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CNN NewsNight with Abby Phillip
Trump Made $1 Billion-Plus From Crypto In First Year Back In Office; New York Post Board Accuses Trump's Sons Of Slimy Practices; Supreme Court Rejects Trump, Upholds Birthright Citizenship; Conservative And Liberal Commentators Debate Supreme Court's Recent Decisions; Vice President Vance Picks Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez To Lead Democrats In 2028. Aired 10-11p ET
Aired June 30, 2026 - 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 VIDEOTAPE)
ABBY PHILLIP, CNN ANCHOR (voice over): Tonight, a return that would make the Founding Fathers blush. The president's cashing in on industries over which he has influence.
Plus, born in the USA, citizen of the USA. The Supremes reject Donald Trump's attempt to overturn the 14th Amendment.
Also, is this new court political, ideological, or bound by law? It depends on who you ask.
MEGYN KELLY, HOST, THE MEGYN KELLY SHOW: Amy Coney Barrett is a turncoat.
PHILLIP: And the results are in as socialists take their fight west to Colorado tonight, and the veep predicts the party's next leader.
J.D. VANCE, U.S. VICE PRESIDENT: I think it's got to be AOC.
PHILLIP: Live at the table, Adam Mockler, Joe Borelli, Ashley Allison, Elizabeth Pipko, Jose Antonio Vargas, and Kmele Foster.
Americans with different perspectives aren't talking to each other, but here, they do.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
PHILLIP (on camera): Good evening. I'm Abby Phillip in New York.
The right accused Hunter Biden of profiting off the presidency. They called him a crook and a grifter. Well, tonight, what would those same people call Donald Trump and his family? Because we're learning just how much richer the presidency is making Trump.
According to a new financial disclosure, the president made more than a billion dollars in his first year back in office from crypto ventures alone. He made more than $500 million from the sale of tokens tied to firms managed in part by his sons, and another $635 million from a licensing agreement with Celebration Coins. And even Mar-a-Lago earned him more than $70 million in that one year.
According to The New York Times, one of his biggest hauls in 2025 came when an investment firm tied to the United Arab Emirates bought nearly half of the Trump family's main crypto company, World Financial -- World Liberty Financial, a transaction that blurs the lines between foreign policy and private enterprise.
Now, the scope and the scale of Trump's holdings continues an unprecedented streak of profit-making for a sitting president. But while the White House denies any conflicts of interest, Trump has promoted businesses and policies that stand to benefit him and his family, particularly in the area of crypto.
Now, before we open it up to the table here, I want to invite you at home to join this debate. Go to cnn.com/abby and weigh in, and we'll get to some of your comments throughout the show.
But let's start with the billions of dollars that Trump has made in just one year. It's an astounding amount of money, Joe, and I wonder how you justify that after all the years of Republicans making a huge issue out of Hunter Biden making perhaps $4 -- let's be generous, $4 or $5 million.
JOE BORELLI, FORMER REPUBLICAN LEADER, NEW YORK CITY COUNCIL: Well, it's not the dollar amount per se, it's the potential quid pro quo. It's also a chain of emails that were found on his laptop essentially saying, put 10 percent aside for the big guy, meaning the person in office, the person who's covered by conflict of interest laws, the person who's covered by public officers law, not necessarily Hunter Biden himself. There is a differential. There's a difference there.
PHILLIP: So, that's -- let's say that that's all true. So, are you concerned about Donald Trump, literally on paper, he disclosed it, making over a billion dollars just from crypto alone, including a transaction that involves a foreign nation, that he is literally right now, as we speak, involved in very delicate negotiations on behalf of the United States when it comes to the war that's going on in the Middle East?
BORELLI: Look we should all be concerned about people in public office profiting off their office. That's why there is disclosure laws.
PHILLIP: So, are you concerned?
BORELLI: Trump's disclosure was 927 pages. He's one of the top 1 percent wealthiest Americans.
PHILLIP: So, are you concerned, Joe?
BORELLI: That's not a secret. I'm not a secret because I can look at the document and see what's there, which I'll be doing right now.
PHILLIP: Joe, are you concerned about how much money Trump has raked in one year? BORELLI: Am I concerned with a billionaire making more billions, on more money? No, I'm not. In fact, look, nobody -- let me just sum up. Nobody who voted for Donald Trump, a guy with, you know, skyscrapers with his name on it, with a plane that has his name on it, is suspect of him making money. That's not the problem. He made his whole career talking about how much money he makes.
PHILLIP: Donald Trump in the year before he was president, 2024 made, let's call it an eighth.
[22:05:04]
It's a fraction of it. It's like about $500, $600 million in total in 2024. Now, we're looking at billions of dollars. So, the amount of money that the president has raked in while sitting in the White House is beyond anything that I think people can even conceptualize. We are talking about billions of dollars.
BORELLI: But you're using innuendo and conjecture to say there's something nefarious --
PHILLIP: No. I mean, it's actually just -- no, it's actually just a fact that the only thing that's changed about Donald Trump is that he's president now.
ADAM MOCKLER, COMMENTATOR, MEIDASTOUCH NETWORK: Joe, you make a great politician, weaving around all the answers. The reality of the situation is Trump is the most corrupt president in American history, and we're not even telling the full story.
