WSJ What’s News - Matt Gaetz Nomination as Attorney General Sends Shock Waves Through D.C.

Episode Date: November 14, 2024

P.M. Edition for Nov. 14. WSJ reporter Alex Leary discusses the political fallout from President-elect Donald Trump’s nomination of Florida Rep. Matt Gaetz. And the Journal’s Ryan Dubé explains how China has capitalized on the U.S. indifference in Latin America. Plus, it’s not a joke: satirical publication the Onion is buying right-wing conspiracy website Infowars. Tracie Hunte hosts. Sign up for the WSJ's free What's News newsletter. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

As a Fizz member, you can look forward to free data, big savings on plans, and having your unused data roll over to the following month, every month. At Fizz, you always get more for your money. Terms and conditions for our different programs and policies apply. Details at fizz.ca. U.S. Congressman Matt Gaetz's nomination for attorney general sends shockwaves through DC. And how America's indifference towards Latin America left a door open for China. Over the last several years, the US has seen Latin America more as a source of problems affecting the US. Whereas China sees Latin America as more of an opportunity for commerce, for trade, for

investments. Plus, Disney's strategy for a post-Cable future. It's Thursday, November 14th. 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. President-elect Donald Trump's nomination of Matt Gaetz for U.S. Attorney General is sending shockwaves through Washington.

House and Senate lawmakers were visibly surprised by the nomination, and some senators, whose job it is to hold hearings and confirm nominees, openly questioned whether Gaetz could be confirmed. Republican Senator Susan Collins of Maine said she was shocked at the news, while Alaska Senator Lisa Murkowski said she didn't consider Gates to be a quote, serious candidate. WSJ reporter Alex Leary joins us now. Alex, why was this pick such a surprise? It's been a real stunner on Capitol Hill and across Washington and beyond.

It's very surprising in the fact that Matt Gaetz was not on any short list that we're aware of for the job. There were a number of other state attorney generals, some former Trump officials that were in contention. But secondarily, Matt Gaetz is a very polarizing figure in Washington I mean, he's loathed by a lot of his own fellow Republicans and certainly Democrats have no love for him either Matt Gaetz furthermore was facing an ethics investigation in the house involving potential sexual misconduct So just a very controversial figure, however, one that is rock solid behind Trump.

So is this a loyalty test of some sort to see if GOP lawmakers will ultimately support Trump? Yeah, you could see it as Trump kind of pushing the envelope here, sort of pushing Republican senators to sort of get on board. He's got a lot of unity behind him. He had a resounding win and Trump wants to exert his power. He's only got four years to do it and this is definitely a power play. So what's next for this nomination?

Well we have to just wait and see. I'm sure there'll be some more explosions in the days to come as Republican senators kind of suss out whether Gates could get the support, more maybe come out in opposition to him. It'll be interesting to see if Trump sort of doubles down and adds more pressure to the situation. So far, he's just contained himself to the statement that he made saying that he was nominating Gates. All right. Thank you so much, Alex. All right. Sure thing. Meanwhile, Trump nominated environmental lawyer and vaccine skeptic Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to serve as Health and Human Services Secretary.

The president-elect announced his decision in a post on his Truth Social platform. The move, if affirmed by the Senate, would put a noted critic of U.S. public policy atop the country's vast health bureaucracy. What questions do you have about Trump's campaign promises, how they may be implemented, and what they mean for you? Send a voice memo to wnpod at wsj.com or leave a voicemail with your name and location at 212-416-4328. We might use it on the show. Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell today said recent signs of economic health would

allow the central bank to take its time in deciding how quickly to continue reducing interest rates. Powell made the comments today at the Dallas Regional Chamber in Dallas, Texas. After his introductory remarks, Powell was asked to explain why it's important for the central bank to be politically independent. Let me say what we mean by independence first. So what that really means is that the decisions that we make about monetary policy, about interest rates, cannot be reversed by any other part of the government except of course Congress. Congress created the Federal Reserve by statute and can do what it wishes to do by statute

but our decisions are not reviewable by any other agency and we are charged to make those decisions with regard to the medium and longer term well-being of the public that we serve. Meanwhile we had more data on U.S. inflation today. According to the Labor Department, prices paid to producers for their output climbed by 0.2% last month and 2.4% in the 12 months through October, an uptick from the rate in September. Excluding food, energy, and trade services, the Core Producer Price Index was up 0.3% last month

and 3.5% over the past 12 months, another acceleration. The data provide more evidence that after fast initial progress, the final stage of getting inflation back down to 2% might be a long slog. Major U.S. indexes slipped after Fed Chair Jerome Powell said the central bank would take its time in deciding how quickly to lower interest rates. The Dow was down less than half a percent, while the S&P 500 and Nasdaq edged down about 0.6 percent. Disney Today reported relatively strong results for its fiscal fourth quarter. According to

