Google Speech-to-Text API Automatic Transcription (Chirp). Treat it as a searchable index of what was broadcast, not a quotation record.
00:00:30in the host of cross country checkup, we're about to start the
00:00:33of show and we have lot to talk about, but first here are few stories to get you
00:00:37ready for that
00:00:38of conversation
00:00:38of
00:00:38today.
00:00:39of is there
00:00:42anything like a trump rally? is there anything like?
00:00:49in i don't. it used to be that US president Donald Trump could count on Texas for mammoth devoted crowds. but
00:00:53Wednesday night's
00:00:54of rally, interrupted by protester. these are
00:00:57of paid protesters, they're paid by enemies of... our nation
00:01:01after protester after
00:01:03of protester, he's
00:01:04of going back home to
00:01:05of mom right now, he's going to get
00:01:06of the hell b out, those rude gestures, indicative
00:01:10a of
00:01:10a how polls suggest many in the country are feeling, trump's
00:01:15in of approval at rock bottom
00:01:19of of and his policies and decisions fair no better, voters turned off by tariffs and the war in Iran, and
00:01:23one stubborn issue in particular, he absolutely failed to
00:01:26deliver on the thing that made lot of voters swing to him.
00:01:30prices are 33% higher than they were before
00:01:34of the uh pandemic. Democrats are
00:01:36in widely expected to win control
00:01:38of the house, but the senate could also be slipping from the
00:01:41GOP's grasp. A recent New York Times CNA poll
00:01:44showing
00:01:45of democratic contenders ahead in Texas,
00:01:48of Ohio
00:01:49of and of Alaska, of and
00:01:50of a surprisingly tight of races in deep red Iowa and
00:01:54Kansas. The policies main
00:01:56of senator Susan Collins
00:01:57of tried of to distance herself from Trump during a... I'm not
00:02:00exactly his favorite uh senator, and then
00:02:04there's Mike Rogers big flip flop in Michigan. This was the
00:02:08Trump aligned Senate candidate
00:02:10in august. The
00:02:11a Canadians of in have not been good partners on this, but as Trump's trade war with
00:02:15of of Canada has proved
00:02:16in disastrous with voters, drinking a la bat and watching the red wings.
00:02:20Rogers is now practically wrapping himself
00:02:22in a maple leaf flag. We know that Canada is not our enemy.
00:02:26We need to end this tariff war now,
00:02:29of but Republicans. do have one major advantage over
00:02:32democrats, vastly larger multi-million dollar war
00:02:36chest. the fact that the money is there uh, and we're leading and
00:02:40spending
00:02:41of in in several
00:02:41of the the swing states here, that's actually a great sign, and of course
00:02:45the president also has his
00:02:46of own $400 million campaign coffer, he's been
00:02:49in
00:02:49of prying open to help Republicans, but time is growing
00:02:52short. and Katy, I mean, despite Trump being a
00:02:56drag on some Republican candidates, democrats are hardly.
00:03:00success across the board, are they? no, not at all. mean, there's a governor's
00:03:04race that's tighten in Wisconsin and Michigan Senate race with razerthin margins
00:03:08in take Minnesota. there's a senate seat up for grabs, once
00:03:11of considered reliably safe for democrats, but it's a toss up between the democratic
00:03:15candidate and the republican, a former NFL sideline reporter Michelle
00:03:18Tafoya. that's in part
00:03:20of because the democrat led state uh, it's been turnished by by
00:03:24fraud and spending headlines. all right, thank you Katie. that's Katie
00:03:28Nicholson in Washington. in the border state of
00:03:32Maine, Donald Trump is not very
00:03:33of popular a and his tariffs aren't either. Maine is pretty important in US politics
00:03:37right now, that's because there's a tight race here for US senate, and its
00:03:41winner could
00:03:44of in determine which party controls congress after the
00:03:45of of mid-terms. Republican Susan Collins has held her
00:03:46of seat of in Maine for 30
00:03:51of of years. You can't spell season without USA. I asked her if she thinks Trump's
00:03:55trade war will
00:03:56of hurt her re-election chances. I'm
00:03:58of much more concerned about the... impact on the
00:04:03of of people of Maine in general, um, many of our products, whether it's
00:04:06of blueberries a or
00:04:07a potatoes or timber
00:04:09of or lobster are harvested here, but
00:04:12processed in
00:04:14of of Canada, of means
00:04:15of of of economy is really closely tied to Canada's, each year there's about 6
00:04:19billion US dollars in
00:04:21of two-way trade crossing the
00:04:22of border. At this annual country fair, voters aren't too thrilled about
00:04:25of Trump's of trade war. Can I ask you about Canada? I love Canada, it's
00:04:29embarrassing. Absolutely embarrassing, I'm embarrassed,
00:04:32the way we've treated you. our relationship is is
00:04:36of awful, of canadians of hate us, we have horrible, mean,
00:04:40selfish president, but head over to this parade
00:04:43in a different town, you'll find different takes. I think Canada's taken advantage
00:04:47of the United States lot, they had unfair tariffs on us for
00:04:51many, many years, especially on Lobster, mumber. Susan Collins
00:04:54has held to her seat for so long, partly because she's been willing to
00:04:58defy Trump, including... on the trade war, Canada's our
00:05:02friend, our neighbor, our biggest trading
00:05:05partner, and I've burge the administration to get back to the
00:05:09table. This is her democrat
00:05:11of opponent, of Troy of Jack. and he's not impressed by what Collins has done about
00:05:15tariffs, everything costs more for people, and you can
00:05:18tell uh, it's a big deal, because Susan Collins was writing concerned
00:05:22letters, Donald Trump about trying to get these things straightened
00:05:26out, people are uh really, really
00:05:28frustrated, and uh, and they're frustrated that
00:05:32a president just unilaterally puts these on, takes them off, to
00:05:36win control the senate, the democrats need to flip at least four republican
00:05:40seats in the midterms, that'll be almost impossible.
00:05:46Choose clicks, choose the algorithm, choose doom scrolling at
00:05:503:00 a.m. choose headlines that scream, choose fake friends,
00:05:54deep fakes and comment wars that never end, choose the
00:05:57chaos, choose the noise or
00:06:01don't, choose news that's checked, verified,
00:06:05accountable, choose being there where the stories are, choose
00:06:09proof over panic, sense over madness.
00:06:13Choose news, not noise. The complicated
00:06:17logistics the world's biggest election. You walk into the
00:06:20hospital and what hits you? The chaos. This is our world,
00:06:24this is the
00:06:25national.
00:06:31At this point before a midterm election, you're talking about your September, October
00:06:35polling. The worst I've ever seen is Donald
00:06:38John Trump. Hi, I'm Saroja
00:06:42Queelo. cross-country checkup is live. Some
00:06:45Canadians are sort of putting eggs in the basket of thinking, well, if the house
00:06:49and it flipped and Trump will have his wings clipped and there won't be lot he can
00:06:53do, and maybe the temperature will come down,
00:06:56maybe. What questions do you have about the
00:07:00US mid-term elections? What's it stake for Canada, and what's it
00:07:03stake for
00:07:04you?
00:07:08You can call us at 1888-416.
00:07:128333 again, that number is
00:07:151888-416-833.