BORELLI: Which one?
MOCKKLER: I'm glad that you brought up the quid pro quo part because the part that we're missing is this $2 billion investment from the UAE was facilitated by the founder of Binance, C.Z. The founder of Binance was subsequently pardoned by Donald Trump, and Trump has benefited off of this crypto. He leveraged the hype of his inauguration to the day before announce a cryptocurrency named Trump Coin. But that wasn't enough, because then he announced Melania Coin. But that wasn't enough, because then he created this pardon economy where people can pay into his campaigns or his family and they get directly pardoned.
Do you agree with the pardon of C.Z., the founder of Binance, who helped funnel money into Hamas? Do you agree with the pardon?
BORELLI: There there's no question that Donald Trump has been --
MOCKLER: Wait, no, don't do the politician thing.
BORELLI: No, there's no question that Donald Trump has been pro- crypto.
MOCKLER: Uniquely corrupt.
BORELLI: He ran on saying, I'm pro-crypto. We're going to pass the Genius Act, which they did. We're going to deregulate crypto. (CROSSTALKS)
BORELLI: We're going to be the crypto capital of the world.
ASHLEY ALLISON, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: My friend, Joe.
BORELLI: It's no surprise that investment --
MOCKLER: So, Hunter Biden is pro-painting. Hunter Biden didn't hide the fact that he's pro-painting.
(CROSSTALKS)
BORELLI: So, when you talk about pardons, let's not forget the fact that the previous president had to pardon his son for crimes he may have committed.
MOCKLER: What about the fact that he removed tariffs on Vietnam --
BORELLI: This president did not have to do that when he left office.
ALLISON: Joe, can I just add -- okay. I just have a couple questions. So, I don't think that public official or officials should be making money that -- on the backs of the American people or using the American interest to make money. Perhaps Joe -- Hunter Biden did it and perhaps Donald Trump is doing it.
But I actually wonder if the American people actually care. I'm not sure that they do. So, if we want to concede the point that they're like, you know what? You're the president. We live in a capitalist society. Let's do it.
I think my biggest issue is that Americans are suffering right now and he just made a billion dollars. And so the people who voted for him, I just want to ask them, does he have your -- did you make a billion? Did you make a million? Did you make $100,000? Did you make $10,000? Did you make 1,000 or are you in debt right now? And if you're in debt right now, the man in the White House is profiting off of you, and that is my biggest issue.
The corruption is there, but I'm not sure the voters care about that, but I do think the voters care about them suffering while this man gets rich on their dime.
PHILLIP: So, to Ashley's point just on this -- the crypto ventures that they've been involved in, Trump launched this meme coin that was actually heavily supported by just regular people who --
BORELLI: Trump supporters.
PHILLIP: Yes, just Trump supporters, right? And when you look at this chart, what it shows you is that the red line is what investors, a lot of them regular people, made from this crypto venture. It goes into the negatives, negative $2.28 billion. The Trump Organization, on the other hand, they're in the positive. They've made $2.29 billion. So, Elizabeth, look, Ashley's making an important point. Even if you don't care about the perception of corruption, about the perception of self-dealing that the president is making policy that he directly benefits from, if you're one of his supporters, shouldn't it bother you that he was enriched while you were ripped off?
ELIZABETH PIPKO, FORMER RNC NATIONAL SPOKESPERSON: You know, it's an interesting question because I can tell you as someone who's traveled the country on the campaign, I've talked to his supporters. I talked to thousands, probably, of his supporters, many of whom told me one of the sole reasons they were voting for him was because he was a billionaire who they believed had made enough money and proven himself that they wanted him in that Oval Office.
I don't think anyone thinks he's profiting off of them. I think they think that he is leading the charge in trying to show people what it means to actually do something different. Joe talked about crypto and what it means to be the crypto president, how, you know, he's tried to embrace crypto in a way no one else has. He's leading the charge, and I think most Americans believe in him. I don't think anyone that voted for him believes he's trying to make money while they are suffering because --
ALLISON: Well, I'll say -- Can I just say, I think maybe he's not profiting off of them, but he's profiting without them.
PIPKO: I don't think so. I think most people that voted for him believe that he's trying to make the kind of policy.
ALLISON: But they're not.
PIPKO: At the same time --
ALLISON: They're not.
(CROSSTALKS)
BORELLI: If you haven't seen a guy run for office talking about deregulating crypto and talking about how we should be investing in crypto, right?
KMELE FOSTER, EDITOR-AT-LARGE, TANGLE: This is totally fair. And if that's what he -- if that's all he was doing, there wouldn't be much to talk about it.
BORELLI: If you didn't see that and read the tea leaves and say, darn, I should probably put a couple of dollars in Bitcoin --
ALLISON: They did and they lost.
(CROSSTALKS)
FOSTER: Oh, did you put the money there? It seemed to have not worked out well for you.
[22:10:00] BORELLI: Look, we have a president who has made a policy point to deregulate crypto. That's a fundamentally good thing for our economy.
FOSTER: I think we're conflating issues here.
