Preet Bharara:

From CAFE and the Vox Media Podcast Network, welcome to Stay Tuned. I’m Preet Bharara.

Ian Bremmer:

If you’re looking for, “Is it the left, or is it the right?” The numbers don’t bear out that the progressive left is winning all over the place. The numbers bear out that incumbents are getting thumped. That’s what we’re seeing.

Preet Bharara:

That’s Ian Bremmer. Does he even need an introduction anymore? Well, just in case, Ian is the Founder and President of GZERO Media and Eurasia Group, a political risk research and consulting firm. He’s a leading expert on international affairs who joins me this week to talk about the geopolitical news making the headlines, namely the national elections happening all over the world in France, the UK, India, and of course, the United States. That’s only some of them. Just how much is the world shaking up? That’s coming up. Stay tuned.

Q&A

Now, let’s get to your questions. This question comes in a tweet from Christie who asks, “Are you encouraged by the UK and France elections? I’ll add that it heartens me to not be the only country that’s struggling. #AskPreet. #StayTuned.” Well, so I was feeling encouraged and heartened in those two elections where the Conservative Right was defeated in two elections in two important countries in Europe. But I put that question, Christie, that you have asked more or less to my guest this week, Ian Bremmer. As he’s more expert and thoughtful on the issue than I am, I’ll let him answer it, and you can hear what he says.

This question comes in a tweet from Max’s mom Anna, who writes, “I believe Rahimi, the recent Supreme Court gun case, had five concurring opinions. What role, if any, do the concurring opinions have on the case? What about dissents, aside from striking us with fear for our democracy? Thanks for helping us non-lawyers understand the chaotic activist SCOTUS, #AskPreet.” Max’s mom Anna, thanks for your question. Given the number of concurrences in a case as big as Rahimi, it’s definitely worth explaining for folks what a concurrence really does in practice. The short answer is not a whole lot in most circumstances. For those of you who may not be familiar, a concurring opinion is one that’s separate from the majority opinion, but that’s written by a justice who was voted with the majority on the outcome of the case. So, they agree in the result, but not necessarily in all the reasoning.

So, sometimes justices who vote with the majority have a different legal basis or rationale for supporting the ultimate decision or part of the ultimate decision, and they want to explain that different rationale in a concurring opinion. In other words, they concur in the judgment or result, but not completely in the rationale set forth in the majority opinion. So, the majority opinion is the only opinion that functions as binding law. Concurring opinions mostly have no binding legal force. To answer the second part of your question, neither do dissents. That said, there have been some watershed dissents that were later resurrected in decisions overturning those precedents, perhaps most famously in a case called Plessy v. Ferguson, the 1896 case upholding the racial segregation doctrine of separate but equal.

There was a lone dissenter, and it was Justice John Marshall Harlan, who wrote at the time in his dissent, “Our Constitution is colorblind and neither knows nor tolerates classes among citizens.” That view would ultimately become law in the unanimous opinion in the 1954 case of Brown v. Board of Education when the court ruled that segregation was unconstitutional. Now, that dynamic sometimes plays out where dissent becomes a majority in cases that you might not necessarily cheer. For example, recently in the case of Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, the 2022 case eliminating the Constitutional right to an abortion, Justice Samuel Alito cited to dissenting opinions in previous cases that had safeguarded that right, like Justice Rehnquist dissent from Planned Parenthood v. Casey, in Justice White’s dissent in fact also from Roe v. Wade itself.

Let me just say one more thing. Well, the sense of concurrences don’t mean a whole lot with respect to the legal question. They do provide clues about the ideology and jurisprudential thinking of the particular justices who write them, and they enable both scholars and litigants alike to make certain kinds of predictions about how a justice might interpret a statute, or think about a constitutional provision, even if in those concurrences and dissents they don’t have a lot of meaningful effect.

This question comes in an email from Terry who writes, “Hi, Preet. Longtime listener. Keep up the good work. I live in Australia, and from this distance, it seems clear that President Trump is a particularly selfish individual who’s willing to say or do anything so he can once again enjoy the trappings of power and apparent respect that comes with being president. I have what I hope might be an easier question. Is there a quick/easy way to define what’s an official presidential act? Apparently, Trump’s lawyers want to argue that some of the evidence presented in the recent New York case involved conversations that Trump and Hope Hicks had when he was president, and that those conversations were official acts. Couldn’t it be argued that if a discussion relates to anything that happened before the person became president or by the same token will happen after the term of office will be complete, it’s not an official act? Thanks, Terry.”

So, that’s a great question. It’s a complicated question. Of course, you’re referring to the recent Supreme Court case involving Trump and his claim of absolute immunity. Justice Roberts didn’t clarify a whole hell of a lot in that decision. You’ll recall from previous conversations on this and other podcasts that effectively, the court decided that certain kinds of core functions that the president has exclusive authority to conduct, those are core things with respect to which he has complete and absolute immunity. They mentioned one such category of conduct. The conversations that Donald Trump had that are alleged in the DC indictment relating to his conversations with his Department of Justice and people within the Department of Justice are off limits per the Roberts Court.

So, those are not only official acts, but they’re so central to the core of the president’s responsibilities, duties, and authorities. They’re completely immune and must be struck from the indictment, but there’s a whole separate category of official conduct that the court does not do a terrific job in explaining the parameters of. Essentially, the court wrote, “When the president acts pursuant to “constitutional and statutory authority,” he takes official action to perform the functions of his office.” Now, what the heck does that mean? Well, the court goes on to say, “Determining whether an action is covered by immunity thus begins with assessing the president’s authority to take that action, but the breadth of the president’s discretionary responsibilities under the Constitution and laws of the United States frequently makes it difficult to determine which of his innumerable functions encompassed a particular action.”

“Further, the Court says, the immunity of the Court has recognized therefore extends to the outer perimeter of the president’s official responsibilities covering actions so long as they’re not manifestly or palpably beyond his authority.” So, the court didn’t decide with great precision what other things named in the indictment or alleged in the indictment fell within his official conduct, and instead remanded those decisions to the district court. Judge Chutkan will have to decide now with respect to all the things alleged in the indictment were they official acts or not. Obviously, and of course, as you may remember, to the extent there’s a finding that something was an official act, there’s a presumption that Trump is immune from criminal prosecution for engaging in those actions.

That presumption can be overcome, but the presumption is quite strong. So essentially, the short non-answer to your question is the lower courts beginning with Judge Chutkan and probably also other courts as well, because he has indictments pending in multiple jurisdictions. These lower courts are going to be shaping what the law means and what the court intended to mean when it comes to official versus unofficial acts. I think and expect it’ll be a long and winding journey. At some point in the not too distant future, the Supreme Court itself will probably weigh in with more detail and concreteness on what’s official and what’s not official.

This question comes in an email from Al who writes, “Dear, Preet, yesterday, there was a general election in the UK, and the results so far suggest that the Labor Party will have a significant majority. I myself spent the last 22 hours staffing one of the polls, and then counting the votes when it closed. What I thought might be of interest to you is that the labor leader and likely Prime Minister in a few hours, Sir Keir Starmer or KC, used to be a prosecutor between 2008 and 2013, and not just any prosecutor, but the director of public prosecutions who was the most senior prosecutor in England and Wales. Prior to this, he spent many years as an accomplished human rights lawyer.” Al tells us, KC stands for King’s Counsel and is a designation given to barristers who have reached a certain level of skill and experience. “My question to you is, do you think prosecutors make good leaders and statesmen? Yours exhaustedly, Al.”