00:07:20Will we face more hurdles, will there be
00:07:22investigations, supinas to his family, to his
00:07:26business associates, other things like that, will he face impeachment? How much
00:07:30would actually change if power does go to the
00:07:34Democrats in Congress? The countdown is
00:07:37to the US mid-term elections, with less than a month until the Americans go
00:07:41back to the pool. and if the polls are to be believed,
00:07:45republicans are in for major shakeup and democrats are gaining
00:07:49ground in traditionally safe red states. inflation is up, gas
00:07:53prices too, and experts warn that Trump's tariff policy
00:07:57could be making economic situations even more difficult. so
00:08:00how could the outcome these mid-term elections change the balance of
00:08:04power in the United States? what questions do you have
00:08:08about the US mid-term elections, what's at stake for Canada and what? at
00:08:12stake for you. You can call us with your questions or talk
00:08:16about how shaky Canada-US relations are impacting
00:08:20you. What do you want to know about what comes next?
00:08:23You can call us at
00:08:241888-416-83-3-3.
00:08:29You can also share your comments if you go to
00:08:31CBC.ca/aircheck. Then in
00:08:35hour two, one in three parents with
00:08:39kids under the age of 40 are still helping them out with their... bills, including
00:08:43their groceries. What, when should a parents step in and bail out their
00:08:47adult kids? What's your story of giving or getting
00:08:50financial help? I'm Seroja Queelo, live on CBC
00:08:54radio and CBC News Network. This is Cross Country Checkup,
00:08:58your voice, Canada's
00:08:59voice.
00:09:06In the lead up to the mid-term elections, the conversation has
00:09:10gone from whether the democ can win the house to whether they
00:09:14can win both the house and the Senate. Republican strongholds like
00:09:18Texas, Iowa and Kansas are suddenly on the
00:09:22line. So we've got two experts to explain what this could mean for
00:09:26Donald Trump and for Canada-US
00:09:27relations.
00:09:32Brian Marroony Institute of Government at St. Francis University.
00:09:36His focus is on Canada-US relations. He is
00:09:40joining us from Edmonton today. We also have have Chris Galdieri in this
00:09:44conversation, professor of political science at St. Allen
00:09:47college in New Hampshire. He's in Concord, New Hampshire
00:09:50today. Welcome to both of you.
00:09:54Hi, Chris, thanks for being here. Chris, maybe you could start
00:09:58for us and put things into perspective. Which numbers really stand out for
00:10:02you as serious trouble for the Republicans and for Donald
00:10:06Trump? Well, I think the most important
00:10:09number going into this election is Donald Trump. approval
00:10:13rating uh, he came into office uh at about
00:10:1750% approval, give or take, and it's that number has
00:10:20gone steadily downward, basically every single month since
00:10:24the... spring of 2025 uh, there have been surveys out just in
00:10:28the last week that have him as low as 30% for
00:10:32context, when he left office in 2021 following
00:10:36COVID, following January 6th, he was at
00:10:3829%. so uh, Trump is going into these
00:10:42elections as unpopular as any president has
00:10:46ever been, barring maybe Richard Nixon at the very end of
00:10:50Watergate, and uh, that is been
00:10:53absolutely toxic for, the Republican brand
00:10:56and so what we're seeing is that Republicans across the board, including in
00:11:00places you mentioned like Texas and Kansas that have not been
00:11:03competitive uh at the statewide level in decades in
00:11:06many cases um are seeing serious signs of Republican
00:11:10erosion and opportunities for democrats that they haven't seen uh in
00:11:14decades. So Chris is describing a situation that feels
00:11:18unprecedented, but the president has had bad polls before.
00:11:22Aza, why does this moment feel different? Uh, I mean,
00:11:26former Canadian Prime Minister John Defenbicker used to say pololls are for dogs, um, but
00:11:30there's some truth to the idea the again, the unpopulated American president, as Chris
00:11:34noted, these are historically low levels for an American president,
00:11:37and kind of a parallel we might sort of think of is the 26
00:11:41elections in which George W. Bush was at historic
00:11:44lows uh rivaling this, and that was a complete washout for the
00:11:48Republicans, so there's a blue wave in that election, um, and certainly,
00:11:52if if kind of recent history of that kind of election as any guy um, that that
00:11:56seems to be the the case here. now Donald Trump has sort of
00:11:59underperformed polling before, um, but I think this the
00:12:03potential in this election, if if even if say Republican voters or Donald Trump friendly
00:12:07voters are not going to somehow switch to the Democrats, there's the potential for lot them just to
00:12:11stay home, because their
00:12:14just um feeling that again the Republicans, but particularly Donald Trump
00:12:18is just
00:12:18an inadequate president who promised lot
00:12:20of things and has failed to deliver on on many of those things and indeed what he has
00:12:24delivered. are are things like higher prices uh and a war overseas that
00:12:28shows shows no sign of ending. thanks for that isa. Chris, maybe you could expand for
00:12:32us exactly what the issues are that are driving down support for the
00:12:35president and for his party. right, and I think uh, as we
00:12:39just heard, one the big ones is affordability. Trump uh ran in 2024
00:12:43a platform of bringing down prices, lowering the
00:12:46inflation uh that had caused so much hardship for so many people
00:12:50during uh the Biden administration and he has not been able
00:12:54to follow through. on that, the prices that went up uh
00:12:57during the uh biden years are in most cases still
00:13:01up where they were um and related to that
00:13:04he also
00:13:04ran a platform of ending foreign wars, remember he said he would end the war in
00:13:08Ukraine in 24 hours,
00:13:10he would negotiate a settlement uh in the middle east, not only
00:13:13has that not happened, but he launched a war against Iran
00:13:17expecting it would be cakewalk uh and it hasn't been, it not only
00:13:21has not been a cakewalk, it has significant
00:13:25raised the price of gas, it's raised the price of diesel uh
00:13:28and those things both uh affect the prices of other goods that are shipped by
00:13:32truck for instance or that uh farmers have to uh
00:13:35produce, and that has uh reminded
00:13:39people of uh Trump's role in those higher prices every time
00:13:43they go to fill up their gas tank, so what we see is just
00:13:47this huge gap between uh the presidency that Trump promised down
00:13:51the trail in 2024 and the reality that he's deliver. since he
00:13:55took office last year, and if I can just add another issue
00:13:59that really is think depressing republican votes is something like the Epsteen files,
00:14:03whatever your views on that, that's something that Donald Trump promised to go through, it
00:14:07was very much at the heart for many the sort of maga movement people,
00:14:11and there's been a perceived kind of failure to deliver on that, which is one these issues that's sort
00:14:15of depressing Republican votes and and depressing Donald Trump's popularity
00:14:18amongst people who would normally lean towards him. Aza, what
00:14:22about the tariff, the trade? with Canada, how's that
00:14:26played out on the campaign trail? yeah, mean it's it's the promise of
00:14:30tariffs was that they were going to
00:14:31sort of deliver this golden age and what they've delivered is higher prices, there's
00:14:35there's there has been some movement of new jobs and new investments in manufacturing in the United States,
00:14:39but those things take a while to get started, and so what
00:14:42what what what you voters, what what what consumers are seeing in the United States is
00:14:46higher prices, partly that's do things like gasoline, but there's also the perception that tariffs are raising
00:14:50prices, which they do, and that it's not foreigners paying for these tariffs,
00:14:54it's... It's the Americans paying through through higher prices and
00:14:57so to an extent Americans in 2024, the
00:15:012024 presidential election, if I could use a popular parphase, they they
00:15:05sort of screwed around and now they're sort of finding out the reality of
00:15:09what mega policies are uh in reality.