BORELLI: I think more people --
ALLISON: Yes, we are.
PHILLIP: Exactly, because I don't think --
(CROSSTALKS)
PHILLIP: Joe, this isn't really --
BORELLI: The economy did really well, and the president's benefited, that's fine.
PHILLIP: This isn't really -- I'm going to let Kmele in, but this isn't really about, oh, he's deregulating crypto. He is profiting off of making regulatory moves that directly benefit his family's companies.
And I think the more concerning thing is that a huge sum of this wealth that we just described comes from a deal with a foreign nation, okay? The -- essentially, the UAE is involved in a deal that basically bought out the Trump family crypto company, more than half of the company, leaving the Trump family massively richer, and it turns out Donald Trump personally himself. So, I mean, that's -- I mean, when the founders talked about you know, preventing presidents from basically enriching themselves off of the presidency, this is basically what -- I mean, they weren't envisioning crypto, but they were envisioning things like this, from foreign governments.
FOSTER: Yes. I'd say this. Look, during the first term, it was entirely defensible to talk about Donald Trump's track record of having made all of this money, his vast real estate holdings, the expectation that his family was still going to be in business. Fine, I can accept that. What's happened subsequently is something else entirely. His sons are enriching themselves, investing in rare earth minerals. They're now defense contractors. And now they're crypto tycoons. They didn't have a competency for any of these industries before.
Now, there is so much credible reporting at this point, on an almost daily, weekly basis now of them having insider information and making trades and dealing with companies who are directly involved with the administration.
PHILLIP: So, Joe keeps talking about the big guy email. The New York Times' story about this mining deal, the president directly negotiated this contract between this mining company that his sons are invested in and the United States government. It's not a cryptic email. It's an actual phone call with the president on the line, and his sons stand to benefit from it. So, again, even if you were to concede every possible thing that Hunter Biden did wrong, wouldn't you at the very least have to acknowledge that this is bad?
BORELLI: Well, with this contract, we're talking about tungsten mining in Kazakhstan. China just cut off our exports of tungsten. There's a -- we need defense -- tungsten is used in warheads --
PHILLIP: Yes, we understand.
BORELLI: -- used in fighter jets, all this stuff, right?
PHILLIP: But why is it okay that the president's sons are involved in a major deal that --
BORELLI: It said the president's son invested in the company after this deal was done, not before.
ALLISON: So, Joe, if Hunter Biden had done this, would you say the same thing?
BORELLI: I read the same article. It said --
ALLISON: No. Can we flip characters?
BORRELI: A company that's involved with the sons, Dominari Securities, invested in this company after this deal was done.
ALLISON: Can we -- but if Hunter Biden did the same thing --
PHILLIP: Is it not problematic that the president's sons are directly standing to benefit from a company that is getting government money essentially, that the president himself helped negotiate?
BORELLI: Look, again, if there's quid pro quo --
ALLISON: Abby.
BORELLI: If there's --
ALLISON: Abby.
PHILLIP: I mean --
ALLISON: But here's the thing. I don't think --
(CROSSTALKS)
PHILLIP: I'm not even saying there's a quid pro quo.
BORELLI: But that's a crime. That's the crime.
PHILLIP: I'm just saying that you were trying to say to me that Hunter Biden committed a crime because some person named the big guy was mentioned in an email. I'm talking about a phone call with the president. ALLISON: Yes. Joe, how about this, okay? Let's remove the existing fact pattern just to see like if we have the same standard of ethics right now. A Democratic president has a son who may be enriching himself from insider information of the government and benefiting off of that information. Is that wrong?
BORELLI: Kickback to the president? Yes.
PHILLIP: A Republican president?
BORELLI: Is there a kickback to the president? Yes, that's wrong.
ALLISON: Okay. I think if you apply the fact pattern here, they're the same fact pattern, so your answer should've been easy these last three rounds of questions. Trump is a problem.
MOCKLER: Can I just say, this entire conversation is infuriating. If there was a Biden coin or an Obama coin, conservatives would be balled up in a curl, balled up in a -- you'd be curled up in a ball crying. I would not be doing ads for it.
It's not just that Donald Trump has enriched himself. It's that he's sold access to the presidency. He's created the executive club. He's allowed tariffs to dictate foreign policy in such a way where he tariffed Vietnam, removed the tariffs, and then one week later, he got a $1.2 billion golf course.
You want to know about the quid pro quo? We gave the UAE access to a bunch of very special chips the same week that they invested $2 billion in Donald Trump's personal crypto firm. Do you condemn that? Do you condemn the pardoning of C.Z.? Do you condemn Justin Sun, who scammed Americans and then was allowed back into the United States after Trump dropped an investigation? Is any of this above board?
BORELLI: Yes. I mean, look, again, if you have the evidence that there is a quid pro quo crime, then bring it to the table.
[22:15:00]
MOCKLER: What if I present the evidence and you just reject it? You reject it entirely.
ALLISON: Well, we did. People did bring crimes and he was convicted of felonies, and that wasn't enough.
MOCKLER: Trump's corruption.
BORELLI: Using conjecture and innuendo without any --
MOCKLER: It's not conjecture.
