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To get a real read on what is happening on the ground and what needs to happen in the evacuation zone. We turn now to the Democratic congressman representing Florida's fourteenth congressional district, of course, in the direct line of this storm. Congresswoman Kathy cast is with us now here on Bloomberg TV and Radio. Thank you for joining us. Congresswoman. I'm sure this is a harrowing time. We hope you have
found your self to safety. What is your degree of concern about residents in your district who may be remaining and what they are about to face in this storm.
This is an epic.
I mean, Hurricane Colleen was less than two weeks ago, and thousands and thousands of my neighbors have debris their lives out on the street. I was home shortly after the Congress finished and out Saturday morning after Heleen hit and folks are in shock. They cannot believe the size of that storm surge from a storm that was one hundred miles off the coast of Tampa Bay and now this double whamming that has poses a triple threat with surge, rainfall,
and wind at the same time. Folks are they're very scared, and they're heating the evacuations. But there are still some people I've heard from them even this morning, who think, Okay, well, I'm going to go to the second floor and ride this out, even though I'm in an evacuation zone. They need to take stock of their lives because that is a dangerous situation and the local authorities have already explained
they're not going to be able to save them. Remember after when Helene surged in there were many water rescues. They're not going to be able to do it if there is a surge that is higher this time. So folks have got to get out. And if you hear my voice right now and you're in that evacuation area, you need to leave now. There's a rapidly closing window for you to take care of yourself.
Well, Congresswoman, we should mention for our viewers and listeners that you represent the fourteenth district of Florida, which is Tampa, St. Petersburg, Hillsboro County. These are the areas that are apparently going to be right in the path of this storm.
We heard from the mayor of.
Tampa on CNN last evening, who also has the name castor no relation, who said, point blank, if people do not leave the evacuation areas tonight, they will die.
Is that accurate, Yes.
It is, Yes, it is there.
This is an unprecedented storm and with the hotter temperatures, record temperatures in the Gulf of Mexico, that is like jet fuel for these storms.
That's why it intensified so rapidly.
I led the Climate Crisis Committee in the Congress for four years where we examined the costs and the risks and developed an action plan, and many of those recommendations were included in the Infrastructure Law and the Inflation Reduction Act. What wasn't able to be included was a lot of the resiliency because so many of these neighborhoods were built in the nineteen sixties and seventies. A lot of the
critical infrastructure back then. It is not It was never planned for these type of intense storms and disasters, So folks need to understand that this is unprecedented and they need to get out of harm's way immediately.
Well for those who have already fled and are wondering what they will return to, what resources they will need available to them. It does raise the question here of the state and the federal response. Is anything needed currently to help facilitate the evacuation effort? Are you concerned at
all about resources being available in the storms aftermath? How has both the Florida government under Ron DeSantis and the federal government reacted so far in the aftermath of Helene and embracing for this.
I've seen incredible cooperation between our local authorities, the cities and the counties, and the state and the federal partners, especially FEMA.
They have been on the ground.
FEMA Administrator Dan Chris Welb was here yesterday hers she met with Mayor Jane Caster of Tampa, Mayor Ken Welch of St.
Petersburg.
FEMA has sufficient funds to respond to this emergency. To all of the response, The Coast Guard is ready for search and rescue. You see the National Hurricane Center and Weather Service doing their job. What is going to be critical though, and what is left out? When President Biden Vice President Harris requested in the last Continuing Resolution that passed the Commerce weeks ago, they asked for additional funds for long term disaster funding to help us rebuild our
communities and that critical infrastructure. That has got to be a bipartisan priority going forward. And it's not just this impending catastrophe in Florida. It's also the Francis Scott Key Bridge in Baltimore. It's the communities that have been wiped by wildfires. The climate crit isn't just about the weather. It's about your wallet in this day and age, and the FEDS are going to be there, but we've got to think about building back in a much more resilient way to guard taxpayer dollars.
That's your governor doing down there at Congress Woman a lot of reporting yesterday that he refused to take a phone call from Vice President Kamala Harris. He later said that he wasn't aware she tried to reach him, or politics creeping in here.
What would they have to talk about anyway?
You know, Governor de Santis is really going to need a President Harris, if she's elected for the rebuilding effort, I'm here what our economic engines in the Tampa Bay area, McDill Air Force Base that's home to Special Operations Command and Central Command, our Coastguard station. You know they're doing their search and rescue. But our Coastguard Air station flooded, had catfish.
They are in the hangar.
Same with the Coastguard station in Sane Pete Port, Tampa Bay. When Helene washed through, it wiped out all of our channel markers and Booie's where ships can safely come in and out. Now they were fortunate to get they scrambled to get right back out there. But these are the kind of investments that we're going to have to work
together on. I don't care if you have a D or an R by your name, so it would it sure wouldn't hurt the governor to take the Vice president's call, just knowing that the chances are she may be president.
