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Welcome to the Wednesday edition. You're on Bloomberg Radio, on the satellite and on YouTube, where you can find us right now by searching Bloomberg Business News Live. I'm Joe Matthew in Washington, and we're just about twelve hours out now from landfall as we track Hurricane Milton on its way to the Gulf coast of Florida, just thirteen days now after we did the same thing with Hurricane Helene.
The President and Vice President Joe Biden Kamala Harris are being brief right now as a matter of fact, on preparations for Milton, on recovery efforts from Helene, and we are going to hear from Joe Biden later today, just to set the baseline on where everybody's At five point thirty pm that'll happen in the late edition of Balance of Power will bring you remarks from Joe Biden as he addresses the nation on this day, we're expecting the
storm to land. He'll be holding forth from the Roosevelt Room. Kareeine John Pierre will brief before that happens. And the candidates are on the road today. Kamala Harris heads to Vegas tonight. Donald Trump in Scranton, Pennsylvania. Joe Biden's hometown also in Redding, Pennsylvania. Later on, He's got a two for today in the critical swing state. Jd Vance fresh Off is op ed about the storm, criticizing the administration.
Is in Arizona, Tucson for a rally mesa later on for a town hall, and Tim Walls is also in the swing state of Arizona. He's with Reuben Diego of course running for Senate, and a man named Jim McCain. Interesting lineup today. So let's get to the story at hand, and that's Milton. Of course. We're at Cap four now and just barely underneath what is a Cap five storm on its way to west central Florida overnight tonight. We're
talking about a fifteen foot storm surge. We're talking about six to eighteen inches of rain, winds topping one hundred and fifty miles an hour. Governor Ron de Santis back in front of people for a storm briefing earlier today in Florida.
Here he is, Hurricane Milton is still a major, very strong hurricane. It's currently a Category four hurricane with maximum sustained winds of one hundred and fifty five miles per hour. That is just a whisker shy of a category five. And while there is the hope that it will weaken more before landfall, there is high confidence that this hurricane is going to pack a major, major punch and do an awful lot of damage undeniable.
At this point, DeSantis has activated thousands of National Guard troops standing by to respond, of course, hundreds of thousands, if not, maybe we learn a couple of million people have evacuated the storm zone already. FEMA is already there. Of course. We talked to Craig Fugate, the former administrator, last evening on Balance of Power, suggesting that if there's any silver lining here, and I don't mean to be too cute about this is a terribly devastating storm that
is about to hit Florida. But the fact is FEMA is already there. The equipment, the people are there from Helene, and we'll hunker down and be ready to respond as soon as the storm passes. David Baker covers climate and Energy for us here at Bloomberg and joins us now with his view on this historic storm. David, it's great to have you with us in our San Francisco bureau. What are you going to be watching as the storm makes landfall tonight.
Two main things. We're looking for the track exactly where it strikes land, and we are looking at that wind speed. Now, the wind speed has been moving around quite a lot over the last day. It's grown at times, dipped at times, but it's still going to stay in major hurricane territory. It's not going to drop out of that category at all, and it's pushing a lot of water right towards the
west coast Florida. What we're really looking for in terms of landfall is whether or not it lands north of Tampa, which would be the worst case scenario, or south of Tampa, which would be bad, but it might spare the city some of the damage they'd experienced if it lands north. Because if it comes in just north of the city, the wall of water that it's shoving at the coast, will go right into Tampa Bay, and that means a lot of property damage.
Understood, So our viewers are on YouTube are looking at a map of Florida as you're talking here, David. What would it mean then, if the storm came in south of Tampa. Is that dodging a bullet or still massive destruction just on a slightly smaller scale.
Fortunately, it's probably the latter. I mean you're still going to see a lot of flooding, a lot of destroyed or damaged homes, and that the destruction could go very far inland as well. We are most concerned with this hurricane about the storm surge and the flooding along the coast. But it's a big storm with very strong winds. When strong enough to actually just knock down your house unless you've got something very strong in terms of your own home.
So that's going to extend well into the state, not just along the coast.
What are the chances of this strengthening back to cap five since it's so close to that level, David, And what's going to happen after it makes landfall. These models show the storm crossing the center of Florida and touching the East coast, what form or what strength would we be showing by then.
So at the moment, it looks like the storm's top winds are going to weaken a bit before it strikes Land, weaken a bit more than they are right from what they've done so far. We don't at the moment think it's going to land as a Cat five, and in fact, there's a possibility it will be back down to a Category three. But I mean category three is still considered a major hurricane. It's not a small storm right now.
It's getting kind of beaten up by some wind shear in the upper atmosphere that's knocking down those top speeds a bit, but it is still a very powerful storm with a lot of water in front of it. It's expected to go across the Peninsula and re emerge into the Atlantic. Now, how organized it will still be at that point is a big open question. If it's able to regather strength, we could be dealing with problems with us for a little while.
I'm really glad you could join us, David. I'd love to check in with you tomorrow if you're still at the desk. David Baker covering climate and energy for Bloomberg and our storm expert today on Balance of Power. This is a scary moment. We'll be tracking, of course, the arrival of that storm and the response to it, knowing as well that there is in some cases an unfortunate political side to this, which we'll be talking about with our political panel a little bit later on this hour.
Many thanks to David Baker. Producer James tells us. By the way, Tampa officials are holding an emergency management briefing right now as well, and we'll let you know if any additional news comes out of that. With the closing window here, the closing window of opportunity for people to evacuate.
