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CNN NewsNight with Abby Phillip
Trump Says Nothing Wrong in Making Billions as President; Rightists Slam Mayor Mamdani's Aircon Move; Trump's Fourth of July Celebrations Become Politicized Despite Low Turnouts. Aired 10-11p ET
Aired July 02, 2026 - 22:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[22:00:38]
ABBY PHILLIP, CNN ANCHOR (voice-over): Tonight, Donald Trump spins profiting off the presidency.
DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: I'm the only President, they say, that's ever given up my salary, I gave up my salary.
PHILLIP (voice-over): While defending his public stakes in private businesses.
TRUMP: Somebody said, that's not very American. I said, no, I think it is very American, actually.
PHILLIP (voice-over): Plus.
MAYOR ZOHRAN MAMDANI (D), NEW YORK CITY: Every business owner, please set your thermostats to 78 degrees.
PHILLIP (voice-over): The right's new evidence of communism? Air conditioning.
Also, did Donald Trump hijack America's birthday?
From small crowds to chaotic pet projects, why the 250th is becoming politicized.
And another worrying sign for the economy. As the U.S. added jobs at a slower rate than expected. Ditto for wages.
Live at the table. Bakari Sellers, Ben Ferguson, Yemisi Egbewole and Ashley Davis.
Americans with different perspectives aren't talking to each other. But here they do.
PHILLIP: Good evening, I'm Abby Phillip in New York.
Tonight, President Trump is defending the billions of dollars that he earned in his first year back in office. Here's part of that defense.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: I'm the only President, they say, that's ever given up my salary, I gave up my salary. I don't get a salary, I gave it up.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIP: The $400,000 annual salary that Trump says he gave up is obviously a drop in the bucket compared to the $2.2 billion he reportedly made during his first year in office.
Now, just to put that number into context for you, the presidential salary would have been just .018 of a percent of his total earnings just last year. But he's also dismissing any concerns about the more than $1.4 billion that he's made on crypto alone, claiming that he has no say or control over his portfolio.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: I don't do anything having to do with my business. My kids run it. They have made a tremendous amount of money, more than I would have ever thought I would have made.
And I let people invest it. I don't even speak to, I don't even know who they are. But it's given to big firms like that are on your show all the time.
My son, Eric, handles it. I don't talk to him about things such as this, I think I'd be allowed to. I'm not sure even what the status is, but I don't.
JOE KERNEN, CNBC ANCHOR: In the disclosure this week, the amount of money that you and the family made in crypto, it was an outsized number. I was just asking, did you or you know about the crypto venture? So that was just something.
TRUMP: By the way, I could know about it. I didn't.
I mean, there's nothing illegal. There's nothing wrong with it. I could know.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: But all of this shouldn't be a surprise. President Trump told "Fortune" magazine back in 2000 that it's very possible that I could be the first presidential candidate to run and make money on it.
Now, before we open it up to the table here, I want to invite you once again at home to join the debate. Head to cnn.com/abby, and you can weigh in. We'll get to some of your comments throughout the show.
And just as this is all happening and Trump is making those comments, we also get another piece of evidence that the Trump family has extraordinary luck. Let's call it that way in the market plan to ease rules on mailing guns could help company that Trump Jr., President Trump's eldest son is a key player in grab a gun, a company that hopes to dominate Internet firearm sales.
They'll dominate it because the President looks like he is about to ease regulations on that .Don Jr. has a stake in the company. He is on the board. So, yes, I mean, the Trump piece of it is actually just kind of a drop in the bucket compared to what his sons are probably doing.
BAKARI SELLERS, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: You know, I think back to 2020 and Donald Trump coined and many Republicans coined Biden the Biden crime family because of Hunter Biden.
[22:05:01]
What we're seeing right now is grifting on steroids. And I want my Republican friends to just think about Barack Obama shoes, Barack Obama fragrances, Barack Obama Bibles, Barack Obama watches.
Imagine Barack Obama making a mean coin, Michelle Obama having a mean coin and then rug pulling it and making billions of dollars off of their investors. I just -- I find it hypocritical.
I find it if we go back in history, we made Jimmy Carter put his peanut farm in a blind trust. And now you have this President. And I don't really feel bad for anybody, I kind of giggle a little bit because he's making money blindly off the back of his supporters who apparently don't care, which is fascinating to me.
ASHLEY DAVIS, FORMER WHITE HOUSE OFFICIAL UNDER PRESIDENT GEORGE W. BUSH: But also not care. But I also think that this is a tale as old as time. I mean, this starts out, remember, when Grant was accused of his whiskey sales and we had LBJ, we had Clinton, we had Biden, obviously.
But the thing is, is what I think is different. And I've said this from the beginning is they are the sons especially are doing this wide open. So the criticism of it's tried inside as Hunter. Yes.
