WSJ What’s News - How Donald Trump Made a Historic Comeback

Episode Date: November 6, 2024

P.M. Edition for Nov. 6. WSJ senior political correspondent Molly Ball on Donald Trump’s win. And Republicans might also win control of the U.S. House of Representatives and the Senate, but who will execute Trump’s agenda? WSJ reporter Andrew Restuccia discusses the names on the short list. Plus, the Journal’s Emily Glazer explains why Trump’s victory could also be a win for Elon Musk’s companies. Tracie Hunte hosts. Sign up for the WSJ's free What's News newsletter.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Snakes, zombies, public speaking, the list of fears is endless. But the real danger is in your hand when you're behind the wheel. Distracted driving is what's really scary and even deadly. Eyes forward, don't drive distracted. Brought to you by NHTSA and the Ad Council. Stocks soar as Donald Trump's comeback reverberates through the markets. And what cleared the former president's path back to the White House?

This was an election where the overriding fundamental dynamic was that people were unhappy with the direction of the country and unhappy with the incumbent administration. They wanted change, and that was what Trump was offering. Plus, who will Trump pick to lead his agenda? It's Wednesday, November 6th. I'm Tracy Hunt for The Wall Street Journal.

This is the PM edition of What's News, the top headlines and business stories that move the world today. Votes throughout the country are still being tallied, but President-elect Donald Trump is on track to be the first Republican to win the nation's popular vote in 20 years. In 2016, Trump won the Electoral College but lost the popular vote margin to Hillary Clinton by about 3 million votes. After seasoned control of the Senate, Republicans are poised to hold onto a slim majority in

the House, putting the GOP in a strong position to enact Trump's agenda. Democrats struggled to take back control as Republicans outperformed expectations on the strength of Trump's ability to make inroads among working-class Black and Latino voters, especially men, supplementing his support among white working class voters. President Biden congratulated Trump and pledged a smooth transition. And Kamala Harris conceded the presidential race, calling the president-elect to congratulate him on his victory. She later delivered her concession speech to supporters gathered at her alma mater, Howard

University. Now, I know folks are feeling and experiencing a range of emotions right now. I get it. But we must accept the results of this election. Earlier today, I spoke with President-elect Trump and congratulated him on his victory. I also told him that we will help him and his team with their transition. And that we will engage in a peaceful transfer of power. We'll get back to Harris and what her defeat means for the Democratic Party. But first, a closer look at Donald Trump's win. Molly Ball is the Wall Street Journal's senior political

correspondent and she joins us now. Molly, how did Trump achieve this historic comeback? We really saw America move to the right across the board. It was not a movement limited to a single region, a single demographic, a single component of the electorate. Really every region of the country, every part of the electorate, almost without exception, moved in Trump's direction. This was an election where the overriding fundamental dynamic was that people were unhappy with the direction of the country and unhappy with the incumbent administration. We really saw Trump run up the score with what we term working class voters, but when we say that, what we really mean is voters without a college degree.

He also improved massively with lower income voters. And this was across racial categories. He massively improved his margins with the white working class, but also did much better than any Republican in decades with Hispanic voters and with Black voters. And while those gains were concentrated among men, he did not see a significant fall off with women voters. In fact, he did better with women voters than he did four years ago against Joe Biden. What can we expect from a Trump economy? He has promised sweeping across-the-board tariffs, which economists unanimously believe will

reignite the inflation that had largely been tamed. At the same time, he's inheriting an economy that is quite good on most indicators and that the current administration is quite frustrated that it hasn't gotten more credit for. He's also said he would like to enact more sweeping tax cuts, which could further balloon an already large federal deficit. But that is something he would need the cooperation of Congress to do. So that would not happen right away. Where does this defeat leave Democrats?

The Democratic recriminations are only beginning. We are going to see a long wailing and gnashing of teeth and rending of garments among the top influencers in the Democratic Party. And already this argument is quite lively about what exactly happened, why they failed and why they didn't see it coming. It's very reminiscent of the 2016 election, which I also covered. Democrats need to look at what their blind spots were that prevented them from acknowledging this reality and confront the reasons that their party was not more appealing to the majority of American voters, and

that's something that that could take time. All right, Molly Ball is The Wall Street Journal's senior political correspondent. Thank you so much Molly. Thank you Tracy. In US markets the Trump trade has gone into overdrive. Stocks rallied, the dollar strengthened and Treasury prices fell with investors piling into positions that align with the second Donald Trump presidency on areas including tariffs taxes

government borrowing and Cryptocurrencies the Dow gained more than three and a half percent or over 1500 points The S&P 500 was up more than two and a half percent and the Nasdaq nearly three percent Coming up with a Trump cabinet might look like and why Trump's win is also a win for Elon Musk. That's after the break. President-elect Trump's transition team is already underway assembling a list of potential cabinet members.

