The Journal. - Red, White and Who? Foreign Policy and the Rise of Donald Trump Jr.

Episode Date: October 11, 2024

Ryan Knutson and Molly Ball explore what we know about both candidates’ approach to foreign policy. Plus, Molly shares what she learned about the future of MAGA from an interview with Donald Trump Jr. and JD Vance. Further Listening: - Red, White and Who? Playlist  - Red, White and Who? Veep Veep! All Eyes on Vance and Walz  - Red, White and Who? It's Always the Economy!  Further Reading: - How Donald Trump Jr. Became the Crown Prince of MAGA World  - JD Vance’s Version of Trump Is Better Than the Real Thing  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

We are only about three weeks away from the election, which is kind of mind boggling. And everything keeps getting busier, like more and more stuff is happening. It feels like there's more and more headlines and more and more stuff that I want to discuss with you. So I thought we could just start off with sort of a rapid fire. I want to get your very quick one sentence take on several news items of the week. Wow. Speed drill. Let's do it. Speed drill. Exactly.

All right. So Kamala Harris's campaign says it's received more than a billion dollars in donations since she entered the race 80 days ago. That is a lot of money in a short period of time, and that's why if you live in a swing state, you cannot escape the Kamala Harris ads. Tim Walz said the electoral college needs to go. A lot of Democrats certainly agree with him after they keep, you know, winning the popular vote

and losing or almost losing elections. And actually a majority of Americans agree with him as well. Alright, Donald Trump went back to the site of his first assassination attempt in Butler, Pennsylvania with Elon Musk. Elon says he is dark maga and he is jumping for joy at the thought of Trump being president. We sure are not in 2016 anymore. Back then, Elon was a Democrat. And in other Elon Musk news, his pro-Trump America pack is offering people $47 if they successfully get one registered voter in a swing state to

sign a petition supporting the first and second amendments of the Constitution. This is apparently legal, surprisingly enough. You can't pay people to register to vote, but you can pay people to refer others. So he's cleverly found a way to offer people this register to vote, but you can pay people to refer others. So he's cleverly found a way to offer people this reward to bring in new voters. And finally, local businesses say they don't want candidates to stop at their establishments anymore because the country is too polarized and it turns off half their customers. This is what we've come to, right?

It's not even a nice thing to get attention for having a political candidate visit you. It's just too much trouble. It is. All right. Let's get to it. From the Journal, this is Red, White and Who. Our show about the road to the White House. I'm Ryan Knudsen.

And I'm Molly Ball. It's Friday, October 11th. Coming up on the show, foreign policy, the war in Gaza, and the rising power of Donald Trump Jr. You let him try violin because you love him. And if you love him that much, love him enough to make sure he's buckled up and in the back seat. Find out more at NHTSA.gov slash the right seat. Brought to you by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration and the Ad Council. So I wanted to talk a lot today about foreign policy.

And I wanted to start out by talking about the conflict in the Middle East. October 7th was just a few days ago, the one year anniversary of the Hamas attacks on Israel. Since then, tens of thousands of people have been killed in Gaza. Israel is fighting now with Hezbollah in Lebanon. And we've seen Iran firing missiles directly into Israel. How are the candidates talking about this conflict, which seems to only be getting worse? Well, they are both saying that they want to bring it to an end, of course. And they are both, in broad broad terms taking Israel's side.

But I think you have a very different approach to the conflict from the different candidates. Trump talks about allowing Israel to, quote, finish the job. We have to be able to get it done and get it done properly and get back to a wonderful, beautiful way of life. You have to be able to do it. You have to finish what you began and you have to finish it quickly. Harris has backed the administration's approach.

She has talked about trying to negotiate a ceasefire and hostage release. A lot of the things she said directly echo the things that Biden has said about the situation, but she's viewed as having more sympathy, more empathy for the plight of the Palestinian civilians and has put a bit more emphasis on that in her remarks, even if she's not offering a dramatically different policy. So one of the things that she was asked about in her 60 Minutes interview earlier in the week was the U.S.-Israel relationship.

