Morning Wire XX
[0] The political battle over the border is dominating the headlines, and the Biden administration is being pressed on its response to the crisis.
[1] I'm just going to refer back to the vice president.
[2] We agree with her.
[3] We agree that the border is secure, but there is still more work to be done.
[4] Will the administration change its strategy, and where are the record numbers of migrants ending up?
[5] I'm Daily Wire editor -in -chief John Bickley with Georgia Howell.
[6] It's Monday, September 19th, and this is Morning Wire.
[7] With the economy suffering a series of shows, Shocks, including plummeting stock values and historic inflation, the once -booming housing market is showing some troubling signs.
[8] What should home buyers expect in the coming months, and can the U .S. avoid another housing crash?
[9] And multiple key races in the usually reliable blue state of New York are drawing a lot of attention.
[10] We break down the tightening races, including the all -important contest for governor.
[11] Thanks for waking up at Morning Wire.
[12] Stay tuned.
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[18] The Biden administration is grasping for a response after three Republican governors forced the border crisis to the top of the news by shipping illegal migrants into sanctuary cities.
[19] outwardly, the White House has accused those governors of pulling a political stunt, but reports suggest that behind the scenes the administration is on its heels and officials are struggling to come up with a solution.
[20] Here to discuss the ongoing crisis at the border and the new pressure being brought on President Biden for a solution is Daily Wire reporter Tim Pierce.
[21] So Tim, the border crisis surged to the top of the national news last week and it's really remained there.
[22] How is the Biden administration reacting?
[23] Hey, John, this has been a rocky few days for the administration on a few levels.
[24] the White House press secretary Corrine John Pierre has accused the GOP governors of Arizona, Florida, and Texas of playing political games with people's lives, but she hasn't yet given a straight answer on what the Biden administration plans to do about it.
[25] Instead, she blamed Republicans for not working with the White House to pass its own immigration plan, which would create a pathway to citizenship for millions of migrants in the U .S. illegally.
[26] So swiping back at Republicans, but not a direct discussion of a plan to address the immediate crisis.
[27] Right.
[28] Here's a moment from late last week that got a lot of attention online.
[29] What we stand by is that we are doing everything that we can to make sure that we follow the process that's been put forth.
[30] That's why we have historic funding to do just that, to make sure that, you know, to make sure that the folks that we encounter at the border be removed or expelled.
[31] What about what's going on behind the scenes?
[32] Yeah, the White House seems to be falling back on some of the same Trump policies that Biden has attacked in the past and pledged to end.
[33] U .S. Secretary of State Anthony Blinken reportedly raised concerns about the border crisis with Mexican officials last week.
[34] According to unnamed U .S. and Mexican officials, Blinken pressed the Mexican government to take in more migrants from Cuba, Nicaragua, and Venezuela.
[35] The Biden administration wants to expel more migrants back to Mexico and other countries under Title 42, the Trump -era health order that authorized the Border Patrol to stop, migrants entering the U .S. over COVID concerns.
[36] Biden has repeatedly tried to end the policy, but has been stopped by the courts.
[37] Right.
[38] Now, Biden administration officials are reportedly trying to use the policy to curb the record number of illegal immigrants coming across the border.
[39] So a move that really clashes with their public statements.
[40] Right.
[41] Now, you reported last week that shelters and processing centers along the border are already overcrowded, some at three times their capacity.
[42] So what about the migrants who are already here?
[43] This is another difficult optics moment for the administration.
[44] Biden may soon launch a similar migrant transport program to the one that Jean -Pierre called cruel last week.
[45] DHS officials are reportedly pressing the White House to begin transporting migrants from the border to cities such as Los Angeles.
[46] The White House is resisting the plan, though, over the program's similarities to what the GOP governors are doing.
[47] Still, according to reports, Biden administration officials have set a threshold for implementing their migrant transport program at 9 ,000 migrants a day crossing the southern border.
[48] That number is currently around 8 ,000.
[49] If there's no more room at the border and the Biden administration isn't relocating migrants in any significant number elsewhere, where are they all staying?
[50] That's the big question.
[51] El Paso, Texas has been in the news recently because the Border Patrol released about 1 ,000 migrants onto the city's streets, most with nowhere to go.
[52] But it's worth mentioning that that sort of thing has been going on in rural communities across the southern border for months at least.
[53] PBS reported back in June that the Border Patrol was busing migrants to health and community centers and dropping them off in rural towns with very little resources to care for them.
[54] As just one example, over the course of about a year starting in February 2021, McAllen, Texas, with a population of 142 ,000 people, took in over that many migrants, dropped off in the city by federal officials.
[55] More than the population of the entire city.
