Episode Info
- Season27
- Episode14
Hosted by Christina Ruffini and Sir Richard Dearlove
Guest
Vivian Salama
Vivian Salama is the Wall Street Journal's national politics reporter discussing what she's watching ahead of the election.
Episode Summary
Next week, American voters will decide who will become the next President of the United States: former President Donald Trump or Vice President Kamala Harris. In this week's episode, One Decision’s Christina Ruffini speaks to Vivian Salama, Wall Street Journal's national politics reporter, to see what she's watching ahead of the election. Later, Christina sits down with her co-host, former Secretary of Defense and CIA Director Leon Panetta, to discuss what the world can expect following the election, the candidates’ foreign policy plans, potential Cabinet members, and how a new administration— whether Trump or Harris—could influence Western alliances.
If you enjoyed this conversation, check out a previous episode of One Decision with former National Security Advisor John Bolton, which features our other spymaster, former head of Britain's MI6, Sir Richard Dearlove.
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Transcript
COLD OPEN
Panetta: And in many ways, you know, that's the big choice in this election. It's a choice between whether or not The United States is gonna continue to be a world leader, whether or not The United States is gonna continue to be able to build alliances and strengthen alliances to deal with all of these challenges we face in the world. With the candidates coming down the home stretch,
INTRODUCTION
Kosinski: we're less than a week away from the conclusion of one of the most divisive and expensive presidential elections in US history. Now at the time of this recording, Vice President Harris narrowly leads. She's got a one point advantage in the polls, which is a statistical dead heat with former President Trump. And as the candidates crawl their way to the end of a very grueling campaign trail, it's now up to the voters to decide what they want the next four years and even beyond to look like. So in today's episode, we sit down with my cohost, former secretary of defense and CIA director Leon Panetta, to talk about what the world can expect leading up to and following the election, our allies and enemies alike. But first, I'm catching up with good friend, former fellow international road warrior, and friend of the podcast, Vivian Salama. Vivian is a reporter at The Wall Street Journal who went from covering stories like ISIS in Iraq, the war in Ukraine, and the Israel Gaza conflict to the Trump campaign. Here's what she's watching ahead of Tuesday. Vivian, welcome. So in six days, in the next six days, what should people watching, not just in this country but from overseas, expect to see? Can you kind of walk us through what's going to happen? And then on Tuesday people will vote, but we most likely won't know who's president on Tuesday.
INTERVIEW: VIVIAN SALAMA
Salama: So to be clear for folks who don't follow sort of the day to day, especially folks overseas, voting is already very much underway in most states across The United States. You have mail in ballots that had begun trickling in and then early in person voting has started in many states across the country. And so you are already getting a sense of how things are going just based on those early voting numbers that are coming in. That being said, there are still plenty of people who go to the polls on the election day Tuesday as it were, and it takes time. Some precincts count their votes slower than others, and particularly in these critical swing states that we talk about all the time here in The United States, which basically will determine the outcome of this election. They tend to be very diligent about it. And especially after what happened in 2020 with all these claims of election fraud, calls for recounts and audits and things like that, there's a concerted effort this time around to be very careful about how those votes are tallied. And so nobody's rushing to the finish line here and we may not know surely for several days after the elections. I mean, I'll tell you this much, Christina. Like, I'm gonna be in Palm Beach with Donald Trump next week. And right now, I'm booked to return on Friday. Maybe I'll come back earlier, but right now my flight is to come back on Friday because I assume that there will be a few days after election day where we still don't know. So just because people are early voting, like, you know, in some states, you know whether that person is a Republican or whether that person is a Democrat.
Kosinski: But to be clear, they're not publicizing those votes. Like, you can't look up a county and see how many people have voted for each person at this point. Right? It's pretty limited.
Salama: You know, we hear a lot about it from the campaigns mostly where they say, you know, the early numbers are looking very good, especially Donald Trump's campaign, which has been bragging quite a bit about places like North Carolina where the polls had them in a dead heat in North Carolina. And they've been bragging and talking about how Republicans have been going in record numbers for the polls in early voting,
Kosinski: but we haven't really come around on early voting because they were very anti early voting last time, and it hurt them.
