Let's Find Common Ground - Inaugurating A New Future?

Episode Date: January 17, 2025

Bob Shrum and Mike Murphy welcome the Spring 2025 CPF Fellows to USC for a virtual discussion of Donald Trump’s inauguration and what a second Trump term may look like. The conversation features:   Bob Shrum (moderator) - Director, USC Dornsife Center for the Political Future Ed Goeas – Republican Pollster and Strategist Betsy Fischer Martin – Executive Director, Women & Politics Institute at American University; Former "Meet the Press" Executive Producer Jonathan Martin - Senior Political Columnist and Politics Bureau Chief at POLITICO Anthony Rendon – Former Speaker of the California State Assembly Cameron Trimble – Former White House Director of Digital Engagement; Founder of Hip-Politics

Welcome to the Bully Pulpit from the University of Southern California Center for the Political Future. Our podcast brings together America's top politicians, journalists, academics, and strategists from across the political spectrum for discussions on hot button issues where we respect each other and respect the truth. We hope you enjoy these conversations. I'm Bob Schrum, the director of the Center for the Political Future at USC Dornsife. And I want to say that before we begin anything, we are thinking of friends, neighbors, colleagues

thinking of friends, neighbors, colleagues who have lost so much in these terrible fires in Los Angeles. And I'm going to talk a little bit more about that later. So welcome to our first event of the semester. We're going to talk with our panel for about 40 minutes and then leave time for your questions. Put questions in the chat and I'll make sure we get to as many of them as possible. We're fortunate to have six terrific fellows conducting study groups this semester. Today you'll meet five of them and we'll have a discussion about the title shifts underway in American politics. The fellow who can't join us for this program but who will be spending time on campus this

semester is Jessica Milan Patterson, the chairwoman of the California Republican Party. Let me introduce the fellows who are here for today's discussion. Ed Goez served as president and CEO of the Terrence Group, one of the most respected Republican survey research and strategy teams in American politics for 35 years before retiring from the firm in 2022. Ed is widely recognized as a leading American political strategist and was program director for the 2008 Republican convention for Senator John McCain's presidential campaign. Betsy Fisher-Martin is an Emmy Award winning journalist,

former TV news executive, who serves as the executive director of the Women and Politics Institute at American University and as a faculty member in the university's Department of Government. She spent 23 years at NBC News, serving as the path-breaking executive producer of Meet the Press. Jonathan Martin is the politics bureau chief, senior political columnist at Politico. Before starting his column in 2022. He served as the national political correspondents of the New York Times, where he covered elections in all 50 states and was the Times' leading

political reporter. He's a legend in American journalism. Anthony Rendon was California's second longest serving assembly speaker from 2016 to 2023. Under his leadership, the assembly enacted the landmark progressive policies including a $15 an hour minimum wage, universal preschool and tougher restrictions on tobacco and stronger gun safety laws. Cameron Trimble is the former White House Director of Digital Engagement and the founder of Hip Hop Politics, Inc. He has extensive experience leading communications and digital engagement strategies across Fortune 500 companies, as I said at the White House, with the U.S. Congress for political campaigns and for the entertainment and health care industries.

So he's kind of busy. Let me start with this question, and it's for all of you. In just four days, Donald Trump will be inaugurated as president for a second time. How much upheaval do you expect after the inauguration and in the days that follow? Jonathan, you want wanna kick this off? Well, I will. And Bob, thanks for having me. The legend in the business of politics.

So I'm grateful for that kind introduction. And I'm thrilled to be part of this fantastic class of fellows. We're looking forward to being in person with you guys later this month. And I'm spending lots of time and giving lots of love to LA. I said, we're very, very fond of. I think that Trump to the sequel is going to be more unbound.

There's no question about it. He's somebody who understands politics in Washington, in the White House and the levers of power. They come with the presidency because he's done it for four years and he is not running for reelection. There's no political, you know, kind of gravitational pull that's going to bring him back to earth or restrain him. I'm convinced, Bob, that the only two real constraints on Trump are the press coverage and the stock market.

You know, Trump does not have a lot of deep philosophical convictions when he does care deeply about the coverage. And he sort of tracks how he's doing, how the economy is doing by the daily stock market. And I think that those are the two indices to watch. I think with Trump going forward What what kind of executive orders does he start with on day one? How aggressive is he on? Immigration right out of the gates is this gonna be a replay of four years ago when They they try to do that travel ban, you know things became chaotic at the nation's airports and that kind of set the tone You know, things became chaotic at the nation's airports and that kind of set the tone.

Or is there going to be a little bit more restraint, at least in the first days that he's president? We'll find out soon. I do think that the one thing that Trump does care about, Bob, from a policy standpoint is he is a believer in tariffs. You know, he said this himself, that tariff is the prettiest word in the English language, and I he is going to love you some tariffs. And I don't know if it'll be the sort of across the board tariffs on Canada and Mexico that he threatened helpful months ago, but there are going to

be tariffs and that is going to have a jolt in the global economy. And I think we're in for a pretty wild ride here, starting at 1201. Next Monday. Anyone else want to weigh in on this? Yeah, again, thank you, Bob. And again, I echo Jonathan sentiments, looking forward to being with everybody in person in the students. I think the upheaval may not be day one, but to this point, depending on what executive orders and how he, this 2.0 version, kind of using Jonathan's words, unbound Trump, who he attacks, who he decides to put in his scope in, and decides to top down, who he picks as his political enemies. decides to top down who he picks as his political enemies. And if he picks the wrong fights, I think then does that galvanize movements? Does that galvanize different interest groups? Does he kind of touch any third rails or things of that nature that start more groundswells

of kind of the people power that may then overwhelm them? So I think that's where the upheaval has, I think you kind of get people power that may then overwhelm them. So I think that's where the upheaval has. I think you kind of get a sentiment that people are both bracing, but also so tired of such as the political division that we've been going through over the last couple of years. I think the American public is kind of prepared for it, but with Trump, you never know what he may say or what he may do.