PHILLIP: Hold on. Transparency is a lot of justification? Hypothetically, if you rob a bank and you don't have a mask on, it doesn't make robbing a bank.
BEN FERGUSON, PODCAST HOST, "THE BEN FERGUSON SHOW" AND PODCAST CO- HOST, "VERDICT WITH TED CRUZ": Is he broken at all? That's the part. He's not broken law.
PHILLIP: I'm saying --
FERGUSON: He's been successful before --
PHILLIP: -- doing something that is unethical out in the open.
FERGUSON: And I was right. I think it's awesome when people in America succeed. I love the fact that we have a President that is really wealthy when he came in and he keeps doing business. There's nothing wrong.
PHILLIP: Hold on. You would have been fine with the so-called Biden crime family. Oh, if Biden had just been transparent. If Hunter Biden had just been -- Answer the question.
FERGUSON: I'm going to answer.
PHILLIP: No, let me ask you if Hunter Biden had just been transparent, if he had just said, you know, I'm using my dad's name to make money. You would have said totally above board.
FERGUSON: If he was doing actual businesses, Burisma was massive corruption. He didn't know anything about the industry. Don Jr. and guns are a great example. I hung out with Don Jr. at the SHOT Show 20 years ago in Vegas. He's been involved in guns for 20-plus years.
PHILLIP: What do the Trump sons know about mining rare earth minerals? What do the Trump sons know about robotics? What do they know about drugs?
FERGUSON: A lot, clearly. They made a lot of money off of it because they actually invested in it. Have you ever looked in your retirement account? What do you know? What do you know about cryptocurrency? What do you know about rare earth minerals? I've invested in all those things.
SELLERS: Respectfully.
FERGUSON: I'm invested in all those things.
SELLERS: I don't know. Let me ask you --
FERGUSON: A lot of America.
SELLERS: You ask me, what did he do that was unethical or illegal?
FERGUSON: Nothing.
SELLERS: And I wanted to answer that just plain and simply because you I don't know. I take hot yoga. I feel like you're doing a little yoga, too, for that pretzel that you got yourself.
FERGUSON: I love it. Make money, I do it because they invest. I just want a lot of money.
SELLERS: That's awesome. In quarter one, in quarter one of 2026, Donald Trump has executed 3500 trades. You want to know what's unethical about this? Can I? I'm glad you brought her up because it's not. It's nowhere near.
FERGUSON: Nancy Pelosi --
SELLERS: Can I finish real quick? Because you ask. Can I ask you? Can I? Can I answer your question?
PHILLIP: No, it's not.
FERGUSON: But it's not. Nancy Pelosi has -- she's literally better than Wall Street.
PHILLIP: Just a second. Objectively, the amount of money is not the same. Okay. We don't need to fight about that. It's just not the same amount of money.
FERGUSON: Pelosi was making how much a year and how many millions is she now worried? But that's insider trading. Donald Trump walks in with a billion. It turns into two. And you guys are freaking out. A billion dollars. A lot to start with. It's like a lot of money.
SELLERS: Ben, to utilize your phrase, the President makes $400,000 a year.
FERGUSON: And he gives it back.
SELLERS: This quarter. He's made over $1 billion, 1.2, 1.4 billion on crypto alone. What I want to tell you that's unethical is the fact that when you make 3500 trades in one year and you go up and you invest in a company, and then you sit in the oval office and you tell people, wow, this company is great.
This company is going to do, X, Y, Z, or you ease regulations on this company and you trade and purchase stock in that company. That fundamentally is unethical. You can call it what you want.
FERGUSON: So, should we then go after Nancy Pelosi with the same figure that you just went after the President? Because she does it for years.
[22:10:02]
PHILLIP: "The Wall Street Journal" has a new story tonight as well. Look, because this stuff is coming fast and furious. And as Jonathan Swan, who wrote a book about this, said, we're scratching the surface of this.
The Journal says, in a series of trades on April 3rd and 4th, the days after Trump announced global tariffs in the Rose Garden, his investment accounts bought and sold hundreds of individual stocks, according to financial disclosures.
The strategy shifted on April 8th, when his accounts only purchased 327 individual stocks, spending more than $3.6 million to scoop up Apple, Berkshire Hathaway, and other blue chip stocks. No selling that day.
Trump posted on social media the next morning, "it was a great day to buy," and then he paused much of his tariff regiment that afternoon. Markets then took off, and guess what? He made a lot of money, okay? So, just lots of coincidences.
YEMISE EGBEWOLE, FORMER CHIEF OF STAFF AND ADVISER, BIDEN WHITE HOUSE PRESS OFFICE: And the political bubble. Yes.