00:15:12Thanks for that. If you are just joining us, you are hearing the voice of
00:15:16Zacurcher. He is the Hudson chair in Canada-US relations
00:15:19at St. Francis Xavier University. Chris
00:15:23Galdieri is also in. conversation, professor of political science
00:15:27at St. Allen College. Uh, our question
00:15:30today, what questions do you have about the midterm, about the US
00:15:34mid-term elections, what's it stake for Canada and what? at stake for
00:15:38you. You can join us in this conversation at
00:15:411888-416-83-3.
00:15:46You can also go online.
00:15:47CBC.ca/aircheck.
00:15:51Chris, Donald Trump has started campaigning in support of
00:15:54Republican candidates. He was in Ohio this past week. Let's
00:15:58just have listen to that. We're going to win strong and the
00:16:02Republican majorities in the house and the Senate.
00:16:06And nobody count. on the fact that Trump was going to go out a campaign
00:16:10for all these people, because when I do,
00:16:13we win, when I run, we win, but
00:16:17for some
00:16:17reason,
00:16:21for some reason when I don't run, they draw 44% less
00:16:25people, so what I'm going to do is ask you to just pretend that
00:16:29I'm running, so that's president
00:16:32Donald Trump a mid-term rally this past week, uh, the
00:16:36US president is... unpopular, as both of you have been describing to
00:16:40us, is his appearance um on that campaign trail helping
00:16:43or hurting his candidates, Chris? um, I think it might be doing a little
00:16:47bit of both. uh, Trump, as you said, is is very unpopular
00:16:51um across the board, however, he does have that dedicated core
00:16:55of maga voters who will still turn out to see him and that sort of thing,
00:16:59so it's possible that his appearances on the trail are going to bring out
00:17:02folks who might not otherwise uh have voted this year,
00:17:06and to the... extent that Trump has an electoral superpower, it's that
00:17:10he was in all three of his campaigns able to
00:17:14bring out these sort of uh low propensity, low
00:17:17attention voters and get them to show up to the polls and that's why he
00:17:21overperformed the polls in 2016 uh in 2024 when he won
00:17:25and also in 2020 when he lost um so I think there is
00:17:29a bit of method uh to the uh
00:17:32madness here, but I don't know that's enough to
00:17:36overcome uh his... or popularity or bring out those folks
00:17:39who don't really pay attention to politics, don't really engage
00:17:43with turning out to vote, except when Trump himself is on the ballot. thanks
00:17:47for that. if you're hearing this conversation and you'd like to join us,
00:17:501888-416-8333
00:17:55is the number to call. you can also go to
00:17:57cbc.ca/aircheck. we have our
00:18:01first caller on the line. greg Moore is joining us from Kingston,
00:18:05Ontario. hi Greg, welcome to show, you don't
00:18:08think that there's anything at stake here for Canada, um, what is your
00:18:12question for our experts today? well, my question is is,
00:18:16what are the tangible things that we're going to see, should there
00:18:20be democratic, senate majority and
00:18:24a democratic uh congress, because I
00:18:27i'm concerned that Canadians are putting a little bit too much
00:18:31weight on the outcome of another country's
00:18:34election, yes, it's the biggest economy. Yes, it's their biggest trading
00:18:38partner, but if anything uh, it's demonstrated in the
00:18:42last two years of his antics uh that we need to move on
00:18:46and broiden our horizon and and move
00:18:50on, i i what i'm just wondering what
00:18:53what's going to really happen, should that happen? mean the leafs are going to win the cup
00:18:57one these days too, but uh what can
00:19:01really happen when there's an election, should it go democrat in
00:19:05both houses because ' think we're weighing a bit too much on that and we need
00:19:09to move on and move wider. thanks for that, Greg.
00:19:13aza, do
00:19:14you want to weigh in? yeah, mean, the the big bet is that the
00:19:17sort of
00:19:18be democratic held congress um that could hold Donald Trump to account, the sort of famous checks and
00:19:22balances
00:19:23that really haven't obviously been working with the republican dominated senate and
00:19:26congress. uh, certainly we can expect to see lot of
00:19:29investigations into the sort of patent corruption and sort of things that the trump
00:19:33administration has been engaged in, the self-dealing, all these sorts of things i
00:19:37number of cabinet secretaries will be up for impeachment votes, that doesn't neces have anything to do
00:19:41with Canada of course, um, but what we could see is Congress sort of
00:19:45begin to wrestle back some the powers that they're supposed to have over over tariffs,
00:19:49for instance, obviously a big issue of concern for us in Canada, lot the legislation that
00:19:53enables presidential power um on
00:19:56tariffs are have their roots in congress, things like the trade
00:20:00expansion act and other sorts of things, so there could be some amendments there, there are a lot of sort
00:20:03of
00:20:04in the very polarized kind of politics in United States,
00:20:08Canada is not a not a target for
00:20:11democrats necessarily, and so there could be some some
00:20:15efforts by democrats to sort of relieve the economic pressure if you like on Canada,
00:20:18but also the democrats are traditionally the party that's not been in favor
00:20:22of of free trade, the been the party that's skeptical of of of things like the Kusma
00:20:26agreement, number of democrats voting against the Kusma agreement when it came up
00:20:30for vote uh six years ago or seven years ago remember that would have
00:20:34been, and so you know there's there's a perhaps a bit of...
00:20:38bit of caution there, but as we've seen even some republicans have been breaking
00:20:42with Donald Trump over this issue of tariffs, Susan Collins, the senator from
00:20:46Maine up for reelection, and Mike, what the heck? pardon
00:20:50me uh the senate candidate in in in Michigan who
00:20:53just released a campaign the other day drinking a little about about blue and talking about
00:20:57how Canada should be our friend so the potential for some Republicans and some democrats to get together
00:21:01and push back um on on the tariffs is is a
00:21:05potential um but as the caller noted right that's a that's a big bet
00:21:09uh that the Canadian governor is is making that Canadians might be making. Chris did you want to
00:21:13add anything? yeah
00:21:15i do think there's some significance to these republicans who have broken with Trump on tariffs
00:21:19in in the last or so uh we do have number of high
00:21:22profile races in uh border states, Alaska, Minnesota,
00:21:26Michigan, Maine, uh, my own state of New Hampshire, um, so I
00:21:29think that's noteworthy and I think it's possible that uh, if this election
00:21:33does go very well for Democrats, um, and if we do see uh
00:21:37Republicans losing in places that would have been unthinkable even a year
00:21:41ago, that we might finally see uh more Republicans willing to
00:21:45break with Trump, and that could be something that could spill over into an effect uh
00:21:48tariff policy among. Thanks for that and Greg, thank you for that
00:21:52call. If you want to join in in this conversation,
00:21:551888-4168333.
