WSJ What’s News - JD Vance’s Debut, and a Look at What He Stands For

Episode Date: July 18, 2024

A.M. Edition for July 18. WSJ editor Aaron Zitner says Donald Trump’s running mate is connecting some of the economic grievance that drove the Republicans’ 2016 campaign to more recent discontent, and WSJ reporter Vivian Salama says his stance on Ukraine is fueling unease in Europe. Plus, Goldman Sachs opens up an investment strategy once reserved for the wealthy. And, Bud Light slips to the No.3 spot more than a year after a boycott turned the U.S. beer industry upside down. Kate Bullivant hosts. Sign up for the WSJ’s free What’s News newsletter. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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That's BetterHelp.com. J.D. Vance makes his debut as Trump's running mate. We dig into how he pitches himself and his political views. He really represents that growing hardline voice that wants to prioritize conservative values over this geopolitical embrace and close allegiance to allies. Plus, Goldman Sachs wants to help everyday investors save on taxes and top American brands are losing ground in China. It's Thursday, July 18th. I'm Kate Bullivant

for The Wall Street Journal, filling in for Luke Vargas. And here is the AM edition of What's News, the top headlines and business stories moving your world today. It's shaping up to be another eventful day in US politics. President Biden has tested positive for COVID-19, forcing him to stop campaigning and self-isolate at a time where the Democratic coalition backing his re-election bid is showing new signs of cracking. According to the president's doctor, his symptoms are mild. Meanwhile, at the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee, Republicans are uniting behind Donald Trump, showing his total control of the party. Last night, though, the focus was on his running mate, J.D. Vance,

who accepted the party's nomination for vice president. I stand here humbled and I'm overwhelmed with gratitude to say I officially accept your nomination to be vice president of the United States of America. His acceptance speech on the third night of the Republican National Convention gave the Ohio senator a chance to introduce himself to the broader American public. Our Luke Vargas is part of the team of journal reporters and editors working at the RNC in Milwaukee this week, and he has the story. It's always a guessing game how a new VP pick will pitch themselves to voters in their convention

debut. And with 39-year-old Vance, last night, we got a story that was very much told in economic terms. Having grown up in the Clinton years, Vance talked about the U.S. joining the North American Free Trade Agreement, or NAFTA, as well as normalizing trade ties with China, steps that he blamed for having outsourced middle-class manufacturing, and he knocked then-Senator Joe Biden for supporting them. At each step of the way, in small towns like mine in Ohio or next door in Pennsylvania or Michigan, in states all across our country, jobs were sent overseas and our children were sent to war. Former President Donald Trump has long been critical of foreign trade, and his trade views were forged in the 80s, often involving teeing off on Japan.

But with Vance, we got this millennial view of America's economic story, kind of a firsthand account of things like weathering the Great Recession, struggling to buy a home like their baby boomer parents did. And he drew a straight line from those past economic struggles to the recent moment of high inflation. And many of the people that I grew up with can't afford to pay more for groceries, more for gas, more for rent. And that's exactly what Joe Biden's economy has given them. We at the Journal have written a lot about the causes of inflation, not just government spending that Republicans are pointing to this week, but also supply chain snafus and convulsions from the pandemic.

And since it is such a complex picture, I grabbed WSJ editor Aaron Zittner, who broke down how Vance connected some of the economic grievance that drove Trump's 2016 campaign to more recent discontent. The kind of economic discontent that we see today, it's broader and it's somewhat different in nature. Stock market has been at record highs. Unemployment has been at record lows. Inflation, which was so high, you know, in the 9% range during COVID, has significantly moderated. By many measures, this is a very strong economy, and yet people don't feel it. I mean, people are grouchy in our polls often and for many reasons, this is a very strong economy, and yet people don't feel it. I mean, people are grouchy in our polls often and for many reasons, but it's been a durable

finding that there's this disconnect between what we see in the traditional economic metrics and consumer sentiment, how people feel about the economy. When we ask about the American dream a decade ago, more than half of people said, yeah, the American dream is still alive. Now it's about a third. And that's some of what I think we heard J.D. Vance speak to, the insecurity behind what on its surface looks like a decent economic situation today. Now, while a lot of Vance's focus last night was on the nation's economy and other domestic issues, journal national political reporter Vivian Salama, who's here with me now, says it's Vance's stance on Ukraine, actually, that has been making some waves, at least among foreign ambassadors and other diplomats here in Milwaukee.