[56] Yes.
[57] In Eagle Pass, Texas, local officials are concerned about the strain on moors from the sheer number of dead migrants found along the border.
[58] One official estimated that authorities are recovering one dead migrant's body at a day from the area.
[59] There's a backlog at the medical examiner's office, and that is causing some concern that officials are cutting corners and processing and identifying each body.
[60] Well, still a lot of grim reports coming out of the border.
[61] Tim, thanks for reporting.
[62] That was DailyWire's Tim Pierce.
[63] U .S. mortgage rates have topped 6 % reaching their highest levels since the 2008 financial crisis and dealing a major blow to first -time homebuyers.
[64] Here to discuss what's driving rates up and what it means for renters and homeowners is DailyWire's senior editor, Cabot Phillips.
[65] Cabot, not great news for those looking for houses.
[66] What can you tell us?
[67] Yeah, this is going to price a lot of people out of the market.
[68] There's no other way of putting it.
[69] So on Thursday, Freddie Mac announced that mortgage rates nationwide had reached an average of 6 .02%.
[70] That is well up from the 5 .89 rate we saw last week and more than double what we saw this time last year when rates were down around 2 .86%.
[71] For context, if you were to buy a half million dollar home last year with a $1 ,000 ,000, you 20 % down payment, you would end up paying roughly 200 grand in interest over 30 years.
[72] But with today's rates, you'd be paying $465 ,000 in interest over the life of that loan.
[73] That's the difference that higher mortgage rates make.
[74] And that's according to the Wall Street Journal.
[75] Now, we've been tracking the Fed's actions in recent months, but give us some context here.
[76] What's causing mortgage rates to go up so quickly?
[77] So if you look at a chart with interest rates from the last few decades, there's typically a pretty gradual increase or decrease.
[78] But when you get to 2021, that line goes straight up.
[79] And again, it's interesting.
[80] If you take another chart tracking inflation rates and put it side by side with those mortgage rates over the last few years, they look almost identical.
[81] And it's a really great visual for understanding how inflation impacts every aspect of an economy.
[82] While mortgage rates aren't directly tied to inflation, they're going up right now because of it.
[83] And as we talked about on the show, it's all part of the Fed's strategy to lower inflation and create a so -called soft landing for the economy, where they try and gently raise rates and then hopefully lower inflation while preventing too many negative side effects for Americans.
[84] But as you can see, for a lot of people, those side effects are still quite serious.
[85] Yeah, about that.
[86] What kinds of consequences do we expect?
[87] Well, the first and most obvious consequence is that monthly payments on a new home are going to be hundreds of dollars more than they would have been last year.
[88] To that point, right now, the median mortgage payment on a home is about one and a half times more expensive than the median asking price for a rental.
[89] That is the largest disparity between renting and owning on record.
[90] And it's driving home buyers, especially first -time buyers, out of the market.
[91] Last month, because of those skyrocketing rates, mortgage applications fell to their lowest point in 22 years.
[92] And overall, now we've seen nearly a 25 % drop in home buying rates.
[93] So it's dropped by a quarter.
[94] That's dramatic.
[95] How is that shaping the market?
[96] So another potential consequence here is that as middle -class homebuyers are squeezed out of the market, But it leaves large investment companies even less competition for buying up homes around the country.
[97] Anybody who's tried to buy a house over the last year has probably experienced that disappointment of learning that they lost out on an all -cash offer, often coming from investors.
[98] Well, as rates go up and buyers leave the market, those investors only get even more leverage.
[99] A lot of this is painting a rather ominous picture for the housing market.
[100] Do we still think we're going to avoid a crash?
[101] Well, there are definitely some concerning signs.
[102] Things are slowing down, no doubt.
[103] buyers have taken 14 % fewer home tours this year than last.
[104] But most of the data seems to show that we're not going to see a wave of foreclosures like we saw in 2008.
[105] The main reason is just because it's become harder to get a loan since then.
[106] The average credit score of a borrower today is nearly 50 points higher than it was in 2008.
[107] And that makes it less likely that people will be foreclosed on.
[108] But the main reason is because homeowners today have a lot more equity than at any point on record.
[109] So they've got leverage to refinance.
[110] or get cash if they're in trouble.
[111] So, yes, there are definitely some scary developments in the housing market right now, but it's still a very different situation than what we saw back in 2008.
[112] Well, let's certainly hope that continues to hold.
[113] Cabot, thanks for the update.
[114] Anytime.
[115] That's Daily Wire Senior Editor, Cabot Phillips.
[116] The general election is heating up across the country, and one state may have a surprising role to play in shaping the national political future.
