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CNN NewsNight with Abby Phillip
Musk Launches War Against Trump's Agenda, Kill The Bill; New Travel Ban, Trump Bars Entry To U.S. From 12 Countries; Judge Blocks Trump's Deportation Of Boulder Attacker's Family; Trump's Education Secretary Sounds Uneducated On Several Issues; Karine Jean-Pierre Announces She Is Now An Independent. Aired 10-11p ET
Aired June 04, 2025 - 22:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[22:00:00]
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ABBY PHILLIP, CNN HOST (voice over): Tonight, Travel Ban 2.0. The president goes bigger in the sequel, banning travelers from 12 countries after an anti-Semitic attack.
Plus, the X-man goes full Uma Thurman to kill the bill. But in Elon Musk's war against Donald Trump's agenda, which side will Republicans choose?
Also, Linda McMahon gets an education in the hot seat.
LINDA MCMAHON, EDUCATION SECRETARY: If you're giving the facts on both sides, of course, they're not DEI.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I don't know what both sides of African American history will be.
PHILLIP: And --
KARINE JEAN-PIERRE, FORMER WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: This is my 306th briefing and the final briefing of the administration.
PHILLIP: -- Joe Biden's former spokeswoman, declares her independence and leaves the liberals she defended for years.
Live at the table, Scott Jennings, Dan Koh, Reecie Colbert, Brad Todd and Ana Navarro.
Americans with different perspectives aren't talking to each other, but here, they do.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIP (on camera): Good evening. I'm Abby Phillip in New York.
Let's get right to what America's talking about, breakups. There have been many infamous ones in modern history, The Beatles, Crystal and Pepsi, Ross and Rachel. And tonight, Donald Trump and Elon speeding toward that list? Well, maybe. Just days after President Trump awkwardly awarded Musk the key to the White House, you got to wonder if they are changing the locks.
Now, Musk has gone full war mode against Trump's agenda, telling Americans to call their reps to kill the spending bill. Privately, sources say that Trump and Republicans are pretty upset, and curiously, Trump hasn't really said much. He's remained silent while Musk only intensifies his attacks as senators are considering the bill's fate tonight.
Now, this is coming as the, there's a new CBO score showing that the bill would add more than $2 trillion to the deficit and leave 11 million people without health insurance.
It has been interesting to watch Elon Musk go scorched earth on this bill. He went from saying, I think this is a bad idea, to saying, call your representatives, get rid of it. And there are a lot of theories about why this is, one of which is the simplest, that he's right, that it does increase the deficit, that it is a lot of government spending that is not paid for.
So, what are Republicans going to do, and is it going to matter after this man spent, you know, almost a quarter of a billion dollars on Republican campaigns?
BRAD TODD, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Well, you know, Elon Musk is a brilliant man, and he doesn't make rockets or Teslas by compromising. And it just might be that his intellect is ill suited to passing legislation.
And so I don't know that he is the right person to give Mike Johnson or John Thune advice about how to stop this -- pass this bill to stop a tax increase. And that's really what it is. And I'm confident that as we get toward the finish line, Elon Musk will be on board because the bill is to stop the Democrat's tax increase. That's its whole purpose. If we don't pass it, everyone's taxes go up.
PHILLIP: That's so interesting because for the last like six months, the answer to every question in the federal government was Elon Musk. And now all of a sudden he's not qualified to talk about spending?
TODD: I didn't say not qualified. I said his intellect might not be suited to legislative strategy.
PHILLIP: Okay. Go ahead, Reecie.
REECIE COLBERT, SIRIUSXM HOST, THE REECIE COLBERT SHOW: Well, I think that he is clearly trying to rehabilitate his image by trying to create some fake distance between him and Donald Trump. Of course, he's against the deficit decreasing, but I don't give him credit for being against his bill because he does not have a problem with the tax cuts for himself, and he doesn't have a problem with millions of people losing their Medicaid coverage. He railed against Medicaid and other entitlements.
And so I don't think he deserves credit. I think this is what a lot of people do when they fake leave the Trump orbit, as they try to act like they aren't on board with things, but we are not going to forget that he has been the single most chaotic and cruelty-causing agent in this administration.
DAN KOH, FORMER WHITE HOUSE DEPUTY SECRETARY UNDER PRESIDENT BIDEN: I think the reality here is that he's realizing the con of Donald Trump that so many people already know, which is Donald Trump claims to be a good fiscal steward. But when he was president first time, no president in modern history added more to the debt than he did.
[22:05:03]
Now, I know what Scott will say, that's COVID. But if you take away COVID, he added $4 trillion to the deficit before COVID even came about, and now he's proposing another $2.4 trillion while 11 million people lose their insurance.
This is the con of Donald Trump claiming that he's a fiscal steward, claiming Republicans are the fiscal stewards, when in reality it is Democrats who have been making the investments time and time again on behalf of the American people.
PHILLIP: Scott, do you have anything to say for yourself? I'm just kidding.
SCOTT JENNINGS, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Yes. Well, first of all, I, you know, I love them both and I don't like it when mom and dad are fighting. But, you know, having spoken to him recently, I know he has a deeply held view that the debt that we have in this country, Elon, I mean, is a problem that must be dealt with urgently, and he does have some disappointment that Republicans don't share his zeal for the urgency of the issue.
