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--:-- John Bickley: Two weeks until Americans decide who will control the House and the Senate, and inflation has separated itself as the defining issue. With the Biden administration scrambling to address spiking gas prices, we look at the current state of the economy and its impact on swing state races. I'm Daily Wire editor-in-chief John Bickley with Georgia Howe. It's Monday, October 24th, and this is Morning Wire.
--:-- Georgia Howe: New data released from U.S. Customs and Border Protection shows fiscal year 2022 was the deadliest year on record for migrants at the southern border. We can be compassionate at the border, but you've got to enforce the law. And if you don't return people, then this is what you're going to have. We break down the numbers.
--:-- John Bickley: And more than a decade after Congress passed legislation meant to curtail insider trading by federal officials, a new investigation reveals that the problem may be as widespread as ever. Thanks for waking up with Morning Wire. Stay tuned. We have the news you need to know.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Here at The Daily Wire, we are committed to winning back the culture. Part of that means supporting businesses whose values align with their own, which is why I'm so very excited to tell you that we've teamed up with Black Rifle Coffee Company. Black Rifle helps service members successfully transition from the military into entrepreneurship. They are constantly giving back to veterans foundations as well as law enforcement and first responders.
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--:-- Georgia Howe: As inflation continues to hit new record highs and the cost of energy is spiking ahead of winter, President Biden is making a controversial last-ditch effort to bring down gas prices before midterm elections. Here with the latest is Daily Wire senior editor Cabot Phillips.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: So Cabot, tell us about the latest move from Biden.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: Well, after a summer that saw the highest inflation in gas prices in American history, there was finally some good news for the White House over July and August. As gas prices started to come down into the early fall. But now they are shooting back up really quickly, and the White House is clearly desperate to get them down before Election Day, for obvious reasons.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: A recent Trafalgar poll shows that 54% of Americans say rising gas prices makes them more likely to vote Republican, while just 32% say it makes them more likely to vote Democrat.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: Right, and that's where the oil reserve comes in. Exactly. The president announced late last week the release of another 15 million barrels from the nation's emergency oil stockpile. This is the final stage of 180 million gallon release that the president promised back in the spring.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: Republicans say the move is more about PR than actually lowering costs, given the fact that the country right now goes through 20 million barrels a day. So, you know, 15 million doesn't really make much of a dent.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: There was also some pushback on the president's attempt to lower gas prices by negotiating with the Saudis. What do we know there?
--:-- Cabot Phillips: Well, we all remember Biden's now infamous meeting with the Saudi crown prince where he was seen on camera fist bumping the country's tyrannical leader. Well the main point of that meeting was to convince the Saudis to hopefully increase oil production in a bid to lower prices here in the States But that meeting failed as the Saudis and OPEC announced earlier this month that they would go the opposite route and would actually start cutting production by 2 million barrels a day starting in November, which is going to cause prices to go up even more right before Election Day.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: So that was bad enough. But then the Saudis made a pretty shocking claim last week. They issued a statement saying that President Biden had urged the Saudis to wait until after November midterms to make that decision on oil and threatened economic consequences if they did not. In their words, it was a ploy to avoid bad news ahead of the election.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: Now, Republicans say that that constitutes a quid pro quo and that Biden was basing foreign policy decisions on political whims. So not a good look.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: We know gas prices are going to impact voters on election day, but zooming out, how is the broader state of the economy impacting things now?
--:-- Cabot Phillips: Well, we've talked plenty about national trends showing that many voters who earlier in the year had listed social issues as their top priority now list the economy as number one. The latest polling from Reuters, for example, shows that 44% of voters list the economy as their top issue. No other issue even cracked double digits.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: But in those key battleground states, we're seeing even more evidence of the impact that the weak economy is having, especially in states with Democrat incumbents. So while Republican challengers in states like Nevada and Georgia can promise something new, look, it's tough for Democrat incumbents to run on a message of I'll fix the economy when they were the ones in power as the economy tanked.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: Yeah, you can see why that might not be as effective this cycle. Yeah, and to that point, the latest polling does show that even the majority of Democrats are now dissatisfied with the state of the economy. So those more nominal Democrats, maybe the ones that aren't as likely to vote in off elections like this might be less motivated than usual to show up for their party.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: And one final note here, the latest polling from CNN had two very interesting nuggets. First, they found that in the most competitive congressional districts around the country, Republicans not only held a 48-43 lead on that generic congressional ballot, but among voters who say the economy is, quote, extremely important to their vote, which is a sizable portion of the electorate, Republicans were up 26 points, 56 to 30.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: Yeah, that's pretty sizable. And clearly the economy is the defining issue of this race. We'll keep following the latest developments.