That like said, that may re-spark and reignite a new movement or some of the old movements that were against him. We're going to reignite some new movements? Look, I mean, I think and to stacco, you all were saying too, super thrilled to be with everybody and looking forward to getting there in person soon. But look, the movement is, you know, the MAGA movement, like not just a campaign slogan, right? I mean, it is, it's shaping, will shape the Trump administration, his cabinet, his agenda. And, you know, I think that will unfold on day one. And, you know,

Jonathan's right, you know, unencumbered by any kind of reelection effort. It's Trump unplugged all the way. And he cares, yes, about the media, but he also cares settling scores, loyalty tests. I mean, he put out a tweet last night saying, nobody should hire anybody that worked for Mike Pence or Liz Cheney. I mean, he's already made that

a centerpiece of just even staffing up in the administration. So look, I mean, I think this is going to all unfold quickly and he just, I don't think it's going to be restrained by much. He's got Republican Congress. He's already making his mark there. You'll see people falling in line on these confirmation hearings. I need to be able to talk some more about that. But yeah, it's all coming to a screening near you soon.

Ed or Anthony? I'll jump in a little bit and explain the political environment today that we've had in the last, quite frankly, three decades. In 1990, and I like to look at non-presidential years because it's not distorted by the individual presidential campaigns, in 1990, 35% of Republicans voted in Republican primaries and 35% of Democrats voted in Democrat primaries. And part of the result of different things

like campaign finance reform, in 2022, 15% of Democrats voted in Democrat primaries, and 17% of Republicans voted in Republican primaries. And both parties are about a parity. What that means is we've moved to a point of, in our primaries it is primarily the far right and the far left voting in the two. I think any

fights you see over the next coming weeks, months, even years, it's going to be a fight between the far right and the far left. It is not going to be a fight representing at all centrist Americans or centrist voters, which comprises about 65% of the American electorate.

They're left on the wayside. So I think there can be a lot of analysis of what happens over the coming weeks and months. I think the Trump operation is looking at doing kind of a shock and awe on their executive orders. They're planning on coming in with 100 different executive orders. That's going to cause a lot of fires in different places, if you will, to use the LA example. And I think at least for a while, the fight is going to be between the two extremes of the parties and not representing the bulk of America, Central America. And I think they'll

be sitting by the wayside. And one of the things I looked at in this last election is, yes, Trump, looked at in this last election is, yes, Trump probably, to give him credit, his campaign credit, they did the best campaign voter ID and turnout operation I've seen Republicans ever do. He increased his vote from four years earlier by about three million votes. But if you look at what happened on the Democratic side, on the Democratic side, Harris got six million votes less than what Biden did. And I think a lot of those six million are Republicans who have not been able to vote for Trump, that may like his policies, but don't like his persona. And I think the question is going to be moving forward,

are they going to see the policies they like or the persona they don't like? And at least to date, my experience has been they're getting a little bit of both, but I think it's going to take a curve sometime in the next couple of months on what are they saying most of. And that's going to be very important for his future because the mega candidates of

the mega party out there, if you will, as opposed to the Republican party, a lot of them are not very favorable towards the president to the point that maybe they didn't vote against him in this election, but they didn't vote for him either. Anthony? I don't know that I have much to add. I agree with everyone that I think we will see sort of an unbound Trump. And I think for me, what is most worrisome is the extent to which, I mean, like all political science models are based on the idea that there will be an adherence to the Constitution.

There will be an adherence to the procedures that we are used to as a country, the tradition that we're used to. We didn't see that on January 20th, and I'm not sure that we're going to see that over the course of the next four years. I don't have a whole heck of a lot of faith in the ability of Donald Trump to control a lot of the moderate Republicans. I don't have a lot of faith in Donald Trump and his ability to control himself. So I mean, I think we need to start to begin to think about what this country may look

like if, when you talk about upheaval, if the upheaval is something like, you know, Trump not adhering to something that the courts tell him that he has to adhere to, what happens then? What happens if Trump ignores Congress? I think there are real constitutional questions that because of the long history of democracy in this country, we don't think about, and we haven't thought about for a very long time,

and we had to think about it for a very short time four years ago but that becomes a difficult question because then everything we talk about is you know within the context of political science and within the context of institutions and checks and balances is completely blown up. But I think it's very, very, very real. And you've seen the rise of fascism in places like Austria, in places like Brazil, very close in France. I'm not sure that we're that far away in this country. I'm going to ask a series of questions here.

And I'll direct them to specific individuals. But anybody who wants to chime in on the answer should not. I'm gonna start with Bessie, cause she raised this. Many observers suggest that a number of Trump's nominations for high office are unusual to say the least. How do you assess those appointments and their prospects for confirmation? For example, Robert Kennedy Jr. and Tulsi Gabbard.

I think it's more than just about the nominees, really. It's a reference random on Trump's vision, right? And so, you know, his strategy, their strategy right now, I mean, you're seeing like a flood of the confirmation hearings. It's a flood zone, high pressure strategy that's going on with these hearings and kind of quick succession. So far, had some fiery moments, right?