Salama: And they were very anti early voting. They were anti mail in voting too. And this is one of the big evolutions of the Trump campaign is that they're coming to recognize the power of early voting to potentially avoid any ambiguity in the final days. Now if it happens that Donald Trump loses the election next week, we may hear a different tune from them. You know, that's always a possibility.
Kosinski: What do you expect to be the biggest differences in foreign policy approaches between the two candidates? Like if Trump wins again, what are we expecting to see versus if Harris wins and whether or not she'll depart from Biden's foreign policy, do you think?
Salama: So I'll start with Harris first because there's some ambiguity there, right? We do have bits and pieces of statements from her, you know, things she said in her time now, the last four years as vice president. But even as a senator before that, you know, we have a little bit of a sense of where she stands, but it's largely ambiguous. And this is what I hear when I talk to foreign ambassadors, you know, senior government officials from all around the world is they're trying to figure her out. Remarkably, even though Donald Trump still continues to try to paint himself as an outsider, but he's pretty established now. People know what they're getting with him. Granted, he can be very unpredictable, but they know that he's very protectionist in his trade policies, for example. They know that his America First agenda kind of revolves around that concept of, like, you know, you bring business to United States and you take away American run companies from overseas because they wanna promote that business in The United States. So those are the protectionist policies. They know that he favors tariffs as a punitive measure when there's a disagreement with different countries about usually trade matters and economic matters, but it can be really a range of things. And then obviously something like we have a conflict that's still raging in The Middle East. Both candidates are viewed to be pro Israel in terms of Israel's right to defend itself. Donald Trump tends to lean in on that more. He calls himself the most pro Israel president ever to exist. And he and Netanyahu are of similar mind on a lot of things. They've had their ups and downs. Donald Trump has not made that a secret. You know, he has come out and criticized Netanyahu, particularly on one instance where in 2020, he alleges that Netanyahu was supposed to join forces with him in a strike on Iran and at the last minute pulled out. And so that was like a deal breaker for Trump, and he's never really gotten over that. There's also this minor issue of Netanyahu congratulating Joe Biden on his victory in the 2020 election, which he also did not really get over. But they have spoken a lot in recent days. Donald Trump has said that publicly that especially after Israel strikes in Iran in the last couple of days, but also of course its operations in Lebanon and in Gaza over the past year, Netanyahu has sought to brief Trump and more and more so as the election has drawn closer because he wants to keep him in the loop. Now we're talking about Israel, so let's talk about Harris. This is one area where a lot of people were really hoping that she would distinguish herself from Joe Biden, from President Biden, in the sense that President Biden has also been very unapologetically pro Israel. He calls himself a Zionist, and, you know, he has said that he will do everything to stand by Israel's right to defend itself. Although he's gotten tougher in condemning Israel's strikes on civilians in Gaza, for example, and has tried to kind of get Netanyahu without much success to wind down the war. And so the hope from especially the progressive wing in the Democratic party was that Harris would be a lot more forward leaning on Palestinian rights and be a lot more critical about Israel. She has done so in a whisper, in the sense that occasionally she will kind of flick at this notion that she supports Palestinian statehood and the Palestinian people's right to safety and dignity. But it always comes wrapped in this bigger package of but Israel has the right to defend itself and that's indisputable in her mind. And so she's gotten a lot of criticism from her party for that reason. And so we don't really see her departing very drastically from Joe Biden's foreign policies yet. That was the one area that people thought, okay, this is where she's really gonna be able to distinguish herself. And so far she has barely done so. And that could really matter in states with large Arab populations like Michigan and places that she's gonna need to win if she wants to win the White House. There are entire movements here in The United States that have taken on the name of the uncommitted movement of voters. And they are largely, like you said, in Michigan where there's a high concentration of Arab American voters and Muslim voters more broadly, so much so that it could actually cost her the state. And Michigan is one of those must win states for her. She really needs that blue wall of Wisconsin and Michigan and Pennsylvania to win this election.