Well, that’s an interesting question. I don’t think there’s a sweeping answer to that question. I think it depends on the person. I think they’re good leaders and statesmen who come from all walks of life. They may have been teachers. They may have been business people. They may have been community organizers. So, I don’t think prosecutors, as a general matter, necessarily make good leaders and statesmen. I’d like to think still exhibiting my parochial bias that people who have served the public as prosecutors and the public interest who are loyal to their faith, who upheld the Constitution and were fair and just in their treatment of people, both defendants and victims and other parties in cases have a loyalty to the rule of law, understand the Constitution, understand how to present the face of the government to the public.

So, maybe in circumstances where they have done their job well, and they were well respected, hopefully you think that they would be good leaders, because they’ve been leaders in a fashion in doing their public interest job as public prosecutors. I think examples abound of people who have been prosecutors, and then served ably as leaders in elected or other office. Adam Schiff, who’s been a guest on the show, was an assistant US attorney for a period of time. The current Vice President of the United States was both a DA in San Francisco and the Attorney General of the state of California. There are Republicans as well who were well respected when they were in office. Tom Ridge, who became the governor of Pennsylvania, was an assistant district attorney.

Arlen Specter who was a Republican, then I think was an Independent, then became a Democrat. He was a local prosecutor in Pennsylvania as well. So, I think there are good examples of people who have been prosecutors who served in Congress or served as governors, and I think they did a good job. I think largely, they were good leaders or good statesmen because of their character and the kinds of people they were not necessarily, because they had been prosecutors. They’re also examples of people who have been prosecutors who I don’t think were good leaders and good statesmen. I’ll mention four, Rudy Giuliani, Chris Christie, Andrew Cuomo, and Eliot Spitzer. All four of those men were prosecutors, either state or federal.

But I think in my view, this is my personal political view about their leadership styles. I think they as a group generally exhibited a toxic arrogance, lack of humility, and belligerence. Now, whether or not that came from their experience as prosecutors is an open question, but I don’t think so. I go back to my first answer, which is I don’t think necessarily being a prosecutor makes you a good leader or a statesman. I think those qualities are determined by something apart from that particular narrow experience.

THE INTERVIEW

I will be right back with my conversation with Ian Bremmer. 2024 is politically, as Ian Bremmer called it, the Voldemort of years, the year that must not be named. The geopolitical expert and dear friend of the show joins me to discuss the elections changing the world. Ian Bremmer, my friend, welcome back to the show.

Ian Bremmer:

Preet, I have missed you so much.

Preet Bharara:

I think this is your 89th appearance.

Ian Bremmer:

I think it is. I think it is. We’re not getting any younger. It’s certainly true.

Preet Bharara:

Can one designated an appearance if it’s a podcast? Is that the wrong word to use?

Ian Bremmer:

I’ve always thought of it as an appearance.

Preet Bharara:

Right, although I can’t see you nor can the audience. There’s a lot to talk about, very serious stuff. I thought we’d start with the weather.

Ian Bremmer:

Okay.

Preet Bharara:

You told me before we started recording that you are in the District of Columbia, which I think as we record this at 9:00 AM on Wednesday morning, it’s about 130 degrees.

Ian Bremmer:

Yeah, my God.

Preet Bharara:

You’re doing okay?

Ian Bremmer:

Even for people that like the swamp, and a lot of people around here do, it’s been revolting. I had one set of meetings yesterday that required about a six-block walk. I had a car, and I said, “Don’t bother with it. I’ll just walk.” That was immediately a mistake. I showed up pretty much drenched from head to toe.

Preet Bharara:

Were dignitaries avoiding you?

Ian Bremmer:

Well, they didn’t know until it was too late. Preet, that’s the way it usually works.

Preet Bharara:

Until you snuck up on them.

Ian Bremmer:

Exactly.

Preet Bharara:

There was a breeze in their direction?

Ian Bremmer:

Yeah. Yeah.

Preet Bharara:

Okay. So, I’m failing at making small talk.

Ian Bremmer:

No, you’re not. You’re doing a great job, Preet.

Preet Bharara:

No. I think it’s a little-

Ian Bremmer:

If you approached me in a bar, I’d find you very charming, clearly.

Preet Bharara:

Isn’t that how we met?

Ian Bremmer:

It is, actually.

Preet Bharara:

I don’t think it is.

Ian Bremmer:

If you remember.

Preet Bharara:

I don’t think it is. I don’t think it is.

Ian Bremmer:

What? That bar in Aspen?

Preet Bharara:

Was it in Aspen?

Ian Bremmer:

I think it was.

Preet Bharara:

Or Liverpool?

Ian Bremmer:

I think it was at the Hotel Jerome. I think you were-

Preet Bharara:

Now, you’re oversharing with everyone.

Ian Bremmer:

Am I oversharing, really?

Preet Bharara:

Yeah.

Ian Bremmer:

Okay. You could take this bit out. That’s fine.

Preet Bharara:

Keep your elitist nonsense to yourself.

Ian Bremmer:

You asked. You said it, “Is that where we met?” It turns out it was. Absolutely. I think you were summering, if I remember correctly. You were summering there.

Preet Bharara:

I don’t summer as a verb. Sometimes I spring as a verb.

Ian Bremmer:

There you go.

Preet Bharara:

I don’t winter either, and sometimes I fall.

Ian Bremmer:

Exactly. Speaking of that, there’s a good transition.

Preet Bharara:

I don’t autumn, but I will sometimes fall. So, I don’t want to talk about the US presidential election just yet. I want to ease into that, and I want to talk about some other stuff. I want to talk about France. I want to talk about UK. I want to talk about Iran. Why don’t we start with why you’re in D.C.

Ian Bremmer:

Well, the NATO 75th Summit and their anniversary, and I will say that last night was pretty spectacular. You had all the heads of state in the same auditorium that the treaty was signed back in 1949. Apparently, Spielberg was involved in the production of the ceremonies last night. You could tell, I mean, the quality of-

Preet Bharara:

Was there an active terrestrial on scene?

Ian Bremmer:

… of the stagecraft. Well, it depends on your views of the president, but leaving that aside.

Preet Bharara:

Oh boy.

Ian Bremmer:

Oh, no. I thought it was very, very well done. I thought it was very, very well done. I will say that everyone in the room, there was a collective gasp holding their breath when Biden decided to give the presidential medal of honor to outgoing NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg. Of course, that meant that he was going to clasp it around the back of Stoltenberg’s neck, and so all of a sudden, everyone is hoping, “Please don’t drop it. Don’t fumble it. Is it going to be okay?” Which is stupid. It’s insane, but it shows just the level of concern to panic that exists in the country and in the world right now.

Preet Bharara:

I didn’t want to get to Biden just yet.

Ian Bremmer:

I don’t really either, but frankly, that is the topic on everyone’s minds.

Preet Bharara:

I know.

Ian Bremmer:

No, I mean, in NATO-

Preet Bharara:

We’re going to delay.

Ian Bremmer:

The leaders that are coming in for NATO, they should be talking about Ukraine, but they’re talking about Biden.

Preet Bharara:

Right, but they’re talking about Biden presumably because they’re concerned he will not win. The other guy, I was going to say the new guy, but it’s the new guy and also the old guy-

Ian Bremmer:

The old guy.

Preet Bharara:

What will he do to NATO?

Ian Bremmer:

Look, I don’t see him as an existential threat to NATO. I mean, you’ll remember over the last two, three months, how many times have you heard members of the media talk about Trump saying, “If you’re not paying your bills, I’d tell Putin to do whatever he wants to you?” You’ve heard that probably at least 10 times in various formats, right?

