Morning Joe - Senate passes government funding bill

Episode Date: November 11, 2025

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Well, first of all, the East Wing was a beautiful little tiny structure that was built many years ago that was renovated and expanded and disbanded and columns ripped out, and it had nothing to do with the original building. It was a poor, sad site, and I could have built the ballroom around it, but it would not have been. We're building one of the greatest ballrooms in the world. By the way, zero money spent by the government, zero. The East Wing is being spent by private donors. And it's a $250, $300 million building. It's going to be the most beautiful anywhere in the world.

I've got to say, Willie, I've heard the White House, the People's White House called many things. I've never heard it described as a sad little house. It's called it a dump in the past, too. Yeah, yeah. I mean, this remarkable historical place just wiped out without a second thought. and, of course, so many people who support him, who will support him no matter what he does, don't even stop and think twice about him just completely wiping out American history in that part of the White House.

But anyway, let's talk about Veterans Day, Willie, which, of course, you know, it's today. And this is a day where we stop and we pause and we remember all of those who stopped and paused their lives and that of their families to give their all for this country. And I know, Willie, you've lived it in recognizing those veterans through the years. And you understand, and so many people understand that we just know these vets a debt for all they've done for us. And it's important that we repay that debt, not just in words one day a year, but also in our actions day in and day out. As we remember the things, the values that they fought for and the sacrifices that they made that, as Abraham Lincoln once said at the Gettysburg Address, we have to act. We, the living, those among us that have seen those vets go off and come back.

We have to take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave their last full measure of devotion and that we here highly resolved that these dead shall not have died in vain, that this nation under God shall have a new birth of freedom. And the government of the people, by the people, and for the people shall not perish from the earth. And yes, it's about the people, not the politicians, not the president, not members of Congress, not the powerful, not the billionaires, not the tech moguls. It's about we, the people. And that's something we have to always keep in mind. Yeah, I mean, you can stretch back to the revolution, the Civil War, as you did there, World War II, which has moved so many of us who hear the stories and visit the battlefields, my father, who served in Vietnam.

And then those of us who grew up in the post-9-11 generation thinking about the veterans of the wars of Afghanistan in Iraq. Everything they gave, many of them gave all. Many of them, their lives altered forever by their service. So I think it's incumbent on those of us who have not worn the uniform to respect their service and to make sure they're taken care of when they come back home, something that tends to fade from memory as the wars get farther away, that these men and women who gave so much, Joe, in Iraq and Afghanistan. particularly who are with us here in Vietnam as well.

They deserve our praise. They deserve us talking about them on this Veterans Day, but they also deserve us and our government remembering them and taking care of them and fulfilling the needs they have. They signed a contract when they put on those packs after 9-11 and the towers were on fire to go fight the war that we'd take care of them when we got home and we have to live up to that. Well, yeah, I saw too many times in the past promises made

to our men and women in uniform and promises not kept by the government that sent them there. And that's something that we definitely have to do. And I think it's also very important because of this generation we're in. You're talking about the post-9-11 generation. It's just too easy for Americans to look at wars and say World War I, World War II, the good wars, Korea, Vietnam, the bad wars, Iraq, the bad wars. Mike Barnacle, I remember talking to Richard Engel on the 20th anniversary of the Iraq invasion. And Richard, who had been, for good reason, highly skeptical of what went on over there, sat there, and behind him there were a table of students, and he said they've been debating the invasion

and whether we are better off, we Iraqis are better off today than we were 20 years ago. And he said, that's a debate that could not have happened 20 years ago. And he got choked up at one point, probably remembering all the sacrifice he saw from our vets. So even when our vets leave a war that may not be seen as the most successful or may have been seen as a strategic mistake going into that war, often they create a space that creates a possibility. of a better future, even in places like Iraq. So it's so important that they don't think that they went over there and they fought and they saw their buddies give their lives in vain or families believe that there are people living in Iraq who are living a better life now, even when our government made a terrible

mistake starting that war, that those people living a better life because of what what Americans did. It's certainly not always the case, but there was, I guarantee you, man for man, woman for woman. There was much heroism and valor in Iraq as there was in any other battle. You know, Joe, I think one of the elements of Veterans Day, and it ought to be an element of every single day, is for more Americans to realize the meanings of the words, service and sacrifice. When you serve the United States in uniform, no matter where it is around the world, you bring America to people who are unfamiliar with the reality of America. This country is free. We are based in freedom. The roots of our country are based in revolution and in freedom

and in independence. And we bring that gift and have brought that gift to many countries throughout the world across the years. If you take the time, just a brief period, of time to read about the wars that we have been involved in, especially World War II. We brought more to Europe and the world than anything you could think of. We brought freedom. We brought liberty. We brought release from a Holocaust. We brought release from the grip of a strangler, a man who was strangling the word democracy and government, Adolf Hitler. We brought so much, and it remains after we leave. We have had some nightmares.

