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I'm June Brosso, sitting in for Joe Matthew in the first votes cast in the twenty twenty four presidential race. Donald Trump tightened his grip on the Republican presidential nomination, with Iowa voters delivering him a commanding win in last night's caucuses, moving him one step closer to returning to the White House. Trump won fifty one percent of the vote, with rivals Ron DeSantis and Nikki Haley not even close. DeSantis came in second, winning twenty one point two percent,
and Haley close behind, capturing nineteen point one percent. Here to discuss what it all means and how it happened is Terry Haynes, founder of Benjia Policy. Thanks for joining us, Terry.
Thank you, Jane appreciate it.
So it seemed like the ca BECAU says we're over before they began. What's the significance of Trump coming in with a majority of the votes here?
Well, I'm going to give you a little bit of a non consensus view about that. Frankly, Trump was expected to come in with about fifty percent of the vote, and surprise, surprise, that's exactly what he came pretty much exactly what he came in with. Four takeaways for you. First, there's still a competitive race since fifty percent or more Republican voters don't want Trump and there are only two not Trump candidates left, either of which could carry that
fifty percent forward. Secondly, I think a former president which is losing half of his party's primary voters is not good news for that candidate, even though he did win. Thirdly, looking ahead to New Hampshire next week, you're likelier to see a more competitive race there since Trump is polling a low to mid forties and right now, based on polling,
you can expect to surge largely from Haley. Fourthly, I think I think this is not well understood at all, but the polling in Iowa, particularly the Iowa poll from the Des Moines Register, showed that thirty percent of likely caucus goers would not support Trump and would not vote for Trump and the general election whether or not Trump, if they'd voted for Trump and the caucus. That to me presages a Republican Party split that I've been talking about for some time.
But as far as the numbers that we see now and what we see ahead, doesn't it appear that Trump is going to wrap it up?
No, I don't think so at all, based on right now. No, I don't think so at all. If what you've got is a situation where where he wins the Iowa caucuses, but let's remember he wins with just over half the overall vote that came through, and the caucuses in twenty sixteen, he gets sort of the not Trump side, gets almost as many delegates as Trump did out of Iowa. Number one, number two. New Hampshire is right now, based on polling,
more competitive than Iowa. So you're going to have a competitive race and where nothing is going to happen for the month after New Hampshire. So I think what you're going to see is you're going to see three main candidates, Trump, Haley, and DeSantis all scratching and bting for advantage. I think you're going to see a lot of visits from Haley and Desandis to Midtown Manhattan to pick up additional money. And additional support there. And I think it's right now,
it's still anybody's ballgame. If you've got a situation where you're not going to have another vote until late late February in South Carolina or early March in the Super Tuesday States, that's an awful lot of time in politics.
It certainly is so. Dessandis and Haley seem to be just battling each other rather than Trump. And you know their numbers are just about the same. So what did they learn, if anything, from Iowa.
I think what they learned is that they need to be on top in order to be the candidate that consolidates the not Trump vote. What you have if you're DeSantis and Haley and you're thinking about this, what you think is, First, you know, I've leapfrogged everybody else. Now my task is I've got to leapfrog the other Not Trump candidate. I've got to be the alternative to Trump. The vast majority of that fifty percent vote comes to me,
and then I can douke it out with Trump. I mean that that is what they're thinking about right now.
Trump pulls strongly with working class white voters. He one with white evangelical Christians who are nearly half of the caucus goers in Iowa. Is there any chance for DeSantis or Haley to pick off those voters?
Oh?
I think some Iowa I think is unique or unusual in the in both the amount of Evangelicals that exist and how and how much and how well they're organized. Frankly, yeah, sure they could do that. But what you're I think what you're seeing is a situation where you know, Trump is kind of topping at fifty percent right now. He's not going to be fifty percent in New Hampshire almost certainly. If he does, you know, we'll have a different narrative
next week. But almost certainly he doesn't get to fifty percent or close to it, you will have a more competitive race. And then what you're going to have is you're going to have a free for all in the first two weeks of March, where the voters starts sorting themselves out. So right now it's very much anybody's race. And there are a lot of variables here, you know, including the desire to want to stop Trump from getting the nomination. You know that I think, frankly haven't crystallized yet.