Well.
And of course voters have a decision to make on that front, Congressman, if they are able to vote at all. This is a concern we also had in the aftermath of Helene, specially in areas of western North Carolina, where actual transit infrastructure has been completely destroyed by that storm. Obviously, we have more immediate humanitarian considerations here first, But we're
four weeks out until election day. Are you worried that it may be disruptive to the act actual electoral process when it's not just presidential and congressional people on the ballot, but also ballot initiatives like in Florida abortion.
Yes, and after Hurricane Ian Hurricane Irma, there were additional flexibilities granted to local communities and supervisors of elections. They're clearly going to have to do that here. The vote by mail ballots arrived in most mail boxes here in Hillsborough County on Saturday, So think about that.
So thousands of people had been.
Washed out of their homes and now with this storm, So where are those ballots and will they have additional flexibility to get a replacement ballot to go vote early in a safe and secure location.
And these are things that.
It's not the it's not my top tier issue today, but it sure will be in the coming week.
Well, it's great to have you with us, Congressoman. I hope that you are somewhere safe and that your family is as well. We love to keep tabs with you and stay in touch as this storm approaches, but thank you for making time for us today. Congress Woman Kathy
cast a Democrat from Florida's fourteenth district. The language that we're hearing from Florida, Kayley, is really something Public officials, of course, are in the business of warning people when they're in danger, but to leave or die is quite the decision that's facing Floridians right now.
Yeah, and at this point with the storm what thirty hours away potentially from making landfall, As we heard from the congresswoman, the window to do so is closing and closing quickly.
That's for sure.
You're listening to the Bloomberg Balance of Power podcast Ken just live weekdays at noon Eastern on Applecarplay and then Rounoo with the Bloomberg Business App. You can also listen live on Amazon Alexa from our flagship New York station, Just say Alexa play bloom.
Welcome to the Tuesday edition. I had to check to make sure this is the world we're in. Yeah, it's still just only Tuesday. With what's already happened so far this week and what could come the big media blitz today for Kamala Harris. We'll talk more about that. She's
already done the view. It's on to Howard Stern and then Stephen Colbert as Joe Biden leaves the bubble today having gotten the hurricane briefing earlier, to travel to Milwaukee, where he's going to talk about cleaning up lead pipes, remembering from the infrastructure law. He also goes to Montgomery County, Pennsylvania later on a campaign event for Senator Bob Casey. As I mentioned Kamala Harris in New York, jad Vance
is in Detroit today, the swing state of Michigan. But the hurricane, of course is top in the headlines today and it will be tomorrow. This is something else. Milton, now at category four, down from five yesterday, is being described in Florida as a once in a century storm, a once in one hundred year storm. We haven't seen a direct hit on Tampa Bay, they say, since nineteen twenty one.
So there you have it.
Now.
This is only twelve.
Days after Hurricane Helene, and there are a lot of worries about the extent to which this is going to stretch resources. Knowing Helene came beryln right through that same area on the Gulf Coast a little bit further north in the Big Bend area, but the southeast is having some trouble here. We heard from the mayor of Tampa, Jane Caster, on CNN last night. It's not often to hear public officials talk this way.
Quote.
I can say this without any dramatization whatsoever. If you choose to stay in one of those evacuation areas, you are going to die.
Unquote.
Glad Lauren Rosenthal is with US live from New York, Bloomberg Weather reporter, joining us now for the second time in two weeks on a major natural disaster. Lauren, it's great to see you. What do we know about landfall and windspeed?
Sure?
I know that Milton is still going to be a major hurricane as it finishes its journey across the Gulf and gets really close to making landfall in Florida, probably sometime tomorrow night. So its top winds will still be very destructive, and what forecasters are really worried about is
the risk of storm surge. Milton is getting a lot bigger as it crosses the ocean, and it's going to pick up a lot of water and bring it ashore inundating communities in Florida that are still cleaning up from Helene less than two weeks ago.
What does this mean for Tampa.
It looks like there will be a direct hit or something close to it in a city that is in a very precarious situation geographically.
What are we about to witness?
Yeah, so Tampa sits on the edge of the West Florida Shelf, which is this really gently sloping land formation. There's shallow waters sitting there, and a storm doesn't have to be very strong to be able to pick it up and push that ashore. So we're expecting to see surge of up to fifteen feet that, you know, rapidly approaching the second story of a two floor home. You know, folks are just trying to clean up as best they can from Helene to try to clear the path for Milton,
you know, before it arrives tomorrow night. But those cleanup efforts take a long time and resources are really strapped, so it's definitely been a struggle.
What'd you think about that statement from may Or Castor on CNN last night?
Is that accurate? If people don't leave, they die.