We have had Vietnam. We have had Iraq and Afghanistan. We have had a horrendous withdrawal from Afghanistan. But the spirit of America, the spirit of the sacrifice and the service of so many Americans who go to these countries, who wear our uniform, who go because they're asked to go and told to go, and they follow orders, that spirit, that sense of service and sacrifice is eternal. We're going to continue to honor America's veterans over the course of this Veterans Day morning. We'll also have two guests from Operation MEND, an incredible organization that is, in fact, taking care of our post-9-11 veterans.

With us this morning, the co-host of our fourth hour, staff writer at the Atlantic, Jonathan Lemire, contributing writer for the Atlantic and an MSNBC political analyst Eugene Robinson, staff writer at the Atlantic, Frank Four, Washington Bureau Chief at USA Today, Susan Page, and the host of way too early. MSNBC Senior Capitol Hill reporter Allie Vitale. It's an Atlantic kind of morning. It feels like, doesn't it? Yeah, staff me. What am I going to join? Well, so submit a writing sample and we'll start talking about it. Keep your resume on file, Mike.

All right, a lot to talk about with the staff of the Atlantic, because today marks day 42 of the government shutdown. But last night, the Senate did pass a bill to reopen the government. The legislation approved with the support of 52 reports. Republicans, seven Democrats, and one independent. It combines three full-year spending bills with a stopgack measure to keep the rest of the government funded through the end of January. It also reverses mass layoffs triggered by the Trump administration during the shutdown and blocks additional firings. But it does not extend health care subsidies. And last night, Speaker Mike Johnson

told reporters he cannot guarantee that he will hold a vote on a bill if the Senate passes. Look, we're going to do in the House what we always do, and that is a deliberative process. I mean, we've got to find consensus on whatever their proposal is. But will you bring it to the floor for a vote? As you know, as you know, as you know, I do not guarantee the outcome of legislation or dates or deadlines or anything. I have to limit. I've got to build consensus among the members, and that is what we will do. Exactly as we have always done, exactly as I always do.

But it's not guaranteeing an outcome. It's guaranteeing a vote. I don't. I can't hear him do that. So the bill to reopen the government now heads over to the House, which has been out of session for more than 50 days at this point. A source tells MSNBC. Speaker Johnson is aiming to clear the legislation Wednesday. So, Joe, we'll get into this in a moment. Democrats are not happy with the seven plus Angus King who voted to get this bill across the finish line. They have their qualms with it, and we'll explain that in just a minute. But what's your sense of where things go from here?

Well, the speaker there is talking about his deliberative process, and I think most of us would agree, he has been quite deliberative when it has come to the Epstein files. He has been quite deliberative when it has come to swearing in a new member of Congress who was elected what? Over a month ago, he has been quite deliberative. I will say Gene Robinson, though, there's a little problem here. He doesn't have a massive majority in the House of Representatives. He's got at least, I think, a dozen Republicans that won in seats where Joe Biden won. If you look at the extraordinary political bleeding that Republicans suffered last Tuesday in Virginia, in rural parts of Virginia, where they are feeling the cuts that are coming,

to food assistance or whether it's coming to whether they can take their child to a medical facility, 10 miles from their home or if they have to drive 65, 70 miles from their home, you can see, and those Republicans and those Biden swing districts can see, these, the trends, the trend lines do not look good with Republicans, you know, again, saying no to helping people out, whether it's with food assistance or helping Americans out when it comes to paying for skyrocketing costs for their health care. So you add those 12 and you put MTG in there and a couple of other people who represent rural districts who are saying the Republicans, you all are sealing your own political fate. I don't think it's going to be as cut and dry as the speaker thinks it's going to be.

I've been in Newt Gingrich's house where there's a majority of four or five. it ain't a pretty sight for the Speaker when things go sideways. Yeah, and with this Republican caucus in the House, things can go sideways pretty fast. You're absolutely right. Every single county in Virginia moved toward the Democrats last week. Every single one, the most rural counties, the most Republican counties, the most MAGA counties, they all moved toward the Democrats, some very substantial. And I think that is about the affordability issue.