Vivian, there are so many events at these conventions. You were at a pretty unique one, it sounds like, where this topic was coming up. Tell us about it. I'm going to probably butcher the baseball reference, but it was the Milwaukee Brewers Stadium where we went out there and it was a breakfast that was hosted for ambassadors and their delegations who were in town, desperate to kind of piece together what a future Republican administration would look like. And many of them came up to me and sort of said, what do you think of Vance?

We started to chit chat. You know, of course, I would turn the question over to them and say, well, what do you think of Vance? And especially the Europeans who were there and one in particular said, we're afraid it's trouble for Ukraine. And why is that? What is it about Vance versus some other Republicans that has these European officials worried? So in the last couple of months, one of the issues in the Senate has been this Ukraine aid bill, which was a very contentious issue. And while there were some traditional Republicans who supported it, Vance was among the leading voices in opposition of it, including some of the hawkish Republicans who were really pushing for it, saying that this was imperative to U.S. national security interests. And Vance also, Vivian, is the lone senator to

have opposed a NATO-backed no-fly zone in Ukraine. And it's also that he's not just saying these things in Washington, but has actually gone to Europe, right, to give this message directly to some Europeans. And that was a really stark wake-up call. He called it a wake-up call when he sat on the stage at the Munich Security Forum, which is one of the biggest international forums on national security issues. And he said Europe has to wake up because the U.S. cannot continue to sustain this level of assistance. He said that Europe can't either, to be fair. What he argued is that manufacturing capacity in the United States just cannot sustain it. It is strained, and it will continue to be

strained, and it has its own national interests and priorities that should dominate. On the other side, though, Vivian, GOP Senator Tom Cotton yesterday said, effectively, don't worry. Vance, as VP, doesn't mean an end to support for Ukraine. But Trump hasn't exactly been unequivocal in supporting aid for Ukraine either. Vance brings out that fear of how influential he would be on Trump's thinking. Now, Trump himself has been very skeptical and at one point adamantly opposed to consistent aid for Ukraine, unconditioned aid for Ukraine. He has sort of come around on that issue a little bit saying, you know, if it's in the form of a loan, I'll accept it. So Vance is not really there. He's a little bit more extreme where he says we have priorities at home and we

need to focus on those. Whether or not that spills into any future Trump administration policy thinking, that remains to be seen. But it goes beyond that. Vance is essentially the future of the Republican Party. If this is the direction that the Republican Party is going in, if they can glean any vision into the future based on his rhetoric, that is something that they are worried about because it really raises questions about where America stands with regard to embracing and supporting allies and its alliances will be in the future. Journal national political reporter Vivian Salama, thank you so much for the time. Thank you very much.

We'll have more from our team in Milwaukee on tonight's episode. Until then, you can follow the journal's full coverage of the RNC at wsj.com. And while we're talking about politics, one topic we're not hearing about as much on the campaign trail this year is federal debt and what that means for the country. We want to hear your questions, so send a voice memo to wnpod at wsj.com or leave a voicemail with your name and location at 212-416-4328. We might use it on the show. Police were suspicious of Donald Trump's attempted assassin, Thomas Matthew Crooks, more than an hour before the attack that took place at a campaign rally in Pennsylvania last weekend. That's according to private law enforcement briefings given to the House and Senate lawmakers yesterday.