You know, it's always a good idea to heat emergency warnings. I talked to Tampa's emergency manager, Barbara Trip yesterday, and she said, you know, folks are just used to extreme weather in Florida. She saw people out in the surge from Helene, which was half as bad as Milton's expected to be. She really wants people to pay attention to the warnings coming out of the US National Hurricane Center coming from the city of Tampa. Get out of the
way of the path of this storm. You know, it's not worth trying to stick around if resources are tight, if you can't find a way out on your own. The state of Florida is offering shuttles to evacuation centers, and I think I saw that ride sharing apps like Uber are also offering free rides. So you know, if folks can figure out a way out, they do need to pay attention to those warnings just to be safe.
Well, this will be even more urgent tomorrow, Lauren, and we'd love to stay in touch with you to the extent that you can join us here on Balance of Power. Lauren Rosenthal reporting on the storm for Bloomberg in New York. It's scary stuff. And again the proximity to the most recent storm makes this even more complicated. We're still trying
to get to some areas. When you talk about the response, trying to get to some areas in western North Carolina that were devastated by Hurricane Halid, massive flooding, people displaced from their homes and areas where they never thought they'd be having that kind of a conversation. And it's been compounded by what is being called a misinformation campaign in
some publications, and it's hard to argue with that. At Donald Trump, of course, has been leading the charge to some extent and questioning the federal response, issuing statements in speeches and putting statements on truth social about the seven hundred and fifty dollars if you lose your house and so forth. There's been some pretty good reporting on this. Politico was leading the charge on it this morning, the
consequences on full display. They spoke with a state official from North Carolina who described the overwhelming deluge of false information in what it has meant for people in need at best, a distraction. At worst, it is obstructing needy Americans from getting the help they need, falsely suggesting for instance that victims, as I mentioned, are entitled to no more than a seven hundred and fifty dollars check. He described it as the thunderdome and people are just pumping
the noise in. It's where we start our conversation with Jeffrey Lane Blevins. We wanted to talk to an expert on misinformation at a critical time and the response to this storm, professor in the Department of Journalism at the University of Cincinnati, and appropriately for our conversation, author of Social Media, social Justice, and the Political Economy of online networks.
Mister Blevins, welcome back to Bloomberg. It's spent some time, and appreciate your being with us here as we try to figure out what in the world is going on. There was a time when a natural disaster like this would bring out the gougers, right, you'd see gas prices go through the roof. Maybe scammers would be afoot trying to do stuff in a storm zone when people were vulnerable. Now it's a political opportunity to use misinformation, but to what end.
Right, Well, first of all, thank you for having me on. It's good to be with you again. Although it's disappointing what we're talking about. But when we think about misinformation, I think we should also consider the term disinformation because we have entities that are putting this information is false information out there for political purpose, uh, you know, to undermine the credibility of of you know.
Government institutions. Uh.
And are you know, our credible uh news outlets?
Uh?
And when people you know, are they when they have access to that and for you know that that disinformation, they are likely to believe it's true, and so they spread it. And that's what I would consider to be misinformation. And it's an unfortunate, you know thing to see.
Well, it sure is.
We've heard reports of some folks turning away help from FEMA because they're reading on social media that that federal officials are confiscating their goods. How do you are we in a in a place where where it's not possible for the federal government to succeed in recovering from a storm.
Well, I think that's the you know, is part of the goal.
And actually I think that the goal is actually a little bit cheaper than that is simply to you know, discredit you know, the Biden administration. And what an awful way to try to score political points, you know, at you know, you know, at the at the lives of people who have already been you know, affected by a natural disaster. This is the time that we need to be able to rely on and you know, trust our government and trust our.
Our our federal resources. It's it's despicable to me, frankly, well.
Speak to me about the role that Elon Musk is playing in this. When we talk about online disinformation. There have been a number of posts, a couple dozen in fact, that have been challenged, that are still up on his x platform, what we used to call Twitter, that are reinforcing the rhetoric we're hearing from Donald Trump and even some kind of wackier conspiracy theories. Does this alliance between Donald Trump and Elon Musk results in an even more dangerous situation?
Well, it certainly, you know, doesn't help.
And you know, in the past, I used to give someone like Musk kind of the benefit of the doubt when he was just a user of then Twitter, and I'm like, well, you know, maybe he's you know, really you know, misinformed, but he does seem to be part and parcel you know, of this now at the very least he should take more responsibility for for.
What he shares.
Uh, this is you know, kind of the message of you know, my recent scholarship is that you know, as audiences, we have to take more responsibility for what we like, what we repost. And that's especially true for politicians, for influencers, for for public figures. It's not enough to say, oh, well, this is you know, this is out there, and how am I supposed to know you know, what's a credible source and what and what's not.
Uh, that's that's a really cheap out.