I think the question of the Obamacare subsidies, you know, one thing that Democrats did do is they made that an issue. It wasn't an issue that had grabbed the public before. Now it's real. And they did make it an issue. So if you, you know, if those who voted for the, quote, end quote, which was actually caving, would, uh, wanted to defend themselves. That's one thing they could say that, that, that we made this an issue and it is a very bad issue for Republicans in the coming midterms. Yeah. And, and, you know, um, Mike Barnacle, you look at, you look,

again, at the election results. If you want to see where the wind's blowing, uh, there's some counties, uh, I read, I think it was York County in Virginia, but there's some counties. that had not gone Democratic since LBJ. And it was just, it's one of those nights that, again, I saw this in 93 when everything broke Republican, these states and these counties, and people said, a tidal wave's coming next year. Now, I'm not suggesting a tidal wave for Democrats

will be coming next year in the midterm elections. But let's just say the forecast, if you look back at the past, the forecast not looking good for them. And a lot of them, if they're smart enough, they're going to hunker down and they're going to make sure they protect their working Americans in their district. They're going to protect their hospitals in their district. They're going to protect their nursing homes in their districts. They're going to do what they can to help their constituents. if they're smart with skyrocketing health care costs. They can't be seen on the wrong side of that issue.

They can't be seen on the wrong side of affordability. They can't run around saying what Donald Trump said last night that the affordability crisis is a hoax. It won't work. This isn't about masks. This isn't about Neil Armstrong walking on a soundstage in Burbank. This isn't about some Bobby Kennedy Jr. conspiracy theory. This is something that Americans are living every single day of their life when they go to the grocery store,

when they go to the gas station, when they go to their doctor. That's it. I mean, you just put your finger on it, Joe. I mean, you go to gas up your car and you look and you think, I'm only going to get $20 a gas today because I can't afford to fill the tank. You go to the grocery store and you know that prices have gone up not month to month, week to week and sometimes day to day. And people instinctively are so much smarter than the people who represent them in Congress. Something happens when you go to Congress. You isolate yourself from the reality of everyday people's lives, people's everyday lives. But there's something out there.

You can just sense it. You can feel it. People know that something is wrong with what's going on. in this country, governmentally. And odd little things, I think, play a role in it. I think knocking down part of the White House had an impact on ordinary people. They want to, what's up with that? Jonathan, I don't know about you, but internally in the White House, what do they think

is going on, really? Does anybody there know the reality of what's going on in the country? Well, I think there's been a recognition in the building quietly that they lost their, they took their eye off the ball when it comes to prices. That is what they won on last year, largely. 24th, central issue was affordability. They've been able to read the polls. They saw the beatdown Republicans took at the ballot box last week. Trump himself has privately said, this is our first real setback of his administration. You know, but the president himself isn't willing to admit this. He did. In fact, and then every last night called the affordability

issue a quote, con job. Like he's almost, he seems so out of touch with voters, which is a little bit of what President Biden did, you know, in his term, that his team was a little slow to recognize the pain that some voters were feeling. Trump seems to be fast-tracking that. And Joe, to your point, that the shutdown, look, the party that is the one who pulls the trigger and says, hey, we're going to shut down the government, sort of never does cut out ahead. And there were Democrats who came to that recognition. The Republicans weren't going to bend on these subsidies, therefore, let's get back to work.

Let's spare the pain of people across the country before the Thanksgiving holidays make it so much worse. is now in the Republicans' court to deal with this, and that includes the House of Representatives. Let's just look at this staff. In the last 18 weeks, 18 weeks, the House of Representatives has been in session for 20 days. So now they are going to have to deal with real anger here that they have simply abdicated their responsibility to the American people. I'll tell you what, and please forgive me for saying this. I could talk about when I coached football. our Little League Baseball, but I think me talking about my experience in Congress might be a little more of it, just to make this point. When you start talking about numbers like that, Susan will remember this,

and Gene will remember this, and Mike will remember this. It sounds a lot like the Democratic Congress we ran against in 1994. Errogant check, check cashing scandals, they would just throw checks. drawers. They didn't vote that much. They weren't doing the people's business. It was so easy to run against them. And I suspect to the same willy would be the case here. And to Jonathan's point, you look where politically we stand at the end of this government shutdown. I understand. I understand what Democrats would be angry for those who finish this deal off. I, of course, if I were there, I would be having, you know, having pitchforks and torches go, drive them into the ground. And I'd probably talk like that because that's a Northwest Florida accent, Willie.

But the fact is, William Wallace. Democrats, nobody can change this fact. No podcaster can change this fact. Nobody can change the fact that Democrats won this shutdown. You look at Donald Trump's disapproval ratings and the CNN poll and other polls higher than it's ever been before. Right track, wrong track. Only one third of Americans think this country's going in the right direction. Two thirds think it's going in the wrong direction. You just keep going down the list, Willie. You look at the election returns last Tuesday, which are the most accurate polls there are. There's cross sections of Americans, whether they're on the East Coast or the West Coast, whether they're in Los Angeles, California, or Bucks County, Pennsylvania, whether they're in New York County, Virginia,

or whether they're in Sycoccus, New Jersey, or in Brooklyn, New York, a wide cross-section of Americans, and they gave Republicans their worst thumping in a very long time. So Donald Trump can say, nothing to see here, move along, move along, like the Sheriff and the Simpsons. But Americans understand there is something deeply wrong with this government. And while they're struggling to pay rising costs, whether it's for food, whether it's for heating their homes in the winter, whatever it is. Donald Trump is knocking down the White House and talking about grand ballrooms. He's pardoning crypto billionaires who have gotten his family rich. He's doing deals, bailouts with Argentina, 20 to 40 billion.

