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--:-- Host John Bickley: The NFL is back, and FanDuel's got everything you need to play your game. From same-game parlays to live betting. Right now, new customers bet $5 and get $300 in bonus bets if you win. 21-plus in president select states. 18-plus in Kentucky and Wyoming. Must be first online real money waging. $5 deposit required. Bonus issued is non-withdrawable bonus bets that expire seven days after receipt. Restrictions apply. See full terms at FanDuel.com slash sportsbook. Gambling problem? Call 1-800-GAMBLER.
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--:-- Host John Bickley: The fallout over the FBI search of President Trump's home continues. Americans and the press want more answers and are asking to see the affidavit that authorized the unprecedented search. I'm Daily Wire editor-in-chief John Bickley with Georgia Howe. It's Wednesday, August 17th, and this is Morning Wire. President Biden signed the Inflation Reduction Act Tuesday. But why do some economists say the name is misleading? There's basically no chance that it's going to lower inflation. If anything, it will make inflation worse. And the ESG backlash is here. More than a dozen state attorneys general are uniting to push back against one of the world's most powerful entities, BlackRock.
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--:-- Host Georgia Howe: Thanks for waking up with Morning Wire. Stay tuned. We have the news you need to know. Food and gas prices are higher than ever which is why you need to lock in your price with good ranchers right now. Good ranchers has your back, their inflation-proof model locks in your price the day you subscribe for the life of your subscription. You got to go to good ranchers.com slash wire and get 30 off your order plus free shipping. That's good ranchers.com slash wire. Enter promo code wire at checkout. Good ranchers, American meat delivered.
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--:-- Host John Bickley: Nine days after the FBI's search of Donald Trump's home, a new battle is unfolding, with many critics and supporters of the former president demanding the release of the FBI affidavit used to justify the operation. Joining us to discuss is Daily Wire senior editor Cabot Phillips.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: So in this case, an affidavit is basically just a document laying out the evidence to justify a warrant in the eyes of a judge. Keep in mind, we've already seen the warrant, which stated what they were looking for, in this case, classified documents. But the affidavit itself would further explain what evidence the DOJ had, including what witnesses they'd spoken to.
--:-- Host John Bickley: Now, most legal experts say that to justify a search of this nature, especially the home of a former president, the bar is set pretty high for justifying a judge signing off. And the affidavit will hopefully shed light on how they got a warrant in the first place.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: To that point, here's Senator Lindsey Graham on Fox yesterday explaining why they want to see the affidavit. Show your cards. Merrick Garland can't have it both ways. He can't give us the inventory, the warrant, without telling us why it was necessary to raid the former president's home. And there was no less intrusive method available.
--:-- Host John Bickley: And yesterday, Judge Bruce Reinhart, the judge who'd signed off on the warrant itself, announced a hearing set for tomorrow that will determine whether the affidavit will be unsealed. So we should be getting some answers here pretty shortly.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: Yeah, let's hope so. One thing that's interesting is that there were people from both sides calling for it to be released. Yeah, there were definitely some Trump opponents who say it should remain sealed until the investigation concluded. But there were a growing number of people on both sides into this week, including media outlets calling for its release.
--:-- Host John Bickley: Critics of the president want it made public because they're hoping it'll offer indisputable proof that Trump committed crimes related to the storage of classified documents or worse. Supporters of Trump won it released because they think it vindicate their claims that the raid was politically motivated and based on little hard evidence but was instead more of a fishing expedition to try and find anything they could use to charge him.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: Now Trump himself released a statement yesterday saying quote I call for the immediate release of the completely unredacted affidavit pertaining to this horrible and shocking break-in. And how is the Justice Department reacting to these demands? They've been clear that they want the affidavit to remain sealed and say that releasing it to the public could hinder the ongoing investigation.
--:-- Host John Bickley: They've been clear that they want the affidavit to remain sealed and say that releasing it to the public could hinder the ongoing investigation. In a court filing this week, the DOJ said, quote, if disclosed, the affidavit would serve as a roadmap to the government's ongoing investigation, providing specific details about its direction and likely course in a manner that is highly likely to compromise future investigative steps.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: They also argue that it could prevent future witnesses from cooperating with the DOJ. And one more interesting note on the DOJ front, we learned this week that Attorney General Garland deliberated for weeks over whether he'd sign off on the raid. So now the question becomes what convinced him to finally get on board, and the hope is that this affidavit would have the answer.
--:-- Host John Bickley: Another development centered on the seizure of Trump's passports. What do we know there?
--:-- Cabot Phillips: Yeah, this was interesting because it gives an idea of just how broad the search was with regards to the contents they took from his home. And there is some drama here. So Trump initially announced on Monday that, quote, in the raid by the FBI of Mar-a-Lago, they stole my three passports, one expired, along with everything else. But soon after that, CBS Evening News anchor Nora O'Donnell essentially accused Trump of lying, reporting that the FBI was not in possession of any passports. And as you can imagine, that saw off a firestorm on social media.