The Pete Hetchcats hearing turning into a lot of back and forth. They've been able to kind of rally the troops and turn this into kind of a mad litmus test in many cases. I think, you know, you saw Pam Bondi, the AG nominee the other day, you know, trying to sidestep some tough questions and still kind of hold the Republican Trump support and lots of lobbying going on behind the scenes. But the nominee is kind of carefully trying to dance around some of these issues. And I think you mentioned RFK Jr. and Tulsi Gabbard, both I think face some bipartisan

skepticism there. Kennedy on some issues about abortion. Tulsi Gabbard obviously has this independent streak and can't necessarily count on a ton of support within the Republican ranks, maybe. And so there's some concerns there. We haven't seen those hearings yet. So it's all unfolding quickly.

And, but I think the bottom line is like, this is reflective of the kind of administration and the direction of Trump more than it is just about a particular nominee. I think if I could jump in, I think once these nominations became a litmus test about loyalty to Trump, they become a lot like the speaker race last week because Trump wanted Mike Johnson.

And so it became about Trump and a lot about Mike Johnson. And when you have a cult of personality that's effectively dominating one of our two parties, the substance and the qualifications just don't matter as much. And I think the pivotal moment was in December when the Trump allies all came after Joni Ernst and it became clear that if you're not for Hexeth, you're not part of the team and you got to be part of the team. And, you know, his background just doesn't matter as much as the tribal test. And I think that's why these folks are likely to get through. The one I got a question about, I wrote my column about this week, is Tulsi Gabbard. Because she doesn't have a sort of cultural connection to the Republicans because she was a Democrat and for Bernie,

not that long ago. Now she's had a MAGA transformation, but she's totally out of the mainstream on national security. She's like a Ron Paul type non-interventionist figure. And so for the normie Republicans and the Senate who are left, that's a math of much of them. But can they vote against Trump's pick? It's not about Tulsi Gabbard or her views. It's Trump's pick. That's really the up and down vote.

That's the choice in the ballot. It's Trump's pick. And so when it becomes about that, it becomes hard for these guys. But she is the one that I still think maybe candidly, depending about how he does in the hearing and how kooky he sounds. But I think the policy likely is the one that could falter. This is inside the weeds, down the weeds a bit, but she's got to get out of the Intel committee first. Now, Tom Cotton's the chair of the Intel committee, he wants to do Trump's bidding,

but he's got Susan Collins and Todd Young from Indiana on that committee. And if one of them does not vote for Tulsi Gabbard and all the Dems oppose her, she can't even get out of the committee. So keep an eye on Collins and Young when it comes to Gabbard. Anybody else think anyone, any of these nominees is in jeopardy?

Hopefully not get in too much trouble for saying this, but my wife is chief of staff for Joni Ernst. So I went through the whole experience of what was going on on the peak exit. Kind of pushback. going on on the peak exit, kind of pushback. What was interesting on that is that, uh, in, in, in the case of, uh, uh, of the Senator, they kind of went after her, um, for only saying, I want to go through the whole process of advising and set. And I have a few concerns and kind of, you can't even do that.

You can't even do that. Right. And it couldn't do that. Um, The interesting thing about Trump is there's a part of him that's like the mafia boss. It wasn't Trump going after. He doesn't say go kill him. He says, oh, it'd be nice if they weren't around anymore. And so it's kind of a wink, wink, nod, nod, but he's not tied directly to it. I think the interesting thing on Joni, she ended up getting, I think, a concession on

what she had a problem with, which she is a military combat vet, one of the first, I think the first woman combat vet ever elected to the Senate. Yeah. And, um, she had a real problem with his, his, um, uh, position on women in, uh, in combat and he modified that. So I think she got what she was, had a concern over as opposed to conceding to the whole thing. Um, the thing I found interesting in the process is the Democrats have made a decision to not make a big deal of the nominees until it gets to the hearing process. They're not doing the stuff in the end.

And I think Joni had put it to a place on the concern she raised that they had jumped in then, the focus wouldn't be on Joni, the focus would have been on the concerns that was raised. And what you saw in the hearing was even though she finally clarified that she was for advisement sent in her position on women in combat, the hearing was pretty testy for Pito. There were some times where there was a real question whether he was actually going to survive that just from the hearings and how contentious it was I think some of the others they haven't gotten to that point it may be more damaging than what what the

The mega people would like to see so and I'm gonna follow up with you in a different area Do you think the Trump administration will actually engage in mass deportations, considering not only the enormous cost of tearing them out, but the potential cost to the American economy in areas like construction, agriculture, and dare I say it, high tech, where he seems to have made a whole set of new alliances.

I think the answer to that is no, I don't think he's going to do the mass moving people out. I think I've always felt that some of the rhetoric and the intensity of the rhetoric he uses on talking about that is targeted at a group of Republicans that don't want any immigration. Has nothing to do with illegal immigration. It has to do with any immigration. And so he puts enough of a tent on it that it makes them feel comfortable that he's going in the right direction.