dollar bailouts for Argentina. And he's like bringing even more cows in from Argentina. We all love Evita. We all love the musical. We all hope it goes from the West End to Broadway. But the obsession. Yeah, I can't wait to see her go out and sing, don't cry for me, Argentina. It's going to be beautiful. That said, like, it's so discordant with where Americans are right now that if Republicans, especially House Republicans in swing districts, have any sense about them at all, they're going to be very worried and they're going to make sure that they're able to vote to help their constituents when that chance comes up on making their health care costs a little less prohibitive. And it really was stunning last night. We'll play more of it to hear President Trump

saying to many of his own voters, as a matter of fact, this idea that you can't afford your own life anymore is a con job. It's a hoax. I'm telling you that you're wrong about your own life. As you say, that's not a subjective question for people. That's, I can't pay the rent. I can't afford a house. And maybe in some cases, you're taking away my food assistance and my benefits. So we talked about Democrats not pleased with the way this went down last night. Senate Minority, their Chuck Schumer facing intense backlash from his own party over that deal to end the shutdown. Schumer did vote against the measure, but Democrats are blaming him for failing to keep the party unified. On social media, Congressman Rokana wrote,

Schumer is no longer effective and should be replaced. If you can't lead the fight to stop health care premiums from skyrotting for Americans, what will you fight for? Congressman Seth Moulton also called for new leadership, arguing Schumer should have held the line on health care. The Office of California Governor Gavin Newsom, of course, widely considered a 2028 presidential contender, also criticized the shutdown compromise, writing, this is not a deal. It is a surrender. Allie Vitale, you know it's bad for Chuck Schumer when the New York Post is putting you side by side with fired Giants head coach Brian Dable. This is the true confluence of my interests, actually. Yes, it is.

Me too, as a matter of fact. So, Allie, can you just explain what about this deal to end the shutdown with the defection of those seven Democrats plus Angus King and Independent? What about this has so riled Democrats? The fact that even though Schumer voted no, Willie, he also was apprised of these negotiations throughout their entirety. And I think that's the thing that I heard consistently yesterday talking to Senator Shaheen and others, the fact that she was clear about the fact that from the day that they

began negotiating, which was actually day one, of the official government shutdown, she was keeping Schumer aware and a prize. And what I've heard from progressives is that they felt that even when they had data that showed that they were winning, that if they held the line, they could just get something. The reality that Shaheen and King kept coming up against was that Republicans told them early on, an ACA negotiation or vote during a shutdown is an absolute non-starter. It's a red line. And that's why they pushed ahead. But what progressives had told me, Susan, is that they felt that Schumer was negotiating from a place of, well, the mods are going to have a low threshold for pain in enduring this. So what will

the left be willing to give up? And I think that's always been the complaint about him is that he's looking for people to air their grievances, but that ultimately he wants a deal that is center left, which of course will always anger progressives. Do you think that he ends up enduring this, outlasting it? At the end of the day, it is hard to get rid of a party leader like this. Well, midterm, yes. Exactly. But is he in trouble for the next time around, I think? for sure. You know, if you remember way back to last Tuesday, when Democrats were feeling so good about the results of the off-year elections, we saw the seeds for what was happening this week, which is this division between the most progressive Democrats about hanging tough, taking the pain, not giving in, and centrist Democrats, who felt like the pain had gotten too big and that you were never going to win on this health care debate. So this is the Democratic Party. It's energized in some ways, but it's also has not yet resolve what direction the Democratic Party should go. And it still does not have the kind of leadership in Congress or elsewhere that Democrats broadly trust to kind of pull things together

and to follow with a consistent and coherent strategy. But isn't that sort of the question, right? Like, what was ever going to be enough for Democrats? Yeah. Well, the Democratic Party brand right now is dirt. And so it's easy for everybody on the left and on the center to attack Chuck Schumer because it gives them a way to distance themselves from this brand. And then, I think the other thing is, is that Chuck Schumer, to an extent, has become a stand-in for the gerontocracy that governs the Democratic Party. And so there is this displaced rage that comes back from everything that happened at the end of the Joe Biden presidency that is now being visited on Chuck Schumer.

And then the other thing that's happening is that there are, as Susan points out, these internecine democratic wars. And so there are a lot of progressives in the party who dislike Schumerner. Schumer's position on Gaza. They dislike his position on any number of issues. And so even if, you know, this was inevitable and even if Schumer did vote no, this becomes a mechanism for forcing that ideological fight. Hey, John Lemire, we do need to wait to see the next polls that come out about what Americans think about Democrats. Americans like winners.

