China Covid Protests, Trump's Dinner Date Protests

facing off with hundreds of police. The White House supports the right of peaceful Purgas Bloomberg Sound On with Joe Matthew on Bloomberg Radio, the Lame Duck starts to quack. Welcome to the fastest hour in politics as lawmakers return to Washington with their to do lists, But will anything get done? We're joined this Monday after Thanksgiving by Greg Valier, the chief policy strategist at a g F Investment. Big questions about government funding as we move into the new year. Later,

thousands of protesters take to the streets across China. Will discuss the political fallout and what it will mean for China's COVID zero policy with Craig Singleton. The Foundation of democracies. Our signature panelists here Bloomberg Politics contributors Rick Davis and Genie Chanzano with analysis on our top stories, including the Senate runoff in Georgia and Donald Trump's dinner date with

a white supremacist. We got a lot to catch up on after the weekend, lawmakers coming back into town after the long Thanksgiving weekend, and I hope you had one with some important business to handle here. The lame Duck gets real starting now. And while everyone seems to have a list, it's funny right on both sides, a list of things likely not to happen. Let's start by circling

December sixteen on our calendars. That's when government funding runs out, right, And that's where we start with Greg Valier, a g F Investments chief US policy strategist. It's great to have you, Craig. Greg. I hope you had a great holiday, and I'm wondering how this is going to work out here in a couple of weeks, if we're talking about a potential government shutdown,

or if it's the opportunity for a deal. Well, first of all, great to be with you, and I would say the next several weeks are going to be crazy, very hard to predict, maybe some uncertainty for the markets. I'd say the first thing that we're going to have to focus on is a railroad strike. It's possible by the end of next week some of the union's deadlines

will be hit. So before we get into a budget showed out and all this other stuff, they have to find some way to finesse a railroad strike and then we get into all the big spending stories. Assuming they can avert this thing, Does Marty Walsh have one more in them? When you talk about, you know, the issues at hand that these rail workers are going through. We discussed it quite a bit on the show last week. This is not just as easy as throwing in, you know,

another day off or something. It looks like absolutely it's over not money, but it's over time off, sickly things like that that has the unions very upset. Earlier in September, Joe Biden got involved. I don't think he's involved that much this time, so it'll be a cliffhanger. Well seen as a win then when we had a tentative deal, So look, he could certainly make that happen again, assuming that we don't have a rail strike on our hands. Which I realized as a game changer is government funding.

A clean cr kicked into the next Congress. Everyone seems to be ready to pile on of this thing, but very few of the ideas seem realistic. Yeah, you hear that, But I think they will make a good faith effort. I don't think there's anything magical about December sixteenth. I think there'll be still another so called continuing resolution that could get us right up to Christmas Eve. It's happened before, and it could be Christmas Eve before we get a deal.

I think there will be big parts of this bill that will have to be deferred until early twenty three. That includes defense spending here, right, Lloyd Austin is upset about the idea of a continuing resolution beyond you know, this quick thing. But if this goes in well in the next year, with the war in Ukraine underway, our own needs here in the United States to replenish our stockpiles.

We can't just keep you know, printing the same budget. Right, you're right, And and the I think the biggest issue of all, as you say, is Ukraine. Uh, there are growing numbers of Republicans who are lukewarm at best of spending another thirty seven billion dollars that the White House wants to spend on Ukraine, so that could easily get punted into next year, along with several other issues, including

as you say, the defense budget. I mean, the defense companies will get their money, but they won't get it right away. Well, there's the point of leadership here as well. It came up on all the Sunday shows. I don't know if this is a worthwhile conversation because there really isn't anyone to run against Kevin McCarthy. But listen to Congressman Mike McColl he'sn't in the Republican leadership here, will will be as part of the new majority on ABC