Preet Bharara:

Yeah. So, is that not true?

Ian Bremmer:

Well, I mean, let’s remember that all of the countries that are on the front lines of Russia are spending far more than 2%, because they’re the ones that are on the front lines with Russia. I was talking to the polls yesterday, my good friend, the foreign minister. I mean, they’re at 4%. They’re going to be at 5% of GDP on defense next year. That’s a significantly higher figure than the Americans actually spend. The Baltic States are way out spending. I mean, if what Trump is saying that he’s not prepared to help the Canadians defend Newfoundland when the Russians invaded, fair enough. Not very analytically interesting.

Secondly, 23 of the 32 NATO member states right now are spending over 2%, and everyone is trending up. The reason for that in part is the Russian invasion, and in part has been pressure from the United States and particularly from Trump. So, I think that Trump is much more likely, if he becomes president, to take credit for that, say, “It’s because of me, and that’s why NATO is stronger today.” Point out that the Europeans are spending more than the Americans are on Ukraine, which is true.

Preet Bharara:

Can we shift our focus to the great nation of France? So, they had an election.

Ian Bremmer:

Who did you vote for, Preet? Did you-

Preet Bharara:

Confusing to people. I wrote in Ian Bremmer.

Ian Bremmer:

Oh, okay, cool. It’s about time.

Preet Bharara:

Which you’re allowed to do in the French system.

Ian Bremmer:

That’s right.

Preet Bharara:

Absentee ballot from the United States of America.

Ian Bremmer:

Radical centers. Yes.

Preet Bharara:

Can you first just do us the favor of explaining how the French system works? What are they? They got a president. They got a prime minister. They have a provost. What do they got?

Ian Bremmer:

They have a president and a prime minister. The president is elected every five years. Macron is not up until 2027, unless he were to call an early election, which he could do. They also have a parliament. The Parliament had a majority that was controlled by Macron and his centrist party. But because of the European Parliament who had elections across the entire EU a month ago… Fewer people turn out for the European elections in individual countries than they turn out for their own individual country elections. But in those European elections, the far right performed wildly over people’s expectations, and Macron’s centrist got thumped.

Historically, they lost by 17 points, and so rather than face that embarrassing loss and the likelihood of censure votes that he would win, but would still undermine his ability to govern, to get legislation passed. Because as president, he’s in charge of foreign policy and national security policy, but it is the prime minister and the government under the prime minister responsible for domestic policy. If he doesn’t have control, if they’re not aligned politically, he can’t get any of that done. So, he was looking at three years of being very weak, essentially a lame duck leader in his own government. So, he decided to call snap elections, which are in just a matter of weeks for his own parliament, betting that he’d be able to convince the French people that they needed to vote for the center, because it would be too scary.

It’s not like the European Parliament where nothing is at stake for the French. It’d be too scary for them to vote for the far right or the far left. So, that’s what happens. Those were the antecedents for the election that we saw over the last week.

Preet Bharara:

Then explain what happened. I think it’s confusing to folks, at least to me as an American. Usually, you have one election. People cast their ballots one time.

Ian Bremmer:

This is twice.

Preet Bharara:

This is twice. Why is that? They have a do-over policy in France.

Ian Bremmer:

Yeah, they have the first round. If you gain a majority in the vote, then that’s it. Then you go ahead. If you don’t, they take the two, or depending on performance, the three people that come in top and each constituency, and then you have a second round to determine who will actually get that seat. So, few of the ballots are determined in the first round. It’s basically a filtering process that gets you through to the second round. What was very interesting is that in the first round, again, the far right performed very well, scared everybody just like it scared everybody after the European parliamentary elections.

Then Macron convinced his own center party, which had very, very little support to coordinate with an alliance of the left, from moderate left to communist left. They agreed that they would not stand any competitive candidates in places that they were essentially fighting against each other. So as opposed to in the United Kingdom where the Conservative Party got destroyed by Nigel Farage, even though Farage only got four seats, his party got completely destroyed. They’re nowhere in parliament, but they still competed and took away enough votes in all of these constituents. Two thirds of the seats that the Conservatives lost in the UK, they lost not because labor outperformed them, but because they lost a whole bunch of their support to Farage and the far right reform party.

In France, that didn’t happen at all. The exact opposite happened in France. In France, you had the center and the left saying, “We’re going to work together to make sure that the right doesn’t come in, and we’re going to do that even though we hate each other. We don’t agree on any policies. We don’t want to govern together, but we’re going to do that just because we hate the far right even more.” It worked. They ended up having 160 different individual candidates standing down, so you didn’t have what’s called this triangular, where you didn’t have a three-way run that would’ve led to the national front winning, or the national rally. They rebranded themselves. So even though the national rally got the largest percentage of support, they came in third in the number of seats.

So, you talk about how in the United States, someone can win the popular vote, but can still easily lose the election because of the nature of the balloting system. In France, this was even more dramatically so. So, what happened was the left took the most seats, then the center, and then the far right actually came in third. Now, Preet, they still doubled the seats that they had in French parliament compared to the last election, but they underperformed dramatically compared to the European Parliament and compared to the percentage of support that they actually have. I know it’s super complicated. It hardly reflects the “will of the people” in a representative way, but it is the way the election system works. It is fully legal. It’s not corrupt. It’s not bought.

Preet Bharara:

It’s not rigged. It’s not rigged.

Ian Bremmer:

It’s not rigged, but you can understand why a lot of people looking at it, including inside France, would feel like, “This government doesn’t represent me.”

Preet Bharara:

Just so people have context and an understanding, when you say the Macron’s party is center left or center, where would you place him and his party and his party’s values and principles and policies on the American spectrum?

Ian Bremmer:

Pretty close to Biden. Pretty close to Biden. Pretty close to Trudeau someplace in there. So, I mean, if Macron really represents the center in France, I would say that makes him center left in the West. I say that… I mean, it depends. Like on migration, I would say he has tacked farther to the right than even where Biden is today, nevermind where he was two years ago. But on things like social benefits and labor, the entire French system basically says, “You don’t need to work.” I mean, look, when Biden’s handlers came out and said that his working hours were really only from 10:00 to 4:00, I mean in France, that’s more than a full workday, right? So, I mean, there is that. There is a, “I kid. I kid, but not completely.”

Preet Bharara:

So, the left in France is the equivalent to what in the US?

Ian Bremmer:

Oh, the left in France, I mean-

Preet Bharara:

We don’t really have that kind of a left, do we?

Ian Bremmer:

If you were to talk about Jean-Luc Mélenchon, who is in charge of the major far left party, those are full-on from socialist to communist. I mean, you would find student groups in universities that represent them at Berkeley or at Columbia, but you wouldn’t find anyone useful politically that would correspond to them. I mean, the far-

Preet Bharara:

Even the squad, the so called squad in the US?

Ian Bremmer:

No. No. The left alliance preach just yesterday came out in France, and they said they want 90% taxation on anyone that makes over 400,000 euros. I mean, the squad, I can’t see AOC problem with that.

Preet Bharara:

This is why Ian Bremmer can’t move to France.

Ian Bremmer:

Oh my God. That’s why Preet Bharara, now that you’re like a big time partner in a law firm, you’re bringing in millions. You’d get destroyed. You’d get destroyed.

Preet Bharara:

Back with your Aspen talk.