ALLISON: It's not conjecture, Joe.
FOSTER: I wonder if we could just go a minute longer (ph).
PHILLIP: I don't know. I mean, look the numbers are on a piece of paper, and as you point out, it's disclosed. It's not like -- you're right, it's not like they're hiding the sums of money. It's billions of dollars. It's written on paper.
BORELLI: The reason we know this is it's a public disclosure.
ALLISON: But is it okay?
PHILLIP: It's not conjecture. That's all I'm saying.
ALLISON: That's the problem. Just because it's public, is it okay?
BORELLI: Is it against the law is the real question.
FOSTER: Can we acknowledge that it's profoundly unseemly for the president and his family --
MOCKLER: You don't have to defend the stuff.
FOSTER: -- to be making all of this money?
BORELLI: I would prefer the president not make money while in office.
MOCKLER: Okay.
ALLISON: Okay, congrats.
(CROSSTALKS)
PHILLIP: We might have to get some truth serum.
ALLISON: Final answer, Joe. Lock it in. Come on. Follow your heart.
PHILLIP: All right. Next for us, we've got more breaking news. MAGA is livid tonight after the Supreme Court rejected Trump's efforts to kill birthright citizenship. Another special guest is going to join us at the table.
Plus, the results are coming in as socialists take their movement west, and J.D. Vance says that AOC is the one who will be the nominee in 2028. We'll discuss.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[22:20:00]
PHILLIP: The Supreme Court just delivered a blockbuster blow to President Trump's immigration agenda by striking down his executive order ending birthright citizenship. The justices ruled 6-3 to uphold the 14th Amendment's longstanding guarantee that, with narrow exceptions, children born on U.S. soil are American citizens.
In his majority opinion, Chief Justice John Roberts wrote, citizenship, then and now, was the right to have rights. The Framers of the 14th Amendment extended that promise to every freeborn person in this land. We keep that promise today. But in a stinging dissent, Justice Samuel Alito called the ruling a serious mistake that preserves a powerful incentive to enter and remain in this country illegally.
Now, President Trump did not take the loss well. He called the ruling bad for the country and is calling on Congress to get rid of birthright citizenship through legislation. This is, at least rhetorically, the next frontier is to try to do this through legislation, which, to be frank, the Court explicitly ruled out today. But what do you -- what did you make of the ruling, how it was structured? And also we described it as 6-3, but the upholding of the constitutional underpinnings of this was really 5-4. So it was a bit more narrow than I think people would have expected.
JOSE ANTONIO VARGAS, AUTHOR, DEAR AMERICA, NOTES OF AN UNDOCUMENTED CITIZEN: I have to say, I could not sleep last night. I just could not sleep, trying to figure out -- because I couldn't figure out where this was really going to go, given how the rulings have been in the past couple of weeks.
I think what happened today is the Supreme Court defined American unequivocally. If you were born in America, you're American. That was true yesterday, that's true today, and that's going to be true tomorrow. And that citizenship in this country is not by blood, it's not by race, it's not by ethnicity, it's by soil.
And I think that -- I have to tell you, coming from California where, you know, 30 percent of the state is immigrant, here in New York, right, like 4.6 million people in New York State are immigrant, I'm not even counting the kids, just the immigrants, I think today was something worth celebrating July 4th weekend.
PHILLIP: It was interesting to me, to your point, how often the majority opinion referred to a nation of immigrants. And that's something that's really pushing back, it seems, on the heavily anti- immigrant rhetoric coming out of the White House and the Republican Party. They were pretty clear. This country was founded by immigrants and is a place that is designed to give citizenship to people who come here, are born here, but come here and become citizens through other means.
PIPKO: Can I just push back on that slightly? Obviously, I'm a supporter of this administration. I'm a daughter of two immigrants. I'm a supporter of immigration when it's done the legal, correct way, and I think immigrants have done an incredible -- a bit of good, let's just say, for our country, including my own family. So, I don't think there is an anti-immigrant sentiment.
I think it's an anti-illegal immigrant sentiment. I would say a good chunk of why Donald Trump got elected is because we have a problem with illegal immigration. I'd say most Americans actually agree on that. They disagree on the level to which it's bothering them and what they want to change, but I know a lot of people that thought that birthright citizenship was a major problem and who voted for President Trump assuming he might be able to make some kind of a difference.
I think with this ruling right now, I think people are really disagreeing on what it means. I've heard a lot of people say this is the end of this topic, and I just don't think that that's the case. I know a lot of people on the Republican side who are now saying, what are the workarounds? What comes next? And I hope that people realize that's actually going to be the next step.
I think this issue's on the ballot actually in one way or another in November because, obviously, millions of Americans see the issue. They want some kind of a change, and they know this is not the end at all. It might just be the beginning actually of starting this conversation.
ALLISON: I take issue with the arguing and the destruction of the 14th Amendment is actually how people want to reform our immigration policy. I agree with you that people were dissatisfied with the last administration's immigration policy, and they want a change. And I do think that's a main reason why Donald Trump won. I don't think he won because of the repealing birthright citizenship.
PIPKO: No, just immigration in general.
