>> the intersection of business and economics with a main street perspective. >> to our viewers here in the united states and to those of you joining us from around the world, welcome. we have full coverage of the stocks and the stories making headlines today. olivia stearns tells us why british retailer top shop is expanding here in new york city.

julia hymen is watching the markets as stocks climb on the republican victories. we begin with a reporter round table on the midterm elections. white house cordens phil mattingly and margaret have analysis has america looks at a new political dynamic for barack obama. phil, let me start with you. did the white house really not see this coming? >> no, mark. i think they had a good sense of what was going to happen, especially over the days leading up to the election. i do think that it ended up being the wave, the wave, the number of seats that have gone down, seven already with the possibility of two more was more than any democrats were able to comprehend going into this. but the president's political team had stayed in pretty close touch with the congressional campaign committees and had been briefing him regularly. he was calling for numbers throughout the day. was interested in it. mark, they had a sense it was coming. just didn't maybe grasp the scope of it. >> margaret, where did the democrats of the white house get this wrong? >> well, i mean so much of it

was that they just weren't able to do what they were trying to do well enough. >> they had to engage voter sentiment. >> they knew they were up against it because so many of those states that were pivotal to the senate were states that voted against barack obama. he was additional unpopular and that hurt them. and some democrats' ability to turn out the way they wanted to just didn't succeed. while republicans were able to turn out in much stronger democrats than the democrats. >> as you well know this isn't first time the president's been humbled during midterm leakses. it happened to ronald reagan, bill clinton, george w. bush. how does an administration begin to regroup when the voters have so clearly said they are not thrilled with your performance? >> the president will focus on his priorities which are trying to sustain obamacare and trying to do something on immigration reform. probably quickly before the republicans take over. then he'll look for any areas ever compromises. it will probably be things like infrastructure. roads. economic austerity. that sort of stuffer. >> phil, the congressional

leadership from both parties will be at the white house on friday. for the cameras it's going to be the picture of compromise. as you know there's been six years ever resentment and mistrust and lack of intrigue. will president obama's last two years in office be the very definition of lame duck? >> he's on the verge of it, mark. i think when you talk about relationships with members of congress, that's an area where the white house has just simply not done the job over the last six years. as you mentioned, there's a bunch of lawmakers coming in on friday. margaret mentioned while she was chuckling there are small bore areas of bipartisan compromise that are sitting out there for them to come to agreement on. however, every republican lawmaker and staffer that i have talked to over the last couple days makes the same point, there is no trust. there is no trust whatsoever that the white house is serious. white house officials scoff at that remark, it's real. it's very real in the republican conference. on the democratic side, it's almost as bad right now. look, the president overhauled his legislative affairs team and it's made a difference. a positive difference. the relationship one-to-one

between the president himself and lawmakers is nonexistent on the democratic side. and that has had major, major concerns on the congressional side of things and is not helping them move anything forward any time soon. >> phil, mark, it is true. there's not a whole lot of love loss at this point between the president's team and harry reid's team, for example. you see so many of these lawmakers like mary landrieu, who are just tremendously frustrated by the position some of the president's policies have put them in. her entering into a runoff. mark warner, so extremely close in this race that should not have been that close. and you don't see the president -- there's not that pass of the background of the president having close relationships that will pull them through. >> it's one thing to have control of congress. now republicans must show they can govern but do this with one eye on the white house in 2016. how can the g.o.p. lead knowing that any accommodation they

might make with the president might be perceived as traitorous or capitulation by their right? >> when you look at it, it is the sort of capitulations or deal makings that may carry republicans forward in a general election. the problem is then the republican who wants to run for president has to get through the primary. that will be the balancing act. how to -- how do you impress your party enough to make it to the next act without alienating swing voters. >> phil, does the road to the white house for the republicans go through texas and ted cruz? >> it might. he's definitely -- he's almost certainly going to run. he's got the infrastructure to to it. he set up a team to do it. now he's going to have the platform over the next two years. i think he's been somewhat quiet over the last couple months. wasn't heavy on the campaign trail. wasn't making a lot of inflammatory statements. over the last three days that's changed. he's grabbed the mantle again to really kind of put a lot of pressure on soon-to-be senate