And she notably declined to say that Netanyahu is a U.S. ally. Instead, she sort of bobbed and weaved and ended up saying that the American people and the Israeli people are allies. Do we have a real close ally in Prime Minister Netanyahu? I think with all due respect, the better question is, do we have an important alliance between the American people and the Israeli people? And the answer to that question is yes.

Has Trump said anything about how he would let Israel finish the job in Gaza? In general, he hasn't been very specific, but, you know, Trump is very much about a sort of foreign policy of personality, of relationships. The idea being that because he is such a great negotiator or because he has such great relationships with foreign leaders, including a lot of dictators and autocrats, that he is uniquely positioned to bring people to the table, to sort of twist arms and get people to accept negotiations that a different leader would not be able to do. Are Trump and Harris under the same kind of pressure from their base when it comes to

how this conflict should be resolved? No, I don't think so. We have seen since October 7th and since the beginning of the war in Gaza, we have seen the Democratic Party really ripped apart by this issue. There is a very vocal segment of the left that is deeply disillusioned with the Democratic Party's general approach to this issue. The Republican Party is far more unified behind Israel. And Trump hasn't always towed the main Republican line on this,

but he's viewed as broadly quite sympathetic to Israel's approach and to allowing Israel to do what it sees fit sort of by any means necessary. Do you think that this divide in the Democratic Party might cost Harris votes? I'm thinking about a swing state like Michigan, where in the primaries, there are a large number of people who voted uncommitted instead of for Joe Biden because of the administration's approach to this issue. It remains to be seen. It could be a problem for her. We don't know. Now, I think many Democrats would tell you that

more has been made of this issue than it necessarily deserves. That being said, there are quite a lot of vocal Arab and Muslim leaders who have spoken out about feeling like they can't support this administration, can't support Joe Biden, can't support Kamala Harris. Now, the't support Joe Biden, can't support Kamala Harris. Now, the difficulty, I think, for a lot of these left-wing voters is they also, by and large, don't support Trump's approach to the conflict, which is even more pro-Israel,

and most of them do not want to see Trump elected. So we've seen Harris doing about as well in Michigan as she's doing in the other swing states of the upper Midwest, the so-called Blue Wall, Michigan, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania. So it doesn't seem like something that's making a huge difference, having a huge impact on her ability to win the state,

but it's certainly something that gives a lot of Democrats heartburn. How important is foreign policy generally to voters? Yes. So, you know, the conventional wisdom is that foreign policy doesn't affect elections, except in special circumstances like when the U.S. invaded Iraq, and that was a big issue in the early 2000s. But America is not currently engaged in a hot conflict. We are not currently at war,

but it's not actually a wartime presidency right now, although I think it feels that way to some people. And so the general conventional wisdom is that foreign policy doesn't matter that much. To American voters, they're much more concerned with pocketbook issues and with things The general conventional wisdom is that foreign policy doesn't matter that much to American voters. They're much more concerned with pocketbook issues and with things that affect their lives. So even though foreign policies doesn't seem to be one of the things that voters tend to

rank very highly when it comes to who they vote for for president, it is the thing that presidents have the most power over because they can take a lot of action without congressional approval. And we've had a chance to see how Donald Trump used that power when he was in office. He pressured NATO allies to put up more money. He started to trade war with China. He pulled out of the Iran nuclear deal. Do you think he might take a different approach

to foreign policy if he wins a second term? If the Trump foreign policy was disruptive in his first term, if anything, I think he would be even more so in a potential second term. He has signaled in all kinds of ways that he wants to root out those traditional Republicans from his administration. You know, he was reigned in in a lot of ways in his first term,

but being surrounded by a lot of those traditional Republicans, Republicans from his administration. He was reigned in in a lot of ways in his first term, being surrounded by a lot of those traditional Republicans, people like his first Secretary of State, Rex Tillerson, who had a much more traditional mindset. And who a lot of the people in the Trump orbit view as sort of neocons and relics of an obsolete iteration of the Republican party. So I think in a second Trump administration, there would be far fewer of those voices, and he would have much more of a free hand, would be surrounded by far more sympathizers who would be on board with his approach to really disrupting these traditional alliances and relationships.

