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Welcome to Bloomberg Law. I Bloomberg Radio. I'm Madison Mills in for June Grasso. This week former President Trump pleading not guilty in a Miami court Tuesday, this after becoming the first president in history charged with committing federal crimes, then heading up to New Jersey for some fundraising. Plus we're going to cover that Microsoft Activision deal later in the show, facing more headwhen this time in the United States. We're going to break it down with our senior litigation
analyst from Bloomberg Intelligence. But first we got to kick it off with the former president. Moments after getting booked fingerprinted, he went back to campaigning, stopping at a cafe in Miami before heading to Jersey for that fundraising event. There, he said that President Biden is the one whose legal troubles should be in the spotlight. Take a listen.
I will appoint a real special prosecutor to go after the most corrupt president in the history of the United States of America, Joe Biden and the entire Biden crime family. Name a special prosecutor.
All right.
So that was former President Trump speaking last night from New Jersey. So let's go to our fantastic politics roundtable. We've got Wendy Benjaminson here at Bloomberg News senior editor, and we've got Kaylee Lines, who was on the ground for us in Miami yesterday. So Kaylee, I want to start with you. First of all, where are you.
I'm back in Washington.
Okay, you're back in Washington. Just because we haven't had a chance to cover this on the show last week, give me a recap of what happened yesterday and how it was for you being there on the ground.
Very hot, yes, very very hot. Indeed, that is my primary takeaway, and the rest of the day really frankly played out as we expected, at least from a legal perspective. President Trump in the early afternoon showed up to the courthouse and he was arrested and processed just like anyone
else who has been charged with a federal crime. He had his fingerprint taken, not a mugshot, and then he appeared before the judge and he actually himself didn't talk very much, we understand, according to people who were in the room, but he pleaded thirty seven counts, not guilty to all of those. He then left the courthouse, as you said, Maddie, he met with supporters in Miami at Cafe Versai, a very popular Cuban restaurant, then went on
to New Jersey. I think what was perhaps most surprising to me about the day was Miami's police chief had said they could see up to fifty thousand protesters there at the court house on arrarenement day. I saw maybe a couple hundred. It really was not the scene that I think a lot of us had anticipated going in.
Well, it's always and you said this on the air yesterday, Kaylee's copying you, but it's always so funny when the media presence is bigger than the protest presence at these events. Yeah, recovering, Wendy. I want to bring you in here though, And I loved what you said yesterday too. You said He's stopping over for a coffee and a Cuban right after getting booked. I mean, what is your takeaway after having a day to kind of process this, what's the big takeaway for you?
I think from a politics standpoint, the thing that's striking me the most is how this should be manna from heaven for the rest of the GOP field. In all the years I've covered politics and all of American history, which aren't all that different time spans, there is there is a you know, anytime, I mean, getting indicted is like the best thing that could happen to your opponent if you are running against him. In this case, they are trying so hard not to offend Trump's base that
they are not really you know, going after him. It's not like he's chumming the water for sharks. He's still this guy They've got a tiptoe around, even though he's under federal indictment.
Well, I also want to get your take not just on the response that we're getting from the other folks running for president here, but also the former Trump camp in Washington. Here's what Senator McConnell had to say yesterday, given that the former president is facing a federal indictment and these serious allegations, could you.
Still support him if he becomes the nominee even if he's convicted.
Look, the Republican campaign for the nomination is We've already been going on for six months, going to be going on for a year longer. And I'm just simply not going to comment on the candidates. We've got a bunch of them. Yeah, I'm just simply gonna stay out of it, all right.
So he's staying out of it, Kaylee, talk to me about what the other responses are looking like, not just from again, the other folks running for president here, but the folks in Congress and the ones who previously were part of the Trump camp.
Well, it really depends on where you're looking, because obviously you have Mitch McConnell and frankly a lot of people in the Senate who want to stay far away from this.