00:22:00James Mulhern is joining us now from Lindsay Ontario. James, you
00:22:04have a question about the role the Democrats? Uh,
00:22:08yeah, I mean, I guess it's almost partially been answered already, but I
00:22:11hope that that it does go back
00:22:15to you, the democrats and they do hold the house and senate
00:22:19because... 'then I hope there would be some check and
00:22:23balances that would help us with you, the
00:22:26they like to say free trade, but I wish they would call it fair
00:22:30trade, and to have a
00:22:32more friendlier uh pasture
00:22:36with Canada and and United States were counseling
00:22:40with uh everything every time Trump wakes up in the
00:22:43morning, I swear he must, well I don't even if he sleeps at
00:22:47night, but I mean he wakes up and says oh Canadas have been
00:22:51really bad to us and he gets and he gets
00:22:54the he puts out the wrong information like saying there's
00:22:58a oh we've been having high tips and we've been
00:23:01charging them for dairy which which there isn't and then there people that
00:23:05believe it and it's the same thing with polls like hope the
00:23:09poles are are right where his popularity is down
00:23:13but we've seen it before pole could be down and then next
00:23:17minute uh when election comes '
00:23:21that certain people he might get back in or he might
00:23:24be might get more uh more in and
00:23:28also the fact that and i god
00:23:32hope not but and i know that the democrats and there's groups up
00:23:35there trying to think ahead to see what what happened at the midturn
00:23:39but i just hope um the people that follow
00:23:43him don't do do anything at the mid terms i
00:23:47uh when you like he's already said it's wants to put
00:23:51uh, the ice or something around polling station, which is
00:23:55against law, but he doesn't follow the constitution or
00:23:58law, he he does whatever he thinks he that he thinks he has a
00:24:02right to, that's it, thanks very much for that,
00:24:06james, aza, do you want to weigh in on that? yeah,
00:24:09I mean, Pierre Tradeau, the former Canadian Prime Minister, you famously described living next
00:24:13to the United States says
00:24:14sort of sleeping with an elephant, every sort of twitch and grunt uh we feel, and so
00:24:18we feel sometimes the effects of America.
00:24:20and what balances what would be American domestic legislation or domestic
00:24:23upevals uh sometimes that ripples into Canadian politics and so that could
00:24:27be, we could potentially you feel the effects if if the
00:24:30situation in the United States goes goes a really bad way
00:24:33um more more positively,
00:24:36I again this to
00:24:37for sort guess there's possibility of checks be upheld in the United we could States. sort
00:24:40think some I the
00:24:40see of cast of characters who as as as the caller
00:24:44noted have been kind of nasty to to Canadians, Pete Heggsff the defense
00:24:48secretary or Howard like the commerce. secretary, we could see some these people called to
00:24:51account, we could see potentially
00:24:54um, impeachment, particular, there's there's already articles of impeachment
00:24:58put forward from Mr. Hegzath, it's the top the congressional agenda, which is one
00:25:02the reasons why the congress is not sitting uh, and that's actually legislation put forward by
00:25:06uh by by republican uh Thomas Massy to impeach the defense secretary
00:25:10for his um his conduct the Iraq war or the Iran war part of me
00:25:14um so there's a potential for some these people who've been really anti-canadian if you like um to to
00:25:18be held to account by uh by congress if it switches.
00:25:22If you are just joining us in this conversation, the number to call if you want
00:25:26to ask a question or make a comment about the upcoming US
00:25:30mid-term elections,
00:25:311888-416-8333.
00:25:36You can also join us by going to uh
00:25:38CBC.ca/aircheck. John Ledston has reached
00:25:42us that way from Huntsville on Terio. He reached us by text and
00:25:45says, would it be responsible to have a travel advisory for
00:25:49Canadian? to avoid the United States while the mid-term
00:25:53elections are on, there is potential for lot of bad news happening
00:25:57during the elections, whether it be ice or the
00:26:00military. Chris,
00:26:01do you want to weigh in on that? Sure, um, I can't speak to
00:26:05necessarily a travel advisory, what I can say is that Canadians,
00:26:09um, even without an advisory appear to be staying away from the US in
00:26:12significant numbers. Uh, here in New Hampshire, uh, tourism from
00:26:16Canada is major source of uh
00:26:19revenue, and that has been down each the last two
00:26:23summers. Uh, clearly Canadians are voting with their feet and voting with their
00:26:26wallets to stay out the US uh, while the Trump administration is
00:26:30in power. With regards... to the election and the possibility of
00:26:34ice and the military. um, you, I,
00:26:37I'm,
00:26:38I don't want to say I am uh skeptical the idea that Trump's going to use force,
00:26:42but I think trying to use force around the elections is much
00:26:46more complicated endeavor than lot of people really give it
00:26:50credit. um, this is huge country with
00:26:54you, tens, if not hundreds of millions of people who will be casting
00:26:58votes uh next month. uh, it's really difficult even
00:27:02with some as vast as the US military to imagine a
00:27:05scenario where Trump is able to use force to
00:27:08meaningfully affect uh ballot counting or the number
00:27:12of ballots being cast and that sort of thing. um, I think
00:27:16you know, that's sort of uh, the sort
00:27:20of thing that if Trump were to try, I think he would find
00:27:22that it was lot harder than he imagined it to be. That
00:27:25said, um, just the fact that we're having this conversation and trying to game
00:27:29out these scenarios uh really says
00:27:31a lot about
00:27:32the state of... American democracy heading into these elections.
00:27:35Thanks for that, Chris. We have our next caller on the line,
00:27:39Ishvan Sabo is joining us from Stratford, Ontario, uh,
00:27:43and has a concern about, this
00:27:47week, uh, something that's going to happen online. Uh, U.S.
00:27:50Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has said that he plans to live
00:27:54stream the execution of Forthood Shooter, a Forthood
00:27:58Shooter who killed 13 unarmed US soldiers
00:28:02a military base uh, hi there Isfan, welcome to the
00:28:05show, what is your question about that? hi, thanks for
00:28:09taking the call. my question to your experts is whether they think
00:28:13that there is a chance if the democrats win the senate and the house that
00:28:17they somehow we will be able to stop this in my eyes
00:28:21barbaric idea of public
00:28:23execution. is i'm going to let you
00:28:27weigh in on that one and maybe you could also provide just a little bit of context for folks who
00:28:31might not know lot about this. peace: yeah, this is a person
00:28:35who shot, he was a US service member who shot, i think
00:28:392009 uh, number of fellow serviceman in act of sort
00:28:43of terror at fort hood texas military
00:28:46base, he found guilty, he's been in prison since then um
00:28:50and
00:28:52the defense secretaries announced that he's going to be publicly executed by firing squad i think uh the
00:28:56first
00:28:56week of december i think is when it's it's planned for uh and then announced that this would
00:29:00be televised so you know as as caller noted, this is kind of barbaric kind of
00:29:04stuff, um, the very things, I think this civilized world sort of
00:29:08condemned ISIS for doing, these kind of snuff videos, um,
00:29:11and so in terms the caller's question though, this would
00:29:15would occur if it does indeed occur in December, before the
00:29:19new the new Congress would take power, and so I don't forcey any way
00:29:23that that the incoming congress again which wouldn't take power until January
00:29:27would would potentially be able to stop it. Istvan, thank you so much for
00:29:31that question, Mark Ross. is joining us next from Windsor
00:29:34Ontario. Hi there, Mark, what is your question for two experts
00:29:37today? Yes, I uh, I'm
00:29:41wondering if uh the
00:29:42democrats are get get
00:29:46elected
00:29:48or they have majority, would they uh impeach
00:29:52Trump? That's a really interesting
00:29:56question, especially considering um how hot some the debate has been during
00:29:59this campaign. Um, aza, do you want to weigh in on that? one: yeah, there's
00:30:03a potential for for Donald Trump to be impeached, again there will be a third
00:30:07time, record breaking achievement, I
00:30:10guess, um, but as we saw the previous two two impeachments, there
00:30:14was the sort of rally around the Trump effect among Republicans, both
00:30:17voters, Republican supporters and Republican members of Congress,
00:30:21even though the president in both those cases, was patently guilty of the things
00:30:25in my opinion anyway, I guess I should say, um, and certainly he's committed
00:30:29high crimes and misdemeaners left and right uh, in in his second
00:30:33term um so again impeachment would be well founded again, but there's this
00:30:36potential for members of congress to and and republican voters to rally around
00:30:40and and see a boost in support uh for Donald Trump which again he he
00:30:44experienced in the last two rounds of of impeachment um so I think the the
00:30:47probably better or or more productive thing from those people who want to hold
00:30:51the administration to account would be the impeachment of uh of various cabinet
00:30:55secretaries for their part um in in
00:30:59in sort of
00:30:59you illegal policies um in in acts of corruption,
00:31:03self-dealing, um, etc. and I think again we can expect
00:31:07to see lots of investigations of Trump family members who've been
00:31:11involved in in in self-dealing of all various kinds.