You're listening to the Bloomberg Balance of Power podcast can just live weekdays at noon Eastern on Applecarplay and then roun Oo with 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.
We are casting our eyes on Florida, which is bracing for what is being described as a once in a century storm as Hurricane Milton prepares to make landfall or everybody prepares for its landfall that could come late this evening. We know eleven counties have been evacuated millions of people because lives are going to be dangerous. We have heard very directly from the Mayor of Tampa herself. She says, if you do not evacuate and you're in one of
those zones, you will die. And that is the serious nature of this potential disaster that we're discussing here, Joe. Not just the wind, as this has now been downgraded again to a Category four still incredibly strong winds, not necessarily Category five level.
But it's the.
Water and the storm surge that could result from this.
That's what we're hearing and why many are hoping that this storm takes a path that goes south of Tampa Bay.
Either way, it's going to be very difficult here with hundreds of thousands of people already evacuated, Governor Ron De Santis activating thousands of National Guard troops, and following our conversation with Craig Fugate last evening, the former FEMA administrator, if there's any silver lining here having two back to back storms, it's the fact that there are thousands of FEMA workers already in Florida and all of the equipment that they brought with them. They'll be hunkering down along
with everyone else there. Kaylee, we're looking at landfall just after midnight. Is the current track. Cat four according to the National Hurricane Center, and Bob Henson, meteorologist and journalists with y L Climate Connections, joins us now with his eyes on the storm as well. Bob, thanks for being with us here. When we talk about category four versus Category five? Is there any difference in your mind when it comes to storm.
Surge in this case, not really. You know, the storm surges is the cumulative surge produced over the time that the hurricane is approaching the coast. And so we've had a powerful hurricane in the Gulf of Mexico for more than two days now, Cat five two times, which is
extremely unusual. Revived last night to Cat five strength, So that water is baked in, it's pushing toward the coast, and the winds may decrease to Pat three level by the time it gets to the coast, but the wind field is also expanding, so you've got a larger area of winds that are going to be more than strong enough to bring down trees and power lines. So there's just going to be all kinds of unfortunately destruction over a large area, and the storm surge is pretty much baked in at this.
Point well, and that's why in so many of these areas people have been told to evacuate or risk their lives if they stay. Bob, Can we talk about the speed of this storm as well, because we've seen in hurricane seasons past that often is if a storm sits over one area too long and is raining for longer, producing more water, that that can cause a lot of
the catastrophic damage as well. Is this going to hit hard and fast or is this going to be sitting over the western coast for some time before it moves across the rest of the state.
Well, the good news is it's a fast moving storm. It's right now between fifteen and twenty miles an hour. It will be reaching the coast sometime between six pm and midnight tonight, maybe around nine or ten, moving across the state. By tomorrow morning, it will already be off the coast, probably somewhere between Melbourne and Daytona Beach now at the Atlantics, so it will be versing the state
pretty quickly. However, there's going to be a lot of problems regardless of that in terms of water, because not only do we have what will probably be a record storm surge along the coast roughly between Tampa's Sarasota and down the coast from there, you know, almost toward Cape Coral, we're also going to have extremely heavy rains. We're talking ten to fifteen inches of rain, which may include the
Tampa Bay area. Now, if it's toward the high end of that, that will be the heaviest two day rain they've ever had in the history of tampas So given the expanse of that metro area, there could be tremendous flooding. The big question is will the storm surge be as bad as feared in Tampa itself. Right now, it looks like they're going to be right on the edge. It could be there. They may end up on the north side of the center. We're just going to have to see.
That cannot be predicted, because it could it comes down to a wabble of the storm ten or twenty miles will make all the difference.
Well, you're pointing us to what really counts your bob. As we've all the track of the storm tonight and it's landing likely early tomorrow morning. What is the differing result between landfall just north of Tampa versus south.
Well, if you say that the center came in just a little north of Tampa, and that looks very unlikely, you would have west winds pushing right into the bay as the hurricane came on shore, you know, pushing the surge into the bay. That's pretty much the worst case scenario that has been contemplated for a century for Tampa. If the I comes in, say twenty miles south of Tampa, then you're going to actually have water exiting the bay or trying to exit the bay, and you simply won't
have the same surge disaster in Tampa. Now, this is simply pushing the disaster down the coast, of course, and it's important to keep in mind that a Manatee County, Sarasota County, which are south of Tampa, Saint Petersburg, they have close to a million people, almost half as much as Vanellas and Hillsboro Counties, which are Tampa and Saint Petersburg. So it's it's not negligible if those areas get hit by the worst of the surge, and again this will
be record surge. Of people living now have not seen the kind of surge that they will be getting just south of the center.
Well, and as we consider that no living person will have experienced this, that we are describing this as a once in a century storm, it is worth pointing out what has changed in terms of the climate over the last century. We're talking about warmer waters in the Gulf, for example, that have allowed this storm to become what it is. How should we be considering the climate aspect of this, Bob, and how this potentially will inform what the storms of the future could look like.
Well, here's one anecdote to consider. There have only been three hurricanes that have hit Cat five then weekends, then hit Cat five again in the Gulf of Mexico. The other two were Camille in nineteen sixty nine and Allen in nineteen eighty. Now, both those occurred in August. Right, Well, here we are almost in the middle of October and we're getting this event happening again. So that tells you something about the waters being warm enough in October sustained
event that previously it only occurred in August. Right, the waters simply are warmer. You know, this is about a straightforward as it gets. We are warming the oceans around the world, and that means you're going to have periods when you have record warm water for a given time a year, and that's exactly what we have right now in the Gulf. So that's not a complicated, you know concept. It's a basic heat engine. You warm up the oceans and that provides fuel for hurricanes. So we can expect
not every year we'll have a lot of hurricanes. The number of hurricanes may not actually increase. What we've been seeing so far is that the proportion of hurricanes that get to really intense streams has been going up, and also the rapidity with which they strengthened. And we saw that manifested with Milton on Monday, where it cranked from a tropical storm to category five in about twenty five hours.