Ian Bremmer:

Because if you’re going to go after me, we got to be equivalent here. I’m waiting for you to whipped out the Rolex.

Preet Bharara:

Let me finish with the context, because I have a question. There’s a question brewing here.

Ian Bremmer:

I don’t even know what you charge for an hour now. It’s got to be astonishing.

Preet Bharara:

It’s simple. You can’t if you have to ask, Ian.

Ian Bremmer:

I know. Exactly.

Preet Bharara:

So then on the right wing side in France, tell us about where they would be in the American system, Marie Le Pen and her cohorts.

Ian Bremmer:

So, Le Pen is assertively pro-Russia in, I think, a way that would be unattractive to the Republicans. I think her migration policy is pretty similar to what you would see from the MAGA right in the Republican Party. Her identity politics are pretty similar though still a lot of what she would end up saying and supporting in terms of she’s no longer in favor of Frexit. She still supports the European Union. She wants more autonomy in the way that France is subsidizing/promoting industrial policy that would be anti-EU. I’d probably put her in economic policy a little to the a little more centrist than MAGA Republican’s migration policy straight on, and Russia national security to the right of MAGA Republicans.

Preet Bharara:

So, the question is, or my set of questions is about, is it a recent thing that within the borders of one country, you have a popular party that gets a lot of votes that’s right wing, and another popular party that gets a lot of votes in the same election that’s way, way, way to the left, including communists and socialists? Is that a recent phenomenon? Has that always been true in Europe? Then the adjacent question is, is that a recipe for disharmony, or is it a recipe for compromise and coalition building?

Ian Bremmer:

I think that the European political spectrum and most political spectrums of democracies have been both broader than the United States, and have also generally been more to the left than the United States. That’s been a pretty consistent and long run thing. The United States has an orientation towards more decentralization of power to the states and to localities. It generally is society that lionizes the individual as opposed to community. It is more private sector friendly, less intrusive in terms of the regulatory state. Those are things that I think generally define the political spectrum in the United States in a way that like Bernie Sanders and a lot of his policies, and most Americans would knee-jerk consider Bernie Sanders a social Democrat to socialist.

I think he would be reasonably center left across most of Europe in the Nordics, in Germany, in France for example. It is certainly true that in Europe and in the United States, it’s not that the far right and the far left are becoming farther right and farther left, but they are attracting larger percentages of popular support. That is definitely happening. It’s happening in Germany and in the Netherlands and France and in the UK. Those are the big countries, and some of the small countries, of course, they’re actually taking over. So, it does matter, and the US is vulnerable to that.

Preet Bharara:

Going back to my question, is that a good thing? Is that a recipe for disaster or a recipe for compromise and solidarity?

Ian Bremmer:

I think it’s a cyclical thing, Preet. It’s a good thing in so far as when your political system and leaders are no longer seen as representing the will of the people. You will end up with more radical solutions to force, to pressure, and if that doesn’t work, to eventually break the system so that you get greater alignment with what the people actually want. I mean, the United States has been a strong force for free trade and globalization for decades. Most Americans are increasingly think that they don’t benefit from that.

They’re angry about it, and so they’ve forced the American political system away from free trade and a center right position that represented the so-called Washington Consensus, and now both parties are doing much more industrial policy. You see someone like Bob Lighthizer calling for 60% tariffs against all Chinese exports. 10 years ago, that would’ve been an anti-American policy way outside the realm of the normal. Today, that’s a policy that is seen as overdue in many circles supporting the workforce, and punishing the Chinese for taking advantage of American large ass. So, is it a good thing? I think it’s an understandable thing.

It can also… You can see excesses that can come from algorithms that get people information that makes them believe things that just ain’t so, and creates polarization. It can come from external disinformation countries that are enemies and adversaries of the Americans and their Western allies who see these divisions but want to pile on and make them sharper and more violent than they necessarily are. I mean, so it’s complicated for me to answer to that question, Preet. Is it a good thing? But I think I can help give some understanding to everyone listening of why it’s happening.

Preet Bharara:

You can go across the channel to the UK.

Ian Bremmer:

To the UK, sure. Man, we teased that a little bit already.

Preet Bharara:

We did. Nice preview. Nice foreshadowing.

Ian Bremmer:

It was foreshadowing. It was foreshadowing.

Preet Bharara:

My listeners really appreciate that the foreshadow as smart listeners often do. So, there, it was a route. Describe in historical terms how much of a route it was by the Labor Party.

Ian Bremmer:

So this time around, the Labor Party got 34% of the vote. I mean, just to show you how much of a route it was, Preet, in 2019, which was the last time you had a general election in the UK, labor got 32% of the vote. So, I mean, that’s just a staggering, virtually zero change in percentage of how Labor did.

Preet Bharara:

So, why are we calling it a route, man?

Ian Bremmer:

Well, you called it a route. I didn’t call it a route. I was just following you.

Preet Bharara:

I am quoting from esteemed political scientists and commentators.

Ian Bremmer:

Yeah, so it’s pretty wild, right? Same percentage, and yet… I mean, this was an enormous drubbing. The Tory party, the Conservative Party is out of power for a long time. It happened in part because nobody wanted to vote for the Tories, so they voted for anyone else they could find, and they went to other parties, not Labor. Most importantly, they went to this reformist party, Nigel Farage, who tried seven times to be elected in his constituency of Clacton in Essex, kind of working class place that I spent a year of my life back when I was in college, and lost seven times in a row.

But the eighth time, he is now a member of parliament, and he’s what they call a chancellor. He is not in any way a serious political figure. He is now in parliament with three of his reformist colleagues. Others were forced to stand down because they said criminally stupid racist things, and got caught out, and it’s a pretty horrible group. Some of them are clearly fascist, but they got enough of the general vote, 14%, that they were able to undermine the Tories dramatically. That’s why we saw the shift. This is… Again, we didn’t have a general election since 2019, but we’ve had lots of different prime ministers who the people didn’t vote for.

They were brought in by the Conservative Party membership leadership and by the members of parliament of the Conservative Party. They went from calamitous to embarrassing to abject failure. I would say that that Sunak, Rishi Sunak, who was the final PM of that group, was certainly the most effective of them, but also, it was way too late. They were seen as the party of Brexit. They were seen as the party of incompetence. They were seen as the party of lies, and they were well past their sell by day.

Preet Bharara:

They had a lot of prime ministers, which is a higher number, the number of times you’ve been on this show or the number of prime ministers the UK has had in the last five years. It is probably close.

Ian Bremmer:

When obviously it’s… No, it’s not even close, but even in the last five years, it’s not even close.

Preet Bharara:

How long was Anthony Scaramucci prime minister of the UK?

Ian Bremmer:

Scaramucci was prime… You barely even noticed him. He was right after Truss.

Preet Bharara:

Not a lot of people know that.

Ian Bremmer:

He was right after Truss. He basically lasted a weekend, and he was out before parliament was in sessions. It was a fun weekend. I mean, I know that the parties were good, right?

Preet Bharara:

Blink of an eye.

Ian Bremmer:

Blink of an eye. Mooch should be allowed to run all democracies for a very short period of time. That could be-

Preet Bharara:

Everyone should have 11 days.

Ian Bremmer:

Yeah, just go in in 11 days. Just clean it up.

Preet Bharara:

To run a Western democracy, and then, like me, podcast.

Ian Bremmer:

It’s funny, when you look back on it, it’s hard to believe that he actually had that position for 11 days.

Preet Bharara:

Prime Minister?