Kosinski: And if she doesn't win Michigan, she's in trouble. Right. And it's not that they're necessarily gonna vote for Trump. They're just gonna not vote or they're gonna write in someone else or they're gonna vote for Jill Stein of the Green Party. You know, it's a matter of turnout in these really close states.
Salama: Absolutely. I mean, that's what this whole election is boiling down to is turnout. The candidates at this point are tied essentially without counting the defectors from certain parties and the people who are undecided. And believe it or not, at this stage, there are a lot of undecided voters in large part because one candidate is viewed as an incumbent who is not really a departure from the policies of the last four years, particularly the economic policies that we've seen where inflation has been very high in The United States and the cost of living has just been a bit unbearable for a lot of Americans.
Kosinski: Why do you think it's still so close and there are so many undecideds? I mean, when I talk to people, I did a story in Bowling Green, Kentucky a couple months ago and ended up having multiple rounds of drinks with a table of lovely people, all of whom were voting for Trump. They just said, for them, it was all the economy. They can't afford their apartments, they can't afford health insurance. They remember whether it's accurate or not, times being better under Trump, and they want life to be easier. Do you think that's the main driver? Or do you think it's just he's just more of a character and more of an individual than she is? He's louder and she's quieter and he just punches through more.
Salama: It's funny, Donald Trump the other day made a comment in passing at some event that he said, you know, we talk about the undecideds. I don't really believe that there are undecided voters, he said. And I sort of agree with him. I mean, it's not, I talk to a lot of people who call themselves undecided voters. And I don't really think that it really captures the proper nuance of what their situation is. It's not that they haven't decided. It's almost that they can't choose between the two. There are very few people on this planet, I'm not just talking about The United States, on the planet who don't have a view of Donald Trump or an opinion about Donald Trump. Because like you say, he's louder, more bombastic, and he's just out there more. People know who he is. They kind of know what he stands for. Even if you don't follow politics very closely, you kind of have an idea of what he's all about. And either you love him or you tolerate him or you hate him or you can't, you know, whatever. But love him or hate him, you do know what he's about. There's no ambiguity there. And so for those people who hate him, who don't wanna vote for him, you know, they have one major option. They have a couple of others. Of course, we have third party candidates here in The United States, but they don't tend to draw a lot of support. I think those undecideds are just at this point torn. They do believe that they should vote. They want to vote. They're just not excited about the options that are in front of them. Whether or not they end up sitting it out or voting third party or just holding their breath and voting for one of these two candidates, that's really the big question going into election day.
Kosinski: All right. I guess we'll find out on Tuesday. Vivian, thank you so much for taking the time.
Salama: Great to talk to you, Christina.
INTERVIEW: SECRETARY LEON PANETTA
Kosinski: Let's pivot now to our conversation with former secretary of defense and former CIA director Leon Panetta. We spoke a bit about what foreign policy changes we could see after the election. Alright, mister secretary. Thank you for being back with us. Going into this, America is gonna have a new leader in five days. Having been in multiple administrations, what would be your advice to the new president no matter who it is?
Panetta: Obviously, as president, you want to establish relationships with leaders abroad, with our allies, to make sure that you're all on the same page in terms of trying to deal with the threats to security that are out there. And that'll be particularly true for this president because we're dealing with an awful lot of flash points in the world, probably more than I've seen since World War Two. And so there really should be a focus about how the president as a world leader will try to work with our key allies and alliances in order to deal with the autocrats who have basically put together their own axis now between Russia and China, Iran, North Korea. We really will face a very challenging world in the next four years. And that should be something that the president spends some time on as well.
Kosinski: I'm a little surprised given all the things you just mentioned about how dangerous the world is right now and how many different hotspots there are, how little we've heard about the foreign policy teams or objectives of both these administrations, whether it's the Harris team or the Trump team. There's a couple names that have been floating around for the Harris team, Phil Gordon, Rahm Emanuel, who's a familiar face to anyone who covered Obama and is the current ambassador to Japan, and then some senators who've been allies of President Biden, including Mark Warner, Chris Murphy, Jack Reed. Any of these names stand out to you? Is there anyone in particular you think will be leading this team for Harris if she does win on Tuesday?