Wow.
National Hurricane Center Bob says Milton could also spawn tornadoes in the area. How likely is that? How much more damage would that cause?
Well, it's already happening. We've had tornadoes near Fort Lauderdale just in the last several hours. So we're going to have a cluster of what are called super self thunderstorms. So these are the ones that can produce the buonafide substantial tornadoes like e F two or stronger. So we're not talking about water spouts that may move just on shore. These are the real thing, and there's there could be dozens of them. You know, some hurricanes have spawned up
more than one hundred tornadoes. Now we're not expecting that, but there could be quite a few. And this will mainly affect areas roughly in the vicinity of Lake Okeechobee, maybe down towards South Florida, basically south of the track of Milton. So what we're looking at is cord are extremely heavy rains north of the track of Hilton of Milton, and then a cord or a very strong winds nearing
just south of the center and the storm search. Obviously the wind corridor could go all the way across the state at a hurricane force and south of that the super self thunderstorms and tornadoes, especially this afternoon and into tonight.
It's just frightening to consider what Florida, the entire state could experience over the next twenty four to forty eight hours. Bob and as we consider what emergency personnel are going to have to respond to, including FEMA, and the resources that will be required. Obviously, we're talking tens of billions of dollars, if not hundreds of billion dollars of damages over the course of these two storms we've seen in
the last two weeks. We heard from the Homeland Security Secretary alle Hundre Mayworkis last week who said, well, FEMA does have the means to immediately respond to these storms, they may not be able to make it all the
way through hurricane season. And given what you just told us a moment ago, this notion that we're seeing storms this powerful in October when we used to see them historically more so in August, say, are we going to look at an extended hurricane season in the few sure, because that has implications for the allotment of resources to potential emergency responses that could need to happen over a prolonged period of time.
Yeah, you know, this is very similar to what's been happening with wildfires. I live in Boulder, Colorado. We had a had astrophic wildfire here three years ago on December thirtieth. Nobody had seen anything close to something that bad that late in the year destroyed a thousand homes just a few miles from me, right And this is Colorado, where we normally have at least a little snow on the ground at the end of December. So wildfire season has expanded.
Hurricane season seems to be expanding a little bit. And in particular, there are years like this year where we were going into La Nina, which is a natural process, but when you combine that with record warm motions, La Nina's allowed the hurricane season to extend further into the fall and late fall, and I'm afraid this year that's exactly what we're seeing. There are already hints that we may have yet another system developing in the Western Caribbean
about a week from now. So there's no sign that this really heavy, backloaded season as we call it, is going to be winding down in the immediate future, and we certainly have to be prepared from an emergency response standpoint for just protracted periods and multiple hits in short order, as we're seeing right now in Florida and across the southeast.
Also, considering the strength of this storm, the impact of warming waters, what does it mean once the storm goes inland. In this case, Bob, what happens to Orlando? Can the storm continue at hurricane strength until it reaches the east coast.
It's actually precisely predicted to do just that. It is expected to come off shore tomorrow morning, still as a hurricane. Now, the strongest winds will be just south of the center. There may be a corridor maybe ten fifteen to twenty miles across with you know, winds of you know, fifty sixty seventy miles an hour and gus even a little above that. That corridor will probably be just south of Orlando.
The way it's looking now, roughly from just south of Landfall location between Tampa and for Myers up toward perhaps reaching Melbourne to Daytona Beach and crossing the state a little bit south of Orlando. But Orlando is squarely in the crosstairs for extremely heavy rain. They could also see ten inches or more of rain, and those rains will
have embedded downburst winds. So you're going to have the problem of trees and power lines going down and very heavy rains with severe inland flooding, potentially catastrophic, life threatening flash floods well inland from the hurricane. So Orlando could see a very very rough night as far as pure winds, the worst of the hurricane style winds maybe just south of them.
All right, Bob, thank you so much for being with us. That's Bob Henson, meteorologist and journalists with Yale Climate Connections, also author of The Thinking Person's Guide to Climate Change. We appreciate your insights as we track this very powerful storm, and we also want to track the response from the White House to this storm, as we just heard from President Biden and Vice President Harris within the last hour. So let's go now to the White House North Lawn
where we find Bloomberg's Tyler Kendall. Tyler, what did we learn from the briefing?
Yeah, hey, Kelly, So we know that President Biden is still at that briefing in the White House on his administration's response to Hurricane Milton. At the top, he gave those remarks saying that this is quote literally a matter of life and death when it comes to heating the administration's safety guidance. We are expecting President Biden to deliver remarks to the nation later tonight at five point thirty
pm Eastern. The White House also went ahead and canceled some of President Biden's scheduled international travel, with stops to Germany and Angola slated for later this week. Instead, he will now remain in Washington to monitor the federal response to the storm now. President Biden also said that he has been in touch with all the governors in the
expected impacted states, that includes Florida Governor Ron Destantis. Of course, Florida is a big focus of this White House briefing today, and actually Governor DeSantis held a briefing this morning and where he went ahead and he thinked the personnel that are already on the ground when it comes to first responders, but also the federal personnel that are already deploying to the state.
