--:-- [Theme music fades out]
--:-- Host: Georgia Howe: 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.
--:-- Host: Georgia Howe: DNC Day 3 sees Tim Walz take the stage for the highest stakes speech of his career. It's the honor of my life to accept your nomination for Vice President of the United States. We have the highs and lows from the VP pick's primetime remarks. I'm Georgia Howe with Daily Wire Editor-in-Chief John Bickley. It's Thursday, August 22nd, and this is Morning Wire.
--:-- Host: Georgia Howe: Multiple reports are out saying independent presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. will drop out and endorse Donald Trump. The Democratic Party is disenfranchising millions of Americans. So I'm a little disillusioned with the Democratic Party today. But that's why I decided to run as an independent. What changed his mind and how is the Trump campaign reacting? And nearly a million U.S. jobs vanish in a massive downward revision for the year. What does it mean for the health of the economy?
--:-- Host: Georgia Howe: Thanks for waking up with Morning Wire. Stay tuned. We have the news you need to know.
--:-- [Producer Brandon speaks in the background]
--:-- Host: Georgia Howe: Hey, guys, producer Brandon here. Balanced Nature is my go-to source for whole food ingredients. Balance of Nature takes fruits and vegetables, they freeze-dry them, turn them into a powder, and then they put them into a capsule. The capsules are completely void of additives, fillers, extracts, synthetics, pesticides, or added sugar. The only thing at Balance of Nature fruit and veggie capsules are fruits and veggies. So go to balanceofnature.com and use promo code WIRE for 35% off your first order as a preferred customer, plus get a free bottle of fiber and spice.
--:-- Host: Georgia Howe: Minnesota Governor Tim Walz was the headliner for the third day of the Democratic National Convention. Joining us to discuss is Daily Wire senior editor and Election Wire host Cabot Phillips.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: A. Cabot. So we heard from Bill Clinton, Nancy Pelosi, and Oprah last night, but all eyes were on Walz. What did we hear from the Democratic VP nominee?
--:-- Cabot Phillips: Well, first, it was certainly shorter than we expected. He was only on stage for 16 minutes, but for the most part, when he did talk, the substance was more or less what we expected to hear. He started with his trademark folksy retelling of his own personal story and offered impassioned praise of the woman who asked him to be on the ticket with her.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: He went on to tell his small town story, quickly ticking off his folksy creds again, including being a high school football coach and teacher. He did rattle off many of the same talking points that we've heard from him on the campaign trail, focusing in on his defense of abortion and gun control early and often.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: When Republicans use the word freedom, they mean that the government should be free to invade your doctor's office. But when we Democrats talk about freedom, we mean the freedom to make a better life for yourself and the people that you love. Freedom to make your own health care decisions. And yeah, Your kid's freedom to go to school without worrying about being shot dead in the hall.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: And of course, he went on to attack Donald Trump, once again trying to paint Trump's agenda as the Project 2025 agenda, accusing him of embracing a radical platform. Their Project 2025 will make things much much harder for people who are just trying to live their lives If these guys get back in the White House they start jacking up the costs on the middle class. They'll repeal the Affordable Care Act. They'll gut Social Security and Medicare. And they will ban abortion across this country with or without Congress.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: Now, again, it is worth noting Project 2025 has no official ties to the Trump campaign. It is a document from a conservative think tank, and Trump himself has denounced it repeatedly.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: Walls finished with a somewhat tortured football metaphor calling for Democrats to rally around Kamala Harris and get her elected. It's the fourth quarter. We're down a field goal, but we're on offense and we've got the ball. We're driving down the field. And boy, do we have the right team. Kamala Harris is top. Kamala Harris is experienced and Kamala Harris is ready.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: Our job for everyone watching is to get in the trenches and do the blocking and tackling. One inch at a time. One yard at a time. One phone call at a time. One door knock at a time. One $5 donation at a time.
--:-- Host: Georgia Howe: Now, you mentioned that Wall's made many of the same claims he's made on the campaign trail. so far. And he's come under a lot of fire in recent days for making misleading claims. First his claims about his military service, now about IVF. What's this latest controversy?
