lot of those seats to win back the majority.

 

Good news for Republicans. Biden’s at the top of the ticket. His numbers are stuck. Bad news on inflation this morning. This is you know, I I compare, inflation to getting gum on your shoe.

 

It’s hard to get rid of. It sticks around literally. And this is one of those things where if the economy goes south, because there have been some promising signs recently, certainly the stock market has been doing well, that could be a real problem for Biden who’s already way behind Trump on handling the economy. Who will win the house? I don’t know.

 

I think it’s a jump ball. I think it depends on on whether they try to take out the speaker, but I think you probably when you go to bed on election night, you’re probably not gonna know and I’m not gonna know who actually wins the house because in house seats, sometimes they can take weeks to settle because they’re still counting votes. If the house flips to Democrats, then Republicans just they move on. Nancy Pelosi lost 63 seats. She kept her job as the top, house democrat.

 

So but if they lose the house, then I think speaker Johnson, will likely not be the top republican. He will not be minority leader. They’ll probably pick somebody else, but who that would be, anybody’s guess. The battle for the senate in 2024, it’s just historically friendly for Republicans. Democrats, really only have a chance because of the way members, senators are only up every 6 years.

 

So they only have 2 seats that they could win, then that’s Texas and Florida, but they’re probably gonna lose those seats. I think, senator Scott from Florida and, senator Cruz from Texas are probably gonna win. Senator Rick Scott from Florida is very wealthy. He’s gonna spend a lot of his own money. So I think it’s gonna be very difficult and expensive and that’s really kind of a red state now.

 

So when you go back up, look at all the Democrats who are have to run. Senator Tester, Sherrod Brown, Sherrod Brown’s in Ohio, Tester’s in Montana. Those are definite red states now. Brown’s a good candidate. Tester’s a good candidate, but they also have had kind of some fortune in running against kind of weaker competition.

 

This year, it’s gonna be, a lot more difficult and a presidential election year, which in that flips it where a lot of Republicans are gonna be coming out. So even though they don’t say it publicly, they’re very concerned that Biden’s gonna drag them down and and there’s only so much better that you can run better than the top of the ticket, maybe at most 5 points, usually between 35 points. So that’s gonna be very difficult. Also, republicans can win Arizona, New Mexico, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, Michigan. And even in Maryland, Larry Hogan is is running.

 

He thought about running for president as a a third party. He’s decided to run for senate, and the polls are looking pretty good as a popular governor in Maryland. However, Maryland is a blue state, and it’s very it’s a lot easier to get elected governor than it is if you’re flipping if you’re, republican in a blue state or if you’re a democrat in a red state. Running for the senate is kind of a different thing, and usually most people for federal elections, they vote their party. But you may see some split tickets.

 

So they have to win every race to keep control of the senate. Why? Well, Chuck Schumer wanted Joe Manchin to run-in West Virginia. Joe Manchin is the only Democrat who could have possibly, kept his kept that seat in West Virginia. But I think he saw the writing on the wall.

 

They recruited Jim Justice, who’s a popular governor, and a mansion decided not to run for reelection. So I do think that is highly likely that Republicans, no matter what happens in the presidential, are gonna win the senate, and it would be a minor miracle for Democrats to retain the senate based upon the map. Why is that important? Supreme Court nominations. I tell you one thing, if Joe Biden wins the race and then there’s a Supreme Court opening and Republicans control the senate, even on day 1, they’re not gonna call for a vote.

 

They’re gonna do what Mitch McConnell did to Merrick Garland, and even though that was toward the end of the the presidential term, I don’t think they would schedule a vote. So the senate really, really matters. McConnell, as I mentioned, is not going to be hanging around much longer. He may go to the appropriations committee, but, there’s a race now to replace him. I think the both nice guys senator Thune and Cornyn are the main candidates though we could have some other candidates get in the race after the election.

 

This this will not be decided until after the election, but both of them, are the clear favorites and I I would give a slight edge to to Thune. Schumer is gonna be a democratic leader for quite some time. He loves the job and no one is really challenging him. So 2024, race. Trump, as I mentioned, won wire to wire.

 

A lot of people thought it would be DeSantis toward the end. A lot of people thought it was gonna be Haley, but he crushed them all, and he did it without doing one debate, which in retrospect was was very smart, because he didn’t need to. He was winning by 20 to 30 to 40 points. Nikki Haley did win DC. You know how many people voted in that?

 

22100 people voted in DC. So that’s not a huge win. And not a lot of Republicans in DC, so not one to put on the wall. Anyway, she won Vermont too, so I gotta give it up. But she was a very good candidate.