Well, it's pretty amazing to see anti Semitic attacks against some of the elected officials, for instance North Carolina who are trying to deal with the storm. A lot of this really brings us back to North Carolina, and much of it has been born on X. The Washington Post died some reporting here, focusing on thirty three recent viral X posts that spread misinformation about Hurricane Helene and caused at least two hundred and thirty one deaths, of course
widespread devastation. The posts collectively attracted one hundred and fifty nine million views. How do you combat that wave of false information?
All?
Right?
Well, and this is you know, again where I think our political our influencers and our politicians have to take more responsibility. A lot of times, you know, folks want to blame it on you know, the the algorithm and or algorithms in general.
Well, here's the thing.
Algorithms they only do what they what they are programmed to do, and they are our programmed to keep users engaged. And you know, so whatever you know, whatever you you know, like, whatever you you know, respond to comment on whatever you you share. Well, you know, the algorithm takes note of that, and so it feeds you more of that type of information or in this case, misinformation, and it really creates
a disinformation or misinformation bubble if you will. Well you're like, well, this is being you know, this has gone viral, so many different you know, users have have shared it, and so it makes it seem credible when it's not.
To what extent is AI making this a more difficult situation to manage. Here, a lot of the posts we're talking about include AI generated images of things that never happened.
Right, and not everyone you know, not every user has access or knows how to use a reverse image. You know, you know a look up tool or you know, thinks to you know, use a fact checking service, and you know, there are several of them. USA today, for instance, has a whole team of fact checkers. You know, they they
take tips to run these these things down. But it always takes a long time for the for the truth to catch up while while these things are you know, are going viral, and it makes it, you know, incredibly difficult once that you know that genie is out of the bottle, so to speak to you know, to put it back in and say, oh, wait a minute, that's you know, that's not accurate.
And I think, well, you know what what we we can I'm sorry, go ahead.
It just says a lot about where we are, Professor, when I go to FEMA's website FEMA dot gov and they've got a rumor response page. In fact, if you search for this on Google, it's the first result that you get. Have you ever heard of anything like that?
You know, it's it's it's unfortunate that that it comes to.
What I would add is that you know, a lot on the on the far political right has spent decades uh you know, demonizing uh you know and other cutting you know, government agencies, so that you have a lot of people that are primed not to trust.
Them, not to believe them.
So you know, the very agencies that they should be looking toward, they're they're simply you know, going to discredit.
I think what we what we need to do as you know, as media audiences, so is we need more you know, media literacy and be aware that hey, there is something out there that you know, AI that can generate these things that can look really persuasive, and we have to be you know, on guard and be willing to check multiple sources and also be willing to have some of our preconceived you know, political dispositions challenged.
Maybe that's what I'll do in my next life, I'll do a media literacy class.
Professor. It's great to have you back. We thank you for the time.
Jeffrey Blevin's Department of Journalism, University of Cincinnati.
You're listening to the Bloomberg Balance of Power podcast kens just live weekdays at noon Eastern onmo CarPlay and then right on with them Bloomberg Business app Listen on demand wherever you get your podcasts, or watch us live on YouTube with.
New York where Kamala Harris is spending some time today after the interview. Her sit down with Sixty Minutes aired last night. We've already seen her today on the View on ABC, just heard her on the Howard Stern Show on radio. She still has the late show coming up. And as we keep track of the headlines that are being generated from these interviews, there's one in particular making
the rounds in Trump and Republican circles. It has to do with this administration and any differentation between her and President Biden. Here was the exchange on the View.
Which you have done something differently than President Biden during the past four years. There is done a thing that comes to mind in terms of and I've been a part of most of the decisions that have had impact the work that we have done. For example, capping the cost of insulin at thirty five dollars a month for our seniors is something I care deeply about.
So nothing let's assemble our political panel. Genie Schanzano is with us, of course, Democratic analyst, Bloomberg politics contributor, political science professor at Iona University, joined today by Lester Munson, Republican strategist from BGR Group. Great to see you both. Welcome back here in our two balance of power. Genie, surely she was rehearsed to answer that question.
Was that the way to handle it?
No, I don't think so. You know, it's interesting, you know, Kayleie mentioned this is making the rounds in the Republican circles Toms campaign a few days ago, when Joe Biden made his first foray into the press room at the White House, he said something very similar, and I've never seen a campaign make a commercial as fast as Donald Trump's campaign did. These are not the messages that the Harris campaign wants to be sending out, especially since today on this issue of change, she got.
Some really good news.
The New York Times Siena poll said she's closed the gap on change that many many Americans, many more than before with Joe Biden, see her as the candidate of change.
She's made that now within the margin of errors. So I think this was a misstep on the view.
I think it was a misstep by Joe Biden in the press room the other day. She's got to differentiate herself from Joe Biden because change and forward looking is what wins campaigns, not backward and looking, especially when so many people are not happy with the direction the country is taking right now.