Panetta: The one person I would probably add to that list is Bill Burns, who is now the director of the CIA, but obviously spends an awful lot of time dealing with the world. He's now, you know, our primary negotiator in dealing with the Middle East. But he also was ambassador to Russia. He really has an extensive background. I would really look at what can you do to really make use of that tremendous experience. I think he's a perfect candidate probably for Secretary of State.
Kosinski: A lot of the people I know and have covered have said they're not staying on. Now, part of that is because a lot of them did stay all four years through the Biden administration, which is rare. Usually people last about two, and then the burnout rate is just really high because it is a 24/7, 365 kind of job. But I do know there is going to be a bit of a brain drain from the State Department, from the NSC. Does that concern you at all? Or do you think there are enough people in the wings who ready to go in?
Panetta: If, as I hope, Kamala Harris wins the election, I think that there will be a much better transition, mainly because Trump doesn't believe in transitions. For Harris, I think that it'll be smoother for a couple reasons. There will be people in key positions who may move on, but they're going to be willing to help. They're going to be there. They'll provide a transition and you're likely to get people with experience that worked in the Biden administration who will be there as well. I feel much more comfortable about that kind of transition and the availability of talent, not only within but outside, that is much more aligned with the kind of professionalism that we usually have had when it comes to governing the country. The one thing I've always known about Kamala is that, you know, she is a prosecutor, but she's also very pragmatic. She's willing to listen to people. She's willing to listen to advisors, to listen to the best minds in the business, and then make a decision about where she needs to go. And that's actually an important process. Having presidents who are willing to listen to people that are smarter than they are on issues is a very important quality that presidents must have. She'll listen to good advisors, and then she'll make decisions that will be comfortable for her. But that's okay. That's what presidents should do. So I feel a lot more comfortable about the kind of transition that would take place from a Biden to a Harris administration, because I think that'll be a hell of a lot smoother than what will happen if Trump gets elected.
Kosinski: Well, I know this last time it depended on the agency. I mean, Secretary of State Blinken said very nice things about former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and said, you know, he facilitated the transition. He gave them the information they needed. I think other agencies had a little bit more problems and the White House was a whole different thing. But when we look at who might come in this round for a second Trump term, there's a lot of questions around the fact that many of the steadier hands, the old school Republicans, the people with experience in these offices have kind of turned against him now that they've been out of office. You know, the last people like John Bolton, even press secretaries, people who were in the White House, people who were close confidants have now, not all of them, but many have said they won't return for a second Trump presidency and have warned against the dangers of it. So it seems to be a thinner list, especially on the foreign policy front when you look at who could be in a Trump cabinet the second term. We have people like Elise Stefanik. Steve Bannon appeared at an event for him this week. Eric Schmitt, Marco Rubio. And then I wonder if Mike Pompeo, who we had all kind of expected to run maybe as a VP candidate, would come back or not in a second term. He seems to be less involved than I think a lot of us had thought he would be at this stage.
Panetta: Well, my hope would be that the president does turn to Mike Pompeo because, you know, my experience with Mike is that he really believes in the more traditional approaches both with regards to foreign policy as well as domestic policy. I think that they at least had a pretty good relationship, I think, during the four years that Trump was president. I would hope that there would be a place for somebody experienced like Mike Pompeo, and hopefully some experienced senators as well and others. But it is such a wide open book because of all the things that Trump has said. If he's about making sure that those in government are turned out, and that new people are brought in, there could be an awful lot of changes and a lot of people who go into these positions that you never saw before. I'm hoping that people who've, like Mike, who have experience, who've been there, and who really care about governing the country are gonna be around. Because, I mean, the one thing is that Mike was able to at least provide some constraints on President Trump when he was gonna do the wrong thing. I think you're gonna need that kind of individual because Trump is the kind of individual who thinks he knows everything about everything and thinks that his guts are better to rely on than the truth or the facts. That's what makes him chaotic and that's what makes him uncertain. And that's what makes him in some ways very dangerous in terms of being able to govern the country. So my hope is that there will be those that have the experience, that have the knowledge, that care about the country, that hopefully can constrain him from some of his crazier tendencies.