--:-- John Bickley: Cabot, thanks for reporting.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: Anytime. That's Daily Wire senior editor Cabot Phillips.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Coming up, migrant deaths at the southern border hit an all-time high. If something were to happen to you tomorrow, how confident are you that your belongings will fall into the right hands. Have you determined where your finances will go? Without a will in place, the state will decide what happens to the things you hold most dear. Luckily, Epic Will makes writing a will extremely easy and affordable. Morning Wire listeners can go to epicwill.com and use promo code WIRE to save 10% on Epic Will's Complete Will Package. It only costs $119 for a single person to create a will. And when you use promo code WIRE, you'll save 10%. Go to epicwill.com and use promo code WIRE to save 10% on Epic Will's Complete Will Package.
--:-- John Bickley: The Department of Homeland Security released September's border numbers on Friday. The data set several records for the past fiscal year. Not only is fiscal year 2022 the highest on record for migrant encounters, it was also the deadliest. Here to discuss the latest border numbers is Daily Wire's Tim Pierce.
--:-- Tim Pierce: Thanks for bringing me on.
--:-- Tim Pierce: So, Tim, walk us through what DHS released last week.
--:-- Tim Pierce: Sure, Georgia. The Department of Homeland Security released September's border numbers on Friday evening. It was the last month in fiscal year 2022, and it was a doozy. The number of migrant encounters at the border for the month of September tallied nearly 230 That the highest tally for the month of September on record Because September is the last month of the fiscal year the report also included yearly totals It turns out 2022 shattered records for both migrant encounters as well as migrant deaths.
--:-- Tim Pierce: Total encounters for fiscal year 2022 were just shy of 2.4 million. The number blows past the previous record of 1.6 million set just last year. If you factor in the number of documented gotaways in 2022. Total migrant encounters for the fiscal year should be closer to 3 million.
--:-- Tim Pierce: Right. Now, we've been tracking migrant encounter numbers pretty closely on this show, but something you mentioned that we haven't discussed much is migrant deaths. You said that 2022 was also the deadliest year on record. What were those numbers?
--:-- Tim Pierce: Well, according to the data released Friday, Border Patrol agents have recovered the bodies of over 850 migrants who apparently died trying to cross into the United States illegally. It's the highest number of migrant deaths in a single year at the border on record. It includes migrants who died in all manner of ways attempting to enter the country, often dehydration, heat, or drowning.
--:-- Tim Pierce: I should note that Friday's data also showed that Border Patrol arrested 20 known or suspected terrorists in September. That brings the total number in 2022 up to 98. For reference, the number of known or suspected terrorists arrested at the border in the prior five years combined was just 26.
--:-- Tim Pierce: So in light of those numbers, has the Biden administration made any comment about what they plan to do at the border?
--:-- Tim Pierce: They have not issued a formal statement about the new numbers, but that's not so surprising because 2021 also set records for these numbers, and that did not spark much change in approach either. The administration is primarily focused on processing migrants rather than stopping them at the border.
--:-- Tim Pierce: Biden has tried to get more cooperation from governments such as Mexico in caring for migrants, but he has had limited success. The administration has made some changes around the margins, though. For example, they eliminated a policy that guaranteed entry for migrants from Venezuela. That policy seems to have had a significant impact. After it was announced, the number of Venezuelan migrants stopped at the border dropped from about 1,200 a day to around 150 a day.
--:-- Tim Pierce: Right, that seems to be very significant. Now, DHS released this report at around 11 p.m. on Friday night. Is it fair to say they did not want much press coverage of this issue?
--:-- Tim Pierce: Yeah, some reporters said the administration appeared to be slow walking the data's release even before it was published. The numbers received some attention over the weekend, though. Congressman Henry Cuellar is a Democrat in Texas and one of the most vocal critics of the administration on the left side of the aisle. He said Sunday that the numbers showed that the border is far from secure.
--:-- Tim Pierce: Here's Cuellar talking to Fox News. I saw the numbers from the Venezuelans have dropped out. I actually want them to do that to every country. If we do that to every country, the numbers will go down. We will be able to control our borders, and that's important to us that live along the border.
--:-- Tim Pierce: Well, Henry Cuellar is also fighting to hold on to a very purple district in Texas, and this is a very important issue for them.
--:-- John Bickley: Tim, thanks for reporting.
--:-- Tim Pierce: Thanks for having me.
