WRFH/Radio Free Hillsdale 101.7 FM - Hart on the Hill: Congress, Cabinet, and Confusion

Episode Date: November 18, 2024

This week, Micah Hart continues the discussion on election results and talks about President-Elect Trump's cabinet.

Welcome back to another episode of Hard on the Hill. I'm still recovering on sleep, to be quite honest with you. It was a long week on election night and election week. All that whole week was just a lot of work and a lot of energy. So I'm still a little tired, but we're getting through it. It's a great day here in this studio. I'm so excited to talk to you about what's going on in politics and what we're seeing right now with everything with the presidential transition team

and what we're seeing with the House and the Senate as well. so let's just get right into this. So first off, I want to just give you a little update on what we're seeing in terms of the election results. Obviously, as I said, things were still a little bit uncertain last week as I was doing this show. So I just wanted to give a little update on where we are right now. So right now, here's where we are. Kamala Harris won 226 electoral votes. Donald Trump won 312 electoral votes sweeping Nevada, Arizona, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin.

He got all of those states. He got all of the swing states that were up for grabs, which is quite incredible, to be honest. That's really impressive. It shows a mandate, I think. I really think that Trump's win shows a mandate to D.C. It says, hey, I won Nevada, Arizona, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Wisconsin, among all these other states. I have now have the ability to go in and govern. I have been given a mandate by the people.

He didn't just win with one state extra, two states extra, like I thought he might. Trump won with an overwhelming majority of these. And not to mention that, but he also won the popular vote, which Republicans have struggled with in modern political history. Republicans struggle with the popular vote. It's just easier for Democrats to get it. I mean, you have a lot of these cities that have a lot of people in them that vote and have more turnout in that regard.

so they usually are able to rack up the numbers. But if you look at it this time around, Donald Trump got it right now, 50.3% of the popular vote. That is actually quite incredible and interesting. It's something to keep in mind as you're watching this administration player, and as I'll get into later, I think that it does also play into who he's picking for certain cabinet positions and other things within the administration.

There's definitely going to be points where he's like, look, I did this. I won all of these states. It's time for me to be able to take the helm and lead how I want to lead. So I think that there's something to watch. Now, Senate side of things, 47 Democrat senators, 53 Republican senators. Republicans did win Pennsylvania. Democrats won Arizona and Nevada. So what's interesting to me with all this, there was a big debacle about letting Senator elected Dave McCormick from Pennsylvania if he could go to orientation. Schumer was kind of like, no at first, and now he's letting him. I think that comes down to this.

If he didn't let McCormick go, he could not let Ruben Gallego go from Arizona. There had to be a fairness in this. So Dave McCormick should be there. Every person who is going to serve and has been declared the winner should be at that orientation, period. I don't care what party you're from.

You should be at that orientation because it's unfair, not just to you, but it's unfair to your constituents of people who voted you in to not let you go and start learning how to be a senator, how to get these resources, is how to start up your office because people still need their services from their senators,

still need to be represented. I don't care what happens. You have to have this process to work out and be able to have an effective senator. So they should be able to be at orientation. So I'm glad that McCormick is there. I just saw some photos on Twitter actually, now X, but formerly Twitter of him at the orientation, which is really good. We really should be encouraging people to go.

And you can have these recounts, you can have whatever. But at the end of the day, if you've been. declare the winner you should be at this orientation being able to start up and prepare for your office and your term as a senator, which is really important to your constituents, as I said. And if you look at the House, I mean, AP still hasn't called it yet from what I'm seeing, but I've seen others calling it for Republican control. So that being the case, I'm going to go off of that. But that being the case, look, it sets up a trifecta for Republicans. You have the presidency, the Senate, and the House. That should be able to give you your agenda, right?