They aren't stepping up to defend him in the same way you are seeing in the House, for example, with Speaker McCarthy and some of these other kind of hardline on the right side people stepping up kind of reiterating the messaging we've heard from President Trump repeatedly that this is a weaponization of the Justice Department, that there's a
two tiered justice system. What I really thought was interesting, though, in terms of the twenty twenty four candidates, was former President Trump's own Vice president Mike Pence, who of course also is seeking the nomination, was on another network earlier this morning saying he cannot defend what is alleged, and I think that in particular is really striking.
Right, really interesting to continue to hear his comments about it as well. Of course, I also want to get to what we heard from Trump last night. As we played earlier some sound from him, and the crowd started chanting lock him up alongside Trump last night, Wendy, does that become the defining campaign slogan for Trump in this campaign cycle?
It sure seems like he's trying to throw all the attention back on Biden and this what about ism that you know, somehow these cases are similar when they're so simply completely different, and you know, nothing has been proven yet about Hunt, whether Joe Biden was involved in Hunter Biden's you know, schemes. But this is something the Republicans want to do. They just want to well, I should
say Trump's base wants to do. They want and actually some of the Republican candidates who all are saying, yes, Trump did something wrong, but the Justice Department is too political. That's what they're going for. They're throwing it back on the Biden administration to say no, I'm not corrupt, You're corrupt. And you know, it's getting to be a little schoolyardy to be frank.
Well, Kayley, speaking of the schoolyard vibes, this is not the last of Trump's legal battles. Talk to me about what else is going on with him.
Well, of course, in this case in particular, we could
see this drag on for a really long time. Things obviously formally kicked off in Miami yesterday with this arraignment, but now it moves from Miami to West Palm Beach, where it's going to be overseen, at least for the time being, by Judge Elen Cannon, who is a Trump appointee who had already been involved in this investigation in regard to the appointment of a special Master got a lot of flak for ruling in Trump's favor in that case, so it really will be up to her to decide
how speedily this moves along, because we know that the former president has a reputation of elongating his legal battles, and he could very well run this up to November twenty twenty four or even beyond it. But of course, in the time in between, we also could see other
indictments coming down. There is a non zero risk of that happening, because he's still under active investigation by both the special Counsel Jack Smith, who indicted him in this case regarding his involvement in January sixth the storming of the capital efforts to overturn the results of the twenty twenty election. He is also being looked at by the District Attorney in Fulton County, Georgia, again related to his attempts to overturn the results of the election in that state.
We could actually see something out of that Georgia prosecutor as early as August, so less than two months from now. Unclear what the timeline is in terms of the other investigation by Jack Smith. But this just kind of goes to show you that his legal difficulties are stacking up, because of course he's already been indicted in Manhattan earlier this year and was found liable for sexual assault in a civil case as well.
And if I could just jump in something that got missed in all the news yesterday was the judge and the aging Carrol case decided to let her proceed with a new in her ongoing attack. She wants more money from Donald Trump. Eugene Carroll does because he continued in the CNN town hall to repeat the same things that a jury had already decided were defamatory, and so she wants even more money from him every time he says those things.
Well, and given that it sounds likely that that effort from her would be successful, Yes, Wendy.
It could be. I just think what's going on here is like we're all trying to figure out how this will work, and I feel like we're all on a ship, you know, piloted by Christopher Columbus that's about to drop off the edge of the flat earth. You know, we have no idea. This has never been this has never happened before. We have no idea what it's like for a presidential front runner to be under federal indictment and
possibly under multiple state indictments. We have no idea what it would be like for to elect a president who has been If he is I mean, if he's acquitted, then we go back to normal, the normal world. But while we're in bizarro land, you know, we have no idea what's how this will all play out. What if he's convicted and elected. It's highly unlikely, but who knows these days. It's just a very weird period in American history.