And what's your sense of what Kamala Harris would be like as a leader on foreign policy? This is a bit of a mystery. Harris's background, having been a prosecutor and attorney general before she came to the Senate, she had far less foreign policy experience. It is something that she has done a lot since becoming vice president. She's visited, I believe, more than 20 countries, interacted with a lot of world leaders. And a lot of those foreign leaders have praised her approach, said that she's sort of knowledgeable and sensible about these things.

She has really indicated that her foreign policy would be broadly continuous with the Biden administration foreign policy. There may be small differences of emphasis. She was on The View earlier this week and was asked if there were decisions that she would have made differently from President Biden. Would you have done something differently than President Biden during the past four years? There is not a thing that comes to mind in terms of, and I've been a part of most of

the decisions that have had impact. That was an indication that, you know, she said she's been part of most of these decisions and therefore supports them. Great. All right. So we're going to take a quick break. But when we come back, we're going to talk about a recent interview that you did with... Do you wanna... Do you wanna... Is it a surprise or can I spoil it? You can spoil it. I interviewed Don Trump Jr. and JD Vance.

Alright, that's coming up next. We're going to start this second half with a question from a listener because I know that the reporting that you've been doing recently is going to shed light on this answer. So this question comes from Sean Checky in Wisconsin. Hi, Molly. This is Sean from Fontana, Wisconsin. And I was wondering what happened to Ivanka Trump? Does she still support her father? Thank you for the question, Sean. I think it's something that a lot of people have been wondering. And the answer is that she does still support her father, but she has largely withdrawn from politics when Donald Trump announced that he would run for president again She announced that she did not plan to be involved

she is living a quiet life in Florida with her husband and children and Recently did a podcast interview where she talked about the what she called the dark world of politics politics is is a it is a pretty dark world. There's a lot of darkness, a lot of negativity, and it's just really at odds with what feels good for me as a human being. As Sean alludes to, she was quite heavily involved in the first Trump administration, actually had a position in the White House and was frequently a sort of ambassador for her father.

And she seems to feel sort of burned by that experience. It was sort of bad for her brand, and she got a lot of negative publicity for it. And so she's sort of withdrawn from the public sphere, and she's indicated that she plans to, I think, stay out of a potential second Trump administration. So you have been doing some reporting on the Trump family and on the fact that Donald Trump Jr. seems to be the one

who has kind of taken Ivanka's place at their father's side. That's right. While Ivanka has really receded from the political stage, Don Jr. has taken more and more of a role as a political advisor to his father. So I interviewed Don Trump Jr. together with J.D. Vance, the vice presidential nominee. It was actually the morning of the vice presidential debate.

Yeah, our big debate props were taking a long walk today. So the interview took place in the Trump hotel overlooking Central Park. And this was the first time the two of them have been jointly interviewed. And the reason for the joint interview was that they're very much birds of a feather. And Donald Trump Jr., who has taken a very active role in his father's political orbit, was really a chief driver of the pick of JD Vance for the vice presidential slot on the ticket. So tell me what I'm looking at here.

Is this the next generation of MAGA? Don, you can answer that one. Listen, I certainly hope at least I'll speak for JD. I don't have the hubris to speak for myself on that, but I certainly hope we have more of a bench for the future. You know, we're young, not going back to the establishment policies that have failed us for so long in the past. And so

he is very much someone who keeps Trump in sync with his base. And so if anything, he's driving his father to go all in on that appeal to the base. What is Don Jr's role in the in Trump's campaign right now? Well, he is a very in-demand surrogate for campaigning and fundraising. He's traveling all around the country giving speeches and raising money, both for the Trump campaign and for associated sort of conservative efforts. But he says that he believes his most important role right now is the work

that he's doing on the transition. He's very much preoccupied with this question of what personnel would be in a second Trump administration. And he and Vance are working on this together and Vance talks about it as keeping the snakes out of the administration. Those people who reigned in Trump in his first term. The Rex Tillerson's. Yeah, there were a lot of people in the administration who came from a more traditional perspective and wanted to stop Trump from doing things

that they thought were in many cases dangerous or illegal. And Don Trump Jr. Even like Mike Pence, was somebody who would, he certified the election results. JD Vance now says that he wouldn't have done that. Exactly. And so Trump Jr.

and Vance are working to make sure that the people who are in another Trump administration would not be obstacles, would not be preventing him from doing the things that he wants to do. And so my role will be to make sure that those bad actors are not getting into administration to subvert my father, those policies, and now we know who those people are. In 2016, we had no idea. And I asked the two of them, I said, well, it sounds like you're saying that he would be unrestrained.