this week. What's the alternative here? You know, Kevin has proven to be the leader of the Republican House, and I do think he will get the votes to eighteen on January three. There's quite a bit that happens between now and then, thought, what does it look like? What kind of a deal does he need to cut with the Matt Gates, ETCeteras of the world. Well, Joe, I hopefully you know, I try to be in the middle

of the road. I'm not an I D logue, but I'm sorry, Kevin McCarthy is not a real leader if he doesn't speak out about Donald Trump having a meal with a Holocaust denying racist, anti semi and if we can't see Kevin McCarthy stand up on that one, I think he loses a lot of credibility. How about that this is the dinner with the Fuentes, right, Nick Fuentes and Kanye. Donald Trump claims at least he didn't know

who Kanye had brought with him to dinner. You don't believe that, Well, is either ignorance or just a total lack of any kind of oversight. I mean, the former president has to have his screen Maybe he wasn't screened, but at the least there has to be an apology. And whether it's McCarthy or Trump himself, there has been no expression of regret over what they did. Well, it's been noted that a lot of Republican senators as well

have been pretty silent about the whole thing. Uh. You know, this came up on Meet the Press with Representative James Comber, which will have more about later in what you know? What was his line? He doesn't have very good taste or a very good judgment and dinner guests, you might need to say a little more than that is your point. Absolutely, Let's see how strong a leader Kevin McCarthy really is. Well, So do you think he gets it to eighteen or

do you think this will determine that? I think by default he probably does, because there's no there's no one else who would be a logical house speaker right now. But he's he's going to be on thin ice all through the spring. And there are so many big issues, as we talked about earlier, a real move against spending, uh, an attempt to maybe look at such security and trim that a little bit. I mean, there's some big, big issues, and uh, I don't see anybody, frankly, who's going to

take to take the reins. Interesting. Uh. The idea of an assault weapons ban was banded about quite a bit on the Sunday morning talk shows, and it has been quite a bit lately because the President has been promising saying once I did it once before, I'm going to do it again in this new Congress. We're going to reinstate the assault weapons ban. But you know, when you're hearing from Senator Chris Murphy that there's still are not

sixty votes for such a thing. He talked about this on CNN, I believe, and he actually had a lot to say about this particular issue, suggesting that states are not enforcing the laws that are already on the books. Here's what he said. I think we have to have a conversation about whether we can continue to fund uh law enforcement in states where they are refusing to implement these gun laws. I'll talk to my colleagues about what

our approach should be this problem. But six of counties in this country are refusing to implement the nation's gun laws. We've got to do something about that. And he's suggesting limiting or somehow changing funding for these police departments that

are not enforcing laws on the books. Greg Val, you're coming off of the defund the police movement, the confusion that that LEDs to in the case of many Democrats who actually didn't believe that, including the president, is this the direction we're really going in here with an incoming Republican majority in the House. I'd say two things very quickly. Joe. Number one, it's unlikely will get anything, but Joe Biden has had a pretty good stretch the last eight or

nine months. He's gotten a lot done. You can't totally rule him out and getting something on this, you know. The other thing I'd say is that this could be the lame duck before you go on though, Greg, is that in the lame duck session, perhaps I don't think you'll get it. I think it's it's too complicated to get right before Christmas. But I think he's going to go after it later in the winter. And the other point Joe I'd make is I think this is going

to become more of a state and local issue. I think a lot of states will throw up their hands and say, we're not going to get a federal bill, so we're going to move on our own. Uh. I mentioned Representative James Coomer. He was asked about this unmeat the press and was shown statistics UH from Chuck Todd that debunks this claim that states that have stricter gun laws have more gun deaths UH, and his reaction was fascinated.

Listen to James Coomer, if you have more gun laws on the books as a state, you have fewer gun related crimes, gun related deaths. That has been proven statistically well.