There's so much that was done in the immediate aftermath and is still being done in that Then you have another storm that developed and immediately you're back on that posture round the clock, no time to rest, no time to sleep for a lot of these folks. And it's not easy. And so I just want to say on behalf of the say to Florida, thank you for discharging your duties, thank you for accepting this mission. It's not going to be easy.
Now.
As you both have been covering, there's been this emerging intersection between hurricanes Helene and Milton, which you heard the governor eluded there, but also the race for the White House. Just this morning, Vice presidential candidate Jade Vance Pendon off ed in the Wall Street Journal alleging a slow response
from the White House. This comes on the heels of North Carolina Center or Ted budd A, calling attention to a delay in one thousand authorized troops getting to his state after the Pentagon had said that they would be deployed within twenty four hours. But for their part, the White House has been defending its federal response. You heard President Biden earlier here calling misinformation incredibly dangerous. FEMA put
out some new figures this morning on their response. They're saying that now federal assistants for survivors of Hellen surpasses two hundred and eighty six million dollars. There's also currently seven thousand federal personnel deployed across the country when it comes to these disaster zones.
Bringing us the facts from the North lawn of the White House. Tyler Kendall reporting from Bloomberg. Tyler, thank you so much. As we mentioned, Joe Biden will be speaking from the White House around five thirty pm Eastern time, and we'll bring you his remarks. As we get a bit closer, we'll assemble our panel coming up next with Kayleie Lions. I'm Joe Matthew on the fastest show in politics. This is Bloomberg.
You're listening to the Bloomberg Balance of Power podcast. Catch us live weekdays at noon Eastern on Eppo CarPlay and then Broudoto with the Bloomberg Business app. Listen on demand wherever you get your podcasts, or watch us live on YouTube.
Welcome back to Balance Power on Bloomberg TV and Radio, where we are continuing to keep track of this election as it grows closer and closer. Now less than four weeks away and with such a short time to go, another natural disaster potentially throwing a wrench not just in people's lives who are affected, but in this campaign as well. As we have seen some politicization of the approaching Hurricane Milton, which is getting ready to slam into Florida's west coast.
There's a lot of misinformation specifically circulating about these storms and the way in which the government is responding to them. This is something that was addressed by President Biden at the White House earlier today.
There's been a reckless, irresponsible and relentless promotion of disinformation and outright lives that are disturbing people. It's undermining confidence and the incredible ruskin and recovery work that has already been taken and will continue to be taken. It's harmful of those who need help the most. There's simply no place for this to happen.
Sere we start with our political panel with us today. Rick Davis, partner at Stone Court Capital, Republican Strategists and of course Bloomberg Politics contributor alongside Laura Think of Rebel Communications, she's founder and CEO of the firm, Democratic strategist. With the pretty difficult conversation that we're having here in Washington, Rick Davis, how is the White House doing and setting the record straight on this? Joe Biden and Kamala Harris
briefed earlier. The President will be addressing the American people later today from the Roosevelt Room. Is he the voice of credibility on this misinformation?
Yeah? I think the fact that he's addressing it raises the level of importance to it significantly. I saw Secretary my on morning shows today echoing his statements trying to tamp down these kinds of misinformations. But I think it needs to be comprehensive all through the government, which I
think they're in the process of doing. But also I think they should sit down with as many members of Congress as they can, those senators affected in the zones that are being disrupted by these weather currencies, and ask them to do the same thing. We've seen many Republican mayors in North Carolina try to tamp down the rumors on their own, maybe a concerted effort to put everybody together and uniformly dispel these things because we're up against
We're not up against they are up against. People with a bigger megaphone, a presidential campaign of Donald Trump's, and a massive social media company like Elon Musk are the ones who are putting fuel to the fire of these rumors and falsehoods.
Well and of course affecting potentially real lives in the process. If people don't understand what resources are available to them, what the correct information is, which is why this effort may be so critical. It does raise the question though, as to other than the detrimental effect it could have, what positive effect it could have, or why this information is being circulated in the first place. These suggestions being made, including Frankly, though it is not falls in all of
its allegations. The op ed from JD Vance about the delayed response we did see in terms of troops going
into North Carolina after Hurricane Helene, Laura. When we consider what this does and the people who may be most open to receiving this misinformation and trusting what they hear from these sources, are these people who are already going to be supportive of Donald Trump already, or these people who could actually change their minds about an incumbent in Kamala Harris given the federal government response to this that they believe is happening.
Well, you know, no one is going to find the silver bullet on the issue that will impact, you know, the swing voters that seem to be so elusive in this election. But I will say this, they are changing the conversation they understand and Donald Trump has an all based strategy and so essentially he is tying this to immigration. All of the false claims are about funding that has nothing to do with the emergency aid that FEMA uses.
But by saying immigrants are stealing your funding, he's able to bring that strength of an issue back to the conversation and lying to do it. But I think that this changes the subject for him, and he really has shown and Jade Vance has really not shown any willingness to stick to the facts. And you know, I agree with Rick who said earlier in the hour that you know, criticism is fair game with respect to response times, et cetera.
But I think we also have to focus on when leadership is in the midst of a natural disaster, it's absolutely critical that we're all speaking from the same playbook
when it comes to getting people age. So I would like to see more prominent Republican voices get the airtime to be able to speak to their audiences, because it's true that arguments from authority really work and you have the people who you trust, and so speaking from the same set of talking points and the same truths is really critical because people that are suffering are you know, are are everyone's face? So really important that we change what's happening here. But it is hard to do with
a national conversation. Eager to talk about the controversy and give airtime to the misinformation.
