Morning Wire - Inflation Blame Game & Maverick Tops Box Office | 6.1.22

Episode Date: June 1, 2022

President Biden shifts his messaging on the economy and inflation, Clinton campaign lawyer Michael Sussman is acquitted, and Top Gun: Maverick breaks box office records. Get the facts first on Morning Wire. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

President Biden shifts his messaging on the economy and inflation. How will the White House tackle pocketbook issues like rising food and fuel prices? And will it change voter opinion of his handling of the job? Unfortunately, the prescriptions that he has teed up aren't really going to fix the problem. I think they could make inflation even worse. I'm Daily Wire editor-in-chief John Bickley with Georgia Howl. It's Wednesday, June 1st, and this is Morning Wire. The first test of John Durham's investigation into the origins of the debunk.

Russia collusion narrative ends in acquittal for a Clinton campaign lawyer. We discussed the key evidence and why Durham's case against Michael Sussman came up short. And Top Gun Maverick soars into the box office record books. To have an audience respond that way, it's just a dream. That's what I want. What led to Tom Cruise's biggest box office success? Thanks for waking up with Morning Wire. Stay tuned. We have the news you need to know. Grilling season is officially upon us. And if you're looking for the perfect cuts this year, you should check out Good Ranchers.

Good Ranchers is the place to get American beef, chicken, and seafood this summer. Good Ranchers is giving away two free ribbyes, a $100 value, to Morning Wire listeners for a limited time only. That's right, go to good ranchers.com slash wire to get two 18-ounce prime center-cut ribbyes free with your order. As record high inflation and gas prices continue to drive President Biden's approval rating to new lows, the White House has launched a month-long campaign to shift the national conversation on the economy.

Here with more on the messaging shift and how the president will look to regain support among voters dismayed by his handling of the economy is Daily Wire's senior editor, Cabot Phillips. Cabot messaging shifts for the White House aren't rare, but this one stands out. What's different here? Yeah, this is a bit different.

Presidents do often look to control messaging on key issues, but what makes this case unique is just how blatant the White House has been with their intentions. Multiple administration officials have signaled this week. They're aware that the state of the economy is costing them support ahead of the midterms, and they want to shift the conversation. So there's been some clear signals from the White House about the urgency on this issue.

Very clear. It started Monday with an op-ed in the Wall Street Journal from President Biden, touting what he called the most robust economic recovery in modern history. In that op-ed, he said he wouldn't meddle with the Fed, but then yesterday met with Fed Chair Jerome Powell and Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen to discuss record inflation. And then it was announced that throughout the week, members of the president's cabinet will be making more than 20 appearances on cable networks, pushing the new White House message on the economy. So bottom line, after months of being on the defensive as the economy struggles, look for them to really shift to more of an offensive standpoint this week. So what can we expect that messaging to sound like? Well, the main message

is going to be that President Biden is helping not hurting the economy. And also that things are actually much better than they appear. That's what they'll be claiming at least. They'll be pointing to the 8 million jobs added since he took office, as well as the strong job market and relatively low unemployment as signs that things aren't as bad as most people think they are. To give you a better idea of how they're portraying the economy and rising inflation, here's White House Economic Advisor Brian Dees on CNBC. The economy we have right now is in a transition from this period of historic economic growth to a period that can be more stable, resilient growth. That requires focusing on inflation and doing so

from a position of relative strength. But critics say that message of economic strength is misleading, given that our economy shrank last quarter for the first time in years, and there are also fears that's going to shrink again, a second quarter in a row, which, as we talked on the show, would be a recession. And also, the stock market is down considerably on the year. They've also pointed out that of the 8 million jobs added during Biden's first term, the vast majority were jobs that had been erased during COVID and simply came back when lockdowns were left it. So not really creating new jobs, but just restoring old ones. Exactly. That is an important distinction. And many economists say it's a bit disingenuous to take credit for,

creating jobs that had already existed before. They also point out that while the federal deficit is being brought down, as Biden has pointed out, the main reason here is that COVID relief spending is no longer necessary, so government spending is down as a result, meaning the deficit is shrinking. But again, critics say it's a bit misleading to take credit for that as well. To that point, I talked to Brandon Arnold, the executive vice president of the National Taxpayers Union. This administration hasn't done anything to reduce the deficit. They're taking credit for trillions of dollars in spending that have just fallen off the books

because that was what was in statute. That was what was planned by the Congress and the previous president. What they've tried to do is spend trillions of dollars more. They've tried to spend more in the way of the buildback better plan, which would have absolutely exploded the deficit. And what about the timing here? What does the timing of this shift in messaging tell us?