ALLISON: I do also think that I come on this show often, and I am debating people who have different ideologies with me, and there are a lot of attacks thrown at folks on my side of the aisle, and we're called radicals, and that we hate this country and that we want to destroy it, and yet this very administration is trying to destroy the Constitution, and that is radical.
[22:25:00]
That is a hate for this country. That is a hate for what our founding fathers stood for.
And so I just want people to just take a second and think about how aggressive this administration is. We do need to fix our immigration policy. It is not by changing the Constitution and the 14th Amendment, and that is why the Supreme Court struck it down today.
VARGAS: This should never have made it to the Supreme Court.
ALLISON: Never.
VARGAS: I mean, I was in college, I'm not sure if you were born yet. I was in college when Pat Buchanan wrote a book called "The Death of the West". Do you remember that? Samuel Huntington. The whole anti- immigrant wave didn't happen overnight. Trump just basically picked up a $500 bill on the floor and said, I'm going to go run on this.
And also, let's remember, I covered Barack Obama for The Washington Post in 2008, and back then when people were like, oh, isn't he a Muslim? Isn't he a -- like -- and remember now, Donald Trump made the biggest part of his political life was when he questioned the citizenship of a sitting president. When that whole conversation happened, that should the disqualified him from this conversation, and yet what has happened?
PHILLIP: I mean, it's one thing to say you don't like the policy, right, of birthright citizenship, and I think that's fine if you don't like it. But the idea that a president can just sign away a part of the Constitution is basically what the Court knocked down today. And even this idea that people like Ted Cruz are saying that Congress retains the authority to clarify federal law, and he says it should act immediately, it's actually not the case, right?
So, Justice John Roberts, here's what he said specifically. What the Civil Rights Act began, the 14th Amendment would finish. Like the act, the 14th Amendment was intended to repudiate Dred Scott. This time however, the goal was even grander, to put the question of citizenship beyond the legislative power altogether and settle the issue once and for all. He goes on to say that this was a codification, essentially, of common law of England. So, it goes all the way back.
This idea that Republicans are trying to sell to their base that they can just write a law and make the 14th Amendment go away is not supported by this ruling.
BORELLI: Our entire study of constitutional law is essentially a study of how the first ten amendments, the other -- the next 17, have been interpreted and changed over time. We have incorporation to the states of some of those amendments. We have different interpretations, for example, of the Second Amendment from what it specifically says. There's a constructionist argument. There's an interpretive argument. So, to say that the Constitution is never challenged is absolutely false.
PHILLIP: That's not what I said. I said that --
BORELLI: But you did say, how can the president challenge the Constitution?
PHILLIP: Well, no.
BORELLI: It's actually -- it happens all the time in the Supreme Court.
PHILLIP: I didn't say that the president couldn't challenge it. It's just that the idea that the president could nullify the 14th Amendment is clearly what the --
BORELLI: A party challenged him on constitutional grounds.
PHILLIP: It's clearly what the Supreme Court repudiated today, and they also repudiated the idea that Congress could do it.
The solution -- here's the solution. I'll give it to you. It's a constitutional amendment.
BORELLI: Sure.
ALLISON: Right.
PHILLIP: And there is a process for that. It's a hard process, but it does exist. So, I don't know. It seems like Republicans are not being honest with what it would really take to make a change to birthright citizenship different from what it is.
BORELLI: We have 50 different states with 50 different levels of gun law that all change the way the Second Amendment is interpreted. So, in this case, with this example, the 14th Amendment, the president made good on a campaign promise. He instituted an executive order. The normal thing happened. Someone challenges what he did. They brought it to court, and this time he lost. And I happen to agree, actually, with the Supreme Court in a large sense. I think the 14th Amendment is very clear.
Now, the thing that may come to haunt Democrats is that Trump ran on immigration very strongly in 2016, build the wall, we remember that. He ran in 2020 on immigration to some degree, not as much, didn't win He ran in 2024 on immigration and won again. So, anything that essentially kicks the immigration issue, maybe it won't be number one again in Americans' eye but I think it does give the Republicans an opportunity to bring an issue that has worked for them in the past back up going into the midterms.
ALLISON: I know. I just want to --
PHILLIP: This is a 70/30 issue and not --
(CROSSTALKS)
PHILLIP: Okay, let me show you -- hold on.
(CROSSTALKS)
PHILLIP: Hold on. Here's a Gallup poll from a few days ago, okay, June 18th through the 22nd, should the Supreme Court keep or reverse its birthright citizenship ruling from 1898? 69 percent say keep, okay? That's not close. That's not close.
BORELLI: You're not asking the right question. The question is in a YouGov poll, 50/50, when it was limited to people who have not obeyed the law. If you've come here illegally and you've had a baby, is the baby a U.S. citizen? That is a 50/50 issue. That's not 70/30.
ALLISON: You said that there are 50 states that have 50 different laws, and that is the case, because there are state rights, but there's also something called the commerce clause. And so that actually says that when you move from one state to another state, there have to be some laws that actually transcend from state to state.
[22:30:05]
So while there are state rights, there are also things of the supreme court have enacted through jurisprudence that actually overrides state rights which is why we have the federal government which is why so many people relied on federal law.