PHILLIP: Lots of coincidences that nobody believes is a coincidence, because the President has the power to control with his words what markets are doing. He has the power to influence government contracts, which some of these companies have gotten. He has the power to influence foreign affairs, which also affects some of the business deals that his kids are doing. That's what's part of the problem here. EGBEWOLE: Yes, and it doesn't, I just don't think it helps Republicans
as a whole as they're going into the midterms, because at the same time, he's doing this with the crypto, and he called it a scam a couple years ago. I guess now he understands it, and he's good on crypto. But he hasn't signed the housing bill.
There are real conversations about affordability that are happening, and I think there are a lot of Republicans who would like some help in their districts and their states in pushing forward that message.
It's very hard to sell affordability when the President is reported to call the housing bill a huge yawn, and at the same time, he's raking in this money. Does he want to help the party as a whole or the family?
FERGUSON: I remember sitting on a show, and you guys were saying that Donald Trump was a fraud, and he really probably wasn't worth a billion dollars. He was lying about his wealth, and now you guys are pissed off that he's worth billions of dollars, admitting that he made a lot of money.
It's like the definition of hypocrisy, it's like, Donald Trump's not really rich. Damn (ph) it, now he's too rich. Which one is it?
PHILLIP: Hold on, hold on, Ben. Hold on a second, Ben.
FERGUSON: It is pretty funny.
PHILLIP: Do you know what hypocrisy really means?
FERGUSON: When you say Donald Trump's not rich, and you say he's lying when he's running, and then he actually is rich, and he makes more money, and now you're mad about it? That's hypocrisy.
PHILLIP: Here's what we're really talking about here. We're talking about Trump in 2024 bringing in $600 million from his businesses, and the very next year, the only thing that's changed is he suddenly is President, and that jumps to $2.2 billion. That's not being a good businessman. That's not playing the market. Those are gains that no one is getting, but the President.
FERGUSON: A lot of people that went into crypto, a lot of people that are liberal, you've got a source. They've made a lot of money off of crypto.
PHILLIP: I just want to be really clear about what we're talking about when we say crypto. You heard in the clip, President Trump claimed that he didn't know anything about it. That we know is not true, because the reason he made much of the money on crypto is because just a few days before the inauguration, he started advertising these crypto meme tokens.
That is where he is getting the crypto money from. He personally did that. He knows where he got that money from.
That was $600 million in crypto. That is the biggest, the largest chunk of this is the $600 million from the transaction sales of the meme coins. He did make a lot of money.
FERGUSON: Is it jealousy? Or did he commit a crime? It's just jealousy. People are jealous that he made a lot of money.
SELLERS: Can I answer a bit? It's not jealousy.
FERGUSON: Yes, it is. I'm going to make one complete sentence and you're not going to know it real quick. It's not jealousy. What we're talking about is, and it's not hypocrisy, what we're saying though is that Donald Trump is corrupt and Donald Trump is a grifter.
And the way that he made his money, for example, I want to talk to you about the Trump meme coin. There were 1 million wallets that have experienced net losses of $4.5 billion. It was a rug and pull. That is what it was.
The Melania meme coin. If you invested $10,000 in the Melania meme coin at its height, you now have $0.90. It's not a genius move. What we're saying though, we're not saying, oh my God, we're not saying don't go out and be rich. I love Mark Cuban.
He's done great work, go out and make your money. What I am saying is though, if you're going to grift on the back of your supporters, like if you're okay, that is transparent or that --
FERGUSON: -- approval rating 90 percent among Republicans. Why do Republicans support him more than any other President?
[22:15:07]
PHILLIP: We just got a comment from one of our viewers who's watching right now. They say, where is the Senate and Congress? I can't believe the silence. Please do something. Where is the Senate and Congress?
DAVIS: This is actually their own problem. And I think that's something we should talk about is the insider trading bill or the stock trading bill, whichever one you want to call it. That's actually very bipartisan, which started not just with Nancy Pelosi, but Republicans as well. Congress won't pass it. So they're able to do the same thing and they're making the same. So I actually --
PHILLIP: Can I just on that point that that insider trading bill stalled and you're right about that. And one of the things about it was that it actually exempted the President and his family from the same rules that would have bound members of Congress. I think what the viewer is asking about is why on earth should that be the case? And I think that's a legitimate question.
DAVIS: Well, first of all, whether it's the case or not, I don't think anything's ever going to happen by it because of it. And also I think one thing that I do want to clarify, the President himself is not sitting there making these hundreds or thousands of trades that were just commented on.
And someone else, every President, every member of Congress, every staffer, you put your, your financial interest in a blind trust. They're the ones who do it.
SELLERS: But also accurate though.
DAVIS: Yes, you do. But I'm not sitting there.