Ian Bremmer:

Yeah. No, I mean, but, right? I mean, because you and I know him. He’s an enormously personable guy, but, I mean, the idea that he’s the actual spokesman for an administration seems ludicrous.

Preet Bharara:

What is the Venn… I don’t know how people are going to react to your comments. What do you think the Venn diagram is of Stay Tuned listeners and Scaramucci fans?

Ian Bremmer:

I hope it’s at least 20 or 30%.

Preet Bharara:

Really. I mean-

Ian Bremmer:

I hope so. Well, first of all, because he speaks extremely plainly and honestly. I mean, he’s a little rough yune, and he’s a little clownish, but actually, he has a heart of gold. He, over the last few years, is one of the people that I think has spoken most plainly and from the heart about the way he has felt about how the Trump administration has conducted itself. So in that regard, I’d like to believe, “Okay, there’s knee-jerk tribalism, and most Stay Tuned listeners are here.” Scaramucci, they associate him with Trump, and therefore they say bad, but I know you also have a very educated listenership, at least all of those that say that when I’m on the show, they must be. So in that regard, I’d like to believe that there’d be some support.

Preet Bharara:

We have now talked about Anthony Scaramucci longer than he was in office. So, can we move on from that, I mean, literally? I mean, that’s insane. That’s a long plug.

Ian Bremmer:

The funny thing is what happens is you bring this stuff up. You bring up something completely random and fun.

Preet Bharara:

I do because I’m curious to know your reaction, because you don’t react in necessarily predictable ways, which is a good thing.

Ian Bremmer:

Then I run with it. If you give me something fun, I want to run with it, and then you-

Preet Bharara:

I think predictability-

Ian Bremmer:

… try to reign me in immediately. You don’t let me run. It’s not fair.

Preet Bharara:

Well, you can jog. You can make me jog.

Ian Bremmer:

It’s like, “My God.” I feel like, “Dad, dad, come on. I just got out. Don’t call me back in.”

Preet Bharara:

I’ll be right back with Ian Bremmer after this.

Is unpredictability in politics a good thing? I mean, the reason why… I was talking to somebody recently who’s a very well-known person who does interviews on television, and I said, “What is the category of guest?” Now, I’m going to offend people also. Listen, what is a category of guest that is least interesting and most boring? The options were actor, author, academic, politician, and there are a number of other categories as well. Hands down, this person said politician, and part of the reason for that is you know in advance how a certain breed a politician is going to answer any question.

We’re jumping around a little bit here, but-

Ian Bremmer:

That’s why Milei is great, for example, from Argentina in terms of intriguing, I just had him on my show a couple days ago. We’re airing it next week. I mean, you have… I mean, there are a number of times I asked him questions, and he just went in completely unexpected ways in a way-

Preet Bharara:

But unexpected and smart or unexpected and nuts?

Ian Bremmer:

Mostly the former. Mostly the former. He’s a very smart guy. I mean, he’s a very unorthodox guy, and he used that to his advantage to become president at a time when, again, everyone was so sick. I mean, easily more sick of the pronos in Argentina than the Brits were of the conservatives in the UK. He took great advantage of that.

Preet Bharara:

So, this discussion of France and UK is a lead up to a question that I’ve been getting. I know you’ve been getting, and you’ve been answering, because as we head into the looming election in the United States of America, home of the free land of the brave, such as it is, the question from people on the progressive side is are those signs? Is that foreshadowing, to use that term again, of an anti right, an anti-conservative movement in Europe that could sweep America too? I believe your answer is not what people might expect.

Ian Bremmer:

My answer is that we’re seeing anti-incumbency, and we’ve been through… I think there are two big reasons for that. The first is people forget about because it’s not in front of us, the pandemic. It’s in the rear-view mirror. We don’t need to worry about it. We get our flu vaccine. We can get the Covid vaccine at the same time, find out someone has Covid. We don’t scream. We’re not watching the news of how many people are dying anymore, all that kind of stuff, but the fact is that it affected our lives in a huge way. It seized up economies. It stopped people from leaving their houses, their communities for years, and then everything opened up.

There are big long-term implications of that, the first being extended historic levels of inflation, and the second being extended historic levels of migration. If you are a president or prime minister that is holding the bag when those chickens come home to roost, that is a mixed metaphor. Then you are going to get punished. That’s what we’re seeing happen. That happened in South Africa, in India, in across the EU and France, in the UK, and I think it’s happening in the United States. I mean, if you had two reasonably competent and popular Democratic and Republican characters running for the presidency, and we don’t, but if you were, this is a likely election where you would expect that the opposition would win fairly handily for that reason, right? For that reason.

Then on top of that, you have the greater general anti-establishment sentiment that is being driven by disinformation and algorithms. Just people are more willing to give chaos a chance, and act in more politically tribal ways than they would have when they were all listening to the same media, and reading the same sources and less divided algorithmically. So, I think those are the reasons why for me, this is not about far left. It’s not about far right. It’s about incumbents having a really hard time. Now, the first two things I mentioned will go away. They’re temporal. They’re not structural. They’ll go away over time, and so the next round of leaders might do better as a consequence.

The last point is structural. It is driving more polarization every day, every month, every year. I’m not sure what’s going to turn that train around.

Preet Bharara:

So to summarize, for the people who’ve been asking the question, and taking some hope because of progressives in the US, it’s not about a victory for the left. It’s about change.

Ian Bremmer:

That’s right. Again, we just talked about Argentina and Milei. I mean, that was a huge victory for the right. In France, the left did not win. In France, the far left has the most seats now in parliament, but Le Pen has doubled the seats that she had before. In Germany, the AFD, the alternatives for Deutschland, significantly outperformed despite massive internal scandals and a leader that is clearly a fascist. They did very well not only in former Germany, but also in the wealthy north of Germany and the Netherlands. In Portugal, far right parties did very well.

In the UK, the left did quite well, but again, only 2% better than they did before. So, if you’re looking for is it the left, or is it the right, the numbers don’t bear out that the progressive left is winning all over the place. The numbers bear out that incumbents are getting thumped. That’s what we’re seeing.

Preet Bharara:

So, my question is hasn’t it always been the case that people become impatient with the status quo, and they want change, or are we less patient now with the status quo? Are we more anxious and interested in change, because we think standard issue politicians? Do we give them less room to make change and make people’s lives better? Connectedly, are we just generally lacking an attention span and patience because of lots of other things in society as well, or are those two things not connected?

Ian Bremmer:

I think that people do have shorter attention spans and shorter patience levels. I also think that people are more frightened of a world that is moving faster, but whether you are-

Preet Bharara:

Right, but then if that translates into more change and more replacement of regimes with other regimes, those two things seem to be at odds with each other.

Ian Bremmer:

Not necessarily. I mean, it can translate. I mean, the latter can translate into a whole bunch of people that are more Conservative or more nativist and populist on the right and are saying, “Migration is a real problem for us, and we want to keep the nature of the country the way it feels like a community to us.” These are frequently the people that have had the least exposure to immigrant populations themselves [inaudible 00:47:30] to me.

Preet Bharara:

I’m confused. Isn’t that a tendency then in those populations and those constituencies against change?

Ian Bremmer:

Well, see. Preet, I’m thinking.

Preet Bharara:

Let’s unpack it. Unpack it, Ian.