--:-- Host John Bickley: But then Trump spokesman shared an email straight from the FBI saying they'd, quote, seized three passports belonging to President Trump, two expired and one being his active diplomatic passport. We are returning them. So an interesting wrinkle in this ongoing saga.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: Yeah. We'll definitely have to keep an eye on tomorrow's hearing to decide whether or not that affidavit goes public.
--:-- Host John Bickley: Cabot, thanks for reporting.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: Anytime.
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--:-- Host John Bickley: That's Daily Wire senior editor Cabot Phillips. Coming up, President Biden signed the Inflation Reduction Act. Do you spend hours on multiple job sites searching for candidates with the right skills? Hire faster and better with Indeed. With Indeed, you only pay for applications that meet your must-have requirements. When you sponsor an Indeed post, you're 4.5 times more likely to get a hire. Join more than 3 million businesses worldwide that use Indeed to hire great talent fast. Visit Indeed.com slash wire to start hiring right now. Just go to Indeed.com slash wire. Indeed.com slash wire. Terms and conditions apply. Need to hire. You need Indeed.
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--:-- Host John Bickley: President Biden signed the Inflation Reduction Act into law on Tuesday. The culmination of months of discussions between Democratic leaders and party moderates to give Biden a legislative victory ahead of midterms. The tax and spend package passed Congress with no GOP support. Estimates released last week suggest the act will actually accomplish few of the goals congressional Democrats and the White House have set for it.
--:-- Host Georgia Howe: Here to discuss the IRA's expected impact is Daily Wire reporter Tim Pierce.
--:-- Tim Pierce: So Tim, the bill is titled the Inflation Reduction Act, but economists say it's unlikely to reduce inflation. How are Democrats selling this bill?
--:-- Host Georgia Howe: Yeah, Democrats say this bill addresses a bunch of Democratic priorities. It supposedly combats climate change, lowers inflation, increases the GDP, lowers the deficit, and all that without raising taxes on middle-income Americans.
--:-- Tim Pierce: Now, some estimates of the IRA's impact on both the budget and the economy were released last week. What did those say?
--:-- Host Georgia Howe: Yeah. So last week, the University of Pennsylvania's Penn Wharton Business School and the Congressional Budget Office each released some estimates on the IRA. They suggest that pretty much every one of those talking points I listed is either exaggerated or false.
--:-- Tim Pierce: On inflation the Penn model estimates that the bill will have quote no meaningful effect on inflation in the near term. As for GDP, the Penn-Warton analysis predicts that the IRA would slightly reduce GDP in the first decade while slightly increasing GDP by 2050. On the national deficit, the Penn-Warton model shows that the IRA will actually make the deficit worse until 2027, in part because that's when some extended Affordable Care Act subsidies are set to expire.
--:-- Host Georgia Howe: On taxes, according to the Congressional Budget Office, the bill will generate $20 billion more in federal revenue through taxes on Americans making under $400,000 a year. The bill adds tens of thousands of new IRS agents. Democrats have repeatedly denied that hiring more IRS agents would increase the chance of audits on Americans making less than $400,000 a year. So the CBO contradicts that as well.
--:-- Tim Pierce: Morningwire spoke to Kenny Stein, director of policy at the Institute for Energy Research. Stein said the bill will drive up fuel prices and worsen inflation. You're talking about increasing taxes on natural gas and oil, which oil prices have already been very high for the last year, year and a half. Natural gas prices have gone up quite a bit in the last two years. So adding more fees and taxes onto those energy sources that people are actually using, if anything, is going to tend to put inflationary pressure on energy prices in general.
--:-- Host Georgia Howe: And then just on top of it, the just basic economic logic, we're talking about spending. I think the total for the bill is around $700 billion in federal government spending. That excessive government spending is what set off this inflation boom in the first place. So adding more obviously is not going to decrease inflation and, if anything, will add to inflationary pressure.
--:-- Tim Pierce: So those are some pretty harsh assessments. Yeah, and Senator Joe Manchin, who is key to securing this bill's passage and one of its loudest proponents in the media, may be feeling burned by this too. He apparently agreed to support this legislation after Chuck Schumer and Nancy Pelosi promised to expedite permitting for some fossil fuel projects in West Virginia. The problem for Manchin is that progressives in Congress aren't thrilled with Schumer and Pelosi's deal, and now we're threatening to fight it.
--:-- Host Georgia Howe: Congressman Jared Huffman told Politico over the weekend that he won't be steamrolled into a bunch of fossil fuel giveaways because Democratic leaders cut a closed room deal.
--:-- Tim Pierce: All right. Well, Tim, thanks so much for reporting.