However, this is not a spending bill. This is a reconciliation bill. And it has three main points, making the tax cuts permanent, massive investments in border security. It fully funds the border wall and the biggest and most necessary welfare reform in at least a generation. Those three things happened to be what Donald Trump ran on for president and won the national popular vote and a not particularly close win in the Electoral College. So, this is the president's agenda.
And I actually think Elon's goals regarding reduction of debt and the president's goals regarding passing what he ran on or not irreconcilable. They're just all not going to happen in same bill.
PHILLIP: Are Elon's goals the same goals that Republicans said that they also shared for, you know, two, three decades in this country?
JENNINNGS: Yes. Republicans do want.
PHILLIP: So, basically, it's out the window now, is that what you're saying? They don't care whether their children or your children are saddled with that? I mean, I'm just saying that's the talking point.
JENNINGS: This legislation is not a spending bill, it's not an appropriations bill and it is not a budget bill. It is a reconciliation bill. There are other vehicles to achieve those goals. PHILLIP: Yes. But I hear what you're saying, but you also just acknowledged that there is spending in there. First of all, extending the tax cuts will cost money. Second of all, even the -- hold on. Even --
TODD: It's keeping the rates the same.
PHILLIP: Okay.
TODD: It's not a tax cut.
PHILLIP: All right. It costs money, okay?
TODD: The money belongs to the people.
PHILLIP: Yes.
JENNINGS: So, you want Republicans to raise taxes?
PHILLIP: Well, look --
JENNINGS: We did not ran on that.
PHILLIP: Hold on guys. He's extending the tax cuts.
JENNINGS: Tax rates.
PHILLIP: He's also creating new tax cuts that cost money, okay? I mean, this is not voodoo, okay? It's just a balance sheet. You either pay for it or you don't. And, historically, Republicans have said if you're going to spend, pay for it. It's just that now, I guess that doesn't matter?
ANA NAVARRO, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Listen, can I tell you this? This whole thing is weird. It's been weird from the beginning, okay, because Elon Musk has been ill suited to be at the right hand of the father since the very start. I'm finding it incredibly amusing to see, you know, a bunch of Republicans, elected Republicans, who, for the last five months, have been sucking up to Elon Musk and to Donald Trump, have to pick between mom and dad.
Look, it's giving me whiplash because it wasn't but last week that they were still in the White House and tweeting love letters to each other and thank you notes and all of this stuff. And it's just -- what I think you have are two guys with a lot of power, one has a lot more money than the other, and the other one is president. This is a fight between Godzilla and King Kong.
And if it weren't so incredibly serious and, you know, the subject matter wasn't affecting us all, it would be incredibly amusing and I would ask for a big bag of popcorn.
PHILLIP: Let me play for you what Speaker Johnson says he thinks is the reason that Elon Musk is so upset about this bill.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) REP. MIKE JOHNSON (R-LA): With all due respect, my friend, Elon, is terribly wrong about the one big, beautiful bill.
I know that the E.V. mandate is very important to him. That is going away because the government should not be subsidizing these things. It is part of the Green New Deal, and I know that has an effect on his business and I'll admit that.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIP: I mean, do you think that's part of the reason that the bill actually does kill a mandate that actually helped prop up Tesla for a very long time?
TODD: I agree with Scott. I think Elon Musk is sincerely concerned about our debt, and I think Donald Trump is, and I think Republicans are too. And Scott Bessent, the secretary of the treasury, said it well. He's trying to keep his eye on our debt to GDP ratio. A big part of this bill is to increase our gross domestic product to make sure we don't raise taxes.
PHILLIP: Okay. Even with GDP increases, the bill increases the deficit by more than a trillion dollars over a ten-year period.
JENNINGS: That's the CBO's intention (ph), which the White House has used.
PHILLIP: Okay, yes.
TODD: The CBO scoring based on if we raise taxes, we don't have to raise taxes.
PHILLIP: No, no, no. Hold on.
COLBERT: We are raising taxes through the tariffs.
PHILLIP: Okay. What is -- so let's just make it simple for people at home, okay?
[22:10:01]
If this bill is passed, what is the deficit going to be in ten years? The CBO says it is going to be more than a trillion dollars than what it is right at this moment.
TODD: I'll use your language. If this bill is passed, your taxes will go up.
PHILLIP: So, okay, but you're talking about a different thing. You just said, Donald --
TODD: It's the whole thing. It's the thing said.
PHILLIP: No, no, no. You said Donald Trump cares about the debt and the deficit.
TODD: Yes.
PHILLIP: If that is true, how on earth could he be okay with a deficit, meaning the amount of money that the government is spending every single day being $2 trillion more than it's bringing in?
TODD: Rule one to have a healthy country, don't raise taxes. That's where you start. And if we can't agree that we're not going to raise taxes --
PHILLIP: So, the answer is yes, he's fine with that.
TODD: No. He's --
PHILLIP: I mean, the answer is clearly yes.
TODD: No, he's not fine with raising taxes. We should not raise taxes. And that's what this bill's going to be in.
PHILLIP: The answer --
NAVARRO: Tariff is a tax on all of Americans.
TODD: There's no tariffs on this bill.
PHILLIP: All right.