majority leader mitch mcconnell. setting the tone for where he's going to be the next two years of the ted cruz is a player here whether you like it or not if you're a republican. >> phil, margaret, thanks so much. live to louisville, kentucky, presumptive senate majority leader mitch mcconnell speaking to reporters. >> worked on with the university over the last 20 years. best and biest program for the students inside kentucky, nonresidents, 10 each year. they are here today to witness what we may talk about. let me just make a couple of observations. i think what the voters were saying yesterday was a couple of things. number one, they are obviously not satisfied with the direction of the administration. but at the same time i heard a lot of discussion about dysfunction in washington. i think there are a lot of

people who believe that just because you have divided government it doesn't mean you don't accomplish anything. earlier today i got a call from the president. also from senator reid and the speaker. and ted cruz, too. which i thought you would be interested in. all of whom i think have the view that ought to see what areas of agreement there are and see if we can make some progress for the country. i always like to remind people that divided government's not unusual in this country. we've had it frequently. i think maybe even more often than not since world war ii. when the american people choose a divided government, i don't think it means they don't want us to do anything. i don't think it means tsh-i think it means they want us to look for areas of agreement. reagan never had the house in eight years. clinton didn't have the house or sfat during six of his eight

years. i can think of at least four fairly significant things done. reagan and tip o'neill saved social security for a generation. the last comprehensive tax reform. need to do that again. bill clinton and the republicans had welfare reform. and balanced the budget three years in a row. i think we ought to start with the view that maybe there are some things we can agree on to make progress for the country. on an institutional point of view, the senate needs to be fixed. i made a speech back in january, not widely covered, probably shouldn't have been widely covered, but a lot of people inside the senate paid a lot of attention to it. the senate in the last few years basically doesn't do anything. we couldn't even -- don't even vote. senator begich, who may have been defeated yesterday, had the handicap of trying to explain to the people of alaska why in six years he hasn't had a roll call vote on the floor on an amendment. the first thing i need to do is

to get the senate back to normal. that means working more. i tonight think we have had any votes on friday in anybody's memory. it means opening the senate up so that amendments are permitted on both sides. and it means occasionally burning the midnight oil in order to reach a conclusion. i can remember the way we used to get bills finished was the majority leader to announce on monday we were taking up a particular bill and we were going to finish it. finish it thursday night, friday morning, or saturday, but you have to mean it. and it's amazing what happened around midnight on thursday. people who were very aggressive on tuesday morning were awfully anxious to leave friday morning. and amendments would go away and bills would pass. another thing is to have the committees be relevant again.

if a bill comes out of committee on a bipartisan basis, that means you got both democrats and republicans who are interested in seeing it pass. so a bipartisan constituency for moving forward. now, having said that, there are differences. and we will certainly be voting on things as well that we think the administration is not fond of. they seem to have had no interest, for example, in doing anything serious on the energy front. we haven't had an energy bill in seven years. when you say energy these days, people think of the keystone pipeline. but that's only part of it. we need to embrace the energy revolution that's going on if -- in our country. promote it. it's hugely advantageous to america. not only in the area of energy independence but employment. i mean the employment figures connected with keystone are stunning.

if we would just get going. so interest's certainly going to be areas of disagreement, but that's not unusual going back to the founding of the country. so with that let me just throw it open. >> based on what the message of the voters was, many say they want to see gridlock end. what can you do, and can you assure the american people that gridlock can end under your leadership? >> the senate was the problem. not the house. the house passed over 300 pieces of legislation. many of them on a bipartisan basis. and nothing was done with them in the senate. the american people have changed the senate. so i think we have an obligation to change the behavior of the senate and to begin to function again. that doesn't guarantee that the president's going to agree with everything we do, but we are going to go back to work and actually pass legislation. i, by the way, have been called by three prominent democrats since last night. prominent democrats. >> the presumptive senate

