<Music> Welcome to Party Politics, where we prepare you for your next political conversation.

I'm Jeronimo Cortina, a political science professor at the University of.

Houston, and I'm Brandon Rottinghaus also a political science professor here at the University of Houston.

Thanks for hanging out and talking politics and some basketball.

Right?

Yes.

Coogs in the Final four?

Absolutely.

I'm power of the net.

And also to you, Jeronimo.

Happy liberation day.

Thank you.

Week.

The president this week is decided that there, this nation needs more tariffs.

The U.S. has to be protected.

So we're going to talk all about what the political implications to that as well as like a bunch of celebrity sightings.

Right.

Kid Rock at the White House.

Yeah.

Wearing some very nice track pants.

That would look great on you.

Actually, I don't like the sort of full on red, yes.

America suit, 1970s vibe.

Absolutely.

I yeah.

That's good.

Also, Woody Harrelson and Matthew McConaughey in Texas testifying about film incentives.

We'll talk about that with respect to the House budget and Senate budget.

So lots to get to.

But let's first talk about liberation day.

All right.

This is the artifact from the Trump administration.

They say basically that the US is being taken advantage of all over the world.

And as a result, there will be reciprocal tariffs on a bunch of countries.

So the short list includes Canada Mexico, Venezuela, anybody who buys oil from Venezuela.

Yeah.

Cars made outside the US.

This has tremendous implications because obviously there's this kind of core concern from the American public that prices are too high.

The president and the administration feel that they need to kind of protect American interests financially, economically in the long run.

Maybe it works.

In the short term, it's going to be a pinch.

What do you think is going to be the most serious kind of short term and then long term implications?

Well.

The short term implications is that the average person is going to feel.

Yeah.

I mean, if you put, tariffs on auto parts or cars, if you are an average American and you want to purchase a new car and suddenly that are already expensive.

Yeah.

If you purchase a car that I now it's ten, 15% higher.

You're not going to do it.

If you need to fix your car and auto parts are even more expensive.

I mean, that's a real problem because it affects real people in real lives.

In on real time.

And then the other long term implications is, you know, I understand the argument of the tariffs, right?

I mean, every country has to try to protect their own industries.

But here the question is, we anti-globalization many, many decades ago.

Yeah.

And the production type of the type of industry that we need, for example, let's think about steel or aluminum or whatnot.

That takes a lot of time.

And you need to have the infrastructure.

You need to have a plant.

Yes, yes.

Right.

And you can't do it overnight.

And certainly not you cannot do it.

And the president's timeline is very short, right.

You know, kind of from the promise to the Liberation Day, like it was not enough time for there to be a ramp up to make this work.

Absolutely not.

And so they're still going to have to fight this out.

And the problem is I think that, you know, obviously timing and politics is everything.

And for the president and for the Republicans, it's a kind of short window.

The midterms are coming up before, you know it.

And this could be a real issue.

So like polling that has come out, this suggested that basically only 4 in 10 Americans think that the financial kind of situation in the US is going in the right direction.

That's a major problem for the administration, for people who want to do things like bike, as you say, which I need to do, probably won't do.

Oh, you like to drink beer like both of us?

Aluminum is going to be more expensive, even for domestic beer.

These are all concerns that could, I think, kind of create a real conundrum here.

So a bad move on the economy could really cost Republicans.

And if it gets really bad, then it definitely could be a disaster for them.

Because we're talking about a economic recession.

Yeah.

Well, look, and here's the question.

So obviously Congress has the ability to frame and to slow what the president does on trade matters.

The U.S. House of Representatives, the U.S. Senate.

Sometimes I think you're noting we forget, right.

This is something that they have a responsibility for.

Now, of course, we could have a whole series of shows about delegation in the way that Congress basically kind of gives these authorities to the executive.

And in this case, the basic kind of core of is the president is use this authority under this emergency power.

But some Republicans are pushing back.

So you have three, maybe four Republicans in the Senate who are going to sign on to a resolution by Tim Kaine from Virginia that says the this is bad, like wrong.

And so the question is, are we reaching the point where even Republicans are abandoning Donald Trump's economic policies?

Maybe, and everything has to do with the political retribution that President Trump, basically, imposes on these people that are just running like normal people and say, like, maybe we shouldn't do these things, right?

They're going to pay a price.

Yeah.

Like Maine.

Susan Collins.

Right.

The governor a. Chuck Chuck, Chuck Grassley right.

From from Iowa.

Like these tariffs are going to hit farming communities worse.

And it's heating ride the basic constituents of the Republican Party or President Trump.