NAVARRO: I know there's no tariffs in this bill but there's tariffs on everything else.
PHILLIP: I am fascinated by the unwillingness to just grapple with just a reality of dollars and cents here. I don't understand --
JENNINGS: Me too, I don't know why the CBO can't grasp the reality that they are using a faulty baseline policy projection to make their scores.
PHILLIP: Okay. The CBO --
JENNINGS: I agree, reality has been distorted by the CBO.
PHILLIP: This is this same CBO that was run by a Republican, a Republican --
JENNINGS: By the way, totally partisan, people who hate Donald Trump, but go on.
PHILLIP: The CBO is run by a Republican who used to work for Donald Trump, by the way.
JENNINGS: This is not an organization that exists to help Donald Trump. And they totally misscored the 2017 tax cuts.
PHILLIP: Hang on. The CBO is run by a Republican who actually used to work in the first Trump administration, first of all.
JENNINGS: You're saying people that work in there don't hate Donald Trump?
PHILLIP: The second thing is that a Republican Congress approved this CBO director. The third thing is that --
JENNINGS: They've made a mistake. They're not infallible. They're not --
PHILLIP: Speaker Johnson just three years ago was citing the CBO to trash the Biden bill. So, I don't understand.
JENNINGS: They're not infallible. They made a mistake.
TODD: The same CBO said that the In Inflation Reduction Act, which Joe Biden sponsored, would reduce the deficit. Then as soon as it got passed, they had to come back and revise it. Said, oh no, we were wrong. We overestimated it. So, when Joe Biden needed rosy numbers, this CBO came up with rosy numbers. Now, Donald Trump's and Mike Johnson has never sticking up at the negative numbers.
PHILLIP: Listen, I think people at home can judge for themselves, but it sure seems like when the numbers are numbers you don't like that, you don't like the CBO. When the numbers are numbers, you do like the CBO.
NAVARRO: But can we tell America what CBO is, the Congressional Budget Office, which is supposed to be non-partisan and score bills, every bill that's going to pass?
JENNINGS: Supposed to be nonpartisan. I agree with you.
NAVARRO: Well --
JENNINGS: Supposed to be.
KOH: And, by the way, Scott Bessent --
NAVARRO: well, when you like the numbers, you like the CBO. Well, you don't like the numbers --
(CROSSTALKS)
KOH: Scott Bessent used the CBO's justification for one of his arguments, which is a larger point, which is only using it when it's convenient for them.
But let's take a step back. If Donald Trump were serious about the deficit, he would not be giving more tax cuts to billionaires. If he were serious about helping working class people, he wouldn't create more barriers for people to get on Medicaid and create more work requirements when 90 percent of people are either working or training to work.
JENNINGS: So, you think that Republican, the Republican president that just won an overwhelming victory should raise taxes and increase welfare in this country?
KOH: I think he should raise taxes --
JENNINGS: That is the most bat shit crazy thing I've ever heard.
KOH: I think he should make sure he's raising taxes on billionaires, they pay their fair share and not hurting people who are on Medicaid, who have enough things to worry about right now.
JENNINGS: More Medicaid and more tax cuts.
KOH: I want people to get the healthcare that they need for their families, for people who need it and can't afford it. I absolutely want more people to get healthcare.
PHILLIP: Scott, I just want to -- hang on, I just want to -- yes.
NAVARRO: There's 11 million people who are going to lose healthcare because of --
JENNINGS: If you're illegal and you won't get off grandma's --
NAVARRO: No, it's not. It's not illegal. It's not undocumented. It's not 11 million undocumented.
PHILLIP: Listen, we --
NAVARRO: It's 1 million undocumented and --
PHILLIP: We actually have the facts.
TODD: We're really ready to have --
PHILLIP: Hang on a second. We have the facts. We got to go, but I'll show the facts before we go, since you guys are fighting over it. There are 1.4 million undocumented residents who are covered on Medicaid through state funding, not federal funding. The rest of those people are Americans. Some of those people are already covered under the program and have to meet more stringent requirements. Some of those people --
JENNINGS: What requirements?
PHILLIP: Work requirements. Some of those people will have to meet more stringent requirements, even though they may have young children at home, which is a new thing in the bill.
So, as I've said before, there are changes being made to Medicaid that are designed so that fewer people are on them, including some people who are working, but who might need to work less because they have young kids. Those people may lose Medicaid coverage. That's just a fact.
More on our breaking news. Up next, a new travel ban tonight, the president barring entry into the U.S. from 12 different countries. We'll debate his reasons for that, and a judge's decision about a high-profile deportation effort. That's next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[22:15:00]
PHILLIP: Breaking news, Travel Ban 2.0. President Trump announcing that he's barring travelers into the U.S. from a dozen countries, including Afghanistan, Chad, Haiti, Iran, Libya, and Sudan. Seven other countries are under partial restriction. And tonight, the president is pointing to this week's anti-Semitic attack in Colorado as the reason behind accelerating the move.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DONALD TRUMP, U.S. PRESIDENT: The recent terror attack in Boulder, Colorado, has underscored the extreme dangers posed to our country by the entry of foreign nationals who are not properly vetted, as well as those who come here as temporary visitors and overstay their visas.