majority leader mitch mcconnell of kentucky speaking at the university of louisville. a day after the republicans won the majority in the senate. of course they held on to their majority in the house of representatives. the republicans now controlling the united states congress. bloomberg's white house correspondentent staying with me on set through senator mcconnell's comments. margaret, he said the american people have changed the senate. we have an obligation to change the behavior of the senate. easier said than done. >> i heard him say two things. number one, they are going to press ahead on the keystone pipeline as soon as he gets a chance. number two, he wanted the senate to get back to normal. it's important to remember that it is actually senator mcconnell who sort of perfected the art form of the filibuster threat starting back in 2007 that helped get the senate to the situation it's in today. >> margaret, thank you so much. good to see you. again this press conference with senator mcconnell -- senator mcconnell is being live streamed on the web.

you can see it there. stay with bloomberg as we bring you live coverage and analysis of president obama's news conference and his take on the election day fallout. mark and john of bloomberg politics will anchor our coverage scheduled for 2:50 p.m. new york time. "bottom line" on bloomberg television coming up more on the results of the midterm elections. we'll take a closer look at the mandate ahead for republicans and for the white house. we'll be right back.

>> welcome back. republicans were able to take advantage of a wave of voter discontent to take back control of the u.s. senate. joining me from washington are jim, senior trector of communications practice at quinn gillespie and associates. and john. gentlemen, welcome to "bottom line." jim, let me start with you. what happened last night? i don't think i can put it as succinctly as that. what happened to the democrats? >> i'm not going to try to sugarcoat it.

we took a beating last night. nothing more, nothing less. so it's going to be up to us now to try to regroup and figure out where to go. but no doubt about it. we took a hard hit last night. >> ron, as was mentioned during my conversation with our white house correspondent margaret, this isn't first time that a president's been humbled by the voters in the mid terms. presidents reagan, clinton, and george w. bush went through this as well. it's to the so much now what it means for the party in control of congress. it's what it means for the last two years of the obama administration. as part of his legacy now going to be having to compromise with the republican majority? >> we'll just have to wait and see how president obama will handle this. i will say that the voters voted on president obama's policies. and the president said that himself. they also voted against gridlock. they voted against inaction in washington. when senator reid would go to the house floor and pound the

koch brothers, they didn't want any of that. they wanted actual progress. that wasn't happening. and they also blamed the president for that, too. so now that republicans have the majority, they have a chabs to -- chance to work with the president in a bipartisan way. we still have a brand building to do. voters didn't necessarily vote for republicans. so we need to convince them that we are able to govern correctly. >> jim, was last night as kentucky senator rand paul said, a repudiation of president obama's policy and leadership? >> no. i honestly don't think that's the case. i think it was repudiation against the gridlock and paralysis that currently envelopes washington. a dynamic by the way, i think was engendered by senator mcconnell. that was his strategy all along. he sillfully used it to run against it. i do not believe it was focused specifically on the president. >> jim, as you know, a lot of

the pundits were saying last night what we have is an economy that appears to be gaining momentum but not being felt by a majority of americans. sure, wall street's doing well, profits are up. corporate people are doing fine. what about the average american? they are still struggling. isn't the president in their view to blame for that because his party is in the white house and was in control of the senate, at least up until last night? >> well, i mean i got to tell you i've got more than a few criticisms about the president. i think -- and his team. i think he's done a good job of trying to steer the economy out of what was a debacle in 2007, 2008 with the greatest recession since the great depression. i understand that people still aren't feeling it. certainly if you look at the polls that's certainly the case. again i think that the administration's done -- as good a job as they can. >> ron, senator mcconnell once said his goal was to make president obama a one-term

president. he did not succeed on that front, but is his goal now to frustrate a politically weakened president at every turn? or will he, as some analysts have suggested, look to cement his own legacy by looking for ways to compromise with the white house? >> i think it's the latter. the republicans in the house and senate have exactly one year to put together legislative accomplishments before the presidential 2016 cycle takes over. and they can't start thinking about who's going to be sitting in the oval office. there is a list of legislation that they need to develop. i think that speaker boehner and mitch mcconnell should come out together with a united agenda and say this is what we are going to work on on behalf of the american people. this is what we want to work with the president on and start building that over the next year. it's not going to be easy. there will be problems. i think that's the way. >> speaking of corporate america, i'm looking at my bloomberg terminal, the market's up today. the markets like the results of last night's election?

