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Welcome to the Thursday edition of Bloomberg Sound On. I'm Joe Matthew in Washington. As we embrace little Friday and watch a long train of cars make their way to the airport at the lawmakers or leaving and we don't have a lot to show for it here. We're going to get to that as we leave our conversation today with the latest polling from Bloomberg News in Morning Consult. It's our big story today and it's not great for
Joe Biden. Trump pulls ahead in Michigan is the headline, and some troubling statistics inside this poll that we're going to talk about with Nancy Cook, involving not only the job that he's doing, but specifically the economy and the lack of support that we've been seeing among union members after he became the first president to walk the picket line. Raising a lot of questions today and so it's great to have Nancy Cook Bloomberg Senior national political correspondent at
the table. Great to see you. You've been talking through this all day. What kind of ideas have you come up with here? Specifically, we're talking Michigan again, a state where he should be outperforming for the investment of personal time, energy and money that he has made in the UAW, in the auto industry, in organized labor, what's happening.
Also, there's universities in Michigan. I mean, all of these places in Michigan should be like pockets of support for Biden. And what we saw in the latest Bloomberg News Morning Console poll is that Trump is now a head of Biden in Michigan. He is actually a head of Biden in all seven of the swinging states that we pulled. And this is the third month that we've done the poll. So in the past the two of them were tied
in Michigan. Now Trump is also ahead in Michigan. And so what this shows to me is that, you know, we have three months of data that now show Trump is really beating Biden, and it's really cementing the idea that this narrator of Bidenomics and everything that the Biden White House doing is not taking hold, and part of problem. Biden's problem is coming from within his own coalition, which we can talk more about young people, black voters. The support is really.
Cratering suburban women, showing weakness for How do we rationalize that when we've seen Democrats outperform in midterms and in special elections since the end of Roe v.
Wade.
That was supposed to take suburban women away from Donald Trump, wasn't it.
Well.
I think that the abortion issue is still very potent for Democrats and it's still probably their best bet for twenty twenty four and the bright spot for them. But we see a lot of voters who are upset about Biden's handling of the Israel Moss War. That's what young voters say. We see a lot of people who are upset about the state of the economy and inflation, the
rising prices. People are upset about immigration and crime. You know, it depends on the group, but all of these negative messages are resonating with voters now, and people really trust Trump, particularly on the economy, to handle almost every part of the economy, housing, interest rates, you know, we pulled on
all these different things. Yeah, the only economic issue that these voters that we spoke to trusted on Biden more with was the personal debt, so things like dealing with credit card balances and.
Things like that supposed to student loans.
Right, even student loans. You know, Biden is not getting credit for. People think that he's not doing enough, or they just don't even really they're not even really aware of what he has done.
Well.
Yeah, so it's so sort of a damned if you do a type of situation that the stock market is at an all time high, this would have been tweet heaven in the Trump white House that you covered, and he even made the point, how can you impeach me? A lot of folks are retweeting this from twenty nineteen when the stock market's at at all time high. Joe Biden's got the same thing to say, but nobody associates it with him.
I think that this White House has always had a problem just selling its own record and accomplishments. You know, Biden has done many, many things that have made progressive of voters and even some centrist voters very happy. You know, he passed sweeping packages through Congress, including the Infrastructure Law, the Inflation Reduction Act. It had money for a bunch of green technologies. But his White House has just not been able to sort of convince Americans of his record.
That's been real sore spot for them throughout his presidency, and I think that we're seeing that really come to fruition as we head into twenty twenty four.
We're going to talk with Nick Ackerman coming up next about Donald Trump's legal problems and Joe Biden's for that matter. But this hasn't made a dent in the polls for indictments. We see him in court every other day, in the lobby, yelling at reporters. This has not had any detrimental effect on his standing.
It hasn't so far. I mean, but two things on that. One, It has not affected his standing with Republican primary voters at all. They sort of view all of these different court cases as a sham. If anything that has mobilized and cause his base to coalesce around him, I do. I think that that calculus may change a bit if Trump is indeed the Republican nominee as we largely expect him to be, and the focus is now mostly on
Trump and Biden. I'm not sure that independent voters and sort of moderate voters are necessarily going to want to support Trump with these legal challenges, and that is the big challenge for him heading into next year.