[22:20:01]
We don't want them.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIP: It's notable also that the alleged attacker in this anti- Semitic attack was from Egypt, a country that is not present on either of these lists, the big lists or the smallest list.
But, in a way, I have to say this one, you have to look at the details and we did. It's different from the first travel ban. You know, Trump said as he was campaigning in 2016 that he was going to ban travel from Muslim countries. He attempted to do that with a pretty ham- handed executive order. This one is different from that. But I assume some people might have some problems with blanket bans from entire countries.
TODD: His ban at 2018 was approved by the Supreme Court. They ruled that he had given enough reason why these countries should be on the list because their vetting was insufficient. That's a part of the role.
PHILLIP: I just wanted to clarify the revised ban. The initial one was blocked and he did it two other times.
TODD: It's the third version, but it was essentially the same thing all the way through. I mean, there were minor changes. That's part of the role of the executive branch is to enforce the border laws of the country and to use discretion and judgment to protect the safety of Americans.
After the election in 2016, Salena Zito and I did a book. And in part of that, we surveyed Trump voters nationwide in the swing states. At that time, there were a lot of Republicans who still had misgivings about Donald Trump, but, you know, the one thing they did not have misgivings about, and that's the travel ban. It was the number one issue that unites Republicans behind Donald Trump's agenda. I think he's going to fare well with this politically. NAVARRO: You know, there's a lot of inconsistencies though, where things that for me are hard to explain with this group of countries. He's got Sudan in the list of the total ban, I guess. Sudan, there's actually a genocide going on, like a genocide that's been acknowledged by the United Nations, acknowledged by the United States of America.
And so at the same time that we are sending a U.S. taxpayer-funded plane to pick up white Afrikaners from South Africa who are fleeing a made up genocide, we are saying no to the people in Sudan who are fleeing an actual genocide. Then, you know, you've got -- you don't have countries like Egypt, which is where this guy who just committed the anti-Semitic attack last week was from. You don't have countries like his new besties, Donald Trump, like the UAE or Saudi Arabia, where most of the 9/11 terrorists came from. So, it seems to me like he cherry-picked which brown people he wanted to exclude.
KOH: And here's the irony. If you don't -- if he doesn't want you to come into the country, he's quick to set up a process and say that he has legal grounds. But when the Supreme Court orders him to return Kilmar Abrego Garcia, he's still in El Salvador. He bans Venezuela on the bannedd list. Andre Romero, the gay makeup artist, is still at CECOT with no due process. There's still a 4-year-old kid with cancer, U.S. citizen from Honduras, was deported without due process.
So, there's no process when he doesn't want one. But when he wants to set up a process, he's quick to do it and we're just supposed to take it. That's the anger that everyone should feel about President Trump is his selective justice as unfortunately the hallmark of his presidency.
PHILLIP: Also, in this case a Colorado judge halted the administration's attempt to deport this alleged attacker's entire family's wife and children ranging from 4 to 18.
Let me just read for you, Scott, and then you can respond, what the attorney for the family said. Punishing individuals, including children as young as four years old for the purported actions of their relatives is a feature of medieval justice systems or police state dictatorships, not democracies.
JENNINGS: Is this family in the country legally or not?
PHILLIP: Actually, I'm not sure.
JENNINGS: I think they may not be.
PHILLIP: Yes, I'm not sure.
JENNINGS: And obviously in the household you have extreme radicalism and that has now led to the literal burning of American citizens on the streets of this country in a clear act of domestic terrorism. And so, again, we have an individual district court judge stepping in here to try to prevent the commander-in-chief of the United States from protecting Americans from a clear invasion of radicalism. That's number one. Number two, regarding the travel ban, he has a great reason. These countries don't vet people. They don't share information, people who come from these countries, which all, by the way, the link is their governments are essentially failed states. They're not functioning, and so they overstay their visas. All of these countries present massive problems for our own government when trying to figure out who's coming here, why, and how long they're going to stay, and what are they going to do when they get here.
We have had an awakening in this country of the abuse of the visa system. If you're on a visa, you don't have a right to be here. You're a guest in this country and we've seen a number of our guests turn on actual Americans that it needs to stop.
[22:25:04]
COLBERT: But I think it's interesting to talk about this being these being failed states when reportedly this country was trying to send, traffic migrants to Libya. So, it was a good enough state to go send migrants who don't belong in Libya to Libya like they're trying to do in South Sudan, people are stranded in Djibouti.
And so I think this is all a trick by Donald Trump. Yes, he did run on another ban. But the timing is quite interesting because there is a Republican civil war right now that he doesn't want to talk about.
JENNINGS: Civil war?
COLBERT: Yes, civil war.
JENNINGS: What do you mean by that?
COLBERT: Please. We know that the Republicans are at odds.
JENNINGS: Oh my goodness gracious.
COLBERT: And even though I think it's a fake beef, but I still think that this is trying to change the subject away from this horrendous CBO report and this anemic jobs report where 31,000 measly private sector jobs were added.
And so if we could be talking about this as opposed to that, that's a win for Donald Trump.
NAVARRO: Right. So, you think the Musk-Trump fires, like reality T.V., like Real Housewives, when they're making a fight so that they --
PHILLIP: I used to think it's real when mommy and daddy are fighting.