Just to emphasize those numbers you're referring to, Genie. In this New York Times Siena poll, which was conducted September twenty ninth to October sixth, when asked who represents change, forty six percent said Kamala Harris. Forty four percent said Donald Trump. So as we consider the changes potentially voters do want to see between this administration and the next one. I'm trying to think how we might see this ad in particular showing up or how this phrase in particular
maybe showing up in campaign campaign ads. Words are difficult today, Lester. Is this going to be images of people coming over the border, statistics on a legal migration than Kamala Harris saying that she wouldn't have done anything differently? Is it going to be statistics around the economy same message or
on the left? Could it be what's happened in Israel and Gaza over the course of the last year In one day now, as we marked one year since October seventh yesterday, that gets her in trouble with progressives.
Look, I have a rare disagreement with Genie here. I think this was the only option Kamala Harris had. You know, Joe Biden's out there saying President Biden's out there saying she and I agreed on everything. She was involved in all the decisions. She can't really go out in public the next day and say the President is wrong and she is tied to him. She's the vice president. She was there for three and a half years. She owns all all of these things, whether she admits it or not.
I think better for her to say, yes, I was there for all of those decisions. I believe they were the right ones. That doesn't mean we're not going to have change going forward. And here are the places where I think we need to pivot to a new approach. And maybe it's the border and parts of the economy, and if she wants to kind of go into that
minefield the Middle East. But so I just think it's a smarter in the long run for her to say, yes, I am with the President on these things, come hell or high water, because I'm going to be with him anyway, So I'm going to defend that and then pivot to
these other new opportunities. Yes, it leaves her a little open to the attack from Trump, but to divorce herself from Biden would open her, I think, to a much bigger attack of being, you know, mendacious and disloyal and having no anchor whatsoever.
Really interesting.
I want to ask you a little bit more about this New York Times, Sana pol You've got a national number that we looked at. You've got a Texas number, not a bit big shot. Donald Trump leading by six points there. But then there's Florida. Guys, I don't know what you make of this, a staggering thirteen point lead for Donald Trump fifty five percent to forty one percent in Florida, the state that is bracing for the storm
right now. And it's an interesting bit of analysis from Nate Cone in the New York Times, who says this is not an outlier, Genie, that the demographics essentially of Florida have changed post pandemic. How do you see this as a polling expert.
Yeah, you know, I.
Don't think we know yet. And it was very interesting to read Nate Cohen's piece where he said, you know, I'm not going to say this is an outliar, as he has done in the past, because of course this is not in line with the rest of the polling that we have seen come out of Florida. That said, I think this number does suggest, and it continues to suggest in the other polls we've seen, that Florida is going to look more like twenty twenty two than twenty twenty.
I think that's for sure. I think Donald Trump, it's his home state. He is popular there. I think he wins the state. I'm not so sure he does that in a thirteen percentage point victory. So there's that. I would also just you know, add about the New York Times Siena very curiously, why didn't we see the Senate numbers from Florida and Texas when they released these? That
has been the practice for the Times. They did not do that this time, which leads some of us to speculate, in its peer speculation that maybe those two are looking quite different than some of the other pollings. So it's going to be interesting to see when those important races come out.
Well, I'm glad you mentioned those Senate races, Genie, because those are the kind of incumbent Republicans that we're seeing that could be might be a stretch. I know you don't think so. In Texas, potential pickup opportunities for Democrats. But when we consider Florida specifically in the incumbent Senator Rick Scott, who of course was governor. I was having a conversation with a few people this morning about how his experience as governor, his handling historically of natural disasters,
could benefit him. Here ask hurricane Milton barrels toward Florida. I would remind everyone that Senator Scott did show up and meet with Joe Biden when he traveled to Florida last week. Lester, is this storm something that actually could work to his benefit, whatever humanitarian cost it may come at.
Yeah, I mean these storms are always you know, in addition to, of course the vastly more important human tragedy of folks who may lose their lives or their livelihoods, or their property and whatnot. Is there's a political aspect to all of these storms. You know, I'm from Chicago, where we had a mayor, Michael Blandick, who lost reelection because he didn't plow the streets very well after snowstorms.
So you think about Hurricane Katrina during the Bush administration, you know, President Bush's reputation was impacted by what people saw as his response to that crisis. So these things are always political. We should expect our politicians to position themselves to look like responsible stewards of the government resources that are going to be needed. And it's the incumbent government, it's the party in the White House who's actually more
vulnerable here. Will the FEMA response be deemed as adequate? Are the real issues in delivering aid on the ground? What should we make of some of these kind of crazy misinformation campaigns. I think Scott if he's if he's true to his kind of chief executive roots as governor, does have a real opportunity to kind of demonstrate some leadership here, whether it's working with the administration or challenging the administration to do a little bit better.