It'll be a few days or weeks before we know for sure what Trump's second administration will look like. But our Andrew Rastusia has been covering this and he joins us now. Andrew, there were quite a few business leaders at Trump's watch party last night at Mar-a-Lago. Might we see a few of them in his cabinet? There was a really kind of a who's who of the most trusted people in his orbit at this watch party at Mar-a-Lago. Among the people that were there were two potential candidates for Treasury Secretary John Paulson, a billionaire investor and a key square group founder Scott Bessent, another investor. These are two pretty well-known commodities on Wall Street and in New York and they are both seen as leading contenders

for Treasury Secretary. So we're going to be watching that closely over the next few weeks. Another person who's been discussed for the Treasury Secretary job is Bob Lighthizer, who served as the U.S. Trade Representative during Trump's first term. It's going to be one of the early jobs that gets announced because the economy is such an important and central part of any president's tenure. Any other positions where names have been floated? Chief of Staff is usually the first job that gets announced soon after an election. And this person really runs the day-to-day of the White House.

They're in one of the most influential positions. They may spend the most amount of staff time with the president. There are two people who are seen as the top contenders for the job. The first is Susie Wiles. She's a Florida political strategist and she helped run Trump's campaign. She's widely seen as the top contenders for the job. The first is Susie Wiles. She's a Florida political strategist and she helped run Trump's campaign. She's widely seen as the top candidate. And Brooke Rollins, who is a former domestic policy official in Trump's first White House and the head of the America First Policy Institute, which is an

outside group of former Trump administration officials. There are other people whose names have been floated that includes former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy. So this will be a real indicator of how the white house is shaping up and who he chooses to run it. Is it sort of this insider type person like Susie Wiles, or is it a well-known politician like Kevin McCarthy? One of the biggest things that the former president has said repeatedly and his

adult son, Donald Trump Jr. has said, is that they're really looking for people who are on the same page as the president. Loyalty is a word that you hear thrown around quite a bit. Should we expect any familiar faces? Potentially, yeah. So there are a bunch of people who served in President Trump's first term that could come back,

among them is former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, who is seen as a leading contender to run the Pentagon, to be Secretary of Defense. Robert O'Brien, who was the National Security Advisor in Trump's first term, is up for a number of roles in a second term, including the Secretary of Defense. He could serve as National Security Advisor again, or he could get a potentially senior role at the State Department as well. Lauren Henry Andrew Vastusia covers the White House for The Wall Street Journal. Thank you so much, Andrew.

Andrew Vastusia covers the White House for the Wall Street Journal. Thank you so much, Andrew. Thanks for having me. Elon Musk, the world's richest man, poured more than $100 million into Trump's campaign. He was also promised a role in the Trump administration, auditing federal expenditures and regulations. This would likely present an unprecedented conflict of interest at the highest levels of government. WSJ reporter Emily Glazer told our tech news briefing podcast how companies belonging to Musk could reap enormous financial rewards. Emily Glazer Elon Musk is the wealthiest person in the

world and he has the most to gain through SpaceX. The United States is extremely dependent on SpaceX. NASA relies on it for some of its most high-profile missions. SpaceX is also the dominant rocket launcher for the Pentagon. It has a growing business working on the intelligence community's satellite programs. And then Starlink, which is a part of SpaceX, and that's the whole kind of satellite business, could really benefit from the government's $42 billion internet expansion campaign. Even Tesla, his electric vehicle maker, it also has contracts with the government.

And you have to look at some of his other companies, like XAI could benefit hugely as AI regulation is proposed throughout the United States. We're really at the nascent stages right now. Social media regulation, he oversees Twitter or X. He also has the company Neuralink, the brain implant startup that relies on the trials right now with the FDA and the boring company, his tunneling venture.

So regulations by these various different agencies all across the government each play a role in his different businesses. You can hear more about this on tomorrow's tech news briefing podcast. And in other news, the Federal Reserve is widely expected to cut interest rates tomorrow by a quarter percentage point. The bigger question is how many more cuts officials expect will be warranted to preserve a solid job market while preserving recent declines in inflation.

Officials won't change their policy approach until they see what President-elect Trump does with proposed changes to taxes, tariffs, and immigration. And UK drug maker AstraZeneca said today that Chinese authorities have detained its executive vice president in charge of China and the broader Asian region, Leon Wang. Last week, the company said Wang was cooperating with an investigation by Chinese authorities. AstraZeneca said it believes that Chinese authorities are probing allegations that employees had illegally imported a breast cancer drug and a liver cancer treatment from Hong Kong and improperly collected patient data.

And that's What's News for this Wednesday afternoon. Today's show was produced by Anthony Bansi and Pierre Bienneme with supervising producer Michael Kazmides. Additional sound in today's episode by the Associated Press. I'm Tracy Hunt for The Wall Street Journal. We'll be back with a new show tomorrow morning. Thanks for listening.