So the premise as you said is these needs to be something that is planned, maybe in the first term of a president aiming at a second term.

Right?

Right, right.

Because the timing I mean, just think about building a aluminum plant in a, well, less than a year and producing and taking up the logging, the demand for, such product.

It's impossible.

Really hard.

I auto parts like, how do you move parts?

Yeah, because auto parts in the US come from Canada.

Yeah, come from Mexico and come from the US.

Right.

So how do we move this plan from here to here and from there to here in 30 minutes?

You just cannot do it.

No.

And I think that the the problem, in addition to the fact that this could be an economic crisis, is that the president doesn't seem to care.

Right.

What was his exact quote?

He said that he couldn't care less if that was the case, that other countries increased their tariffs result.

That's I think, a bit more like kind of let them eat cake.

It could backlash on the.

Oh yeah.

Also could be a liability for Republicans who have to go to their voters and explain why this is all happening.

There's a lot of anger already, especially from Democrats, but this could be a real kind of conundrum.

Let's pivot for a second on this very issue and talk about kind of the politics of it.

I am loathe to admit that special elections have any kind of harbinger for the future, right?

This is not a crystal ball, but elections this week in Wisconsin for their state Supreme court and two, Senate of two House races in Florida to replace members who have left Matt Gates and of course, Mike Waltz, basically were wins for Democrats, even though in the two House seats the Republicans won the kind of specifics maybe aren't as important right now.

But basically the Republicans won by less than they normally do in the House races.

The House is able to keep its majority, so why aren't any changes there?

The Senate, in Wisconsin, the the the the Supreme Court seat, the Democrats won by a big number despite the fact that Elon Musk put about $25 million into it that he found in his couch.

Yeah.

What do you make of, like, the outcomes here?

I mean, I already previewed one, I think, which is basically that, like, these special elections don't really tell us a lot about what's going on.

Right?

You've got a kind of really energetic Democratic base right now.

You've got independents who are looking at what's happening, and they're maybe a little unhappy.

Trump voters stay home there where got the win.

So it's hard to read into this.

But like what do you make of the fact that so early on the Republicans seem to be kind of struggling and Democrats, at least in small part, are surging?

Well, obviously, I mean, Wisconsin, it's it's a clear victory for liberals and pretty decisive.

Yes, in a swing state.

Right.

Oh, yeah.

And it shows that, you know, polarization has, implications, and those implications, now liberals are going to say, let's hold the line.

And it's that swing back, right?

We had a swing in 2020, to the left.

And then 2024, we have that turning to the right.

And dizzy from all the.

Swing.

Yes I know, and then we're going to have the pendulum perhaps go maybe to the middle.

Hopefully, so things can get done.

But it's very clear that people are not happy with, Trump's policies.

And it's, it's something that Republicans should pay attention.

And in Florida, the reduction of the margin.

Yeah.

That's very interesting.

Yeah, it's very interesting.

Obviously it's red state, 100%, but that reduction, that, the way that they lose that, degree of how competitive they were a couple of, of, years ago in comparison to now, that's something that maybe.

Some.

Are already feeling in the price of eggs.

Yeah.

And I think, you know, certainly these are kind of alarms going off.

I don't think that it's like panic time for no kids because this is a lot of time between now and the election.

You know, enough time that you can switch things around.

Look, Democrats poured a bunch of money into these seats that otherwise is going to be spread across the country.

The Republicans in these races didn't run great races.

That's why I like the kind of national polls to kind of swoop in and do these tele town halls, to try to make sure Republicans came out to vote.

So I hard to read these very are right.

Right, right, right, right.

And the thing, too, is that Democrats have been really good at turning out high motivated voters.

But the question is, can they connect to voters who are otherwise not that motivated, like, can the messaging really apply?

We'll talk about this with respect to Texas in the new chair in a second.

But that's the issue.

I think that can you engage less engaged voters?

Maybe.

I mean, the numbers don't imply that that's the case, but like, of course, there's a lot of time between now and then.

They figure it out.

The other thing, too, is that I'm always sort of remind people that, like when we have these special elections, look at what happened in the last at a special elections.

And what we found was that they, didn't really prove a harbinger for much at all.

Like there was this discussion after the kind of special elections were happening in, in 21 and 22 places like Tennessee and New Hampshire, Pennsylvania, these special elections that came like, you know, the Democrats win and, it didn't mean much at the end of the day.

Then Democrats get blown out in 24.

Yeah, because it's a context.

Right.

And here is where the water is starting to boil or not.

And and it's once again is your promise that the price of eggs were going to go down first day.

