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--:-- Host: John Bickley: This episode is brought to you by LifeLock. Between two-factor authentication, strong passwords, and a VPN, you try to be in control of how your info is protected. But many other places also have it, and they might not be as careful. That's why LifeLock monitors hundreds of millions of data points a second for threats. If your identity is stolen, they'll fix it. Guaranteed or your money back. Save up to 40% your first year. Visit LifeLock.com slash podcast for 40% off. Terms apply.
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--:-- Host: John Bickley: The latest inflation numbers stun economists and send the stock market tumbling. Why were the numbers so concerning? And what's next for the U.S. economy?
--:-- Host: John Bickley: Forget about 75 basis points. That means we're going to be on a path that the Fed is going to be raising rates a lot, not just this meeting, but in multiple meetings going forward.
--:-- Host: John Bickley: I'm Daily Wire editor-in-chief John Bickley with Georgia Howe. It's Wednesday, September 14th, and this is Morning Wire. The Justice Department issues dozens of subpoenas as part of their January 6th inquiry. Is the investigation into President Trump heating up? And the latest Twitter whistleblower shared a bombshell testimony in the Senate, alleging that the company knowingly employed a Chinese agent.
--:-- Host: John Bickley: They simply lacked the fundamental abilities to hunt for foreign intelligence agencies.
--:-- Host: John Bickley: We have the details on the many allegations, as well as Twitter's response. Thanks for waking up with Morning Wire. Stay tuned. We have the news you need to know.
--:-- Host: John Bickley: 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 EpicWheel.com, promo code WIRE.
--:-- Host: John Bickley: New data released Tuesday shows that inflation continues to sit at near 40-year highs, even as record gas prices have dipped as summer comes to a close. Here are the latest numbers and how President Biden is reacting to the news as Daily Wire senior editor Cabot Phillips.
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--:-- Cabot Phillips: Well, we found out that inflation in the month of August was still at 8.3%. Now, that's down slightly from the month before, but still considerably worse than what economists had predicted. As the New York Times put it in their headline, U.S. inflation remains stubbornly high.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: For context, that 8.3% number, while lower than 9.1 figure we saw in June, is still twice as high as anything we saw from 2010 to 2020 when it never got above 4%.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: Yeah, it actually gets worse the more you look into the numbers. So the food index, which just tracks the price of groceries, jumped nearly a full point last month and is now 11.4% higher than it was the same month last year. So $100 grocery bill last September is $110 this month. That is the biggest one-year jump for food prices since 1979.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: But that's nothing compared to the price increases we've seen for energy, which are 23.8% higher than they were 12 months ago, which, again, won't come as much of a surprise to people who've been tracking their utility bills closely.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: No. So what sort of reaction did the news garner? The markets were clearly spooked by the report as they'd been hoping for much better news. The Dow took a nosedive, ending the day down more than 1,200 points, while the S 500 finished the day down 4 with all 11 sectors in the market falling The S 500 is now down 16 on the year
--:-- Cabot Phillips: So I said it before I say it again If you got a mutual fund or a 401k do not look at it right now.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: What have we seen from President Biden in response to all this? He actually touted the latest figures as an example of his administration bringing inflation down. He tweeted, quote, today's data show progress in fighting inflation. My plan is showing we can lower costs.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: Now, critics of the president, as you can imagine, were quick to push back, claiming that his policies largely created record inflation in the first place and that he shouldn't be celebrating when prices are still near record highs.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: They also point out that back in December of 2021, he said inflation had reached its peak and that it would come down, quote, more rapidly than people think. So they feel like he's been wrong on inflation all along.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: But nevertheless, he called for a, quote, celebration yesterday at the White House to commemorate the signing of his spending package, which Democrats call the Inflation Reduction Act. After all, this bill cut costs for families, help reduce inflation at the kitchen table, because that's what they look at, how much of their monthly bills and how much do they have to pay out for their necessities.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: In case you missed it, the event also included a musical performance by James Taylor. So the White House was really putting off sort of a party vibe.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: One more thing before you go. We talked yesterday about how the looming rail worker strike could contribute to inflation. What's the latest there?
--:-- Cabot Phillips: Well, as of late Tuesday, there hadn't been any progress between the two sides, and a strike is seeming more and more likely. On that note, Amtrak began canceling long-distance trips out of Chicago in anticipation of the strike.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: While they own about 700 miles of track in the Northeast, 97% of their trains rely on track owned by freight railroads, which would be shut down starting Friday. Other freight carriers announced an embargo on all trains carrying hazardous materials for fear that they could be stuck on the tracks if and when the strike begins.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: So ominous signs on that front. And remember, the strike would cost the U.S. economy about $2 billion a day and increase prices on a huge swath of goods, which would only drive inflation up more. Definitely the last thing we need right now.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: Yeah.