Just ask Chuck Edwards, the congressman from North Carolina, out with a list of rumors and just untruth that he's trying to debunk. Referring to himself as one of the Mountain people, he says, well, it's true FEMA's response to Hurricane Helene has had its shortfalls. I'm here to dispel outrageous rumors that have been circulated online, including Hurricane Helene was not geo engineered by the government to seize and access lithium deposits in Chimney Rock. This is the kind
of stuff that's going around here. Rick, To what extent are the social media platforms, one of them owned by Elon Musk, responsible for controlling this content?
Yeah, I think that Pok's on everyone's house for giving air to this kind of information. I do think even normal media outlets who report things like Marjorie Taylor Green's claims that you know, Democrats were able to engineer the storm, I mean, in order to only hit the Republican locations.
I mean, all these things are just complete fabrications of the truth, and so at some point, I think, you know, all of us have to get together, the media, elected officials, and others and say, you know, we're just going to stop giving air to this, because every time we talk about it, we're actually, you know, raising doubts in people's mind. Gee, well, I hadn't heard that rumor before. I wonder if there's any veracity to it, you know, can we believe Rick
Davis and Joe Matthew. I don't know, And so I think there's got to be a more comprehensive strategy than just sort of wagging the finger at X or a couple of these other social mediaut lists and say stop this. I mean, I honestly, I think Congress owes it to the American people to hold hearings and start coming up with remedies to this, because otherwise misinformation is going to control the agenda every day.
Well, it's a very fair point.
Rick.
Of course, we probably won't see Congress do anything like that until this election is already over, as they're not scheduled to come back until mid November, potentially still not even going to return to address any supplemental funding requests that may arise from these storms. But given that it is the election that is dictating a lot of this timeline. I do want to switch gears to the campaign which
is still underway, if not impacted by this. We just got some new reporting out of NBC which recording which cites two people familiar with the numbers and says Kamala Harris's presidential campaign operation has crossed the one billion dollar fundraising threshold in September. Includes money raised by the campaign committee itself, CAMPAID affiliated joint fundraising committee that also collects
for the DNC and state parties. If we look at just the financial figures, it raises the question of whether that momentum is sustaining for Kamala Harris, Laura, and Frankly, what the incremental dollars still mean at this point when a lot of the advis are already in.
An adviser One thing I would say campaign infrastructure. I think what Kamala Harris has done well and I think it's one of her strategic advantages over the Trump campaign is she has field offices, and she's hired staff, and they have resources that they're able to build out. They're also able to work with community organizations and groups that could also be deployed and be able to reach out
to voters in a trusted way. So the ability the early infrastructure has made this money much much more effect But you're right, there is a limit to the impact of money. You know, you very well may lose if you don't have it, and the delta is too big. But money is not a guaranteur of a win, and
we've seen that time and time again. So but I think the money is one thing, But I think there's also momentum we see and you know, don't trust all the polling, but in terms of direction, she's moving in the right direction, and her media appearances this week in a narrow casted way, are really making the argument to the targeted groups that she needs to continue to persuade with messages that we now see are working in terms of getting voters on her side.
Well, you know, we can still have another debate here. I don't know if anybody thinks it's going to happen, but Rick, Fox News is raising its hand again. Fox News Media reporting it's made a final pitch to host a debate between Kamala Harris former President Trump. Today, the
executives from Fox sent letters to both campaigns. This would be October twenty fourth, or twenty seventh Brett Baar Martha m McCollum as moderators, Rick, is there any chance this happens if the money continues to be lopsided and the race stays as tight as it is.
Yeah, I'm pretty sure that the Trump people do not want him on the stage with Kamala Harris. He completely schooled him in the last debate, and this puts him in an awkward spot because he can't complain about the network being against him. I don't think there's any scenario where people would think Fox isn't the easiest option that he could possibly have. And if I were the Harris campaign,
I would immediately agree to this debate. There's nothing they can throw at her that is going to be any tougher than what previous moderators have done, or even you know, things like the sixty minutes interview, So she's more practiced today than she was then. It really calls in a question whether or not Donald Trump thinks he's winning or losing. If he's losing, he better get on that stage because otherwise he'll be criticized for having ducked.
We have less than a minute left, but there's another debate that's happening today in a state you know, well, Arizona, Carry Lake and Ruben Diego, the Senate candidates are going to battle it out, apparently on the eve of carry Lake voting early, which is something she didn't like in past cycles. Is that going to move the needle at all? Or do you see this one is already in the back?
Yeah? No, I think this is a pretty competitive race. Carry Lake is behind Ruben Diago by every poll that's been taken in the last month, so I would suspect you will see a very unhinged carry Lake trying to throw as much mud at the wall and see what sticks. And Ruben Diego is no pushover. I mean, he's an attack politician who knows his way around a microphone. So I think that this would be actually pretty good at entertainment if there weren't any playoff games going on today.
All right, Rick Davis partner as Stone Cord Capital, and Laura Fink Communication Rebel Rebel Communications founder and CEO, thank you so much for being here with us on balance of power and pointing out in Arizona, it's not just debate day, it's also the start of early voting, a reminder, this election is already well underway.
See Carrie Lake is going to be doing that herself, and believe tomorrow casting the ballot. We'll be watching right here on Bloomberg.
