ep. 32 AUDIO

In this podcast, the main topic of discussion is the upcoming Iowa caucus and the Republican candidates' chances of winning. Donald Trump is currently leading by a large margin and experts are questioning if any candidate can surpass his support. Ron DeSantis, who has spent a significant amount of money in Iowa, is struggling and may not continue if he doesn't perform well. Nikki Haley and Vivek Ramaswamy are mentioned as potential contenders for second place, but there are also suggestions that Trump may choose someone who aligns more closely with his current Republican Party base. The conversation also touches on the challenges and considerations of selecting a running mate, with examples given from previous elections. Welcome to the Bill Kelly podcast, critical discussions in critical times. Here's your host, Bill Kelly. Hello. Hi, Reggie. Happy New Year. Happy 2024. So far it is. According to your reporting, it could change at any minute. There's a lot that's going to happen. Awesome. All right, guys, you go for it. I'm just going to be hanging out in the background. Cool. Okay. Take it away. Reggie. Okay. What a view. Yeah. I figured out how to do things without having to show my ugly office in the background. Perfect. My dying plant that I haven't gotten rid of yet. Oh, darn. Okay. Here we go. One, two, three, four. Here we go. Welcome. This is the Bill Kelly Podcast. I'm your host, Bill Kelly. I'm your host, Reggie. I'm your host, Reggie. I'm your host, Reggie. I'm your host, Reggie. I'm your host, Reggie. I'm your host, Reggie. I'm your host, Reggie. I'm your host, Reggie. I'm your host, Reggie. I'm your host, Reggie. I'm your host, Reggie. I'm your host, Reggie. I'm your host, Reggie. I'm your host, Reggie. I'm your host, Reggie. I'm your host, Reggie. I'm your host, Reggie. I'm your host, Reggie. I'm your host, Reggie. I'm your host, Reggie. I'm your host, Reggie. I'm your host, Reggie. I'm your host, Reggie. I'm your host, Reggie. I'm your host, Reggie. I'm your host, Reggie. I'm your host, Reggie. I'm your host, Reggie. I'm your host, Reggie. I'm your host, Reggie. I'm your host, Reggie. I'm your host, Reggie. I'm your host, Reggie. I'm your host, Reggie. I'm your host, Reggie. I'm your host, Reggie. I'm your host, Reggie. I'm your host, Reggie. I'm your host, Reggie. I'm your host, Reggie. I'm your host, Reggie. I'm your host, Reggie. I'm your host, Reggie. I'm your host, Reggie. I'm your host, Reggie. I'm your host, Reggie. I'm your host, Reggie. I'm your host, Reggie. I'm your host, Reggie. I'm your host, Reggie. I'm your host, Reggie. I'm your host, Reggie. I'm your host, Reggie. I'm your host, Reggie. I'm your host, Reggie. I'm your host, Reggie. I'm your host, Reggie. I'm your host, Reggie. I'm your host, Reggie. I'm your host, Reggie. I'm your host, Reggie. I'm your host, Reggie. I'm your host, Reggie. I'm your host, Reggie. I'm your host, Reggie. I'm your host, Reggie. I'm your host, Reggie. I'm your host, Reggie. I'm your host, Reggie. I'm your host, Reggie. I'm your host, Reggie. I'm your host, Reggie. I'm your host, Reggie. I'm your host, Reggie. I'm your host, Reggie. I'm your host, Reggie. The big question here is, you know, how much is he actually going to win by? Because look, this is a Republican presidential candidate right now who has not really been hitting the ground running in this state, despite the fact that you've seen Nikki Haley and Ron DeSantis dump millions upon millions of dollars in attack ads against each other. Trump has held a few rallies here and there. He's expected to hold, I believe, something like eight or ten in the final week before the caucus gets underway. But I mean, he's leading right now by more than 30 points over a second place and more than 30 points over a third place contender in the race right now. The question being, is it going to be bigger than 30? Look, this is somebody who very clearly feels that he doesn't need to be on the ground because the support amongst Republicans in Iowa, while it's not really going to make a determination of how things end up at the end of the election here, the support is there for Trump. And if he can get higher than 30 points to where he is right now, I mean, that could be a signal going forward. You mentioned Ron DeSantis, and DeSantis, as you mentioned, has spent millions and millions of dollars on Iowa. He's trailing badly. He was in second place for the longest time. He's dropped out of that right now. Is this his last stand? I mean, if he does not do well in Iowa, does he continue on with this? Well, I mean, look, some political experts I have talked to, some Republican pollsters I've talked to have said that this is the end. If Ron DeSantis can't clear any kind of hurdle in Iowa, then he has no chance of clearing a hurdle, especially as the actual primaries get underway. Think something like New Hampshire. Donald Trump obviously is leading there. Nikki Haley is trailing, but not, you know, by a lot, but I mean, is doing a lot better than Ron DeSantis in a place like New Hampshire. So ultimately, if Ron DeSantis struggles in a place like Iowa, where he has spent the vast majority