2020 U.S. Presidential Election Panel

October 28, 2020

The Empire Club of Canada Presents

2020 U.S. Presidential Election Panel

Chairman: Antoinette Tummillo, President, Board of Directors, Empire Club of Canada

Moderator
Anita Sharma, BNN Bloomberg Reporter, Host of Market Call Tonight

Distinguished Guest Speakers
Frances Donald , Managing Director, Chief Economist, Head of Macro Strategy, Manulife
Bruce Heyman , Former US Ambassador to Canada
Chris Jackson, Senior Vice-President, Ipsos Reid Public Affairs

Introduction
It is a great honour for me to be here at the Empire Club of Canada today, which is arguably the most famous and historically relevant speaker’s podium to have ever existed in Canada. It has offered its podium to such international luminaries as Winston Churchill, Ronald Reagan, Audrey Hepburn, the Dalai Lama, Indira Gandhi, and closer to home, from Pierre Trudeau to Justin Trudeau; literally generations of our great nation's leaders, alongside with those of the world's top international diplomats, heads of state, and business and thought leaders.

It is a real honour and distinct privilege to be invited to speak to the Empire Club of Canada, which has been welcoming international diplomats, leaders in business, and in science, and in politics. When they stand at that podium, they speak not only to the entire country, but they can speak to the entire world.

Welcome Address by Antoinette Tummillo, President, Board of Directors, Empire Club of Canada
Good afternoon, fellow directors, past presidents, members, and guests. Welcome to the 117th season of the Empire Club of Canada, and today's live webinar. My name is Antoinette Tummillo. I'm the President of the Empire Club of Canada and your host for today's virtual webinar event on the 2020 US Presidential Election, featuring Frances Donald, Bruce Heyman, Chris Jackson, and Anita Sharma. This is our seventh Empire Night evening event. And we typically have a cocktail at these events, so I hope you all have yours ready. You may especially need one tonight—and given the topic of discussion, I know I need one. And I'm having a Manhattan, in honour of this discussion. So, without further ado, I now call this meeting to order.

Now, before we begin today's session, I have a few logistical items to let you know of. If you're finding your internet feed is slow, click the "Switch Streams" button below. And there's also a "Request for Help" button available to you, if you're experiencing technical difficulties. So, please use them if you need help.

I do want to take a moment to recognize our sponsors, who generously support the Empire Club, and make these events possible. Thank you to our Event Sponsor today, CPA Ontario, and our Season Sponsors, Canadian Bankers Association and Waste Connections Canada. I also want to thank our event partner, VVC Communications, and livemeeting.ca, Canada's online event space, for webcasting today's event.

Our topic today is about something everyone is talking about these days: the US election. It is shaping up to be the most consequential in recent history. Today's panel discussion will focus on the impacts that the US election will have on the economies of Ontario and Canada. How do Donald Trump and Joe Biden stack up on critical issues relating to health, energy, and trade? How will recent developments, from the COVID-19 shutdown, social unrest, a trade war with China, and an economic recession, influence the outcome of this election? What opportunities could a Biden win create for Ontario and Canada, and could there be setbacks associated with a Biden win for Canada? We'll find out in this exciting discussion.

But first, I'd like to briefly introduce you to our panel. Frances Donald, Managing Director and Chief Economist and Head of Macro Strategy at Manulife. Frances forecasts global macroeconomic and financial trends for potential opportunities and risks, and serves as a thought leader, both within the firm, and externally. She has held various positions at Deloitte, Roubini Global Economics, and Bank of Canada. Frances holds a BA Honours in economics from Queen's University, and a Masters in Economics from New York University. Bruce Heyman, former US Ambassador to Canada from 2014 to 2017. Bruce is an American business leader, and a 33-year veteran of Goldman-Sachs. He has served as a board member for the Chicago Council on Global Affairs, and the Northwestern Memorial Hospital Foundation. Bruce holds both a BA and MBA from Vanderbilt University. Chris Jackson, Senior Vice-President, Ipsos Reid Public Affairs. He's also Program Director of Ipsos Strategic Research and Polling Practice in the United States. Chris is an expert on American electoral and public polling, with a deep background in the American political system. Our moderator today is Anita Sharma. She's a BNN Bloomberg reporter, and a host of Market Call Tonight. After working on Bay Street throughout the '90s, Anita started her media career in 2001. She has been a national network news anchor and reporter for CBC, CTV, CP24, and Sun TV, before moving to BNN Bloomberg.

Now, before I hand over the podium to Anita, I just want to remind everyone on this call that this is an interactive event. So, we encourage you to take advantage of the question box to the right of your screen, and let us know what is on your mind and if you have any questions for our panellists. Now, I'm first going to hand the podium over to Chris to set the stage, before turning it over to Anita. So, Chris, all yours.

Chris Jackson, Senior Vice-President, Ipsos Reid Public Affairs
Great, thank you. It's so great to be with you tonight. So, great to be with everyone tonight. We are six days away from, as Antoinette said, one of the most consequential elections in American history. So, I want to spend just a few minutes taking you through some of our latest and greatest data. This has been a heavily researched election. There's a lot going on. So, just wanted to, really, help set the stage a little bit, with what we see happening. And I'm going to sort of walk through four really specific areas. And first, I want to start with setting the context, because elections are not happening in a vacuum. Most of this. I think, goes without saying. But right now, the United States is very much still in the midst of the Coronavirus pandemic, where we're experiencing, actually, a surge at the moment, with cases climbing across much of the country, hitting new daily case records. And this, I think is, really, the headwinds that President Trump is trying to sail into in this election. At the beginning of the year, he was in actually a pretty strong position. But the pandemic has really changed the nature, changed the trajectory of what we're seeing.

The other piece to keep in mind is the economy, even though it has started to recover—and I think Frances will talk about this at some length a little bit later—it's definitely not back to where it was. There's still a lot of people having a hard time, a lot of people struggling to make ends meet. And that's the other, sort of, part of the storm that we're within right now. And all of this is happening at a time during which America is experiencing alternate realities at a greater rate than, really, is in recent American history. This is some data from a recent survey we did, where we look at Republicans who get their news from FOX News, which is a Republican administration-aligned news outlet, versus Republicans who get their news from other sources, Independents, and Democrats. And you can see there's huge differences in belief in the Coronavirus fatality rates, belief in the job President Trump is doing. And I think this illustrates, more than anything, how America is still struggling so much with a lot of the issues we're facing. Is this real fundamental difference in world view, fundamental difference in what we see as reality, from people on the Left, on the right, and the people who aren't really involved.

And then, finally, to finish setting the context, I wanted to underline this, how important this election is seen right now. This is a statement that was actually taken from the Democratic National Convention a little over a month ago, that we're in a battle for the soul of the nation. You can see supermajorities of both Republicans, Democrats, and Independents agree with that statement. It really just helps underline just how significant this election is, and it really helps underline the intense emotions behind people on both sides, as we go into next week's final day of the election.