In places like rural America, where just about every other household uh exercises their Second Amendment rights, there aren't a lot of crimes in these areas, And I think one reason is because potential criminals know that these people are exercising their Second Amendment rights, suggesting that rural America is almost its own state, uh, greg and one that you know clearly the the people of Washington don't know about

where where is this argument right now? It's it's difficult to tell who's being serious, who's having a serious conversation when you hear answers like that in the face of data. Yeah, I mean, it's actually inaccurate to to make the assertion that we just heard. But it's going to be awfully hard to get done. I mean, one of the things that Democrats are going to regret for decades maybe is the fact that they got stuck with a label of

defund the police. I understand that Biden didn't believe in it, and a lot of Democrats didn't, but they can't shake the label. And because of that, it's going to be really hard to get a bill done. So when we step back and look at this time period, you see likely as cr moving us in the next year. Maybe there's a hiccup around Christmas Eve, you see Kevin McCarthy uh most likely being elected to be the next speaker, and then what happens next two years? Greg? Nothing, Probably nothing.

I'm in a minority that says that Georgia race is really important because if herschel Walker loses, and it looks like he is going to lose, that that sort of neutralizes Joe Mansion, if that makes any sense at all, because the Democrats won't have an absolute tie, they'll have a majority of one and that could make a difference. Let's see how Kirsten Cinema feels about that, right, Yeah, exactly, there were a couple of turns. Though one senator would

have made the difference. Two would have made all of the difference, and we'd be talking about this build Back Better law right now, wouldn't we. Well, that's right, absolutely, But I think I think Mansion is going to get checkmated here and he's gonna face a really tough re election fight in West Virginia. Fascinating, Greg, It's great to

talk to you and and come back soon. Greg Valier of a g F investments to get us started here the view from the chief US policy strategist at a GF, which means we need to bring the panel in next.

We'll do that with Rick Davis and Genie Chanzano, both coming off a long Thanksgiving weekend and a lot to talk about here, not just Congress coming together for the lame duck session, but also, as Greg said, that race in Georgia, we're gonna zero in with a lot more said, a lot more time and money spent on the campaign trail over the weekend. Senator Raphael Warnock and herschel Walker will do that next with Rick and Genie on the Fastest Hour in Politics. I'm Joe Matthew. This is Bloomberg.

You're listening to Bloomberg. You sound on with Joe Matthew on Bloomberg Radio. Fascinating numbers to see early voting from over the weekend in Georgia, and it's always interesting to look back and get a sense of where things were in the last runoff, because you know, we've done this a couple of times already. Here. Uh, there actually was a legal fight over whether they'd be allowed to do early voting on Saturday. Well, seventy thousand Georgians turned out

to vote Saturday. Uh. They came out in force again on Sunday, another eighties six thousand, eighties seven thousand people voted. You add in the fifteen thousand mail ballots accepted so far, and it's almost a hundred and eighty two thousand voters cast ballots by the end of the weekend. By comparison, more than two hundred thousand people are already submitted a mail ballot on the first day of really voting in Georgia's last one off elections last time we went through this.

Let's assemble our panel here. Rick and Jeannie are with us off the long weekend. It's great to see Rick Davis and Jeannie Chantino, Bloomberg Politics contributors who make up our signature panel Rick Georgia right now. Interesting, Raphael Warnock did not even uh, I'm sorry herschel Walker did not campaign over the weekend. Raphael Warnock was out in force, And I wonder what that tells us about the strategies

on the ground for each campaign. Yeah, my guess is that hurt blockers trying to figure out how to campaign for the next couple of weeks. Um, you know, he's had a lot of I would say self inflicted wounds over the last and since the since the election was over, and so I'm my suspicion is that he's sort of hunkered down trying to figure out like how is he going to sprint to the finish And and and kudos to Warnock for getting out ahead of him and using

a good weekend. Um, you know where some people would think, oh, you know, campaigning on Thanksgiving weekend is uh inappropriate, But the reality is people are voting, as you pointed out, and in large numbers, and so why not be out there among them, you know, stoking it up? What do you think about this genie? At the the incumbent is working harder on the campaign trail, it seems right now

