Alabama's Morning News with JT
National Correspondent Erin Real talks VP Harris' campaign and Job Market Cooling
A new law is helping me save more money on prescription drug costs. Maybe you can save too. With Medicare's Extra Help program, my premium is zero and my out-of-pocket costs are low. Who should apply? Single people making less than $23,000 a year or married couples who make less than $31,000 a year. Even if you don't think you qualify, it pays to find out. Go to ssa.gov/extrahelp. Paid for by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. Erin Riala, of course, has been following all that. Erin, welcome in. Happy Thursday. Oh, Happy Thursday. How are you? Doing fantastic. So how about the millions and millions of dollars she's doing and bringing in? I think there's a bit of a refreshing eye-opening moment for the Democratic donors right now. I'm going, "Ooh, got rid of Sleepy Joe. Some new energy here. All right. I'm on board. Let's go." J.T., it's like a spigot. It's like it couldn't wait to be released. It's finally released. And it's coming in. It's flooding in, frankly. And now what we see is that it's being contested by the Trump administration. The new money that came in to the Harris for President campaign, that is hers. That's her fair and square. And she's brought in over $100 million in less than 36 hours. So if the loses this, it's not going to be from lack of funds. But Trump is contesting the $159 million that was in the war chest that was committed to the Joint Biden Harris for President campaign. It's a long shot. They know it's a long shot, but they filed a challenge. They say that Harris was not actually a candidate for anything and that the committee is in the process of looking at it and that she's committing the largest campaign finance violation in American history. Now, if you speak to FEC enforcement divisions, if you speak to people who previously worked there, if you speak to finance law experts and lawyers, they all say it's her money. She was on the original statement of candidacy as a candidate when the committee was registered. It doesn't matter that she was the VP candidate, it's her money. They all kind of know this. It's actually probably the primary or at least among the primary reasons she was named as a candidate for president as opposed to like a new sum or what more would have been much messier. This is her money. We expected it to be contested and they will now go in front of this committee of six commissioners and they're actually completely bipartisan. It's a deadlock bipartisan. They will decide whether or not to take up the challenge and investigate or just dismiss it. But in the meantime, the funds are not frozen. She can use them and she is. Is there specific language anywhere? I mean, you mentioned the agencies that all agree that, yes, this belongs to the Biden Harris camp. So now that he's out, she's in, the money still belongs to the Biden Harris camp. So with that argument and they say, you know, yes, she's entitled to it. What are the other side, you know, lawyers basing this on? I mean, is there constitutional campaign finance laws written somewhere? Do they have anything in black and white that says it shouldn't be her money in black and white? No, no, they do not because this is the first time this has ever happened. So which is why you're like, sure, go for it. If you have lawyers on retainer and you like spending money, why not? Sure. This is what we do here. Like, no, no, at every, not everyone, I'm using those generalizations is not wise. But most experts in this field believe that this is pretty hollow and that it won't, you know, hold water. And frankly, I don't know about you, but part of me is like, you guys, it's not a good look that our country essentially buys elections. That's never been great. And now that we're fighting over who can buy them based on which funds were given, it's just, it's goofy. And also, Trump campaign isn't broke at 45 million committed every month from Elon Musk alone. Well, let me stop you on that because apparently Elon Musk came out yesterday and said, look, that report was never real. He's pulling back. Yeah. Yeah, I saw that too. Yeah. Which is very interesting. Yeah. Very interesting. And I think, I don't know if he's like, I don't want to throw like it, not that he's the richest man in the world that swaps places with the basis every now and again, but he could give, that's not a big deal, it's like less than going off a 20 in someone else's world. So it's not, I think that it speaks more to the idea that do I want to do this. Like, is that something that is worse by time in energy? He can endorse Trump without giving him all his money. Right. Well, let me ask you about, you know, the money situation and these push, the folks that are pushing back and the attorneys getting involved here. If they file suit or file court papers, is that enough to stop the presses and keep this money locked up until courts decide on this being released? No. Yeah. And will that, will that clog the system beyond November 5th? Nope, it won't. The funds aren't frozen. So they're like, this is like, I'm not an exercise in futility. I don't, I understand why they're doing it and they're entitled to, but it doesn't mean. So there's, but if they file suit, don't they put usually what's, you know, in discussion in lawsuits on hold until there's a decision made in civil, not in ones like this. This is a different type of law. It's going to be, it's federal, it's number one federal suit and it's going to go in front of the federal election commission, which has very nuanced details. I honestly, for really intricate questions about this one, you'd have to speak to a campaign finance lawyer, I have not privy on all the insides and outsides of this. Like I have, I have a general understanding, but no, you'd need to speak with an expert to know what this is, but from the, I actually spoke with a former FEC enforcement division person. He, he's no longer there, but he's like, this isn't, this isn't going to work. Okay. This is, this is, yeah, she hasn't broken any laws. And, and one of the things is that the Trump, the Biden Harris campaign worked so hard to make sure that this was, it's not like this is quickly nearly hoping for the best. Like kind of new. Okay. All right. Well, moving forward just real quickly. I'm going to get your thoughts on the job market now because the economy, jobs, you know, is always a major sticking point for voters when it comes to, you know, who they're going to cast their ballots for. What's going on with the latest job market numbers? It seems to me that it's cooling down just a bit. Just a bit. Yeah. And listen, we're not driving off a cliff. It's a good time to have a job. It's a harder time to find one. So essentially the unemployment rate, it's picked up to 4.1% last month. It's the first time it's above that 4% threshold since 2021 workers have stopped quitting at this frenzy pace. You have college grads. They're having a harder time breaking into the market. And then the number of open positions for every unemployed person is back to the pre pandemic level of 1.2%. Again, historically, this is a good job market. This is not anything to be terrified of. It's just this frenzied pace. Well I think the job market, you know, was going to calm down sooner or later. I mean, it can't continue the way it was. So yeah, it used to be like, if you quit your job, hey, you find a job, you know, within the hour. Speaking, Aaron, thank you so much. An official message from Medicare. A new law is helping me save more money on prescription drug costs. Maybe you can save too. With Medicare's extra help program, my premium is zero and my out of pocket costs are low. Who should apply? Single people making less than $23,000 a year or married couples who make less than $31,000 a year. Even if you don't think you qualify, it pays to find out. Go to ssa.gov/extrahelp. Paid for by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.