So Haley is heading to New Hampshire. Dessantis is heading to South Carolina. Tell us about the importance of New Hampshire.
Well, I think New Hampshire is much more of a hinge for the race than Iowa might be. You know, your colleague Mike McKee points out that drilled down even farther than I did on results in discussing this today, and you know, points out essentially that there's about two and a half percent of Iolands that actually voted in the Iowa caucus. And this is a state that has a seventy five percent or had it in twenty twenty
a seventy five percent turnout rate statewide. So this is a very very tiny sliver of Iowan's Generally, New Hampshire I think is more of a more of a hinge because what you have is a situation where Hayley looks like she's surging, looks like she's competitive, and the not Trump vote today exceeds the Trump vote. And so if that's a trend and that continues over the next month or so, you know, then you've got a much bigger race.
But if over the next week Trump tamps that down and New Hampshire rights come away from this thinking, well, you know, I'm probably going to vote for Trump over Haley. Let's say then that narrative gets shot to pieces. But right now it's still much, very much anybody's ballgame in New Hampshire. And what happens in New Hampshire frankly flavors the race going forward, where people will spend the next month after New Hampshire saying, well, is Trump you know,
is Trump Ashley invincible? Well, you know, it seems like he was in Iowa, but maybe not in New Hampshire. And that provides alone, provides some running room for Haley and DeSantis to try to keep consolidating the vote.
And Desanti is going to South Carolina and basically skipping New Hampshire. What is he giving up by doing that.
Well, he's giving up a New Hampshire caveness, obviously. But the but de Santis's uh, the Santas's idea all along was he was going to go as hard into Iowa as he possibly could. He was going to be as well organized as possible. That probably brought him the uh, the the scraping out the second place that in fact happened. He got the endorsement of the vast majority of the regulars in the Iowa Republican Party from Governor Reynolds on down, and he also got the evangelical endorsement.
Uh.
I think he thinks that he could play whatever the whatever the result in New Hampshire is, he can play well in South Carolina. Firstly, Secondly, it's it's an awfully good opportunity for him to go take Haley out. Uh, since if she's weak in her own home state. Uh, DeSantis would think that would that would turn the not Trump side of the vote much more to DeSantis.
So do you think that DeSantis has an advantage over Haley at this point?
I think it's a little too soon to say. What you've got is a situation. I don't have the exact numbers in front of me, but you've got a situation whereas Desanta's is second place is basically eked out about four thousand more votes than Haley did, with about on Haley and Desantas together roughly about forty five to fifty thousand votes cast. So you know, I think he probably thinks he has the ability to have an advantage over Haley if he spends a month hammering away in South Carolina.
Certainly that that will weaken Haley and enhance his chances to some extent, but I doubt very much that he sees the opportunity to be free and clear. I think this is going to be a race for the half of the vote that's not Trump for the next four to five weeks.
Frankly, and as far as fundraising does, DeSantis have more of an uphill battle there than.
Haley right right now. And I mean this includes Wall Street of course, but right now a lot of the Wall Street money has gone to Haley, frankly, because based on polling, Haley has seems to be a better matchup candidate against Biden in the fall general election. And certainly, what a lot of deep pocketed Wall Street people have wanted and a lot of other people have wanted is a candidate that most clearly can beat Biden and most clearly is business friendly. Both of these candidates are certainly
business friendly. Where Haley's advantages that she looks more electable, it's going to be up to Disantus to counter that narrative he does to some extent already by talking about, you know, he's the only person that's actually got a track record of doing a bunch of things that are business friendly and economically positive. But he's going to have to ramp that up in order to separate himself from Haley. I think, so.
Does he have to win one of these early states in order to continue.
I think what he has to do is he has to have a very good showing in South Carolina or it's going to be difficult for him. And then he's going to have a situation where there are in the first two weeks of March alone, there's something there's something like something like eleven primaries and six caucuses, I mean, a real dump of information and voting all at once.