MOCKLER: I like that you pointed out that Trump ran on immigration multiple times because he's impressively turned one of his strongest issues into the Republican party's largest liability. I mean ICE is currently being rejected by the American people after Renee Good and Alex Pretti were killed and the Supreme Court seems to be siding with the American people that Donald Trump's immigration policy is way too radical.
I mean, I was young at the time, but you brought up Barack Obama. It wasn't that long ago when he issued a slew of executive orders, and Republicans called him a communist dictator. Now, Republicans are frothing at the mouth because the Supreme Court won't let Donald Trump rewrite the Constitution via executive order.
So this is an extreme policy dictated by Stephen Miller, at one point Kristi Noem, and right now it's backfiring on the Republican Party.
ALLISON: And Donald Trump.
VARGAS: Let me just make sure this is really clear. This is not about legality.
Remember, just a few days ago, the same Supreme Court basically are making TPS holders temporarily protected status. Haitians, what, 350,000 people are about to lose their documents. They're here legally, under the law, and they're now about to lose their status.
So this is not about what's legal or not. This is about who's American.
ALLISON: Who's American?
VARGAS: And who belongs here.
ALLISON: And who belongs here. And what country we want to be in.
VARGAS: And, you know, look, thankfully, X is not real life. Twitter is not real life. I know that this weekend, when we celebrate July 4th, when I go to the Bay Area, all of us are going to celebrate the fact that all of our neighbors who might have come here 20 years ago, 15 years ago, or last week.
We're going to celebrate the fact that this is the ideal of what we're actually trying to fight for, the ideas of this country. That's not about race, ethnicity, right, or even blood. It's about who gets to define who an American is.
PHILLIP: Next for us. So is this Supreme Court political or are they following the law? Because both liberals and conservatives right now are pretty livid. We'll debate next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[22:35:00]
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
PHILLIP: Tonight the Supreme Court used the last day of its term to rule on some of the most consequential cases before it. Birthright citizenship, transgender athletes, and campaign finance.
But as soon as the court's opinions were reported out in the court of public opinion, each of the justices were either heroes or villains. It depends on who you ask.
Now, this court might either be deemed political or bound by the Constitution, MAGA, or against Trump, ideological or independent. This week, right-wing commentators have slammed Justice Amy Coney Barrett for siding with Chief Justice John Roberts and the liberal minority on two separate occasions and standing in the way of important aspects of Trump's agenda.
Here's Megyn Kelly just hours before Barrett sided with the liberal justices in this key birthright citizenship case.
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MEGYN KELLY, CONSERVATIVE COMMENTATOR: It's Justice Amy Coney Barrett, a Trump appointee. She's supposed to be one of ours. Why are they always so wiggly?
Honestly, like the libs, you can take it to the bank. Kagan, Sotomayor, Ketanji Brown Jackson. I have to admire their commitment to their side. They never abandon their side. Amy Coney Barrett is a turncoat, she's constantly siding with the left. John Roberts obviously and he is pursuing the wrong agenda as Chief Justice.
You know he's an institutionalist meant to protect the Supreme Court that's not your job.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIP: Now, I mean look it's true that Amy Coney Barrett has been a swing vote in some cases but it is not true, but she's always siding with the left. I mean she has voted with the conservative majority a lot. It's just that sometimes she doesn't, which I don't know, isn't that what we're supposed to see?
FOSTER: I think so many Americans, and this is true of pundits, it's true of regular American, everyday Americans as well, and it's certainly true of folks on the MAGA contingent who have lost confidence in the courts as the President has been more openly critical of them.
Seem to have this perspective that the way you should feel about the court has everything to do with whether or not they're ruling in the way that you like on various issues. And I must be in a weird minority. I am happy to see justices make decisions that seem out of step with what you would expect from them as a conservative or liberal justice.
But when you read the opinion, there is an argument there. There's a case that's being made and they're doing it on the merits, on the basis of principle. You've seen, actually, Sotomayor and Ketanji Brown Jackson break ranks with their party and vote in different directions because they see the issues in particular ways.
PHILLIP: Do you think liberals are wrong to call this court essentially captured by MAGA and by Trump? ALLISON: Well, I don't think you're actually in the minority about
wanting the justices actually to adjudicate a case. I actually think it's because it's not happening is why people are feeling like this court is political.
First, the reason why people feel like this court is captured by Donald Trump is the hypocrisy of how Scalia's seat was filled and how they prevented Merrick Garland.
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You can try and argue until you're blue in the face, but when you say that if it's less than 100 days out from an election, when the Democrat is in and they shouldn't replace it, then it should be the same thing, and that wasn't the case. And so it was the unfair way in which Republicans went about filling these two seats is why people first feel like this court was captured.
The second thing is that I actually believe -- I am a lawyer by training, and I believe that the Supreme Court should not be political. However, when Supreme Court justices go in front of Congress under oath and give testimony that they will not -- they will live by precedent when it comes to Roe v. Wade and they go against their opinion, it does feel political.