of this campaign so far, that poses and spells problems for him going forward. Now, look, Iowa can have surprises. Rick Santorum won Iowa. Ted Cruz won Iowa. So anything really could be possible here, because this is far different from a primary. It's people kind of gathering in churches and schools and rooms. But ultimately here, with Donald Trump running away with this, at least right now, if DeSantis can't do something about that, you know, the question is, where does he go and where does any support that he has then go? Right, I was looking at some of the notes from previous discussions ever since DeSantis declared his candidacy for this. And the characterization of DeSantis at that time was, look, I'm just like Donald Trump, but I don't have the baggage. That seemed to be the essence of it. Clearly the message that Republican voters have sent and supporters in Congress and on the streets in many of these small towns is we don't care about the baggage. We like Trump. We need you, Ron DeSantis. Is that starting to resonate right now? Well, yeah. I mean, look, Ron DeSantis has two problems right now. Number one, he's not Trumpy enough for some parts of the Republican base to be able to go after him. On the second part, he's too Trumpy for Republicans and moderate Republicans who feel that they don't want to go down a path of having somebody who's like Trump in the White House or as the leading contender. So the kind of path that he had put himself forward with trying to be Trump while not being Trump has actually worked against him. And he's struggling to kind of make any kind of ground with saying, look, I don't carry that baggage. You don't care about the baggage. I can be Trump and I can't be Trump, but I don't want to be Trump, but you want me to be Trump. Ultimately, he's caught himself in a bit of a whirlwind here and doesn't know how to get out of it. And this really could be problematic for him. It could be beneficial for someone like Nikki Haley. When your colleagues the other day characterized this race as it continues now, as you say, with Iowa caucus coming up, is the race for second place, that Trump's going to win this thing and second place may well be the person that he chooses as his VP. As it stands right now, the ones that are making noise are Nikki Haley, as you just talked about. She's had a bit of a resurgence over the last little while, and Ramaswamy, who's trying to be Trump. Realistically, from the insider's conversations that you've had, Reggie, are either one of those the sort of people that Trump would even consider as a running mate? I mean, look, I think on the campaign trail, you know, the conversation about who is going to be the vice president, you know, is it going to be Nikki Haley? Is it going to be Vivek Ramaswamy? You know, people will kind of throw their coins in the race. But there are people from within Congress who are saying, look, it shouldn't be one of those two people. It should be somebody who actually understands how this current Republican Party is moving forward and whether that's someone like Marjorie Taylor Greene or whether he goes after someone like Lauren Boebert or whether he goes outside of the current sitting Republican Party and taps somebody like Carrie Lake in Arizona. The question here is, you know, the people who are running against Trump right now who are trying to not be Trump or trying to be like Trump, is that going to be something that overshadows Donald Trump should he make them the vice president? Or does he take someone who kind of falls in line with him but won't do anything to outshine him, which is kind of a problem that vice presidents find themselves in? You know, the Republican Party wants to move in one direction and they want to be behind Donald Trump. We've seen that with the with the endorsements that have come from Republican House leadership over the last couple of days here. You know, we have to see who does Trump want with him, somebody who has been bashing him on the campaign trail or somebody who has been praising him from within the political realm. And even what Biden did last time when he eventually won, I mean, thinking Kamala Harris as his running mate is usually the exception, not the rule, isn't it, for the person that comes out on top, either Democrat or Republican. They don't usually go with the people that ran against them, do they? They usually do try to find a governor or somebody outside of that competition that they just went through. Yeah, that's true. And look, it was it was surprising at the same time that it wasn't surprising that we saw Kamala Harris wind up in the position of vice president. Kind of, you know, the issue here, if we look beside Trump and look kind of where Joe Biden is right now, Kamala Harris's vice presidency could actually be weighing down Joe Biden's chances here for the end of 2024. Her job approval numbers are lower, her disapproval numbers are significantly higher. But again, this is what I was talking about. It lies within the challenges of being the vice president. You don't want to do something that is going to drag down the presidency. But at the same time, you