Ian Bremmer:

Well, if you have a country that has been supportive of free trade and open borders, and welcoming immigration for a long time, and you are saying, “No, I don’t want that anymore,” the ideology you’re supporting is Conservative, but you are pushing for significant change from your existing policies. I mean, the United States has been a pro-globalization power, the pro-globalization power for roughly three generations now. That is changing. The United States is now the world leader in industrial policy. That’s what the Inflation Reduction Act, Bipartisan inflation reduction Act reflected. The CHIPS Act reflected that 18 billion in tariffs against Chinese electric vehicles and other areas of export reflected that, right?

This is not the United States that is trying to lead a globally open and free market and competitive economy. This is the United States. It’s putting its thumb on the scale in favor of Americans. Very different, right? That’s a change. But it’s a change that reflects a more Conservative sensibility of how economic policy should be run.

Preet Bharara:

Just in having this discussion, I’m thinking back to the middle of the last century in the US, and there was a democratic president for like 80 terms. Franklin Roosevelt was in office for… He elected four times.

Ian Bremmer:

Four times, yeah.

Preet Bharara:

Four times, they had to change the rule. They amended the Constitution after that as high school students know, and you had huge democratic majorities in the Congress as well. It took a long time for people to want change then, and so that’s why I wonder 80 years on, can no party have a president who serves two or three or four terms anymore? What do you think about that?

Ian Bremmer:

I believe the biggest democracy by population in the world right now has a leader that is-

Preet Bharara:

Country of my birth.

Ian Bremmer:

… prepared to serve for 15 years, and, okay, 8% growth. Despite that, he’s now leading in coalition with two state-based regional parties as opposed to running it by himself. So, he didn’t do as well. Same challenge that I’ve spoken about more broadly.

Preet Bharara:

No, but I thought he did, compared to expectation, quite poorly.

Ian Bremmer:

Less well. Yes.

Preet Bharara:

Am I correct? You’re talking about India.

Ian Bremmer:

Yeah.

Preet Bharara:

I know. I know.

Ian Bremmer:

You wouldn’t call it poorly.

Preet Bharara:

Even I figured that out.

Ian Bremmer:

You wouldn’t call it poorly.

Preet Bharara:

Well, I guess in life in politics, it’s a question of how people do compared to what the expectation was, and it was a surprised.

Ian Bremmer:

Well, internationally, I think people are very comfortable that they’re working with the same administration, same policy, same ability to get things done. I think international investors feel the same way. JP Morgan just brought India after the elections into their emerging market funds can lead to billions more of a portfolio investment into India. I mean, I think that people are very comfortable that this guy is still in charge for five more years. If anything, some of his Hindu nationalism excesses will be tempered by his coalition partners who have significant Muslim minorities populations in their own states, their home states.

So, this was a very good outcome in terms of stability in India’s trajectory. But when you ask me like, “Can you still win for a long period of time,” the answer is yes, but it’s getting harder for the reasons that we’ve been talking about. Again, anti-incumbency trends are getting more challenging now. One way that leaders try to react to that if they can is they undermine democratic checks and balances. So in Hungary, it’s becoming much harder to displace despite the fact that it’s ostensibly a democracy, the sitting president in Turkey, Erdogan, trying very hard to change the Constitution, so he and his party can run things forever.

Now, they still have a robust competitive party system. In the last elections, Erdogan didn’t do so well, but he’s still running the country, and he is in an anti-incumbent environment. He’s trying to change the rules, so he still gets to rule the roost. Of course, Trump’s been trying to do a lot of that himself.

Preet Bharara:

So, we’ve been saying that as an ideological matter, what happens in the UK or in France or other countries doesn’t portend anything necessarily ideologically for the US other than there’s an appetite for change and against incumbency. However, if I recall correctly, some years ago when the UK did Brexit, people said, “Well, that is a preview ideologically of Trump, and that you could have predicted Trump a little bit from across the pond because of Brexit.” Does that still stand?

Ian Bremmer:

Yeah. I mean, I think that absolutely the level of-

Preet Bharara:

It was a big FU-

Ian Bremmer:

Yeah, to the elites.

Preet Bharara:

… and the Americans are like, “Yeah, we FU also.”

Ian Bremmer:

That’s right. I think that’s right. I think that’s still true, but the point is that’s.

Preet Bharara:

I’m sorry. Just to pause up for a second, my understanding is that now, the population of the UK regrets that FU, and a majority of folks were like, “What the hell were we thinking?”

Ian Bremmer:

That’s right.

Preet Bharara:

How does that play into this dynamic as well?

Ian Bremmer:

Well, you could argue that played into the Biden dynamic for four years. So, you got for four years in the United States, you returned a pretty competent, more technocratic, boring leadership and government. Yeah, you had a whole bunch of progressives that yelled a lot about DEI and about climate change and about open borders and sanctuary cities. But in the reality, Biden has governed as a centrist. I mean, maybe what Lina Khan is trying to do, but failing is an exception to that, but-

Preet Bharara:

The chair of the FTC.

Ian Bremmer:

Yeah, who’s doing all this antitrust stuff that’s not standing up in court, but generally speaking, he’s governing as a centrist economically, internationally on social and identity policy and even now on immigration policy, and that the UK is now set for five years of very similar sorts of policies. So, maybe you make the argument that in this case, I mean, the Americans “learned from the Brits” with Trump after Brexit.

Preet Bharara:

Right. So, we’ve already had the backlash.

Ian Bremmer:

The Americans have already had the backlash, and now the Brits are about to see that. Yes. I think that is the right way to look at it.

Preet Bharara:

Now, we may have the backlash to the backlash.

Ian Bremmer:

To the backlash, that’s right. That’s right.

Preet Bharara:

It’s just a pendulum.

Ian Bremmer:

Well, and again, you can’t sleep on the fact that in between all of that, you had the pandemic. I mean, it’s just a massive, massive, but it’s a single biggest external impact on global lives that we have had post World War II. So, I mean, the idea that that wouldn’t have a structural systemic impact on political cycles is insane.

Preet Bharara:

So, we got to talk about the US election, and I guess my first question is you are a political scientist. You observe democracies and non democracies all over the world, and draw conclusions about trends, and you do this report about risk every year that we talk about at the beginning of the calendar year. I wonder if generally speaking, and more specifically in the US, we over-interpret polls and election results as being a consequence of people’s ideological views or policy views or interest in change or incumbency and all these other things we’ve been talking about, when literally the collection of flaws and negative and positive attributes that are inhabiting the bodies of these two very specific men makes more of a difference than all those other things.

Ian Bremmer:

The polls in the US have moved very little over this election cycle. Most Americans are pretty set on who they like and, more importantly, who they hate. So, I mean, when you are talking about an election that is in likelihood going to be determined by a few hundred thousand voters in a small number of swing states, the polls don’t matter all that much. That’s not what… So, you’re talking about what’s going to affect turnout, and the polls are talking about likely voters, but they’re not giving you a lot of information about turnout. Are people going to be turned off or not care? How much ennui is there in the United States? A poll of ennui would probably be pretty useful in this environment.

Preet Bharara:

You have now used my favorite word, ennui.

Ian Bremmer:

Ennui is your favorite word?

Preet Bharara:

It’s one of my favorite words. You don’t get to use it much. What’s interesting to me and saddens me is the internal strife and debate and angry name-calling within the Democratic Party.

Ian Bremmer:

As opposed to the cult that is the Republican Party, which is obviously much healthier.

Preet Bharara:

Well, I know some people are suggesting there’s this assemblance is smaller, less nutty, but similar cult of Biden. I don’t think that’s necessarily true. I think-

Ian Bremmer:

I think that’s clearly false. I think it’s clearly false.