Fascinating stuff and you can read a lot more about it, of course, on the terminal and online at Bloomberg dot com. Nancy Cook, it's great to see you. Love to talk to you next about the ad blitz. I guess that's coming in Iowa for Donald Trump, because that's the next leg in the story. Isn't it great to see at the table? Nancy. Thank you. As we turn our attention now to Donald Trump's legal situation which we were just
referring to. Now the Supreme Court involved, which is pretty remarkable at this point, as we wait for the Scotus to weigh in on this idea of presidential immunity and a challenge to the obstruction charge that he and January sixth rioters are facing. The court may wait till June and likely will to weigh in on this stuff, and that trial. Jack Smith's trial is supposed to start in March. Maybe not. Nick Ackerman is the man we like to talk to when we need to call a lawyer on
this story. Of course, the founder of the law office of Nick Ackerman, former assistant US Attorney, former assistant special Watergate prosecutor. It's great to see mister Ackerman, welcome back. This is the type of story. You put these two together and you see it being brought to the Supreme Court. Now, why people say, you know what, nothing's ever going to happen to this guy. Do you think this delays the trial that's set to begin in March.
There's no reason why it should. The Special counsel has asked for expedited hearing. The Supreme Court is open to that. They've ordered Donald Trump to submit his papers by the twentieth of December. I think there's going to be an oral argument shortly thereafter on this issue. This could all very well be settled and decide by the Supreme Court by mid mid January, and this case will just move along in March. I mean, I think that's what's going
to happen. I remember back in my Watergate days when people were saying, well, Nixon has three members on the Supreme Court that he's appointed, They're all going to come his way. It didn't happen. It was a to zip in terms of a decision, And I think you're going to see the same thing here.
Well, there are two separate things, and I want to delineate between them. One is the justices considering Jack Smith's request. He asked for this to be clear to fast track consideration of Donald Trump's claim on presidential immunity. That's something that you are intimately familiar with.
Neck.
The other one has to do with the obstruction charge and whether the way this is written, it's a law that follows the Enron scandal, and it looks like, depending on how you read it, that it might only apply to document tampering. Either of these could invalidate part of the case against Trump. You don't see the court ruling that way. Is that how I understand it.
I don't see them ruling that way at all. In fact, the case, the statute that you're talking about, refers to much more than document tampering. It really goes to all kinds of obstruction, including an obstruction of Congress. So I don't see that a difference here, But that particular issue probably won't be decided until much later. Not that that will make a difference because a number of people have already been convicted of obstructing Congress. It's a question for
the Supreme Court. They'll respond to that issue in due course. It'll go to trial and due course against Donald Trump, and if it continues as an appeal, it'll be part of Donald Trump's appeal from a conviction, assuming he's convicted of the obstruction count. But keep in mind, there are two other counts that he's been charged with in the election interference trial. So yes, that particular count is not the be all, end all of the prosecution against Donald Trump.
Are you still of the mind and correct me if I'm not remembering this the right way, that that will be the first trial to begin in the first to end Jack Smith's election tampering case.
Assuming that the Supreme Court acts quickly, which I think they will, will be the first case. I mean, already we have a January eighteenth date that starts the process of selecting a jury in this case. So I don't see this slowing down. I think the Supreme Court realizes
that they've got to make this decision. It's important. This is an extraordinary circumstance, and this is one of those situations where the Government's going to be able to bypass the DC circuit and go straight to the Supreme Court and get a pretty quick decision. It is really not a very very difficult issue. The DC Circuit has already spoken on it in terms of the civil case cases
that were brought against Donald Trump. I don't think there's any question that running for president is not part of presidential duties. It doesn't come under the subject of presidential immunity, and I think this is going to be a fairly simple issue for the Supreme Court to deal with.
Talking with former Watergate prosecutor Nick Ackerman about the former president, let's move to the current president, mister Ackerman. This took place yesterday in the House of Representatives.
On this vote, the a's are two twenty one and then a's are two twelve.
The resolution is adopted.
That Objecson, the motion to reconsider is laid.
On the table. The final act, it seems, of this House before they head home, codifying, formalizing, making official, and impeachment inquiry that actually was already underway by direction of the leadership in the House. Nick. There are a lot of questions after we saw Joe Biden's son Hunter up there yesterday at the podium, A lot of questions about how they will prove a link between his bad behavior and the actions of the current president of the United States. Where's the evidence.