Yeah.

And that has not happened.

Ending of the war in Ukriane.

That it has not happened.

Right.

Yeah.

Yeah.

You know tick off.

All the things that were promised.

And forget about those foreign policy things are 30,000ft away from from you.

It's a real, you know, little things in your everyday life now.

It's like, oh, I want that new pickup truck.

Oh, well, now it's 15% more expensive sticker prices.

Like, what's going on?

Yeah.

And the price of eggs.

I'm going to the supermarket and but etc.

etc..

So it starts to compound.

So at the end is not that if you're going to put money or not, or if Republicans are feeling comfortable or not is like, yeah, hey what up?

Well, let me ask you this.

Like Donald Trump says that a lot of people want him to run for a third term.

Yes.

And that is really a constitutional conundrum that has been settled to a serious degree.

But he floated the idea and he said specifically, I'm not joking.

There are ways that this could happen.

That's not totally true, right?

Because there are very few paths where this could actually.

Yeah, there is some speculation that, like JD Vance could become president and that Trump could run as vice president, and then Vance would just be told to step aside like, you know, told to go to Greenland.

Yeah.

Because now cannot happen.

It can't.

Happen.

You have to be eligible to serve as president if you are.

Best.

Respected as vice president.

So that's a nonstarter.

The other issue, of course, is that, like, if you want to change the Constitution, it's pretty soon.

It's impossible.

It really is very unlikely.

Right.

You've got to have two thirds of both houses not going to happen.

No.

And you've got to have three fourths of the states.

No.

Also not going to happen.

So the likelihood is happening is very low.

But I guess the question then is sort of what is Donald Trump really after here?

I think it's three things.

Number one, he's prone to bluster.

There's no question.

Right.

He has these kind of authoritarian tendencies.

Sometimes he acts on them, sometimes he doesn't.

But I think that's part of it.

Right.

Number two, it is certainly the case that this is about making sure that people don't see him as a lame duck.

Right?

He is a lame duck like he will be in office for this term only.

And if you are Donald Trump putting through some kind of maybe risky policies, maybe unpopular policies, Republicans, you need them to stay with you and making sure that they do, because there's a threat that Donald Trump will still be around is definitely real.

The third is that it's a little bit like revenge porn.

Like, I think that that you can see the way there's this sort of like we're on PBS, we can say, Bill Moyers would never say that, but I think that's what's happening here.

Like, you've got essentially him saying, I want to run against Barack Obama, who also can't run for president.

So, like, I think part of this is just a way to rile up the base, right?

Just kind of constantly feeding them this reality, gating the past where Republicans are still mad about all these things.

I think it's a mistake.

I think that the more you push the American people to think that you're going to break these rules, the more they're going to look at this and say, you know what?

We can find somebody different.

Other Republicans won't do this.

So maybe there's a sort of need to revoke Trumpism to run against it and find somebody different.

So I think he is in danger of basically making himself irrelevant, which if you're the Republican Party, is a mistake because for all of his faults, Donald Trump has been a success for the Republican.

Right.

And so you don't want to be in a position where you make people mad.

N Sure, I agree with those things, but I think it's also another factor is is a distraction.

It's a distraction in the sense of not really focusing on these issues.

Right.

And once again the issue is the economy.

Once again the issue is like why are we doing times.

Every single CEO right is like no, no, no.

Types are very bad.

Yeah.

In in, in in Texas, Jeff Sessions just says like, times are bad, because we have a lot of stuff going on with Mexico.

With Canada, it's going to hit us hard.

And and that distraction is from that.

You had a couple of days ago, the signal scandal.

Now, apparently it reported that, Waltz use g-mail to send stuff.

Right.

Also, more unsecure the signal.

Right.

So there is this distraction that everyone is running like a chicken without a head.

Right.

DOGE has not found the trillions and billions of dollars.

A lot of people have been fired.

Even Trump supporters that work in these, institutions have been fired.

So that's a lot of of of things going on.

And the, I guess, speed by which these policy changes are enacted is something that people say they want.

But suddenly you say, I'm going to run for a third time.

A lot of.

People want me.

To, so it's like, you know, when when a dog see a squirrel boom, square, boom, squirrel.

So that's a tactic that they have used before and also was an announced tactic.

Yeah.

Before President Trump took, part of Steve Bannon said very clearly we're going to flog this thing, right?

Yeah.

So many things that no one is going to know what's going on.

We all bite, right?

We're like, oh, absolutely.

What about this?

And how does this work?

All of a sudden we are 17 things happening that you don't notice because.