But the central organizing factor of this election is Donald Trump. He is the incumbent President. He is the figure around which everything else is orbiting. He's this gravity centre of the election. And he's a really interesting character, from a public opinion standpoint. His approval ratings have been remarkably stable through his presidency, much more than any president in American history that we have data on. And just think about that for a moment, right? This is the guy who swept into office on calls of locking up his opponents, he has been impeached, he has presided over the Coronavirus pandemic, the economic downturn, the social justice protests this summer. A huge number of events. And yet, his public opinion about him has barely moved. And I think that's partially testament to the different realities people have, and the insulating properties of that. But it's also testament to his ability to manipulate and control his brand, and control the news cycle, and media cycle around him.

But as we go into the election next week, it's important to remember that he is not seen equivalently across the entire country; there's areas where he is more and less popular. We see him extremely unpopular on the coasts, in California, New York, the more urbanized areas of the country, and much more popular in the large rural swathes across the centre of the country, and in the South. And then it's those areas that are a little bit of both are the battlegrounds. That's where this election is being fought. It's in the Upper Midwest, the South Atlantic coast, the Southwest, areas that are a mix of suburbs, rural areas, urban areas that really have a little bit for Trump, and a little bit against Trump. And that's why there are our key battlegrounds.

And the terrain that's being fought on is, really, the Coronavirus. Donald Trump had a moment in August where he seemed like he was maybe being able to sort of push the agenda back to the economy. Seemed like the Coronavirus pandemic had gotten a little bit under control. But his diagnosis, combined with the spike in cases that we're seeing, has really made the Coronavirus the central focus again. And that's a problem for the President, because we see his personal credibility on the topic is really poor. This is some data we have from an Axios survey we conducted about two weeks ago, where we asked people if they would get a Coronavirus vaccine if various people vouched for it. And fewer than one-in-five said they would if President Trump vouched for it. That suggests just how low his credibility is, versus over 60 percent would get it if their personal physician vouched for it, right? I think this really illustrates Trump's weakness in this specific area. And that, I think, is really shaping up to hurt him, as we're going into these final days of the election.

We see that this election is really being driven by perceptions of Trump himself. People that are attracted to him for the characteristics he has of being strong, being seen as sort of an American-first type figure, and people being pushed away from him by, really, more of his personality characteristics, than any policy areas. And Joe Biden is actually a much less important figure in how this election is shaping up. He's really more of just a neutral repository for people who are hostile or opposed to President Trump. And it's actually been something of a smart strategy for Biden and his camp, of being, essentially, a relatively neutral figure, and letting Trump, essentially, dig his own grave, proverbially speaking.

So, as we look at the election, and we track what people are telling us, the main issue that they're focused on, it continues to be the Coronavirus; Joe Biden continues to be the strongest on this. And this is important, because when we look at elections around the world, we see the candidate who is strongest on this main issue tends to win those elections, right? So, as long as this stayed the top issue, Coronavirus stayed the top issue, Biden continued to be seen as stronger on it, it's continued to say that Donald Trump is, essentially, fighting a holding action and bad terrain for him.

So, then we get to where we are now. Actually, we have Joe Biden up nine points over Donald Trump at the national level. This is a very considerable margin. I get lots of questions about, well, what about 2016? The polls missed. It's important to remember, in 2016, that the national level polls were within eight percentage points of the actual national popular vote. Which means that maybe Biden's up eight points instead of nine points, maybe Biden's up ten points instead of nine points. But it means if Biden's up considerably at the national level. And really, at this point, we don't see much of a path to President Trump getting a popular vote majority. Even when we dig inside the poll data, we get below these top-line numbers, and look at some of the various things that sort of are showing levels of uncertainty—which I'm showing, for instance, that we see a huge number of early vote, we see relatively high levels of commitment to vote for the candidate on either side, relatively few numbers of undecided voters that could potentially swing the vote in the last couple of days.

And when we combine all that together, we're presented with this picture where, even if Biden only holds on to those people who are absolutely committed to him, his floor is still above Donald Trump's ceiling. If Donald Trump is able to commit all the voters who have expressed any sort of support for him, it's still not enough to get a popular vote total—a popular vote win, rather. But it does get him within about four percentage points, which is enough for the Electoral College to come into play, because the Electoral College in the United States is a little bit more Republican-friendly than Democratic-friendly, as a whole. Many of the key battleground states that I was mentioning before are a couple of points more Republican. So, you know, Joe Biden really needs to have probably a five-percentage point national victory, in order to make sure he has clearance in a lot of these swing states, to win enough of Electoral College votes to get to that 270-magic number.

This is just a slide that's showing a little bit of composite data. We're seeing a huge amount of vote being cast early. We expect by the time next Monday rolls around, the day before the election, we'll have already seen 100 million votes cast in this election. It's an unprecedented early vote for American elections. And we're actually expecting to see over 150 million votes cast on Election Day, which will make it the largest election in US history. It'll be the highest turnout, if that holds up, in about a hundred years. And if this comes to pass, we, again, we see a situation where Joe Biden most likely is going to have a popular vote majority—or not a majority, but have the plurality, at least, in the popular vote. And the real question mark is, is Donald Trump going to be able to convert more of his supporters at the end to close this up, and get those swing states within reach?

So, as we look closer at those swing states, what we're seeing is a picture that the Midwest, which is the area that surprised us in 2016, that Hillary Clinton thought was going to be her Blue Wall, is looking more and more out of reach for Trump. Michigan and Wisconsin are high single-digits, if not low double-digits, away from him. In fact, The Washington Post just released a poll showing Wisconsin at a, in the teens for Biden, huge number. Pennsylvania is a little bit closer. It's about five or six points in the poll averages right now, which makes it a little bit more obtainable for him. But the real battleground for President Trump remains the South Atlantic coast of North Carolina, Georgia, Florida, and the Southwest of Texas and Arizona. And of those states, they're all very much still toss-ups. They're all still very much in play. But for President Trump to win, he needs to take all of those. He needs to win North Carolina, Georgia, Florida, Texas, and he still needs to convert Pennsylvania or another state—or a couple of states, even—in order to get to that 270 mark, which is telling us that Donald Trump has fewer and fewer paths to victory. But it's not out of the realm of possibility. It's still very much possible for him to do it. He, essentially, drew an inside straight in 2016. I don't think anyone will discount him this year being able to do it again.

So, as we look closer at those states when we model out our data, and sort of see again what's happening, it's very much in the realm of possibility for Trump to win in Arizona, Florida, and North Carolina. He is close enough in those states that they could go in his direction. And Pennsylvania is—a tie is achievable for him in our data. It's not likely that he's going to get an outright win. He's not going to win by, you know, 100,000 or a million votes. But if it gets close enough, right? If it's close enough where it's in the tens of thousands of votes, that's when things like some of the issues we've seen about voting, and voter disenfranchisement, might come to play. And the fact that he now has a 6-3 majority behind him on the Supreme Court may also come to play. If it comes down to those razor-thin margins in these states, that's actually the place where it gets really dangerous for the future of American democracy.