Well, Wendy, I feel like I've asked you every day for the past two weeks. What happens if he is elected president? And Ken pardon himself? What happens if he's running from jail? Like the amount of what ifs that we never thought we would be asking ourselves and each other definitely never never cease to amaze me. Wendy Benjaminson, thank you so much for joining us Bloomberg News senior editor, and of course Kaylee Lines fresh out of that trip to Florida to cover this for us on the ground
in Miami. Always great to speak with both of you. Things for making time stick with us here on Bloomberg Law, because coming up we're going to talk about that Microsoft Activision deal and the roadblocks still facing those folks. This is Bloomberg Law. I'm Madison Mills with us.
This is Bloomberg Law with June Grasso from Bloomberg Radio.
Him Madison Mills in for June Grasso. This week for Bloomberg Law. We've been focused quite a bit on former President Trump and his own legal battles, but we're gonna spotlight some of the battles happening with current politicians, specifically in the House of Representatives, because Republicans somewhat paralyzed amid in fighting stalling some votes. We're gonna get to the House GOP feud with Zach Cohen. He's Bloomberg Government's Congress reporter and he joins us by phone. Zach, thanks so
much for hopping on with us. What's going on in the House. I've been so focused on Miami this week. I need an update on Washington.
Yeah, no, and what is actually decent in Washington. There you go. They've managed to move ahead with sort of this, as you mentioned, sort of a disagreement or a feud, if you will, between House Speaker Kevin McCarthy and his leadership team and about a dozen House Republicans from the more conservative wing of the party that essentially for a week stalled any floor action on anything other than the most consensus of bills. And so that's been resolved in
they're voting today. They are voted in today out a number of bills, key Republican messaging items that they were hoping to get done last week. And so now the question is can they sort of maintain that truth not just next week when they're still in session, but for the rest of the year and they'll lead up to the twenty twenty four elections when this Republican majority will have to defend that rather meager majority.
Again, well, Zach, you cover Congress, You know this space incredibly Well did this feel unique to you or is this just politics as usual?
It was very unique. The fact that members of the majority had the votes to sink what's called the rule on the House floor, which basically sets the terms of
floor debate. That hasn't happened in twenty years before this, And so the fact that members of the party were able to stand up to their own leadership and say no we're not going to allow you to move the bills that you want to move today was rather extraordinary, and what it really boiled down to, these folks did agree with the actual substance of the bills that they were voting on, but they wanted another vote on a bill that would subject certain pistols to certain rifle regulations.
And there's this ongoing negotiation around spending levels, which is something that they thought that the debt ceiling agreement that McCarthy had reached with the White House was a little bit too high, and so they wanted that number to be brought down and they got that, and so we'll see if they sort of continue to flex those muscles. But again, this is rather unusual.
And it would you read it as sort of a referendum on McCarthy's leadership.
There's this interesting new rule that basically says any member of the House Republican Conference can sort of unilaterally call up a vote that would subject McCarthy to another vote for speaker, which obviously we remember took a historically long time in January to get done. So we could see that happen again. If these folks really wanted to give McCarthy a hard time. I think what they're essentially saying
here is, look, we could do that. Again. They haven't explicitly said that, but they're saying that they have the votes to really go up with the works if they don't like what McCarthy does. And so they're using really different tools in the procedural toolbox to make their message known, not just to McCarthy obviously, but to their own constituents who are looking for really conservative policies out of Washington.
It makes me wonder, if you know this cohort has such a choke hold on McCarthy, is he kind of just a figurehead at this point that has to continue to walk this tight rope just to maintain his position as speaker.
There's an old adage in Washington that leadership is followership, and this is something that obviously not just Kevin McCarthy, but you know, Chuck Schumer, Mitch McConnell, and Nancy Pelosi will all tell you that you're only as powerful a leader as a number of votes behind you within your party.
And so McCarthy not only has to contend with this more conservative wing of his party, but he's also got a number of moderates who won really tight rate in twenty twenty two that delivered that majority, and you're not going to hear from them as much, but especially folks from maybe New York or California and somebody the bluer states, But they're also really critical to that majority, and so McCarthy has to find a way to balance between the
two of them. And it just seems the conservative size is going to be a little louder about their demands.