TODD: I'll give you credit for one thing. The Democrats are going to take the bait and make sure we talk about this. Every time Donald Trump takes an action to crack down on illegal immigration, Democrats take the bait and defend the terrorists and illegal immigrants every single time, and they will this time.
NAVARRO: I'm like 40 percent or more of the people that are here illegally overstayed visas, but a lot of them are from places where people are white, and there's no white people in this list.
COLBERT: And Donald Trump is flailing with immigration. Stephen Miller is even talking about how they aren't meeting their quotas.
JENNINGS: Flailing? we've closed the southern border. It's his top issue.
COLBERT: Stephen Miller is not satisfied.
PHILLIP: Don't argue yourself out the job now, Scott, because, you know, the problem with the administration right now is that because they've been so successful at the border, they now have to really dig deep to meet their quotas for deportations, and that is what she's talking about.
But I just want to address the point about the distraction factor of this all. That's why I said at the beginning, we got to look at the details of this. Because, in a way, the ability to restrict immigration based on the lack of ability to vet people coming into the country and perhaps a pattern of visa overstays, that's actually not so controversial.
But you know what is perhaps controversial for this president, is a big headline that says Trump is banning travel. Trump has issued a travel ban. And I think that is very effective for this president in terms of changing the direction of headlines on a day when otherwise we would be -- well, actually, we did talk about the infighting.
COLBERT: Yes. I mean, immigration is always his ace in the hole. That's his best card to play. And so if he can change the cycle and talk about that as opposed to millions of people losing their healthcare, then that's great for him. And he knows that these particular countries that he singled out, they don't have a massive base that's going to take to the streets, as they did.
JENNINGS: No, they do. They have a whole political party that will fight for them. The Democratic Party, they'll be in the streets tomorrow. They'll be in the streets.
TODD: And don't forget The New York Times.
COLBERT: They pick their targets well so that they don't get the ground swell pushback that they did in the prior administration.
PHILLIP: All right. We got to leave it there.
Coming up next, a wild hearing today featuring the education secretary who had some surreal answers on DEI, the Holocaust and race.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: You know what the Tulsa Race massacre is?
MCMAHON: I'd like to look into it more and get back to you on it.
(END VIDEO CLIP) (COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[22:33:06]
PHILLIP: Tonight, Trump's Education Secretary sounding uneducated on several issues. Linda McMahon was grilled on Capitol Hill today over her Department's DEI cuts, and the former WWE executive turned education authority didn't sound all that comfortable with the facts.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REP. SUMMER LEE (D) PENNSYLVANIA: Would you say that it would be an illegal DEI for a lesson plan on the Tulsa Race Massacre?
LINDA MCMAHON, SECRETARY OF EDUCATION: I'd have to get back to you on that.
LEE: Do you know what the Tulsa race massacre is?
MCMAHON: I'd like to look into it more and get back to you on it.
LEE: Okay. So, I look forward to that. How about, the book "Through My Eyes" by Ruby Bridges for instance?
MCMAHON: I haven't read that.
LEE: Have you learned about Ruby Bridges?
MCMAHON: Because if you have specific examples you'd like to find --
LEE: That was a specific example.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIP: After her Department demanded school sign a certification declaring they were DEI free, McMahon was asked to clarify whether or not teaching African American history is now illegal.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MCMAHON: I do not think that African studies or Middle East studies or Chinese studies are part of DEI if they are taught as part of the total history package. So, that if you're giving the facts on both sides, of course they're not DEI.
LEE: I don't know what both sides of African American history would be.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIP: What -- what is the other side of African American history? Does anyone know? I don't.
KOH: This is a person charged with crafting the education agenda to make our kids competitive in the 21st century. This is a president who mocked DEI and said that we are hiring the -- Biden administration was hiring unqualified people. This is the least qualified Education Secretary in our history. There's just -- that's just the tip of the iceberg. Look. She referred to artificial intelligence, which was - A.I. is already --
PHILLIP: Well, we have -- let's -- let's play this --
(CROSSTALK)
KOH: Please.
(CROSSTALK)
PHILLIP: Then we'll have to play it again.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MCMAHON: This morning, I wish I could remember the source, but that there is a school system that's going to start making sure that first graders or even pre Ks have A-one teaching, you know, every year starting, you know, that far down into grades.
[22:35:11]
And that's just a -- that's a wonderful thing. And so, wasn't all that long ago that it's - - we're going to have internet in our schools. Now, okay. Let's do -- see A-1 and how --and how can that be helpful?
(END VIDEO CLIP)
NAVARRO: Maybe she wished she had remembered the sauce.
(LAUGHTER)
PHILLIP: Steaks -- steaks for first graders. I agree.
KOH: Well, there's more than without saying --
PHILLIP: Extraordinary, right?
KOH: In the letter that she wrote to Harvard threatening them, it was riddled with grammatical errors and typos. She didn't know what the Tulsa Race Massacre was. She oversees the Office of Civil Rights in the Department of Education.
And it's not -- it doesn't just end with her, right? It is a series of unqualified hires the president does. Either you're a big donor, you give money, you get a cabinet post, or you praise him on Fox News like Pete Hegseth or Judy Pirro, and you get these appointments. That's his qualifications.