>> i think that as i understand it, traditionally the markets go up the day after an election whether it's a democrat or republican. again, i think that if you look at it, this administration has been very, very good to wall street once we got out of the 2008 era recession. it's difficult to argue against the numbers. >> jim manly, senior director of communications practice at quinn and gillespie, and ron bonnjean, the founder of the company. both joining me from washington. thank you for your time and perspective. appreciate it. up next, we'll check the post election trading. our senior markets correspondent has an onthe markets update.

>> we are approaching 26 minutes past the hour. that means that broomberg television is on the markets.

here's our senior markets correspondent julie hyman. the story on bloomberg.com tells the story. u.s. stocks rose as republicans won control of the senate. >> there is optimism, mark, that with that control will come some more business friendly legislation and perhaps repeal of legislation that was perceived as not business friendly. could we see, for example, an excise tax on commal device makers be repealed. still an open question but there is that perception that's affecting the market today. energy and utility stocks gain the pose in the session. the dow and s&p at records. let's also talk about earnings because this continues to be part of the story as well when we are talking about stocks. time-warner shares on the list of stocks moving on earnings. the stocks up after the company reported better than estimated third quarter profit. shares are still trading below $85. that is the offer -- price at which rupert murdoch made an offer for the company over the summer. the numbers did beat estimates

after time-warner collected higher tv fees for its tv channels. also, let's look at home away shares. they are falling. the vacation home rental company reported third quarter profit that beat estimates, but fourth quarter fell short of what analysts were expecting. we'll have more "on the markets" in 30 minutes.

>> welcome back to the second half-hour of "bottom line" on bloomberg televisionment i'm mark crumpton. thanks for stay with us. voya financial beat third quarter estimates today. the new york based company reported after tax operating earnings of 5 cents a share, topping analyst' estimates. the c.f.o. joins me in studio. sir, welcome back to "bottom line." good to see you again. the shares have risen 11% since

the beginning of the year. the stock has climbed 26% over the past year. where's the strength coming from? >> let me explain to you where our performance coming from. if you look at the results for this quarter we show a 50% increase of the operateling earnings from our ongoing business if you take out one particular item. so very clearly the ongoing business is performing well and improvements are very visible. if you look at the return on equity of the company, we also see very steady progress. we reported 11.2% r.o.e. for the trading 1 months. if you compare to last year we were at 10.3%. if you compare to 2012, 8.3%. we clearly are on the path to hit our target in 2016 of 12% to 13%. the last item what i want to explain is we are doing very well with respect to the capital position of the company. the capital position of the company is growing well. we have reported risk based

capital ratio of 512%, well above our targets of 425%. that translates in capital of $1.2 billion. the excess capital generation is going well. it gives us an attractive position to buy back shares or other opportunities to return capital to our shareholders. >> there was a conference call today, the chairman and c.e.o. said the company's thinking of other considerations including in his words expansion of dividend and further investment in the business. can you elaborate further on that? how much of an expansion of dividend might be considered. what type of investment was he referring to? >> at this moment our policy have minimal. weigh out one penny per share per quarter. the reason is we have putting our excess capital to buy back shares. the position of the company is particular because we still have a shareholder -- european shareholder that owns 32% of the company that has to completely sell down. and our opportunities whether

it's big liquidity in the stock and where we are able to take away and help to take away some of the overhang of the stock. what we have done, we bought back shares at some of those official when the european shareholder is existing. we believe at this moment that's the best way to use our excess capital. the price is still below one. it's attractive moment to buy pack shares. once that situation is over anti-european shareholder is completely out, of course we have to go to a more normalize dividend yield. what you see in some of our peers in the industry. that's the ultimate objective. >> i'm speaking with the chief financial officer of voya financial. let's talk politics. there were midterm elections here in the united states. the republicans gain control of the u.s. senate. now that the g.o.p. has majorities in both houses of congress, what does that mean for long-term investors? >> let me react on it in three different ways. the course the election result is very early. so we should see what kind of new policies are come out of