--:-- Cabot Phillips: So Walz has repeatedly claimed on the campaign trail over the years that he and his wife Gwen used in vitro fertilization to conceive both of their children. And he has used that claim to attack Republicans and Trump, falsely claiming they went to ban IVF. But it turns out the Walz's did not use IVF.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: That has now been confirmed by the Harris campaign itself. The couple instead used an insemination procedure that takes place inside a woman's body and does not discard human embryos and therefore has not been an issue for pro-life activists. That is important because, again, Wallace has used this false IVF story to go after the right over so-called reproductive rights, going so far as saying they would, quote, not even have a family if it were up to Trump running mate J.D. Vance.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: First of all, it was up to him. I wouldn't have a family because of IVF and the things that we need to do reproductive. My kids were born through that direct, you know, that way.
--:-- Host: Georgia Howe: And this isn't the first claim he's repeated that's come under scrutiny. No, it is not. The one that's certainly gotten the most attention is his embellishment about his military service. Remember, he did serve in the National Guard, but did not see combat in the Middle East or retire as a command sergeant major, as he has repeatedly suggested over the years.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: There's also new questions about whether he actually won Minnesota Teacher of the Year awards, again, as he has repeatedly claimed. And then there is his drunk driving arrest. Walls was pulled over by a Nebraska trooper back in 1995 for speeding and ended up spending the night behind bars.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: He failed a field sobriety test and a blood alcohol test and later admitted that he was driving drunk. That is according to court records. But when he ran for Congress, Walls' campaign falsely claimed that he had not been drinking, saying he only failed those sobriety tests because of hearing loss from the military.
--:-- Host: Georgia Howe: The Harris-Wallis campaign has been asked about those discrepancies a number of times, and thus far has refused to address them. There's still a lot of discrepancies to address for Walls.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: Meanwhile, his big night on the stage brings us now to the biggest night of the convention. Yep, the final night.
--:-- Host: Georgia Howe: Cabot, thanks for reporting. Anytime. Cabot will be hosting election wires. Final night of DNC coverage tonight, starting at seven 45 central.
--:-- [Producer Brandon speaks in the background]
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--:-- Host: Georgia Howe: Democrats weren't the only ones making big campaign announcements this week. On Wednesday, reports began circulating that independent presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. would drop out of the race and endorse former President Trump.
--:-- Tim Rice: So Tim, is RFK really going to drop out? It sure is starting to seem like it. ABC News reported yesterday that Kennedy was planning to drop out by the end of the week and was still debating whether or not he would endorse Trump.
--:-- Tim Rice: But just as those stories began circulating, RFK announced that he would address the nation Friday on, quote, the present historical moment and his path forward. The address will be broadcast live from Phoenix. That's where Trump is scheduled to host a rally on Friday, leading many to speculate Kennedy is planning to drop out and endorse Trump in one fell swoop.
--:-- Tim Rice: Well, that would be something. Do we have a sense of how the Trump campaign is reacting?
--:-- Donald Trump Jr.: I think it's safe to say they're pretty excited. During an appearance on Daily Wire's show Election Wire Tuesday night, Donald Trump Jr. expressed the campaign's willingness to accept RFK's endorsement and said that doing so would send a clear signal to American voters.
--:-- Donald Trump Jr.: If people like that and others are saying, hey, you know, the reality is the biggest threat to actual democracy, the biggest threat to our republic today is this, at this point, clearly communist regime. I mean, the only person worse than Kamala Harris would probably be Tim Walz. And they're running together.
--:-- Donald Trump Jr.: If it takes that kind of unity to bring Americans together, even people who have differing values, I think we'd be all for that. I think it makes total sense. And I think the American public probably wants to see that.
--:-- Tim Rice: As for Trump himself, the former president told CNN on Tuesday that while he was not aware Kennedy was thinking about dropping out, he thinks Kennedy is a brilliant guy and would certainly be open to accepting his endorsement and considering him for a role in his administration.
--:-- Tim Rice: Trump and Kennedy have reportedly spoken several times since July and discussed the possibility of Kennedy dropping out and endorsing Trump in exchange for a role in the latter's administration.
--:-- Host: Georgia Howe: It's also worth noting that before taking office in 2017, Trump asked RFK to chair a presidential commission on vaccine safety. The commission never materialized, but it's clear these two have been circling each other for a long time.
--:-- Tim Rice: Although just this week, it seemed like Kennedy planned to see his campaign through to the end. He even appeared in Pennsylvania court last Tuesday to fight to get his name on the ballot. Why the sudden change of heart?
--:-- Tim Rice: Well, with just 74 days until the election, it seems like Kennedy has decided his priority is defeating Vice President Kamala Harris and Governor Tim Walz, and that throwing his support behind Trump is the best way to do that.