than this challenger. That's right, you know. And and there is a school thought which says, and I agree with your last guest, and this race matters a good deal. It doesn't decide power in the Senate, but it's critically

important for Democrats and that may be reflected here. And also I think Rick has a point that you know, Walker is how a lot of self inflicted wounds, probably trying to figure out how to go out, and Warnock has a really focused message here, which is a message about the lack of competence on Walker's side and the fact that character does matter, and he has gone out on that message and he is sticking with it. And we also should remember that they are fighting for a

very narrow pool of voters. Most voters minds are made up. It's about those two hundred thousand voters who split their ticket that the Walker campaign and the Warnock campaign need to go after. And we see, you know, as a surrogate KEMP trying to pull them back to his side. And we're not making a concerted effort to say. You may be a Republican and you may be attracted to to a Kemp, but you certainly can't believe that Walker

is fit to serve in this office. I know you liked Raphael Warnos focus group add UH that came out for the weekend and certainly was shared quite a bit on social media. Whether this is I'm assuming it's a real focus group, but that you know, you've got people here are sitting you see them one by one sitting with headphones on UH and re acting to the things

they're hearing. If you listen to this broadcast every day, you heard everything from herschel Walker that ended up in this ad, you know, beginning with the vampires and the werewolves and all that. Listen, What the hell is he talking about? Is he's serious? Is for real? I'll tell you something that I found out where I wolf to kill a vampire. Did you know? How is he talking about? I don't want to be a vampire and more I want to be a wetwolf? Oh my god, he's talking

about vampires and werewolves right now? Yeah? Yeah, serious about this? Right? Okay? So look, we could have kept on going. It's like three minutes long, lot of material there, Rick. Uh if this stuff isn't already making up people's minds though, is this is this just for fun? Is it a fun campaign stunt? Or does this get to the two thousand people that Genie mentioned? Well? Uh, yeah, certainly that's a

target group. And these are uh, you know Governor Kemp voters who did not vote for herschel Walker um and and and likely didn't vote for Warnick either, So yeah, they would be in play, probably for Republicans only. So can you get them out? And where can you convince them? To vote for herschel Walker is the attempt. But look, as I said, you know, these are the kinds of

things that were tested in that ad tested. I use that in quotation marks um, you know we're we're pretty bad faux pause, right, I mean like and and and what's really interesting is their vote pause to all of us. But I don't think herschel Walker thought they were vote paused. I mean maybe there was some deep meaning in being Awarewolf. I don't know. But well, that's when he was really starting to really come out in in full character on at the an ad lib at the podium, right, Genie,

this was he I think Rick is right here. He thought he was starting to hit his stride at this point. And now it's the target of you know, quite a quite a little advertisement here. Well, as you know, Joe, I loved this ad because you know, we had been on the ERIC a few weeks ago, and every once in a while you would say, hey, Jeanie, can you interpret what what Walker is sick? And I was at a loss of words. I could have been in that focus group saying what the heck? I wan't say the

other word, what the heck is he talking about? Because I could not make any sense of it. So I think the ad is incredibly not just funny, but it's it's incredibly effective because it's where many voters find themselves because you're hard pressed to understand what he is talking about. And again it underscores the issue. He is not fit for this office, as Obama said, he may be a great football player, but being great at football doesn't mean you would be a great U. S. Senator for the

state of Georgia. I don't know if we have enough time for this next one. Herschel Walker on the Dan Patrick Show. Sometimes it's not funny the things that he's saying. Listen to this. I talked about the Russian roulette people, you're trying to kill yourself. No, that's not no, because that's against what I believe in. I said what it was if you came to my house and say you want to challenge me at something, and you know everybody