Kosinski: Pompeo was very pro NATO, and he was put in a hard position because we would be on the plane with him while he was going through Europe and trying to make allies in Eastern Europe with countries who, this was before the war in Ukraine, hadn't necessarily picked a team yet. And meanwhile, Trump would be saying he wants to pull out of NATO and people aren't pulling their weight and all this other stuff. Now a couple good things did come out of that. I mean, European allies have really stepped up as we've talked about when it comes to funding, when it comes to standing on their own. The EU is now having its own defense secretary because European nations have said they need to be more in control of their own destiny when it comes to security, and that's probably a good thing. But on the other hand, you were talking a little about uncertainty. It's almost like the financial markets hate uncertainty. Geopolitics also hate uncertainty. And one of the things that Trump was not shy about doing is trying to unilaterally pull out of treaties or alliances he didn't think served him. That's not only trying to at least looking into pulling out of NATO, but the JCPOA, which was the Iran nuclear deal, the Paris Climate Agreement, TPP, which was that Trans Pacific Partnership, which was a big trade thing that we talked about nonstop during the Obama administration and then got cratered. We previously had President Obama's US trade representative Mike Froman on the podcast. Let's listen to what he told us.
Froman: Look. I think the decision to pull out of TPP will be seen historically as one of the most significant strategic blunders in American history.
Kosinski: Because what he said was basically that was made to counter the growing economic power of China and make it easier and cheaper for The US to trade with allies in the region. And pulling out of that had big ramifications. Are there any specific places where you are especially concerned a Trump administration could throw chaos into the already weakened geopolitical structure that we've got going on right now?
Panetta: Obviously, what Joe Biden tried to do is to restore a lot of those relationships and to restore our leadership with regards to the climate change and put us back into the Paris Accords. If Trump wants to again go through this process of basically getting rid of everything that the prior administration did, he'll have his hands full basically tearing up relationships and tearing up alliances in that process. I happen to think that probably the more dangerous thing is that Trump has kind of promised that somehow he can deal with all of these conflicts that face us in the world. You could probably do that if you're willing to basically cave in to your adversaries and do what they want you to do. And if Trump begins a process of appeasement where he's basically going to give Putin whatever he wants or give Xi whatever he wants or give Iran, he probably won't do it with Iran because he's made enemies with Iran. But if he basically caves in and makes it clear that The United States is essentially going to do whatever tyrants and autocrats want him to do, then it really is going to undermine The United States in terms of our position in the world, because not only our allies, but the rest of the world is going to look at The United States and come to the conclusion that The United States has absolutely no idea what its role should be in the world.
Kosinski: I also feel like it's, I mean, from the ambassadors and officials that I've spoken to, especially in Europe and even some of our Middle East allies, it's the whiplash that starts to make America an unreliable ally. No matter which take you think is the better decision is almost irrelevant. It's the lack of consistency that people can't plan around, they can't make policies around. And the result of that is they're just going to go without The US. They're just going to find ways to do it without us if The US can't be relied upon. I think that's their greatest concern in talking to our friends abroad.
Panetta: That's the one thing that really worries them, which is that, you know, having gone through four years of Trump, having survived four years of Trump and then having gone back to a more traditional approach with Biden, where they felt very comfortable with the relationship with The United States. And should there now be a whiplash that brings us back to Trump basically being very unpredictable in terms of his approach? What that eventually does is, I mean, Macron have been very, he's commented a great deal about this, Europe has to develop its own security alliance, that it has to take steps to protect NATO on their own without The United States. He's basically said, Europe is gonna have to deal with the problems that they're facing the world without The United States being part of that. Those are hard words to say because, as I've said, since World War II, The United States has been a world leader in working with our allies. And every president, Republican and Democrat, has basically been a world leader and believed in our alliances with the exception of Trump. But if Trump goes back to that, our allies and other countries are basically going to say The United States is really no longer a leader. And in many ways, you know, that's the big choice in this election. It's a choice between whether or not The United States is going to continue to be a world leader, whether or not The United States is going to continue to be able to build alliances and strengthen alliances to deal with all of these challenges we face in the world, or whether we're just going to become totally isolationist, basically abandon our friendships. And you know what, I think what that means is that The United States will be a country in decline. And just like past empires have come to an end, I think The United States, in terms of our country, it'll begin to fade. So it's a fundamental choice between whether we are going to be an America that retains our position in the world in the twenty first century, or whether we're going to be a country in decline.