00:31:15uh again, why the why the president's son-in-law, Jared Kuschner is is
00:31:19basically conducting US foreign policy in violation of American law is
00:31:23is
00:31:23is is incredible uh sort of act of of lawlessness, just as one
00:31:26example. Chris, would you like to add any thoughts?
00:31:30yeah, I do think a lot depends if democrats uh take the senate as
00:31:34well as the house uh, if they take the senate uh then they would be the ones
00:31:38uh controlling the uh presentation of uh senate
00:31:42impeachment trials, and so I think in addition to the
00:31:45impeachment votes in the house against cabinet secretaries and I think we also need
00:31:49to uh uh expect uh something like that
00:31:52against Robert Kennedy Jr. who has been the health secretary uh for the
00:31:56last two years and tried to dismantle the vaccine infrastructure in
00:32:00the country, we've seen Measles outbreaks particularly in uh Pennsylvania
00:32:04lately. um I think that would be an opportunity for Democrats to
00:32:07essentially put the focus the country on the
00:32:11actions these cabinet secretaries, whether uh it's corruption. and
00:32:15self-dealing, whether it is uh the human cost
00:32:19of uh for instance vaccine policy being changed under
00:32:22Kennedy. Um, essentially, if you are republican
00:32:26appointey in this administration, um, or if you are member the
00:32:30Trump family, if democrats win both Houses of Congress,
00:32:32congratulations, uh, you're now Hunter Biden, and I
00:32:36think that is uh, going to be a real
00:32:40drag on the last two years of Trump's presidency, whether or
00:32:44not, Trump himself uh winds up being impeached
00:32:47again. Um Asa, I'm going to direct this next question
00:32:51to you. Um, we've seen border state candidates and
00:32:54auto industry leaders who are pushing back against tariffs amid all
00:32:58of this conversation. Um, our Canadian retaliatory tariffs
00:33:02actually working to turn US voters against the trade
00:33:06war? Uh, I don't think they're they're hurting, you hurting
00:33:10sort the the case against against sort the wider terror policy pursuing by
00:33:14Donald Trump, they make. case again that tariffs and and trade
00:33:18wars generally cost consumers, they cost average people, and they certainly
00:33:21cost both small, medium and and large businesses, and
00:33:25so to the extent that the tariffs are having an effect, it's
00:33:29it's I think generally a positive one in reminding Americans that this trade war is very
00:33:32silly, that that turning Canada from a friend to an enemy, Canadians
00:33:36from from from friends to enemies is is is backwards kind of
00:33:39policy, if Donald Trump is truly concerned for instance about the
00:33:43threat of of China sort the geop. and economic competition with
00:33:46China, why not partner with Canada as opposed to
00:33:50to to to spurning us away, I think it sort of fits this general pattern that Donald Trump's
00:33:53policies
00:33:55are are backwards thinking and certainly are costing Americans, so I don't perceive that they're
00:33:59actually hurting like the Canadian case, if if you'd like to frame it in those
00:34:03terms. Thanks for that. If you're listening to this conversation and you
00:34:07have your own question to ask or you have some thoughts on the conversation so
00:34:10far, you can give us call at
00:34:121888-416.
00:34:156833. you can also reach us online, that's
00:34:19cbc.ca/aircheck. text
00:34:22message is also possible
00:34:24226758-8924.
00:34:29let me give that to you again, for text message
00:34:31226-758-8924.
00:34:36our question is, what do you want to know about the
00:34:40US mid-term elections? what's it stake for Canada and what's it stake
00:34:44for? you. Sean Barry is joining us now from
00:34:48Peterborough Ontario. You have a question about celebrity
00:34:51endorsements. What would you like to know,
00:34:53Sean?
00:34:57I'd like to ask your guests here
00:34:59about the effectiveness of celebrity
00:35:03endorsements and let me just preface this or preficent.
00:35:07Um, I listened to Steve Harvey and of lot,
00:35:09and on his uh final thoughts, he
00:35:13normally um... let's or he
00:35:17encourages his users who are predominantly black to like let's
00:35:21get out the vote kind of similar to you know what they did the rock the vote kind of
00:35:24thing and um sugessing that there's a lot of
00:35:28contingent the population that's apathetic that
00:35:32is maybe complacent maybe they think that their vote doesn't count my
00:35:35question however is you know in in the more broad scope as far
00:35:39as like not just
00:35:40you know the black population but other uh the
00:35:44more generally apathetic or dis uh
00:35:47disengaged uh voters um
00:35:51is celebrity endorsement effective in you know mobilizing
00:35:54this uh group of people to perhaps you
00:35:58know like yeah you know you're right um i should be voting
00:36:02because didn't sign up for my you know prices to go up
00:36:06things like that i just want to know if if that's if there's like maybe
00:36:09something in the literature or if there's a if there's examples that
00:36:13maybe i'm missing that "now maybe could be mobilizing
00:36:17people to change the tide. Sean, that is
00:36:21such an interesting question, because Starpower has clearly played into so much of
00:36:25American politics over the last eight years." at least the last
00:36:28four. um, Chris, I'd like to go to you first, and then to
00:36:31to Aza, how effective do you think celebrity endorsement will be
00:36:35or could be uh, as the mid-term elections approach? I
00:36:39think it's possible that they might make a little bit of difference on the fringes,
00:36:43uh, you, I think, someone like Steve Harvey talking to his radio audience is a really good
00:36:47example, people might not pay that much attention to politicians, but maybe
00:36:51they listen to uh, TV actors or musicians
00:36:55or whomever, but I... really struggle to think of an
00:36:59election where they have tipped the outcome, you remember
00:37:03in uh 2016, I think most the cast the
00:37:06Avengers did a bunch of ads for Hillary Clinton and that didn't really
00:37:10uh do her a whole lot of good in the final analysis, it seemed like one
00:37:14celebrity after another came out for Camela Harris in uh
00:37:182024, um so I I think there are plenty of
00:37:21examples of candidates who mustered incredible star
00:37:25power and found that it just... did not make
00:37:28um, a big difference in the outcome the election. Aza, do
00:37:32you want to add anything on celebrity endorsements and and what role they might
00:37:36play in the upcoming elections in the United States? Sure, certainly in the
00:37:402024 election, there was a lot of post-election sort
00:37:43of focus on the so-called manosphere, the idea that there sort these these
00:37:47um political
00:37:50podcasters in particular, people like Joe Rogan or or Tim Dillin
00:37:54or or kill Tony, um who have... sort of
00:37:58mobilized young, particularly young males and that many these were
00:38:02traditionally sort of non-voters, apathetic uh sort
00:38:05of of people who hadn't really voted in the past um
00:38:08and certainly turned out to the polls uh in the 2024
00:38:12election to cast their votes for Donald Trump, that was sort
00:38:14the kind of media narrative if you like, there was truth behind it in terms of
00:38:18numbers and other sorts of things and many of those same
00:38:22podcasters and comedians have sort of again turned broadly
00:38:25against the Donald Trump administration. question a lot of its policies and
00:38:29question things like the war um in the middle east, gas
00:38:33prices, again these these are people fascinated by the epsteen
00:38:37files um and again so their sort of listeners
00:38:40perhaps might be motivated not necessarily to switch to the democrats but again just
00:38:44to to stay home and i think there could be depressed vote this could be again another sign of prep the
00:38:48depressed vote um among among people who had voted for Donald
00:38:52Trump in the 2024 election
00:38:55uh who will just not show up um to the pole a few weeks, it's
00:38:58it's certainly turning into this litmus test for how the country is feeling
00:39:02um about the president, even though the president isn't actually on the ballot. um,
00:39:06we have someone joining us from south the border next, susan Ryan
00:39:10white, susan Ryan is in Whitehaven, Pennsylvania.