A number of years to do that, and they haven't done it. There doesn't appear to be any link between what he's done with his taxes, what he did with the gun charge. None of that has anything to do with Joe Biden. This is a purely political act by the House Republicans done at the behest of Donald Trump to try in some way tar Joe Biden. The fact of the matter is there's no evidence. There is no
evidence they developed. During the entire time that Donald Trump was in office and everyone knew about the Hunter Biden situation, they never came up with anything, and there's no reason to think they're suddenly going to come up with anything new at this point.
Well, I'm confused, and that's not unusual for me. But the chair of the Oversight Committee says that he's going to hold Hunter Biden in contempt. The chair of the Judiciary Committee said this as well, for not showing up to testify. Albeit they wanted him behind closed doors, but he showed up and said I'm here and I will testify in public. Does that count as being a no show. How would you be held in contempt for showing up?
You can't. You can't be held in contempt. I mean, can you imagine this going before a jury and Hunter Biden's lawyer said, standing up and saying he came here, he honored the subpoena, was willing to do it, but he wasn't going to do it behind closed doors. That's just asking for an acquittal on a contempt charge. I just don't see that going anywhere.
Well, we've settled that. I guess what will be the need then? Is there going to be a need for a so called smoking gun of piece of paper that shows the connection here for this to move to an impeachment trial.
The only way this moves to an impeachment trial is if they can show some violation by the president that he engaged in a high crime or a misdemeanor. They don't even have a parking ticket against him at this point. So I just don't see where this is going. It's just going to be another grand standing play by the Republican Congress trying to raise doubts about Joe Biden when there's no there there.
Yeah, you don't think it gets to the Senate.
It'll never get to the Senate. I can't imagine this getting to the Senate. I mean it could in the fact that you get all the same Republicans who wound up voting for this formal hearing based on what Donald Trump wanted. I suppose they could all do the same thing and bring an impeachment against Joe Biden. But they've got to have some facts. You've got to have a charge, you got to say you did something wrong, and like I said, right now, they don't have a parking ticket to charge against them.
It's good to see again Nick Ackerman with us here on Bloomberg's Sound On, a voice of experience here as we bring you conversations with insiders in Washington who've been there every day. On this program, you're listening to the Bloomberg Sound On podcast.
Catch the program live weekdays at one Eastern on Bloomberg Radio, the tune in app, Bloomberg dot Com, and the Bloomberg Business App. You can also listen live on Amazon Alexa from our flagship New York station, Just say Alexa play Bloomberg eleven thirty.
Hey find us on YouTube watch Charlie Pellett do his thing join us here in the studio. Any day we're on the air. Go to YouTube search Bloomberg Global News. You'll find my friend Kaylee Lyons, who just came into the studio here for part two of this broadcast. We've got got some news. You're going to help me kind of unpack all of this because we heard from Chuck Schumer a little bit earlier today on the floor dismayed
that everyone was going home. And I've been sitting here for the last hour talking about everyone going home, and some people are. But let's listen to the majority leader because it sounds like, well, he seems to think they're onto something in these border negotiations. Here he is.
Yesterday we had another round of productive conversations and there was more progress, but of course there's more work to do, and we're going to keep at it and keep at it. Last night I falled Klocher and a couple of nominations to the federal bench in the Department of Justice, with possible votes on these nominees as soon as tomorrow. To my Republican colleagues who have set action on the border as urgent, let's keep working to find a solution instead
of rushing for the exits. If Republicans are serious about getting something done, they should not be so eager to go home. This may be our last best chance to get this legislation done.
Now that was this morning. It doesn't sound like somebody who's about to pack his bags here. He's even got a couple nominations to deal with. Yea, So are they staying overtime?
We're about to find out. The Majority leader is going to go back to the floor and announce what the schedule is going to look like. But there's been reports that they're going to do some folts tonight. Then they'll come back Monday and try to keep working. The thing is, though, is if the Senate does stay overtime they reach a deal, that's great. The House is still gone.
Yeah right, So just ask Byron Donald's. He was standing outside the House looking across the other side of the Capital, asked about this today.
The Senate is crazy. The Senate wants to spend more money than they voted for back in May, and now they want to spend more money on top of that. I mean, like, what are we doing. Joe Biden signed in the law the spending levels they want to now spend more money. So the Senate wants to break the deal.
For what it's worth, there were plenty in the Republican party who also didn't like that deal, who want to spend less money.
Right, So.
Does that sound like someone who's ready to avoid a government shut down the beginning of next year. If you ask Kakim Jeffreys, he'd tell you the only good thing that happened this year was Democrats in the House. Here's the leader, who, by the way, held a year end news conference. The speaker did not, so maybe he's coming back. I don't know. Here's the Democratic leader.