--:-- Host: John Bickley: That's Daily Wire's senior editor, Cabot Phillips.
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--:-- Host: John Bickley: Coming up, the DOJ issues dozens of subpoenas connected to its January 6th investigation. Justice has reportedly seized the phones of two top advisors to former President Donald Trump and issued dozens of subpoenas to his former aides.
--:-- Host: John Bickley: The rapid escalation in investigative activity comes as part of the DOJ's criminal probe into the activities surrounding the January 6th riot at the U.S. Capitol.
--:-- Host: John Bickley: Here to discuss the DOJ and its criminal investigations into former President Trump is Daily Wire reporter Tim Pierce.
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--:-- Tim Pierce: Hey, Georgia. We don't know most of those names yet, but a few names have surfaced. Reports say that the two men who were forced to give up their phones to the FBI are Trump's in-house counsel, Boris Epstein, and campaign strategist, Mike Roman.
--:-- Tim Pierce: And keep in mind, Epstein has been helping coordinate Trump's legal defense against all the state and federal investigations against him. So the DOJ is striking very close to Trump there.
--:-- Tim Pierce: Exactly. A few other people have been named in reports as having received subpoenas, though the vast majority are still unknown to the public.
--:-- Tim Pierce: Dan Scavino reportedly received one. Scavino was one of Trump's top communications officials and ran the social media accounts of the former president campaign and then for the White House He also one of Trump closest allies He began working for the former president long before the 2016 campaign at one of Trump resorts
--:-- Tim Pierce: Another subpoena went to former New York City Police Commissioner Bernard Carrick, who Trump pardoned in 2020 of several felony tax fraud and false statement convictions.
--:-- Tim Pierce: Carrick's attorney, Timothy Parlatour, said the subpoena Carrick received is the, quote, whitest and most obtuse subpoena I have ever seen in my years practicing criminal law.
--:-- Tim Pierce: He called it a scattershot for anything related to Donald Trump. So this has nothing to do with the classified documents. These subpoenas are part of a separate investigation, aside from the one that prompted the search at Mar-a-Lago.
--:-- Tim Pierce: Well, most of this information is coming from anonymous leakers speaking to the media, so the details are hard to pin down.
--:-- Tim Pierce: It's related to January 6th, but it's not clear if investigators are targeting Trump's attempts at stopping or overturning the election through technical legal arguments or about the right at the Capitol.
--:-- Tim Pierce: We've seen evidence that prosecutors are looking at both. The New York Times got a hold of one of those subpoenas and reported that it cast a wide net seeking any records or communications from people who organized, spoke at, or provided security for Trump's January 6th rally before the riot.
--:-- Tim Pierce: It also sought any documentation on legislative or executive officials who were involved in trying to obstruct, influence, impede, or delay the certification of the election.
--:-- Tim Pierce: Some of the latest subpoenas have hit Trump's Save America pact that fundraised tens of millions of dollars after the 2020 election, ostensibly to help Trump challenge the election results.
--:-- Tim Pierce: Most of that money went unspent and is still sitting in Save America's war chest. And earlier this year, a federal agent seized the cell phone of attorney John Eastman, who advised Trump and authored a memo making a legal argument for former Vice President Mike Pence rejecting certified electors.
--:-- Tim Pierce: So at this point, we're seeing a lot of investigations, but we probably won't know what they're after until we see an indictment.
--:-- Tim Pierce: Right. A lot of investigations to keep track of.
--:-- Host: John Bickley: That was Daily Wire's Tim Pierce.
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--:-- Host: John Bickley: Twitter's latest whistleblower dropped several bombshells in his testimony to Congress on Tuesday. Former Twitter executive Peter Zatko told Congress that not only does Twitter have many security risks, but the social media giant has an undercover Chinese agent on its payroll.
--:-- Host: John Bickley: Daily Wire investigative reporter Mireille Alordi is here to tell us more.
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--:-- Mireille Alordi: Hi, John. So Zatko was Twitter's head of security from the end of 2020 to earlier this year. Zatko gave over two hours of explosive testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee yesterday.
--:-- Mireille Alordi: He accused Twitter of being rife with domestic and national security risks and of having at least one undercover Chinese agent on its payroll, as you noted.
--:-- Mireille Alordi: When Zatko warned another executive that he was confident Twitter employed a foreign agent, the executive responded, according to Zatko, quote, Well, since we already have one, what is the problem if we have more?