00:39:14uh, hi Susan, thanks for joining us. you're a swing
00:39:17state, uh, how are you feeling about the upcoming
00:39:20elections? well, it's it's gonna be
00:39:24hard in Pennsylvania, I think, because there's a... lot of
00:39:27people, I live around Scranton, Pennsylvania, it's still coal
00:39:31country, and
00:39:32you now we've been, I, I drive by a coal strip mine every day, and
00:39:36it's really busy, and people around where I am love
00:39:40Trump, and uh, they're there's a lot of
00:39:44people that want to vote for Trump where I am, and it's really, very
00:39:48scary, so everybody has to make sure that they do get out and not
00:39:52get too relaxed, um, the one thing that concerns me
00:39:56is lot of people, democrats and and Canadians think that
00:40:00once Trump is done in the next two years, that maybe
00:40:04it'll go back to normal, but the scary thing is he's messed
00:40:08up the Supreme Court, and I know they're also talking about one the older
00:40:11guys on the one the Republican Supreme Justices
00:40:15retiring and having Trump replace him too as well with
00:40:19somebody else younger, and it's really scary
00:40:23that the Supreme Court is full of 40 and 50 year old...
00:40:28republican justices who are making rules and
00:40:32laws, not just for the next two years, but for the
00:40:36next 20 or 30 years, so this could go a long
00:40:39time. thanks for that, Susan, um,
00:40:43Chris, I was wondering if you could weigh in on the idea that
00:40:46despite whatever the outcome the upcoming US mid-term
00:40:49elections, the shift in the Supreme Court could have
00:40:53could define the future the way that Susan seeing it, yeah, and this is...
00:40:57become huge issue um uh both uh for uh the
00:41:01country at large with lot the rulings we've seen come out the court uh stuff like
00:41:05the Dob's decision uh striking down Rowy Wade, decisions on
00:41:09presidential immunity from criminal prosecution uh and
00:41:13more um you the Supreme Court is
00:41:16unusual in that they serve what are effectively life terms on the
00:41:20court and I think we've seen a lot of democrats in the last decade
00:41:24or so uh bring themselves around to the idea that if when
00:41:28they control the presidency in Congress uh that they
00:41:31might uh find themselves wanting to impose major reforms on the Supreme
00:41:35Court. Things like expanding the size the court to add
00:41:39more justices. to it uh splitting up some the courts
00:41:42jurisdiction uh stripping them of power over which
00:41:45cases they hear and other things um and I think
00:41:49that really shows uh the extent to which uh the Supreme Court
00:41:53has sort of been functioning in recent years, not just like a courp, it
00:41:56is almost
00:41:57like this this unelected super legislature that gets a final vote
00:42:01over um policies coming out of Congress and coming out
00:42:05of uh the White House. aza, would you like to add anything? yeah, if I can
00:42:09just sort of piggy back on what this sort of in terms of
00:42:12the the the the caller's question you means sort of for
00:42:15Canada um
00:42:16you know the idea that the sort of politics the United States the
00:42:20Canadas relationship are not going back to normal that's the sort of central line that
00:42:24um prime minister mark carne has made that's the the very idea of this kind of rupture point right a rupture is
00:42:28kind of irreversible break um and so that's I
00:42:32think what certainly the federal government seems to be counting on that seems to be
00:42:35the the view of some some Canadians at least um but there's obviously some people who think that the
00:42:39relationship can go back.
00:42:40to normal that American politics again is there you call sort of note there's a perception that once
00:42:44Donald Trump has gone uh once the sort of you Republicans
00:42:48sort of punished by voters and potentially in this this
00:42:51mid-term election that things might go back to normal and and some Canadians certainly have that view
00:42:55too and so this is I think a central through line that we'll see in in some
00:42:59upcoming debates in Canada about should be purchased the
00:43:02F-35 um and tire ourselves more to the United States or not these are
00:43:06some sort of
00:43:07is is the United States going back to normal or not these are some central. I think those Canadians
00:43:11will have to figure out and and draw our evidence as we will
00:43:15from from events like the election a few weeks time. Thanks for that is uh that's the
00:43:19voice of Aza Mckercher. He is associate professor at the
00:43:22Brian Malboroney Institute of Government at St. Francis University,
00:43:26and also in this conversation we have Chris Gadieri who is a professor of
00:43:30political science at St. Anselm College in New
00:43:33Hampshire. So we are asking for your questions about the
00:43:37US mid-term elections.
00:43:39You may simply have. thoughts that you want to share about what is it stake for you,
00:43:43what's it stake for Canada or what you're curious about uh what
00:43:47might unfold in the
00:43:49in in as this election approaches? that is something that our
00:43:52our next um participant in the show is
00:43:56interested in. our brewer has written in from Toronto
00:43:59and says, I'm concerned that the president may declare
00:44:03a national emergency and cancel the mid-term
00:44:06elections, how likely is this to happen? according to your
00:44:10experts, Chris. I think it's unlikely uh, there is
00:44:14no um button in the oval office that Trump could
00:44:18push that would automatically cancel the mid-term elections, he could try to declare
00:44:22emergency, he could urge states to cancel their
00:44:25elections, but uh, one the things about the US federal system
00:44:29is that elections are administered and controlled by
00:44:33the states and uh through local governments and Trump doesn't
00:44:37have direct control over that, so I I think... It's
00:44:40tempting uh for him to want to do that sort of thing.