His job is going to have to be coming out looking like the better alternative than Haley in the early Super Tuesday states in order to remain viable.
So tell us more. You think that if Trump is the nominee, the Republican Party won't unite behind him, even though you hear even from the former governor of New Hampshire. Well, if it's Trump, I'll vote for Trump. Of course, I'll support the Republican nominee. You think that that won't happen, Republicans won't fall in line.
I'll take the quote that you just gave me. I will vote for Trump and I will support the nominee. What isn't said there is that I will actively go out and try to and try to make the nominee win. I think what you're going to have as a situation, and you know, this is developing, and I think it
develops into the spring and summer. Frankly, but if Trump is the nominee, uh, You're going to have a situation where uh, Republican luminaries in the Republican Party are going to are going to say to themselves, what's better for me? Is it better for me to firstly say I won't vote for Trump and you shouldn't either, or should I say I'm gonna you know, I'll absolutely support the nominee, but then absolutely do nothing other than say that in
order to support uh. You know, there's that number one. Number two. I point out the and have for the last several days. One of the most interesting findings of the Iowa poll the Moines and the Des Moines Register runs a very accurate kind of gold standard poll, which showed him that that about thirty percent of Iowans who were going to vote in the caucuses said they wouldn't support Trump in the general. I think you get a
voter split here too. And you know, the way I look at Trump, and have looked at him for some time, is a lot like a pig and a python. You know, what's what's really if you're an officeholder, if you're a republic what I call a Republican luminary, your interest is in getting past Trump as much as possible. You know, if you if you're not enamored of Trump in the party,
you know you want him past you. If you if you were very enamored with Trump but he loses, well then maybe you become more prominent as a result of that. But either way, the way to get past Trump is to is to have him lose. And and you know that's why politicians think. And I think you'll see a lot more of that coming up.
Terry, I think we'll leave it with pig and the python. And thank you so much for being with us. That's Terry Haynes, founder of penji A.
You're listening to The Bloomberg Sound on podcast. Catch the program live weekdays at one Eastern on Bloomberg Radio, the tune in alf Bloomberg dot Com, and the Bloomberg Business app. You can also listen live on Amazon Alexa from our flagship New York station. Just say Alexa play Bloomberg eleven thirty.
It was Taiwan's most hotly contested election in decades, and Taiwan elected current Vice President b Ching Day as leader of the country at the center of US China tensions, putting in power a man Beijing has branded an instigator of war. What happens next is anyone's guests joining us is Sean King, senior vice president at Park Strategies. Sean just set the stage a little bit explain China's warnings before the election.
Beijing had said, well, you know, Beijing is uncomfortable even discussing Taiwan's elections because their theory is that people who are Chinese are incompatible with Western style demoscery democracy. So even acknowledging that people in Taiwan have a choice to their leader sort of betrays their own system at home. But they had let it be known that they were interested in either one of the opposition candidates winning and not the current vice president who is now the president elect.
So if anybody at all listen to what Beijing was saying, however cryptically they said it, they rejected it, and now.
So the situation is China says Taiwan is part of China, even though the Communist Party that has never controlled Taiwan. What is this a source of continuing animosity between China and the US and does this election threaten to ratchet that up?
While starting first in the late seventeenth century, Taiwan has been part of China for a total of two hundred and seventeen years, but only for four years since eighteen ninety five and not at all since nineteen forty nine, at least governed by the mainland. But the fact is that it's never been under PRC control and the PLA, the People's Liberation Army, has never set foot on any
part of Taiwan. So even though Taiwan has been part of China historically at different points in its history, and before that it was actually home to Dutch and Spanish settlements and settled originally by austron Asian aboriginal peoples, it's
never been under PRC control. So if you listen to Mao and Kissinger from the old days and PRC officials today, Taiwan is the main irridant or the main issue in US PRC relations because until nineteen seventy nine, we recognized the government in Taipei as the Chinese government as opposed to Beijing. We never recognized Taiwan as Taiwan, say, but we just recognized the government there as a sole legitimate
Chinese government. So for US, I think the issues with the PRC are much bigger, whether it's freedom or religion, freedom of expression, the South China Sea, Beijing's backstopping North Korea. There are a lot of different things that play. It's refusal to take a clear moral stand on the Ukraine War. But for Beijing, the Taiwan issue is front and center because the Communist Party of China has staked itsself on Chinese nationalism, and also getting Taiwan would allow it to
project naval power into the Western Pacific. So right now, I would say, especially from Beijing side, Taiwan is the number one issue in US PRC relations.