Anything productive that has happened in this Congress, which is not much because of the extreme maga Republicans, has occurred because House Democrats have led the way.
And so we wait to find out what the schedule is going to be. Looks like the House going by by though. Yeah no, if we get some movement on the border, we'll let you know. It is not the border that appears to be driving numbers, because we could bring any number of polls out on that. But the new Bloomberg News Morning consult swing state polls looking to at the economy. We've talked about Bidenomics We've talked about it with Jared Bernstein on the air, trying to figure
out the disconnect. But Kaylee, these numbers go beyond disconnect. Joe Biden's losing to Donald Trump among suburban women yep, and among Union voters yep. I'm scratching my head. This is Michigan. This is the guy who walked the picket line.
Yeah, it doesn't seem like it really did that much his support for the UAW And it's not just those two groups either. Joe young people eighteen to thirty four. Increasingly he is losing their support, and all of that paints a not so great picture for the current president when this is a state that could be absolutely critical in twenty twenty four.
I bet they're looking at this pull in the campaign. And I know Eli Yoakley as he helped us put it together political analysts that morning consult is with us right now on Bloomberg's sound on Eli, It's good to see you. This is a month three that we've been working on this together. So I believe that, based on the scientific method, is officially a trend here, and it's not good, is it.
You know, I used to work with the political analyst Nathan Gonzalez at Roll Call, and when we saw three things happening on the campaign, Charlie, we'd always say three is a trend. And that's what we're seeing here. I mean, in every successive survey we've seen of these seven key key states to the twenty twenty four elections, Joe Biden has been underperforming. And in every survey it stands out that it's his base that's the problem. It's young people,
it's black voters. If you ask people who voted for Joe Biden in twenty twenty if they're going to do it again, they're less likely to say so than Donald Trump's supporters. Clearly, he needs to rev up his own supporters. And none of this stuff is breaking through. Be it his legislative accomplishments that are legitimate, be it Donald Trump's severe criminal problems and democracy challenges that bother his base, or be it the fact that these economic problems are slowing.
He's got a major problem, and none of his messaging on any of these things is breaking.
Through to the Marria.
So, eli, is it that Biden is losing right now more so than it is Trump is winning? If that makes sense?
Yeah, probably. I mean, if you're not able to pull all of your supporters from last time and your other and your opponent is doing better at that, I think that suggests that you're losing. And you know, I think the one thing that we should be thinking about is everybody can say this is early, these are successive, this is not changing. But we haven't really seen the campaign litigated yet. I think Grig Davis mentioned this earlier in your show. I mean, where is the Biden ad campaign,
Where is the Biden super pac attacking Donald Trump? Where are any of these typical things we see in American politics to try to tear down your opponent. The most energizing thing for a base is going after your rivals. And you know, I think probably because of his legitimate concerns about looking like he's interfering with the Justice Department, I think the President has been scared of going after
Trump on some of these legal issues. But you know, he's got an economic case he could start making to the American people. It's just not breaking through because they're not quite buying it. I mean, one of the most interesting things that we saw in this survey is good chunks of swing state voters still see prizes as increasing. Despite all the reports we've seen that it's getting better, We're starting to see the share of voters in some of these states that say they see prices as increasing
decline since October. But it's still clear clear majorities see inflation as a big problem in their lives.
A little context on Michigan. Joe Biden won that state beat Donald Trump in twenty by one hundred and fifty four thousand votes. It was really close in twenties. I mean, that is pretty close. In twenty sixteen, Donald Trump won Michigan by just under eleven thousand votes. Eli, can you speak to the not only the close nature of what's happening here in Michigan, but how important that state will be among the seven we're watching to decide the next president.
It's could be very important, and I think that what happens in Mission it's going to be reflective with some of these other states, such as like Wisconsin up in the same area. All of these states were really close, and all of these states margins are going to matter a lot. I think that's why you've seen the President and his campaign so concerned about some of these third
party contenders in the wings. The good news for him on the third party contenders at this point still, as we've seen in the previous surveys, is they're not yet pulling any more support than from Biden than they are from Donald Trump. But you know, Michigan stands out as one of those states that has a clear labor union population.
That these are working class voters that he needs across the country to come out and support his campaign, and right now they're just not there in the numbers that he needs them to be.