And so I actually think it's not for a Democratic President, a Republican President, a pundit, any elected official to restore the confidence in the court again. Actually think it's the justice is responsibility because I think they are behaving in such a way not all of them but some of that will sell political right now that is why I don't actually think you're in the minority right now.
FOSTER: Recent ruling suggests to you that the court is captured and you certainly saw decisions in justice --
ALLISON: I think they're consistent like what, how do you do a ruling on one case around gerrymandering in Alabama two years ago and then to a totally different ruling on another case? How do you say there's the President has executive authority to fire some appointed individuals in the independent offices and then not some?
So it's the inconsistency actually think that makes people feel like it's so political and that some of the inconsistencies in their answers.
PHILLIP: There's also some of these some of the justices right, Clarence Thomas in particular, I think has become much more outspoken. This is what he said earlier this year about what he calls progressivism. Listen.
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CLARENCE THOMAS, SUPREME COURT JUSTICE: Progressivism seeks to replace the basic premises of the Declaration of Independence and hence our form of government. It holds that our rights and our dignities come not from God but from government. It requires of the people a subservience and weakness incompatible with a constitution premised on the transcendent origin of our rights.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIP: I think a lot of people would hear that, and they would hear somebody who has a very clear agenda and maybe isn't taking a look at each case and the text and making rulings individually, but is looking at things through a very, very strict ideological lens.
BORELLI: Well, I think, first of all, we should have a Clarence Thomas clip every night on the show. I think it'd be very good.
But, yes, it is no secret that he is one of the most conservative, if not the most conservative, on the court. And I think we can fairly say, as Megyn Kelly pointed out, that Roberts and now Amy Coney Barrett have become these moderate, occasionally swing voters.
I guess the question I would ask is, who was the last Democratic presidential appointee to the Supreme Court, that could also be considered a swing voter. It's not certainly the three --
ALLISON: Well, he lost, too.
PHILLIP: Justice Kagan has been a swing voter.
BORELLI: That doesn't mean that she has not switched parties. All the justices have switched parties. I'm saying people that are routinely recognized as a moderate swing voter.
I would have to go back to -- my memory serves correctly, and my Googling serves correctly. I couldn't remember the guy's name, but it would be Byron White, appointed by JFK, was the last Democratic presidential appointee of the Supreme Court who was genuinely considered a swing voter. I think he even dissented.
ALLISON: They're not voters.
PHILLIP: I just want to point this one out. Here's one crazy thing that's been happening.
The attacks on Amy Coney Barrett have been -- let me just be clear -- sexist. Matt Walsh, back in 2020 when she was being appointed, he called her an impressive judge. Now today he says the worst Supreme Court justices of all time have all been women. That's just a fact, Republican President should take a hint.
Other commentators, Derek Evans, a former West Virginia state legislature, "Amy Coney Barrett is the poster child for why we need to repeal the 19th Amendment."
Another conservative says, "If Amy Coney Barrett really votes against ending birthright citizenship, we should begin to look into how to deport her Haitian child back to Haiti."
That's the level of vitriol.
ALLISON: Nasty work. MOCKLER: There is a lot of vitriol coming out, a lot of hypocrisy from
conservatives. And I'm not surprised this party is having sexist attacks against her. There's a bunch of hypocrisy.
Ben Shapiro said, "This is a legal abomination," but two years ago he said "I'm sorry the constitution is happening to you when there was a ruling that the liberals did not like."
So we see this on both sides. We see unfair tax. I think it's a top- down effort from Donald Trump to try to delegitimize the courts, to try to, you know, spew vile and venom in politics.
Marjorie Taylor Greene had to leave politics due to the death threats that she was getting, so women in the Republican Party aren't treated well.
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FOSTER: Are you concerned about progressive attempts to delegitimize the courts, to talk about court packing schemes and various other things, insisting that the courts have been completely overtaken, despite the fact that you get rulings like today that are clearly checking executive power pretty regular?
MOCKLER: Well I'll ask you do you think that the Supreme Court was right when they said Trump should be able to overthrow an election without any --
FOSTER: He insist on answering questions with questions.
MOCKLER: No, if there's a far-left person delegitimizing the entire court then absolutely that's bad, but I think the court does have some concerns with allowing billionaires to buy elections with saying that Trump can't really do anything illegal as long as it's in the purview of the presidency. They've had some whack court or whack cases.
ALLISON: Well I would just say we also just had a segment and we were told that we could revise the Constitution. So I don't think that it is unfair for progressives to say if they think something is broken, fix it.
PIPKO: Can we just say also this conversation isn't helping. We're sowing more distrust in the court.
These are all nine educated people that were appointed by Presidents, approved by our Senate. We should not choose to not have faith in them when they vote away or judge.
ALLISON: No, we can't. That's America. No, you can say whatever you want, that's America. That's actually what makes democracy stronger.
PIPKO: You can say whatever you want, but to try to sow distrust in the system when it doesn't go your way, that's the problem.
ALLISON: I'm not sowing a distrust, I'm calling a spade a spade. PHILLIP: Next for us, it's primary night in Colorado, and after a wave
of socialist victories so far this season, the vice President is predicting that the new Democratic Party leader will be Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. We'll discuss that next.