But I think once they get into it, and we'll see what he does in these executive orders, because there's going to be a lot pertaining to this issue, is he going to selectively go after the ones that make sense to do, or is it going to be more broad in scope on the way it's defined? If it's more broad in scope and the way it's defined, I think he's going to be ending up in the short end. The thing I felt from the very beginning with the James Langford issue, when he came out six months, seven months out from the election with a proposal to deal with border control,

is the one thing that has been kind of mixed in this whole process is that the border control problem is different than the immigration problem. The border control problem is a current problem that has surfaced. The immigration problem is immigration has been broken for 30, 40 years. And if he does these mass deportations, it has to be in hand with fixing quite seriously the long-term problem we have with immigration in this, which is quite frankly that we haven't increased the volume or the speed limit of the number of people coming into this country as immigrants that we need, not only in high skilled workers,

but medium and low skilled workers. And what you're talking about here, the economic impact to it is gonna just hit them flat in the face if they don't separate the two and then start focusing on fixing the immigration problem we have that is separate than the border problem. Cameron, you were nodding your head when I first asked that question.

So why don't you weigh in? It made a really great point in terms of separating the border control problem in the perception that people have there as opposed to the larger immigration. I think the average person kind of sees maybe the Mellon says two in the same, or I'm sorry, one in the same, but I really think he's going to run

in serious political waters when it really starts to what the media decides to cover and when it hits social media and people. I think in theory, this sounds to a lot of people like, yeah, folks who are for fixing immigration are controlling the border. I live in DC, but often in Chicago, New York and some major cities when you can, you've seen the immigration, the migrant crisis really kind of boil up and people are having real visceral reactions to that on the street. But when people start really losing family members, friends, if, when you have certain school district preparing for students to potentially be taking out,

I mean, you're starting to hear hereditary information about maybe they may have to deputize local law enforcement departments. Let that first police officer who has been deputized by ICE accidentally shoot somebody or accidentally do some violence or any of those things that then turn this into a completely different issue. And then if that hits the net, that creates a groundswell. Then now Republicans or any or folks who are loyal to Trump that may have to go into reelection and next year, even when you start talking about governors and mayors' races, when you start talking about governors and mayors' races, if those things become to happen due to this mass deportation,

then this becomes a very, very different issue and people may feel, I think this turns into something that then he has to address or others down ballot face those political consequences because people, when they see it, and if it does go wrong, I'm praying it doesn't, but if it does go wrong, then you have a real people problem and a cultural problem that I think really doesn't, spells a little bit of doom for folks in this party or Trump loyalists. Anthony, you live here in California, you ran the California legislature.

Do you think they're really going to, what's going to happen to agriculture here or high tech for that matter if you first deport all the illegals and secondly crack down on H1B visas? I think it'd be decimated. I do think that Trump does a great job of sort of walking the tightrope between showbiz and substance. And I think Trump will probably engage in a lot of policies that will allow Fox News to say that mass deportations have happened and then maybe get a certain amount of people happy

and a certain amount of people satisfied with what they view as the progress in that issue. But yeah, you're absolutely right. I mean, during COVID, when we weren't able to fly, I drove from Los Angeles to Sacramento every Monday and every Thursday. The extent to which that part of the state

is such a huge part of the economy and incredibly conservative, is, you know, I think those people are, a lot of the people who live in that area would realize the extent to which their, particularly the agricultural industry would be decimated with mass deportations or by mass deportations. Right, Jay, I wanna ask a related question here

because you talked about Trump not believing in much of anything, but believing very much in tariffs, the most beautiful word in the English. Yes. But you also said that he cares deeply about the situation in the stock market. So if you impose universal, massive tariffs across the board, you're going to have inflation, you're going to have very bad impacts on the stock market. Is that going to constrain him?

The unstoppable force moves the immovable object, to borrow a phrase, Bob. Exactly. Trump is going to see the face of God here when he goes through with these tariffs and the market takes him seriously. Look I was surprised but not shocked in November when he did the threat that Mexico and Canada about across-the-board tariffs if they don't get tough on the border. The market yawned. There was no reaction the next day. Let's see what happens when the market realizes he actually is serious about pursuing some of these tariffs. I mean, and then that raises the question of, you know, does Trump back off some of these tariffs? Now, my experience

with Trump is he'll find some other factor to blame. He'll yell at Jerome Powell, the Fed, he'll bark at, you know, the private sector, who blamed Congress. He's not going to say that, well, I was mistaken. It turns out tariffs are actually totally regressive and a 19th century economic tool. Of course, he's not going to say that. He'll find some other excuse.

But that is the best leverage, Bob, to get them off the tariffs, is that that stick of, all right, if you touch that rail, then this is what's gonna happen. And if I was John Thune or Mike Johnson, I wouldn't say it publicly, but privately I'd say, you know, Mr. President, like, you know, you won in part because of the economy, you're gonna be judged on the economy. And if these tariffs start undermining the US economy, that's not helpful.

I just think they have to be careful about it because he doesn't want to hear it. But boy, the market reaction when he does that stuff is going to really, really make this hard to avoid in terms of a conversation, but he's done. You'll start to see CEOs speaking out too. I mean, just happened to be listening to an interview that the CEO of Lululemon, I know this is not a staple product, but maybe for college students it is,

but he was on CNBC the other day and was asked a question about it and look at the end of the day, it's like if they are paying tariffs on importing from Asia from Asia like that cost is going to be passed on to the consumer. Period. And so you're going to see prices increase and you're going to see people pretty out front as to why. I think Jonathan I have a place down in New Orleans and I was we got an email the other day from Cox Cable, that announced to all of their subscribers, because of the Jeff Landry Republican governor here,

tax increases that he's passed along to taxing various parts of business, that they're now gonna be charging you a tax on your cable bill for streaming and for cable. And Cox sent out an email to every subscriber that said, hey, on next Good Small, you're going to notice taxes that you now have to pay because of Jeff Landry's tax increase. And so I mean, similar kind of thing,

you're going to see CEOs that have to pass on those costs to consumers being pretty out front of why their products are going to be more expensive for people. So maybe what he'll do is some tariffs, declare victory, and then move on. Anybody think that's? He'll use the threat of it to motivate

in certain areas, I don't know. I think Anthony said it the best is that Trump is a master at that line of show biz and substance or in my opinion less substance, but still the show biz part of this. So how he paints this, how he paints this with a few tariffs and it's marks it as a win. He can take that and move on to the next thing

because Jonathan added right on. If the stark market starts to tank and CEOs start to come out, you will see his tune change quickly and the blame game will begin. But as we've seen it throughout his political career and probably actually throughout his professional career, he will take no blame on anything.