So, finally, before I hand it back to Anita to bring in some of the other experts on this call, I want to talk to you, just briefly, about election forecasting. Because I think this is an important distinction to make. People typically treat election polls as if they're forecast. But they're not. Election polls are by their very definition a retrospective exercise. They're us talking to people yesterday, or last week, or last month. And even if we're asking them about what they're going to do in the future, they're really just telling us how they feel at that moment, right? So, taking an election poll and trying to predict what's going to happen in the future is, essentially, like seeing somebody running down the street, closing your eyes, and then trying to guess where they're going to be in a minute. Maybe you're right, maybe you're not.

So, what we do when we come to election forecasting is we actually try to take lots of different types of information and combine it together, to present a more holistic picture of what's going on. So, when we do that and start looking at what's going on in the larger circumstance—not just at what we're seeing in our polls, but in a lot of other circumstances—we are starting to see a certain measure of agreement, right? Experts like the folks at the University of Virginia Crystal Ball or at the Cook Political Report are saying Biden's likely to win, polling is saying that Biden's likely to win, economic models are saying Biden is likely to win, most of the academic models are saying Biden's likely to win. At this point, there's a few that are still outliers, that are saying Trump's going to win it. But we are starting to see a little bit more unanimity on the results, or what we think is going to happen.

However, when we dig into our data, our public opinion data, we do see some contrary signals. For instance, we see that the polls suggest Trump's in a bad position in all of these states, but his approval rating actually remains relatively strong. It suggests he has a robust base of support that he can turn out in a lot of these states. Which means you should not write him off, or his ability to turn those people out to vote. You know, if you watch American news and you see the rallies he's been holding, the huge numbers of people who show up for those rallies. I don't think the rallies are necessarily indicative of anything by themselves, but they are indicative of the enthusiasm of his base. And because Biden has really run a campaign that is more about not being Trump, he doesn't have a similar level of enthusiasm about him. He's relying on antipathy towards Trump to turn out his base. And maybe that works, maybe it doesn't. It's just an inherently more risky strategy than having an electorate that's more focused on you.

So, when you combine all that together, we do see, at the end of the day, Biden is the favorite. Biden is in a strong position. We see him, right now, with about a three-out-of-four chance of winning the election. We see the most likely scenario being a relatively close win, that's suggesting that he wins six, seven, maybe eight percent of the popular votes. He wins enough to win in the Electoral College, certainly, but it's not like an overwhelming tidal wave. It's not, you know, 380, 390, 400 Electoral College votes. But it is a win, it's a clear win. It's not necessarily a scenario where it's a long, drawn-out fight. We do, though, see in the realm of possibility what we would call a Blue Wave, and that would be Biden winning these huge margins, and winning states like Georgia or Texas, that are traditional Republican states. It is in the realm of possibility that Biden can win that, if the poll error is in their direction by in his favour, essentially, the opposite of what happened in 2016, it's well within the realm of possibility that Biden can have this huge win. But it's also in the realm of possibility that Trump is able to close this margin and eke out this Electoral College victory that I've outlined earlier. So, I don't think anyone should go to sleep on that possibility. But at this point in time, we think it's at best a one-in-four-chance, if not, maybe a one-in-five chance. So, that was a lot of data. Honestly, this is just our particular version of this. There's a lot of people, I think, who are really smart people, who have other perspectives on what's going on here. So, I think Anita, if you want to bring the other voices and...

Anita Sharma, BNN Bloomberg Reporter, Host of Market Call Tonight
Yes, sir.

Chris Jackson
... liven up this discussion.

Anita Sharma
It's already lively, like you said, Chris, just a lot to digest, there, with respect to your stellar polling analysis. Chris Jackson, Senior Vice President with Ipsos Reid in DC. But yes, let's bring in our other panellists. We all know Bruce Heyman. He's a regular on BNN Bloomberg. He's also the former US Ambassador to Canada. Ambassador, always great to be with you, sir.

Bruce Heyman, Former US Ambassador to Cabada
Good to be with all my friends in Canada—except virtually, obviously, but.

Anita Sharma
It has to be virtual. And we're going to lead the discussion off with you. But I also want to bring in Frances Donald, another regular on BNN Bloomberg, always giving us her economic analysis, with respect to macro strategy. That is her focus at Manulife, where she's also the Managing Director and Chief Economist. Frances, thanks for joining us tonight.

Frances Donald, Managing Director, Chief Economist, Head of Macro Strategy, Manulife
I'm excited. Let's get into it.

Anita Sharma
All right, let's do it. Let's throw it over to Bruce Heyman, who, you've been sitting there, I know, like Frances and I. You're ready to dive in. Any reaction, first of all, to Chris's polling results, before we really just get into the nuts-and-bolts of a Biden versus Trump?

Bruce Heyman
I think Chris is spot on, from everything that I'm hearing from updates that I'm getting, from campaign, and elsewhere. The key is, here, we're in multiple phases of the voting process. And this, as Chris pointed out, is so unique, that we are having so many people turn out early. And this early vote, what you don't know is how much you've cannibalized from the actual Election Day, versus expanding the vote. And so, we can do all kinds of polling. But unless people actually vote, then you don't know.

But early on, you had the Democrats, they pulled in, I think, people who would normally have voted on the 3rd. They came in. You're starting to see, now, phase two. Republicans are starting to come in, and we're starting to see the gap starting to narrow in places like Florida, et cetera. But now, we're going to get into this next phase. And this next phase is going to be all about how many people—do we get up to 100 million before Election Day, and then how many people show up on Election Day, and what will that look like. But look, we've all been working hard, those of us who want to protect our democracy and restore, kind of, the liberal democratic values—small "l" for those of you in Canada, small "d" for in the United States—but liberal democratic sets of order. And glad to talk about the Vice President, hopefully President-elect next week. But I know him personally, and I think it's going to be a very welcome change for those of you watching today, and many of us around the world.

Anita Sharma
All right. We know, especially in previous interviews as well, sir, where you stand, with respect to US President Donald Trump. But we also know, Frances, you sit back, and you say, look, I don't professionally care who it is, but I want to know how this impacts the economy. And as Antoinette from the Empire Club said off the top, what does this mean for Canada? What does this mean for one of the biggest engine drivers of the Canadian economy, the province of Ontario? So, when you crack open your books, when you look at your analyses, when you have your trading monitor like I do in front of me, what is crossing your mind, and what have you discovered, Frances?

Frances Donald
Well, admittedly, lately it's been less laying back, and more peering forward with a ton of anxiety.

Anita Sharma
Yeah.

Frances Donald
So, you know, whenever you're doing this type of economic analysis, you try to put less weight on binary political outcomes. And after 2016, you're going to find a lot of economists, and strategists, and investors, really hesitant. Chris Jackson is the best of the best, and I watch him, and I still get nervous about saying, "I'm gonna put a trade on, because Biden will absolutely win." That's really challenging to do, after we've been scarred by Brexit and the 2016 Trump elections. But in this election, investors and markets have these additional complications. And one of them is this mail-in voting.

Anita Sharma
Yeah.