don't want to be in a position of then outshining the president and getting in the bad books of those within the administration. It's a difficult position to be in. It's a difficult job to have. Joe Biden obviously saw something in Kamala Harris that assisted him in 2020. It may not assist him in 2024. And it gives the Trump team something to think about in that you can pick the wrong vice president and it could have a significant detrimental impact on your electability or what you're trying to do within your agenda. As we talk about who's in first place and who is the public paying attention to these days, the common sense solution or the presentation, I guess, at the time was when the charges started to pile up against Trump is that, well, that's going to rewrote his support. They're going to say enough is enough. It's done just the opposite. Getting kicked off the ballot in Colorado and now in Maine. We don't even know the end result of that. Those may be reversed as time goes on. But it seems to have increased that passion that they have, that they want their guy in there right now. And he seems to be the one with the momentum on either side of the political spectrum right now. I mean, yeah, I mean, this is where we are at in political history and political current times and where the intersection of politics and the law finds itself in that in any other time, somebody who was facing significant legal drama, including a number of indictments, it would be detrimental to their ability to run for president. But here you have Donald Trump, who is actually picking up support from within the Republican Party, not only because they feel that he is the victim of some kind of political witch hunt here via the numerous indictments that he's been facing, but he's also picking up more support and he's picking up some sympathy for how he's being treated regarding the January 6th investigation. And I think that that speaks to where the Republican Party is right now. That echoes and kind of kowtows some of the emotion and kind of anger that's been spilling out from within the House Republican side, at least. And even with his first court date likely coming up in the next couple of weeks here and closing arguments set to begin in the New York trial with Letitia James on January 11th, none of this is turning the Republican Party away from Donald Trump. And it raises that question here, what does he have to lose here? You know, this is only helping him. And the more he pushes back on it, the more support he gets. But the discussion, I mean, first of all, the references and the commonalities, it seems, between Hitler and some of the Trump speeches as of late, even four years ago, certainly eight years ago, that that would have inflamed and probably shocked an awful lot of people. They seem to be gravitating toward it now. He's quite open about it. He says he's going to be a dictator for one day. I tend to think it's going to be a lot longer than that if he ends up winning this thing. But he's talking about, you know, rounding people up that are illegal immigrants. So they're going to be massive deportations. They're going to be camps set up for people that don't qualify and on and on and on. It's a totalitarian description and he's not even hiding it. There's no dressing on this. Yet Republicans and other Americans who declare themselves to be independent seem to think he's got something there. Oh, I mean, look, it's this is no different than the language that we heard from Donald Trump in 2015. And then in his first year of office in 2016, I remember him standing at a podium making derogatory comments about people from Mexico. And the Republican base didn't push back on that. And here we are now with Trump making these exact same claims again. He's still kind of looping up and corralling the same part of the Republican Party that wants to hear this kind of rhetoric. It is having a bit of a of a negative side effect, though. Some of the members of the Republican Party from within, you know, the more religious sect of the Republican Party, particularly amongst Hispanic evangelicals, they are starting to turn on Donald Trump where they say, look, we may want border security, but this can't be done in any kind of racist way. He's pushing back on some, but but he's rounding up others. So, I mean, Trump can say what he wants to say. He's the person who said that he could stand on Fifth Avenue and shoot somebody and nothing would happen to him. And the Republican Party embraced that. Here we are now with him running again for presidency, being embraced for the things that he's saying, despite the fact that they are oftentimes incredibly dangerous. The Trump strategy has always been and this goes long before he ran for president and successfully eight years ago with delay, delay, delay, you know, and when he gets charged with something, whether it's a business thing or a personal thing or a political thing, it didn't push it back, push it back. And clearly that's the strategy that is going on with all these cases and all these charges that are against him right now. But I'm getting a sense of from your reporting