Kosinski: Do you think Trump will try once again to pull out of NATO? And is that possible now? Because congress passed this thing basically saying you can't pull out of NATO without our approval, but it's really untested, and it's not clear if Trump tried and he went up against congress where that would end up, where the votes would end up, what court it would, how would that even happen?
Panetta: Well, you know, again, the real question is gonna be whether our system of checks and balances is able to continue to survive in a new Trump administration. I have to say that despite being tested in the last four years of the Trump administration, our system of checks and balances has overall pretty much survived. And I think it will again. Look, in the Congress, no matter who gets elected president, I think the Congress is probably gonna be divided. I think the House has a good chance of being Democratic, but I also think the Senate might very well go Republican by a few votes. So it'll be still very close in the Congress, but close enough so that it could basically be a barrier to Trump trying to get some of the things done that he wants to do. Secondly, I think the courts are still in place and I think that the press will continue to be in place as well. So I do believe our checks and balances will survive. I think there are Republicans, as well as Democrats who do strongly support NATO and strongly support our alliances. At the same time, the one thing that Trump did that made sense was on the Abraham Accords, getting Arab nations to agree to recognize Israel and coming together. So it's not totally crazy to think that, particularly if he feels it's fulfilling a political goal that he might have, that he might continue to try to do something like that. So there's enough unpredictability here that I think one way or the other, we'll be able to survive.
Kosinski: I did want to ask you, since we're talking about presidents and leadership, what was the best moment of leadership you've seen throughout your career? And what was the worst or most disappointing moment you've seen from a leader that you've worked with in your career?
Panetta: I was a chief of staff to Bill Clinton. And I can remember we talked about foreign policy. Mexico was going broke at one point during the Clinton administration. Bill Clinton made the decision that we could not allow Mexico to go into bankruptcy, that we had to do everything we could to help them. And actually sat down with Bob Dole and Newt Gingrich, who was speaker at that time, and said, we've got to provide money to Mexico to do that. And Dole and Gingrich both agreed that the president had to do that. But then they went up to the hill and talked to their members. And I got a call from them at the White House and they said, we just can't deliver the votes because most of our members don't wanna provide money to Mexico. Both Democrats and Republicans were basically saying, we're not sure we'll be there to provide that. Bill Clinton, to his credit said, we've got to do this. And he basically turned to me as a chief of staff. And I turned to Bob Rubin, who was secretary of the treasury. And we said, we've got to come up with this money. And Rubin, to his credit, found a way to provide the funding that was necessary to get it done. And Bill Clinton, you know, I mean, the politics of this issue, and he was somebody obviously who had great antenna for the politics of this country, knew that he would probably get criticized for doing it. But he actually said, this is the right thing to do for our country and for our hemisphere. And he went ahead and we provided the money and actually protected Mexico from going into bankruptcy. That was a small moment, not big in history. But from my point of view, that was a very important decision for a president to make when the politics of it basically played against that.
Kosinski: Thank you so much for joining us. It was nice to see you.
Panetta: Good to see you, Christina. My best.
OUTRO
Kosinski: Thanks for listening to One Decision. If you enjoyed this conversation, check out a previous talk we had with National Security Advisor John Bolton, featuring our other cohost, former head of Britain's MI6, Sir Richard Dearlove. If Trump wins in November, I think American aid to Ukraine is very much in question. And I think the Ukrainians look at our calendar and say,
Dearlove: this may be the moment to take the chance, the risk of this operation.
Kosinski: We discussed potential challenges in the lead up to the election, the conflicts in The Middle East, and more. And for other exclusive content, timely updates on crucial global events, and other meaningful conversations with thought leaders, be sure to check out 1decision.com. Thanks for listening, and come back next week for our analysis of election results and what the world sees as we all watch the returns.
