Rishi Sunak to be Britain's first PM of color, latest school shooting: 5 Things podcast

On today's episode of the 5 Things podcast: Rishi Sunak to become Britain's first prime minister of color

Hear what he plans for the country. Plus, Florida's governor candidates hit the debate stage, reporter Bethany Rogers explains why Pennsylvania U.S. Senate candidates will debate only once, the Columbia Journalism Review's Kyle Pope looks at coverage of American gun violence in the wake of the latest school shooting and money reporter Medora Lee explains the good and bad of rising wages.

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Hit play on the player above to hear the podcast and follow along with the transcript below. This transcript was automatically generated, and then edited for clarity in its current form. There may be some differences between the audio and the text.

Taylor Wilson:

Good morning. I'm Taylor Wilson and this is 5 Things you need to know Tuesday, the 25th of October 2022. Today, a look at Britain's next Prime Minister. Plus, election debate season rolls on and more.

Here are some of the top headlines:

1. Justice Department officials have unsealed charges against 13 Chinese operatives in three so-called influence campaigns. One involves two intelligence officers accused in an attempt to obstruct a federal criminal investigation into the Chinese telecommunication's company, Huawei.

2. The Supreme Court has temporarily paused the subpoena battle surrounding Senator Lindsey Graham in Georgia. It surrounds his involvement in the State following the 2020 election.

3. And Leslie Jordan has died. The comedian and actor was best known for television roles on Hearts Afire and Will & Grace. And became a social media sensation in recent years. He was 67.

♦

Britain is set for yet another prime minister change. Former Finance Minister Rishi Sunak was selected by the country's ruling Conservative Party just seven weeks after he was beaten to the office by Liz Truss. She resigned last week amid economic turmoil in the country. Sunak will be the fifth British prime minister in just six years and the third in less than two months after Truss and Boris Johnson. He's the country's first leader of South Asian descent, its first Hindu Prime Minister, and the nation's first leader of color. He's also the youngest prime minister in modern history.

Sunak takes over with Britain in the middle of challenging economic times. Forecasters suggest its economy has already fallen into recession and the country is being hit with some of the highest energy and borrowing costs in Europe. Borrowing costs were made worse by Liz Truss as predecessors moved to aggressively cut taxes. Annual inflation in the country hit 10.1% in September, a 40-year high.

Sunak is a former banker and finance minister under Boris Johnson's government. He focused on the economy during a speech yesterday.

Rishi Sunak:

We face a profound economic challenge. We now need stability and unity. And I will make it my utmost priority to bring our party and our country together because that is the only way we will overcome the challenges we face and build a better more prosperous future for our children and our grandchildren.

Taylor Wilson:

Sunak quickly rose up the political ladder after a privileged upbringing and lucrative marriage. His wife is the daughter of the founder of one of India's largest technology companies and they have an estimated wealth of a billion dollars. Sunak has spoken often about his Indian roots and as a practicing Hindu. He said lighting candles to mark the religious festival Diwali outside the official Downing Street residents was one of the proudest moments of his career.

♦

Florida's candidates for governor hit the debate stage last night. Republican governor Ron DeSantis and Democrat Charlie Crist went at it, and it was Crist on the offensive He trails DeSantis in both polling and spending. Crist hit on abortion in his opening statement saying, "You're going to hear a stark contrast in this debate and this election. It's a stark contrast between somebody who believes in a woman's right to choose. I think that's fundamentally important, and Governor DeSantis has signed a bill that would restrict that right, even in cases of rape or incest." DeSantis weaved around abortion at times but did defend the law he signed, banning most abortions after 15 weeks of pregnancy.

Another focus for Crist was on whether DeSantis will commit to a full term as governor, saying he's committed to run for president in 2024.

Charlie Crist:

You talk about Joe Biden a lot. I understand you think you're going to be running against him. I can see how you might get confused, but you're running for governor, you're running for governor, and I have a question for you. You're running for governor, why don't you look in the eyes of the people of the State of Florida and say to them if you're reelected, you will serve a full four-year term as governor? Yes or no? Yes or no, Ron? Will you serve a full four-year term if you're reelected governor of Florida? It's not a tough question. It's a fair question. He won't tell you.

Taylor Wilson:

As for DeSantis, he repeatedly worked to link his Democratic opponent with President Joe Biden.

Ron DeSantis:

Well, listen I know that Charlie's interested in talking about 2024 and Joe Biden, but I just want to make things very, very clear, the only worn-out old donkey I'm looking to put out the pasture is Charlie Crist.

Taylor Wilson:

He specifically referenced inflation saying "It's much more expensive to replace a roof today than just three years ago, thanks to the Biden/Crist policies that unfortunately is contributing to the increase."

And the pair clashed on immigration, Governor DeSantis spent $1.5 million in Florida taxpayer money last month to fly asylum seekers from Texas to Massachusetts. Crist called that a political stunt. The move has drawn an investigation into possible human trafficking by DeSantis. And he's being sued by a Florida State Senator for misusing state funds. Still, he said he had no regrets.