Democrats right now are winners. That's the thing. Again, I've been there. I can tell you when you're on the hill and they're like government shutdowns and the government shutdowns end or there's a CR or something and people go, Americans will never forget how we betrayed them on this clean CR. And then you walk outside and like, nobody cares. They just don't care. What Americans are going to remember this week is the fact that Democrats,

won a massive victory in New Jersey. In fact, they were the first party since the 1960s to win the governorship three elections in a row. In Virginia, one of the biggest wins by a Democratic gubernatorial candidate in decades, massive, a massive victory. And Republicans were wiped out across the state of Virginia. As we've said, probably the most heinous stories that have come out in this election came from the Attorney General candidate in Virginia, and he's still won. And this is not a good thing in my eyes. I'm just saying, though, the Democratic brand was so powerful this past week that, you know, swept him over the finish line. will reopening the government, will making sure the airlines run smoothly over Thanksgiving

so people can have their families come home? Will getting food assistance started back up to the poorest and the most truly deserving Americans? Will that make people turn against the Democratic Party after huge victories last week? No, no, it won't. But I will tell you what, continue to infighting in the party? That will. Like if they got a problem with each other,

They don't need to tweet it. They need to do what we used to do in the Republican caucus room and go down to HC5 and yell at each other at the top of our lungs. And then you go outside and, you know, you stand shoulder to shoulder for the most part. That's what Democrats need to do right now. They don't need to have all of this infighting. They need to focus on the future. And the next fight that's coming in December. And Jonathan, the next fight that's coming in December is going to favor them.

because by that time, we're going to have all these health care premiums going up. So that'll be the state of play the next time a government shutdown comes into effect, and they'll be in a stronger position than they were even this time. Yeah, there's no question. There's a lot of anger in the party right now at what happened. We shouldn't overlook that. But as I wrote in the Atlantic last night, there was a sense that this is how the shutdown was always going to end. And what Schumer, I'm told, has been telling people privately,

is that yes, he voted no and he recognizes that people are disappointed that this deal came to be. But he is saying, defending himself, hey, I held Democrats together through the election, that there were some senators who wanted to bail on this prior to the election, take a deal, open up the government again. Schumer's telling people his allies privately, hey, I was able to keep us together through that Tuesday, and the shutdown was an advantage to us as voters went to the polls. So he's defending that. And Willie, he is, as Joe says, saying, this sets us up better for. for the future. There are, even though there are some disappointment now, there are battles to come

and we're in better shape for them. It should be an interesting day for you, Ali Vitale, up on Capitol Hill, MSNBC Senior Capitol Hill reporter, Ali. Thanks so much. We appreciate it. Up next with polls showing the economy, top of mind for many Americans, Steve Ratner joins us with charts on how the Trump administration is falling short on the issue of affordability. A word President Trump said last night he doesn't want to hear anymore. And as we go to break, a check on this morning's travelers' forecast from our new partners at AccuWeather. Slippery roads this morning across central and western parts of Pennsylvania due to lake effects snows windy in Boston.

Your acuether exclusive forecast, New York City, 42 degrees with the flurry and acuether real field temperatures in the 30s all day. The southeast cold start, but with sunshine, it's not going to be as cold. If you're doing any traveling, wind will cause problems in Boston, New York City, and Philadelphia looks great in Atlanta. to help you make the best decisions and be more in the know, make sure to download the Accuather app today. It was a con job, affordability, they call it, was a con job by the Democrats.

The Democrats are good at a few things, cheating on elections and conning people with facts that are true. They said, oh, I don't want to talk about affordability. The reason I don't want to talk about affordability is because everybody knows that it's far less expensive under Trump than it was under Sleepy Joe Biden and the prices that we're dead. That's President Trump on Friday calling the Democratic Party's focus on affordability, a quote con job.

Democrats swept last week's nationwide elections. The president also said in a Fox News interview yesterday that, quote, costs are way down and talk of rising prices, again, a con job by the Democrats. Join us now, former Treasury official. Morning Joe Economic analyst, Steve Ratner, to help us sort through all this. Steve, good morning. So let's get right into your first chart. Shows a big shift in voter mood when it comes to the president's performance on the economy.