So then how big of a loss was this for Beijing to have Taiwan ignoring its warnings, however subtle they may have been.
Well, the fact that people on Taiwan are voting at all as a loss for Beijing. But this in particular is an extra special loss. But people have been ignoring or turning their noses up at Beijing's warnings ever since nineteen ninety In nineteen ninety six, when Taiwanese had the audacity or temerity, as you would hear PRC officials say it, to actually vote for their first freely elected president, Lee
Dung Wai, who got his PhD at Cornell. I might add, they shot missiles into the Taiwan straight hoping to intimidate people from going to the polls. Even more people showed up when ju Umji, the premiere of the PRC in two thousand, voted people not to vote for Tchenhubien. He did end up winning in a three way race, and most people think that got Chen at least two to three extra points in the polls. So I'm sure whatever interference Beijing tried this time only made people more sympathetic
to lie. Also, former taiwan President Maying Joe, who's drifted closer to the PRC in retirement, said that Taiwanese who welcome unifications so long as that's peaceful, and Toy told deuts Cheavella German TV that Taiwanese should trust Shijingping that I'm sure only increased support for Lie. But even the KMT candidate who's thought to be China friendly, which is kind of a mischaracterization, he's native Taiwanese. He spoke in the Taiwanese and he rejected Beijing's Hong Kong one country,
two systems proposal for Taiwan. Only one to two percent of people on Taiwan support immediate unification of any kind, So for years and years, and even more so echoed on Saturday, Taiwanese categorily reject any overture from the mainland.
Is there a fear among Taiwanese that China might take some action, you know, military exercises or otherwise in light of the election returns, We seem to be.
More worried about Taiwan security than Taiwanese themselves are. After Nancy Pelosi, a freely elected leader, was welcomed to Taiwan by another freely elected leader and exchange in democratic exercise and exchange of ideas. Beijing, of course did these made for Hollywood exercises around Taiwan. And you know, most people
there in Taiwan, they've learned to live with it. You know, for seventy years they've feared Beijing invading the island, so yes, I mean this is on their mind long term, but that's not going to stop them from living their lives, and they don't expect any immediate action, nor do I. You know, people compare it to Ukraine, but I don't see the comps Russian soldiers were able to waltz across an unguarded Ukrainian land border where many senior Russian officials
had actually served in the Soviet Army. It's one hundred miles between Taiwan and the mainland rough seas we would see it coming, and Biden has said four times we would defend Taiwan in the case of attack, even though there's obviously no treaty obligation to do so, because you can't have a treaty with someone you don't recognize.
But I think that.
Taiwan is too important for the free world to lose, so the US would intervene if Beijing unprovoked attack the island. So most people don't expect an invasion anytime soon, and that's my feeling as well.
Well. Those are good words, good thoughts. Thank you so much. For joining us on the show. That's John King, Park Strategy, Senior Vice President.
Your Last Thing, the Bloomberg Sound On podcast. Catch us live weekdays at one Eastern on Bloomberg dot Com, the iHeartRadio app, and the Bloomberg Business App, or listen on demand wherever you get your podcasts.
Fresh off his victory in the Iowa Republican Caucuses, Donald Trump arrived in a Manhattan courtroom this morning for the next trial of his crowded legal calendar, this time in a defamation lawsuit by e. Gene Carroll, the writer who won a separate sexual abuse case against him last year. My guest is Dave Ehrenberg, the Palm Beach County state attorney. He joins us in our New York studios. Dave, you left sunny Palm Beach to be here in New York for the snowstorm.
And there's no place I'd rather be.