Frances Donald
So, typically, we'd be waiting on November 3rd, 4th, to find out the response, and would be able to activate either putting on risk or taking it off. But we know we're preparing for a week, two, maybe longer, of not knowing the election outcome. And actually, these markets, when you look at the odds of volatility, have priced in higher volatility not just for November, but into December as well. So, we know that we're in this heightened period. We've heard comments about the possibility of a contested election. These are issues that markets have to contend with.

Now, on the flip side of that, when we look at this market, what we know, we have a pretty good sense that markets have already priced in, or mostly priced in, a Dem sweep.

Anita Sharma
Okay.

Frances Donald
They follow the polls. We can see this by looking at underlying sectors. And if we have mostly priced in a Dem sweep, then it means if we get a Dem sweep, not a large market reaction already priced in. If we get any variant of that, then you can get a big market reaction. So, generally, how I feel heading into the next few weeks—and we're already seeing that in the last couple of days—is the market saying, maybe we got a little bit ahead of us, we should allocate a greater probability to the idea this is not a Dem sweep. And this is, I think, why you get big moves like we did today, over three percent down on the S&P.

Anita Sharma
Exactly. I'm looking at the headlines right now. DOW's sinking more than 900 points, worst drop since June. We're keeping an eye on the Coronavirus cases, Chris. And as you said, that's really where a lot of Americans, and I'm sure Bruce would concur, a lot of Americans—and Canadians too, perhaps—would say that the current president has dropped the ball. So, how does this jive with your polling thus far? Keeping in mind, like you said, these are polls, and they are really looking in the rearview mirror, not really looking ahead. Is that right?

Chris Jackson
That's right. But one of the things we've seen this year is, unlike 2016, which was, actually, there's a lot of volatility in public opinion data. Hillary Clinton went from leading Trump by just a few points, leading him by almost 10 points, back to leading him by about three points over the course of, essentially, the last four weeks of the campaign. This year, it's been remarkably stable. And one of the places we've seen that stability is views of Trump's handling of Coronavirus. We talk about Trump and his job approval ratings, essentially, in terms of how they line up with his overall approval. Overall, his job approval has been very stable, between 40 and 45 percent. But his approval of his handling of Coronavirus has been very steady below that mark, right? So, it means that even people who generally like him, and think he's done a good job, don't think he's done a good job here, in this space. And because it's become such the central focus of the election, that's presenting him in, essentially, his worst possible light, making it harder for him to make his case about why he would be re-elected. And that's compared to the economy, which is his good ground. That's where people, actually, who don't like him give him credit. And if he'd been able to focus on the economy, he'd be able to make a stronger case for his re-election. But even Donald Trump, the master of spin, the master of his own brand, can't spin the Coronavirus.

Anita Sharma
Very interesting. And Bruce, you know, you're wearing a political hat, as a former US Ambassador to Canada. But you're also a Goldman guy. You've been on Wall Street for many years. So, your perspective is equally fascinating, with respect to, yeah, when you look at, it's traditionally a Republican president, or is it, where as an investor one would say, okay, I'm good with this President or this administration being rather amenable, if you will, with respect to lower taxes, giving the juice to Wall Street investors, having the market drive higher and higher. But in this case—well, in all cases—I know you're a Democrat, and you've got your money on, and your support behind Biden. Why is Biden going to be the guy to take us forward? Is it just because he doesn't make the gaffs that Donald Trump makes? Is that good enough?

Bruce Heyman
Look, it's much more complicated than that, but let's just start. And I think everybody here is in agreement, hopefully, on saying that the key issue is this pandemic. And Donald Trump so dropped the ball on this in such an incredible way, that no leader in the world has followed his path. And he, you know, I just can't understand. And I guess one day, maybe, we'll figure out why it is he lied to himself, the American people, his party, everybody, to take us down this path. We know he did that, because he is recorded by Bob Woodward saying exactly what we know today, how dangerous this virus actually has turned out. But what's going to happen is that we're going to have a plan, we're going to have strategy, we're going to put it together. The thing is that with Joe Biden, at 47 years experience—which I think Donald Trump thinks it's some kind of negative—when you have seen what he, Donald Trump, has done to the State Department, to the EPA, to the various agencies of the US government, to our relations globally, and now we have a pandemic, and high levels of unemployment, you're going to have to have somebody who knows the ways of Washington to begin to get to work right away, and put a team around him that has experience. And all of the experience around this team that Joe has put together. He has, you know, people that I know directly, from working either in the Obama administration or working on the campaign. I can tell you that they can get to work right away and start doing things. They're going to need to, because a lot is going to be thrown at this next administration, and it's going to be really challenging. From a business perspective, just so you know, look, we had the proposal—even Donald Trump talked about it in his last election—about an infrastructure campaign that he was going to bring to Congress. He had Congress. He had a Republican House and Senate. But no, he went with the tax cuts first, and not the infrastructure plan. Well, the tax cuts were a sugar high, basically, for a lot of people, especially with the corporate repurchase that was done by many corporations. So, now we find ourselves, I think we're going to have to have an infrastructure plan get put forward. I think there's going to have to be a stimulus program, and I think that's what Frances was talking about, that if the Democrats do sweep, he's going to have the ability to do that. But if he doesn't get the Senate, working with Mitch McConnell is going to be a bit more challenging, I can say the least.

Anita Sharma
And thank you, Ambassador. And Frances, we've seen that, right? We've lived through the years of the former US President Barack Obama going up against Mitch McConnell and company, the, just the, the partisanship that we've seen, just the acrimony in DC. Trump said he would come in, he would "drain the swamp," as it were. But the ambassador, the former ambassador, really alluded to a lot of the problems that may, potentially, still be there. I want to go back though, Chris. Chris's slide number nine, the President's approval rating, still holding decently at 42 percent. Chris, the only thing I can see, here, that pops up for me is just two other one-term presidents on that list: George Bush Senior, with a 33 percent approval rating, and Jimmy Carter at 35. I know you said that's a solid number for the, the President, but it's pretty close. It's pretty darn close to what Bush Senior and Carter were going into for the second election.

Chris Jackson
Yeah, President Trump is in a little bit of a limbo position. He's not as weak as the one-term presidents who lost in recent American history, but he's not as strong as the incumbents who won. So, he's really in this sort of position where it could go either way. And that's why this is, actually, a contested election. It's not like in 1980, where everyone sort of thought Carter was a dead man walking, unfortunately, and it's not like in 1992, where, even after the first Gulf War, and George, the Senior Bush, was really popular, ran right into a recession, and saw his numbers decline precipitously. Trump's in this weird position where he's holding his ground, holding his water, but isn't really as strong as the guys who've been able to win out and come back. And I think the big question mark for us is, is that base of support he's been able to retain, is that enough to win an election, particularly when, essentially, everyone else has started to unify against him.