It's interesting when looking at this polling across all seven of these swing states. Obviously we know the economy's problem matic for Biden. It has been consistently voters by and large in these swing states trust Donald Trump's handling of the economy more so than Biden's. What's interesting, though, is also swing state voters had a more favorable view of their own local economies than of the national economy as that whole. As a whole, ELI is that telling in
some way? Does that suggest that maybe it's not as bad for Biden as maybe it looks at the top line level.
I think one of the other things we saw in the survey was that not a lot of folks are worried about jobs. I think that's whenever you think about your local economy, you're like, where can I go to work? Inflation is clearly a macroeconomic problem, and it looks like the American people are smart enough to realize that it's a national issue, that the economy is a bigger problem nationwide. Maybe we'll watch this as we move forward. I think
continue asking that maybe that'll start translating upward. But you know, I think the American people are blaming Joe Biden for the state of the national economy. They're not blaming their mayor for inflation and the costs of milk. Right, this is something that is a national problem that lands on the president's shoulders.
I'll tell you, I wonder your thoughts on timing. Eli. We hear in one ear that's a year out, don't pay attention to these polls. We also hear that state poles are critical at this point because the national polls don't paint the picture. I guess what I'm getting at is not just what should we take seriously because obviously we're invested in this year at Bloomberg News in morning console, But how much time does Joe Biden have to write the ship.
Well.
First of all, they do pay attention to these polls, because you see the White House talking about poles every single day.
Yeah.
The other thing, the national polls, even a lot of the same trends we're saying in the swing states are being reflected at the national level. Be it Joe Biden's base issues, especially these concerns among black and young voters. You know, if the American people traditionally start tuning into the campaigns, we get closer to it. Once we could pass the Republican primary, there is an official Republican nominee.
That's a pretty good moment when this stuff solidifies. But at this point in the campaign, the Joe Biden campaign has all the time in the world to paint it, to try to rebuild the president's image. That was one of the greatest things he wanted, The greatest assets he had in the twenty twenty campaign was the fact that people just liked the guy. They might have thought he was too old, he might have had other issues with him,
but they liked him. And it was a perhaps a comparison to the incompany the Oval Office at the time. This is a moment where the Biden campaign could be spending time trying to rebuild the president's image. The problem is going to a Maryland NIH facility is not going to break through to the American people when we want
to talk about drug process. That's going to take a concerted effort from his campaign, from his allies, spending money on TV in these key states to try to rebuild the president's reputation.
Well, the president has some reputation problems. The former president does as well. As we've seen consistently in polling, there is a large chunk of the American electorate who would like neither of them to be the nominees for the Democratic and Republican Party. And something else I wanted to mention from this poll ELI thirteen percent of swing state voters said they were very likely to consider supporting a candidate from a new political party. What about that factor?
Yeah, I mean, I think that figure is pretty close to the level of support we're seeing for the various third party contenators we've named in these surveys at the state level. At this point, both President Biden and for President Trump stand to lose about the same with those candidates names thrown into the mix. I'm not sure that at this point they're having a huge impact. But you
mentioned Michigan, You mentioned these close margins. That's something that surveys like this aren't going to be able to pick up a few thousand votes here and there that could decide this thing. One thing that I noticed going through some of the numbers is just the fact that Robert F. Kennedy Junior's popularity has been improving among swing Saint voters
fans as they get to know who he is. That's something that I think both of the Trump's campaign and Biden's campaign are going to be keeping a close eye on as we move forward in this race. If they get vallid.
Access, the conventional wisdom is that RFK Junior would take votes away from Donald Trump, Cornell West, Jill Stein take votes away from Joe Biden. Is that right, Eli? Do they cancel each other out?
It looks like they're canceling each other out at this point. The only the only caveat that I would add though, is like a few votes here and there could shake the whole thing.
Yeah, we've certainly seen that in a lot of these states. Kayley, if this came down to ten thousand votes in Michigan the way it did in twenty sixteen. This poll is something we're going to look back at.
Yeah, absolutely, And of course we'll continue to do this polling and we'll keep talking to Eli.
About this is monthly Eli through the cycle.
Right yeah, wait, yep, absolutely, strap in.
Appreciate your coming to see us. Yeah, we're we're fastening our straps as always with Eliyoakley from Morning Consul to our partners here at the Bloomberg News Swing State Poll headquarters. Thanks for listening to the Sound On podcast. Make sure to subscribe if you haven't already, at Apple, Spotify and anywhere else you get your podcasts, and you can find us live every weekday from Washington, DC at one pm Eastern Time at Bloomberg dot com