d.c. in the future. the second is, our business is really a long-term business. we have policyholders. we have plan participants that stay with us for decades. and are really customers for decades of the company. we manage the company from a liability perspective, from a long term view and we are able to deal with different political environments. different economic environments. but the most important, the third aspect, that's really a bipartisan point, is it is very important that the incentives for americans to continue with savings for their retirement will stay in place and maybe even will be accelerated. why? because americans are grossly undersaving for their retirement. they are not well prepared. so we need the tax incentives. we need the incroo hes -- increases in the contributions for the 401-k limits and so on. that's a bipartisan -- this is a harm social issue and that

touches all americans. >> why do you think that is? why, as you just pointed out, the statistics bear this out, why americans not saving enough for retirement? >> well, there's a couple of reasons. and maybe one of the prime reasons is, it's very hard to make a translation between if you save for retirement and you save a certain sum of money how that translates into an income in the future. so you have a certain salary level, but after retirement you fall back. >> they don't want to think about it? >> this is a complicated topic. we are investing as a company in tools to help americans to think about what kind of income level do i get if i save at this level. should i save more? should i increase my contributions? those tools are called my orange money, personal financial, we are proud to invest in those tools. we put a lot of money behind it. and i think we were voted number one in terms of those tools by

an independent research organization in the recent past. >> let me ask you quickly before we close about the two areas that are polar opposites. something that voya's concerned about. a lot of americans, they put their retirement savings, it's lump sum. you're in the camp that says month to month would serve you better. why? >> because ultimately people are interested in a shortened payout in an income stream. because if you are only thinking about a certain sum of money, first of all you don't know what you can buy in terms of a pay out, secondly, if you just use the money by months yourself, there is a risk you might outlive your assets. that's a very sad perspective if people at the end of their lifetime fall into poverty. that's why we as a company are focused on income products. products that will translate into money. >> the c.f.o. of voya financial

joining us in stewed heo. good to see you again. >> always a pleasure. thank you. >> we'll look at the impact of the republican sweep in the midterm elections and president obama's final two years if office. "bottom line" continues in just a moment.

>> time now for today's latin america report. groupo btg, the overwhelm pub i canly -- publicly traded investment said profit rose 3.1%. hat has made auto loans turn negative. principle investments which include real estate and propray tarry trading, is a challenging scenario of uncertainties. that's your latin american report for this wednesday. in just a few minutes president obama is scheduled to hold a news conference in washington. this in the aftermath of what a

gentleman just told me, jim manly, said the democrats they got a beating last night at the hands of the republicans. let's look what this is going to mean going forward with trish. she's the anchor of street smart which starts at the top of the hour. they got a beating. >> yeah. most definitely. i think it really speaks volumes about the dissatisfaction the country has had with the president and the lack of coordination between democrats and republicans. and they really blame the president for a lot of that. >> but, trish, i just spoke to a couple of guests and the sentiment was this. the economic indicators seem to be going in the right direction. the economy seems to be gaining momentum but at its very core this turns into a pocketbook issue because people are saying, that's fine. wall street's doing well. but i don't feel it. i'm still struggling. my wages are still flat. >> this is the most hated rally ever, right? you just haven't seen the participation rates that you would normally see.

and i think that that has a lot to do with the dissatisfaction a lot of people are feeling right now. yes, the jobs rate is improving. yes, g.d.p. is growing. there are a lot of things for us to be encouraged about. yes, the stock market has had a heck of a run here. but your average american, mark, hasn't benefited from that. you look at wages, this has become a huge issue, and you're not seeing any wage inflation. someone out there in the middle of the country is saying to themselves, all right. the fat cats on wall street are benefiting from the upside in the stock market. perceived a new strengths in the economy. how has it changed my life? then they look at what has happened in washington and certainly republicans took a lot of the blame for the shutdown. ultimately as we look at how these elections played out last night, can you see there was some dissatisfaction on behalf of the president. because i think it's natural people say, ok, i blame the guy in charge. >> sure, they do.