You go to the FEMA homepage, Genie, and you see the first entry on Hurricane Milton, and then there's something called Hurricane Helene rumor response. They've had to put up a whole section of the website to knock down some of the misinformation that's been put out there on social media, including some things that have been suggested by Donald Trump on the stump, like you lose your house, you get a seven hundred and fifty dollars check and that's the end of it.
What does that tell us.
About where we are that FEMA has to have somebody put this on the website.
Yeah, I mean it.
Is utterly stunning.
There was a time when a disaster like this people are really seriously impacted. They We've had two hundred and fifty dead or more by Heleen, and now we have Milton coming and the idea that politics would be played like this is, you know, still stunning to me. And the fact is you had the governor of Florida refusing to take phone calls from the sitting Vice president and then bragging about it on TV. You've had Donald Trump out there with a misinformation campaign, and the reality is
a scary reality. You talk about FEMA, they're saying now only nine percent of their workers are available to respond onto these disasters.
That's a huge decrease from.
Where we were. And I was so glad you had the congresswoman on and talking about the economics of climate change because it is here to stay and all of us Republicans and Democrats have to address that. And that begins of course in Congress. So a lot of important conversations to be had not this misinformation that we're hearing.
On the subject of Congress, Lester, we heard from the Speaker of the House in the aftermath of Helene that the resources were there for FEMA, there was no need to call Congress back for a special session before the election to address supplemental funding. Does Hurricane Milton change that calculus.
Well, it certainly could, And it sounds like this is going to be an epic storm for the ages, and if it does play out that way, then I don't see why Congress could, you know, wouldn't be able to come back, even though it is a very important election cycle, come back and do what's necessary to make sure the people of Florida and who are or else may be
impacted by this storm get the resources they need. And as we know, FEMA is pulled in a bunch of different directions by recent storms and some other issues, and so it is Congress's responsibility if they're going to need more resources. We're going to need you guys to come back and vote for.
It, all right.
Lester Munson of BGR Group and Jeanie Shanzino of the Center for the Study of the Presidency in Congress and Bloomberg politics contributor our political panel today, thank you so much. As we consider a landfall that could be made late tomorrow. The back half of this week, Joe clearly going to be dominated by the storm and its potential aftermath. And as we've mentioned, Joe Biden was set to travel internationally
leaving Thursday. He has now canceled that trip to be here to respond to the storm.
Both Senator Marco Robio Congressman Jared Moscowitz both describing this was the black Swan event that they had been presented with by FEMA officials and here it is happening before our eyes.
We'll have a lot more ahead.
On the fastest show in politics, This is Bloomberg.
You're listening to the Bloomberg Balance of Power podcast. Can just live weekdays at noon Eastern on Applecarplay and enroid Oro with a Bloomberg Business app. You can also listen live on Amazon Alexa from our flagship New York station. Just say Alexa play Bloomberg eleven thirty.
Yeah, this is Balance of Power on Bloomberg TV and Radio. As we welcome our global television and radio audiences to this daily conversation about politics, live from Washington and today, it's taking on a bit of a new form as Kamala Harris leaves the bubble and the Vice president conducts the start of a massive media blitz. Sixty minutes last night, kayleie today, as we've been telling everyone, it was the View made a little bit of news there, Howard Stearns.
She's talking to you right now just down the dial from a channel one twenty one here on Sirius XM, where we broadcast every day on Bloomberg, and then it'll be Colbert tonight a town hall and Univision Thursday. Will the Republican campaign be able to still criticize her for not doing interviews?
Well, I guess that's the question, considering she did do sixty minutes, which aired last night, Donald Trump did not. This thing may go both ways. But as you allude to her appearance on the View, of course, we played you earlier this hour, the clip of her being asked if she would do anything differently than Joe Biden, she said, nothing comes to mind.
She then did come.
Back though, to that kind of question, she said, and this is a quote you asked me, what's the difference between Joe Biden to me? That will be one of many differences. I'm going to have a Republican in my cabinet because I don't feel burdened by letting pride get in the way of a good idea. Unclear if that pride is Joe Biden's or just this general idea of not putting someone from the opposing party in your cabinet.
What we do know, though, based on an exclusive interview with Bloomberg earlier today, is that Jamie Diamond, the CEO of JP Morgan, might like that idea. This is part of what he told are Lisa Bromwitz.
It's about growing the economy, it's not about putting business people there. I also, I think we should insult each other as citizens try to understand each other. And I think it'd be great at the next president they really want to set where they say unify, you know, put someone from the other part of your cabinet.
All right, So Jamie Diamond might like this idea. Let's see if Kevin Walling, like said Joe, he's joining us here.
He does in our Washington, d C.
Studio.
He of course is a democratic strategist. So we've heard from her on the view. We've heard from part of her interview with Howard Stern. We saw her on sixty Minutes last night, Kevin, by and large, for someone who has not been doing that much media up to this point, how's the blitz going?