All right, fair enough, Well, Donald Trump is here too. He continues his tour of courtrooms around the country, like the DC Appellate Court last week. He doesn't have to be in the courtroom, but he is for the very beginning of the trial. So what do you make of this? Is he trying to impact the jury or impact the voters.
Impact the voters. This is all about public relations. This case has already been lost. The judge said, we're not going to relitigate the past trial, which said, according to the jury, that Donald Trump committed sexual assault against Egene Carroll and committed defamation against her. So now we're just talking about damages. How many millions in compensatory and possible
punitive damages will be assessed. So the only reason why Trump is there, I think, is to try to gain political points, to show that he is being derided as the leading candid for president. This is the Biden administration doing this, even though that doesn't make sense, and ultimately nothing fuels his magabase more than martyrdom and grievance.
Now, I want to talk about what his defense could possibly be here, because the judge has basically cut off every avenue of defense that I can see. He can't say that he can't deny that sexual abuse happened, or that he believed his statements were true. He can't comment on Carol's prior romantic relationships or the lack of DNA. I mean, what is his defense here?
He doesn't have a defense In fact, I don't think it's a good move for him to try to testify it because if he tries to pull what he did in the New York civil fraud trial in this trial, he's going to get sanctioned. He's going to get cut off. This is a jury trial, this is not a bench trial like the last trial. And you have a federal judge and Judge Kaplan who's not messing around judging Goron. A state court judge in New York gave him a wider latitude, and he allowed Trump to bash the judge
and the process and the attorneys. That's not going to happen here. And in this case, he's limited to what he can say, as you correctly pointed out, they can't relitigate the last case. He can't attack Egene Carroll. And so what is he going to say. He's not going to be able to go on a political rant. So there really is nothing he could say that could influence a jury here. Best, he just not testified at all.
So he says he wants to testify. Of course, he said he wanted to testify at the last Egene Carroll trial. So who knows the judge is saying that he can do so if he wants to testify on Monday, January twenty second, which is the day before the New Hampshire primary.
So maybe maybe Well, he had a lawyer the last time, this Tacapina guy, and Tacopina and Trump split up. They just had a divorce and he's been represented. Now Trump is by Elena Haba, and Alena Habba is gung ho on Trump testifying. The word was that Tacopina did not want Trump to testify. So this is Trump saying, I am going to do it.
I am going to.
Show that the whole process is of fraud, but he's not going to be allowed to testify that way. So in the end, I think he just does what he's done before, which is to promise that he's going to testify, but then in the end he does not.
So Joe Takapina is a well experienced trial lawyer, so there is the reason why he doesn't want Trump to testify. Alena Habba I don't think has much trial experience at all. And again today she was, you know, sort of the same thing that happened in the trial, the New York trial. They seem to be trying to get on the judge's bad side, challenging the judge and you know, arguing with
the judge. I mean in the New York trual, in the trial that was ended last week with judge and gorn I mean, it was it was crazy, some of the things that they did and said to this judge who was going to be making the decision without a jury. So I'm not sure about her courtroom tactics.
Now, one of the first things they teach you in law school is never upset the person wearing the black robe and wielding that gavel. Big mistake, But yet they keep doing it. And they got away with it with the judge and Gorin because they knew their goose was cooked in the New York civil fraud case, so what do they have to lose? But by attacking judge and girl on, I think it gave Trump a false sense of confidence that he can do it again.
This federal judge.
We're talking about lifetime appointments, and these guys run their court room like a tight ship. And there's no way that Trump's going to be able to get away with any of this stuff, especially because it is a jury trial. So although he promises he's going to testify. I think this is like other promises where he said he would promise to testify earlier in the New York Civil Froud case, which then he didn't do, or in the first trial in this matter, he said he would testify and he
didn't do. Just like he said he would meet with Bob Muller during the investigation, which he didn't do. And just like he said he was going to have a health care plan that comes out in two weeks.
Oh, you're going back far now, but you have a lot to work with. So what's interesting is the Council for Egene Carroll Roberta Kaplan expressed concern in recent days that Trump would attempt to turn the trial into a circus, and she suggested the judge be prepared to hold Trump or his lawyers in contempt of court or issue punitive fines and monetary sanctions. Was that necessary for her or
just for publicity. Everyone knows Judge Caplin. Judge Caplin is no nonsense, and he's not going to He doesn't need, it, seems to me direction from an attorney how to run his courtroom.