It is always going to be someone else's fault. So he's going to find a way to be able to convince his base. And then it goes back to I think to the top of what we said, this is a, I mean, he's not up for reelection. So without those constraints, he's willing to to get he's not up for reelection. So without those constraints, he's willing to kind of move how he wants to move in and blame whoever he needs to blame. So Cameron and Ed, I'm going to ask both of you about social media and then anybody else who wants to come in on this. How influential in terms of the way the president makes decisions or the

president elect will make decisions as president will social media be? And along the way to answering that, what do you make of the conflict between Elon Musk and Steve Bannon? And how is that likely to play out in the weeks and months ahead? The number one test, and this is something I think that can buy Trump so much goodwill, and where government, I understand why they're doing it, and it makes sense, and on the policy side

and national security side, I agree, but it is just wildly unpopular with people, is with coming up with this ban on TikTok. I mean, TikTok is set to go dark. If everything in the courts don't intercede in any way, or there's not some 90 day extension or something, what is that, Sunday? Yeah, I mean, you're talking 170 plus million users.

Everyone's on this is not, I mean, while it is disproportionately younger people, everyone is on TikTok. You're talking about millions of people who make money on there. And full disclosure, I make some money on TikTok through having TikTok followers and social media followers and so forth.

And then you've heard that the CEO of TikTok plans to attend the inauguration, be right there on the dais next to Bezos, Zuckerberg and Musk. I think how social media may even react to him in the larger social media space, because it is not a monolith, but if he finds a way to keep TikTok alive,

and maybe successfully transition it to an American company, or find a way for folks to still be able to feel like this is the TikTok they knew of old. I think that sets the trajectory of the online chatter, at least initially, could go a lot of different ways, or a lot of different ways. I think the rest of social media in terms of, depending on what comes out of his executive orders, what he decides to say, who he decides to attack, and the kind of statements that he covers there, I think that kind of sways the ebbs and flows. There will still always be people attacking.

I don't think that's gonna necessarily move him, but whatever happens on social media that then makes it to mainstream media, because it's widely been reported that Trump is constantly watching TV, constantly watching the news, constantly saying there. Now what news media picks up off of social media and decides to make the lead story or make the conversation of the day? I think that's where the social media influence on him maybe his day-to-day policy and rhetoric.

But I think his first major social media test is what he and his administration decides to do or able to do surrounding this impending TikTok ban. Ed, I hope you don't mind if I say it, but you and I go back a fair number of years. And the image in my head of an inaugural platform and who's sitting on it does not include huge numbers of very wealthy CEOs who have business before the government.

That's obviously going to be different this time. Who's going to win this battle between Elon Musk and Steve Bannon? And how is it going to play out? It's going to be very interesting. You know, history of Trump in the past, if you look at the last administration that he had, is he brings in some very qualified people. He gets their interest, he pulls them in. But if they get crosswise ways with him, he then puts them over at the kiddie table. And that's when they then end up exiting the door. I think the question with Elon Musk

is going to be at some point, he may be shuffled over to the kiddie table and he's not going to put up with it. And that's when you're going to see a very visible and very vocal move. The thing about Trump and social media is the danger in social media is not what happens from the bottom up. The danger in social media is what happens from the top down, and especially when you get into the area of misinformation, and more specifically disinformation.

And I always thought it was very interesting in the debate where they declared that he had been inaccurate or not told the truth on 33 different events that he stated. When you went back and saw what they identified, he's a salesman, not a businessman. He labels. He doesn't sell. He doesn't produce a product. And if you look at those 33 inaccuracies, 31 of them was not him using statistics and being inaccurate. It was him making the kind of braggadocious, if you will, statements like, I had the best economy ever.

Well, that's a pretty easy thing to check. And it wasn't because he was trying necessarily to be wrong on it. He was just labeling it so that his followers would follow in terms of that. I think that's where you're going to get a little bit of a difference between Musk and what he's saying, because he's very focused on the $2 trillion in cuts versus Trump, who's going to try to label all of that rather than the specifics on that. And that's where I could see a real split between the two. Anthony, as I noted at the outset, we've just been through these calamitous fires in Los

Angeles, the worst in the history of the city and maybe the most expensive natural disaster in modern history, a may exceed Hurricane Katrina. Will the new administration and Congress, in your view, send the needed federal aid to California without the conditions that some in the GOP are advocating? And will they also try to roll back the Biden initiatives on climate? and can they actually achieve that? I think a lot of the things that we've talked about thus far will be in play here. I think to a large extent, I think Trump will try to frame,

I think a lot of the funds, disaster funds will come to California. I think he will try to frame it as though, you know, there was a power play and he got something from it, whether or not he does or not is a different matter. With respect to the Biden initiatives on climate, I mean, I think to a large extent earlier I was talked about the system of checks and balances we have. We have traditionally enjoyed in this country and the extent to which they may be in jeopardy.