Well?
Even the campaign to your point, he's calling it this media blitz, previewing it among her campaign spokespeople.
I think it's great. It's perfectly timed.
We saw kind of a similar strategy with Donald Trump over the summer where his numbers were up before Joe.
Biden dropped out of the race.
Again, the key factor is this five to ten percent of folks that are undecided or are thinking that they may change their vote. You know, so much of this focus is on this Trump obviously Harris dynamic in terms of who folks are going to pull for. I think the more important factor is that five to ten percent, where it's not a matter of choosing between the two of them. It's a matter between choosing to vote at
all or just stay on the couch. And I think appealing to these wider audiences is part of this splitz, as you call it, and the campaign calls it, is a smart strategy.
This began again with an interview on sixty Minutes which, by the way, she could have been sharing with Donald Trump and he chose not to take part. Scott Pelly was pretty deliberate about explaining how that all worked out. But an interesting moment here, And I wonder if this kind of leads us into the other interviews this week, because it strikes me that we're not talking about policy here,
We're talking about personality. These are interviews that tell us more about who she is than maybe what she's proposing. Interesting moment last night, as they were discussing the Second Amendment and her revolution here in the public talking about I own a gun in the debate, if you break into my house, you're going to get shot in.
The Oprah interview, and.
Then last night we actually got down to the make and model of the weapon.
Here's Comm. Harris on sixty minutes.
I have a glock, and I've had it for quite some time. And I mean, look, Bilt, my background is in law enforcement.
And.
So there you go.
Have you ever fired it?
Yes, of course I have at a shooting range.
Yes, of course I have.
I have a glock. Who are we talking to here?
Is this an effort to make her appear like less of a threat that some Democrats might pose to the second Amendment, or are we trying to reinforce the law enforcement bona fides knowing that a lot of progressives have a real allergy to gun violence.
Yeah, jud it's a good question. You know, we were all out in Chicago for the convention. So much of her bio emphasis was on her record with criminal justice, right, being that attorney general, being that border state ag.
Taking on transnational gangs.
That was in every bio video and things like that, because again, I think women in general, and I work with a bunch of women candidates have a higher bar in a lot of people's estimations in terms of an executive role. Right, are they tough enough to take on
some of those challenges? And I think the dynamic that you're seeing from the Vice president is an emphasis on some of those kind of taking on those character questions when it comes to a lot of undecided men in this country in terms of the matchup between Donald Trump and the vice president, she's shoring up those folks. On Howard Stern Today last week with the podcast with the two former NBA players, right, especially appealing to long largely
to young black men. Right, The key component of her tent well.
And call her daddy, potentially reaching out to young women the Alex Cooper podcast she did over the weekend. Is there still something she needs to tap into an interview or a place where she could get that audience she needs that she is not going because, as Joe alluded to earlier, there might still be some criticism that she's going to friendly or outlets, people who are throwing her softball questions sympathetic to her cops.
Yeah, I mean, I think that argument goes out the window now with that sixty minutes. That's the toughest, one of the toughest interviews that we've seen going back generations of both sides of the nominees showing up for that interview. Obviously, something Joe mentioned with Scott Pelly condemning Donald Trump's pull out of that, So.
I think that goes out the window.
I think later in this week, as Joe alluded to, we're going to have that Univision town hall. Obviously, hispanics aret of key concern and focus, especially in key states like Arizona and Nevada still for this campaign. But again, I think it's a matter of reaching as many people and that key factors at five and ten percent, not to signing between Trump and Harris necessarily, but deciding whether to actually show up and vote. And she's got to
go outside these bubbles. They're not watching US sadly, most likely they're not watching CNN, They're not watching MSNBC or Fox. These are folks that are outside of that mainstream where the conversation is happening.
Yeah.
Well, not that Donald Trump is a stranger, just speaking with friendly interview your He has typically gravitated toward right leaning programs and right leaning interviews. Is back on Hewitt yesterday talking about whether it would be possible to turn Gaza into another Monaco, for instance. Both campaigns have decided to largely issue the sort of traditional, hard hitting journalist interview. Is that smart politics?
I think it's a reflection of where the changing dynamics are with regards to the media landscape. To your point, Donald Trump, the twenty seven and the last thirty media appearances have been before conservatives, listen to you with the since he's doing Ben Shapiro for the first time, that's today as well that the campaign the Trump campaign just previewed. I think it's a matter of going where eyeballs and ears are and the shifting dynamics of the media landscape more than anything.
Well, as we consider the media landscape and what people are consuming, it isn't just news broadcasts and interviews. They are seeing things in between those actual produced segments. They're seeing ads. So at this point in the cycle, is it the interviews, the new information that maybe gleaned from them, that actually make a difference, or is it just the flooding of the airwaves with the same messages we're seeing over and over and over four weeks out? What actually matters here?