Right.

No, I think that's perfectly fair.

You can exhaust people's attention.

And this system, with the speed of it.

Well, let's talk about Texas and let's talk about lack of speed.

Christrian Menefee, who is the Harris County attorney and one of the announced candidates for the congressional district in 18, which is a replacement for Sylvester Turner who passed away, saying that he is going to possibly sue Greg Abbott, the governor of Texas, because he hasn't yet called a election to replace Sylvester Turner.

What he says is that this silence is effectively suppression.

Doing nothing is disenfranchizing this community.

I pulled some of these numbers, and he's not wrong.

Except we're not into a sort of zone yet where correct has been too far outside of those boundaries.

Basically, most of the time.

This last three times this has happened.

The average time for Governor Abbott to call a special is between three weeks and two months.

We're still in that mix of us return.

Turner passed away about a month ago, so it's not like out of the question yet that he could.

That is, Governor Abbott could still make that call.

Usually the election is called for about 80 to 120 days after.

So there's still like time for that to happen.

But now, because sort of the windows closed, the governor has to call a special election if it's going to be any time real soon.

Or why wait for November, which does leave a pretty big space.

So my question to you is, what are the implications to not calling the election, letting the seat lay dormant and simply waiting for November?

I mean, obviously you have these, what people are saying.

This is political maneuvering, just leaving the Democrats with, one less poll.

And fewer vote in DC.

In DC.

Yeah.

Now.

That the Republicans got the two seats, they needed in Florida.

Right.

Exactly.

About.

And they also pulled back Elise Stefanik nomination, so.

Right.

She'll still keep her seat York, which maybe could have flipped, probably wouldn't, but maybe could have flipped.

So they're stable on numbers.

But that margin is pretty.

Small that margins pretty small.

But now after yesterday's victory in Florida, even though the margins reduced as we said, he may be more locked in.

So okay, fine.

We're going to have these thing in June or or why not?

Or wait for the November election.

Right.

I mean, legally, yes.

The governor can wait, for November without any, any significant problem if he goes after, the November election.

That's a little bit.

Yeah.

Worrisome, because removing the losses, it requires that candidates have a minimum of 40 days to file before the election takes place.

Right.

A longer period here definitely benefits the candidates who either haven't jumped in yet, say, like a Jolanda Jones, or maybe like a Jarvis Johnson.

And a shorter window benefits people who already kind of jump around a bunch of money like Christian Menefee.

So his concern and Christian Menefee concern is like, let's get this done right now.

Like, but a longer horizon may give a chance for this to kind of unfold.

But the I think, implications to this are, are serious, like not having representation in that seat in this critical moment.

Right.

Is really, I think, a problem.

I'm really anxious to see what kind of litigation comes from this and what kind of courts hold, because states have all different laws about what the obligations of governors are to call a special election than this, like the very different.

So I'm wondering if there's some like kind of general kind of civil rights claim that could be made, and kind of the degree to which Menefee can make this argument.

And so I'm interested to see the degree to which there then becomes a kind of constitutional obligation for representation.

Correct.

That has implications beyond just sort of this seat.

But in the meantime, you know, things generally function well, like these district offices you and I studied this graph is is actually like, we know that these things are going to continue to work and operate.

People still have questions about Social Security or federal grants.

They can still get their information kind of answered, but it definitely is not as impactful when you don't have someone in district trying to kind of ride herd for you, making those connections, answering those questions, getting things done.

So I think those implications are very real.

So we'll see what happens.

But the Democrats, are hopeful, right?

Yes.

They're hopeful for that special to be called.

And they're hopeful that their new chair, Kendall Scudder, who they just elected, will turn the tide in Texas.

Yeah.

Kendall Scudder was elected to be the chair of the Democratic Party at the state level.

He will replace Gilberto Hinojosa until the next election in 2026.

His argument was we need to listen to the grassroots.

We need to try to recalibrate things by listening to voters.

He beat out two other individuals who had a lot of experience winning elections.

Former Harris County Democratic Party chair Lillie Schecter from here and, former Annies list, executive director Patsy wood Martin.

They said, look, we want elections.

He's won any elections.

What do you make of the fact that the Democrats have put Scudder into this role?

Well, I think that, the message that he's bringing, tends to really resonate with what the Democrat Party is going through.

And let me just read you these, he said in one of his speeches or whatever, or.

I don't know, it's a quote from, from him.

He's a the problem is that every Democrat thinks that if they had ten more minutes, they could explain it to you.

Yeah.

And this is exactly right.

What we saw in the presidential campaign.