SELLERS: Let me just, let me just tell you why it's not accurate. Just real quick.
(CROSSTALK)
DAVIS: Okay, yes, yes.
SELLERS: Because you have 4500 trades from this President of the United States. Do you know how many trades, portfolio, whatever, Joe Biden made? Zero. Do you know how many trade Barack Obama made?
(CROSSTALK)
SELLERS: Do you know how many trades Barack Obama made? Zero. Do you know how many trades George Bush made? Zero.
(CROSSTALK)
PHILLIP: I also don't think, I'd also don't think that it's enough to say, listen, I have investment accounts. I don't manually make trades myself either. It doesn't require you to manually do trades. I don't think that absolves the President and his family and his associates from questions about whether the moves that were made on his behalf were done with information that was non-public.
And I think that we may never know the answer to that question, but when you look at the list of evidence, that's what the question, that's what is raised here.
In the same way that you raise questions about Nancy Pelosi that are not informed by any knowledge that she knew anything and acted on it. I think people are making those same connections when you see not just the trades, because the trades are just a small piece of it.
It's also getting on the boards of these companies and then the companies getting no defense contracts. That's what we're talking about here.
EGBEWOLE: My point though, is they're doing this.
DAVIS: I apologize.
FERGUSON: If you want to rein in Congress at the same time, let's bipartisan do it, that's fine.
PHILLIP: Everybody should be reined in. I think most Americans would agree on that.
And by the way, when you have a billion dollars when you come into office, you've got that because you're pretty good at business. Sure it is. PHILLIP: Everybody should be reined in. I think everyone would agree that everyone should be held to the same standard in terms of this stuff.
SELLERS: Except Trump.
PHILLIP: Not, just the President and not just Congress.
Next for us, a big question for America is conserving energy, communism now. The rightist slammings are on Mamdani's request to New Yorkers, despite Republicans having a long history of doing the same.
Plus, more rain on America's birthday parade. Why Democrats say the donors were duped by a Trump backed 250th group? We'll be right back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[22:20:00]
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
PHILLIP: Tonight, New York City's mayor Zohran Mamdani is asking New Yorkers to set their air conditioning to 78 degrees during this triple digit heat wave. And the right is pretty hot over it.
Of course, the move is intended to alleviate the strain on the city's power grid. Senator Ted Cruz says this in a first world country, you could turn on the A.C.
Senator Rand Paul said it was proof communism is alive and well. Nikki Haley said, welcome to socialism.
But as the weather is unbearable, so is the hypocrisy. Mamdani's energy conservation plea is nothing new for New York City. Eric Adams made the same plea, so did mayors de Blasio, Bloomberg, Rudy Giuliani himself.
As governor, Nikki Haley urged South Carolinians to conserve energy during extreme weather. And in Texas, where Ted Cruz lives, energy saving guidance is standard, both in the summer and in the winter.
In fact, up until today, on a Web page dedicated to keeping cool, Donald Trump's own Department of Energy recommended that Americans keep their homes between 75 and 78 degrees during the day. That Web page is now no longer available as of this afternoon. CNN has reached out to the Department of Energy to ask for comment.
A bizarre hill to die on, Ben. I don't understand this.
FERGUSON: Do you support it?
PHILLIP: Ask Nikki Haley.
FERGUSON: No, my mask. Do you think you saw that? You're like, hell yes.
Let me walk over there. Knock that number up to say.
PHILLIP: Let me ask you a question. Is Nikki really the Republic of South Carolina?
FERGUSON: I live in Texas and there's no way we're putting it on 78 degrees. Just to be clear, it's not 78 degrees in here right now, either.
Like, like no one's going to abide by this. Like it's absurd.
PHILLIP: But Ben, I'm just saying this is a weird hill to die on when Nikki Haley says -- hold on.
[22:25:02]
When Nikki Haley says, we ask that you set your thermostat to 68 or lower by doing --
FERGUSON: 68 or 78?
PHILLIP: -- in the winter, this is for the winter energy conservation. So in the winter, they're telling people to set, to tell people to set their thermostat to 68.
And also this doesn't come from the politicians. This is also coming from, as I pointed out, the Department of Energy. It's coming from the power companies, Con Edison says, Con Edison, which is running the power in New York.
FERGUSON: So let me, let me translate.
PHILLIP: Stay cool and stay cash.
FERGUSON: Republican talking points for you.
PHILLIP: Set thermostats no later than 78 degrees.
FERGUSON: This is real simple.
PHILLIP: I'm just asking.
FERGUSON: We believe in better power grids.
PHILLIP: Hold on a second.
FERGUSON: We believe in reinvestment in power grids.
PHILLIP: Ben, I'm just saying.
FERGUSON: We believe that you should build enough so that I don't have to walk up and go to 78 degrees.