 

I actually thought she was gonna run as a third party, and I thought she could’ve done pretty well. I think she’s very impressive. I’ve interviewed Nikki Haley. I just don’t know what her future in the party is because, once you go up against Trump, it’s very difficult. And even when Trump is off the stage whenever that is, at some point, a lot of people think he’s gonna live till he’s a 100, but but it’s gonna be very difficult for her to get the nomination even in subsequent years.

 

I think there’s gonna be a Trump effect. So if you’re gonna get the nomination in 2028 or 20 32, you’re gonna have to be you’re gonna have to attract the Trump crowd, the MAGA crowd. Again, I he he wins because he he’s engaged, but he does have some problems here. I mean, let’s face it. He’s got massive legal issues, massive legal bills.

 

The RNC, the Republican National Committee is, paying some of those, but he’s got a lot of cases. Georgia, January 6th, classified documents, hush money, the New York fraud case, obviously, had just put a bond up for that. So now the big question is, how many of these are actually gonna go to trial? I think a very small percentage, Georgia could go. That’s been a mess because of the prosecutor and and her alleged affair.

 

The New York fraud the Hashmoney case is gonna definitely move forward before the election. The classified documents probably won’t. January 6th, I’m not sure. It remains to be seen. But Trump’s, strategy is just delay everything.

 

Delay everything until he’s president and then basically the department of justice is gonna run out of the White House. He’s not gonna be able to dismiss all these charges because some of her are not, federal charges, but he’s gonna be able to seriously influence them. So he is spending a lot of money. I wouldn’t be surprised if somehow he tries to get the government to reimburse him for legal fees. I wouldn’t vote a pass.

 

This some people think, well, what what happens to Trump if there’s, you know, if he’s convicted? And listen, you know, he’s been indicted. The indictments helped him. The indicts indictments helped him raise money, but that was a Republican primary. That’s not a general election.

 

So lot of if he’s convicted, does that change? If you look at polls, and there have been polls, actually, if he’s convicted of January 6th, that’s one where Trump is winning right now against Biden. But if he were convicted on January 6th, polls say Biden would jump ahead of him. One poll, the Harvard Harris poll that we we partner with. The other case is if he’s convicted, before the election, Trump is still winning though it does narrow.

 

So it’s gonna hurt him if he’s convicted. And if you told me 10 years ago we’re gonna have a a leading presidential candidate who could go to jail while also being president, I’d be like, come on. That’s ridiculous. But that’s where we are. So Haley is not an insurance policy.

 

A lot of people thought she was just collecting delegates from DC and Vermont and saying, well, I have delegates at the convention and for whatever reason, whether it’s health or more likely legal issues, maybe she’d be the insurance policy. Not gonna happen. No chance. That the any insurance policy would be, whoever, Trump picks for VP. A lot of speculation about Biden, both before the 2022 election, and still to this day.

 

Is he too old? A lot of voters are very concerned about his age, including a lot of Democrats, but they’re kinda stuck right now. I I talked to a, house Democrat who said, yes. I understand that Joe Biden could lose to Trump. But I tell you one thing, Harris would definitely lose to Trump.

 

So they don’t want to they don’t want Harris to be at the top of the ticket. Now if if Biden did have a health issue and listen, there have been a number of Democrats who want him replaced. I mean, Jim Carville, Bill Maher on HBO says, hey, you can just do it at the convention. That’s what conventions are for. You can replace him or he can bless somebody, but Joe has to be the one who agrees to that.

 

And then the politics of not giving an African American, the first African American vice president, the chance to run would be so difficult. So Michelle Obama recently said she would not run. I think there’s if probably Biden is gonna be at the top of ticket, but if he’s not, I think a lot of people will be going to her to to say, hey. Why don’t you serve at the top of the ticket? But still, I think we are looking despite all the rumors, we are looking at a a rematch that not a lot of people are excited about.

 

Okay. Who who is Trump gonna pick as VP? You know, some people on TV, some smart people, and even former members of congress I’ve talked to say, well, you know, Haley would be a great pick. That’s never gonna happen. He is going to pick someone who is extremely loyal.

 

Trump got upset at Mike Pence for stealing headlines from him, Mike Pence. I mean, so there’s no way he can take Vivek Ramaswamy who at a Reese after he won one of the primary contests, a lot of it that he won. He said, Vivek, why don’t you come up to the stage, but you only have one minute, Vivek, because he doesn’t want him talking that long. So it’s gotta be someone who’s kind of quiet, a loyalist. I think he’s gonna pick a woman.