Yeah.

These long speeches, 30,000ft, above the ground that do not race.

And then he says, we got to get to a point where we're speaking to people at their got.

Yeah, because people vote with their guts and not their brains.

True.

So it's something that is riding into the debacle that we're seeing in terms of, I guess the Democratic Party and we saw it, last night with, Senator Booker, that gave 25 hours, or.

Right.

I mean, I don't know if it was 25 or 24 plus, breaks the record, breaking the record of of of, Thurmond, a couple in 57, I believe.

But it was a very emotional speech, but regardless of the count, it is the Democrats once again trying to get attention and getting the spotlight to say, hey, we're here.

Yeah.

The next question is, okay, Scott, are you going to deliver or not?

Are we going to get the results?

Because they're in a pretty bad hole, right?

Yes.

The structural problems are pretty obvious.

The turnout rate has been abysmal.

The bench is in disarray.

Messaging that they have, as you say, is not landing.

They've raised a bunch of money, plenty of money, but they simply don't put that money to use.

That's basically going to, kind of get the job done.

So I don't know.

They bragged in a press release that they raise $50,000 off of this, like five, zero thousand dollars, and that's probably not going to get the job done.

Maybe for a party that needs some extra structural help and they can kind of build some of the operational components, which they desperately also need to do to make sure they've got the grassroots kind of spread across the state.

But realistically, this is a really big job.

So we'll see if that change really matters.

And honestly, we'll also see if he is able to kind of hold that job because he actually might not be able to.

So you could see this is temporary.

Well, the last thing we should talk about is about the budgets for House and for the Senate.

House appropriations sends a full budget to the floor to about a 33, the $337 billion plan.

Former Lieutenant Governor Bill hobby once said that the only thing the ledge has to do is pass a budget.

Everything else is just poetry, so at least they're on their way to making that happen.

Representative Harrison, and who is a Republican, and Representative Goodwin, who's a Democrat, voted no.

There's a lot of stuff in this budget.

Lots of money for property tax relief, $6.5 billion for property tax relief, $3 billion reserve for additional buy down on the tax compression rate, which we've talked about.

Border security is pretty plump here.

$6.5 billion, a bunch of money for the Foundation school program, which, not surprisingly, is sort of on public ed vouchers.

They cap vouchers at $1 billion, which is kind of interesting here.

At the same day, they postponed a hearing on HB2 and HB three.

Which of the two budget bills that are connected to school choice?

It's funny to see Brian Harrison using Democratic strategies to slow things down.

He's been very vocal about it.

It's too big.

No one agrees because this is a pretty passable budget.

But it's funny that both the House budget and Senate budget passed with almost no dissent.

I think it's going to be hard to compromise on these things.

Yeah.

So what do you think?

So I think, we're going to see what happens.

I think that the fact that the higher ed committee stopped or the education committee stopped hearings, it's a strategy to, reassess and see, okay, who's in, who's not, and remember what are going to be the consequences.

So I think, I mean, it eventually is going to be possible.

Eventually they're going to vote.

Yes.

Yeah.

The question is, you know, even if, you know, the branding of these and how they can iron out differences with the Texas.

Senate, one difference is actually on film and center.

Yes.

We saw Matthew McConaughey and, Woody Harrelson testify about the need for there to be additional money.

This has been a conundrum for Republicans who say, like, we shouldn't be spending money on this.

We don't want Texas to be like Hollywood, but we need to figure out a place to put, like, our Texas style Hollywood signs in place.

Maybe Hill Country, Big Bend, Texas, because Dan Patrick is all in favor of it.

Oh, yeah.

Taylor Sheridan.

Right.

Who forces written a bunch of stuff like Yellowstone and, and, and some other movies like Hell and High Water.

They're BFFs, so they want the money.

House and Senate, though, have very different priorities here.

I'm wondering how that's going to play.

I'm also wondering, like for Dan Patrick, what's the strategy?

You know, if you are in a position where you can't beat Hollywood, maybe you got to join them.

And I think that's kind of what he's after.

He says, let's export Texas values.

Can they do it?

I think they can.

And I think it's very good business.

You see it in Georgia, you see in other states in New Mexico that bring a lot of money.

Yeah, a lot of money and generates businesses, generates a lot of stuff.

And that generation is beneficial for the state.

We're going to get you that Kid Rock outfit, put you in a movie as an extra.

There we go.

See your future.

Maybe on next episode you will see me wearing my tracksuit.

So I'm Jeronimo Cortina.

And I'm Brandon Rottinghaus The party keeps up next week.

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