You're listening to the Bloomberg Balance of Power podcast Ken just live weekdays at noon Eastern on applecarplay in enroyd Oro with the Bloomberg Business ad. You can also listen live on Amazon Alexa from our flagship New York station, Just Say Alexa play Bloomberg eleven thirty.
As we turn our attention to politics and the swing states again, this is where we find our candidates almost every day. Lest Donald Trump is throwing a rally at Madison Square Garden, which is one of the more recent headlines. But yes, it's Pennsylvania, it's Michigan, it's Wisconsin, where the Cook Political Report plants a flag again today Jessica Taylor writing that Wisconsin seeing its Senate race shift, Cook has
gone from Lean's Democrat to a toss up. And what is a narrowing race here now a two point race depending on the poll that you're looking at. Here, this is Senator Tammy Baldwin versus Republican challenger Eric Hovdy and Jessica Taylor is with us from the Cook Political Report right now to talk about why and I wonder why this is narrowing to such an extent here, Jessica, welcome back. This was a seven point race in August.
I think that we're just seeing a natural tightening and a lot of these races. Wisconsin is probably the closest to an evenly split fifty to fifty states we have in the country. These races are just always close, and Wisconsin the twenty twenty two race with Ron Johnson the Republican winning there was decided by just one point. What we are seeing across particularly some of these blue wall states is that Republicans were underperforming where Trump was. We're
seeing that sort of Republicans coming home. We saw in our poll, our Swing State Project poll, which and found that Timmy Baldwin, the Democratic senator there was a head by two points forty nine to forty seven over her Republican challenger. Since August, we have seen an eleven point shift among Independents along with a slight shift among Republicans toward Hubdy. And we're seeing that sort of you know, Democrats,
Democratic candidates we're running more ahead of Harris. I think that those numbers have sort of become more in line with the Senate races. Ultimately, what we see is that these Senate races are just very closely aligned with the presidential results in the state. Remember that in twenty sixteen, every single Senate race went the same way as the presidential result. And in twenty twenty only Susan Collins of Maine managed to win reelection, out running Trump by seven points,
even as Biden won that state. So Wisconsin always a very close race. We're seeing that Titan Huvedy is spending millions of his own money. He's up to about twenty million so far, and Democrats had the early spending advantage that has now narrowed. Republicans even have a slight edge when it comes to spending here in these last few weeks.
Well, I wanted to ask you about that. That's really interesting. To what extent is this tightening just the natural course of politics up and down the ballot, or to your point, the spending, the massive spending by Hubby of his personal fortune.
I think it's a little bit of both. You know, Hubby spent early, but his campaign got off to a little bit of a rocky start. His ads weren't great. He was featured in them. I think that that didn't he didn't seem to endear himself to voters in that regard, and Baldwin was able to sort of make the race about him, about some of the controversial comments he said about people voting in nursing homes, about obese people paying
more for healthcare, about single moms, and different things. But now Hubby's ads are more focused on bald when more focused on policy issues. They're not this direct a camera appeal, and that does seem to be coming across even Democrats I talked to, So I do think it's a combination of both. It's the increased spending. I think it's more
targeted advertising. But just in the fact that you know, Democrats admit, you know, they never believed this was going to be a seven point race, that there was always sort of going to be this natural tightening, just because that's the way racism Wisconsin.
Are interesting that as we consider the money in this race, Hovedy is actually attacking Tammy Baldwin for insider trading, essentially accusing her of insider dealings on Wall Street, even attacking her partner Maria Brisbane, who, as you point out, as a private wealth manager in New York. How much of that has to do with insider trading or reminding people that Tammy Baldwin is openly gay.
I mean, Republicans deny that that's something, but you know, Democrats are certainly saying this is reminding her of her sexuality. She was the first lesbian elected to Congress to the Senate rather and you know, one of the taglines actually says she's in bed with Wall Street. So I mean, it certainly does could have a subtle message there, But you know, Republicans and these ads, they say it's just targeted to say, you know, she's she's profiting or her
partner potentially is profiting. Because they aren't married, she does not have to disclose as much as if they were legally married in that regard. So I think it's you know, but Republicans believe they found a salient line of attack, but Democrats say, you know, again, this could backfire if they're trying to hint at her sexuality.
Spending time with Jessica Taylor from the Cook Political Report, and they're new ratings here on the Wisconsin Senate race. If we can just pull out the lens here a little bit here at Zoom Mount Jessica to some of the other battlegrounds, we can even stay in the blue wall of Pennsylvania Michigan. Are we seeing them all tighten in the same way Wisconsin is.
We are seeing them more of a tightening. Now, Wisconsin was the closest race that we had at the presidential level. They're all within the margin of their where polling found, and that's very consistent. The Michigan race was a four point edge with the Democratic Now this is an open sea, so it's a we're seeing, you know, a little bit more competitive there that Elissa Slocke in her first time running statewide, she has far more money than her Republican opponent,
former Congressman Mike Rodgers there. But in both Wisconsin and in Michigan, we're seeing the Senate Leadership Fund, the main superpack backed by Senate Leader Mitch McConnell, pour millions of dollars into there. They've also up there by there in Pennsylvania, and this is a state, you know, we rate Michigan still as a toss up, but Pennsylvania is still in lean Democrat, but that one was a seven point race in our poll. We have seen some internal GOP numbers
that have that closer. Both sides believe this certainly could tighten. But right now, Bob Casey, who's you know, longtime senator there father was governor, he is running slightly ahead of where Harris is, and Dave McCormick still running slightly behind where Trump is. But would I be shocked to see this one become closer? I wouldn't.