NAVARRO: There's --there's definitely people in the Trump cabinet who are qualified. I may disagree with them on their duplicity and their hypocrisy, but people like Marco Rubio can get asked practically anything about foreign policy and foreign relations and he would probably know how to answer. I would say the same thing about a Scott Bessett. But then you have some dum dums. You just do. And every time they go
in front of Congress and they get asked questions about their departments that they should know about, they're incapable of answering. You've got Kristi Noem who doesn't know what Habeas Corpus is. You've got Pete Hegseth, who couldn't answer the most basic questions about memberships in organizations that we belong to. And then you've got this lady who doesn't know what the Tulsa Massacre is.
I recommend that she watch "Dreamland, The Burning of Black Wall Street", which was a movie made by CNN. Excellent. So you can get an education in, like, you know, maybe an hour. And "Ruby Bridges".
PHILLIP: I mean --
NAVARRO: How does she not know somebody who was so crucial when it came to education in America and changing education in America? I guess we should at least be happy that she didn't think it was a bridge.
PHILLIP: I mean, what was fascinating was, at one point she was questioned about her use of note cards. Just watch -- just watch this.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MCMAHON: -- morning. He truly believes, as do I, that the best education is that, that is closest to the child, times even this morning. He truly believes, as do I, that the best education is that, that is closest to the child.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIP: So, as she's trying to answer a question, an aide is sitting there with a stack of note cards presumptively with answers on them, this is almost like getting help on an exam. I mean, I don't - look. Presidents can pick whoever they want in their cabinet, that is definitely true, but this president has also said that it's about merit, that they want to get DEI out of every part of American life.
Why on earth then do they have someone who seems not prepared or qualified perhaps for the job that she's been placed in?
JENNINGS: You know, the main difference between this cabinet and the Biden cabinet is that these people are actually allowed to go in and see the President, unlike the Biden cabinet, who were apparently not allowed to see the sitting president.
PHILLIP: Are you going to answer -- are you going to answer for -- are you going to answer for this or are you going to change the --
(CROSSTALK)
JENNINGS: The only thing I care about for the Education Secretary, the literal only thing I care about is what they are doing to close the Department of Education. I don't care how many books she's read. I don't care what answers to "gotcha" questions she has. I just want to know how quickly can we close the debacle. PHILLIP: Question to ask, do you know what the Tulsa race massacre is?
TODD: Or do you know the answer to that question she could have given?
PHILLIP: Yeah.
TODD: She should have said, Congresswoman Lee -- Summer Lee asking the question to Congresswoman in Pittsburgh, why is it that when you were asked to vote is anti-Zionism, anti-Semitism, you chose the side of the terrorist? How is it when you were asked to condemn anti-Semitism on campus? That's an education issue. She took the side of the terrorist.
Summer Lee is the exact wrong person and it's full outrage for Democrats to sit here and take Summer Lee's side and slam it to me.
PHILLIP: I want to play -- because since you -- you brought up the anti-Semitism of it all, she was pressed by a different congressperson about, all the different things that you may or may not be allowed to teach in American universities. Listen to this.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REP. MARK TAKANO (D) CALIFORNIA: Would the Harvard government department be compelled to hire faculty that believe the 2020 election was stolen?
MCMAHON: I believe that, there are rights to freedom of speech for their -- and the on campuses and universities of colleges and universities across the country, freedom of speech should be allowed.
TAKANO: Does refusing to hire a holocaust denier as a member of Harvard's history department faculty count as an ideological litmus test?
MCMAHON: I believe that there should be diversity of viewpoints relative to teachings and opinions on campuses.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIP: A diversity of viewpoints about holocaust denying?
[22:40:01]
JENNINGS: That's not what she said.
UNKNOWN: That's not what she said.
JENNINGS: That's not at all what just happened there.
PHILLIP: Okay, hold on. She says --
JENNINGS: She's saying that college faculty are uniformly --
PHILLIP: Hold on. Hold on. Hold on.
(CROSSTALK)
PHILLIP: Okay. All right. Let me just read again what was just said. The question, "Does refusing to hire a holocaust denier as a member of Harvard's history department count as an ideological litmus test?" She says, "I believe there should be diversity of viewpoints relative to teachings and opinions on campus."
JENNINGS: She was not --
PHILLIP: I don't understand.
JENNINGS: She was not answering what is a patently ridiculous question.
PHILLIP: Wait, excuse me. Excuse me.
JENNINGS: And I and no Republican can take any lectures about anti- Semitism right now from Democrats.
(CROSSTALK)
PHILLIP: But why on Earth would she not be able to answer that question? Why would she even dodge the question?
JENNINGS: She has the same answer every Republican has had for time immemorial.
(CROSSTALK)
JENNINGS: Why isn't there any diversity?
(CROSSTALK)
PHILLIP: So, what is the -- so, what is the answer?
UNKNOWN: It was the joke of a question. It was the joke of a question.
PHILLIP: Okay. So, what's the answer? What's the answer?
(CROSSTALK)
PHILLIP: Is it an ideological litmus test to have a holocaust denier be asked --
(CROSSTALK)
JENNINGS: Is there an ideological litmus test that you have to believe in progressive radicalism --
PHILLIP: Wait a second.
JENNINGS: -- to get hired now? Because that's what it seems like to us.
PHILLIP: Holocaust denialism.