 

That’s gonna be important for the suburban women vote that he lost, an independent vote that he lost in 2020. Kristi Noem, governor of South Dakota, served in congress, definitely a loyalist. Elise Stefanik, who is in leadership in the house right now, republican from New York. I heard someone say Ben Carson, he’s a little old. He’s 72, but he is definitely a quiet person who is a loyalist.

 

And there’s another name that just popped up. We actually just wrote a story about this, JD Vance from Ohio. He and Trump clashed a while back and I think that Vance is a smart guy, but I I think he wants again somebody who’s not gonna take attention from him. Tulsi Gabbard, former Democrat, from Hawaii, has a track record on abortion. And remember, John McCain wanted to pick, now the late, Joe Lieberman to be his VP before he picked Sarah Palin.

 

And why didn’t he pick Lieberman, who was a very close friend? Because the rules back then I need to check if the rules are still now, but but I’m pretty sure they are. If you get 2 thirds of delegates to say, I want this VP candidate off the ticket, that then that person goes. And Joe Lieberman was not gonna make it through the convention, so that’s why he went in that direction. Now for a brief message from TRSA.

 

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2024? A lot. I mean, you know, in 20 in 20 in 2000, a lot of people said Bush and Gore were exactly the same, and they did have a lot of similar positions. That’s a different era. Biden and Trump are so different.

 

The Trump prosecutions, the department of justice is going to be we’re gonna see a very different second term, if Trump is elected. He is not gonna be picking John Kelly’s as his white, house chief of staff or Mick Mulvaney, people who tried to control him. No, no, no. All hands are off now. He is gonna be picking loyalists like Steve Bannon to be high level positions.

 

So the the first term, would look nothing like the second term. Taxes, huge year for taxes next year because of Trump, a lot of the Trump, tax cuts expire And that’s gonna be a huge battle. The economy, inflation, government spending, at some point they’re gonna have to, deal with, the debt of this country. It’s like both parties are ignoring it. But as we see, inflation and interest rates in particular continue to rise, they’re gonna have to address it.

 

But they’re not addressing it this year or anytime soon. Otherwise, these these programs are headed for bankruptcy, both, Medicare and Social Security. Student loans, obviously Biden is hitting the the gas on student loans because he knows he’s behind foreign policy. China has indicated and the CIA believes it’s true that they’re gonna be invading Taiwan, in 2026 or 2027. So this is a we’re in a very serious time.

 

Obamacare has some deadlines that are, pending and will be pending in 2025. The border obviously has been a huge and basically, Trump won 2016 because of the border. He may win again because of the border. I I don’t understand why this White House didn’t go to the border earlier. They kinda mishandled the situation and Majorcas became a lightning rod and at first they said that there’s no border crisis and then more recently they’ve said, well, there’s a crisis, but it’s the Republicans’ fault.

 

And and Republicans did block a democrat, well, bipartisan bill, but that was supported not by a lot of Republicans to in the fiscal showdown on funding the government. But immigration is a top issue depending on what polls you look at. It’s the number one issue. And I just think over climate change, and we think about implementing bills like the, the inflation reduction act, which didn’t get any Republican support. That takes a long time to implement.

 

The bipartisan, and it was slightly bipartisan, infrastructure bill, that takes years to implement. So what is if Trump wins, what is the implementation of those things going to be like? He obviously is a critic of those bills. He’s a critic of everything that Biden likes. So that’s gonna be significant.

 

And I and I mentioned how the senate and the supreme court are such big factors, and we’ve seen that with recent decisions. Lot of third parties out there, I think they’re gonna have more of an effect. They can’t win. No labels. As I mentioned, Larry Hogan was thinking about running for president.

 

That was gonna be on the 3rd party ticket name, no labels. Haley didn’t work out for her. Some people were concerned that you can’t run-in the primary because of sore loser laws in the States And they just failed to get a high profile name even though they they collected 1,000,000 of dollars because 7 out of 10 people don’t wanna see Biden versus Trump. But, here it is. And here’s an example.

 

Biden won Wisconsin by about 20,000 votes. Jill Stein did not get on the ballot, in that state 4 years ago, but in 2016, she got 30,000 votes. She’s on the ballot in Wisconsin. That can make all the difference. But the biggest one is RFK junior.

 

And RFK junior who just picked a, a VP candidate, and and Shanahan is a huge donor. So she has a lot of money that’s gonna help RFK Junior. His goal is to get to 15% and get on enough ballots because if you’re on enough ballots and you have 15% in most polls, you can get in the debates. Now we don’t know if they’re gonna be debates, but that would be interesting if he got in. Most there’s conflicting data on RFK Junior whether he takes more from Biden or Trump.