What do the numbers say? Yeah, let's just set the stage. for discussing what the numbers on the economy really are by talking about what Trump's numbers really are and whether the Americans think that it's a con job or not. So if you go back to the first term before in October of 2017, you've found that he had a 37% overall approval rating, but he actually had a higher approval rating for his handling of the economy than his overall one by seven points. He had a 44% approval rating for his handling the economy. But now he's got a 41% overall approval rating, slightly higher, but let's just call it within

the margin of error difference. But his approval rating for the handling economy is actually down to 37 percent. And his disapproval rating for his handling the economy is up to 62%. So he can't, he can talk about a con job all he wants, but the American public is not happy with the way he's handling his economy. Why are they not happening? We're going to go through a bunch of reasons, but let's just start with the big picture. If you go all the way back to the COVID era and you look at growth of spending by personal income group, in other words, by your income level, and you compare it to inflation, what you find is that most Americans are below the top 20%, so the bottom 40, the middle class, and the middle class all have only barely kept up with inflation as measured

by the CPI. There are other measures of inflation. The Ludwig Institute just put out one using what they think people actually buy that show people falling farther behind. But the best you say is that people have barely kept up for the last five years unless you're in the top 20%, in which case you're up 49%. Income inequality has gotten worse. Wage increases have diverged, and you have what we call a wealth effect, that these people participate in the stock market more heavily. 87% of all the stocks owned by individuals are now owned by this top 20%, and that's up about 10 percentage points from a few years ago. So Steve, as we move to your second chart, part of his historically feeling like you're doing okay in this country is your ability to buy a home for

yourself, for your family. Homes, though, for many people have just gotten too expensive. There's a staggering statistic you have that since the pandemic, home prices are up more than 50 percent. That's just in the last couple of years. Yeah, exactly. And we saw during the pandemic, everybody rushed to buy a house. Prices were relatively low. Interest rates were close to zero. And it was affordable. So back in here, all the way through to 2023, a typical house, average house in America sells for about $415,000 plus or minus. The average monthly payments were something like $1,000. You combine that 53% increase in house prices with interest rates that are now four, five, six percent, depending upon how long a mortgage, how good a credit, and you see that

it's more than doubled. So literally in a few years, the cost of owning a house has doubled for a typical American. And so what has that done? Not surprisingly, and I know Mike Barnacle has talked about this before, it has dramatically changed the age of home buyers, and particularly first-time home buyers. So these are repeat buyers, average age 62, all buyers average age 59. But when you look at first-time home buyers, where it was sort of ticking along in the low 30 to 31 years old, it's now jumped up to 40. So people are having to wait another 7, 8, 9, 10 years to be able to afford their first home. And obviously, that makes people. really, really unhappy. And you put this all together with now the third chart, which is the labor

market slowing down. If you don't have the job you want or a job that pays you what you need to buy a home, it all comes together here in the end. Yes. And so the other thing worrying people are jobs. We don't haven't had official jobs numbers for a couple of months because of the shutdown, but all the private data suggests that we're creating very few jobs at the moment. And so what does that mean? Our unemployment rate overall has ticked up slightly. It's been going up a little bit to 4.2 percent, but that's still considered a very acceptable number, very good number. But what's happened more dramatically is the youth, well, I'll call the youth unemployment rate, people 20 to 24. Now, that rate is always higher, not because they're in school, those people aren't counted,

but because they're out there looking for their first job and getting settled in the labor before. So it's traditionally higher, but it's now at 9.2%. And you can see it's shot up. It's much higher. It's got up much faster than down here. There's a bunch of reasons for it. Companies aren't hiring as much. We can talk about the impact of AI potentially on this, but it's gone to 9.2%. That is the highest. It's all the way back here in 2016. And when you put all that together into like, how are people feeling? And this is a data that came out just the other day, so just slightly after the election. Consumer sentiment done by the University of Michigan, what do you find there? You find there that consumers, good feelings about the economy,

they're feeling about spending, is now the second lowest that's been since they started this study way back in 1978. The only time it was just a tiny bit lower was June of 1920, when we had that spur of inflation. It hit about 9%. And interestingly, back here in 1980, when inflation was 15%, people weren't even as pessimistic as they were in 2022 or as they are now when inflation is down to 3%. So you can talk about, you can try to, you know, pretend it doesn't exist, but people are really, really unhappy with the state of the economy, and they do think affordability is a huge problem, and they don't think it's a con job. So, Steve, as you were mentioning inflation there at the end, I know it's not one of your charts, but just to kind of talk to President

Trump when he says life is much more inexpensive now than it was under Joe Biden with inflation. What is the truth about the trend of inflation through the Biden years now into the second Trump administration? So the truth about inflation is it went up a lot during COVID. We all know that. It peaked at about 9%. And then it's been coming down steadily, steadily, steady, steadily. And by every measure, it's around 3% right now. 3%. It can be a little bit higher. You can find some grocery item like meat that's gone up a lot in the last year. You can also find things that haven't gone up as much. Put it all together, it's 3%. It's a bit above the president's target of 2%. It doesn't create a lot of real purchasing