00:44:44I'm sure he believes that he is president has those
00:44:47powers uh,
00:44:48but the fact is uh if he
00:44:50were to try to do it he would find that he was making a declaration, but he
00:44:53would probably not find um
00:44:57you know much um uh in the many folks in
00:45:01the states who were willing to follow his lead on that, so I
00:45:05think it's it's profoundly unlikely uh the only reason we're talking
00:45:09about that is because Trump has such distorted uh and
00:45:12magnified view of his own power. Aza, what do you think
00:45:16about the safety and security situation that could unfold around these
00:45:20elections? Chris put well there, I
00:45:23think, some some notes of caution or sort the
00:45:27catastrophizing
00:45:28that that could occur, um, I think just the important thing to is the very fact that we're kind
00:45:32of having this discussion shows the kind of state of American
00:45:35democracy that that you know we're we're witnessing as Canadians
00:45:39across our. across our border, um, America is very far away from the sort
00:45:43the shining city a hill that Ronald Reagan used to invoke,
00:45:46um, and I think that says a lot about the problems
00:45:49internally um in in that country. Thanks very much for that.
00:45:53We've received another text message, Kenneth P. Mitton from Sterling
00:45:57Heights, Michigan reached us via Air Check, and Kenneth says, as
00:46:01a dual citizen and university professor, I know that even young adults in
00:46:05college here are often not understanding that journalism is
00:46:09evidenced-based. news, they mostly do not follow real news
00:46:13sites on their phones, many them tend not to get off the couch to
00:46:17go to vote, so do not be surprised if the blue wave in
00:46:20November does not match what you might expect from the opinion
00:46:24polls, so aza that connects with something that you were saying earlier about
00:46:28not not counting the chickens before they're hatched.
00:46:31yeah, mean again polls um give you
00:46:35a slice of you opinion and slice of time, usually few days or
00:46:39few weeks back. from when when when they're actually released um and
00:46:43so they don't necessarily count for um apathetic voters or voters
00:46:47who might mislead polsters, sometimes people don't want to admit that they might want to vote for Donald Trump
00:46:50or one the sort of download candidates, fellow like Ken
00:46:54Paxton for instance, the senate candidate in Texas, Serial
00:46:57Fallanderer, uh, someone cheated on his
00:47:00wife, um, you know, if I was a,
00:47:03methodist, voter in in Texas, I might not want to admit that I'm going
00:47:07to vote for someone whose own personal politics maybe might be at
00:47:11odds with my religious values and I might mislead posters on that, so there's the potential
00:47:15again for polls to be wrong and for these kind of election surprises um to
00:47:19occur. Chris, maybe I could get you to zero a little more closely.
00:47:23on Kenneth's concern about young voters, maybe not feeling entirely
00:47:26inspired or maybe not being particularly well informed in his
00:47:30opinion. um, he's he's really speaking to the experience as a professor who's looking
00:47:34at his students. what's your sense about where young people lie on the
00:47:37upcoming US mid-term elections? well, i think, first of
00:47:41all, young voters are among the hardest people to turn out simply
00:47:45because they have not gotten in the habit of voting, right? when you're in your 40s and
00:47:4950s, voting is just something you do uh,
00:47:52as a good citizen and member of your community and and all that sort of
00:47:56thing. young voters haven't necessarily gotten into that habit, they might be away from
00:48:00home at college. uh, it can be difficult to vote absent or to vote with a
00:48:04student ID in different states and that sort of thing. that said,
00:48:08um, I think,
00:48:09you know, if you if you again, if you look at the uh polling data
00:48:13we've seen over the course of this campaign, young voters um
00:48:17have really soured on Trump, uh, he did very well
00:48:20with young men who turned out to vote in the 2024 election,
00:48:24that really doesn't seem to be the case anymore, if you look at uh
00:48:28opinion among uh gen z voters
00:48:31um folks in that 18 to 25 or 29 range or so
00:48:35um they really do seem to have decisively turned against Trump so if they turn
00:48:39out I think that will be another headwind for Republicans in this
00:48:43election, if they stay home uh then that's probably good news for
00:48:47Republicans um heading into uh November 3rd,
00:48:51thanks very much for that, caller is on the line, suckfinder
00:48:55sadou is joining us from Brampton, Ontario, hi there,
00:48:58Suckfinder, hi, how are you? good, thank you, thanks so much for
00:49:02calling in, you are crossborder truck driver, wow, what a what
00:49:06a year you've had, uh, how do
00:49:08you feel about, how do you feel as you're looking at American politics right
00:49:12now? there's a big disconnect, um, the
00:49:16American population doesn't know what's really going on,
00:49:20look at what's happened with ice, people have been shot. "I think the
00:49:24American voter needs to wake up, forget about red, blue or
00:49:27green, yellow color, like you got to wake up and see this
00:49:31guy was worth two billion dollars, once he
00:49:34got elected he's worth $4 billion dollars, like I'm being very
00:49:38honest with you, you, I go to work every
00:49:41morning to provide for my family and I'm
00:49:45struggling, diesel prices, gas
00:49:48prices, I'm a trucker, so naturally I seen..."
00:49:52because we have an app where our prices come up every day, it
00:49:56was $1.90 a gallon was my price early,
00:50:00i'm sorry today it was
00:50:02$202.12 all of
00:50:05sudden, like people need to understand this guy
00:50:09is scamming the American public, i'm sorry to
00:50:13say we love Americans,
00:50:15you know my son just got his green card in the US and my
00:50:18daughter-in-law, but this guy is the biggest
00:50:22sc in the world, people need to wake up to
00:50:25this, you know, there's so much I can say, but
00:50:29as people who are hard working, I'm from an immigrant family,
00:50:33people hate immigrants right now in the US and in Canada,
00:50:36there's so much anti hate against immigrants, why,
00:50:40but we're just people who want to work and look, look after our
00:50:43families, why are we hated so much,
00:50:47like you know what I mean, so this guy is the biggest
00:50:51fraud in the world.
00:50:53and Americans need to wake up with this time is, so Vinder, thanks for
00:50:57for calling, you have such a unique insight because of your job as
00:51:00a as crossborder trucker and also being an immigrant
00:51:04who's uh clearly scratching your head over some the um some
00:51:08the hateful sentiment that you're encountering. I want to do a quick fact check
00:51:12a little bit of what you've said, Chris, um, is it also your sense what
00:51:15Sukvender says that Americans don't know what's going on, and
00:51:19he's expressing lot of very strong opinion, which he you are his own
00:51:23opinions, but um, when it comes to the way that
00:51:26Ice has interacted in communities across the United States, when it comes to things
00:51:30like personal financial gain of politicians who are associated with Maga
00:51:34or with Donald Trump, or Donald Trump himself, is your
00:51:37is it your sense, first of all that those things are things that we can verify, and second of
00:51:41all, um, whether or not Americans actually know that these things are
00:51:45happening? I do think Americans know that these things are happening, and
00:51:48I think that's the reason we've seen this steady erosion of...