And Vance said, well, of course the president has the restraints of the Constitution. The Constitution, right. He's one of the the restraints of the constitution. The constitution, right? He's one of the leader of one of the co-equal branches. But I certainly think it's really important that the people in his administration actually agree with him. Or at the very least, even when they disagree with him, they disagree privately, but accept that he's the president of the United States and you have to follow his leadership. Of course, what does it say about a potential Trump presidency if he's listening to

Don Jr. instead of Ivanka this time around? That I think is really the key to this whole conversation. And it's the reason that I wanted to write about Don Trump Jr. because in the first administration, you did have a Trump who was somewhat restrained, somewhat reigned in, somewhat prevented from pursuing the full breadth of the things that he wanted to do, the fact that the sort of family influence on another Trump administration would be someone like a Don Trump Jr. instead of someone

like an Ivanka Trump really shows you. It's a sort of dramatic illustration of the unrestrained nature of a second Trump administration. He's really laying down a marker for a second Trump administration that would make the first look positively timid by comparison and that would much, much more aggressively pursue its agenda on multiple fronts. So as we're recording this podcast, Hurricane Milton has made landfall in Florida just a

week after Hurricane Helene caused so much damage in southeastern states. When we talked last week, you said that in an election this close, anything could make a difference. So how do you see these back-to-back hurricanes this close to election day potentially impacting things? Well, of course, the first thing to say is that our hearts go out to all of the people who are affected by this terrible storm. And it's an incredible tragedy for so many people.

And there is a potential political impact, I think, on two different fronts. Number one, it's a practical disruption to the voting process. Right. Voting is underway in a lot of these states. Uh, people whose homes have been washed away, uh, potentially their absentee disruption to the voting process. And that obviously could have a material impact on turnout, although we don't know in which direction that might cut. And then the other impact is the way people view the leadership of the respective parties. You know, you go back to George W. Bush and Hurricane Katrina, people really do judge

the competence of government by its ability to act in emergencies like this. And so I think you see Trump trying to sow doubt in the competence of the Biden administration and by extension, Kamala Harris, by accusing them of not sufficiently responding to the storm. And then accusations in the other direction pointing out that when Trump was president, he was often accused of either not being sufficiently competent or empathetic in these situations or even conditioning federal responses on the partisanship of the affected areas.

So a lot of accusations flying back and forth, but it is the kind of thing that I think weighs heavily on voters' decisions because it's one of the most practical impacts that the government has on your life is when there's an emergency, you know, will the government be there to help you and to make sure that people get what they need? All right, Molly, what are you going to be watching for over the next seven days until we talk again?

It's just going to be another crazy week in the run up to the election. We are getting closer and closer. More and more states have opened voting. So I think we're really going to be looking at those early voting numbers as they start to come in, the turnout numbers. It's dangerous to read too much into those tea leaves. But you can start to get a sense of who is voting and how many and where. All right, Molly, always a pleasure.

It's so much fun, Ryan. See you next week. All right, see you next week. ["The Journal at WSJ.com"] Before we go, do you have a question for Molly? Send us an email or voice message to thejournalatwsj.com. That's thejournalat wsj.com. That's thejournal at wsj.com. Red, White, and Who is part of The Journal, which is a co-production of Spotify and The

Wall Street Journal. Our senior producer is Rachel Humphreys. Our producer is Piers Singie. Our editor is Catherine Whalen. I'm Ryan Knudsen. This episode was engineered by Peter Leonard. Our theme music is by So Wiley and remixed by Peter Leonard. Additional music this week from Peter Leonard. Fact-checking by Amelia Schoenbeck. Artwork by James Walton. Special thanks to Kate Leimbach, Sarah Platt, Ben Pershing, and the whole journal team. Thanks for listening.

We'll be back with another episode of Red, White & Who next Friday morning. See you then.