I think a lot of people are like, that will definitely give Trump what he needs. He can get his whole agenda carried out, right? Maybe. Maybe. Why? If he has all three, you're thinking, and rightfully so, well, all Republicans of all three, why aren't they just going to do everything? You have to consider everything in this, in the political climate. You have to look at the political reality. We can't just live in a world where everyone on the right agrees with each other or everyone on the left agrees with each other. That's not the case. Also, you have to look at swing districts. You have to look at swing states. You have to look at just overall where the country is and the separation of powers. That's something I really want to talk about right now is, especially in like these leadership battles that you're going to see

playing out for Senate, majority leader, and others across the board of leadership in positions in the House and the Senate, what's important to know is these are different distinct chambers, but more importantly, the presidency is not the House and Senate. That's not the legislative branch. It's the executive branch. They're separate. So while I do think Trump can say, hey, you need to do this to them and like, I really want this and he can lay out his agenda, they're also their own branch of government. They do have a right to do their own things. And they also have to serve their constituents at their local levels as well. They're looking at what's best for my state, what's best for my state, what's best my district. So that's also something to consider is, yeah, they might be on the same side of

things, but there are differences in policy, and there are also differences in how they can legislate. Trump got that mandate, but some of these House races specifically were really close. They are swing districts. They are ones that were one by razor-thin margin. Same with Senate. Dave McCormick, very close margin there right now, too. Some of these are less than a percentage point. And so they're representing all of these people. They have to consider things different states have different needs and different issues matter differently to them. There are things that matter differently because you're from a certain state as compared to another.

So it's something you have to really look at is how does this all work? Can Trump get everything he wants done? And I think part of that too goes to there are things that Trump is going to have to try to get done right away like tax cuts. I was just reading a Washington Post clip on this. And they're saying many of the tax cuts that President Trump put in during his first term are going to expire at the end of 2025. So that's something that Republicans are going to have to deal with

as they start taking over leadership again in these chambers. And this is the reality. Whether Trump wanted it or not, if these failed, let's just say taxes went up again for a lot of people, right? If they weren't able to put tax cuts in place, they're going to blame the people in charge right now. That's how it works. If you're in charge right now, you should be dealing with that.

That's how people will think of this, is if Trump wasn't able to get more tax cuts, that's what happened. So there are things Republicans are going to have to work on from day one. Even starting now, they're going to have to look at it and say, we need to work on this right now because you can't wait, can't keep pushing things off. You'll have to get to work now. And that does take unity, but it also does take compromise sometimes. And I think that's something that even when you have all three of these, you have the presidency,

you have the House and you have the Senate, you still have to consider a compromise. You have to get things done. There is the filibuster still. There are swing districts. there are other things that come into play other than just Republican and Democrat. And that's what we have to look at when we look at politics. There's so much more to it than just left and right Republican Democrat, red, blue, all of that. There's so much more thinking that goes into it.

Even if we look at, I was on Twitter scrolling through and I saw something on Twitter from somebody, a reporter at the Hill. And it was like asking Johnson if he thinks he'll be able to get the speakership on the first ballot. and he thinks he will. Even though, like, others like Chip Roy have said, there are concerns in the conference about all of this. Johnson thinks there is he thinks he has unity on this. That's something to watch as well early on next year

as we start this new House and Senate, our new Congress, and looking at all of that is what happens here? How do they move forward? Like, is this going to be contentious, or is there going to be a lot of unity? And I don't know right now. I think we'll have to watch as the months play out is, is there going to be unity,

or is there going to be some contention between different people because they have to based on what district they're representing or what state they're representing or maybe they do have disagreements and you'll have to see how that plays out within the Republican Party and what gets done. You have to remember too. Trifactos don't mean effectiveness. That does not mean that everything is going to get done. You can have the biggest landslide and nothing get done. It's legislators who can take action, the executive who can take action.

They have to talk about things, work together, but they also. have to know their spots in all of this where some are in the legislator, some are in the executive, they do have different positions and they're dealing with different audiences that they have to also reach out to and different constituencies that they are serving the president, obviously serving the entire country, senators serving their states and representatives serving their districts. So that's a lot to consider. As you're watching a lot of these over the next few months and as leadership races play out as we see administrative picks, which I'm going to go to in a minute play out as well. So just keep that on your radar as you're getting ready for

