美国中期选举日：特朗普林肯纪念堂演讲与关键州选情

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This is it. We finally made it. Welcome to election day in America. No more polls, no more commercials. It's time for people to actually vote. I'm Joe Matthew alongside Kaylee Lines at Bloomberg World Headquarters in New York. Happy election day. We made it.

We have long awaited this moment is finally upon us as we crisscross uh the map this hour. Uh looking at where opportunities for potential Democratic pickups are and of course Republicans trying uh to be on defense in a number of districts that could ultimately decide the balance of power. President Trump himself has been crisscrossing uh the country. Uh he did what some 32 events in 20 different states uh over the last month or so.

Yeah. But interestingly chose for his closing message the day before the midterms

to speak from right around the corner

in DC the Lincoln Memorial or maybe more specifically the reflecting pool that he worked so hard to remodel. Here's part of the president's closing message yesterday. a good portion of them we will win in a landslide. Now, that doesn't happen because usually whoever the sitting president is, Republican or Democrat, uh, good or bad, good president, great president, bad, for some reason, the sitting president doesn't win the midterms.

But we gave this a very strong shot.

We learned a lot about recocking and renovations over the course of that roughly 25minute address. less on the closing message from Republicans. Now, we're going to go around the horn here with Jen Dooie at the White House. Brook Sutherland's in Maine, Skyler Woodhouse is in Iowa, Kaylee and I here at world headquarters in New York. And we want to start, Jen, with you on the north lawn of the White House. What is the closing message from the president?

Well, you you played it there. Uh, you know, the president obviously did this unorthodox appeal uh from the reflecting pool yesterday where he spoke more about uh, you know, refurbishment of the reflecting pool and his construction projects around Washington, then deliver kind of a a a classic appeal to voters uh, ahead of election day still uh, later in that speech and in a pair of Fox News interviews uh, he, you know, uh, made an appeal to voters uh, saying that uh, they shouldn't be voting for Democratic candidates who are out of touch with most voters.

Uh he emphasized his crackdown on illegal immigration and he touted tax cuts that uh came about as part of last year's one big beautiful bill act. He also repeated some of his rally pitch to Americans. He said the country was now hotter than ever. Something we've heard him say a lot that his tariff policy has has driven a lot of investment into domestic manufacturing. And you know he declared inflation was over in the US.

And that's of course despite US data showing that it's trending well above the 2% target rate for the Fed.

Well, Jen, walk us through how different the president's world could look tomorrow or maybe more specifically in January if we are to see one or both chambers of Congress uh suddenly filled with uh a Democratic majority rather than the Republican majority he's been working with for the last two years. What is the White House bracing for?

Right. Well, what's important to appreciate is is of course how much this president has built his policy agenda on executive action. So, you know, from the very beginning, he he has leaned into doing as much as he can uh administratively uh without needing Congress despite these large, you know, these these Republican majorities that he's been able to draw some support on. Uh obviously, the the the tax uh bill last year is is is a significant example of where he does need Congress's help.

Uh now looking out at the landscape over the next two years uh obviously a lot of expectations that the house will change to democratic hands. The president is already anticipating that to some degree saying that he will be Mr. veto uh you know essentially threatening uh to veto legislation that comes across his desk from Democrats in Congress. uh but you know he will not be able to count on uh the capital on Capitol Hill to deliver on his legislative agenda and instead you know the the administration the president and top officials are bracing for a wave of oversight with investigations and calls to appear before congressional hearings.

Mr. Veto Jen Dooie thank you so much. The president will be at the White House by the way this evening. There were questions Kaylee about where he was going to hold forth. I guess there's a watch party in the East Room. I don't know what they're serving, but the news might not be great as the results come in in real time. Our watch party will start right here at 700 p.m. Eastern time. It'll be on Bloomberg TV and radio as well as YouTube, where you can find us right now by searching Bloomberg Business News Live.

And we carry on with Brook Sutherland, one of our many reporters in the field who will be pivotal in our coverage this evening. She's standing by in Portland, Maine, reporting for Bloomberg on one of the most important Senate races in the country. Brooke, just looking at some of the the polling data we saw in the last 24 hours. The big one, of course, was New York Times Sienna gave Troy Jackson a sixpoint lead. It's a 9-point lead from the University of New Hampshire.

What's the vibe on the ground? What are the candidates doing on this election day?

The vibes are, you know, positive from the Jackson side. He had an event here in Portland last night at a bowling alley. He was enthusiastic. He was telling his supporters there that it is our time and that Democrats have a real shot at giving getting the Senate majority that they want in this election. But I will say that pretty much everybody is expecting this race to be very very close. You talked about the latest polling data, but Susan Collins over the course of her nearly 30-year career has repeatedly defied both polls and expectations here in Maine, and I don't think anybody is feeling overly confident right now.

Mhm.

Well, and we know the polls close in Maine at 8:00 p.m. uh Eastern time. Brooke, how quickly are election officials saying we can anticipate a result? I think we might be in for a late night here in Maine. I think we're looking at a pretty long process um before we hear. And don't forget, if this race ends up being very, very close, there is a ranked choice voting system in Maine. Now, we don't have a prominent third party candidate, but there are, you know, some candidates who did declare themselves by the deadline.

And if we get into a situation where this is super super tight, you could go to rank choice voting, which would mean this takes even longer to get a result here in Maine. So, I think we're going to be waiting for a while and everybody's going to be waiting with baited breath for those results.

All right, Brook Sutherland live uh in Portland, Maine for us. Brooke, we'll be checking in with you uh throughout the evening. And Maine obviously Joe is host of a close contest. Though in the latest New York Times Sienna poll it did show Troy Jackson with a six-point advantage as you were alluding to the race in Iowa much much closer in that poll. And if you look at prediction markets as well they basically are pricing in even odds of a victory for either the Democrat Josh Turk or the Republican uh nominee Congresswoman Ashley Henson.

And it's to Iowa where we go next where we find Bloomberg Skyler Woodhouse who is live for us in De Moine. Uh Skyler, it's obviously not just uh the Senate race. There's a high-profile gubanatorial one as well, a number of close house contests. When are we l