 

The Biden people are more upset because after all, he is a Kennedy. Shanahan, the VP pick, is a progressive. So he’s got the Kennedy name, but he certainly there are some there’s some data that show that he’s also pulling from Trump, but Trump has recently engaged and said, I I I’m so happy he’s running. Democrats are certainly not happy that RFK Junior is running. However, he does need to get on the ballot, and that’s gonna be difficult.

 

He could run as a libertarian. Libertarians saw his VP pick and are like, what is that? That’s they didn’t like that because libertarians have gotten on the ballot forever, so they they kind of have their place. Now he’s getting on more ballots, but, again, if he doesn’t get on enough ballots, he can’t qualify for the debates. And he is not a 15%.

 

He’s actually got no he got no bump recently from the the VP announcement. But, you know, overall the the system is totally rigged against 3rd parties. It’s it’s the system that we have, and it’s not gonna be changing. If there was any year that a third party could win, this would be the year, but that’s not happened. Conclusions and prediction.

 

Will Biden’s health hold up? I ran into Biden on a plane, about a year before he announced his 2020 bid, and he was flying in coach so that was a sign he was gonna run. He was only with, like, 1 or 2 staffers and he was very engaged. And I’ve talked to him when he served in the senate. And then about 6 months to a year later, I did notice he he just wasn’t as sharp.

 

And this was before Trump, which he often does now, this is before even Trump was kinda mocking him, that the guy I talked to on the plane was was not the guy, that I was seeing on TV. Now, obviously, he’s had a stuttering issue, but it’s more than that. You know, my dad’s Biden’s age. He needs a nap, every day, and that’s you know, I look forward to that. I look forward to having a nap in the middle of the day.

 

I mean, it’s just a arduous job and and his you know, it’s just there’s so much concern about his age. The big question is whether he can actually get enough people to think, yes. I’m going to, vote for someone who’s still gonna be around in 4 years. More than 7 in 10 people, think that a vote for Biden, because of his age, is a vote for Harris. And her poll numbers are terrible.

 

And his his numbers are not that good, but but hers are a little worse. He has actually made some ground up recently. He’s caught up in some of these battleground states, but about a month ago. And that, you know, depending on how how many battlegrounds you count, you know, it’s, you know, it’s 7 or 9, but but Trump was winning all of them. I don’t think I I think Trump is a favorite in Georgia, which he lost.

 

I think, Trump is a favorite in Arizona. Maybe Biden could win North Carolina, but I kinda doubt it. I just think the economic numbers and the pessimism, that’s going on in this country right now, you know, during COVID, even though COVID hit and we didn’t know how long it was gonna last, people were optimistic. The mood of the country is sour, and that’s always bad for an incumbent. Polarization is always gonna continue.

 

It used to be that the losing side would say, okay, we lost and now we need to to work for the country. Those days are over. When John Boehner after Mitt Romney lost in 2012 and he said, well, we lost. Obamacare is now the law of the land because, you know, Obamacare was on the ballot. He got murdered by conservatives and had to backtrack immediately.

 

So the day after the election, you’re either fighting in that election, which I think is likely, maybe on both sides, or, it’s just gonna be a situation, where everyone is is thinking about the next campaign. As I said, they’re gonna have to deal with entitlements at some point, record spending this year. It’s gonna only increase with super packs. There’s so much online. I do expect a close election.

 

As I said, I think the president right now is the underdog. I think she he should embrace being the underdog. Obama, a year before the election, a year before 2012, he said I’m the underdog and he was right because he was having a tough spell. And he ran a very good campaign and he beat Romney. I think Biden would be wise to be not be defensive about the polls.

 

He’s saying the polls aren’t accurate now. Embrace the underdog role. Everybody loves an underdog, especially in this country. I think Taylor Swift will endorse Biden. It’s just a matter of when.

 

Trump is very concerned about that and he should be based upon what kind of following, she has. But but she’s backed him before. So I don’t expect anything else. I do think that how the candidates deal with the media is a very important thing because Hillary Clinton and DeSantis and Biden to this point Biden is not very accessible to the media. Trump takes on the media, but he’ll engage.

 

And if like that first time when I interviewed him, he he said to me as I left, be fair when you write up the story. And then he said it 3 more times. And, of course, I put that in the story, but we were. So, you know, because we were just trying to break news and just trying to, not egg him on and I don’t I think he only had 15 minutes. I gotta maximize that 15 minutes, but you can’t be scared and win.