Lawmakers were also told that Crooks scouted the rally site multiple times before the event and that his motive remains unclear. and that his motive remains unclear. Coming up, Bud Light's star is still falling after a boycott that reshaped the beer industry. And Deer slashes diversity initiatives after criticism from a conservative activist. Those stories and more after the break. Summer is like a cocktail. It has to be mixed just right start with a handful of great friends

now add your favorite music and then finally add Bacardi rum shake it together and there you have it the perfect summer mix Bacardi do what Do what moves you. Live passionately. Drink responsibly. Copyright 2024. Bacardi. It's trade dress and the bat device are trademarks of Bacardi and Company Limited. Rum 40% alcohol by volume. We are exclusively reporting that Goldman Sachs plans to open up access to some of the sophisticated investment strategies it has long reserved for the wealthy. It's structuring these portfolios, which will be offered through a partnership with robo-advisor Betterment, to help everyday investors save money on their taxes,

in part by moving their cash from ultra-safe bank accounts to fixed income ETFs that involve more risk. While Goldman has long helped its deep-pocketed clients, who on average have about $70 million in the bank, gain a tax edge, Betterment's platform requires just $10 to start investing. We asked journal reporter Anna Maria Andriotis, who covers Goldman Sachs, why the bank has decided to offer these portfolios to a broader clientele. We asked journal reporter Anna Maria Andriotis, who covers Goldman Sachs, why the bank has decided to offer these portfolios to a broader clientele. Goldman is basically focused on selling products, strategy, advice, any types of services it can that will generate fees for the firm. And those fees, like when looking at this as an example of betterment,

might not be very big in the grand scheme of things. But this is just one example that fits into Goldman's broader strategy that it's increasingly leaning into of generating what it views as recurring and predictable fee revenue. It needs to find ways to offset slowdowns in its traditional businesses. And what we see in this partnership with Betterment is ongoing appetite to generate fee revenue from wherever they can get it, including from Main Street, from retail investors. And in other corporate news making headlines today, we're exclusively learning that Bud Light has slipped to the number three spot in the US beer market. That's according to an analysis of Nielsen IQ data by consultant Bump Williams. It shows the former number one being outsold by Mexican import Modelo and Michelob Ultra, which shares the same parent as Bud Light.

The ranking shows the continued fallout from a boycott that started in April last year when a transgender influencer posted a video about a personalised Bud Light can that the brand had sent her as a gift. And in another example of companies facing a backlash over their progressive stances, Deere is diing back some of its diversity and inclusion initiatives. The farm equipment giant said diversity quotas have never been its policy, that it would avoid, quote, socially motivated messages in company trainings and policies, and that it wouldn't participate in or support, quote,

social or cultural awareness parades, festivals or events. The move came after criticism from conservative activist Robbie Starbuck, who has frequently targeted what he describes as the company's, quote, woke initiatives on X. Consumers in China, the world's second largest economy, have long provided a major source of revenue for big American brands, from luxury to fast food. But now major American brands like Apple, Starbucks and McDonald's are rapidly losing market share to new domestic rivals. losing market share to new domestic rivals. Alison Ho is a consumer strategist for trend forecasting company WGSN. She told Journal reporter Emily Siu about the nationalist sentiment that's helping Chinese brands like sportswear maker Anta compete against the likes

of Nike. It was very much linked to very big and bold expressions of Chinese pride. So think about your large logos, red and yellow color combinations. It's resonating especially with younger consumers today because they don't have the same level of adoration for the West as the past generations. It's not about, you know, blind kind of, I'll buy something from the west just by virtue of it being from the west. For more about the battle to win over Chinese consumers and how big brands are approaching it you can look for the full video at wsj.com slash video. And here is what we're watching in markets today. Stock futures are pointing to a higher open for the S&P 500 and the Nasdaq after yesterday's tech sell-off. It's going to be another busy day for earnings. Netflix is set to

report after the market close, while results are due earlier in the day from Blackstone, Martian, McLennan and more. And across the pond, the European Central Bank is expected to leave interest rates unchanged later today after cutting them last month for the first time since the COVID-19 pandemic. And that's what's news for Thursday morning. Today's show was produced by Daniel Bach and Anthony Banzi with supervising producer Christina Rocha. And I'm Kate Bullivant for The Wall Street Journal, filling in for Luke Vargas. We'll be back tonight with a new show.

And until then, thanks for listening.