WSJ What’s News - Harris Clarifies Immigration, Fracking Stances

Episode Date: August 30, 2024

A.M. Edition for Aug. 30. Kamala Harris says her “values have not changed” on key issues as she sits down for the first major television interview of their 2024 campaign. Plus, Donald Trump gives mixed signals on an abortion ballot measure in Florida. And, as demand for fully electric vehicles proves softer than carmakers had hoped, plug-in hybrids start to gain ground. The WSJ’s Christopher Otts explains what’s behind their newfound popularity. Luke Vargas hosts. Sign up for the WSJ’s free What’s News newsletter. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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her campaign. Plus Donald Trump sends mixed signals about his stance on abortion. And with many consumers not ready to make the jump to electric cars, automakers downshift to plug-in hybrids. The federal standards for emissions are also getting more stringent. Plug-in hybrids are one way for automakers to get the credits that they need to meet these standards. It's Friday, August 30th. I'm Luke Vargas for The Wall Street Journal

and here is the AM edition of What's News, the top headlines and business stories moving your world today. Vice President Kamala Harris and her running mate, Minnesota Governor Tim Walz, gave their first major television interview of their 2024 campaign yesterday. Harris didn't lay out significant new details

on how she'd govern if elected president, but she did answer questions from CNN's Dana Bash about some key policy areas where her position has shifted, like a ban on fracking that she supported during her 2019 presidential bid before reversing her stance the following year. And was there some policy or scientific data that you saw that you said, oh, OK, I get

it now? What I have seen is that we can grow and we can increase a thriving clean energy economy without banning fracking. Harris also told CNN's Bash that she now believes in taking a firmer line on illegal border crossings than she did in the 2019 race. There was a debate you raised your hand when asked whether or not the border should be decriminalized.

Do you still believe that? I believe there should be consequence. We have laws that have to be followed and enforced that address and deal with people who cross our border illegally. Meanwhile, Donald Trump has suggested that he would support a ballot measure to roll back a six-week abortion ban in Florida, saying the ban is too restrictive and doesn't give women enough time to access the procedure. Hours later, though, Trump's campaign tried to walk back those comments, which drew outrage

among anti-abortion activists, with a spokeswoman saying that the Republican presidential nominee quote has not yet said how he will vote on the ballot initiative. It was Trump's latest attempt to try to find a middle ground on an issue seen as a political liability for Republicans. Trump also said yesterday that if he won a second term, his administration would provide federal financial support for in-vitro fertilization treatments or force insurance companies to cover them. Before the week's up, let's touch now on a few stories from around the world worth

keeping an eye on. The Israeli military has killed more than a dozen people in an operation that began Tuesday in the West Bank and is meant to target newer and younger militant groups that have emerged in recent years. Middle East correspondent Jared Malson told me that while Israel has described its operation as targeted, the deteriorating situation in the West Bank

is adding new demands for its already stretched armed forces. It has been descending into a certain amount of turmoil. You have attacks by Israeli settlers on Palestinians. You have the rise of these new militant groups in the northern West Bank especially. And now you have the Israeli military launching airstrikes using drones and helicopters and also sending ground troops into three different places in the West Bank. Strategically for Israel, the concern is that if you get drawn into yet another front in this war, you are demanding more of the Israeli army, which is largely made up of reservists

who have already been fighting one of the longest wars they've fought in decades. On the public health front, a number of state and local health authorities in the U.S. are tracking a mosquito-borne disease called Eastern Equine Encephalitis, or EEE. The disease is rare. The worst year for it was 2019, when 38 cases were reported. But given its severity, Journal Health reporter Brianna Abbott told us that the detection of cases this year across five states — Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New Jersey, Vermont, and Wisconsin — has raised some alarm.

First, it causes fever, chills, aches, that sort of thing. But it also causes more serious neurological symptoms that can lead to death. The fatality rate, if you get it, is around 30%. And earlier this week, New Hampshire reported a death of a man from the condition. Health authorities are taking action, including starting to spray to sort of prevent some of those mosquito populations. And you can go on health department websites

and see if it's sort of appeared in your area. If you're going outside, especially between dusk and dawn, it's important to wear bug spray, wear long sleeves, get rid of standing pools of water in your yard and as much as possible avoid any sort of bug bite. And in South Korea, the country's constitutional court has sided with dozens of children who sued the government over inadequate climate change policies, ruling that the lack of quantitative emissions targets in the coming decades placed excessive burden

on future generations. South Korea's Environment Ministry said it respects the ruling and has pledged to revise its relevant policies by a March 2026 deadline. And moving markets today, inflation in the Eurozone fell sharply in August. At 2.2 percent, it's now only a shade above the European Central Bank's target, opening the door for another interest rate cut. Meanwhile, U.S. personal income and consumer spending data for July are due out at 8.30 a.m.

Eastern, along with the Fed's preferred inflation measure, the PCE price index, which is expected to show that inflation ticked up slightly last month. And shares in Dell Technologies are up off-hours after the server maker beat expectations in its latest results. That's as sales in its servers and networking unit jumped 80% thanks to a surge in demand for AI-oriented servers. Coming up, Autos reporter Chris Otz will join me to discuss the sudden popularity of plug-in hybrids as weak EV demand creates trouble for carmakers trying to green up their fleets.