I think the checks and balances under this Trump administration will be the checks and balances of the people you talked about earlier who've been mentioned. Elon Musk is a check and balance. I think all the rich folks, Zuckerberg, all the rich folks that we've talked about are gonna be the people who will ultimately check Trump

and tell him this is bad for business or this is not okay for business. So the extent to which I think a lot of the quote unquote green industries are owned by people that Trump is close to and will listen to will determine the extent to which those specific industries are targeted for rollbacks. Betsy, you and I are both on university campuses on a fairly regular basis. What about the diversity, equity, and inclusion issue? Well, we see a big rollback there, and is the administration

big rollback there and is the administration actually serious do you think or will they be serious about punishing universities and institutions that pursue DEI policies? I mean I think he's kind of pretty made it you know pretty clear like these you know DEI programs are his next battleground on his war on wokeness right and it And it's more than a policy shift, it's kind of a cultural statement targeting, you know, targeting the leftist indoctrination, right? And so look, I mean, I think this could, in many ways, you know, getting rid of these programs could reshape

to a large extent sort of this higher education landscape and you know, force universities to kind of rethink their priorities and think fundamentally change how universities kind of approach the issue of inclusivity, you know, and obviously comes with, you know, big risks there, you know, leaving a lot of students kind of without the resources that they depend on. You know, it's more than just budget cuts, right? It's about kind of visibility, safety on campus, that sense of belonging that we know is so important. So I think it's real, it's out there, and I think universities, you think universities really need to think

about how they're going to deal with this. I think it would be quite interesting to see if there was actual follow through on the threats to cut federal research funding. Yeah, cutting that. Universities, I mean, what are we gonna do transfer basic scientific research from MIT to someplace where there isn't the same capability of getting it done John would they actually do that you know could cut some of those federal grants you know try to ban diversity statements that colleges make

yeah you can totally see a scenario where Trump tries to, you know, bar funding or gets Congress to pass a riot or two on appropriations bill, barring funding to any school that, you know, still has DEI policy. The schools would go to the courts and the court, you know, I think would take a while in the courts, Bob. What we don't talk about because we just don't know is, uh, what if Trump ignores the courts? I'm not just on this issue, but like on a variety of issues, I don't

really fully contemplate the possibility that like, you know, he may just keep doing what he wants to do on some of this stuff and that that's hard to even say out loud, but I think we got to at least mention it. Yeah. It could be like Andrew Jackson, once said of a Supreme Court decision that courts now made its decision now, now let the court enforce it and just proceeded to do what he wanted to do. But American universities I think are a crown jewel in the American economy and to begin to fool around with this and the research base that we have in our universities, I think, be very, very dangerous. I don't know if

that will stop him or get him to back off even a little bit. But we'll see. Brian Smith Barber wanted to say something to this is because it it's so close to home. I'm a I'm a graduate of Howard University, a historical college university, HBCU. And we saw a little bit of this in Florida on certain campuses when you had public universities

who may have kind of inclusionary groups or diversity groups for African-American students, Asian students, and so forth there. And there was some groundswells, groundswells, at least online movements and, and they have even seen in protests and so forth of where governors and where local jurisdictions decide to take what national DEI policies or what, wherever Trump goes with this at a federal level, how far they decide to take with national DEI policies or whatever Trump goes with this at a federal level, how far they decide to push it when it comes to funding, when it

comes to both not just the reddit, but the actual funding for schools. And I think this is a very, very sexual orientation, any of these affinity groups, if they start to feel under attack in any and where different, like I said, depending on how far a state or local government decides to take this baton that Trump has given them around coming down on DEI. And then does this spill over into the HBCU world? I think Trump did actually some amazing work that Biden took up and took to another level. But with HBCUs, he brought, I think this was something that happened to him in his first to second year, where he brought some of the almost 100 HBCUs,

he brought like 50 or 60 of their presidents and was able to grant a lot of funding there. I'm curious, but the larger sentiment and kind of the larger atmosphere and landscape has shifted politically around that. And it just makes me nervous that where does that go? Does he, does, or do those live in two separate buckets? Or does he decide to come, or does he decide to come after, like I said, does

he decide to come after whether it's HBCs or does he in minority serving institutions, or does he decide to come after these different groups and cut funding from schools that do offer affinity groups, funding and opportunities? I think there could be some political underestimation of the power of those groups. And if a few schools are attacked, does then that spark something nationwide? Going back to that larger thing is that it all depends on how hard he decides to go at something, who he decides to choose as his opponent, and what that may spark in

people because I guarantee you if he goes after certain schools or goes after those groups, it won't just live online. People will organize. There will be a ground so because it protects so many different people. It gives them space on these universities. We hear about violence all the time in the news, yet we rarely hear stories about peace. There are so many people who are working hard to promote solutions to violence, toxic polarization, and authoritarianism, often at great personal risk. We never hear

about these stories, but at what cost? On Making Peace Visible, we speak with journalists, storytellers, and peace builders who are on the front lines of both peace and conflict. You can find Making Peace Visible wherever you listen to podcasts. There are a couple other things I want to get to, so I'm going to keep going here for a minute. I'll try to get to an audience question before we're done. Ed, we may have a ceasefire in the Middle East. What is the likely future there? What's in store for Ukraine? And by the way, is there any chance that we will actually buy Greenland and take back

the Panama Canal? You mixed all three of those together. Let me start with the last one. No. That's the easy one. I think with Israel, I like what we're seeing on where we are. I think President Biden deserves a lot more credit than what the Trump people are probably going to want to have him have. And I think he did a good job of trying to spread that benefit across the live. I think the big concern is Ukraine

on what's going to happen there. And the type of answer that he has given so far and what he wants to see on Ukraine is not going to be a good answer. It doesn't in any way send a message to Russia that we're not going to accept them going in and taking over territory. And let me tell you, it's more than just Ukraine. If you look at the types of things that were done through social media in Crimea before they started going into Crimea, Those same tactics are being used in Lithuania and the countries up there. They're eyeballing all those countries. Now, maybe they won't do it when Trump's in office because they maybe think he's crazy enough.