Anita Sharma
Frances, we know a lot of Canadian business owners—thanks, Chris—we know a lot of Canadian business owners are on this panel by a webcast with us tonight, and as Antoinette welcomed them, so do I. A lot of questions: if it's Trump, what does it mean? If it's Biden, what does it mean? We saw in the first four years just how contentious the US President has been, for lack of a better word, with respect to tariffs, with respect to dealing with Ottawa, as well as the province of Ontario. I'm sure you've got a big book on this side, a known book if you will, dealing with the current administration. Then you've got another book which would crack up and investigate how the situation would look under a Biden win. Let's start with US President Donald Trump. What does that mean for the Canadian economy if he gets that second term? What are you pricing in? What are you looking forward to, or not looking forward to?

Frances Donald
Anita, it's not just about who has the spot as the President. It's how much can they pass, how much regulation can be passed, what does the fiscal stimulus look like. And that will depend on who takes the Senate. I say who takes the Senate, because we're assuming that the House goes Democrat—and Chris, you should really just throw me out the window if that's not a right assumption—but we're operating with that.

Chris Jackson
No, that's pretty likely.

Frances Donald
Okay, great. I'm glad I'm on the right page, there. So, the really big question for us is the combination of those two developments. So, Trump with a Republican Senate is a very different story than Trump with a Democrat Senate, and vice versa. And not just that, but what is the majority within the Senate? Do they get to over 60 seats, and then we don't have to worry about filibusters, and the extent of legislation can be passed more aggressively? So, these are the components of the story that will determine our economic outlook.

Now, that said, when we think about geopolitical risks and we think about the trade picture, that is generally driven a little bit more by who is in that presidential spot, whose administration it is. And I've got to tell you, you know, between Vice-President Biden or President Trump, I basically have, you know, hawkish and deglobalization, or more hawkish and more deglobalization. The trend of deglobalization will exist, will continue, in my opinion, no matter who wins, no matter how many seats go in either direction. This is not just a US story; this is a global story. And it has implications for Canada in two direct and indirect channels.

The first one is that if we were to see by surprise a Red Sweep, I do think that would be positive for the US dollar, which means you get a weaker Canadian dollar. That's the number one impact to Canada from this election. In my view, and particularly in the next year, any big moves in currencies have tremendous impact on not just how Canadian assets trade, but what happens to our underlying economy. Even how much you and I spend at the grocery store on fruits and vegetables is determined by that Canadian dollar. So, the FX channel is the one that I'm most concerned about being relevant in the next six months or so.

But the other one is that as we continue down the deglobalization path—and sure, the style may be different, but I suspect the substance will be similar—we are going to see greater regionalization of trade, which is, yes, unfortunately, I think Canada and the US will be doing more business together, not less. Canada's tried to diversify trade; it's going to go in reverse. That's also inflationary. So, what we should be expecting is—remember, you know, the pandemic was the second deglobalization shock after tariff—we should be expecting, and the survey data tells us, 30 precent of North American companies are relocating their supply chains back home. That's inflation. They're going to pay more for their inputs, they're going to pass some of it on to us. So, these might seem subtle. I know that people ask me this question; they want me to say, "Oh, so-and-so is going to rewire NASA," or "This is what it means for autos," and there's some minutiae under the surface that I think is really important. And maybe I'll have Bruce answer some of those sector issues. But where I'm really, really focused here is on that inflation, deglobalization front, and what it means for FX. And if you do get a Red Sweep, it is more consistent with a stronger dollar, and we in Canada would probably feel that first.

Bruce Heyman
So, in the investment world, we always talk about tail risk, meaning the things that happen that are more at the extremes, or even the most extreme, what they call a Black Swan event. Donald Trump and his behaviour is a daily Black Swan event. He creates risk, and the risk to relationships, because there's no value of a relationship. He does not value relationships; he looks at them as disposable, and he's completely transactional. And the transactions that he wants are created in his mind. Every day, he comes up with something, he thinks of something. And he is typically off base from the Republican Party, and he's off base entirely on any rationale. So, when he comes in and slaps on tariffs on steel, aluminum, the basis of US national security, then he works out a deal with you on the new NAFTA, then comes back and hits you six weeks later after the implementation of the new NAFTA on aluminum tariffs, then says, "Oh my gosh, I'm not gonna... I'm gonna take those off," when he sees retaliation, and then he's to slap on a limitation on N95 masks, when you need them so much, or the threat of troops at the border, or during the NAFTA negotiations, he said, "I'm going to get your auto industry, because I know that's where it hurts you." That is not a relationship, okay? That is not a partnership; that is strictly a transactional set of decision-making.

And so, what happens with Canada in a second Donald Trump term is a lot less of this rational thinking. And no offense to the two of you, or such great rational thinkers, I think you have to think completely irrationally about the things that he may do and propose. Because he has no guardrails anymore. He has all enablers around him. The people who were stopping him initially, in the first part of his administration, were either fired, or left, or put in jail, or something. So, he has gone through all of those. So, we are now at the extreme of himself for a second term, and I think it's high-risk for Canada, it's high-risk for the world, it's high-risk, because he's an autocratic dictator who does not believe in the rule of law, using his own attorney general for his personal attorney. He's been impeached...

Anita Sharma
All right, Ambassador.

Bruce Heyman
...so, look, I think you've got a big problem in Canada if he's re-elected.

Anita Sharma
Ambassador. And yet, I go back to slide nine, with everything you've said, and I look at this approval rating that Chris brought to our attention, 42 percent, rather steady. Quickly, how do you...

Bruce Heyman
Wait a minute. Mark Twain said, "It's easier to fool the people than to convince them they've been fooled." We have a TV talk show personality, you know, reality show guy, who has been in the fooling business all along. His casinos failed, many of his business deals; he's a showman. And there are a lot of people who want to believe that they can become instant millionaires, and he has sucked them into this. And that's where the pandemic, where he tells them, in his magical thinking, "It's going to disappear, it's going to be gone, it's a hoax, 15 people, it's gone, summer, it's heat, it's gone." He's now caused 225,000 people to die in the US. So, that's, that polling is about his showmanship.

Chris Jackson
I do want to elaborate on that, just a touch. I think what Donald Trump has done is he's made a lot of subtext in American society the text. It's like, there's been a lot of dog whistles in American politics for the past several generations that he's brought to the surface. And I think the thing that he's been able to do effectively, and he's been particularly effective because he, essentially, has a whole media ecosystem behind him—I mean, FOX News functionally operates as a wing of the government in many ways—is that he speaks to a certain anxiety of a whole class of Americans who believe in a certain structure of society that doesn't seem to exist anymore. And this is particularly white men, particularly, sort of blue-collar white men, traditional household types, who saw themselves, essentially, as the centre of society for all of American history. And then, particularly with Barack Obama's election, all of a sudden, we're no longer the centre of American society. And I think Barack Obama's presidency helped mobilize this, with The Tea Party, Hillary Clinton's nomination and run in 2016 added fuel to the fire, with not just a minority running things, but now a woman running things. And I think that's what Trump has been able to speak to, is he represents this traditional view of masculinity, of being strong, of being tough, of not having to take crap from anyone, of never having to apologize. And that is actually very, very appealing to a lot of people who see their view of the right way things should be as being under attack. And this is the reaction, essentially, Trump is that reaction, he's that reaction personified. And yes, he's a showman. Yes, he's more adept at manipulating the media than any political figure since probably Ronald Reagan. But that only happens because this underlying substrate exists, this underlying ferment exists, of people who are just worried about their place in the world, and don't necessarily see their future in society.