PHILLIP: You can let this one go if you want.
FERGUSON: You don't have to turn up to 78 here right now. And in solidarity, we stand with Mamdani. PHILLIP: You don't have to jump off the partisan cliff. You can let it go.
PHILLIP: I agree. Listen, I am, do not agree with many of the mayor's policies, but this one, I don't think he was like, I think we're doing a really big reach on this.
I mean, he wasn't trying to control our lives. He was giving a suggestion.
SELLERS: There's a lot to be critical of, right?
DAVIS: Totally.
SELLERS: He didn't go into the book of socialism to figure this out. And the crazy thing is, it's literally not because in Texas where your grid falls apart, right? And Ted Cruz is in Cancun.
Anyway, so you have, that actually did happen.
DAVIS: You're getting partisanship.
SELLERS: That's all I'm saying. Like, I'm not going to do this because I grew up in South Carolina and my grandmother, I don't know if y'all had a grandmother that had the couch with the plastic on it.
DAVIS: Oh yes.
SELLERS: And when it was on 78 and your butt sticks to the plastic. So I have PTSD from thinking about that. However, I will say that this is not some grand socialism gesture.
This is absurdity.
FERGUSON: Probably grand socialism.
SELLERS: This is absurdity from Nikki and Ted and the others.
DAVIS: I'm actually surprised with Nikki because, you know, I'm a huge fan. I'm surprised she jumped into this fight.
PHILLIP: Arguably, she may have started it because she may have made one of the first comments about this and everybody else just jumped on the bandwagon. But it's like everybody has such short memory about this stuff because, you know, it's just so easy to be like, oh, it's just a socialist thing.
But the entire country has guidance from the Department of Energy that says when there's a major heat wave, we have to take pressure off the energy grid. That's just common sense.
EGBEWOLE: And it could be a good time for a bipartisan conversation on our grid infrastructure because New York City is supposed to be one of the greatest cities in the world.
And I agree, I'm not turning anything up to 78. FERGUSON: Thank you.
EGBEWOLE: Taylor Swift and Travis Kelsey down in Madison Square Garden are not at 78.
FERGUSON: And by the way, if you really want to get technical, he could have said, hey, the grid sucks and we got to work on it. Can you guys raise the temperature?
But it's on. So it's because of who Mamdani is why people look at this way. It's because he's a guy that's like, hey, that's my house.
PHILLIP: Let's be clear. It's not why people look at it this way. It's right.
There is this like, you know, partisan --
FERGUSON: He's a socialist. I mean, it's, you know, dictator one.
PHILLIP: Look, you can. I'm not. I'm not telling you how to feel about Mamdani.
FERGUSON: He proved it. He said you can tell you what you can run.
PHILLIP: Exactly, I'm not telling you how to feel about Mamdani. I'm just suggesting that maybe the thermostat is not the reason.
FERGUSON: Let's raise it in here, 78 will be sweating by the end.
SELLERS: I would actually ask Ted Cruz to put forth a bill, right, to actually invest in our grids. Let's actually if you want to talk.
FERGUSON: So, he's been a huge advocate.
SELLERS: That's not what I said. I said, if you want to --
FERGUSON: -- done that in Texas.
SELLERS: That's not what I said. Put forth the bill. Go to Treasury, let's have a conversation, grab your partners on the left, grab your senators from New York and let's actually put forth the bill.
FERGUSON: I think it's a great --
SELLERS: Let's stop talking about things that when you when we get on T.V., you say he's a socialist, fascist, you know, dictator, whatever it is.
But whatever it is, set that aside Ted Cruz and Nikki Haley. Why don't you do the work? Like, be honest about it. Why don't you? Why don't you call in the one thing?
FERGUSON: -- The Green Deal is a scam and we should be. Nobody in that for decades.
SELLERS: That's my point, that you just made my point. We are tired of people. We are tired of people talking.
What I just said is why didn't he file a bill today? Why don't he call Chuck Schumer, the senator from New York? This is what the American public would love to work together with.
Oh, listen, let's make it happen then. Like, that's my point.
DAVIS: I feel the same way about immigration. Let's fix the problem.
We had it, and y'all ran them out. We had the Gang of Eight. Oh, stop it.
[22:30:04]
PHILLIP: It also just so happens that also today the Department of Education says, or Energy says, that they're ending wind and solar subsidies, taking more energy out of the system, not putting it into the system. So, yes, I mean, I'm not sure there's any problem solving happening.
FERGUSON: Here's the question. If you look at windmills and you look at them in Texas and other states, they have been a disaster compared to what they were supposed to produce. They're not producing.
So why would you invest in a bad investment? By the way, they're doing this in Europe as well. The data is now there.