the company's earnings report, Disney's streaming unit swung to a profit of $321 million in the September quarter from a loss of $387 million a year earlier, its second consecutive quarterly profit. Meanwhile, Disney's cable TV unit continued to lose steam. Heard on the street columnist, Dan Gallagher, says that whoever ends up as the entertainment giant's next CEO won't be inheriting a complete fix-up job. But that doesn't mean it'll be an easy one. Like other traditional media companies, Disney has this essentially melting iceberg of a cable TV business. People are logging off cable going to streaming and so that business continues to shrink. That was a big source of their profits 10 years ago and the streaming business is only kind of barely profitable. So the profits from that are not even close to compensating

for what used to be this cable TV business. So long-term, these things are working to have the kind of profit margins they used to but that's a long pickup because even though theme parks are doing really well and back to pre-COVID levels, even stronger in some respects, getting streaming to generate the kind of profits that cable TV used to is not going to happen quickly at all. Coming up, China's growing influence in Latin America. That's after the break. China has replaced the U.S. as the dominant trading partner for most big economies in Latin America, with the exceptions of Mexico and Colombia. This week, Chinese leader Xi Jinping is visiting the region to take part in leadership summits, including an Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation Forum

in Lima, Peru. According to the AID Data Research Lab, Beijing has invested more than $286 billion in projects in the region. China is also a voracious buyer of Argentina's lithium, crude oil from Venezuela, and Brazilian iron ore and soybeans. Joining us now is Ryan Dubé, a reporter at the Wall Street Journal based in Lima, Peru. So Ryan, of course, Latin America has a ton of natural resources, but what else does China gain from investing so heavily in the region? What's the attraction?

It speeds up trade with the region. That's I think the main thing. But when China is your biggest trading partner, then that comes with kind of diplomatic and geopolitical influence. Over the last few years, for example, several countries in Latin America have switched from recognizing Taiwan and now fully recognize China. So after Honduras stopped recognizing Taiwan, they got several kind of investment projects in the country and they're hoping to get increased trade and those types of projects.

What kind of opportunities is the U.S. missing out on? Washington's attention has really been on conflicts in Europe and the Middle East and also Asia as well. It's missed out on deepening relationships within Latin America, having better ties with some of and also Asia as well, has missed out on deepening relationships within Latin America, having better ties with some of the countries here as well. The US really, its focus has just been principally on immigration and kind of drug trafficking and stuff, rather than these kind of commercial opportunities in the region. A good example is Xi Jinping this evening is going to inaugurate a massive new port

in Peru. That port was offered to the U.S. according to former Peruvian officials. They tried to get U.S. companies and the U.S. government interested in it and they just got nowhere with it. And they eventually turned to the Chinese. So it's an opportunity for China to kind of come in where the U.S.

wasn't really paying attention to that. What will an incoming Trump administration mean for this growing China-Latin American relationship? That's what a lot of people are asking right now in the region. There's a lot of apprehension about what it will mean. At a minimum, it'll probably make it a lot more difficult for these countries to kind of manage the geopolitical tensions.

Obviously, trade is massive with China, but they're still doing a lot of trade with the US and stuff too. There's a couple scenarios that could play out. One is that the Trump administration puts a lot more pressure on these countries to kind of to limit their ties with China and kind of to choose which side they want to be on. Another one is the Trump policies more generally about tariffs and how that affects global trade in general.

And that could push these countries even closer to China potentially. Ryan Dubay is a Latin American reporter for The Wall Street Journal. Thank you so much, Ryan. Thank you. And in business news, we are exclusively reporting that Boeing has poached an executive from a defense rival to run its Phantom Works Division, which oversees research efforts for its Pentagon business and is involved in bidding for U.S. government projects. The jet maker today said that Colin Miller, a former Air Force commander who oversaw aeronautics engineering at Northrop Grumman, will take over the division. The aerospace giant has

been losing billions on military contracts, and Boeing CEO Kelly Ortberg back in September fired the defense unit's chief. The Onion, a satirical news publication, today announced that it is buying the right-wing conspiracy website Infowars. The Onion was able to buy Infowars after the site's founder, Alex Jones, lost a defamation lawsuit and was ordered to pay $1.4 billion to families who lost children in the Sandy Hook massacre, forcing a sale of his assets. Jones had repeatedly claimed on InfraWars that the 2012 Sandy Hook school shooting was a government hoax. The

Onion said the family supported the sale. A sale price wasn't disclosed. The Onion said it expects to launch a new platform for Infowars in January. Lawyers for Jones didn't immediately respond to requests for comments. And that's what's news for this Thursday afternoon. Today's show was produced by Pierre Bienneme and Anthony Bansi with supervising producer Michael Kosmitis. I'm Tracy Hunt for the Wall Street Journal. We'll be back with a new show tomorrow morning.

Thanks for listening.