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PHILLIP: Tonight, a wave of progressive Democrats are hoping to build on the momentum of recent victories across the country as Colorado's primary results roll in.
In the race for the state's first congressional district, 29-year-old Democratic Socialist Milat Kiros is trying to oust a 15-term congresswoman, Diana DeGette. Now, right now, it's still too close to call.
In the race for the U.S. Senate in Colorado, CNN projects incumbent Senator John Hickenlooper will defeat progressive challenger State Senator Julie Gonzales.
And, as socialism fever spreads, there are some new questions about how this will all shape up for the Democratic field ahead of 2028. Here is Vice President J.D. Vance with his prediction.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MICHAEL KNOLES, HOST, "THE MICHAEL KNOWLES SHOW": The leading Democrat for 2028.
J.D. VANCE, VICE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: I think it's got to be AOC. I know that's probably conventional wisdom.
I mean, it's funny. The AOC versus Ossoff thing, I guess the question would be, who do you think really has the power in the Democratic Party?
And if you think the answer is like Wall Street and the left of center business community, then it would be Ossoff. If you think it's the universities, it would be AOC.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIP: AOC had a chance to respond today. Here's what she said.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
KAITLAN COLLINS, CNN CHIEF WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: J.D. Vance just said in an interview that he thinks you are going to be the leading Democratic candidate for President in 2028. What's your response to that?
REP, ALEXANDRIA OCASIO-CORTEZ (D-NY): I mean, yes. You know, I hope he is. That's what I'll say.
COLLINS: He's a Republican nominee?
OCASIO-CORTEZ: Yes.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIP: All right, Kmele, I clocked your face. J.D. Vance was talking. You didn't agree?
FOSTER: That's wishful thinking. That is not the conventional wisdom that AOC is the leading candidate on their left. But certainly lots of Republicans hope that's the case.
The DSA bonanza has, the DSA's achievements recently have been a bit of a bonanza for a party that is being roiled by infighting at the moment.
BORELLI: The early state lineups don't line up for her. Some of them are open primary states. So it's functionally difficult for her.
But I think there's a very fair case to be made that everyone in the Democratic Party, from Sanders to James Carville, said the Democratic Party didn't stand for anything. People like AOC, Zohran Mamdani, they filled this void with their version of progressive socialism. And for better or worse, it's the only cohesive plan the Democratic Party has that's attractive to voters.
ALLISON: And that's what Donald Trump did. Donald Trump filled a gap when they felt like Republicans were stale and not doing anything. And I think that is on both sides of the aisle what we are seeing is that Americans are sick of the status quo and they want somebody that's going to fight for them.
They want somebody that's going to come with new ideas and if you are going to about a billionaires that you got to go, and it's working right?
MOCKLER: People looking for new ideas and I think when it comes to young voters there's oftentimes it's like reductive and lazy framework that there is a bunch of socialism spreading among them. But when you can't accumulate capital in a society you're not going to be tied to the capitalistic system. I don't agree with all the prescriptions of the DSA.
But the reality is when young people are negative on student debt, negative capital on medical debt, and actually are farther and farther away from getting a house, they're going to begin to rebel against a system they don't see as working for them. So having an alternative vision is what these Republicans and establishment Democrats need to have if they want a fighting chance.
PHILLIP: All right. Next for us, a new addition to the table, you there at home. We'll read some of your feedback when we come back.
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Now, viewer feedback from CNN.com/Abby.
Our first comment tonight: We need to elect Supreme Court justices, too. Right or wrong?
ALLISON: No.
PHILLIP: That was his point.
ALLISON: He was talking about them being voters, so why not vote for them?
BORELLI: That was an innocent mistake, but maybe I'm onto something. Maybe I'm starting a new revolution.
PHILLOP: I'm not sure. I mean, would that solve any problems?
PIPKO: No. I mean, we're already electing the people that nominate them.
BORELLI: We elect judges all over the country.
PHILLIP: I think that there ought to be some -- I think the problem with the Supreme Court is that there is no end to their term. That's probably the biggest problem.
MOCKLER: Voters would elect Trump to the Supreme Court knowing them.
PIPKO: Jesus Christ. They definitely would.
PHILLIP: Okay, next up. Can someone please give Joe a twister game? That way at least he'll have a reason to twist himself into a pretzel trying to defend Trump.
BORELLI: Can I give the finger to the camera?
No. Can I do that?
MOCKLER: You were like, all Presidents dabble in things. Cryptocurrency is dabbled in sometimes. Like, bro, you can't just weave around like that, just say it's bad.
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PHILLIP: He did get props from Adam for being a good politician.
MOCKLER: Yes. He did give me a compliment. It was impressive. I saw it in real time.
BORELLI: Is that a compliment?
PIPKO: I think it's a compliment. From Adam, it's a compliment. PHILLIP: All right. And finally, last but certainly not least, I like
Ashley's outfit tonight. She's dressed for battle.
ALLISON: You know, stay ready so you ain't got to get ready.
PHILLIP: You are a viewer favorite.
ALLISON: I know. Oh, thanks, guys. Love you, too.
PHILLIP: Thank you very much for watching "NewsNight." "Laura Coates Live" starts right now.