The solar and wind is not going to fix our grid. And if you're saying we need more solar panels or wind turbines, we're totally screwed. We will have to go to 70 degrees.
PHILLIP: Here's the thing. I think that there is an argument to be made for all of the above energy, right?
FERGUSON: But if it's ineffective and it doesn't work, why do it?
PHILLIP: Hold on. But I think what's interesting about this administration's approach is that they've literally paid these companies billions of dollars not to produce energy. So I don't understand how that works.
FERGUSON: Do you think Solyndra and the money in Obama and the Green New Deal that was a total scam was good for the country? It did not help the administration. It did not help the grid.
But a bunch of their friends got really rich and we said, hey, we're all going to die in 20 years.
PHILLIP: Listen Ben, the President's administration is paying companies to stop producing windmills because he thinks that they kill birds. It's not because he thinks inefficient, because he thinks they're an eyesore and they kill birds.
FERGUSON: But they're also ineffective energy producers compared to what we actually need. If you want a better grid, it's not going to be for windmills. If it's so good, the private sector should do it. PHILLIP: We are subsidizing countries to stop producing energy. That
also doesn't make sense.
FERGUSON: It makes a lot more sense in doubling down and sending money to companies that are doing something that has no impact on the grid in a positive manner. It's dragging it down.
My tax dollars should not go to support or subsidize a Green New Deal that is a disaster for the grid.
SELLERS: Why is your grid in Texas such a failure?
FERGUSON: It's been absolutely upgraded and we've advocated for it and we've been pushing and voting for it.
When it broke last time, they made it very clear. The legislature came in in a bipartisan way and said, we can never let that happen again. You just criticized Texas and you didn't know what you were talking about.
PHILLIP: You're going after two of Ben's hobby horses here. His podcast partner and the state of the grid.
FERGUSON: The grid is a lot better than it was.
PHILLIP: That's why you're getting that kind of reaction.
Next for us, the President's plans for America's 250 have one big focus on Saturday night and it's him. And some are placing the blame for poor turnout on the whole event to being too politicized. We're going to debate that next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[22:35:00]
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
PHILLIP: Tonight, as America gets ready to celebrate a landmark birthday, House Democrats are accusing President Trump of hijacking the anniversary for his own gain. A new report claims the donors who intended to give to the congressionally approved and bipartisan America 250 were actually given bank information to the Trump-backed initiative Freedom 250 without their knowledge.
Now, if those allegations are proven true, it could constitute wire fraud. Trump established Freedom 250 last year to organize July 4th events in a way that his allies could control. That includes the Great American State Fair, which has been dogged by low turnout. But despite the birthday blues, Trump plans to put himself front and center on Saturday.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: On July 4th, it's going to be approximately 107 degrees out. And I'm going to go and I'm going to make a really long speech just to show that I can do anything.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIP: I think the big question, Ashley, for me about this is, was there ever a world in which like this moment could have been what it should be, which is a moment to actually celebrate America in a bipartisan, unifying manner? Or was it made worse by the Trump decision to create this sort of like parallel structure that was actually very partisan?
DAVIS: I think in this world, especially with Trump being President, anything he does becomes political. And that's just the facts. And we all know that this isn't a political statement.
I actually did my podcast from the lawn and there weren't that many people there. Maybe it was my podcast, but I do have to say, though, it was, you know, it was early evening.
But I do think that last night there were thousands and thousands of people in the same spot watching the FIFA game, the American play. So, listen, I'm not going to criticize this one way or the other. And I don't -- I'm going to discuss the unnamed sources in this report because I unless they're going to come out and say what who they are, like, I don't believe anybody.
But I also think that there are so many Europeans or so many people from around the world that are saying how great our country is. And we're sitting here, not just on the show, I'm just saying in general, discussing if people are at a mall or not. And instead, we should be celebrating the country.
[22:40:07]
SELLERS: But I think that I would -- I hear you because I do agree that everything that Trump does is it becomes political, either from the right or the left. But I would also take it a step further, which you may disagree with, that everything Trump does, he takes ownership of and it becomes about Donald Trump.
DAVIS: He brings it on himself, yes.
SELLERS: And so I think we're saying the same thing. I think that, yes, if you compare the 250 festivities to the World Cup festivities, they're night and day.
I mean, I was in Houston, Texas, when the Netherlands was playing Sweden and watching the Netherlands having to come out and celebrate with Houstonians, which is fascinating. Or being in New York for Brazil versus Morocco and watching Brazilians take over Times Square and watching people just enjoy.
You see the tick tocks of people enjoying Popeye's, right, and enjoying American culture and ranch dressing and ranch dressing and all the things that we kind of take for granted in the essence of America is fascinating to see. And then I believe that if Donald Trump, which I don't believe he's capable of, but if there was a President of the United States that actually took this moment to wrap the American flag around all of us.