the one heavy is the head that wears the crown. you told me during a commercial break, i was surprised, too, how close some of these races were. >> new hampshire, right? i am a new hampshire native surprised in many ways that scott brown was able to make the inroads he did there. because jean shaheen is well-known in the state. she's the former governor. she's held every office. >> why was he able to make those inroads? >> it gets back to the frustration that a lot of people have felt with this administration. this is just a knee-jerk reaction. ultimately he wasn't able to do it as we saw and the whole carpetbagger massachusetts aspect, all of this certainly didn't help him and was a very good campaign tactic on her side because as i have told you before, there's a certain bias, shall we say, against massachusetts from those granite staters. ultimately it didn't work. the fact he was able to make the inroads that he did, some coming

from the outside from massachusetts really shows you that there is frustration. >> you'll follow this more? >> we'll have more on what all this means. the president will be speaking shortly. we'll carry that live. we'll talk about where we go from here. >> trish, top of the hour, "street smart." stay with bloomberg because president obama expected to make comments about what happened last night to the democrats. that's coming up scheduled for 2:50 new york time. it's la founder says the company had record high sales last week. we'll look at tesla's strategy to move more of their cars when "bottom line" continues.

>> welcome back. you're watching bloomberg television. i'm mark crumpton in new york. you're looking at a live shot of the east room of the white house. president obama is scheduled to make a statement and take questions from reporters. following last night's results of the midterm elections.

republicans winning a majority in the senate. the dwopgop now controlling both the house -- g.o.p. now controlling both the house and senate. what this might mean for president obama's final two years in office. what it will mean for the g.o.p. going forward. stay with bloomberg. we'll take you to the white house live and our two bloomberg politics host, mark and john, will have coverage of the president when it happens. in other news, tesla released third quarter results today. after the market closed. bloomberg wes editor at large joins me from san francisco with a free view. tesla's target is to sell 35,000 cars this year. how close are they to hitting the goal? >> quite a ways. the company has to do a 1700 vehicle sales for the quarter. that's the first number we'll look for. more important than revenues and the losses. we are not talking about profit, we are talking about losses. the most important number will be how many cars they sell in the quarter. can they get to the 13,000-plus

cars that they have told people they are going to get in the fourth quarter. which will be more than they have ever sold in a quarter. the fourth quarter is not always strong for car sales in the world of the automotive. they have set some very ambitious targets. and promised wall street they'll get there. there's been a lot of data coming out, some very good -- we had nathan wise from our show. who said he actually goes through every country in europe and goes through registration data, look how many cars are registered for tesla found they had falling sales in europe this quarter as the previous quarter. the question is, where are they going to get these sales? can they hit these numbers? >> corey, let's assume for the sake of argument they do hit the numbers. then what? >> well, there's going to be issues about what's coming next here. first of all to the sales numbers themselves. when the "wall street journal" reported that the sales numbers weren't looking good using some

of the same numbers we have been reporting, ian put out a tweet and it was interesting. he said the "wall street journal" has it wrong. we have record -- specifically said the article regarding tesla sales, september, not the quarter, september was a record high worldwide. and up 65% in north america. when you tweeze it out not saying it was a record for the company. just worldwide. he was talking about one month. not all three. the stock responded and surged after those comments. but we are going to find out for sure what they actually sold in the quarter. we might expect they made a lot of cards even if they didn't sell them. if they made a lot of cars, gross margins can looked good. the more you run a factory the more efficient it is. fundamentally we want to see are vehicle sales to see if the car is having success. this is not divorced from the white house. the white house sponsored this company with lots of loans in its earlry days. this is -- early days.