More than anything, it tells us the White House is just deeply aware of how much frustration is built up among voters when it comes to the economy. We've talked on the show about how 8 and 10 Americans say the president is not doing enough to combat inflation while a similar number say the country is heading in the wrong direction. And with midterms, just five months away now, this is part of them trying to stop the bleeding, politically speaking. The timing also has to do with the fact that now that it's summer,

economic problems are just being felt more personally. More Americans are driving, so gas prices are felt on a more regular basis. And as vacation season picks up, more Americans are feeling the price spike on flights and hotels, which are both 30% more expensive than last summer. And as a result, 58% of Americans in one recent poll said they've changed their vacation plans. Well, we'll have to see if any of this stops that downward trend, the president's seeing in the polls. Cabot, thanks for the reporting. Any time. That's Daily Wire's Senior Editor, Cabot Phillips.

Coming up, a lawyer for Hillary Clinton's 2016 presidential campaign is acquitted. This show was sponsored by Indeed. Indeed is the hiring platform where you can attract interview and hire all in one place. Start now with a $75-sponsored job credit to upgrade your job. job post at Indeed.com slash wire. Offer good for a limited time. Indeed.com slash wire. Terms and conditions apply. Pay per qualified applicant not available for all users. Need to hire, you need indeed. A DC jury acquitted former Clinton campaign attorney Michael Sussman on Tuesday. Sussman was charged with intentionally misleading the FBI ahead at the 2016 election by claiming

not to be acting on behalf of the Clinton campaign and a tech executive. During the meeting, Sussman gave then FBI General Counsel James Baker supposed evidence of a secret back channel between the Trump Organization and Russia's Alpha Bank. Sussman's trial was the first major courtroom test of Durham's investigation into the origins of the Trump-Russia collusion narrative. Here to talk about the verdict and recap the trial is Daily Wire's Tim Pierce. So, Tim, is this the end of the Durham investigation? Thanks, Georgia.

It's unclear how this not guilty verdict will affect Durham's larger investigation, but it definitely is a setback. The special counsel issued a prepared statement after the verdict, saying, while we are disappointed in the outcome, we respect the jury's decision. Sussman, of course, celebrated his victory in a statement from the courthouse steps. I told the truth to the FBI, and the jury clearly recognized that. Now, do we have any information right now about what swayed the jury? Not yet. First off, there's a lot of confusion around what Sussman was actually charged with. He's charged with lying to the FBI during one specific meeting. But legally,

lying to the FBI is only a felony if the lie is germane to a relevant investigation. The defense argued that the FBI was aware that Sussman was a partisan, and they factored that knowledge into their handling of his information. So even though Sussman falsely presented himself as a private citizen not connected to any political campaign, the FBI knew otherwise. It's also important to note that the scope of the charge was pretty narrow. It only included communication that occurred during one specific meeting, whereas some of the false information was communicated via text message before that meeting. The statute of limitations for the crime had already passed when prosecutors obtained those text messages, though,

so they couldn't add them to the indictment, which weakened their case. The prosecution also expressed concern that the jury would struggle to separate their own partisan leanings when they were evaluating this case. Right. The prosecution had concerns from the start about their ability to convict a Clinton ally in D.C. Keep in mind, the jury polls coming from a jurisdiction that voted more than 90% for Clinton. And in fact, there was evidence that the jurors largely favored Hillary Clinton over Donald Trump politically. The jury's political leanings shouldn't matter in a criminal trial, but people are human. And we do know that at least one juror said that they would try their best to be unbiased, but acknowledge that it would be difficult. D.C. is also a really small world, so it is difficult to find jury members that don't have interpersonal connections with people associated with political campaigns.