And to what extent, Zach, is this sign of what's to become increasingly worse, for lack of a better word, overtime in terms of the partisanship that we're seen in the country happening amongst our lawmakers inside Congress.
It really does speak to a growing partisanship. I think you're right about that. There are members of both parties that have taken particularly strident policy positions and are willing to use the sort of tools of Congress in order to extract those concessions from the people who actually call the shots. And so obviously the conservative part of the House Republican Conference have been the most public about this,
especially over the last six months. And I think the really key question, honestly will be over the next couple of months. If they do that on spending bills as well, the government does run out of money September thirtieth, and if that or rather authorization to spend money by the end of the fiscal year, and so if they don't come to some sort of agreement by then, you could see a government shut down in early October, and that
will be where the rubber hits the road. Can you get enough support from both Democrats and Republicans on both ends of Pennsylvania Avenue from Congress to the White House to say, here's how we're going to spend our money over the next year, and that's where it's really going to be tricky.
So that makes me think that we are going to have the same debt ceiling trauma that we just had over and over again, based on your description of the government shut down on spending as well.
Yeah, I remember the debt ceiling is only raised until about twenty twenty five. Whether that's the second term of the Biden administration or the Trump administration, that deadline's going to come up again, and depending on the configuration of the government, could be a very different compromise than what McCarthy and Biden came to and that's spend decisions that government appropriations, which is being worked out right now in committee. That's going to come to the floor and come to
a head sometime over the next few months. And that's going to you know, not just on you know, overall spending levels, but on really critical details, things like how much do you spend on border security or the military, or on healthcare services. You know, the Nancy Pelosi speaker Pelosi likes to say, show me a budget, I'll show you your values. And so it's it's sort of a very existential debate, especially because so much of what Congress does is spend tax payer dollars.
Well, talk to me about what that budget and value system looked like with these bills that the GOP did end up grinding out. What did these bills entail.
So the at least on the debt ceiling, the first bill that they passed out was a lot of many more cuts to especially domestic spending than what they ended up agreeing to between McCarthy and Biden. It ended up passing, but mostly with Democratic votes out of Congress. And so now what they're talking about is actually capping spending at fiscal twenty twenty two levels. Basically, in Layman's terms, spending the same nominal dollars that were spent last year on
the next year. Now we all know inflation has been rather rampant, and so in real terms, it's a cut to basically everything. Part of the debt sealing compromise was that defense would at least get a three percent increase. But if they can't come to an agreement on either defense or non defense spending, there would be actually an across the board cut in both real and nominal dollars, and so that could mean government services, military preparation, all
of that would probably take a hit. This pocket of the House Republican conference is more than anything else, concerned about debt deficit concerns. They're worried about the growing national debt. They're worried about how much is borrowed in the form of bonds that are sold both in the US and abroad, and so that is their top line concern and everything
else is kind of secondary. But there if you ask members of Congress, okay, what should be cut in the interim, that makes it a lot trickier, and so Democrats will say, we need to be able to fund these programs. And that's the debate that's happening right now in these appropriations committees, both, I should say, in the House and the Senate.
Final minute with you, Zach, what's the next shooter drop when it comes to the debate over this legislation and spending on that legislation. What's the next big site.
Going to be?
The House appropriations committees are meeting this week, I believe, on military construction, veterans affairs, things like that, and then they've got eleven other bills that they'll have to agree on, and the key question will be can they get those across the House floor? Probably not this week, and then they're gone for a two week recess, but maybe when
they come back before the August recess. Those couple of weeks will be really critical to understanding whether the House Repoking Conference is unified as it goes into negotiations with especially Senate Democrats over general government spending.
A lot to cover down there for us, Zach, thank you so much for joining us and taking a break from that coverage to walk us through all of it. That was at Bloomberg Government Congress reporter Zach Cohen. You can find his story about the House GOP floor feud on the Bloomberg terminal and at bloomberg dot com. Stick with us, This is Bloomberg