--:-- Georgia Howe: A new report by The Wall Street Journal shows that some federal officials are heavily engaged in trading stocks. Often in industries or with companies, they oversee or help regulate. Here are the details as Eric Eggers, the co-host of The Drill Down with Peter Schweitzer, who's been covering this issue.
--:-- Eric Eggers: So Eric, first, why does it matter that federal government employees are buying and selling stocks in high volumes?
--:-- Eric Eggers: So there's a couple concerns, but the overriding one is the idea that people are leveraging positions to buy or sell stocks based on non-public knowledge. The other is that the idea that government officials are supposed to be regulating certain industries might favor a company if they hold stocks in that company.
--:-- Eric Eggers: And does this new report show that?
--:-- Eric Eggers: Absolutely. From the records that the Wall Street Journal looked at over 2 federal officials owned stocks and companies that were lobbying their federal agency This includes things like 200 EPA employees and their family members collectively owning between or up to million in shares of oil and gas companies on an annual basis for example The Department of Defense employees or their families owned between 1.2 and 3.4 million of stock in aerospace and defense companies, including some Chinese companies the United States was considering blacklisting at the time.
--:-- Eric Eggers: Some of the individual examples the report revealed are actually pretty bad also. Yeah, walk us through some of those, if you would.
--:-- Eric Eggers: So a Defense Department official for Southeast Asia was buying stock in Chinese company Alibaba, while the Treasury Department was considering blacklisting the company. Two weeks after the guy purchased the stock, when Alibaba wasn't blacklisted, their stock rose 4%, and the official sold the stock immediately afterwards.
--:-- Eric Eggers: Another Department of Defense employee, this one's a scientist whose division was overseeing the testing of F-35 jets, bought stock in Lockheed Martin, who makes the jets, weeks before the Pentagon announced that they would be buying $1 billion more worth of those jets from that company.
--:-- Eric Eggers: Another example is a lawyer who runs the National Labor Relations Board's office in Oakland was holding Tesla shares as her office was pursuing complaints against the automaker Tesla and chief executive Elon Musk. And actually, while that investigation was ongoing, she increased her holding in the company.
--:-- Eric Eggers: Now, your team at GAI has been covering the issue of stock trades by federal officials for some time now, right?
--:-- Eric Eggers: Absolutely. Our organization was actually started after our president, Peter Schweitzer, wrote a book called Throw Them All Out, which exposed how members of Congress were buying and selling stocks in industries that they had committee oversight over.
--:-- Eric Eggers: So the public outrage over the revelations in that book and subsequent media coverage led to the passage of the Stock Act, which required members of Congress to disclose their stock trades on a monthly basis.
--:-- Eric Eggers: And the Stock Act, that's the Stop Trading on Congressional Knowledge Act, that actually passed with bipartisan support. So what happened here?
--:-- Eric Eggers: So that's really what's at the heart of this. The act passed 96 to 3 in the Senate and 417 to 5 in the House. So that doesn't normally happen. But the problem is the act doesn't have a ton of teeth. The year after its passage, Congress quietly removed some of the provisions relating to federal employee disclosures.
--:-- Eric Eggers: So as a result, you now have the activity that the Wall Street journalists discovered.
--:-- Eric Eggers: And what about the members of Congress themselves? So there are more disclosures for sure. But, and this is interesting, the PDFs of those disclosure forms aren't searchable, which makes real-time monitoring more challenging.
--:-- Eric Eggers: And last year, a series of investigative reports revealed that actually over 50 members of Congress had violated the act by not disclosing the transactions in time. And there's no evidence they'd actually been subject to any fines or penalties.
--:-- Eric Eggers: Definitely something that merits more looking into.
--:-- John Bickley: Eric, thanks for reporting.
--:-- Eric Eggers: That's Eric Eggers of the Government Accountability Institute and co-host of the Drill Down podcast with Peter Schweitzer.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Other stories we're tracking this week. President Xi Jinping, China's most powerful leader in decades, was awarded a third five-year term as General Secretary of the Communist Party on Sunday. Author Salman Rushdie, a high-profile critic of Islam, is on the mend after an August attack. But Rushdie's agents say the author has lost sight in one eye and has lost the use of one of his hands. Rushdie was attacked by a man who rushed the stage at a lecture on August 12th.
--:-- John Bickley: Thanks for listening to Morning Wire. We created this show to bring more ballots to the national conversation. If you love our show and you stand with our mission, consider subscribing, leaving us a five-star rating, and most importantly, sharing our podcast with a friend. Thanks for waking up with us. We'll be back this afternoon with more news you need to know.
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