power for people when it's at 3%. But it is still rising at a solid 3% every year. They're not going down. All right, morning Joe, economic analyst. Steve Ratner, as always, thank you so much. greatly appreciate it. Frank, let's just talk about the state of the situation. Again, we've been talking about the Democratic Party. They had their best week probably in a year and a half, maybe two years last week. And I will say, even though there's some infighting in Washington, D.C., among Democrats, and of course, there's not among Republicans, because, well, the House hasn't been in session for weeks and weeks and weeks. don't work. But good news keeps coming in for the Democrats. Last night, just minutes before

a midnight deadline, Utah judge, Judge Gibson threw out gerrymandered Republican congressional map and has put in place two options for the legislature to take up. And both of those options actually give Democrats one seat around Salt Lake City. So they had been completely shut out by Republican gerrymandering. But while Democrats were sleeping last night, they just picked up another congressional seat for next year's election. Things do seem to be breaking their way. Right. Even when they're sleeping, things go their way. I think also just thinking about what Steve just presented and what we've been talking about all morning. I mean, we've seen this story before where you have a would-be dictator cocooned in their gilded palace who is, who comes to

attach from the fact that the peasants can't buy bread. And I think that the populist case for going after Donald Trump for being out of touch with what's happening when he describes everything that Americans are experiencing on a daily basis as a con job while he's focused on demolishing the White House, the east wing of the White House, in order to build this extravagant ballroom paid for by his billionaire friends. It's hard to come up with a populist script that adheres so close to reality, and that has the potential for unifying Democrats. I mean, I look at Democrats, and there are these ideological divides between the center left,

which is more focused on this abundance agenda, and then the Sanders' populist wing of the party, which is focused on going hard after oligarchy and monopolist and the like. And even though there's a lot of structural differences between those two programs, in the end, they're focused on essentially the same thing. And Trump provides this unifying theme that is able to bridge the differences between those two dissonant wings of the party. We should see. Again, I don't understand. when you're claiming there's no problem with affordability and that that's a hoax.

I don't know what the campaign slogan will be for Republicans in 2020. Maybe it's let them eat Patagonian beef for Buenos Aires beef. I don't know. We shall see Staff Ryder at the Atlantic on this morning of the Thousand Atlantic stars. Frank Four, thank you so much for being with us. And when we come back, we're going to be digging into reporting from New York Times on Trump supporters who've been pardoned and then go on to commit more crimes. What a shock. Criminals committing more crimes. Investigative reporter Michael Smith joins us next on Morning Jam. Nothing more to say.

My picture of the White House, 6.52 in the morning. A new report from New York Times is highlighting the way President Trump's handling of pardons and commutations has allowed some convicts to allegedly commit more crimes. Case in point, a federal judge in Brooklyn yesterday announced Jonathan Braun sentenced him to 27 months in prison after the convicted felon violated the rules of his release by assaulting a nanny, swinging an IV pole at a nurse, and dodging tolls in luxury cars. Braun originally pleaded guilty to drug trafficking and money laundering in 2011. The Times reports that in 2021, Braun's family used a connection to President Trump's son-in-law, Jared Kushner, to obtain a commutation.

According to the Times, Braun is at least the eighth convict that Trump granted clemency to during his first term, who since has been charged with a crime. Join us now. One of the co-authors of that piece, New York Times, investigative reporter Michael Schmidt. Mike, good morning. So we're just talking about commutations from the first term, because obviously in this second term, right out of the gate, we saw that Donald Trump effectively emptied the prisons of the January 6th convicts. We've seen some alleged crimes there as well. What did you focus on in this report? Well, so this is a guy that we've been tracking for five years. The last day of Trump's first term, I got a phone call from someone I've known for a long time, says, you're never. never going to believe that Trump commuted the sentence of this guy. This was, he was the largest marijuana dealer in New York City, but he was a money launderer. He was someone who had fled the

country when he came under scrutiny by the government. He was smuggled into Canada. He had gone to Israel. He had come back. He had a violent history. He had a history of using violence against the people that worked for him. And he had received this commutation. And at the time, we were like, holy cow we were still like a little innocent in the way we looked at at clemency and we were like this is crazy that this person would receive a commutation and what happens is is that he goes back into the world and just returns to a life of violence that that was absolutely extraordinary he was arrested at least five times it wasn't until he had beaten was accused of beating a child accused of beating a nanny, that he was arrested again and actually held behind bars.