everybody always want to challenge me. Everybody want to challenge me. It's like why I said, Okay, if you want to challenge me, you're tough enough. Let me see you pull this here, pull this trigger here, put a bullet in and spending people are you're crazy. I would take it and put it to my head to snapping people. You're trying to kill yourselfn No, And I don't know whether I'm just blessed, and but I am. I've been blessed, and it's just hanging out there as we head for

the election. This is bloomberg, a rare display of public anger over COVID zero. People taking to the streets thousands and cities across China in recent days to demonstrate against the strict lockdowns, the mass testing, clashing with police, in some cases, some calling for President She to step down, and while some of them arrested, authorities have not yet responded with you know there's any sort of widespread violent crackdown,

people think Tneman when this stuff starts. Of course in China, and boy, they were careful today at the White House. Great story about it on the terminal. China protests draw cautious US response following Bali meeting. Remember, Joe Biden was just with President She. We felt like things were going well. But it's one of the most frequently asked questions today. Uh In the news briefing at the White House, John Kirby was there and so that's why you know that

frequently brings up national security issues. The spokesman for the National Security Council at the White House. Here's how he responded. Our message to peaceful protesters around the world is the same and consistent. People should be allowed the right to assemble and to peacefully protests. Policies or laws or dictates that that they take issue with. White support their efforts to sort of regain their personal freedoms and lockdowns. Because

White House supports the right of peaceful protest. That's all I would say. And they came back around a lot of times. So where's this going? We wanted to speak with Craig Singleton about a senior China fellow at the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies. Are we still talking about this in a couple of weeks, Craig? What does President she do now? Yeah? Thanks for having me. I mean, the scale and the intensity of these protests I would

say here are simply too great to ignore. I suspect over to see the mix of sort of announcements aimed at mollifying some of the protesters demands about zero COVID this morning, for example, People's Daily, the CCP's official newspaper ran a front page story about the need to make COVID controls more targeted and effective, but at the same time, right Chinese security services will be keen to clamp down

on the future protests. We've seen some fenses erector erected around sites of some of this weekend's protests and demonstrations. I suspect going forward, though, the big problem is going to be that the CCP has not articulated a clear path out of zero COVID, and Sheping has so closely staked his legacy on the notion that China's pandemic response has been better than the West, and that narrative would

be really damaged. I think if China lifted these controls too quickly and Chinese hospitals were overrun, do you think that's the president she actually wants to do. I mean he's he tends not to be moved by his people historically.

Why lift the policy now? I'm not sure that they're going to because I think the Chinese Communist Party has enjoyed certain benefits uh stemming from zero COVID, particularity the draconian surveillance technologies that has been able to deploy over the last three years in real time to sort of track descent and track the movement of people. At the same time, though, it's impossible to ignore the economic side

effects here. China's economy is rapidly cooling. There's no chance that they're going to hit their growth targets this year, and so once again, I think the biggest challenge they're facing is that the policy of zero COVID is so tied to She's personal legacy, and he just hasn't articulated any path out that makes sense, particularly at the time when most Chinese nationals are not inoculated against the virus. There is no herd immunity. Uh. It really is a

trap of She's on making. John Kirby was asked about supply chain disruptions. He said, you know, nothing really to speak of, but we did see what happened at the apple plant, uh and Sanju were workers pushed back against pay and quarantine. Uh. You know that that turned into a very ugly scene. Apple will inevitably feel that in its production. In fact, they're moving a lot of production because of this. At what point is this an economic story that we cannot deny? I mean, I think it

already is there widespread factory closures. Closures will further snarls supply chains. It will absolutely have a negative impact on US shoppers and companies at the height of the holiday season. Uh. The effects of today's factory and port closures are going to be felt into three as well. And I think that leads a lot of US and foreign companies to accelerate Mason plans to ship supply chains away from China

to other countries in Asia. It's interesting to hear from John Kirby on the vaccine and this is something I keep wondering, like, you know, how come how come they're not asking for our It's not just that we're not giving if they're not asking for it. Here's John Kirby again. We have not offered any to to China at this time. As you know, we are the largest supplier of COVID vaccines around the world. UH, and we have not received any requests or any interest by China to receive our vaccines.