Christmas, like seeing all of that as you're going through these holidays and this still continues and you'll see this and make, I wonder what's going on there. Just always keep all of this information of an explaining in mind. I've been looking and following very heavily Trump's cabinet picks. I think it's super fascinating to see who is going to be up for these key positions. Trump already has named his chief of staff. Susie Wiles, she was really, really with him on the campaign trail really worked a lot with President-elect Trump while he was running. So it makes sense to have somebody like her appointed for this position. I mean, I don't think people were really surprised when they saw this. She has helped him a lot in his

runs for office and in a lot of the work he's been doing. So it's not surprising to me that Trump picked somebody like Susie Wiles to be at the helm with him and he's really looking at picking trusted advisors. He's looking at picking people that he thinks he can work well with and that he thinks are different than last time when he had a, he was new to D.C. He had to figure everything out. Now he's going and knowing what the beast of Washington, D.C. is and how he needs to deal with it. So I think that was an interesting pick to watch also his inner circle and how that group of people are in this like where is Elon Musk going to be if he's in it where's RFK Jr. going to be if he's in it.

Where's a vague Gramaswamy going to be if he's in it? Or where is he going to go? Maybe I've heard something about the Senate seat in Ohio. What is going to happen? We're unsure still, but definitely we're seeing some picks. Another pick came in, Elise Stefanik for you and ambassador. Remember, she is one of the top people in the house. She is a big defender of Israel.

She has pretty good experience. She's from New York. So it's going to be really interesting to watch as she. takes this. She's also been aggressive with university presidents. She has a strong leadership position as chair of the House Republican conference. So that's also going to be another race. We're going to have to be watching now. So she'll go in here. She got this from Trump. She just needs to be confirmed, which obviously will happen later on. But look, that's a pick as well. She's been a staunch ally of his. And she has a lot of the experience there. If we're looking,

looking at EPA. Trump announced Lee Zeldin, who's a former representative from New York. He ran for governor in New York. Another pick EPA taking on that. That's a big one for Republicans as well. How do you do with the EPA, the Environmental Protection Agency? What do you do there? How do you make sure things like climate change are dealt with? What do you, what do you do with that? Where does Trump put his focus in the EPA? And so I think that'll be a really interesting one to watch as well. There are others two that aren't necessarily confirmed. It's very tough. with this to be like, that's confirmed or that's just speculation on Twitter or now X again or other outlets and like what they're reporting. So there can be a lot of speculation. So I wouldn't

I wouldn't say like this is definite like for some of them. But I've been hearing obviously what everyone probably has been hearing is Marco Rubio for Secretary of State Marco Rubio ran for president of course in 2016 against Donald Trump, which is very interesting that now Trump might bring him back into the orbit of the Trump orbit, which is really bring him back and like trust him to do that. I think that's fascinating. Rubio has been pretty strong on foreign policy has a lot of experience when it comes to that on things like Iran, Cuba, other things like that, China. He's going to be, he's a really interesting pick here to watch and see if how he plays out in his relationship with President Trump.

And there are others, obviously, two that are up for positions right now, but those are the three I was going to discuss. And I want to know and discuss also what happens with these balances of power now. Because, look, if Trump picks Ruby, you also have Vance, who is a senator. So that's two Senate seats. If you look at Stefanik, now she's in the House. There's also another person in the House that has been granted a position. And that's Mike Waltz, who is very big on China.

aggressive against China. He's going to be national security advisor. He's a current representative. And so Trump asked him already to be in his administration. So you're looking at this and people are like, oh, those are great picks. Yeah, you can say they're great picks or not whatever. But what I'm really interested in is how does this affect the House in the Senate? Look, the House has a razor thin margin. It's not like you can just say, oh, we'll take one or two people and nothing happens. No, one or two people is consequential. It was consequential. in this Congress, like you needed every seat you could have. I remember when George Santos's seat was up,

like that was a huge special election to watch because even one seat shift is really critical and important to look at. I mean, when you look at the entire situation in general, of like, this could be a few seat victory, so they might be replaced by Republicans, you know, who knows what's going to happen. You can never just say for sure.