I agree it does.
Caplin is not going to suffer fools lightly, And I do understand why miss Kaplin no relation. Eging Carroll's lawyer wanted Trump to say under oath that I will not violate the court's order. But you know what, she also wanted Trump to admit under oath that he committed sexual assault against Eging Carroll. And although the jury found it, in our country, we still don't force defendants to incriminate themselves or to stay certain things like I did it,
I'm guilty. So I think she was asking for too much, and the judge is not going to go there.
What's unusual in this case is you talk about secret juries, anonymous juries. This jury is so anonymous that the judge issued an order. First of all, he issued an order that bars Trump and his team from saying a lot of the things that they have said before. But he told potential jurors that if they're selected for the trial, they should use fake names when discussing the case with each other, and they wouldn't be permitted to disclose their
role to anyone, including family members. So this judge is trying to avoid what we've seen Trump before do, which is issue these sort of either direct or indirect threats.
Yeah, I've seen anonymous juries before, but I've never seen an order where you can't even communicate with each other using your real name. But it makes sense, you want this to be air tight, But it really tells you what kind of political culture we're in now, what kind of country we're in now where you have the threat of violence against your political and legal opponents that's so pervasive that you need an anonymous jury like you do
in mafia cases. When you are trying a former president and the leading candidate for president in the Republican side. This should never be normalized. The fact that the person who won the Iowa Coxes has to get on a plane and go to a courtroom where he's already been found liable for sexual assault should never be normalized in this country.
Well. Also, increasingly judges are being threatened. In fact, in the civil fraud trial before the closing arguments, Judge Angern was also threatened. And it's it's very difficult to you know, to be able to protect the judges. Now another you know, another kind of area where we hadn't been used to that before.
Yeah, you know, judges get their houses swatted, they get threatened, their families get threatened. And you know, we just seem to accept that this is not how a functioning democracy is supposed to work. We're not a fascist country, at least not yet, and you're not supposed to threaten your political or legal enemies. But that is what certain elements
of the MAGA movement have done. And look, it's not everyone, but you have extremists within the movement who think that anyone who attacks the leader needs to be threatened and really possibly even killed. And that is absolutely unacceptable, and we need leaders to stand up and say no, this is not to go on any longer.
Now, Trump, what's curious to me, but he has escalated his attacks against Egene Carroll. He's repeated what's already been determined in the last trial to be defamatory. So after his after the actually it wasn't after the close of the closing arguments, it was during the during the New York Attorney General's closing arguments, Trump held his own press conference downtown in his building on the Woolworth Building, and he repeated that he'd never heard of her before, he
didn't know who she was. So I mean, we're going to keep having trial after trial after trial if he repeats the defamation.
Yes, until the cost of saying these things is so great where he gets hit with such punitive damages that it's not worth it anymore. So one of two things has to happen for this to stop. Either the punitive damages in this case or a subsequent case has to be so great that he assides not worth it, or he actually gets a political hit from it where his poll numbers drop, and then I think he'll back away from it. But right now, neither of these things has happened.
He got fined five million dollars in the first case. That's not enough for him to change his behavior. And he just won the Iowa caucus. So as long as he keeps winning, he's not going to change his behavior.
Let's turn to it could come down this week. Let's turn to the case of Trump's claim of absolute presidential immunity in the DC Circuit Court and the question that was heard around the country from Judge Florence Pan about whether or not he could assassinate You could assassinate your political rivals and still and get away with it because of presidential immunity. Do you think that's going to come fast?
That decision I do, and you can see by the judges questioning it was just such a no brainer. Where of course a president doesn't have absolute immunity. Of course they can't kill their political rivals. And look, it's not so funny when it happens to the other guy. So if you give Joe Biden this kind of power, he can cancel the election, arrest Donald Trump, and be president for life. So of course they're not going to rule for apsolt immunity. Now the question is how long will
the decision take. I think it'll be soon.
The d C.