♦

As for the Senate race in Pennsylvania, the first and only debate is taking place tonight between Republican Mehmet Oz, and Democrat John Fetterman. Producer PJ Elliott spoke with reporter Bethany Rogers to find out why only one was scheduled and what we can expect to see tonight.

Bethany Rogers:

Democrat John Fetterman has been recovering from a stroke that almost killed him back in May. And he's kind of had a gradual return to the campaign trail. So this was the only debate that they actually ended up getting scheduled despite the Republican candidate Mehmet Oz pushing for more time and for more events like this.

PJ Elliott:

So The Wall Street Journal reported that immigration is becoming a key component in this race. Why is that?

Bethany Rogers:

I think that Oz has tried to focus on it. I think nationally Republicans go to immigration as sort of an issue because polling has shown that it advantages their candidates when that becomes a focus of the race or an issue that voters are making decisions on. Oz has really tried to tie questions on immigration to problems of drugs and crime coming across the border.

PJ Elliott:

Bethany, aside from the battle for control in the Senate, what else is at stake in this race and the future of elections in Pennsylvania?

Bethany Rogers:

I think that some of the issues around male and voting and what former President Trump does in response to the results in Pennsylvania could be very telling. There's been some reporting saying that he's going to try to use this midterm kind of as a test case for 2024 and see if he could kind of contest some of the results here if they don't really go the way that Republicans want them to.

♦

Taylor Wilson:

Two people were killed and seven injured after a former student opened fire at a high school in St. Louis yesterday. The 19-year-old gunman shot and killed a 61-year-old woman and a 16-year-old girl at Central Visual and Performing Arts High School according to police. They also said the attacker graduated from the school last year and had no criminal history. He had almost a dozen 30-round high-capacity magazines on him and was killed by police at the scene. St. Louis Police Commissioner Mike Sack said the day's trauma will affect an entire community.

Mike Sack:

Now, this is a heartbreaking day for all of us. It's going to be tough. While on paper we might have nine victims, eight were transported and one remained. We have hundreds of others. Everyone who survived here is going to take home trauma.

Taylor Wilson:

The seven injured were all stable. Police said they included male and female students aged 15 and 16 with injuries including shrapnel and gunshot wounds. It's still not clear how the gunman was able to enter a locked school. The shooting is the 257th incident of gunfire on school grounds this calendar year, according to the K-12 school shooting database. And there have been at least 39 school shootings this year that led to injuries or deaths, according to Education Week. That's the most in a single year since the outlet began tracking such incidents in 2018.

With yet another American shooting we wanted to use this morning to consider how we cover gun violence across the country. The Columbia Journalism Review held a summit last year on how to improve coverage of gun violence. Kyle Pope is the editor-in-chief and publisher of the Review. He says they found it's important to cover gun violence as a public health crisis.

Kyle Pope:

Gun violence is a sort of daily public health crisis in America that tends largely to go uncovered until one of these high-profile events comes up. And we're not saying that these things don't deserve coverage. We're saying that we're living in a kind of pandemic of gun violence and that it deserves daily sustained attention that it's not getting. More than a hundred people die in America every day from gun violence. And it is a health crisis and it affects disproportionately marginal communities and communities of color. And we think it needs to be framed that way and it's just not. And the sad fact is that there's not a community in America that's unaffected by this.

We're not arguing that this isn't a terrible thing that happened or that it doesn't deserve coverage. All we're arguing is that this is happening every single day, literally without fail in the country. And that all those other people who are being victimized and all those other communities that are being sort of attacked by this deserve attention from the press as well.

Taylor Wilson:

You can find more of Kyle on Twitter @kylepope.

♦

There's some good economic news as wages are rising on average, but that could also bring bad news. PJ Elliott spoke with money reporter, Medora Lee to find out why.

Medora Lee:

There are different measures of wages, but one of the ones that a lot of people look at is Employment Cost Index, and that rose 5.1% in the second quarter annually. That's below the inflation rate, but it was the fastest pace since the series began in first quarter 2002.

PJ Elliott:

Medora, you wrote that this is a good thing for workers but not so much for inflation. Can you go more into that?

Medora Lee:

Workers will demand more higher wages because they realize that their money's not going as far as they had hoped, and so they'll ask for more money. And so the companies will give them higher pay, but they have to pass that cost through, so they'll charge higher prices for that. And so this is what they call the wage-price spiral.

PJ Elliott:

So what if anything can be done to stop the wage spiral?

Medora Lee:

We have to get inflation down. And to do this, the Fed doesn't really doesn't have very many tools. It has to raise interest rates.

PJ Elliott:

How high would rates have to go for things to stabilize?

Medora Lee:

Some top economists like former Treasury Secretary Lawrence Summers, and then some of the economists at Deutsche Bank, think that the Fed funds rate has to probably move to at least 5%, maybe even higher. It just depends on whether we have any more shocks that could push inflation higher.

Taylor Wilson:

Thanks for listening to 5 Things. You can find us seven mornings a week right here, wherever you're listening right now. Thanks to PJ Elliott for his great work on the show, and I'm back tomorrow with more of 5 Things from USA TODAY.

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Sunak to be Britain's next PM, St. Louis school shooting: 5 things podcast