And that's something you know. It's not lost on us that Joe Biden was in Montgomery County stumping for Bob Casey earlier this week. Do you believe in reverse coattails? We only have a minute left here, Jessica, But could Bob Casey actually help Kamala Harris or is it the other way around?
I think in my I'm not. I think these presidential results are just tied. And if voters, if members can convince them to sort of see these as two distinct races. But can we see these so closely tied? I'm a little skeptical of this reverse coattails. You know, there's been brought up in North Carolina with what's gone on with the governor's race. We aren't seeing any evidence of that in our polling yet.
Really glad to get you back, Jessica Taylor. This is the busy time, four weeks to go here, and we're always looking at the Cook Political Report. Today it's Wisconsin, and we'll be making our way through all the swing states between now, of course November fifth. Jessica Taylor, thank you so much.
You're listening to the Bloomberg Balance of Power podcast. Catch Just Live weekdays at noon Eastern on Applecarplay and then Roudoto with the Bloomberg Business app. Listen on demand wherever you get your podcasts, or watch us live on YouTube.
Welcome to the Wednesday edition of Ballance of Power here on Bloomberg TV and Radio. On YouTube as well search Bloomberg Business News Live. You can always find our programs here in Washington and in New York. With so much attention paid to the arrival of Hurricane Milton, and that will happen overnight, a major political story as it is a natural disaster in the making. Here, we're keeping tabs
on what's happening in Israel. Of course, one of the other major stories that we've been following for weeks and
the phone call we understand has happened. There was reporting earlier that some questioned Joe Biden has had a telephone meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Nett and Yahoo and Kaylee lines it comes against the backdrop of the wait for a response of course by Israel to Iran, and Israel's defense minister you have Glan today says an attack on Iran will be deadly, precise and above all surprising.
Yeah, adding that they will not understand what happened and how it happened, but they will see the results well. With the reminder that Gallant was supposed to be here in Washington today, specifically at the Pentagon meeting with Defense Secretary Mary Lloyd Austin, and that trip was canceled because Netanyahu, essentially, we understand, based on a reporting, said no, I'm talking to Biden.
Yirse, you pulled him from the schedule here, which is why some question whether this phone call would take place today or not. Kaylee, We're waiting for a readout from the White House and might have to wait till a bit later in the White House briefing to learn what was said.
Yeah, that briefing is scheduled to begin in a few minutes, will of course bring you any headlines we get out of that, But in the meantime, we want to turn to an expert on the Middle East joining us here in our Washington, d C. Studio as Maara Rudman. She is professor at the Miller Center at the University of Virginia, also director of the Ripples of Hope project focused on democratic solutions. Mar great to see you here, Thank you
for being with us on balance of power. As we await the readout, I think we can still question what the tenor of this call was between Biden and net Nyahu. As we have seen born out in recent months and in recent weeks, what the US wants doesn't necessarily always matter to Israel. Do you think that will remain the case when Israel does US have this surprising response that Golant is alluding to.
So I think that what the US wants does matter to Israel, it may not be determinative, and so I would just caution with that. I think part of the Secretary of the Minister of Defense Galant, coming to Washington is a signal of the closeness of the relationship, the need to talk through to take advice or to hear advice, and to hear counsel. But ultimately you have a sovereign country that's going to do what it feels is that
it's best interest to defend itself. The relationship between President Biden and Prime Minister Netanyahu is a different type of sticking point challenge, and I think that was reflected in Golant's visit being put on hold by the Prime minister.
Was his relationship maybe overstated at the beginning of this conflict with Benjamin Netanya, who Joe Biden us to talk about the strategy would be to hug Benjamin Netania, I would hold him closer to steer phrase Bob Woodward's reporting paints a picture of screaming, shouting matches on the phone between these two leaders. What was their relationship before it began to deteriorate.
So what I would say is, and I can't speak specifically to President Biden's relationship with Prime Minister Netnaho. I have been in the position to observe other presidents and there back and forth with Prime mister netna who, given the long term he has had and in and out
of government. But I definitely observed moments of deep irritation, sometimes buried sometimes not between the presidents for whom I worked and Prime Mister Neunyaho, and I heard private comments made about the frustration, as well as sometimes some of that seeping out into their dialogues with one another. So aside from the varas of Bob or Woodwood's reporting, which has not been verified, I believe it's not hard to
understand that it's a contentious relationship. It's not the only relationship like that the US presidents have with foreign leaders at various points, and particularly ones where the countries have the closeness of relationship the United States has with Israel.
Well, and certainly the closeness of that relationship was on full display when the US aided Israel and defending against the hundreds of missiles around sent toward Israel last week. So it's the response we're still waiting for from Israel to that, what is your expectation about what form it actually will take, how escalatory a move Israel would be realistically considering.
Well, I listen closely to your description of what Defense Minister Gallant said, and he strikes me as having chosen his words with great care, and the equation in the region between what various countries and Israel's not alone in this see as necessary for deterrence and yet so deterring your enemy, your adversary, and yet minimizing the degree of escalation of the conflict is a pretty precise calibration that can often go wrong, and I would expect that that
is part of the discussions the United States is having with Israel, and also Israeli internal discussions. Defense Minister Galante has not had the easiest time interacting with Prime Minster Yaho, nor has the entire defense establishment in Israel.
Well went on to say that Israel saw that Iran's attack failed because they were not precise. Is it possible to impress your opponent without escalating in this case.
