Joining us now from Massachusetts is a member of the House of Representatives. Democratic Congressman Jake Auchincloss is with us. Welcome back to Bloomberg TV and Radio. Congressman, Happy election Eve. It does feel like almost no one is willing to say anything with conviction at this point. But how are you feeling about becoming a member of the majority confident?
I think Democrats are going to take back the House. I don't think it's going to be a blowout. Neither party would claim that at this point because of how polarized the country is right now. But I do think that Republicans dysfunction in the one hundred and eighteenth Congress, in which they had multiple rounds of infighting over their speaker choice, in which they brought the country to the verge of a debt default, in which they had to
be really bullied into funding our allies. I think is going to speak to the swing voter in those two dozen seats that are going to decide the majority, and it's going to give Hakeem Jeffries the gable.
What do you make of the conventional wisdom in Washington. We've been hearing this for months and months. Congressman that the House turns democratic and the Senate turns Republican. As we talk to the investment community here every day on Bloomberg, there's the old Wall Street saying gridlock is good, and there does seem to be a preference to have a split Congress regardless of who wins the White House. How would you respond to those people?
I think those individuals are under indexing to how deranged a second term of Donald Trump would be. Too many individuals are assuming that the same antibodies and the buddy politic would be there and the second term, as we're there in the first term. But those antibodies have been depleted. The Republican Party is full on maga and unfortunately, we have seen the Supreme Court with its official Immunity ruling.
We have seen the state parties all supplicate themselves to his whims and those individuals who are in the White House in term one, people like Jim Mattis, people like John Kelly, even someone like John Bolton.
To be invited back to term two.
It's going to be Trump and his two sons making decisions that are in the interests of their own businesses and of their own family fiefdom. Not in the interests of the rule of law or the American people. And I think too few on Wall Street are understanding how bad for their business the degradation of the rule of law will be.
But has Kamala Harris Congressman made enough of an argument that she wouldn't be bad for business that she might actually be good for it. Because the prevailing thinking on Wall Street is Trump means lower taxes and higher profits.
Yeah, so, first of all, that's not true, because Donald Trump wants to put in place tariffs that would cost the average American family at least four thousand dollars a year and would radically increase the cost of inputs for most American businesses. Tariff is an anti growth economic agenda in the way that he is describing it. Kamala Harris and the Democratic Party wants to be driving towards an economy that works like legos, not monopoly.
We want an economy that builds things.
I'd like this to put forward an audacious agenda for ten million units of housing, on thousand nuclear power plants, building more ships in the entire Chinese Navy, starting more small businesses than the.
Rest of the world combined.
We want to be an economy that builds things and does things, not an economy of middlemen. And I think Wall Street, I think Main Street can get behind that vision, whereas Donald Trump is there to cross off names on his enemies list.
Congressman, more than seventy seven million Americans have already voted. How do you read into that number? What does it mean for tomorrow night?
I don't read into that number at all.
Actually, I think any prognostication based on the early voting is very subject.
To confirmation bias.
The only takeaway I have from that is that, thankfully, most Americans have ignored Donald Trump's lies about early voting from twenty twenty, and they have recognized that our election system, when it's not being interfered with by MAGA election deniers, is robust, is free.
And is fair.
Congressman, I'd like to ask you as well about what we've heard from the current Speaker of the House within the last week two suggestions about repealing legislation, at first the Affordable Care Act Obamacare, and then just days ago, a suggestion that the Chips Act passed during this administration would be repealed. He then clarified that he didn't understand
the question he was asked. Instead, what he wants to do is streamline the legislation, and I wonder if you buy that clarification or if you really think that might be on the agenda.
I think digging into specific policy details is missing the forest for the trees, because the core agenda of the House Republican Party is not actually any specific policy outcome and healthcare and semiconductor manufacturing and education.
It's nihilistic.
Unfortunately, Speaker Johnson is subject to the whims of about a dozen members of his conference who simply don't want to govern at all. He's got a conference like the Joker from the Dark Knight. They just want to watch the world burn. And again, I think too many in Wall Street are thinking, oh, that means gridlock, and that means that there won't be any threats to our short term business interests. It's just a very myopic way of
looking at Washington. What they should be seeking our guardrails to protect the rule of law and a positive governing philosophy that actually wants to build out the productive capability of our economy rather than bringing us to the edge of a debt default every single cycle.
Hayley mentioned taxes, And of course we're going to have, no matter who wins, a grand debate about what to do with the expiration of the Trump era tax cuts, the twenty seventeen tax cuts. If it is Donald Trump, what would a Democratic led House do on that front? Would get out of the Ways and Means Committee? How do you see that playing out? Because a decision will need to be made next year.
I'm not going to speak for Richie and Neal other Ways and Means Committee.
I will say that the first order of business, should the worst happen if Donald Trump be elected, is going to be to protect the Constitution of the United States, because he will not Speaker Johnson will not.
Republicans in general will not.
So before we even talk about taxes, we're going to be talking about the institutions of our democracy and how we safeguard them. But in general, we have seen some indications of where there is bipartisan consensus on taxes. I'll give you two examples. One is the child tax credit. You know Mitt Romney has put forward ideas. Obviously, Democrats are galvanized behind making fully refundable and expanding the child tax credit. That puts money directing in the pockets of
working families. And then number two is fixing the R and D tax credit issue from the Trump Bill in twenty seventeen and allowing businesses to amortize those R and D tax credits over five years.
At least, that's a pro growth policy.
I think both parties can get behind it, especially if pair with the child tax credit.
Harm's been Thank you for the time Jake Auchincloss joining us from his state of Massachusetts. It's good to see you, and welcome back to Bloomberg TV and Radio.