this is a luxury automaker. one backed by government loans to get them off the ground. >> what about the sales ban? is that going to be an issue? >> there are a bunch of states where you can't buy this car. those rules are becoming entrinched. these are very big populated important states like texas, arizona, michigan. throw in missouri, minnesota, iowa, north carolina, new jersey, there are a lot of people in those states that can't buy the car in those states. can't get service for the car in those states. tesla has a lot of difficulty they are driving uphill with an electric battery car. it's an exciting story. but the execution is the question we get to look at on a day when they report quarterly earnings. >> we do know the share's gaining 59% this year through yesterday. >> amazing. >> very much so. was that surprising? >> i don't just play the role of a cynic on tv, i come by it

honestly, mark. i have to say this is a company that -- the notion of what they could do is so exciting. when the rubber hits the road, pun intended, we find out how they are doing. this quarter is pivotal. this announcement today is pivotal for this company. >> bloomberg west editor at large, thanks so much. we are standing by, president obama's scheduled to meet with the press in the east room of the white house. it will be discussing the results of last night's midterm elections. he will now have to deal with republican majorities in both houses of the u.s. congress. what this is going to mean for the republicans going forward. the presumptive senate majority leader mitch mcconnell of kentucky speaking to reporters earl -- earlier today saying one of the things he's looking to get done is move on energy. he specifically mentioned the keystone pipeline, which has been a point of contention between democrats and republicans on capitol hill.

president obama's press conference coming up in just a few minutes. stay with us, we'll have another check of the "market movers" on the other side of the break. "bottom line" continues in just a moment.

>> republican senator mitch mcconnell of kentucky had o's poised to weekend forecast the new joirl national park january held his own press kmps and he said the only democrat who matters is the president. that was striking. he put a lot of own us in on the president. the president will step up today and talk. our white house correspondent is in the east room where the president will come out in just a moment. phil, quickly, in brief, what is the white house suggesting the president is going to do in this press conference to try to position himself after last night's big loss for his party?

>> i think there's a hope there will be a setting of the tone. bipartisanship. you heard what mitch mcconnell had to say. also continued reinforcement that executive actions are on the able. i think while they are going to try to strike some balance with what you heard from mitch mcconnell earlier, there is no backing down from the white house on some of their agenda items they have laid out. first among them is immigration. something they said they will to by the end of the year. there is no sense that they are going to back off that in any way shape or form. >> john and i will talk to our -- phil our our colleagues. john, do you think the president has a big challenge today or is this a relatively easy exercise? >> it's a big challenge. it's a challenge. he's faced a big story last night. this is in some sense his presidency now. the last few years has been on the line. he has to get off to the right start. >> here comes the president. we'll listen to the talk to the media. and we'll be back to analyze it. >> today i had a chance to speak

with john boehner and congratulated mitch mcconnell on becoming the next majority leader. i told them both i look forward to finishing up this congress' business and working together for the next two years to advance america's business. i very much appreciated leader mcconnell's words last night about the prospect of working together to deliver for the american people. on friday i look forward to hosting the entire republican and democratic leadership at the white house. to chart a new course forward. obviously republicans had a good night. and they deserve credit for running good campaigns. beyond that i'll leave it to all of you and the professional pundits to pick through yesterday's results. what stands out to me, though, is thated american people sent a message -- is that the american people sent a message, one they have sent for several elections now. they expect the people they elect to work as hard as they

do. they expect us to focus on their ambitions and not ours. they want us to get the job done. all of us in both parties have a responsibility to address that sentiment. still, as president, i have a unique responsibility to try and make this town work. to everyone who voted, i want you to know that i hear you. to the 2/3 of voters who chose not to participate in the process yesterday, i hear you, too. all of us have to give more americans a reason to feel like the ground is stable beneath their feet. that the future is secure. that there's a path for young people to succeed. and that folks here in washington are concerned about them. so i plan on spending every moment of the next two-plus years doing my job the best i can to keep this country safe and to make sure that more americans share in its

prosperity. this country's made real progress since the crisis six years ago. the fact is more americans are working. unemployment has come down. more americans have health insurance. manufacturing has grown. our deficits have sha runge. but we have just got to keep at it until every american feels the gains of a growing economy where it matters most, in their own lives. obviously much of that will take action from congress. i am going to work with the new congress to make the next two years as productive as possible. i am committed to making sure that i measure ideas not by whether they are from democrats or republicans, but if they work for the american people. that's not to say that we won't does agree over some