I think that this moment would actually be what it should be, which is a celebration of America for its warts, its progresses, because I've always said we've made progress in this country. The problem is people like to put a period at the end of that when it should be a dot. We still have yet a ways to go.
PHILLIP: But it's also, I think, true. You talked about who's concerned about filling up bodies on the mall. And I think the person most concerned about this is Trump himself.
Here's what he said a few days ago about the speech that he's going to deliver on July 4th.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: Then on July 4th, we will have the greatest show of all on the National Mall. Your favorite President will be speaking. So please show up.
Because if we have two empty seats, you know what's going to happen? The fake news is going to say he didn't fill out the arena.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIP: And CNN has reported earlier this week that when he gave a speech, I think it was last weekend, and there were so many, it was empty. He became livid.
But the plans for Saturday night are for him to deliver a lengthy speech late at night and then have the fireworks start basically hours later than they normally do. One White House official vented, I don't understand why we're doing this so late. I'm not really sure who thought this was a good idea.
I don't know. It seems like a lot of it is happening because Trump wants to take up more space.
FERGUSON: I think two things. One, it's hard to compete with sports in general. People just love sports and the World Cup doesn't happen every year.
Those celebrations are going to be awesome. I look at July 4th as the big day. It's really hot in D.C. right now, we've talked about the weather.
To sit outside for hours on end, I don't think it matters who the President is. Are you going to take your little kids out there for long periods of time when it's really hot? Probably not.
I've been to D.C. multiple times when Obama was President and when Bush was President for the 4th of July fireworks. It's awesome. But when it's really hot, the crowds are not as big.
I think having it later is actually cool. It's going to be a little cooler when it's out there, and I think it's appropriate for the President, no matter who it is, to have a grand speech about how awesome America is on the 250th birthday.
Sure we do. I celebrated America, love America, I love 250. I think it's amazing.
EGBEWOLE: That's great. We all love America. And I was down there for FIFA last night, it was fun, it was great, it did not feel political whatsoever, even with all of the things around us that were like set dressing.
And I agree. We do have a problem, I think, in this country of feeling pessimistic about being American. And the World Cup has been so great for that, which is why I wish everything that was set up was actually interesting.
I do think that the heat and the weather is a deterrent for a lot of the crowds during the day. But I was out there. It's kind of boring, guys. Can we also talk about that? The content of what is provided on the mall?
FERGUYSPM: What would you rather have, though?
EGBEWOLE: We have all of the Smithsonian's along the mall. We have so many things that actually represent the 250th. And those could have been integrated into the whole program.
PHILLIP: Let's be honest. The state fair, the criticism of it is that it is Trump-coded. You would love it if you're a MAGA adherent, if you're Christian, if you're conservative, right-leaning.
But everybody else doesn't feel represented. That's the main criticism.
EGBEWOLE: And that's not why we go to a fair.
SELLERS: We've also had an event where we celebrated America just recently, just around Juneteenth. We had the opening of the Obama Library. And what you saw was, you asked, what could you do? What you saw was you had Bruce Springsteen, you had John Legend.
FERGUSON: They won't show her because Trump's President. You know that, it is a -- you guys. If Democrats would actually go, man, this is about celebrating America.
PHILLIP: We were like a raging liberal. And I think one of the things also was that all these artists, they basically said, we feel like we were duped. Because we thought this was the bipartisan, congressional celebration of America when it was really the Trump piece of it.
[22:45:09]
And that's what people felt. That's one of the reasons that they said they pulled out.
FERGUSON: The Trump piece of it is that Donald Trump won an election and Democrats were afraid to be associated with Donald Trump because they would care more about giving no finger to Trump than celebrating America.
PHILLIP: He set up a parallel organization that he controls that is separate and different from the one that Congress approved that is truly nonpartisan. That is the difference, that's the Trump piece.
I didn't invent that. He did.
FERGUSON: Do you actually believe, though, that John Legend, as liberal as he is, is going to show up for anything where Donald Trump showed up?
SELLERS: I will tell you this.
FERGUSON: You should put America ahead of the politics. And the left will not do it. If you want to know what the problem is, it's because the left refuses to work with anybody that doesn't agree with them.
DAVIS: I want to make a clarification on something, going back to the podcast.
I actually had two Democrats and two Republicans on it. And the Democrats that came on, one very left and one more middle of the road, they turned it into, wait, am I going to get in trouble from my side of the aisle? However, I'm just going to embrace the fact that I'm sitting in front of the United States Capitol right now.
And they were great. They've gotten great feedback.
SELLERS: The wild part about it is not everything has to be political.
FERGUSON: Then show up and sing.