JENNINGS: That's the box they have to check.
PHILLIP: Which is card carrying, text book anti-Semitism. You think --
JENNINGS: She wasn't responding to that.
PHILLIP: -- that doesn't count?
JENNINGS: She wasn't responding to that. It is a patently ridiculous assertion.
PHILLIP: Why are you -- why are you assuming that she wasn't responding to that when she gave that answer in response --
(CROSSTALK)
JENNINGS: Because I have -- because I'm a thinking human being who can see what a rational person would say to a ridiculous question.
JENNINGS: She didn't say that's a ridiculous question.
JENNINGS: You were totally -- you were totally misconstruing this.
PHILLIP: Scott, Scott, literally, we played it for the American people to see it.
JENNINGS: Yeah. And every single person's going to see it my way.
PHILLIP: She -- she literally did not answer -- she did not answer the question the way you want to answer the question, and that question has an answer. What is the answer?
JENNINGS: The answer to that question is you're an idiot to that congressman.
PHILLIP: What is the answer to the question. What is the answer? Will the federal government -- if somebody comes in and says, I don't believe the Holocaust really happened. Will the federal government bring the hammer down on universities for saying, that is not a viewpoint that we are allowing on our campuses?
TODD: The question would be --
PHILLIP: That the answer -- the answer ought to be no, but it sounds like no answer to the answer.
(CROSSTALK)
TODD: No. The answer ought to be what kind of litmus test is Harvard putting on its faculty now?
JENNINGS: Yes.
TODD: Only three percent of its faculty are --
(CROSSTALK)
PHILLIP: I mean, listen.
COLBERT: She didn't have a note card in front of her to tell her the answer and this is what happens when you have somebody who lied about having an education degree. They didn't teach about the holocaust maybe when she was getting her French degree.
UNKNOWN: You all wait.
COLBERT: If she actually has it.
(CROSSTALK)
JENNINGS: Outrageous.
(CROSSTALK)
JENNINGS: You're accusing her of being a holocaust denier.
(CROSSTALK)
PHILLIP: No. No.
(CROSSTALK)
PHILLIP: Hold on. Hold on a second. Excuse me.
(CROSSTALK)
PHILLIP: Everybody, everybody stop. Everybody stop for a second. Excuse me, Scott. Nobody accused her of being a holocaust denier.
JENNINGS: You're implying that that's what she wants.
PHILLIP: No one did that.
JENNINGS: You're implying.
PHILLIP: - It is completely -- Scott. Just stop for just a second.
(CROSSTALK)
JENNINGS: The line of inquiry here is an implication that she's -- you can't do that.
(CROSSTALK)
PHILLIP: It is completely disingenuous for you to sit at this table and say that we accuse her of being a holocaust denier.
(CROSSTALK)
PHILLIP: Absolutely, no one said that. It is disingenuous.
JENNINGS: How are you portraying it? How are you portraying it?
PHILLIP: It's disingenuous. It's disrespectful. (CROSSTALK)
PHILLIP: Excuse me.
TODD: It was a disingenuous question.
PHILLIP: How is this a disingenuous question? The other part of the question is, if you are an election denier, and Harvard said, you can't be an election denier and teach at this school, is that a litmus test?
TODD: The question is what litmus test is Harvard putting on its faculty?
PHILLIP: Okay.
TODD: We know they have --
PHILLIP: We got to go. But it is very clear that neither of you want to answer a very simple question.
JENNINGS: So now, you're the guest? Are you accusing us?
PHILLIP: Are -- is Harvard --
JENNINGS: Are you accusing him and me?
PHILLIP: Is Harvard allowed or any school --
(CROSSTALK)
PHILLIP: Is any school allowed to say that these are facts, and if you don't believe in facts, you cannot teach here? Are they allowed to do that?
JENNINGS: The question is, what is the litmus test today?
PHILLIP: Scott, don't -- do not answer a question -- do not --
(CROSSTALK)
PHILLIP: When you answer my question with a question, you are dodging. So, answer the question.
JENNINGS: Well, you asked me questions that I think kind of ridiculous framing of this issue then I think you're missing a true meaning.
(CROSSTALK)
PHILLIP: How is this ridiculous framing?
(CROSSTALK)
PHILLIP: Because you either -- you either believe that there are things that are facts or you don't. JENNINGS: I do believe in facts, and I also believe that that member of Congress was creating a disingenuous, ridiculous question designed for this "gotcha" moment right here.
PHILLIP: Okay. It is very telling that you are not able or willing to even entertain an answer. You could answer --
JENNINGS: I gave you an answer.
PHILLIP: -- the question right now and you have refused to do it.
TODD: Wait a minute. Harvard has a right to have any litmus test they want for their faculty. They're a private institution.
PHILLIP: Okay. All right. Well, there's the answer to your question. Thank you, Brad. I appreciate that. Coming up next, Karine Jean-Pierre was the voice of the Biden administration, but now she says that she is leaving the Democratic Party. We're going to discuss that.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[22:49:26]
PHILLIP: It was just five months ago that Karine Jean-Pierre was speaking on behalf of the leader of the Democratic Party. And now, she is no longer a member of that party. Jean-Pierre announced that she is a registered independent now, which coincidentally is the name of her upcoming book.