When not fix this whole problem? Correct, they had the good stuff potentially, I mean, you wonder what would happen in China. CCP had spent the last three years investing in advanced therapeutics and hospitals. I don't think it would be facing the current situation that it is. At the same time, it's politically unpalatable for cheating pain to accept

Western assistance. He has spent the last two and a half years railing against the US response, constantly pointing out that more than a million Americans have died of COVID. We don't want to be like those guys over there sort of stuff, and so I suspect that for China. Um, it's just it's politically untenable to ask for the United States support, Craig, Thanks for coming to see us, Craig Singleton, always a pleasure from the Foundation for the Defense of Democracy.

Is quick around with our panel on this. Rick Davis and Jeanie Schanzino are here. Rick, do you see this impacting in eventual dropping of the COVID policy and should we start sending the vaccine over there? It's gonna help everybody in the end want Yeah. Look, I mean there's no indication at this stage that they're going to change

anything they're doing. If anything, you know, one of the little things that people are paying attention to is Chinese coverage of the World Cup and they're not showing people who aren't wearing masks. Right, the last thing they want their population to do is think you can go out and party with the masses. And they're convincing everybody that they're they're taking their medicine. So uh, and I agree.

I think that China to agree to take US technology in the form of a vaccine or a booster would be a massive defeat for this administration in Beijing because they're they're used to telling everybody we had all of this stuff first in the US is actually behind us. We have secretly set him the recipe, Genie, how do you do this? Well, you know, it's just devastating and and there's no way for us to do anything. The vaccine is available, they will not ask for it apparently.

And let's remember what started this an apartment fire. Ten people did locked into their apartments because of this COVID zero policy. And we've seen this in authoritarian regimes beyond China. We're seeing it in Iran, We've seen it in Russia where post the pandemic or in the end of the pandemic. For many of us, we are seeing populations emboldened to respond to what they see as enormous exertions of state

power in the wake of the pandemic. We've seen it here to a certain extent, obviously democratic state, but in these authoritarian states we are seeing it. And I don't see this ending in a way that you know is going to allow j Ping to save face on this one. John Kirby handled it the right way today. Rick, Yeah, for sure. I mean I think that you don't have very many options when it comes to, you know, sort of influencing China, and especially during a crackdown against protesters.

Let's say as little as possible, Rick and Jennie up next, This is Bloomberg. You're listening to Bloomberg Sound On with

Joe Matthew on Bloomberg Radio. So it's looking like the Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals is going to be the center of some important action here and any well shut down Donald Trump's Special Master, as the three judges on the panel express skepticism that Judge Eileen Cannon had jurisdiction to take action before an indictment take action by applying this special Master to the process, which means potentially an indictment comes anytime. Let's reassemble the panel, Rick Davis and

Jeannie Chanzano were here. Is that how you see this happening? Rick? For sure, Jack Smith already has some momentum. People wondered whether he's going to take some time to get started, and he didn't even take Thanksgiving off. So this is the new special counsel, the new special counsel and uh and and and the person in charge of these prosecutions

from the Department of Justice point of view. And so if the Eleventh Circuit throws out the arguments by Cannon that you needed a special Master, which it seemed to be leading in that direction as early as this week, Um, that really opens the door for a prosecution for an indictment of Donald Trump on the charges that have been enumerated in in in this debate. So, uh, you know, I don't think we have long to find out what mysteries will unfold as it relates to the Special Counsel's uh,

Jack Smith's intent to potentially indict Donald Trump. How does that impact this campaign for the White House that he has formally launched, Genie if at all? Well, you know, we believe that there were a couple of reasons that he decided to announce so early, and one of was one of them was to scare other people in the Republican Party out of running. The other was to put the Justice Department in a position where it would have a hard time of prosecuting a candidate because it's the