Preet Bharara:

I think this is a dispute about strategy. Everyone on the progressive side, on the democratic side is pretty much on the same page. We can’t have another Trump. Some people think based on a variety of factors, including Biden’s debate performance, that Biden has no chance of winning, not because those people necessarily think that Biden can’t be president, at least for a while, but that other people, including more specifically and relevantly independents, can’t vote for that guy they saw on the stage. Other people say and think, “Well, it’s useless to try to push Biden out, because he’s not going to go.”

Even if he did go, you’re going to have chaos and no new candidate. Kamala Harris or anyone else is going to be able to garner the support of 80 or 85 million Americans in the course of 100 days. So, that’s a stupid way of going about it. Neither position is enviable, and it’s all about strategy, or do you think it’s about something else?

Ian Bremmer:

No, I think you’re absolutely right, Preet. I think that-

Preet Bharara:

But they shouldn’t be fighting in the way that they’re fighting, I think.

Ian Bremmer:

This is a situation that I think there’s no good answer. Every outcome is extremely risky, and it’s extremely risky with limited information. I don’t know about you. I don’t mind taking big risks when I have really good information, but I really avoid-

Preet Bharara:

Isn’t it by definition, Ian, less of a risk if you have really good information?

Ian Bremmer:

No, not at all. I mean, you can have great information about a poker hand, and you know that you have a 95% chance of winning, and you can bet everything, your tournament entry on that. There’s a one in 20 chance that you’re going to lose, but you know what that chance is in. This case, people are putting their careers. They’re putting their party, and to an extent, they’re putting the country on the line on the basis of a decision that they have vastly less ability to have confidence in what they’re betting on. That’s a serious problem, and I see this all the time.

My view, I’ll tell you, let me put my cards on the table so you understand how I’m thinking about these percentages. If I thought that Biden had a team around him that was capable of strongly executing on a strategy, and I thought that he would be able to continue to operate more or less as he had prior to the debate, so as Pelosi said, “This is an event, but it’s not a condition,” then I would want him to stay, because I think changing to Kamala at this stage is dangerous, but I don’t believe either of those things. I think that in the week and a half since the debate, he has been advised. His team has managed this abysmally.

They should have been putting him out immediately, both in terms of making phone calls the next day to the donors, to the governors, to the senators as opposed to four days later, and hearing nothing from him over the weekend.

Preet Bharara:

What’s the logical conclusion? I hate to say this. What’s the logical conclusion of why they didn’t… That’s so obvious of a strategy, right? I mean, even an idiot knows that that’s the strategy, and the people around Joe Biden are not idiots. They’re not idiots.

Ian Bremmer:

Not at all.

Preet Bharara:

So, why don’t you do that? You don’t do that because?

Ian Bremmer:

I think you don’t do that-

Preet Bharara:

You think it’s going to turn out worse.

Ian Bremmer:

Either you think it’s going to turn out worse and or these people defer too much to the president. If the president doesn’t want to do it, he’s not going to do it.

Preet Bharara:

Well, he’s the president. How much are you supposed to defer or not defer to the commander in chief?

Ian Bremmer:

Well, I mean, I think that in an environment, this is a very White House centered group. They don’t have… When you see cabinet and policies, for example, there’s a lot of strategy around they are meant to implement. Yellen is meant to implement on White House policy. She’s not meant to drive her own policy for treasury. Lloyd Austin, defense, same thing. These have been the same people for four years. Almost nobody’s left. They love the president. They’re very loyal to the president. They don’t leak at all. They’re very coordinated on strategy.

Those are all good things, but you don’t see an enormous amount of pushback. So when Biden makes a mistake, like sticking with Netanyahu, and not wanting to push him publicly in the early days of this war, and therefore, the Americans get isolated and don’t have a policy together with their allies, that’s a mistake driven by the president. His people are not saying, “We really need to do something else, and need to push him hard.” I fear that a lot of that is going on here, but look, either way, whatever the reason is for it, they have not managed this well.

Especially because I have heard so much from the CEOs, the world leaders, the senators, the congressmen and women that have been meeting with Biden over the past months that have seen him deteriorate, that have watched him deteriorate that, I think, that the… We’re four months away from this election. That is a long time. The likelihood that they are going to be forced to make this decision if they don’t make this decision now I think is going way up. So as a consequence, my view would be rip off the bandaid, force him out now. It’s his decision.

Preet Bharara:

So, if you remember Congress that you would join the nine or 10 that have said he should step down?

Ian Bremmer:

Well, first of all, it’s not the nine or 10. I think it’s the majority, but they’re not going to say it publicly.

Preet Bharara:

No, the nine or 10 publicly who have had the temerity to come out and say it publicly.

Ian Bremmer:

Yeah. I don’t know. I think I would probably be more in Warner’s camp where I would be saying it privately, and I would be working very hard to get a large group of senior senators together so that it’s more effective as opposed to coming out by myself. So, I don’t know if… I’m not sure I would be in the Sherrod Brown, Bennett, Tester first couple days camp. I’m not sure I would be, because I think there are advantages in numbers.

Preet Bharara:

But isn’t this a perfect example of the aphorism if you’re going to come at the king, you best not miss?

Ian Bremmer:

Right, exactly.

Preet Bharara:

To the extent that people reasonably have thought it was a futile exercise to persuade Biden to drop out of the race, to the extent that you have all these voices, you just heard him, and damaged him more. He’s in a worse position than he would’ve otherwise been in.

Ian Bremmer:

Yeah. I mean-

Preet Bharara:

That’s not a crazy strategic position.

Ian Bremmer:

The thing is when you’ve got four months to come at the king, you probably have at least a few shots on goal.

Preet Bharara:

It’s not really four months. The convention’s in a few weeks, sir.

Ian Bremmer:

I know that. I know that, but I’m still saying at the end of the day, if he has a serious crisis and is not able to actually run, there is… I mean, in principle, they could switch him out with Kamala after the convention, in principle.

Preet Bharara:

I think it’s tough a little. Where do you put the odds?

Ian Bremmer:

It’s horrible. It’s horrible.

Preet Bharara:

Where do you put the odds of Biden prevailing in the election if he remains in?

Ian Bremmer:

I mean, certainly, well sub 50 at this point. Again, you’re four months out, so a lot can happen.

Preet Bharara:

Is that because no Democrats I don’t think are changing their mind and planning to flip their vote to Trump?

Ian Bremmer:

Let me answer it this way. There is not a single domestic leader or foreign leader that I know and have spoken to that believes that Biden is capable of running the country for four more years, number one, number one. Number two, there’s almost no one that I know in that camp that believes that it is 50% or more likely at this point that Biden will win in November if he runs, if he remains the candidate. That is, I think, the most useful way I can answer the question. So, they know they are in serious trouble. They know that. The question, as you said, is one of strategy.

Given that they are in serious trouble, what is the least damaging, most effective way to respond to what is a crisis without any question? What is a crisis? It’s not that he lost the debate. That’s not the problem. He could have lost the debate. The problem is that the debate confirmed in the most public and dramatic way the single biggest vulnerability that Biden has had since he’s decided to run for a second term. That’s the problem.

Preet Bharara:

If you’ve been a Biden advisor and were clear-eyed about his capabilities and how he sometimes is not as sharp as he is at other times, and all the reporting is he varies. He has his ups and his downs in any given day or work cycle. Would you thrown your body in front of the train, and prevented that debate?