--:-- Host Georgia Howe: Thanks for having me.
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--:-- Host John Bickley: Attorneys general in 19 states are pushing back against investment giant BlackRock and its CEO, Larry Fink. The state AGs say the company is breaking multiple laws by prioritizing an ideological agenda at the expense of residents' investment returns and pension funds. Joining us to discuss is Vivek Ramaswamy, founder of Strive Asset Management.
--:-- Vivek Ramaswamy: Well, look, I think that state AGs actually have a lot of power on these issues because states aren't just regulators. They're also market actors. What do I mean by that? States are actually, through their pension funds and through their state treasuries, directing the capital of their constituents to these large asset managers.
--:-- Host John Bickley: So if these other large asset managers are then using the money of those state constituents to advance social and political agendas that most of those constituents don't want to see advanced, that's a big fiduciary problem. It's a fiduciary breach, arguably.
--:-- Vivek Ramaswamy: And I think that's what a lot of state AGs, as top legal officials in the state, have started to wake up to, to say that, you know what? It is not only a cultural unfortunate reality, it is also a legal violation to use the money of my state constituents to advance agendas that my state constituents don't want to see advanced with their money.
--:-- Host John Bickley: And so you see someone like the Kentucky State AG Daniel Cameron stepping up and doing something really simple which is not to bring a case not to litigate a case in court. You know that may come later, who knows? But to do something much simpler, which is just to just issue an opinion. He issued a legal opinion on behalf of the Attorney General's office in the state of Kentucky, finding that many of these practices relating to ESG are a violation of state law.
--:-- Vivek Ramaswamy: And I think that alone is actually a lot less expensive, a lot less time-consuming, a lot less risky than litigating cases or bringing cases, but showed the effect and the shockwaves that a single state AG can send through the system that I think and hope and expect, frankly, that many other state AGs are going to take as their call to action in the months ahead.
--:-- Host John Bickley: Now, we've seen some states already take action, for example, West Virginia, to actively block some of these initiatives. Have they been effective?
--:-- Vivek Ramaswamy: Yeah, I mean, look, I think it's important to be precise about the scope of what we're talking about here. But West Virginia has also been another leader in the fight where what they've said is, look, if you as a financial institution are going to actively harm the interests of our state and our state's constituents, then we're not going to do business with you by subsidizing that behavior.
--:-- Host John Bickley: Texas actually had done something similar as well. I think that's the first order step. Okay, the first order step is to say that we're not actively going to use our state's funds to do business with a financial institution that boycotts our state or that behaves in a way that's adverse to the economic interests of our state. I think that much is natural.
--:-- Vivek Ramaswamy: But I think none of them have really taken the step that I think needs to be taken, which is to say that we're actually going to direct our citizens' capital in a way that gives our citizens a voice in the economy. One of the things you get as a shareholder of a company is the ability to vote your shares, is the ability to advocate for policies on behalf of your shares. And what many citizens across this country want is companies to focus exclusively on being as profitable as they can be, on making great products and services for people without mixing that with political and social ideologies.
--:-- Host John Bickley: But if those states get together and say that as a group, the thing that, no, no, no, we want you to do as an asset manager in investing our state's money is to exclusively focus on products and services and to maximize profits without these social and political agendas, then I think that's going to create much more of a positive change that opens up the opportunity for new competitors. You know, I found one of them, Strive, but I hope there are others, new competitors to actually provide the vehicle for those constituents to express their interests.
--:-- Vivek Ramaswamy: All right, Vivek, thanks so much for joining us.
--:-- Host John Bickley: That was Vivek Ramaswamy, founder of Strive Asset Management.
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--:-- Host John Bickley: Other stories we're tracking this week, Representative Liz Cheney has lost her re-election bid in Wyoming. Cheney, who voted to impeach then-President Trump and is the vice chairman of the January 6th committee, was defeated by Trump-endorsed attorney and Wyoming resident Harriet Haigman.
--:-- Host Georgia Howe: Amid a massive drought in the Southwest, the Bureau of Reclamation announced that it will be reducing the water supply for both Arizona and Nevada.
--:-- Host John Bickley: First Lady Jill Biden has tested positive for COVID-19. She has been double vaccinated, double boosted, and is now taking Paxlovid.
--:-- Host Georgia Howe: New York Mayor Eric Adams has reached a deal with a luxury hotel in Times Square to house up to 600 migrants arriving on buses from Texas.
--:-- Host John Bickley: Thanks for listening to Morning Wire. We created this show to bring more balance to the national conversation. If you love our show and you stand with our mission, please consider subscribing, leaving us a five-star rating, and most importantly, sharing our podcast with a friend. That's all the time we've got this morning. Thanks for waking up with us. We'll be back tomorrow with the news you need to know.