Justice Department of Joe Biden. But of course the appointment of a special counsel has you know, removed it from essentially the Justice Department's control. And the Eleventh Circuit hearing was, you know, just really an awful legal moment for the Trump team because as bad as it was, the Supreme Court that last week also ordered him to turn over

his taxes. This essentially gave the Justice Department, well the special Counsel now the ability to really delve into this issue of these classified documents at marl Lago without having

to deal with this special Master. And we know that traditionally Donald Trump has used the court to delay, delay, delay, and in this case, they are getting a boost if this they rule in the way we think they will, they are going to get a boost in terms of being able to delve into those documents and what happened

there without having to deal with a Special Master. And so that will help move this along much more quickly than we thought, and potentially we could see a decision to indict, you know, in early if they decide to do that. Well, this is a big deal and one that all of our listeners should keep an eye on here as we discuss a few remaining topics here on sound On, because it's that's not what everybody was talking about with Donald Trump over the weekend. It's it's of

course probably the most important development. But after that dinner at mar Lago, that's what we're here ring about here, right, Kanye West shows up at marl Lago with this guy, Nick Fuentes. This country wouldn't exist without white people. There you go, Yeah, and white people are done being bullied. As an expert on bullies, it's take issue with that, So I'm supposed to call him a white supremacist, a Holocaust denier. What's the deal? Nick Flentes now has has

broken bread with Donald Trump thanks to yea. That would be Kanye who discussed uh the uh the dinner or whatever on video after it was done. So Trump is really impressed with Nick Fluentz. And Nick Fluentz, unlike so many of the lawyers, as so many people that he was left with on his twenty campaign. He's actually a loyalist when he didn't know what the lawyers is, you'll still have your lawyer list, Okay, And there's your loyalist, Nick fluent As. I guess he's got because everyone's got

their own TV network. It's like he's with the America First Foundation. And he was on online talking about this at the full of the anchor desk in the suit and everything, and he just he clearly had a great time here. He is the president. I don't think he does know who I am, or rather, he didn't know that I was me. Let me put it that way. I don't think he knew that I was me at the dinner. Let's put it that way. I don't know if I'm gonna say he didn't know me, but I

I'm not sure about that. But certainly he didn't know that I was me. But he's gonna wink and a smile. Donald Trump writes on truth Social because and I know this because Genie told me that he dined with Yea and the rapper quote unexpectedly showed up with three of his friends whom I knew nothing about. Unquote, he can't believe people are blown away by this one, Jennie. I'm

guessing because he's been posting ever since. He has been posting, and I spent my Thanksgiving Joe Matthew for you tracking what was going on. Yep. He he called Yea a seriously troubled man whose business was decimated, and said he showed up with three people he didn't know. But of course we know that that's not the case. We know one of them ran his campaign in Florida, and she

certainly knew Donald Trump. He certainly knew her. And you're hard to press to imagine Donald Trump didn't know Fuentes because everybody else in the Republican leadership does, including of course Marjorie Taylor Greene and Paul Gossar, amongst others who

spoke at his group. And so even if you believed he didn't know him, for him not to come out, and as his former US ambassador said, to condemn them and to throw these bums out is deplorable and vile and human scum and all the words that have been used described them. And if people look up what Nick Fanta's has had to say. In addition to Yea, the

anti Semitism is disgusting and should be condemned. And we've seen Republicans Asa Hudginson the most recent, do that, but it has been slow, and it's been a slow drip so far. We heard Greg Valier weigh in on this earlier in the hour here, Rick, I know you're not surprised probably by a story like this, But does Kevin McCarthy need to condemn this before he can hold the gavel? Well, I think Kevin McCarthy can't condemn it if he wants

to hold the gavel. That's really the pinch he's in because you know, he needs these supportive people like Marjorie Taylor Green and Paul Gossar who attended white nationalist conferences with Nick flint Is. I mean, you know, they're on his side and and so he's he's basically in the position where he doesn't have a vote to spare and and he's just gonna stay silent because that's the bargain with the devil, and the devil in this case is Donald Trump. And just to reiterate it, it's not about

Nick Pointez. I mean, Donald Trump is talking about meeting with his friend kind West Ye who by the way has just shown us the stripes that he had, and that's as an anti semit and the rest of the entertainment world, in the business world of oster sizing, but not Donald Trump. Well look, and that's that's important here.