SELLLERS: That is probably the most insensitive, wildest thing I've heard. It sounds a lot like, what did Megyn Kelly say? Shut up and dribble?
FERGUSON: You want to celebrate America and you don't want to be partisan, then show up and celebrate America. And not make it about yourself and Donald Trump's the President.
SELLERS: But Ben, what we're trying to --
FERGUSON: Like the Foo Fighters, show up. They're amazing, I love them. What we're trying to articulate to you is --
FERGUSON: Show up and play some music and I will be --
SELLERS: There were people like Morris Day and The Time that agreed to show up for the event that was a nonpartisan event. And they were duped.
FERGUSON: And then the media started asking questions and they got nervous. And instead of saying, hey, I'm going to celebrate America, they're like, oh, this has Trump's name on it. I've got to run away.
SELLERS: But Ben, what we want you to do when you talk about celebrate America --
FERGUSON: It's fireworks on the 4th of July.
PHILLIP: Let him finish his thought.
FERGUSON: It's fireworks on the 4th of July.
SELLERS: You interrupt because you just can't win this thing. But what I'm trying to say is --
PHILLIP: Just give him a two second break.
SELLERS: Thank you.
What I'm trying to say is while you want us to celebrate America, we want to celebrate America and the diversity that makes America what it is.
FERGUSON: So it's a kumbaya.
SELLERS: Oh my God.
No, it's not a kumbaya.
FERGUSON: It's a screw Donald Trump and then we'll show up.
SELLERS: Oh my God.
PHILLIP: If this was a test.
SELLERS: I said diversity.
PHILLIP: This is a test.
FERGUSON: You guys do this every time.
PHILLIP: We've got to move on here.
Next for us, we'll hear from some of your feedback. We're going to have that when we come back. Stay with us.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[22:50:00]
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
PHILLIP: And now some viewer feedback from cnn.com/abby. Our first comment. Would Trump have made this money without the office?
SELLERS: No.
DAVIS: I think he still would have invested in crypto. Unless there would have been -- I mean crypto policy was moving whether Trump was President or not.
SELLERS: But Trump -- Crypto made more money than Coinbase.
Let's put this in perspective here. So no, he wouldn't have made this type of money. And we've seen Trump failures, we've seen Trump stakes, we've seen Trump whines. We've seen the casino.
This is not something that he was not a prolific --
FERGUSON: He was only a billionaire, I agree. Not prolific at all.
SELLERS: You know what the amazing thing is? Have you ever met somebody who was born on third base and thought they hit a home run? That is who Donald Trump is.
FERGUSON: So which one is it? Is he a bad investor who got lucky? Or is he an investor that has gotten some wrong just like Mark Cuban and invested in bad things that didn't work out and had bad investments and then learned from them and then got better at it? Which one is it?
SELLERS: Mark Cuban actually started from scratch. Donald Trump actually got a loan from his daddy.
FERGUSON: I don't blame anybody for starting on second or third base. I don't have jealousy towards you or their success. I just celebrate it.
PHILLIP: My big thing about the crypto piece is that it actually has much less to do with investments and much more to do with him utilizing the fame from the presidency to make money off of the coins.
And then you brought up the deal that his sons made to sell half of World Liberty Financial to a sort of Saudi-associated firm, I'm sorry, a UAE-associated firm. That is also something that just raises a lot of questions because that's not about did he invest in the market or not, it's about whether an entity that is backed by a foreign government wants to buy half of your company.
DAVIS: Again, that doesn't trigger --
PHILLIP: I didn't say it was illegal. I'm just saying if the question is would this have happened if he had not been President?
SELLERS: Can I tell you one thing that's going to contribute to his wealth greatly that would not have happened if he was not President?
He actually got a 747 that was upfitted with nearly a billion dollars from the American taxpayers.
FERGUSON: That's not private.
PHILLIP: Let me just read --
SELLERS: He's going to get it when he leaves office.
PHILLIP: We got one more comment from a viewer. I made .000038 percent of what Trump made last year and I bet I paid more taxes than he did. We'll find out if that's true. [22:55:05]
And we have some fun ones. No one moderates like Abby. Are you available for family dinners?
No, I am not. I am staying away from your family dinners.
One last one. I feel bad that Abby's baby has to listen to Ben.
FERGUSON: I'm okay with it. You come into Lion's Den here, you've got to stand up for yourself. It's all in you and me.
PHILLIP: My baby is only going to hear your voice.
DAVIS: He's going to hear his voice.
FERGUSON: I can read the bedtime stories really well. I'll animate them in everything.
DAVIS: But mom!
FERGUSON: Your kid would be very smart and ask lots of questions.
PHILLIP: Thank you very much for watching "NewsNight." "Laura Coates Live" starts right after this break.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