Circuit Court of Appeals has expedited its review. And then the question is when it's not if when DC Circuit rules against Trump, what does a Supreme Court do. I would bet that they're going to defer to the d C Circuit and deny review, and then it's game on in the election interference case in Washington, d C.
I agree with you, but we are in the minority. I have to say, I think we're in the minority. I think a lot of you know, legal scholars, legal experts, think the Supreme Court has to take that case, has to make the decision, but they already have so many different issues related to the election coming up that I'm not sure they want to, you know, go into another one yet.
Right, this is a no brainer. This is not a hard one, and the Supreme Court, I think, would rather deal with others things and it'd be easy. I think the reason why the Supreme Court one of the reasons why they denied their own expedited review, because remember Jacksmith wanted the Supreme Court to bigfoot the d C Circuit Court of Appeals, and they said, now we're going to
let the DC Circuit handle it. I think one reason why they did that was that they were going to defer to the ruling of the d C Circuit, knowing they would deny presidential absolute immunity.
Do you think that the decision will just be we're denying absolute presidential immunity, or the judges might have to set out some of the parameters where presidential immunity might apply.
Judges generally like to rule on the narrowest issue possible, don't get too ambitious, especially when there's an expedited review. So I think they're just going to deny it here. I don't think they're going to go much further, because you do that, then you open it up to more delays, and this case, the one Washing d C for election interference, is the one that's most likely to be tried before
the election. It's in that sense, the most important case because all the others, I think, with the possible exception of the New York State case on Stormy Daniels, will be tried after the election. So that's why I think these courts want to get started as soon as possible.
Now. The judge, Judge Tanya Chuckkin, has not she's sort of put everything on hold, but she hasn't actually you know, taken it off the docket. The March fifth trial. Do you think that there's any way they could meet that if let's say the DC Circuit comes down this week and says no presidential immunity, the Supreme Court says, no, we're not going to review it. How long?
Oh, then it's immediate.
I think also the DC Circuit will remove the gag excuse me, the stay the state of the case immediately, and then it goes to Tanya chuck and Judge Chutkin, she will calendar it. Now it's set for March fourth, I think within sixty days of that is the trial that's what I have been saying from the beginning. I'm going to stick to my prediction, and this case will be decided well before the election. And you see the polls.
Even though Trump won pretty handily in Iowa, still a certain segment that says, if he's found guilty of in one of these trials, people would switch their vote away from him.
And very quickly, very briefly, what about your Florida trial down there on classified documents. You have a date for that.
It's scheduled going May. It ain't going. Here's the thing, Judge Cannon is slow walking this case. That case in my neck of the woods is the strongest of all the four cases against Trump. He has no defense, but that case is going to be delayed past the election. And that's a shame.
It is a shame. I'm so happy that you came in today though through all the snow. It was hard for me to get in from seventy ninth Street to fifteen Mine Street, so I appreciate your coming in from however you got here from Pombe.
It's worse. It's frozen rain.
Now you're listening to the Bloomberg sound on podcast. Catch the program live weekdays at one Eastern on Bloomberg Radio, the tune in alf Bloomberg dot Com and the Bloomberg Business app. You can also listen live on Amazon Alexa from our flagship New York station, Just Say Alexa played Bloomberg eleven.
The drowning deaths of a woman and two children in the Rio Grande River as they tried to enter the United States from Mexico on Friday have intensified tensions between Texas and the federal border officials. US border officials say Texas officers prevented federal border officials from helping them, and that is in dispute. Joining me is Leon Fresco, a partner at Holland and Knight and the former head of the Office of Immigration Litigation in the Obama administration. Leon,
what happened? What do we know happened on Friday? Because it seems like there were conflicting reports.
Well, there were conflicting reports, including one from the Congressman Henry Quaar, who's the esteem congressman along the border. And so the Department of Justice actually filed a brief of the Supreme Court that actually discussed this issue slightly more.
And it seems like there were six migrants that were actually in distress, but three by the time the Mexican government reported this to the Department of Homeland Security, and by the time the Department of Homeland Security would have responded, it seems like even if Texas had let them in, three of them would have already been found deceased. Unfortunately, there were two others that were rescued by the Mexican government that presumably would have been rescued by the border patrol.