That's after the break. RPC has helped millions of young Canadians turn their most-likelies into most-definitelys, making their ideas happen with scholarships, internships, and skill development, plus resources for artists and athletes. Learn more at rbc.com slash support youth. Last week, we reported that Ford was scrapping plans for an electric SUV and instead shifting its focus to offering hybrid versions of its popular Ford Explorer and Ford Expedition SUVs. But far from an isolated move, Journal Auto's reporter Chris Otz finds that plug-in hybrids

are now being embraced by a number of carmakers, as the industry's road to electrification seemingly comes to a fork. And Chris joins me now from our Detroit bureau. Chris, before we go any further talking about these plug-in hybrids, we should note these are different from maybe the Toyota Prius sort of hybrids people might be familiar with, where basically a battery is supplementing the gas engine and capturing some energy from braking and things like that, right? Yeah, it's important to define these terms. The plug-in hybrid is an entirely different thing. This is a car that is like an electric vehicle and a gas car under one hood. So the car plugs in, the battery gets a charge that allows it to have electric range of in

the neighborhood of 20 to 50 miles of all electric driving, just like an EV, before a gas engine then kicks in and is able to provide longer range. I mean, just what you said there, the fact that these vehicles are sort of two cars in one, doesn't that inherently make them more expensive and perhaps less attractive for that reason? This is why many players in the industry assumed, frankly, that plug-in hybrids would be sort of left in the dustbin of history as the automakers moved to full EVs, right? Because it is inherently inefficient to have two ways of powering the vehicle. And that is an issue whether consumers will pay the additional cost of having that battery in the car. Do they value the savings on gasoline? Do they use the vehicle

in a way that allows them to capture that savings and justify the additional cost? Well, so far anyways, though, it looks like sales for plug-in hybrid cars are growing rapidly, whereas there's a chart in your store that suggests that the trend for EVs is kind of pointing in a different direction. What is driving that shift? EVs are still growing. At the same time, many consumers are really not ready to make the whole lifestyle jump that is required to have a fully electric vehicle.

The nightmare scenario of running out of charge, of not being able to find a place to charge it, those things really weigh on consumers' choices. And many people who are buying these plug-in hybrids are not so interested in alternative power trains, but what's happening is that auto companies have standards that they have to meet. California has more stringent standards than the national. There's about a dozen states who follow California's lead, and just the federal standards for emissions are also getting more stringent. Plug-in hybrids are one way for automakers to get the credits that they need to meet these standards. If you look at the best-selling plug-in hybrids right now, the top two are Jeeps. Jeeps are not a customer base that is known for really valuing fuel economy and efficiency.

And what we're seeing is that Stellantis, the parent company of Jeep, Chrysler, and Ram is offering heavy incentives. And then there's federal incentives on top of that, up to $7,500 per transaction. And what you've got is a situation where consumers are not often having to carry any additional cost to get one of these plug-in hybrids. So the dealer says, hey, this car with a battery that saves you gas is cheaper than the regular gas one that you were interested in. And the consumer says, well, why not? I guess that would explain why demand for these vehicles, these plug-in hybrids is showing

up as much as it is. But I do have to ask finally where this leaves these car makers. If the EVs are still the future eventually, couldn't this be an expensive detour for many of them in the meantime? The automakers are looking at it like there's only so much you can do if the consumer isn't ready to make the leap. There may be some subsidizing that's going on here to get consumers into an alternative powertrain vehicle, but in the grand scheme of things, that may be the most cost-effective

trade-off for the automakers to make until consumers are ready to adopt EVs more fully. I've been speaking to Wall Street Journal autos reporter Chris Otz in Detroit. until consumers are ready to adopt EVs more fully. I've been speaking to Wall Street Journal Autos reporter Chris Otz in Detroit. Chris, thank you so much. Yeah, thanks for having me. And finally, it is the unfortunate side effect of a holiday weekend having to sift through

a crowded inbox on a Tuesday morning. Well, columnist Elizabeth Bernstein has been looking at whether a more honest, out-of-office message could help to make the inevitable return to work less overwhelming. People are starting to be much more blunt and push back in their out-of-office messages. Basically, they're saying, I'm not here and I won't be replying when I return. The people I spoke with said it works great for them. It helps them prioritize their inbox.

It's helping them focus on their real work because they're not buried in their emails. The thing though is that these people tend to be in positions where they can do this, either running their companies or they're working for themselves or they're at the top of their field and so pushing back a little at everybody else

is not as problematic as it may be if you're a desk warrior or have a boss you have to worry about or have clients that you think might not like this. And that's it for What's News for Friday morning. Today's show was produced by Kate Bulevent and Daniel Bach with supervising producer Christina Rocca and I'm Luke Vargas for The Wall Street Journal. We will be back tonight with a brand new show. Otherwise, have a great long weekend. Thanks for listening and give my inbox a rest for a few days, would you? Bye-bye.