Ian Bremmer:

Yeah, I would’ve. I was very surprised that he gave that debate. I understand that they attempted to make the rules so favorable to a normal politician, and not to Trump, that they thought that Trump was going to say no. Then it wasn’t going to be Biden ducking it. It was going to be Trump refused to accept the rules, and that they both can blame the other for why there isn’t a debate. That was a risk that they were taking. Trump wisely accepted all of the rules, didn’t debate them at all. Then Biden destroyed himself.

I think you and I have talked about this. I was quite surprised that they were going to allow him to debate, but it’s obviously hard to run someone where you’re scared for them to debate. I think the more relevant point is I don’t think he should have run a year ago. I mean, it’s like when he first became president, no one close to him thought he was up for two terms, but here’s the problem, Preet, is I think that if it wasn’t Trump, I think that if it were Nikki Haley or DeSantis or someone else, it’s not clear to me that Biden would actually be still the candidate right now.

I really do believe that, because remember that when Obama forced, asked Biden to step aside for Hillary Clinton, and this was at the time that Biden was frequently in tears, I mean, breaking down because of the tragedy of Beau Biden dying. I mean, it was going to be very hard for him to be up for this. But however you want to describe the narrative, the fact is that Hillary Clinton lost that election, and Biden blames himself to a degree. Biden thinks that if he had been standing instead of Hillary that he would’ve won.

Preet Bharara:

Yeah. Isn’t that quite arguable that in 2016, Biden would’ve beaten Trump?

Ian Bremmer:

I think so, and I think that if you are Biden, and you believe that, and you are the guy, Trump is president. Trump became president because of you, and now you are thinking people want you to stand aside. You are thinking to yourself, “I’m the only guy that knows that I can beat him, and I got to do it again.” I mean, whether or not that reflects the state of reality in July 2024, I feel quite confident that is Biden’s mindset. So, I think it is harder to get him to step down as a consequence of that.

Preet Bharara:

Look, part of the problem is found in your analysis on two different things. One, if it is the case that it was a mistake to debate because of your mental acuity and deafness, and then that is exposed to the world, it cannot be the right strategy to do the thing that you said one should ordinarily do, which is to get out there a lot more, and provide more opportunities for that to be witnessed as well. That’s the conundrum, right?

Ian Bremmer:

Well, no, but the upside of doing that, my view is you have to do that, and you have to do that precisely because you have to prove that this is a-

Preet Bharara:

Right, but if you’re incapable of proving that, then you’re-

Ian Bremmer:

No, but if you’re incapable of proving it, then he should be stepping down. That’s the whole point. By the way, we saw this this morning like Nancy Pelosi’s comments, right? She has already said he’s staying in. So, the fact that she is now saying, “It’s up to the president to decide, and we’re all encouraging him to make that decision because time is running short,” that is obviously reflecting a position from Nancy and for many others that he should get out, but she won’t say it, which I think is spineless, right? So, I mean, that’s the problem is that the Democrats are all in the position that Pelosi is basically in right now. That is absolutely the strong majority-

Preet Bharara:

On behalf of Madam Speaker Emerita, I don’t know that it’s spineless. I think it goes back to the strategy, because you don’t know if he’s going to step down or not, and you want to encourage it if you’re her, but hedge and not inflict maximum damage in the eventuality that he doesn’t step down.

Ian Bremmer:

Everyone knows… What I’m saying is I think that most people at this point believe that the right strategy is for him to be out.

Preet Bharara:

No, I don’t know that that’s true. I think there’s a large group of people who rightly believe… I mean, the point of this is that there’s no good strategy, who rightly believe that the chaos that would ensue in a scramble to be the replacement, and in particular whether it is Kamala or isn’t Kamala, will alienate specific constituencies, incredibly important, longstanding constituencies of the Democratic Party, and you’re totally host. I think it still comes back to, I hope and I like to think in good faith, difference of opinion as to what puts you in the best stead for the election. None of which are good.

Ian Bremmer:

I understand, and I get why this is so hard for them to say, but I’m just saying that there’s inconsistency. Pelosi was just saying after he put his letter in, he’s running, and that’s what he said, and then they’re backing away from it like, “That’s not good.” What you don’t want is to be inconsistent and changing in your position all over the map. “Oh, this is a strength of the Republican Party is that when they’re making a decision, they stick with the decision, whatever it is.” I think that here, the fact that they are all hedging all over the place is likely to continue to allow this to fester, and it ends up being worse.

They should have been talking to Biden about this in much stronger terms a year ago, and they were unwilling to do so in part because there is just much more open diversity, much less party discipline, much less party loyalty in that regard in the Democratic Party. I think that’s a challenge for them.

Preet Bharara:

Ian Bremmer, my friend, you’ve been very generous with your time. Once again, thanks for being with us.

Ian Bremmer:

My pleasure, Preet.

Preet Bharara:

My conversation with Ian Bremmer continues for members of the CAFE Insider Community. In the bonus for insiders, we discuss the future of NATO.

Ian Bremmer:

I actually don’t think that there is a possibility that NATO would fall apart or that the Americans would leave NATO if Trump were to be president. I don’t believe that. I don’t believe he would try to do that.

Preet Bharara:

To try out the membership for just $1 for a month, head to cafe.com/insider. Again, that’s cafe.com/insider.

BUTTON

Before we wrap up this week, I just want to say that I know there are of course, a lot of feelings and concerns surrounding the election. Since the debate, fears about President Biden’s ability to win another election and then lead the country for another four years are at an all time high, so too is anger at Biden’s detractors. Long before the debate, I was kept up at night by my deep worry about Donald Trump winning again in November about what it would mean for this country, for democracy, for justice, for the climate, for immigrants and women and marginalized people, for the DOJ, for the world, for the future, and for all of us.

As major Democrats sound the alarm about Biden, and as we all think back to that evening on the CNN debate stage, I can’t deny that I’m worried about the sitting president too. I don’t know the best path. I’m not a pollster, and I’m not clairvoyant. We are four months out from the election, and a lot can happen in that time. As we all try to make sense of this moment and what is to come, and as we keep bringing you experts and analysis on this show, I wanted to hear from you all. You’re engaged and thoughtful and smart people, and I know you care deeply about these issues like I do, and about our country. So, call me, and leave a voicemail with your thoughts and feelings about the election, about Joe Biden, about Kamala Harris, about this process, about our prospects.

Be our focus group. What are you worried about? What are you hopeful about? Who do you want to lead this country? What’s helping you cope with election-related stress? Are you planning on getting involved at all? We want to hear from you. Just to note, if you leave a voicemail, it may end up on the show. Call and leave a message at 669-247-7338. That’s 669-247-7338. I look forward to hearing what you all have to say.

Well, that’s it for this episode of Stay Tuned. Thanks again to my guest, Ian Bremmer. If you like what we do, rate and review the show on Apple podcasts or wherever you listen. Every positive review helps new listeners find the show. Send me your questions about news, politics, and justice. Tweet them to me at Preet Bharara with the hashtag #AskPreet. You can also now reach me on Threads, or you can call and leave me a message at 669-247-7338. That’s 669-24-PREET, or you can send an email to letters@cafe.com. Stay Tuned is presented by CAFE and the Vox Media Podcast Network.

The executive producer is Tamara Sepper. The technical director is David Tatasciore. The Deputy editor is Celine Rohr. The editorial producers are Noa Azulai and Jake Kaplan. The associate producer is Claudia Hernández, and the CAFE team is Matthew Billy, Nat Weiner, and Liana Greenway. Our music is by Andrew Dost. I’m your host, Preet Bharara. As always, stay tuned.