He would react differently or more aggressively. But I think any type of a forced agreement to let Russia keep what they've gotten, let's have peace and Ukraine keeps what they already have is going to be very bad for other things kind of coming forward in the future. Anyone else on that? Yeah, Bob, I tend to think that some of this is opening negotiating tactic by Trump that he's looking for leverage on everything. But certainly when it comes to foreign affairs, he wants to cut

deals because he wants to be able to say he did these big, beautiful deals. And if the Danes understood Trump, and there's been some reporting about this that suggests they do, they would talk to Trump and there's been some reporting about this that suggests they do. They would talk to Trump and say, you know, it's not for sale, but like you're a NATO ally America and you know, why don't we let you guys open a second base. There's already a US military presence on Greenland and the Danes could say, you know, bring up some, bring up some styles or some, some, some Arctic cutters and we'll build a new installation or maybe a new

airstrip for the air force. Hell, we can, we can name it Fort Trump and you can come for the ground, come for the groundbreaking and we'll get some good shots, you know, while we've got some penguins and some, some ice flows and we'll just have a big Arctic photo op. So I think a lot of this is trying to hand Trump victories and find wins for some ice flows and we'll just have a big Arctic photo op. So I think a lot of this is trying to hand Trump victories and find wins for Trump.

These countries are gonna figure that out pretty fast. I wanna turn to something we kind of neglected here. And then I have a question from anonymous in the chat. So maybe we'll start with you again, Jonathan. How can and should Democrats handle Trump this second time around? Well, this is a question I'm gonna ask myself tonight at this candidate forum because they haven't figured it out yet. You know, here we are, it's been over two months since the election. They clearly aren't gonna

be the resistance, but they don't want to be the acquiescence either, Bob. And there's no clear strategy about how to handle Trump. I think his winning the popular vote was a blow to the solar plexus of Democrats collectively. It's not that he won narrowly the three blue wall states. That wasn't a surprise to anybody. I think it's the sort of scale of his popular vote win, the success he had with traditional democratic constituencies. So Democrats can't say he's illegitimate. They can't say he's a fluke. Um, he obviously has a, has a real following.

This is not 84. He didn't win 49 states. And by the way, side note here, I think some of these corporate executives are acting like Trump won 49 states. It's still a really evenly divided country. But in any event, Democrats got to figure out what they stand for outside of we're not the Trump Party and we're not Trump. That was their message for 10 years.

And by the way, a pretty effective message, and it was a very unifying message to war against Trump. The problem was they tried that play one last time last year didn't go so well. So they're obviously the opposition. But what does that mean? And I hadn't gotten the answer yet. We'll see what they say tonight.

And I think if I was to really probe and put some of these folks on trivia serum, Bob, maybe you too. The actual answer is they're going to respond to what Trump gives them. And Trump's excesses and incompetence is going to take whatever the democratic message is going to be. Much like Democrats responded to Bush in 05 and 06 and became, you know, war against bungling the Iraq war, war against privatizing social security. That was their message then, we're not Bush. And I think that's going to be the Democrats message eventually is that we're not the tariff

party or whatever he does. Anthony, what would you say as a, as a democratic leader, Democrats ought to do in this new world they never anticipated they would have to live in? I think it requires a degree of, uh, aggressiveness that Democrats haven't exhibited that the national Democrats haven't exhibited either on campaigns or in the White House over the past four years. I think the Democratic Party at the national level in particular has been paralyzed, seems incapable of moving with any great speed or a tremendous sense of purpose.

In the first two weeks of the year, I haven't seen any change at all in the party. I think there's still a party that's confused. I think leadership is confused. I think they're running around not knowing what to do in the same way that they knew how old. When Joe Biden was elected, everybody knew how old he was gonna be four years later.

And then suddenly they seemed shocked that he had reached this age where he couldn't possibly win. Democrats have just not been that thoughtful for quite some time and I don't see any change. Yeah, I myself believe, by the way, that it wasn't, and this leads to the anonymous question, that it wasn't and this leads to the anonymous question that it wasn't Biden's age it was his performance level you know Richard Neustadt and his book Presidential Power said the greatest power of a president is the power to persuade and somehow or other that seemed to slip away from Biden and Trump who will be 82 at the end of this term, I think if I'm right,

got elected despite age or age wasn't even relevant. So this question from anonymous, I'm gonna give everybody a chance to go around the horn. We don't have that much time left. How's history gonna regard the Biden administration? Betsy, you wanna start? Oh, think about history when you're kind of just emerged from it, right?