For example, at least one juror discovered after jury selection that her daughter played on the same high school sports team with a daughter of the defendant. But the judge allowed her to remain on the case despite protests from prosecutors. All that said, legal analyst at the National Review, Andrew McCarthy, had doubts about Sussman being convicted. Here's his analysis from before the verdict. He's confident that the case is going in his direction. And it's odd to say that under circumstances where the proof is overwhelming that the statement was false. But there's a difference between the statement being false and the FBI being fooled by. it. And I think the statement at this point is better understood as a kind of a cover story

so that the FBI could take information or feel comfortable taking information that was obviously political opposition research. So what the Sussman defense, I think, has been able to show is the government has big trouble trying to prove the materiality of the false statement, which is an essential element of it, because the FBI really wasn't fooled. and because they went to great lengths to conceal the fact that they had accepted information from a partisan political source. All right. Well, Tim, thanks so much for breaking that down for us. No problem. That was Daily Wires, Tim Pierce.

Top Gun Maverick, the sequel to the 1986 action hit, debuted to a stunning $156 million in the box office this past weekend. This marks a record for star Tom Cruise. The film also took the record for the highest Memorial Day opening of all time, surpassing 2007's Pirates of the Caribbean at World's End. Here to discuss what made Maverick such a success and what that success tells us about the mood in Hollywood as Daily Wire reporter, Megan Basham. So, Megan, I guess this proves that it's actually possible

to get people to come to theaters for something other than superheroes. It does, it really does. But you have to say, in this case, Maverick is kind of a superhero when he's flying those planes. So maybe this, yeah, maybe this falls into that category a little bit. But the other thing we can note here is just how much pent-up demand was on display for this film. First, from people who've been wanting to see a sequel to Top Gun for 36 years, but also from the production and COVID delays the movie experienced.

So it was first supposed to hit theaters in the summer of 2019, but it was delayed so the team could work on those phenomenal aerial sequences. But then the pandemic also pushed it first to December 2020, then July 2021, then July 2021, then. November 2021. At one point, there was actually talk about it being released to streaming, but Star Tom Cruise promised that that was never going to happen. He said it was going to be the big screen or nothing for Maverick, and I'm sure he's feeling very good about that decision right now. Yeah, I'm sure he is. Looking at audience reaction, it seems like a lot of people agree it was totally worth the wait. Oh yeah, absolutely. The cinema score for this movie is just through the roof. Now, if you're not familiar with the cinema score, that's a rating based on exit polls of audience

members. Maverick earned the first A-plus grade of 2022. So what that means is that audiences liked it more than a number of other very big releases this year, including the latest Marvel movie, Dr. Strange and the Multiverse of Madness, and the Batman. All right, so Megan, you're also a film critic. You saw the movie before it came out. You've written a review that's linked over on Rotten Tomatoes for fun. What was your opinion of Maverick? I'll say that when I came out of my press screening early last week, I was pretty sure that it was going to put up some really big numbers, and not just because it offers incredible fan service, which it absolutely does, but also because, you know, pardon the pun, it does fire on all cylinders. The action sequences

are mind-blowing. It's got a great cast. And, you know, noteworthy for me, there's nothing politically divisive here. This really, very much like the original movie, was fairly patriotic. It celebrates America's military skill. And related to that, I'll just note that before Maverick came out, it made some fairly negative headlines when some footage showed that Paramount had swapped out a couple of patches on Maverick's iconic jacket, specifically the Japanese and Taiwanese flag patches. Those had been replaced with something sort of generic that a lot of people took as a bid not to offend China. Well, that offended a lot of Americans. Paramount seemed to hear that outcry, because when you see the movie now,

the original flag patches, they're back in. So to me, that's the latest proof that maybe the era of studios bending over backwards to make Xi Jinping happy is coming to an end. Yeah, it looks that way, and I'm sure a lot of Americans

are cheering that. Speaking of cheering, we resist giving our opinions much on this show, but full disclosure, I watched Maverick this weekend. I came in with super high expectations. Totally surpass them.

It's just terrific. That's a very hot, I know. I'm risking a lot here. Thanks, Megan. Anytime. That was Daily Wire Culture Reporter, Megan Basham. Thanks for listening to Morning Wire. We created this show to bring more balance to the national conversation. If you love our show and you stand with our mission, please consider subscribing, leaving us a five-star rating, and most importantly, sharing our podcast with a friend. That's all the time we've got this morning. Thanks for waking up with us. We'll be back tomorrow

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