Bruce Heyman
You're so diplomatic. I mean, the way you phrased that. Racism, misogyny, Islamophobia, this is what we're talking about. I mean, this is what he's, he's his dog whistle, this is what he's touching, you know, when he talks about the "Proud Boys stand by," or when he says "good people on both sides" in Charlottesville, when you have, you know, the Nazi flags and the Confederate flags flying against people who are peacefully protesting, or when he tells, you know, women in suburban America, "they're coming to your suburbs, they're coming to take it away from you." I mean, that's what you're saying. I mean, he is using that language. And you've said it so diplomatically, but I thought, you know, I would just lay it out there. Because I think this is a really high-risk moment for America, and that's why you're having all these people coming out to vote, because they are recognizing the risk to our system and to our democracy. And I just think he'll be the extreme of himself, and I just don't want anyone to, you know, normalize this in any way, in our conversation about what the risks are. Because I think the risks are profound.

Chris Jackson
No, I totally agree with you, Ambassador, that, you know, what Donald Trump speaks to is a world where women, People of Colour, people of different gender identities, are all second-class citizens. And I think that that is a, not a good place for the world. But that's the power, is that he's speaking to these people who are feeling left behind.

Bruce Heyman
I agree with you. Yeah.

Anita Sharma
So. So, you....

Chris Jackson
And I think, you know, it's been....

Anita Sharma
Gentlemen, the thing is that...

Chris Jackson
Oh, sorry. Yeah.

Anita Sharma
No, hat's okay, that's okay. It's a fascinating, you know, discussion as, you know, as we go down that one path. Frances, I want to bring you in, here ,with respect to, if you take off your economist hat for a second and you delve into these social issues, if you will, that are coming to the forefront here, how does that colour, no pun intended, your analyses moving forward, or does it?

Frances Donald
So, unfortunately, and much to my husband's chagrin, I never take off my economist's hat, and I sleep with it on. And that is the lens through which I see the whole world.

Anita Sharma
Well done. Well done.

Frances Donald
And I have to tell you that, you know, I think I feel as passionately as the Ambassador, and as Chris. But one of the greatest challenges in your role, when you're making investment decisions, is to separate your passion and your concern into, how do I complete my fiduciary duty to my end clients, and make decisions that benefit them and the promise that I've made to them? And that, I think, has been very challenging for the field as a whole. Now, that has been exacerbated by this COVID-19 shock, specifically, which every economist will tell you, exacerbated the really painful inequalities that exist in Canada and in the United States. Racial, income, gender inequalities, were all worsened by the COVID-19 shock. Those who were least capable of bearing the pain, physical, financial, were the ones that received the bulk of it. So, in some ways, for years, economists like myself, and others, have been pleading for policymakers in Canada and around the world to take childcare as an economic necessity seriously, to recognize that systemic racism was an economic barrier. And even as I sit on Bay Street and try to make money in the TSX, these issues are so obviously an impediment to everybody's future growth and benefit.

So, my hope is that as we have discussions at the Empire Club about how powerful, important, how emotional we might feel, that it is a call to action for us to try to rectify, at least start talking about them more openly. So, even with my economist hat on, I am very capable of recognizing there is a lot of work to do. And one would hope for the economy that we're building a more inclusive and sustainable future. So, certainly, when I say I want to make sure that we get the FX call right following the election, that is not to be complacent about the future growth risks, the future risks to equality that exist in our countries. It's to say right now, today, what do I have to do when I go into work? Let's get the trade right.

QUESTION & ANSWER

Anita Sharma
Getting the trade right, that's one of the main preoccupations for a lot of traders and businesspeople on this webcast. On that note, Frances got the last word. Frances, Donald, former US Ambassador Bruce Heyman, Chris Jackson, thank you so much for your insight on this great panel discussion. Are y'all ready to take some questions now? We have a lot of 'em.

Bruce Heyman
Man.

Chris Jackson
Yeah, let's hear it.

Anita Sharma
All right, let's do it. So, this comes from Sitara; she is handling this for us—great team at Empire Club, Zimmer, Antoinette, Ashley, thank you. Let's get to this one from Antoinette: how concerned should we be with how the mail-in ballots, Chris, they'll be counted, especially with what we hear from the Senate? Can that impact the outcome for the Dems, for the Democrats?

Chris Jackson
Yes. And I think that we're in a situation where there's a lot of things that can potentially impact the outcome. I do think that we've seen so many ballots coming in early that that may not be quite as dire a situation as we may have thought early on. But I think as Bruce was talking earlier, it really depends on how the next six days play out...

Anita Sharma
M'hm (affirmative).

Chris Jackson
...how many people actually show up to vote in person. And it could, particularly in some of these states where the margins might end up being very close, these kind of things like what gets counted and what doesn't get counted may be the thing that makes the difference. In a state where it's a big margin, probably doesn't matter, right? Michigan, Wisconsin right now, it's probably not going to be that big of a deal because it looks like Biden's likely to win those by a relatively large margin. But in Florida, which may come down to a single percentage point difference? Might make a big difference there.

Anita Sharma
Okay. Ambassador, I'm going to throw this question to you. It's from Sarah: should Biden win, just dovetailing from what Chris just talked about, should he win, do you think he would include – and we know that Frances also touched on just that huge divide in politics there in D.C. – would he include Republicans in his cabinet to help bridge the political divide to some extent, similar to what Clinton did, i.e., the quote-unquote "team of rivals," Ambassador?

Bruce Heyman
It wouldn't surprise me. Although, you know, I'm not privy to who his short list is or isn't, at this stage. But here's one of the first things he is – he went down to Georgia, talked about unity, he talked about unity at Gettysburg. He's trying to send a message that we are a country divided and we need to come together. And I think that that would contribute to a positive outcome, if he did do that. Look, I think he's going to need Republicans to speak up very quickly, especially if we have to institute a national mask policy, or roll in some type of lockdowns, or whatever else the experts recommend to him. I think he's going to need Republicans at his side recommending the same. And I think that would make it more palatable and maybe more accepted by a broader group of Americans. So, we'll see. I wouldn't be against it at all.

Anita Sharma
All right, Frances, maybe we won't have that great divide moving forward. I want to lob this question to you, if I can. And just very quickly, as a preamble: I was on a call last night with a couple of Canadian investors who do a lot of work in the US. They are afraid. They are worried about potential tax hikes that could hit Canadian business, people working in the US. And with that said, we have this question from Michael. Frances, he asks: is the stock market discounting the possible tax increases that will likely happen if the Democrats have a clean sweep?