I was thinking about, I saw the other day that Kamala is going to be writing a book. And what is she going to have to say about what happened and how things are going to be judged? And Jill Biden did an interview yesterday where she was kind of doubling down on the fact that he could have run again and that he shouldn't have had to step down. You know, look, I think there's gonna, I think what ended up happening in this, you know,

the Kamala Harris race, I think is directly attributable to the fact that he waited so long to get out. And I think it's going to be hard to look at history without kind of rewinding that tape and doing the kind of what if game, you know, what if he, you know, would have had that successful midterm and then decide to go out on, on top and not run again. And we would have had an actual, um, a primary and you know, what could have been different.

Um, it's, it's hard to think about, to think about what history says without trying to think about that aspect of it and what could have been different from that. And I think that's probably the big pivot point of Biden's term, whether he stayed in too long and will history judge him harshly for that. Ed, he's leaving office with an approval rating about, or approximately about where Harry Truman's was when he left office, driven from office really. And then 10, 15, 20 years later is regarded as a great or near great president. What's going to happen with Biden? I think the same will happen with Biden.

And I think the encouragement will happen with Biden. And I think the encouragement on that is looking at Jimmy Carter and how he moves so much just in recent history. You know, the thing I see out there, and I've been talking about this for some time, you know, even with Trump, and I'm not known as a big fan of Trump, but I acknowledge he is a symptom of where our country is. He's not the disease. And that's important to understand.

I think the whole environment we're in now is the 20 years of increasingly running negative campaigns on both sides. And what we've done in the process of doing that is we're teaching a certain segment of the electorate, depending on what side you're on, what to be against. But neither party is doing positive campaigns to talk about what we're for and educating people on what to be for. And I think going back to the question about the Democrats,

they're not gonna get anywhere by just attacking Trump. They'll get somewhere perhaps with the progressives, but they're not gonna get anywhere with the centrist out there, this majority. My advice to them is start campaigning on what you're for, so that the next election that comes along when Trump is out of this equation,

when the next election comes along, you can campaign on what you're for, not just what you're against. And I think that would be a huge change in American politics that we've been falling into that hole for a good 20 years now. Jonathan, Biden in history? I think a lot of it will hang on how malignant or benign the Trump four years are, Bob. I think a lot of it will hang on how malignant or benign the Trump four years are, Bob. I think if Trump really goes far and strains the fabric of American democracy and creates international crises left and right, I think that's really bad news for Biden because Biden will be seen, the first paragraph of his obituary as

the great enabler. The Shakespearean tragedy that the same man who defeated Trump appeared to extinguish Trumpism then brought it back because of his vanity and refusal to retire. That would be the sad part. If Trump is a more benign force, it's more just playing golf, watching Fox and Friends and sort of like trying to sign big, beautiful trade deals with whoever will do it with them. Then I think Biden will have a comeback. I do. I think 20, 30 years from now, the Biden years will look better,

especially if Russia is constrained and does not go into other parts of Eastern Europe, Biden will get some credit for that. Obviously Sweden and Finland joining NATO on his watch is significant. This sort of collective Western alliance against Russia's aggression is significant. I think it could be in history's eyes. Does this Middle East peace deal hold up? I think that'll be significant as well, Bob.

And then on the economy, if we do move toward a more green economy and do more to address climate change, I think Biden will get some credit for having started that with the IRA. And so I think that that will matter too. We don't have a lot of time left. Tamron, go ahead.

Bob, I would say what's history in the sense of where we're talking about a year, two, three, four years ago from now, are we talking 20 and 30 and 40 years from now? Because I think Biden, obviously having served under in his administration in his White House for the first two years, I think some of the, it will be groundbreaking. And if the funds and the changes that were made are actually being able to see him through throughout the country, I do think that will have a material effect on people.

And if those are able to be attributed to Biden, those will be remembered positively. We can't forget about the history made with Kamala Harris as the first woman and the first black vice president of the United States. So I think that even that in and of itself puts them in a place of history for good. But when I started off in saying what's history, I think how the internet evolves and how folks, the images, the videos, the moments, both the positives and the gas, I think how people now review and revere recent history. And as we've seen, as we see how people can quickly move on from something that may have just happened

a couple of weeks ago, let alone a year or two ago. I'm curious to what, how people will generally feel. I think in the next election or so, Biden won't have that same strength or power that either George W. Bush, but definitely like, say, Obama had. But I do think when we start looking further, further out, history will remember him kindly, history will remember him as a statesman, and history will remember the totality of

his career and almost as his presidency as a culmination of a career of kind of one of the most esteemed careers in public service and elected politics that this country has ever seen. Anthony? I think it completely depends on two things. It depends on the extent to which this republic's experiment with democracy is over, whether or not it's run its course. If it has, then I think Biden will not be looked upon fondly. And I also think it depends on who's asking.

I think the perspectives abroad of Biden are quite different than they are domestically. I think the European perspective of Biden is a very strong perspective. And to a large extent, I think there's a sense in Europe of Biden is a very strong perspective. And one, yeah, to a large extent, I think there's a sense in Europe that he saved American democracy for a while.

We went over time, but I wanna thank Betsy, Jonathan, Ed, Anthony and Cameron for a terrific discussion on the eve of a profound change in our national leadership. I wanna thank all of you in our audience for being with us today. Join us on January 30th for our annual Warshaw Conference, co-sponsored with Politico,

which will focus on what happened in the tumultuous politics of 2024, why Trump won and the Democrats lost. The conference will bring together an extraordinary group of strategists, campaign managers, and journalists here on campus at USC Town and Gown. For details and to sign up, please go to our website, dornsife.usc.edu, slash, center for political future. Thank you all and have a great last weekend of the Biden administration. Thank you for joining us on the Bully Pulpit.

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