I think what actually matters to your question, it's a really good one, is just content?
Is everything? Right?
The matter for this campaign to get out, both campaigns to feed that beast?
Which is content? Right?
The thirty second spots on TikTok that you know we're all on our phones watching Instagram videos to flood the zone, which you know a lot of these long form interviews to your point earlier, you know, it was a forty minute conversation with you know, with that podcaster in terms of call me what is it called color Daddy?
Callored? Yeah, I see, I'm like this. I'm already probably more my demographic than well.
Those clips were broken up right in terms of getting that element out there, and that's you know, that's again content is critical and winning the content game in addition to the paid advertising campaign, which the campaign is just dominating.
The airs campaign is dominating.
You look, one hundred and fifty more million dollars spent since the conventions ended through October fourth. I mean, that's just an onslaught of ads. The Trump campaign would say it's still relatively even despite this spending. So that's maybe a good indication for the Trump campaign. But again, flooding the zone is critically important.
Well, so take us to school for a minute, a little clinic with a media consultant. With this massive you talk about flooding the zone. This is a big zone. Four weeks with no debate, there's no other major event left. That's this big thing called October, and it hasn't been very kind on the news front to either campaign. Quite frankly, we're about to witness this massive hurricane slamming into Tampa. Do you just reserve ads across the country and then
remove them as needed? Do you focus on the seven swing states? How do you make the decisions when it comes to the closing arguments like that.
It's a really good question.
I think also too, as we've seen every cycle, right, more states make early voting more available. Yes, back in twenty twenty we had about an eighteen percent leap point leaned right now in terms of the early vote in terms of requests and returns, that's at a twenty five point differential for Democrats.
So that's certainly something that the Hairs campaign is looking at.
They've also previewed the the idea of maybe doing thirty second infomercials and some of these key states as well, because of that funding advantage that the Hairs campaign just blowing the doors off thirty second nutes, thirty minutes half our advice in some of these broadcast DMAs into your point.
The seven key states.
You're not going to see that in the Boston media market or anything like that, but in some of these key states where where funding is is what your dollar goes a little bit farther again, we're also bumping up to you know, from a media consultant perspective, we're also bumping up into the holidays too, right, so not just politics driving the cost of advertising higher, but November, you know, late October and November are very expensive, especially on broadcasts in some of these key DMAs.
Kevin just reminded me it's prime day todayotentially to do today and tomorrow.
Yeah, so much like the holiday season.
I'm not even but to your point with early voting, it's also election season. It's no longer just yes, that's right day. As we consider to Joe's point about what has happened already in October, what could happen remaining in this October. It's not just natural disasters, it's man made tragedies as well, including war in the Middle East, specifically in Michigan, with the news flow that we have gotten
with intensifying and fighting rather than cooling off. Having just marked one year since October seventh, are you worried that the campaign is not paying adequate attention to the potential votes that could be lost on the Democratic side for those who are opposed to her position or this administration's position on supporting Israel, which she said on the View today, there is no issue that she would have tackled differently.
So I'm a Democrat, so I worry about everything, every population, every state up until you know, we're notorious for being badwetters. And I think, you know, to your point, at least Lockin has previewed some of those concerns. She's obviously the Democratic candidate running in that state. Most battleground state polls have the vice president up, but it's within the margin Nevara.
But again, you know, to your point, there's a huge issue with Arab American voters that are traditionally in our camp. There's new stories about Korean American voters that were a core element of Joe Biden flipping Georgia for the first time since Bill Clinton.
And you're going to see these campaigns.
You know that the Hair's campaign has touted three hundred and thirty field offices, twenty four hundred staff. So many of those folks are dispatched to those communities that are a part of those communities as well that aren't new to those areas, and lifting up those voices is going to be critically important.
I'm going to throw something actually here with a minute left. It's totally unfair, but there are reports of not only all the way in the Sezo, not only misinformation in western North Carolina, but laying the groundwork in some cases for claims of fraud. They are voting, as you just mentioned, in some of these states that have been hit by massive tropical storms. What is that going to mean at the beginning of November.
It's going to be more in certainty. Right.
The fact that we're now politicizing disaster response is something a road that we haven't gone down.
Before in this country.
You know, you see the Trump campaign bringing on recruiting more and more poll watching volunteers as opposed to actually feel people going out and knocking on doors.
They just want people at the polls, challenging folks.
So this is another reason to contest results.
This is a huge reason to contest results.
Luckily, I think you know this is not new to both sides, and everyone's gonna be lawyered up certainly. But again it's a problem because people like certainty and we likely won't have that on November fifth.
It's great to have you back at the table.
Yes with us early the early edition of Ballots of Power, the Democratic Strategistic.
Thanks for listening the Balance of Power podcast.
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