Frances Donald
Absolutely. The stock market is discounting the possibility of higher taxes. Why? Because this economy is still, by several measures, in a recession. It will require massive amounts of additional stimulus. It is not an economy that can withstand any tax hikes, I would say, for at least two years, particularly corporate tax hikes. Now, in addition to that, some of the original Biden platform really focused on how we would fund some of their program spending programs. But we are entering a little bit of a paradigm shift now, in which we recognize we can run very large budget deficits and high levels of debt, because interest rates are extraordinarily low. And guess who's buying up all of the debt? Central banks in the United States and in Canada. So, there will be less of a call to fund additional spending programs via higher taxes. So, I am not expecting, even in a dead sweep, that we see corporate tax hikes, or even that income tax hike on over $400K for at least two years. Now, if I'm wrong; and again, you know, I started this by saying this market has priced in peak Biden, peak fiscal, peak Dem sweep. If we're wrong, there's only one way that market will go. So, it is an important risk. But I do not think it's a risk that we're going to have to contend with in the next 6-to-12 months. What we need to focus on now is that fiscal package, what is it going to be, and unfortunately, the progression of the virus.

Anita Sharma
Okay, thank you for that, Frances. I think this one's more of a policy question, so I'm going to leave this out for whoever wants to jump on this first— every man and woman for himself here. But the question's from Mary: if Trump loses the election, how much damage can he do between the election and when Biden would take over? Why does the US leave such a long time between an election and when a president actually takes over? Who would like to chomp on that one?

Bruce Heyman
I'm fearful of what he might do. You know, look, there was a day they were joking and, you know, they took the W's out of the typewriters in the White House as a spoof on George W., right? So, the reality is, he could do a lot of damage. And the concept of a transition is to make sure the next government taking over is fully educated, equipped, understands, and this, like in a relay race, you can effectively hand that baton over to somebody else and start running. And I'm deeply concerned, based on his language and behaviours, that that baton handoff may not go as smoothly as we'd like. And he could be very bitter. There could be a lot of things that he could do to really disrupt things. And so, I'm hopeful that, you know, if he loses, he is the better man, and stands up and works to make a smooth transition. But there's no indication that he's going to do that.

But, you know, I am confident that Joe Biden's going to win, though, on Tuesday, and he has a really strong team around him. And the transition, you know, hopefully, will go well. And there are a lot of core civil servants—but you saw, even this last week, the President was trying to make moves that he could fire the civil servants. Which, you know, would be a real disaster, I think, for us all.

Anita Sharma
All right. So, just getting back to that whole idea, I like that term you used, "passing the baton." That's, that's tradition, that's going to stay for some time, and one would think, it's in place, so that it is a smooth transition, so the newcomer has an opportunity to get the proper files, to sort of sit down with the current president, and make sure it is a smooth transition. Bit of an unprecedented time right now, right, Ambassador?

Bruce Heyman
Yeah, very unprecedented, given his language and style, in which he said, the only way I can lose is, you know, if it's an unfair election. Well, we know the polling, and we know where people's minds are, we know what people are doing. That is not true at all. And so, my belief is the only way to actually deal with him and the nefarious activities that are taking place, with regard to dismantling mail machines, and ballot drop-offs in Houston, and all this craziness, is to overwhelm them with the numbers. And such that, you know, the other Republicans standing there who want to preserve their future careers will turn and say, "Look, it's over, it's done, you've got it, we gotta move along."

Chris Jackson
Yeah, I think a point Bruce just made, is actually really important to keep in mind, is while the President is the key actor, he's not the only actor.

Anita Sharma
M'hm (affirmative)

Chris Jackson
And public opinion tells us that the large majority of the public wants the peaceful transfer, wants the loser to sort of concede gracefully, and the winner to be able to sort of take over. They don't want the loser to, essentially, try to monkey around with what's happening. But Donald Trump has shown many times that he doesn't actually care about what the majority thinks. He's very much playing to his base. So, it's really going to come down to what the rest of, if Biden does win, what the rest of the Republican establishment decides to do. They've decided for the last four years to, essentially, go along with Trump, believing that's sort of their best path to power. But if Trump loses, if Trump loses in large numbers, does the Republican establishment—which will continue to control the Senate for the next three months—even if they lose the Senate for the next term, what do they decide to do? Do they decide to try to double down, much like Mitch McConnell has done, getting a new Supreme Court Justice in? Or do they try to actually start taking that pivot to a new Republican post-Trump Republican Party? I think that's a big question. I don't think anyone really knows what that's going to look like yet. But that's, I think, going to really determine what that transition period looks like.

Anita Sharma
All right, Frances, let's bring it home. Again, we touched on this earlier in our discussion on the panel side. From Bill, he wants to know: what kind of opportunities could Biden open up for Ontario—we're talking energy, perhaps tech, health—does it present additional challenges under a Biden administration?

Frances Donald
So, not to be lazy, but I'd actually like to hear Bruce's response on this, because he probably has a better understanding of Biden's specific sector plans and how they would relate to Ontario, and then I can provide a wrap-up comment after that. You're welcome, Bruce. Here I am, just throwing it over to you.

Bruce Heyman
So, I'm going to start back with the pandemic. So, I think the first thing that we need to do is reach out to Canada and other allies and recognize that this is not a problem that we can solve by ourselves individually, that we have to have a collective solution. And then, we're going to have to build standards that we can work on together, such that we can accept people from the US to Canada, and Canada to the US, and not have just differences, here. That will also involve an increase in bringing—I know, to North America, I know the US is going to have to do it—to bring self-dependence in terms of its access to medical equipment, supplies, and drugs; that we're highly dependent still on China. And that's going to change pretty significantly, I think, regardless of who wins this next administration.

The big change is going to be in environment, climate, et cetera. You know, Joe Biden has made it very clear: we're going to rejoin the Paris Accord, we're going to focus on alternative energies, we're going to reduce carbon. I think that is a huge job creator if we embrace it, accept it for what it is, and dive into it. And I think Canada has a lot of opportunity to work with us as partners to drive that outcome, in terms of electric vehicle production together, and the way we're going to make things together, do things together. And then, you know, I think that you're going to then go on from there.

I do not see ending any specific sector. I know somebody, you know, thinks, and there was some comment with regard to, you know, other energy sectors. They're not ending in the morning. But I definitely think there's going to be a pivot here. And if you get a Biden administration, I wouldn't be surprised if a large part of an infrastructure plan includes a lot of alternative energy infrastructure.

Frances Donald
I would add just one final comment on that: so, one of the tremendous opportunities that exists for Canada within this tumultuous political environment is to attract and retain highly skilled labour, both to Ontario and across Canada. So, Canada actually suffers from the fact that we have too few children. I have one, I'm exhausted, I get it, I think I'm done. But we fundamentally rely on immigration as one of our major drivers of growth, and this is particularly true in Ontario.

Now, how do we make sure that we can continue to attract very high levels of talent? We need to make our home a place that people want to be, we need to encourage government incentives, in order to allow for high levels of immigration. Montréal looks like it could become a tech and gaming centre that attracts huge amounts of labour. It's very affordable, they have great childcare, they have a more affordable city. This is an opportunity to take those that, no matter what policy outcomes we get in the United States, who need a place to start a business, who need a place to work, who are attracted to a different lifestyle, that can be Canada. We have to make some policy shifts to get there, but this is a massive opportunity for us as a country, and one that I hope we take advantage of.