Have they've been allowed to enter, But there is no dispute that the Texas state officials are blocking this park in Eagle Past, Texas and not permitting the Department of Homeland Security officials enter the part which the Department of Homeland Security officials say is a violation of their right to enter in times of emergency, that they have a federal right under the supremacy clause to do that.
And do you agree which side do you agree with? Does Texas have the right or does the Department and Homeland Security have the right.
It's clear that.
If there's any kind of transnational emergency that's happening on the border, that the federal officials have the ability to access the border to be able to respond to that transnational emergency where they can't necessarily do things. Is that they were just patrolling this park, and the State of Texas said, this is our park to patrol. The federal officials who don't have jurisdiction here, that's fine, but in these situations of an emergency, there's no doubt that the
federal government has the authority to enter. And so the Texas government not allowing them to enter will probably lead at some point to some sort of injunctive relief that will then, if it happens again, could lead to contempt of court findings.
So Texas Governor Greg Gabbitt has been escalating the tensions with the federal government over immigration at the border. Is this was this part of the new law that's been passed that hasn't gone into a chair yet where Texas says that it can its local official officers can arrest migrants, which is normally what is a job for the federal government.
Well, this is.
Part of that overall strategy. The law itself, what it's going to do is it's going to say that if you're not in Texas legally, it's a misdemeanor that you can then be taken to the border, and if you don't actually cross back into Mexico, you can be re
arrested again for a felony. And so all of these areas that are being enclosed are part of this overall strategy to be able to have places to take people to along the border and say you are your two choices either go back into Mexico or if you try to come back in, we will arrest you under the Texas Law. Of course, the legality of that Texas Law is currently under review at the courts and it's probably going to work its way all the way up to the Supreme Court.
This is all part of the bigger problem of immigration and the security at the southern border, and in the Iowa caucuses, that was one of the major concerns of the caucus goers there, of course Republicans, but one of the major concerns what is the status there. We were talking before about negotiations over immigration among you know lawmakers. I haven't heard about that for a while. What's the status of that.
Well, one of the biggest problems happened in the last few days where House Speaker Mike Johnson said that he thought that there wasn't any legislation that would be able to be created by this semic group of negotiators that would be acceptable to the House, such that this needed President Trump to be able to come in and be able to solve this problem, and that what President Biden needed to do was just unilaterally act with any powers that he had, but that the legislation to solve the
border problem would be too weak if it was the current legislation that's being talked about by the Senate. I don't think that's going to be the last word. I think that's posturing in many cases. I do think the White House wants a deal. The White House is actually brought in all the relevant negotiators and chairmen to speak later today at the White House to try to get a deal. The White House very much wants a deal.
They're negotiating in areas that make many very Democrats very uncomfortable with regard to what kinds of limitations they're willing to accept along the border. But at the end of the day, it's going to come down to can the Senate pass something? And if the Senate can pass something on a bipartisan basis, then they can make the House look really badly they refuse to pass something, then it becomes evident that the House would be the ones blocking progress.
And there are some areas where the Senate negotiators have come to agreement right.
The Senate has some spots with regard to sort of a re implementation of Title forty two authority, which was the auplority to automatically expel people at the border who don't come in through the ports of entry, who actually try to come in illegally in between the ports of entry, with limited exceptions for very extreme humanitarian cases. Also an expansion of detention for those kinds of people who enter the United States and are waiting for their cases to
be heard. But the area that's not yet resolved is there are these thirty thousand people per month that the Biden administration is allowing legally to enter the United States from Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua, and Venezuela, that the Biden administration argues is necessary so that people don't enter illegally, so that people wait in their countries and applied for this program. That Republicans want that program eliminated, and they also want
it to be eliminated. That basically, under almost all circumstances that the Biden administration couldn't find someone with urgent circumstances on the border and admit them I legally, And so those two areas are under debate about whether those will be accomplished for them.
Thanks so much, Leon, that's Leon Fresco, a partner at Holland and Knight.
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