and from some of the stuff I've read in places like The New York Times and The Washington Post and other publications, Americans are losing interest in this. You know, they can say, look, I can't renew my mortgage. I really don't give a damn what he did or didn't do on January the 6th or how much of a part he had to play in it. With the passage of time, the sting of January 6th and the attack on American democracy seems to be fading in a lot of Americans minds, not just with Republicans, but but others as well. They just say, well, maybe it was no big deal after all. That's that's dangerous. It is. And look, some political experts have said the problem with some of that lies in the fact that Democrats aren't embracing where America is at right now. Look, inflation is down. Gas prices are way down around the United States. Actually, for the first time, they're down below three dollars at most gas stations per gallon around the country. And Democrats really aren't embracing that, trying to explain to the average person, look, this is a big deal for you. Republicans, on the other hand, are kind of tied to the investigations that are still surrounding former President Trump. And when you talk about January 6th, yes, look, Democrats will say that day was a day that that fractured democracy in this country. Republicans say, look, let's ignore it. Let's pretend that it didn't happen. Let's move on and focus on inflation. Let's focus on things that are happening around the country that can be pegged on on Joe Biden. And that is resonating with many Republicans. It's resonating with some Democrats. I mean, look, Joe Biden has his own issues with Democrats. He's losing support when it comes to people of color. He's losing support when it comes to young voters who feel that he's not progressive enough. But Republicans, they look at one message. They look at one issue and they stick with it. And January 6th is one of them saying it is time to move on. Despite the fact that there was a committee that found, well, that they say found wrongdoing, that it's going up against the courts right now. That Trump's trying to claim he was immune from any wrongdoing while also admitting that he didn't do anything wrong. Republicans are galvanized around, look, Trump is being attacked. Let's just move forward. And Democrats are saying we can't move forward because the attacks could continue on this country if Trump is reelected. On that premise, what happens is that 2024 has got to be in a definitive time period for a lot of if not all of the charges against Trump, whether it's Mar-a-Lago, whether it's the the insurrection on January the 6th and who had what part to play in that. We know the stories already. It doesn't matter. As you say, it all has to be proven in court right now, which ultimately is going to end up at the Supreme Court. And now we go back to the composition of the Supreme Court. And I mean, some of the more dramatic characterizations have been, well, it's a maggot court. Now, the chief justice, John Roberts, bristles when somebody says that it says there are no Republican justices or Democratic justices. There are American justices. They may say that, Reggie, but what they've done with some of the decisions over the last little while tells a different story. I mean, he stacked the court with people that he wanted to see on that court right now. Can they be judges or are they going to be swayed by political partisanship? Well, I mean, look, number one, you'd be hard pressed to find somebody who votes Democrat in the United States who would say that there is no partisanship on the U.S. Supreme Court. You know, going back to the matter of abortion, you know, regardless of what Chief Justice Roberts wants to say. The question here is, what is this court going to do? And that question lies with the fact that this is a Supreme Court, despite the fact that it's been stacked with people, justices put there by Donald Trump. This is a court that oftentimes does not want to find itself in a political lane that has to do with a presidency. This is a court that still believes it should be the people of this country who chooses a president and that they shouldn't be involved in that. And all eyes really are going to be on what they decide if and when Donald Trump appeals the decision in Colorado as he faces a January 4th deadline to do that. The Supreme Court ultimately is going to, you know, either not take this case and keep Trump off the ballot, which is going to spark the conversation of, well, look, now the courts are the ones who are deciding who can and cannot run for president, or they're going to make a narrow ruling here and then possibly open up the court here to 49 other cases coming from other states that are also going to try to get around this and putting Trump on or off the ballot. What's the court going to do? Nobody knows until the court actually makes that decision. And best guesses here are that they will simply try to do something that answers one question once and for all, whether it satisfies one side or the other or both. Again, you know, everybody is guessing and waiting, but it's all really