Anita Sharma
All right, Frances, thank you so much for that. Chris, I want to toss this question over to you from Mark: what is the chance that Trump would attempt to get the senate legislatures to name electors and/or foment unrest and perhaps violent unrest? Do you want to take that question?

Chris Jackson
I mean, trying to guess what Trump's going to do I think is a little bit of a fool's game. He's a bit of a wild card; he'll do what he sort of feels like doing in any particular moment. I think what's more important is to focus on what the other institutions will do, and what the public will allow. And what we do see is, while there are significant numbers of Americans who are, who tell us that they're going to be unhappy with the results if the other side wins, there are relatively few people who say that they're going to do, you know, just outright illegal activities. You know, if Trump wins, I think we'd see mass protests, much like we saw after he won in 2016. But there isn't a large number of Democrats who are saying they're going to start, you know, engaging in domestic terrorism. And while there are some figures on the Right, like the Proud Boys that were mentioned earlier, that are really sort of in the realm of domestic terrorism, we're actually talking about very few individuals, in terms of the actual population. And the real, I think, the check that exists is the American electoral system is actually extremely diffuse, it's extremely federated, really, it's 51 different systems, each state and the District of Columbia. And Trump would have to co-op a large majority of them to do some of the things that they've been talking about doing. And it seems really hard to see how he'd be able to do that, beyond the occasional bad actor, do that systematically enough to really change the outcome, especially if he's handed a major popular vote loss like we expect to see next week.

Anita Sharma
All right. I've got one final question that I want to get to. I'm going to lob this to the former ambassador. It's from Rick: what overall effect will Trump have on the markets in the US and Canada, if he contests the election? And you made a joke—but I don't even know if you're really joking, Bruce, with respect to that, yes, the election's on Tuesday. But is it over on Tuesday? And what are the implications for the market? We know Frances touched on that as well. What is the Street saying? I know you have your ears to the ground on Wall Street and Bay Street.

Bruce Heyman
So, you know, in all those years that I worked at Goldman and worked with clients—and I think that the guests here may concur—that if you increase uncertainty, and you make people uneasy about the path ahead where they can't see it, then that markets don't like that. They just don't like that. And what happens in your mind when you have uncertainty, you start blowing things up to the highest risk component that you can think of. Fear is a terrible thing for markets. We saw it, you know, in the spring of this last year, how markets can react to fear, and the unknown of the path ahead. And so, I think the more certainty that we can provide, and the more certainty the President-elect can provide about the path ahead, with regard to, as Frances said, taxes, and the timing, and the implementation, what budgets look like, et cetera, the continuity of the US government, given it's the largest economy in the world—the reserve currency of the world, with the US dollar—is, would be highly destabilizing if it goes on for a period of time, and it doesn't look like there's a path to come out of it.

Now, we did have this contested election. It wasn't really contested; it was just down to Florida, 537 votes, and Hanging Chads, and everything. But it was still done with decorum and respectability. Even though people were anxious and fighting for their side, it was still done with the rule of law, and once the Supreme Court made a decision, you know, Al Gore stepped back. Donald Trump has given every indication that he's willing to throw the hand grenade back inside the room. And, you know, that's a high-risk move for markets, I think, unfortunately. I hope we don't get there, by the way. I don't think we're gonna get there. I'm thinking that we're going to know who it is, and I think it's going to be overwhelming—and I'll go with Chris's three-quarter probability or more, and I'm in that camp. And I think that it's going to be, you know, a good week for democracy, and a good week for US-Canada relations rebalancing themselves. And I'm really, I've moved from anxious optimist to cautious optimist.

Anita Sharma
All right, cautious optimist is the call of the day, as far as the Ambassador is concerned. Frances, you know, you've got your ear to the ground as well. You're in the trenches as we speak. The fair trade's been massive, has been massively exhausting, I count myself in that group. But it's also been massively rewarding. The Ambassador and Chris just touched on just a lot of the volatility we've seen, contest or no contest. It certainly is going to be, is it going to be a new beginning. Your biggest fear is gridlock, right?

Frances Donald
Look, we're going to go through, whether it's six days, or two weeks, or six weeks, of a lot of uncertainty. We then, to your point, have to get through until we have our elected officials actually in their seats. What do you do? You focus on themes, and trends, and trades that work no matter what. What are they? Extraordinarily low interest rates, record high deficits, ongoing deglobalization. There is a lot you can do in this market that is not just betting on the next two weeks of equity volatility, which most portfolio managers that I know, as much as we put as much space as we can in the polls, are just not doing in this environment. So, keep your investment horizon a little bit longer than the next six weeks. Don't make big bets on what the election outcome will be, focus on the long-term trends. And that, I think, is the best that we can do in this environment, at least for the time being.

Anita Sharma
Alright, Frances, thank you. And Chris, we'll give you the ultimate final word, here. We started with you and your polling analysis; we'll end with you. There is a lot of uncertainty, and Bruce also alluded to it. Boy, what a turnout early on, right? That may say it all, right there, or may not.

Chris Jackson
Yeah, you know, the data suggests that there's more enthusiasm, there's more intention to vote in this election than I've seen in the last 20 years of public opinion research.

Anita Sharma
M'hm (affirmative).

Chris Jackson
We're certainly seeing it in the early vote data, where over 70 million people have voted now, you know. So, I think that, if nothing else, this does speak to citizens of the United States' commitment to being part of democracy, being part of the system, and hopefully, that commitment can really carry us all through all of this uncertainty and anxiety to a new day, as we sort of continue forward, and hopefully make a better world for all of us.

Anita Sharma
All right, Chris Jackson, Frances Donald, former US Ambassador to Canada Bruce Heyman, thank you for your time. I think it's been a great discussion with a lot of fabulous information. Antoinette Tummillo, I also want to thank you at the Empire Club, for giving us an opportunity to offer some insight.

Note of Appreciation by Antoinette Tummillo
Thank you, Anita. You did a terrific job moderating this amazing panel. Chris, Frances, Bruce, I'm just doing this. I won't say which side I'm on; I'm not allowed to take sides, I guess, but we've been watching this election very closely. My husband's American; I won't tell you what he did in 2016, when the results were here. This house was just...all I will say.

On behalf of the Empire Club, thank you. On behalf of our event sponsors, CPA Ontario, who unfortunately couldn't be here tonight, I want to thank you all again for taking the time, sharing your insights, and, again, I'm doing this. Thank you.

Anita Sharma
Thank you, Antoinette.

Concluding Remarks by Antoinette Tummillo
So, I just want to take a second to tell you about our upcoming events. On Friday, we've got the Honourable Lisa MacLeod, Minister of Heritage, Sports, Tourism, and Culture Industries, coming at noon. And on November 3rd, at noon as well, we've got Honourable Catherine McKenna, Minister of Infrastructure and Communities. We like to spend money on infrastructure here in Canada first. And we've got a whole bunch of events for lining up that will be posted over the next few days in November. So, please go check out our website. I now call this meeting to an end. So, thank you very much. Thanks, everyone. It's been a blast.