It will go through the three weeks before Biden dropped out of the 2024 race and the, quote, " -- betrayal by the Democratic Party that led to that decision." Jean-Pierre has come under fire from other Democrats and Republicans for her full-throated defense of the President's fitness over the last three years.
[22:50:00]
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
KARINE JEAN-PIERRE, FORMER WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY AND SENIOR ADVISOR: Oh my gosh, he's the President of the United States. You know, he -- I can't even keep up with him. I would put the President's stamina, President's wisdom, ability to get this done on behalf of -- of the American people against anyone.
UNKNOWN: Is anyone in the White House hiding information about the President's health or his ability to do the job day to day?
JEAN-PIERRE: Absolutely not.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIP: I don't think a book has made this kind of a splash since Jake Tapper and Alex Thompson's book came out. But it's got the Democrats talking for sure. I mean, I don't know. I wonder. I mean, you worked with her. What -- what do you make of this? KOH: Look, I like Karina a lot. I respectfully disagree with her on
this one. Democrats continue to in-fight. They continue to get distracted from what I think is the most important thing that we need to prioritize. First, how we help working class people. Second, what our message is. And third, over and over again, that everybody says we're not doing enough to push back and fight Donald Trump.
So, I'm pretty sure that in 2028, it's going to be a Democrat versus a Republican. And one of those two people are going to be the president. So, Democratic Party needs to stop the infighting and figure out how we win in 2028.
PHILLIP: It's -- it seems that she is going to blast the party for pushing Biden out.
COLBERT: Girl, we're at the wrong place, not right now. We don't have time for this. I mean, look. I think it's a little crazy to try to play this Biden was persecuted thing. No, he was not persecuted. He flopped at the debate and he dropped out moving right along. You know, now we have a President Trump. And so, this is just not helpful with the timing.
But it's a memoir. It's not a movement. There's not going to be a mass exodus out of the Democratic Party because Karine Jean-Pierre left. So, I'm not mad at her. I'm not going to burn her at the cross for it, but I just don't think it's helpful timing.
PHILLIP: Ana?
NAVARRO: I haven't read the book yet, right? I haven't.
PHILLIP: It's not out.
NAVARRO: It's not out. We haven't even seen excerpts.
PHILLIP: Yes.
NAVARRO: All we know is that she left the party -- the Democratic Party. I don't know if the reason she left is because she's pissed off at the way they treated Biden. I do know that I am not very interested right now in relitigating anything about Joe Biden, who I wish the best of luck as he combats and fights stage four metastatic cancer.
I, you know, I think that ship has sailed. He's in retirement. He's not going to be designating who the next nominee of the Democratic Party is. I just think there's so many crises in this country right now led by Donald Trump. I think that the things that are happening with the Latino community are horrifying on a daily basis. I read stories that just break my heart and make me want to scream and say, this is not the country where I've grown up.
And so, I don't know, to me this is not something that I'm interested in talking about. I hope, Karine and I hope and I suspect she was loyal. Because if there's something that I find really objectionable is when people work in administration till the very last minute and then write a book or get a TV contract or whatever to pan that administration that they worked at. You know -- well, I --
PHILLIP: This is going to be an interesting --
NAVARRO: But Karine's a loyal person, so I hope it's going to be --
(CROSSTALK)
PHILLIP: -- this is going to an interesting point here, because I think there's a distinction between perhaps her loyalty to President Biden -- former President Biden, and her loyalty to the White House. I mean, the tagline of the White House or of the book is about what was going on in the White House, and it's not exactly positive. But I want to play for you what she said. This is in February 26th at the IOP about how she interpreted the push to get Biden out of the race after that debate.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JEAN-PIERRE: It was a firing squad and I had never seen anything like it before. I had never seen a party do that in the way that they did. And it was hurtful and sad to see that happening. A firing squad around a person who I believe was a true patriot. A person who I believe did everything that he can for this country.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIP: So, if you're looking for her to throw Biden under the bus, I don't think this book is going to be that.
JENNINGS: I agree. I don't think she will, although I would argue that it's pretty disloyal to leave the political party that, you know, gave you your biggest career shot that you've ever had. But I tend to agree with you. I mean, I think the things we've learned in the last two years is that the two least credible sources of information in this world are the Gaza Health Ministry and Karine Jean-Pierre.
And when she puts this book out, every single person who reads it, reviews it, or discusses it needs to remember that virtually everything she said about what was going on behind the scenes in the White House was an outright lie.
[22:55:00]
And so, when she puts a book out, I think we ought to treat it from a source that has a proven track record of lying from the podium of the White House to the American people.
PHILLIP: Well, we will find out what she saw or didn't see in the White House and what her experience is. It's -- book is going to be out in a few months, so we'll be talking about it. Everyone, thank you very much. We'll be back in just a moment.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[22:59:59] PHILLIP: A special programming note from us. Most summer Fridays, we are taking the show on a little field trip. We'll be broadcasting our roundtable debate from the Food Network Executive Kitchen. We're going to have food, drinks, some lively conversation. You don't want to miss it. We had a lot of fun last Friday. We'll see you there this Friday, and thank you very much for watching "NewsNight". You can catch me anytime on your favorite social media -- X, Instagram, and TikTok. "Laura Coates Live" starts right now.