[117] Reliably Blue New York has not elected a Republican, statewide in two decades.
[118] But this year, it finds itself in the spotlight.
[119] Joining us to discuss is columnist David Marcus.
[120] Hey, David.
[121] So how critical is New York in this cycle?
[122] Morning, John.
[123] It's a big deal.
[124] There are five house races that are either toss -ups or only leaning towards a party.
[125] And those alone are basically enough for the GOP to flip the body.
[126] So a lot's on the line.
[127] One key race pits incumbent Nicole Maliatakis, a Republican who flipped New York's only swing district located in Staten Island and South Brooklyn back in 2020, and the man she beat, Max Rose, who had flipped it blue in 2018.
[128] There was original redistricting done by the legislature, made the district way more blue by adding a very progressive Brooklyn neighborhood to it.
[129] But a judge invalidated that, and now it's basically the same as it was when both of these candidates had victory.
[130] So it really is purple.
[131] All right.
[132] So aside from the fact that this is a fairly rare chance for Democrats to take a seat back from the GOP.
[133] Why is there so much focus on that race?
[134] So it's interesting.
[135] Both Maliatakis and Rose are people who their parties want front and center.
[136] Over the last two years, Malia Takas has done a lot of national media.
[137] GOP leadership likes her, and she's viewed as a moderate.
[138] For example, she voted for the infrastructure bill, but she also has the support of Donald Trump and a pretty good relationship with him, you know, from what I've heard from my sources.
[139] Likewise, Rose, when he held the seat, was a kind of moderate Democrat poster boy.
[140] So beyond just the number crunching, these are both potential political stars with their careers on the line.
[141] Now, another close race actually involves Representative Sean Patrick Maloney, the chair of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee.
[142] Should he lose, this would be a Republican pickup, and probably a bit of an embarrassment for Democrats, right?
[143] Absolutely.
[144] He's squared up against Republican Michael Lawler in the picturesque Hudson Valley of artistic fame, just north of Gotham.
[145] And this race is currently leaning towards Maloney, but yeah, as chair of the D -Triple -C, he has a lot on his plate, even just within his own state, let alone the rest of the country.
[146] So he's going to have to pay some attention to his own backyard, as well as helping Democrats hold on to at least three other New York seats that really are in some jeopardy.
[147] Meanwhile, there's the governor's race in New York that, until recently seemed like a real stretch for GOP challenger Lee Zeldon, but it's shown some signs of tightening.
[148] how realistic is a Zeldon win and how could this matchup affect things down ballot?
[149] So Governor Kathy Hokel took over for Andrew Cuomo after he resigned is definitely leading, but a recent poll, it's a reliable one, it is an outlier, had him within four points.
[150] Most polls show her lead more like 10 points.
[151] The race is really turning into Zeldon slamming Hockel over crime and COVID policies and Hockel going all in on the abortion issue and even tying Zeldon to January.
[152] six because he voted not to certify the 2020 election.
[153] Hogle is still the likely winner, but if she leans too hard into Joe Biden -style Republicans or extremist stuff, it could turn off some swing voters, you know, for Democrat House candidates.
[154] I mean, back in 2020, Max Rose was sending out mailers with him standing next to Donald Trump at a bill signing.
[155] He's not going to want this kind of rhetoric.
[156] What are the issues really driving these races in New York?
[157] Do they track with the rest of the country, or are they more region -specific?
[158] Mainly they track.
[159] Crime may be bigger issue here than other places, focused more on the economy and inflation just because of New York City's crime spike and things like bail reform.
[160] The Democrats clearly believe that abortion is working for them in the wake of the Supreme Court overturning Roe v. There's been some evidence to support that.
[161] The wildcard in tight congressional contests for incumbents is often constituent services, especially in New York, where politics is very transactional.
[162] and voters want to see goodies brought to the district.
[163] Right now, it's all pretty wide open.
[164] Yeah, it sounds like it.
[165] David, thank you so much for joining us.
[166] That was Daily Wire contributor, David Marcus.
[167] Other stories we're tracking this week.
[168] The Biden administration has announced steps to take on so -called racist roads.
[169] Nearly $105 million will go toward dismantling interstate 375 in Michigan.
[170] A highway, some say discriminatorily divides certain neighborhoods of Detroit from commercial opportunity.
[171] In reaction to a recent ruling from the Supreme Court, Yeshiva University has suspended all student groups and clubs.
[172] The court's ruling denied the Orthodox Jewish school's decision to block an LGBTQ -plus student organization and said the school must pursue the matter in state court.
[173] Thanks for listening to Morning Wire.
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[176] That's all the time we've got this morning.
[177] Thanks for waking up with us.
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