00:51:52support for Trump uh basically since the moment he uh
00:51:56returned to office last January. Um, it's not that there's
00:52:00been a decisive turning point. It's not
00:52:03like um, 9/11 happened and George W. Bush's
00:52:07numbers went up, or the US withdrew from Afghanistan and Joe
00:52:10Biden's numbers went down. Uh, instead, it's just been this ongoing
00:52:14drip, drip, drip reminders of uh, Trump and his
00:52:18families uh profiting from the presidency, or
00:52:21uh, the, um, incredibly aggressive
00:52:25and violent actions of ice in places like
00:52:29Minneapolis earlier this year. Um, I, I don't think,
00:52:33if if you're looking for a, moment where things changed, I
00:52:37don't think you're going to see one them, but I think we've just seen a slow
00:52:40grinding away Trump's standing with the public, and I think that's why we're
00:52:44seeing Democrats making headway in places uh that were
00:52:48pipe dreams to them for years. Uh, Kansas, has not
00:52:52had a competitive senate election a century. Uh, Texas has been
00:52:56out of reach for democrats since the early
00:53:001990s. Um, it's possible
00:53:04that if these... elections actually break in the democrat's favor uh
00:53:08that that's the result the uh sort of uh
00:53:11realization of uh Trump's true nature and
00:53:14the the way he's using the presidency uh that the caller is hoping
00:53:18for. Aza, would you like to weigh in on some of Suicfinder's
00:53:21thoughts? Yeah, I think he he obviously reflects I
00:53:25think
00:53:25the the position of many Americans who go to the gas pumps, who go to the grocery store
00:53:29and see nothing but but higher prices and then they you turn on social media
00:53:33or they turn on the news or whatever. they might be doing
00:53:35and what is the president talking about? he's talking about ballroom, he's talking about an arch, he's
00:53:39talking about new hellipad uh, and the beautiful granite
00:53:43on the in the white house lawn and issues of course that are not of importance to voters
00:53:47in the least uh that voters don't care about and that are
00:53:51reminder the fact that he's living off the larges
00:53:54the the American taxpayer, the time in which the American taxpayer is paying more for the basic
00:53:58necessities of life, and again this this this's point, this is sort of
00:54:02part of this drip drip drip daily reminders from the president. um about
00:54:06what his true interests are, which is he's interested in himself, enriching
00:54:09himself, enriching his family, um, bettering the white house and not
00:54:13bettering the lives the
00:54:14of American people. thanks very much for that. if you are
00:54:18joining us, the voices that you are hearing our mckercher,
00:54:22who is a associate professor at the Brian
00:54:25M Rooney Institute of Government at St. Francis University, and his focus is
00:54:29on Canada-US relations. Chris Galdieri is in this conversation as
00:54:33well, professor of political... science at St. Alonso college
00:54:37in New Hampshire. We are taking your questions about the US
00:54:41mid-term elections. What is it mean for Canada? What does it mean for
00:54:44you? You can join us at
00:54:461888-416-8-3-3-3.
00:54:52Arnold Hegberg is joining us next from New Hazelton, British
00:54:55Columbia. Hi there, you have a question about Trump
00:54:59and Russian leader uh, Putin, what is your question? Well,
00:55:03my question, my concern is... is is if the American peoples
00:55:07are watching us, you look at the chaos that he's created in the middle east,
00:55:11now we all agree that we do not want Iran to have
00:55:15nuclear weapons, they could not be trusted with it, but when
00:55:18he says that he would
00:55:20like to have Vladimir Putin
00:55:24release his diesel oil reserves to the
00:55:27Americans, but the critical call for that is
00:55:30for the Ukrainians to stop attacking his petrochemical
00:55:34industries. but the splip side of that is
00:55:38the Ukraines would like him to stop killing their citizens in the
00:55:41cities and that's not agreed agreed
00:55:44upon and then Trump saying today that they need
00:55:48to change the presidency the Ukraine uh I'd
00:55:52like to understand if this is the American people, the American
00:55:56military personnel that are involved in that middle east
00:55:59problem that uh is this part the
00:56:03consideration or able point during the
00:56:06election. Thanks very much for that. Arnold. Um, Chris,
00:56:10before you answer Arnold's question, perhaps you could just set a little context for
00:56:14us about what, what Trump has actually said uh
00:56:17in relation to um gas and oil and the Russian
00:56:21leader and his and his sense of of where that relationship could go and what would be
00:56:25allowed. Sure. Well, and Trump has been all over the place when it comes
00:56:29to gas prices this year. At times he said, well, it's just a small increase,
00:56:32it's a small price to pay for. Iran not having uh
00:56:36nuclear weapons and that is sort
00:56:39of uh landed with a wet thud with
00:56:42most voters uh more recently he said he would uh make
00:56:46arrangement with uh Russia to uh for the US to import
00:56:50Russian diesel fuel to try to uh ease the cost
00:56:54of diesel for uh truckers and farmers and other folks who use
00:56:57that um I am
00:57:01not sure that's going to have the intended effect ' I
00:57:05am not sure they can get enough diesel here in the numbers uh that it would
00:57:09take to really bring down prices before uh the election, which is
00:57:13just three weeks from this Tuesday, um, but I think this is also part
00:57:16the, ongoing Trump Putin romance for
00:57:20one of better term for it. Trump clearly admires Putin in the same
00:57:24way that he admire admires other authoritarian leaders. Um,
00:57:28I think he's jealous at the fact that they don't face the same sorts of checks and balances
00:57:32that an American president does. Um, and we've heard
00:57:36him, wax nostalgic about uh Putin
00:57:39and uh Victor Orban and Hungary and and other
00:57:43folks so you generally would not expect to hear an American president
00:57:46speaking. fondly of um, I think also Trump
00:57:50has uh wanted to get uh Vlodimir Zelensky
00:57:54out of power in in Ukraine, in part
00:57:57because he associates him with his very first
00:58:01impeachment back in 2019 and 2020, so I
00:58:05I I think there is lot of uh longstanding and
00:58:08complicated relationships at work, but it really comes down to
00:58:12is, Trump admires Putin and he's hoping Putin can help him out of this
00:58:15jam with the mid-term election. and exchange Trump would like
00:58:19to uh remove Zelensky from power in Ukraine. Thanks very much for
00:58:23that. We have already reached the end here,
00:58:25I have about 30 seconds for each of
00:58:27you to have just closing thought. Can I start with you? Yeah,
00:58:31I'd say just addition to the bad polls that
00:58:35Donald Trump is is facing.
00:58:36I think there's also a candidate problem in the for the Republicans, they've chosen lot of
00:58:40really bad candidates again. I mentioned moment ago, Ken Paxton, the
00:58:44Senate candidate in Texas, he's was impeached by his own. party when he was
00:58:48attorney general of Texas, um, so this is not contributing to
00:58:52to Republican Fortunes. Thanks very much for that. uh, Chris, would
00:58:56you like to weigh in with final thought just
00:58:58briefly? um, sure, I think uh, one thing Canadian
00:59:02viewers might not appreciate is how long this campaign has been going
00:59:05on. uh, I know Canada, like lot of parliamentary uh systems, has
00:59:09pretty short campaigns for for parliament, uh, here in the
00:59:13US, lot these candidates for Congress have been running since early...
00:59:172025 and I mentioned that not as a specifics lesson,
00:59:21but to uh put forth the idea that you a lot of ways this
00:59:25cake is already baked uh and I think it is really tough
00:59:29um for a party that is struggling to change the trajectory
00:59:32their fortunes a big way with just three weeks and a couple of
00:59:36days uh to go until the election. Thank you very much to both of
00:59:40you for the conversation today. I've been speaking
00:59:43with, thank you. I've been speaking with Zarcher, associate professor.
00:59:47at the Brian Marroony Institute of Government at St. Francis University and Chris
00:59:51Galdieri, professor of political science at St. Alsum College
00:59:55in New Hampshire. And we are going to say
00:59:59goodbye to our TV viewers on CBC News
01:00:02Network. We're gonna continue with live uh on CBC radio
01:00:06and on CBC News app. Uh Rosie Barton Live
01:00:10is next on CBC News Network. Thank you so much for spending some
01:00:14time thinking about the US mid-term elections. with us this