up to Donald Trump and whether or not he wants to appeal to them. And of course, you know, you watch the Sunday morning political shows, as I do, and many Americans are trying to I guess they're not catching on, hey, it's election year. We're going to start paying attention to this stuff now. But the voices are loud on both sides right now. And, you know, the Lindsey Graham's who's making regular appearances, mostly on Fox, of course, and others. And the gospel here is January 6th was no big deal. Mar-a-Lago, he was still technically president when he took those things out of the White House. So what's the big deal here? And I'm getting the sense that the pushback or lack of a pushback from the Democrats is really just really putting wind under the wings of that argument by the by the Republicans. Yeah, I mean, look, it's an election year. So understanding that Trump is currently leading is, you know, projected to lock up a significant number of primaries heading towards Super Tuesday and beyond. And once we get to the conventions, I mean, all signs, you know, we tend to take the polls a little bit lighter than we have in recent years. But the signs are pointing to Trump being the number one nominee here. And Republicans are going to have to find themselves in a position of saying if this is going to be our guy, we need to ensure that he is in the best shape to run forward because the track record here goes against Donald Trump. He lost once to Joe Biden already. The risk is that he potentially loses again. But the factors playing for Trump right now are the fact that Joe Biden is not doing well as president. His job approval numbers are low. He's losing support from a number of people within his own party. He's dealing with a whole bunch of foreign crises right now that are fracturing his own party. And at the end of the day, Joe Biden's age is the biggest factor that's working against him right now. And that is, according to the political experts here, what Republicans are really going to start focusing on as we head beyond the primaries and towards the convention, that Biden is simply not up to the task because he is too old. And that is likely going to force not only Democrats, but possibly the president himself to start acknowledging that. It's been talked about behind closed doors. It's been danced around. Joe Biden's a bit self-deprecating when it comes to his age. But ultimately, that is going to be a deciding factor for many Democrats, particularly those under 35 who are going to vote, who don't like the fact that Biden is too old. You know, as I was watching some of those comments and listening to your reporting over this over the last little while, I hearken back to when Hillary Clinton was still running and the first time that Trump won eventually, of course. And she mentioned it at the Democratic Convention. She mentioned it a number of times on the campaign trail. When they go low, we go high. And I thought that's the stupidest scenario. You can if they go low, you go lower and you start kicking. I mean, politics is a blood sport. And Nancy Pelosi understood that when she was the house leader and the Democrats had control there. They don't have control of the House anymore. Hakeem Jeffries is the new leader of the Democratic caucus there. You need a bulldog. You need somebody who can really go after Livingston and even McCarthy, who's still kicking around and making noise. Do they have what it takes to get down in the dirt with these guys? Because that's usually how elections are won and lost. Sure, it is. And it's oftentimes one of the biggest criticisms that's that's put on the Democratic Party is that they oftentimes times try to play by the rules too much and then kick up a storm when the opposing party, when the Republicans do things that go against the rules. And ultimately, you know, Democrats find themselves in a position of being on the losing end of whatever the battle might be. Look, Democrats have oftentimes tried to say the rule of law is important if we want this country to continue to roll forward as it has for centuries now and going against that rule of law, whether or not it's a president subverting an election or any of the other things that happen in this country, that the things are going to go wrong. Does the messaging stick? You know, the president's job approval numbers are not great right now. So, you know, whether or not the message is going to stick, they need to do something about it. But at the same time, when it comes to kind of, you know, when you go low, you go lower. There was a question posed to Ron DeSantis just earlier in the day on Wednesday saying to him, why are you not going after Donald Trump as hard as he is going after you? Why are you putting all of your focus on Nikki Haley? And Ron DeSantis tried to play the moderate road here by saying, well, look, you know, we can't get this country doing things if we're simply attacking each other. Ultimately, though, Donald Trump will attack Ron DeSantis and it will have an impact with the voting base. So, you know, both sides really try to dance around the subject. But but attacks and targets