 

Hillary Clinton and DeSantis both regretted they didn’t engage. Biden turned down the Super Bowl interview, the Super Bowl. And this was not okay. Last year, it was Fox. This year, it was not.

 

There’s no excuse to not sit down and do the Super Bowl interview. I’m not saying it’s an easy interview, but think about all the people who are watching the Super Bowl and how many people are gonna watch that. So I think, you know, remember, 2020 is COVID. He did campaign from his basement. He won narrowly.

 

Now he’s gotta run on his own record, and that’s gonna be, I think, very difficult for him to do especially if he’s not out and about. Now if he’s out and about, he’s prone to gas. So what do you do? I think you gotta let Joe be Joe, and that’s what you gotta do. Just like, you know, when people ask me what’s Trump like, What you see is what you get.

 

I mean, that’s Trump. If there’s no camera in the room, he’s a little less amped, but he’s he is who he portrays. I mean, he’s very straightforward and sometimes he says what he thinks too often and it gets him in trouble. But overall, it’s very hard to become president and he became president and and may, create more history by becoming president again. However, there could be a lot of fatigue, legal courtroom fatigue of him.

 

Remember, these whatever cases that are going in, he’s gotta be in court. The criminal cases, he has to be there every day, and that’s gonna be covered wire to wire, and it remains to be seen if the legal stuff is going to help him like it did in the primary. I I think it’s actually gonna hurt him in a general. Joe Biden won independence in 2020. He is losing independence now.

 

In a recent poll, RFK junior was beating Trump and Biden with independence. Independents are looking elsewhere, and I don’t know where they’re gonna go. And that’s what makes this fascinating. And RFK Jr’s gonna have, the resources, to be a factor. Again, I don’t expect him to actually become president, but he can make the difference and potentially get in the debates.

 

Will there be be debates? I don’t know. I I do think there will be at least one debate. Usually, there are 3 presidential and 1 VP. I do think that people want debates.

 

Business leaders this week have urged, for debates. I think they’re healthy for democracy. That first debate between Biden and Trump was not healthy, and it was not good for democracy or for the country, but it’s better than nothing. And the problem is that Trump doesn’t wanna Trump wants to debate Biden. There’s some Democrats who are like, I don’t know if I want Biden to debate Trump, but Trump doesn’t like the presidential commission.

 

He thinks it’s left of center, doesn’t trust it, even other people, republics and democrats on it. So they’re gonna have to come up with, some other way to do it, or at least he’s gonna have to back off on not allowing the commission, which has already set dates for these debates. But I do think that that is one to watch whether there’ll be any debates, going forward, and I think that could make a difference. And as I said, I think if Trump had, just calm down a little bit at in that first debate, he’d still be president. I think if he handled COVID a little bit better and didn’t talk about bleach, he’d still be president, but he’s not.

 

And I do, I do think that this country can overcome a lot, you know, reading a lot I like to read a lot of World War 2 books, and this country has faced many challenges. We are facing many challenges right now. One of the things about the 2000 presidential election that I was very impressed by, even though a lot of people were upset, no violence. There was no violence. I I do fear either way there’s gonna be violence, and I do think that Democrats have to be very concerned about protests in Chicago because of Israel.

 

They are everywhere. Protesters are everywhere, and I think it could be before I was born, but, the, convention in 1968 in Chicago was not a good thing, and I think Democrats are gonna have to have a lot of security. And that’s that’s where we’re seeing. We’re seeing older voters, actually. It’s a weird election.

 

They’re kinda gravitating more towards Biden. The younger voters are actually gravitating a little bit more towards Trump. I know people who don’t like RFK Junior, but they’re gonna vote for him just to protest vote. So I I do think and a lot of these young voters who Biden relied on, they could be staying home. Trump doesn’t have to worry about enthusiasm.

 

I do think he would be wise to move a little bit more to the middle. Abortion is a huge huge issue for Democrats. If if Democrats didn’t have abortion as an issue, they’d be in serious trouble. But if you think about who has a better chance, are we looking at divided government in 2025? Yeah.

 

Probably. As I said, the senate is probably gonna flip. House is a jump ball. White House kind of a jump ball as well. Who has the best chance to have all 3?

 

Well, it’s the Republicans, because Trump is winning right now, the senate map, and the the house could go, either way. If you have any comments on today’s show or suggestions for future episodes, send an email to podcast attrsadotorg. That’s podcasts attrsa.org. Thanks again for tuning in. And if you liked what you heard on today’s show, please subscribe, rate, and review us on Apple Itunes and Google Podcasts.

 

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