The government finally went to court and asked a judge to determine whether he had violated the terms of his release because his sentence had been commuted, but he was still on supervised release. And the judge found that he did, and he's now been sentenced to 27 months in prison. So he's back in prison. Mike, how did he get the commutation? I mean, what was the connection? there must have been some connection. So he hired Alan Dershowitz, who wrote a letter on his behalf to the president. And he had gone to a school in New Jersey that the Kushner kids had gone to that had a tie to

the Kushner family. And they had the father, his father, Jonathan Brown's father, had reached out to the Kushner family to try and get the application before the president. And when his sentence was commuted in 2021, even the announcement of his commutation was inaccurate. It overstated the amount of time he had already been in prison. And in the course of reporting on this in the past several years, we were able to figure out that because the Trump White House in the first term didn't follow the normal process of going through pardons and commutations and not checking with the Justice Department, they had actually dealt damage to an ongoing SDNY investment. investigation because Jonathan Brown was in prison in 2020 and SDNY was trying to build a case

against the what's called the Merchant Cash Advanced Business, which is basically a business that makes small usurious loans to small businesses. And they were trying to get him to flip. They were trying to get him out of prison to get him to cooperate and use him in a prosecution against this business. And what happened was is that when Trump committed a sentence, the government lost all their leverage on him. And then he never cooperated in the investigation went nowhere. So, Michael, obviously, an extraordinary story. You just mentioned how the first term the Trump administration wasn't adhering to the normal process. I think it's safe to say in the second term, they're doing the same. Walk us through how best you understand they're doing it now,

where we have these broad-based pardons like the January 6th, right, as President Trump took office, but even in the last couple of days, these election deniers, the election deniers, these 20-20, De Giuliani, Sidney Powell and the like, you know, yes, some say this largely symbolic, but clearly message being sent. Yeah. So whatever they did in the first term is basically on steroids in the second term. It's more in your face. It's more blanketed. It, you know, obviously the moves right out of the gate on January 6th to commute all of those sentences. And when we're talking about people that have gotten into trouble since they were commuted, we use this number of eight people since the first term. We're not talking about those people from January 6 that have been pardoned, that have gone on. to do wrongdoing. That number is larger as well. You have these preemptive pardons that came out the other day for those that helped to try and overturn the 2020 election. It obviously insulates those people. It also signals to people around Trump that if you're to do this around another

election, we'll look out for you. And look, it doesn't change anything at the state level. the lot of those individuals still face state charges in different states across the country for what they've done. But I think as we've seen, the state charges don't necessarily hold the umph that the federal charges potentially hold and they don't move as quickly. So, you know, I guess that's where we are. Do you know whether prior to his receiving the commutation, the Kushner family or Alan Dershowitz ever met with him? I don't think that Alan Dershowitz met with him.

And I don't think the Kushner family met with him. So you just write a letter without ever having met him? He said that Jonathan Braun's father would call him and would essentially, you know, cry to him about the fact that his son was in prison and that Alan Dershowitz was very moved by this. And I've seen the letter that he wrote to the White House about Jonathan Braun. It's pretty bare bones. The thing is, look, pardon's in common.

mutations happen in a lot of administrations, right? People usually don't like them. People don't, there's people that get pardons and commutations and previous administrations run into problems down the road. These, like, it's not like even in normal times, someone who receives a commutation may go on to commit a crime. The thing about Jonathan Braun from the beginning that we were always struck by is that he was just a very unusual candidate for clemency.

So, like, you know, there are people that, that the government of the president ultimately determines, like, okay, this person should probably not be in prison, you know, for 30 years for this drug crime. But the thing about Braun was that there was such a documented history of violence. This wasn't a nonviolent offender. This is someone that it's in the court records. You didn't need to be some great investigative reporter or legal beagle to look at the docket and see all these things. So with all this stuff out in the open at the time in 2021, we're like, oh, my gosh, we can't believe this person received clemency. And then in the years that followed, it just kept on happening again and again.

And he kept on getting in trouble. And we kept on writing stories that, oh, this guy's been arrested again. He's been arrested again. But the justice department and the judge still didn't do anything. It wasn't until he was arrested a fifth time. And to no benefit of President Trump, we know about all the January 6th stuff because he's trying to whitewash what happened that day and protect his legacy or change the story. But there was no benefit to President Trump commuting this guy's sentence, was there? It was just he got a list in front of him and said, go ahead and do it. The problem is, is that when you wield pardons and commutations the way that you do, like Trump does, I can't sit here and say, I don't know what the benefit is to him,

because you can't accept what they do at face value. Like, there have been reports about other people that have made donations, that have paid lawyers exorbitant fees to get their cases before the president. So when you do this and you act in this way and you hand them out like that, you say to me, well, there's no benefit to Trump. Well, I don't know that. And this is coming off the 60 Minutes interviewer said, I didn't even know the crypto billionaire. Yeah. Correct. Never heard his name. Don't even know. Pardon him. You're telling me for the first time. Pardon him, but. you're telling me. But I don't think was that in this, was that in what they played or was that

in the transcript? No, they played. No, they played that. Yeah, they played that. I don't know the guy. I don't know. They played that one. Fascinating piece. It's available online, New York Times investigative reporter Michael Schmidt. Good to see, Mike. Thanks as always.