--:-- Tim Rice: Kennedy's running mate, Nicole Shanahan, made a similar point in an interview this week, where she spoke about Democrats' efforts to sabotage the Kennedy campaign.
--:-- Nicole Shanahan: We don't want to be a spoiler. We wanted to win. We wanted a fair shot. The DNC made that impossible for us. They have banned us, shadow banned us, kept us off stages, manipulated polls, used lawfare against us, sued us in every possible state.
--:-- Nicole Shanahan: They've even planted insiders into our campaign to disrupt it and to create actual legal issues for us. I really wanted a fair shot at this election. And I believed in the America that I, a little girl pledged an allegiance to. And that is not where we are today.
--:-- Nicole Shanahan: And it's not because of the Republican Party taking us out. It is exclusively because of the Democratic Party taking us out. And I am so disappointed I ever helped them.
--:-- Host: Georgia Howe: And it looks like all eyes are going to be on Phoenix this Friday. Tim, thanks for reporting. Thanks for having me.
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--:-- Host: Georgia Howe: New government data out Wednesday shows that U.S. job growth appears to be significantly weaker than once thought. The Biden administration may have overcounted the number of Americans in jobs by close to 1 million. Daily Wire reporter Tim Pierce is here to talk about the job numbers and what they mean for the health of the U.S. economy.
--:-- Tim Pierce: Hey, Tim. So what did we learn on Wednesday?
--:-- Tim Pierce: Well, it looks like the Biden-Harris administration may have overstated the amount of people in the workforce, and by a huge margin. The last time a downward revision in the jobs numbers was this big was after the financial crash in 2009.
--:-- Tim Pierce: According to Bureau of Labor Statistics data, in the 12 months ending in March of this year, the government overshot the number of jobs created by 818,000. That is roughly five times larger than the average annual revision from the past decade.
--:-- Tim Pierce: It would bring the average monthly jobs numbers during that period down by about 28% from about 242,000 jobs a month to 174,000. Now, this revision is just preliminary. It'll be finalized in February next year, but it would bring jobs numbers, which have been an outlier as a data point, back in line with a few other economic indicators.
--:-- Tim Pierce: Really stunning numbers here. What does this tell us about the health of the economy?
--:-- Tim Pierce: So there's been a disconnect for a while. It suggests that between Americans' general pessimism about the economy and the rosy picture from the administration, the average voter has a better gauge of what that reality is.
--:-- Tim Pierce: But there's also another issue here, and it has to do with illegal immigration. The data used to generate the monthly totals that have seemed so solid don't take into account a worker's legal status. A job is a job, in other words.
--:-- Tim Pierce: But this latest data is retrieved from state unemployment tax records, which don't count jobs held by illegal immigrant workers. So there's a chance that part of this massive drop is due to illegal aliens taking jobs that would otherwise go to Americans or to at least legal residents and workers.
--:-- Tim Pierce: Yeah. Now, there's been some buzz lately about what will happen to interest rates at the next Fed board meeting that's happening next month. How does this new data affect that?
--:-- Tim Pierce: It's now much more likely that the Fed will cut the interest rate. Probably the better question now is how big will that cut be, either 25 or 50 basis points.
--:-- Tim Pierce: Now, that has to have political consequences in the middle of a presidential campaign. How is this going to play into the election?
--:-- Tim Pierce: Yeah, former President Trump is already on the campaign trail crying foul. Here's Trump.
--:-- Donald Trump: I want to address the massive scandal around the revised job numbers that were just announced this morning, a little while ago, just before I came up, I got to see him. And it really isn't a revision. It's a total lie. Total lie.
--:-- Donald Trump: There's never been any revision like this. The Harris-Biden administration has been caught fraudulently manipulating job statistics to hide the true extent of the economic ruin that they've inflicted on America.
--:-- Tim Pierce: The economy has been a rough issue for Vice President Harris. She's struggled recently to come up with an economic message that sells. Her stated policies haven't done it, such as price controls on groceries and tax increases, a 28% corporate tax, a 44.6% capital gains tax, and this is a big one, a 25% tax on unrealized capital gains.
--:-- Host: Georgia Howe: For now, it looks like the economy will continue to be a tough issue for her campaign. Well, this massive revision has already raised a lot of eyebrows. Tim, thanks for joining us.
--:-- Tim Pierce: Thanks for having me. Thanks for waking up with us.
--:-- Host: Georgia Howe: We'll be back later this afternoon with more news you need to know.