I mean, Senate obviously are appointments in the states that I'm looking at right now. So obviously, there are two Republican governors, they'll appoint Republicans. But if you look at the House, it's going to be really close and you cannot lose votes. You have to have those votes. I think they're, if I was a betting man, which I'm not, but if I was a betting man, I would say, yeah, there's probably definitely only concern in the House of Representatives right now in their leadership that Trump might take more. And hopefully they're having these conversations of like, hey, we need this number right now. Like, we have to

keep these people here. Like, you can take these people, but we cannot take more than this. And I think definitely like two is that number I've been seeing like they can have two and Trump's already up to two. So we'll have to see what he does with the rest of his cabinet because he's already written people from his former administration like Nikki Haley and Mike Pompeo off of this administration. So they're not going to be a part of it. So you have to really see who does he go with? What does he do? Is it going to be an outsider?

How is he going to handle all of this and make sure that he picks people that are going to work with him this time around? I mean, he had some contention with people last time around. So how does Trump now go in and say, I want people around me? who will support me and will work well with me, but also that I don't hurt the House of Representatives or the Senate, and I make sure that I can still have that trifecta. That's what he really needs to look at, is how do I balance this power that I now have

and take really good people who will support me, be there for me, but also make sure I'm not taking down the power of the House or the Senate, and that's a really tough juggling act to have to deal with. Like, that's incredibly difficult, because you're trying to balance all of this as a result are still coming in and there's still a little bit of uncertainty for sure. So I think this is going to be a really interesting thing to watch again as this administration is getting started and as there are still people being picked for positions because obviously nothing is done yet.

There are still several positions left. There needs to be approval of this. They have to all be voted on. And so then you'll watch all of that go down as well and say, well, did they all get in? What is it looking like here in terms of who got in? where they got in, how do appointments look from different governors to the Senate? And I think there will be a lot to watch in the next few months, even as Trump starts in office, as to how big is his majority, or the Republican majority in these two chambers? Like, if it's really close to what happens,

how much of that agenda can get done in the first hundred days, or how much is going to be stalled because you're going to have such a tight majority that you have to wait until you can get those special election so you can get those appointments and everything done what is that going to look like how fast is the turnaround on that i think that's something we'll have to continue to just investigate think about and um really keep a keep a really close eye on all of this stuff because it's going to be developing over the next week i think for sure and maybe the next few weeks well it's just been a crazy crazy crazy crazy crazy few weeks in politics and it's not going to get any less crazy i mean we have the transition team we have inauguration and

January, we're going to get our new Congress in January. You're going to start seeing legislation again. It's definitely been tough as I've been writing this show for the last few weeks and months even is there's not much going on. Congress was out of session. People were campaigning. So it was mainly focused on Congress campaigning, on presidential campaign, on all of that. And it's going to start shifting again to a more policy focus. What's going on in D.C. More on the hill again. Heart on the hill. That's the show name. So I'm hoping to get back. to that as we get more towards what Congress is doing and they're legislating. We get executive orders. We get the executive doing stuff. We get Supreme Court issues and Supreme Court cases and looking at

that maybe even and just trying to see where the country is moving forward because I definitely think this is a mandate for Trump. Like there is a huge win. You can't argue him that. This was a massive win for him in the electoral vote and the popular vote. It's not like he won one. He didn't just win the electoral by a few votes, but he won popular vote. He won electoral vote. He can send a clear message now, and we'll see how Congress works with him to get his agenda done and get certain things on like mass deportation's been a big one that people are talking about right now. Immigration, obviously, part of that, looking at how immigration looks, how foreign policy looks

with a war in Ukraine, Middle Eastern conflict with Israel and Hamas and Iran also. And then how does China deal with us now that Trump is back in office? Like, what does that look like? And this is also just historically interesting to look at because Trump is not serving a consecutive second term. There's a break. There is Joe Biden. So it's definitely going to be interesting to watch how all of this plays out that they know President Trump. They know who he is.

Our adversaries know who he is. Our allies know who he is. Now it's time to see what work gets done. how other countries do with us with this going on and how the country moves forward and how people honestly do move forward as well as are we able to start mending the divides that we've seen in our country and I really hope that we are able to do that because I think that we have so much more that unites us and that divides us and we really need to focus on being able to unite, being able to come together more, being able to support each other, being able to care about our communities,

whether we are Republican, Democrat, or independent, because at the end of the day we are human being and that's what should matter most to us. Well, you've been listening to Radio Free Hillsdale 101.1.7FN. And this is Hard on the Hill. Thank you so much.