Nick Fuentes is so outrageous and so offensive, Genie. The people forget in some cases at least that Kanye was just fired by Adidas and a couple of other companies right there, that wasn't the only one for being uh a full throated anti semit That's right. And let's not forget Donald Donald Trump himself has recently spewed anti Semitic remarks. So you know, this is what Donald Trump has trafficked in.

And it has been Donald Trump's approach all along. If people like me, if they'll vote for me, if they support me, then I'm all in for them. I don't care who or what they are. And that's the case here.

You know. The the best part of this dinner, apparently in my mind at least, was when Kanye West decided to ask Donald Trump if you wanted to serve as as vice president, and that apparently threw Donald Trump into a rage, and then he attacked his his ex wife, So you know, you know that that was that was the most absurd but the best part of the whole dinner by reports, I can't tell if they're even friends

or not. I guess this is just you're you're in this sort of fringe circle and you want publicity to see you show up at mar Lago. Rick. But but that means anybody can get into mar A Lago now hang out with the former president current candidate. I think after Nick Flinn does at dinner with him, it shows anybody can go to Marra Lago and have dinner with Donald Trump. It's incredible. Uh, you know, we'll see if I guess the Oval Office works like that there there

of course he's he's been there. There's a big conversation as well about what's happening at the r n C right now. This is all part of the the stuff that follows a difficult midterm election cycle. Rona McDaniel, the chair is now being officially challenged by none other then the my pillow guy here he is, I am one running for the RNC chairman against Rona McDaniel. H I'm all in, Steve, and uh. One of the things that

one of the big donors said to me. He said, Mike, he said, everybody wants you to be head of the RNC. Some of them just don't know it yet. That's that happens to the best of us. He's talking to Steve Bannon. I believe they're Uh, look, I'm assuming that you guys don't think Mike Lindell, the my pillow guy, is going to be the next chair of the r n C. But it's not just him. Listen to to Christie Nome from over the weekend talking about this issue on Fox and we need to win. I mean, that's just the

fact our kids's future depends on it. So, uh, you know, we really all have a responsibility to message what Republican policies bring to this country. And I don't know a party that can continue to lose like we have and keep their jobs. The governor South Dakota sometimes talked about a potential running mate, Donald Trump is certainly a you know,

a loyal Trumper. Uh, Rick, what's happening at your old r n C. Well, Uh, we used to have people who actually experienced electoral victories, either in their own races or are working for other people who could then replicate some of that successful formulation for the rest of the party.

Now we have people who have never really run for anything, who are just Sinka fans for Donald Trump, who think that the Treasury Department at the Republican National Committee is Trump slush fund and and that's why they're running to be r n C chair, not to win elections, but to make sure Donald Trump's lawyers get fed. So I scratched my head all the time because we keep losing. We lost in twenty we lost in twenty one, we

lost in twenty two. I mean, like Daniel out cut the line and say, you know, we need people who actually know how to you know, actually had to run an election. Is Rona McDaniel out, well, if ron Daniels out, Mike Lindell is in, I mean, like what we need or some candidates so I actually know what they're doing. Wow, the Genie's just sitting over there smiling, aren't you. I am waiting for my free pillows and free slippers from the pillow man. Well done, Genie, Rick I missed you

on a long weekend. Boy, we covered a lot of ground. We could keep going here. This is the fastest hour in politics. Somehow we move on I'll meet you back here tomorrow. This is Bloomberg