Chapter 1: What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
Hello, I'm Joel Weber. And I'm Eric Balchunas. We're the hosts of the Trillions podcast from Bloomberg, a deep dive into all things ETFs and investing. Eric, what's so amazing about ETFs? It's never a dull moment.
They track everything under the sun, four new ETFs launch a day, and they take in $4 billion every day. So it's where all the money's flowing to and a lot of the innovation is happening. I call it the Silicon Valley of the investing world.
As you can hear, Eric's passionate about them. My role is to try and keep him in check and make all of this a little bit more understandable for the rest of us. Not always easy, but always worth a listen.
So listen to Trillions on Apple, Spotify, or wherever else you get your podcasts. I'm in Jersey City, New Jersey, with the Congressman for the 8th District of New Jersey, which represents most of Hudson County and a good chunk of Jersey City, where I'm standing right now.
Congressman Rob Menendez, great to have you here, sir, on a day where I think a lot of people are really looking right now to the Statehouse and wondering whether this is that year where we end up with a Republican governor for the first time in a while.
Yeah, listen, New Jersey and Virginia are the epicenter of the political universe right now here in America. And so Mikey's made the case every single day of this campaign. She came out of the contested primary, ran away with it. And every day she's been disciplined about the issues that New Jerseyans are facing. So she knows there's an immense amount of work to do.
She's raised her hand and dedicated herself to New Jersey, to the American people. And this moment she wants to deliver for New Jersey. And I believe that that has resonated with a lot of our voters.
There's been some criticism of the campaign that Mikey Sherrill has been running. The idea that that campaign is a little bit more high level. It's about national issues. While Jack Chiarelli seems to be focusing a little bit more on the kitchen table and pocketbook issues, if you will. What are you hearing from voters as to what they actually want?
What are they going to the polls to vote for today?
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Chapter 2: What is the significance of the gubernatorial race in New Jersey?
Part of that's good. I guess that's a sign that you're getting these data centers and other things moving to the state. But when it raises the bills for homeowners and businesses, you need something to address that. What's the plan?
So she's made it clear that on day one of her administration, she's going to declare a state of emergency on the energy price hikes. There's an immense amount of work that we have to do with our regional operator, PJM, the production that we have in New Jersey. And we also have to look at how demand has changed. You mentioned AI data centers. It's good for New Jersey to be a leader on AI.
You need those data centers to do so, but they require an immense amount of energy. There are ways, and we're looking at it in Congress. It's one of the things that I'm doing on energy and commerce. to think about how that increased energy demand, which could be 13% of all energy demand in the next several years, how that doesn't get pushed to our consumers, our residents.
So it's going to take an all-hands, whole-of-government approach, but she's made that a clear priority of hers, and that's a day one priority. So I know it's something that she's looking forward to tackling as governor.
Another big issue, of course, is taxation, the idea of addressing some of the budget issues, potentially raising the sales tax once again, as well as corporate taxation. Do you think that's something, A, that the governor, no matter who it is, would actually follow through on? And would there be enough support at the statehouse to see that through?
Well, I think you can take innovative ways, right? Like I think, yes, traditionally money in, money out, right? So if we need to spend to grow and build New Jersey, then we need to raise the revenue to do so. But on something like mass transit and infrastructure, there are ways to do it where you look at the assets that NJ Transit has that are underutilized.
And if you can make better use of them, you can actually create revenue for the state without having to raise taxes, raise the levy. So I think Mikey is going to have an innovative approach there.
I don't think she's just going to go and say we have to raise taxes because we have to pay for A, B, and C. I think she's going to look about how the state has underutilized assets, how to make better use of them to reduce the tax burden on New Jerseyans because it goes into the affordability crisis, whether it's energy, whether it's taxes. These are what people are thinking about.
You represent Jersey City, the second most populous city in the state and really third most populous really in the entire New York metro area. It's seen phenomenal growth over the past few years in terms of new residents and new businesses. How do you get more businesses, and not just the big companies, but small and medium-sized businesses to actually set up shop here?
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Chapter 3: What are the main issues driving voters in the upcoming election?
Keep fighting for us. Because if we do nothing, we will not be able to afford our health care, our housing, our prescription drugs. That's what Democrats are fighting for. And they're happy to see us do so. And they are in this fight with us.
Chapter 4: How is affordability impacting New Jerseyans in this election?
All right, circling back to the election here in New Jersey, I do have to ask you, we've had four years here of Phil Murphy. Maybe potentially that legacy continues with Mikey Sherrill. When you take a look at Murphy's legacy, what do you think he got right? And more importantly, what do you think he maybe did not take advantage of?
So, I mean, I think he got an immense amount right on moving the state forward on a lot of things that were responsive to what was happening in the first Trump administration, codifying reproductive health care here in New Jersey. He's done an immense amount to drive the economy here from being an AI, a leader on AI, to tech, to film studios.
So he's done a lot to grow New Jersey, grow New Jersey's profile. You know, I think on the energy front, I think we could have diversified our approach a little bit more to not think so much of into offshore wind, but to really maximize solar, to look at nuclear, to look at fusion. But he still did so much. And I'm really proud that he was our governor for for these important years.
Only about 30 seconds left, but looking ahead to the potential results that we get tonight, the polls have gotten a little bit tighter over the last few weeks. Trittarelli has really closed the gap with Sheryl. You think she's still going to pull it out?
I do. I've seen the momentum on the ground the last several days. Last night in Union City, two days ago in West New York, it's palpable. And people know it's on the line. And I think when they're in this final moment and they have to make a decision in the ballot box, they're going to go with Mikey because she's a true leader for New Jersey. All right.
Really appreciate you taking the time for us, Congressman. Appreciate it.
That's Congressman Rob Menendez of the 8th District here in the state of New Jersey as we keep a close eye here on the gubernatorial race.
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