The headline is, I'm sure you saw this, Brooke, "I Know Firsthand Why Graham Platter Should Not Be a US Senator." Do stories like these or do, do columns like these matter at this point? Do the people of Maine feel like they, they know what they need to know about Graham Platter?

Platter?Our Boston Money and Power reporter Greg Ryan is actually on the ground today in Maine talking to a bunch of voters, and the overwhelming sentiment that he has gotten back from these Democratic voters is that they're not happy about, you know, the, the steady drip of scandal that surrounded Graham Platner.

But they're willing to hold their nose and vote for him because it's so important to them to topple Susan Collins, the, who's seeking a sixth term, and, you know, get those Democrats on the board in this push to, to retake the Senate in the midterms.

And so I think you're seeing, you know, nobody's, nobody's happy about this, but I think you're seeing a number of people willing to look past it and focus on his message.

Mm-hmm.

And he is finding a lot of support with a campaign that's focused on criticism of billionaires and the political establishment.

He's called for universal healthcare, higher taxes on the rich, and he's really tapping into that voter anger around rising costs and people in Washington who don't necessarily seem to be making it better.

And so I think you do see people willing to sort of put his personal past in one corner and really focus on those messages that he's talking about.

So with office as the dominant stress story, how is that showing up in what you're monitoring? And are there other property types that are raising flags for you?

Yeah.

It's clear when you look at the ratings migration in surveillance that office remains the dominant stress story.

There have been fourteen SASB transactions that have been downgraded since twenty twelve, and eleven of those were secured by office properties, uh, primarily in deals that were originated pre-pandemic.

I mean, we do continue to see a widening quality split within office.

While there is, you know, still strong demand for well-located trophy-type office properties, the weaker properties in challenged markets, maybe with lower construction quality or lack of capital investment remain under pressure.

And then outside of office, we have seen downgrades limited pretty much to regional malls and, and the Park MercedProperty which sort of suffered along with the San Francisco economic environment.

Where has the most pressure been concentrated, and has there been any positive ratings movement?

I mentioned at the start that you'd written about this, but what is it that you had spotted about people's response to higher car insurance premiums?

Sure, and you've really seen insurance premiums skyrocket over the years and there's a couple of reasons for that.

But the biggest one is that cars are increasingly complex.

They are jam packed with sensors, semiconductors, from everything from the bumper to the headlights.

And so what used to be more minor fender benders are now becoming significantly more expensive repair jobs.

And so what insurers have done in reaction to that is that they're more likely to c- declare cars totaled, but they also have to reflect th- those rising repair costs and so, you know, insurance premiums have gone up alongside that.

In addition, we've also seen, of course, um, replacement cars rise, and so this is all sort of happening in tandem.

What kind of ripple effects are we likely to see? Are they, like are they, could they actually over time really have a big impact?

Walk us through what that would mean for this institution to have that amount of money disappear.

It would be really crippling.

I think we should say, too, that it's not necessarily clear that he intends to follow through on this plan of giving all that money to trade schools or what exactly that would look like.

The $2.6 billion that's been frozen is primarily for research funding, and trade schools do not do research funding.

And so it's not necessarily practical to take that bucket of money away.

and put it toward trade schools.

But certainly, I mean, in terms of moving forward with research projects, not having this money is material to Harvard.

Bloomberg's Brooke Sutherland says the university plays a vital role in its home state's economy, in its backyard, and all over the world.

So I'm guessing pretty much every private college and university around the country, Brooke, is looking to this Harvard case.

I think they definitely are.

I mean, I think there's a question of whether the administration is particularly targeting Harvard because it is so well-known and so prestigious in terms of trying to effectuate some of the change that it wants to see on college campuses, sort of making a model out of Harvard versus some of the other universities in the country.

But certainly, I think they are watching this.

very carefully.

And if they're not directly connected to this particular fight or going to see their own tax-exempt status called into question, they're likely feeling the pressure of the funding cuts.

Because NIH funding does not just go to the Harvards and the MITs of the world.

Can you give me the takeaway from that? I thought it was quite interesting is how we're looking at the economy.