About this episode
It’s a political earthquake, but what will Joe Biden’s unexpected withdrawal and Kamala Harris’ emerging candidacy mean for investors?
Join Head of Public Policy Jason Cole and Executive Director of Investment Research Andrew Korz as they delve into how Republicans and Democrats may respond—plus the potential impact on the “Trump trade,” interest rates and market volatility.
Transcript excerpt
[00:00:00] Andrew Korz: This is a remarkable situation, right. A candidate for president dropping out of the race mere weeks prior to the convention, in which he was supposed to be officially nominated, months before the actual election takes place. And not just a candidate, but the actual President of the United States.
[00:00:17] Andrew Korz: Welcome to FireSide, a podcast from FS investments. I’m Andrew Korz, Executive Director of Investment Research.
President Joe Biden’s decision to drop out of the 2024 presidential race, which occurred via tweet or via X at 1:46 PM yesterday, Sunday, July 21. Clearly this is a political earthquake. Occurring just as the market is really starting to kind of look toward the election as the most important event of the second half of the year.
I’m joined today by our in-house expert—which we are incredibly lucky to have here at FS—Jason Cole. He is our Head of Public Policy. Jason, thanks so much for making the time. I know you’re running around like your hair is on fire right now, so thanks for making the time.
[00:00:58] Jason Cole: Pleasure to be here, Andrew.
[00:01:00] Andrew Korz: So let’s just jump right in. The news was dropped yesterday, Sunday afternoon.
This is a remarkable situation, right. A candidate for president dropping out of the race weeks prior to the convention, in which he was supposed to be officially nominated, months before the actual election takes place. And not just a candidate, but the actual President of the United States. Is there anything that can help us understand the ways in which this might play out, any historical analogs, or is this truly unprecedented?
[00:01:27] Jason Cole: This is truly unprecedented. And it’s a word that I feel like we’ve overused. Especially the last four years, the last four or even eight years.
And if you even consider the last few months, right, on May 30, you had a former president convicted on 34 counts in a court in New York City; you had, in the last eight days, an assassination attempt; you had a historically poor debate performance by a major party nominee. And then finally you have that nominee drop out, and in just eight days.
It’s truly remarkable. And I don’t know that there’s any historical analog to this. I mean, you had Lyndon Johnson in 1968, step out of the race, interestingly, for a convention that was going to be held in Chicago, just like this year’s convention. But Johnson stepped out in March, many months before that.