as, you know, awful as they can be, sometimes they register with the base and it's oftentimes worked for Donald Trump. And there are other issues here, as we've talked about in the past. I mean, this is a U.S. presidential election, but the ramifications, especially in a geopolitical sense, are huge here, especially with conflicts going on. Ukraine drags into coming up on another anniversary of that Russian invasion. That's not over. And as a matter of fact, as you guys have been talking about, there's a lot of talk, especially on the Republican side, that maybe it's time to pull back some of that funding and some of the armaments that have been going over there. The Gaza situation is not getting any better. Clearly, I know that Biden came out very strongly in favor of Israel at the time of the initial attack. What Netanyahu has done and what the Israelis have done in Gaza since then have really soured, I think, an awful lot of public support for that. It's at the point right now where Biden has said he doesn't agree with what Netanyahu is doing. Netanyahu is going to continue to do it. You know, the headline, of course, was Hamas leader was was killed in one of the bombings. That seems to encourage that. That means we have to do more. And that's not sitting well with a lot of Americans right now. Is Biden in a corner here where he's going to have to take a stand against Netanyahu and risk how that may have an impact on the Jewish population in the United States? Well, I mean, look, a couple of things here. Number one, you know, while there has been some skepticism expressed from the White House, including from the National Security Council about what's going on in Gaza with the significant rise in the civilian death toll here, it's worth pointing out that just a couple of days ago, Bill, President Biden authorized one hundred forty seven million dollars in weapons sales to Israel the second time that he has done that since October 7th. He bypassed congressional approval here, saying that there was an emergency that required this. This is something that's been done in the past under various presidents. But this is the reason that Joe Biden is finding himself backed into a corner, at least when it comes to support within his own party, because there are a number of people of color around this country. There are a number of people under 35 who do not like what they are seeing when it comes to this Israel versus Hamas war. And seeing President Biden authorize a weapons sale to Israel is part of the reason not only that he's losing support around the country, but also the reason that he is seeing his own party fractured. Senator Bernie Sanders came out within the last several hours to say that he wants to see weapons sales halted to Israel. So this is a delicate line for President Biden to be walking as he is walking towards an election while he's also trying to kind of rally up the troops to get money and support for places like the Indo-Pacific region and for Ukraine, which Republicans are saying, well, maybe we don't need to do that. Republicans have their own problems to deal with a potential government shutdown coming on later on in November and then again in early February. But all of this poses problems for what President Biden is trying to do in pleasing both sides. It's a quagmire right now, and somebody's got to come out of this, you know, out of the smoke and be the leader that Americans are looking for right now. And I'm not so sure that they've made up their minds about which way they want to go. So we'll be watching for your reporting and always look forward to your appearances on our podcast. Reggie, thank you so much for this. Appreciate it, Bill. Reggie Cicchini, the Washington correspondent for Global News, of course. And that's the addition for the Bill Kelly podcast. This is the way we see it. And it's, again, a very malleable situation that is ongoing. So we're going to continue to watch this and we'll have the experts like Reggie and others talking about some of the next little while until next time. Take care. This podcast was brought to you by Rebecca Wissons and her team at Wissons Law. Rebecca Wissons is a 20 time winner of the Hamilton Reader's Choice Awards for their exceptional client care and legal practice specializing in personal injury, car accidents, accidental falls and Wilson Estates. Now, if you or a loved one have been seriously injured or if you want to make sure that your family is taken care of for the future with the will and powers of attorney, call Rebecca Wissons 905-522-1102 for a free consultation. When life happens, you can rely on Rebecca Wissons and Wissons Law. And trust me, Rebecca is my wife and I don't know what I'd do without her. That's Wissons Law, 905-522-1102 for a free consultation. Subscribe to my sub stack for timely news updates and commentary straight to your inbox. Let's keep the conversation going. I'd love to hear your thoughts on today's episode. Let me know what you think we should be talking about next by contacting me through my website at www.billkelly.co. Thanks for tuning in. This is Bill Kelly. Till next time, you take care.