I think it's a definition of what escalation means and in which ways. There are a number of different ways of going at Iran, and and so that's that's a hard question to answer, and it may be in the eye of the beholder or the eye of the I think there are a number of reasons why it hasn't happened. It's a tough call to make sure, and a question of timing and wanting to catch by surprise when the entire world of the tension is on as well. So
I think there are any number of factors. I wouldn't read too much into the length of time it's taken.
You just described all of this as being in the eye of the beholder. So it is also a question not just of how Israel is viewing the situation, but how Iran is likely to view these potentially different retaliatory
actions and how Iran will respond. We frequently hear at Bloomberg look at oil prices, look at the map of the Gulf and the amount of oil that is coming through the Straight of Horror moves for example, each and every day, and question how realistically disruptive this could be to the global economy depending on how Iran decides to
make its next move. Would you expect that, especially this close to an American election, when authorities are telling us Iran is trying to be disruptive, how they would think about the potential economic impacts of their next move when it comes to global energy markets.
So Iran has its own domestic challenges on the economy as well. So there are a number of different factors that play in as do how regional actors are going to respond other than Israel, and I took note of the fact that the Iranian Foreign Minister, I believe today is in Saudi Arabia meeting with the crown Prince. So there are a lot of discussions with a lot of actors, including folks who do not have good relationships with one another. The Saudis and the Iranians are a good example of
that and a huge international aspect. The reason they're able to talk to each other is because China broke with a surprise deal about a year ago between the Saudis and the Iranians. So there are so many different factors at play, and you really have to look at who benefits and who is who assumes the costs. And that's a global picture, not just a regional picture.
Lot said, they will not understand what happened and how it happened. Should we be thinking beyond a military response in this case? Could it be cyber? Could it be a diplomatic salvo that we didn't expect here that involves the US. Maybe this is not simply a military response.
I think it's I think it's fair to assume it would not be solely a military response. I think even now in the calibrations going in, you see certainly diplomacy hard at work, and there are a number of economic tools or military kinetic action that would affect the economy as well as Israel's history on cyber actions within Iran.
For them to not know how it happened suggests something other than a ballistic missile.
Isn't it.
It certainly raises questions, and I assume he if he was making that statement publicly, he wanted people to be thinking along some of the lines of your suggesting.
Well, it also brings my mind to say, pagers and walkie talkies suddenly exploding in the hands of people in Lebanon as we're still seeing that limited incursion into Lebanon underways, we watch this relationship, there's still the battle being waged against Hessela as it continues to target Israel, and.
The pages in walkie talkies are a great example of because it wasn't just people in Lebanon, it was Hamas people in Lebanon, Hamas fighters, people who were affiliated with the organization. Those are the people, sorry, yes, thank you, hes Bla hes Blah fighters. Those are the people who had those pages in Walkee Talkies. And so it's an interesting illustration because it does fit Galam's language right of precise,
They won't know, they won't know how it happened. So I think he is consciously opening up a wide range of thoughts or concerns or fears for people.
We're waiting for a White House briefing to start here. How public should Joe Biden be about his motivations right now on a day when he's on the phone with Benjamin Netanyah who how much does he need to disclose here, assuming he wants to have another phone call with Benjamin Debt.
Yet well, part of maintaining a relationship with friends and adversaries alike goes to the opposite of what you guys want, which is full you know, which is as much public disclosure as possible. Right, you have to constantly balance, as you would when you're having any kind of tough conversation with anyone in a personal relationship. If you go out and tell the world about it or complain to all your friends, you're unlikely to get them to move in the direction you.
Want, especially if your friends do not corroborate what you're saying and that's been a recurring scenario for Joe Biden. I just talked to Bebee, here's the deal, and net and Yahoo says no, I never made that deal.
So there's definitely a tough call to be made as well. There's no shortage of tough calls in this situation with how much you say publicly to let people know there's progress being made when you know you have a somewhat unreliable interlocutor on the other side, or someone who's making different calibrations about what they're going to say publicly and privately.
So we've covered the US Israel relationship, We've covered the Iran relifationship even with other countries in the Gulf, and you alluded to in part the notion that China is part of this and broker in some China and Russians well. And when we talk with Republicans, specifically frequently on this program who say this administration has been too soft on Iran when it comes to sanctions, a lot of the impact we see, or the lack of impact, is because
China is still buying Iranian oil. So as we look at this picture across the world, what role does China play and what role does Russia play in what comes next?
Well, I think it's useful to bring up both of them because if you look at China buying Irani and oil. Also, part of the reason that Russia was able to sow quickly essentially defy US and international sanctions or not feel the impact was because of the side deals they had with China. And China has done it, frankly, very cleverly, sidestepping a lot of what international sanctions would be and has given Russia the ability to be able to quickly
rearm itself against Ukraine. And so China is playing is playing as is Russia all over the world. Iran is busy giving Russia as well munitions, and Russia and Iran have had a long standing relationship. So all of these actors are at play. It's part of the reason the United States needs to look at all elements of its national power when it's figuring out how to deal with these situations, and why it needs so strongly to maintain relationships with allies and partners to count watching.
For the readout on this phone call. In the meantime, Mara, thank you so much for joining us and for a smart conversation as always here at the table, no less in studio. Amara Rudman, Professor at the Miller Center at the University of Virginia, director of the Ripples of Hope project focused on democratic solutions. We thank you for a great talk, Thanks for listening to the Balance of Power podcast.
Make sure to subscribe if you haven't already, Apple, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts, and you can find us live every weekday from Washington, d C. At noontime Eastern at Bloomberg KA