Senator JD Vance (R-Oh.) accepted his nomination as former President Trump's vice president and running mate Wednesday night at the Republican National Convention (RNC) in Milwaukee, WI. In a speech last night, Vance said working-class Americans "are done catering to Wall Street." Trump is expected to formally accept his nomination at the RNC tonight.
Yahoo Finance senior columnist Rick Newman weighs Vance's comments against what could be expected from a second Trump administration's policies. Newman also discusses President Biden's COVID-19 diagnosis — his third time contracting the virus — and what it may symbolize as the Biden administration contends with calls from Democrat lawmakers to exit the presidential election.
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This post was written by Luke Carberry Mogan.
Well, Senator JD Vance accepting the GOP's nomination for the vice presidency at the Republican National Convention. During his speech, Senator Vance looked to win over the working class by blasting Wall Street.
Wall Street barons crashed the economy, and American builders went out of business. As tradesmen scrambled for jobs, houses stopped being built. The lack of good jobs, of course, led to stagnant wages. We're done, ladies and gentlemen, catering to Wall Street.
We'll hear from former President Donald Trump today where he will accept his nomination as the Republican nominee. For more on what we want to hear tonight, what we might hear tonight, Yahoo Finances is a very own Rick Newman is here. And Rick, when we talk about what we could hear from Trump, I'm just curious, your reaction to what we heard from Vance last night. Obviously sticking to many of the talking points that we had anticipated him to do and really doing everything he can, it seems like, to win over that working class.
Uh so those clips you played, when I heard him say that last night, I had to stop for a minute and ask myself, what exactly is he talking about? Um Wall Street has not crashed the economy lately. Um the economy is actually doing pretty well. Uh I mean, we're hitting hitting record highs in the stock market uh until uh recently. I think he's talking about 2008, when, by the way, George W. Bush was president. He's talking about the the housing bust. Uh and then he says we are done catering to Wall Street. Um is he saying that the Biden administration is catering to Wall Street? I don't think so. Biden wants to raise uh the corporate tax rate from 21% to 28%. So, my takeaway here is uh these are talking points that might sound uh okay to some voters. In reality, the Trump campaign is kind of doing the opposite. They are actually sort of catering to Wall Street. Trump wants to cut the corporate tax rate, not raise it. Uh he's he reportedly told oil executives earlier this year that they could have any policy they want under a second Trump administration if they could raise a billion dollars for his campaign. Uh and we've got um tech moguls like Elon Musk, uh who seem to uh be the people who put JD Vance into the vice presidential role for the Trump campaign. So we're going to get more obviously um from Trump tonight, and then we've got about four months of campaigning to go. But those were some um curiosities, let's say, of JD Vance's acceptance speech.
I also want to talk about President Biden testing positive for COVID-19, as we continue to hear reporting about calls for him to step down. Uh right now a lot of those calls are private. We're hearing reports that Biden is becoming more receptive to those calls. Do you think that his COVID diagnosis potentially leads to those calls becoming more public from officials looking for Biden to step down within the Democratic campaign?
I mean, Biden obviously is having a terrible summer, and it's like uh catching COVID when everybody else is out going to the beach and going on vacation. It just sort of um symbolizes what's wrong what's wrong with the Biden campaign. Um we're the latest reports here, I mean, it's been a drip drip drip, but the latest reports are that um senior Democrats now, including Hakeem Jeffries, the minority leader in the house, and Chuck Schumer, the Senate majority leader, are basically telling Biden that if he continues to campaign, if he's the nominee, he could bring down um Democrats in both houses of Congress, and we could have a Republican sweep. And reportedly, Biden is now thinking a little bit more that he needs to take this seriously. Uh some analysts think the dam is breaking. Um Biden, however, is extremely stubborn, um and very proud, uh it's worth saying. And um we'll I we'll see what happens. I mean, I think we're probably above 50% likelihood that Biden withdraws. Uh it's going to have to happen within the next three weeks or so, I would say. So, once the Republican convention is over, I think that's going to be the big political story.
All right, Rick, always appreciate your insight. Thanks for much popping on with us this morning.
Bye, guys.