--:-- Mireille Alordi: So Twitter was warned that it might have a foreign agent on its payroll and essentially dismissed the concern, according to this whistleblower.
--:-- Mireille Alordi: That's right. Tell us more about the technical security concern Zatko mentioned.
--:-- Mireille Alordi: Well, Zatko also said Twitter is extremely vulnerable to national security threats like foreign governments penetrating and exploiting the platform.
--:-- Mireille Alordi: He mentioned that Twitter struggled on a technical level to track foreign agents. What I did notice when we did know of a person inside acting on behalf of a foreign interest as an unregistered agent, it was extremely difficult to track the people.
--:-- Mireille Alordi: There was a lack of logging and an ability to see what they were doing, what information was being accessed, or to contain their activities, let alone set steps for remediation and possible reconstitution of any damage.
--:-- Mireille Alordi: Another concerning allegation he made is that Twitter CEO Parag Agrawal before he was CEO had proposed bowing to Russia demands for more censorship and surveillance so Twitter could grow users in Russia His suggestion wasn't taken, but it set off alarm bells for Zatko.
--:-- Mireille Alordi: Even domestically, Twitter doesn't keep users' data especially safe, Zatko said. For example, he told Senator Josh Hawley that more than 4,000 Twitter employees have access to geolocation data and IP addresses that could potentially be used to dox Twitter users.
--:-- Mireille Alordi: I know that Twitter has IP locations and that they do use geolocation services based upon IP addresses. Wow, 4,000 employees with access to that data. That's extraordinary.
--:-- Mireille Alordi: A Twitter employee could also potentially take over the account of a high-profile person, he said. Twitter also doesn't wholly understand all the user data it collects, why it's collected, and where it's stored, according to Zatko.
--:-- Mireille Alordi: Another noteworthy point, Zatko said that Twitter was more afraid of foreign regulators than of the U.S.'s own Federal Trade Commission.
--:-- Mireille Alordi: This is because Twitter expects one-time fines from U.S. regulators and even prices the fines into its business, he said. But foreign regulators like France's Data Protection Authority might impose more stringent penalties.
--:-- Host: John Bickley: Morningwire spoke to Carl Szabo, professor of internet law at George Mason University. Here's what he had to say.
--:-- Carl Szabo: Remember, their entire business is maintaining customer trust. So to the extent that Twitter is engaged in any of the allegations that Zatko says, it should be concerning.
--:-- Carl Szabo: But I think it's also unlikely to actually be true. Now, I haven't seen the evidence, but what this does make crystal clear for me and seems like many of the senators in Congress is that we need a national standard on privacy and data security to make sure that any business, regardless of its size, regardless of its location online or offline, is protecting and collecting our information responsibly and protecting it appropriately.
--:-- Mireille Alordi: What kinds of reactions did we see from senators on the committee?
--:-- Mireille Alordi: Well, committee chairman Chuck Grassley actually said that if the whistleblower allegations are true, Twitter CEO Agrawal should resign.
--:-- Mireille Alordi: Senator Drash Hawley called the testimony really significant. But Twitter responded Tuesday to Zetko's testimony by saying that his allegations are, quote, riddled with inconsistencies and inaccuracies.
--:-- Mireille Alordi: We should note, too, the whistleblower testimony wasn't the only big Twitter news on Tuesday. We also got some news on Elon Musk's bid to buy Twitter.
--:-- Mireille Alordi: Well, Twitter shareholders appear to want to change. Less than an hour after Zetco's testimony concluded, the shareholders formally approved Musk's $44 billion buyout offer.
--:-- Mireille Alordi: Well, a lot of upheaval for Twitter this week.
--:-- Host: John Bickley: That's Daily Wire investigative reporter Mairead Alordi.
--:-- Host: John Bickley: Other stories we're tracking this week. Over 1,000 New York Times workers who are part of a union are saying they will not come back to the office this week in the midst of negotiations.
--:-- Host: John Bickley: And sometimes employees are even warning of a strike.
--:-- Host: John Bickley: The Memphis man accused of gunning down several innocent people around the city while live streaming some of it on Facebook last week returned to court for a brief motion hearing on Tuesday.
--:-- Host: John Bickley: He was released 11 months into a three-year prison sentence for a previous attempted murder charge.
--:-- Host: John Bickley: Kenneth Starr, whose investigation as independent counsel led to the impeachment of President Bill Clinton, died Tuesday. He was 76.
--:-- Host: John Bickley: Thanks for listening to Morning Wire. We created this show to bring more balance to the national conversation.
--:-- Host: John Bickley: 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.
--:-- Host: John Bickley: 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.
