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Earthquakes Rock Venezuela; Interview With Sen. Andy Kim (D- NJ); Supreme Court Rules on Immigration Cases. Aired 11-11:30a ET

Aired June 25, 2026 - 11:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

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WOLF BLITZER, CNN HOST: Happening now, breaking news: The U.S. Supreme Court weighs in on immigration. Justices deliver two major decisions on President Trump's policies.

And a desperate search for survivors right now. Back-to-back deadly earthquakes rock Venezuela, trapping people under crumbling rubble.

Welcome to our viewers here in the United States and around the world. I'm Wolf Blitzer. Pamela Brown is off. You're in THE SITUATION ROOM

ANNOUNCER: This is CNN breaking news.

BLITZER: And we begin this hour with new opinions just released minutes ago at the U.S. Supreme Court.

Justices hand the Trump administration two major wins on immigration. The president can revive a controversial policy to turn away asylum seekers at the Mexican border, and he can also end temporary deportation protections for Haitians, Syrians, and other foreign nationals.

And the court handed down a gun rights decision as well. Justices struck down a Hawaii law banning guns on private property that's open to the public, such as retail stores.

We have a lot to break down right now.

CNN's chief legal affairs correspondent, Paula Reid is outside the Supreme Court. Our Priscilla Alvarez is here with me in THE SITUATION ROOM.

Paula, let me start with you.

How significant are these immigration rulings for the Trump administration?

PAULA REID, CNN CHIEF LEGAL AFFAIRS CORRESPONDENT: Well, here, Wolf, the conservative supermajority at the Supreme Court handing President Trump to really significant wins on his efforts to curb legal immigration.

Now, both of these decisions fell along ideological lines. They were 6-3. The most significant case is the one where they are going to allow the administration to rescind Temporary Protective Status, also known as TPS, for Haitians and Syrians.

Roughly 360,000 people could have their work authorizations rescinded. This was a program that was aimed at helping people who are coming from countries that had seen upheaval. Now, this policy, this effort to rescind these protections was challenged by individuals who say all of this was motivated by racial animus.

Now, in his majority opinion, Justice Alito wrote that none of the cited statements by either the president or the secretary was overtly racial, and, in substance, all expressed policy views that could rest on race-neutral justifications.

Now, there are still some pathways for this to be challenged, but those are not expected to be successful. Now, in the other case, the administration is going to be allowed to pursue a controversial policy of physically blocking individuals who want to cross the border, where they could then claim asylum protections here in the U.S.

Now, this is not a Trump-specific policy. This is something that began under the Obama administration. It was formalized under Trump one, rescinded under the Biden administration, but now the court giving the administration the green light to resume this policy.

Justice Alito again saying you're not in the country unless you actually cross the border. But, in a dissent, Justice Sotomayor saying as a result of this opinion -- quote -- "More people will die."

So these are two significant wins for the Trump administration. Of course, President Trump campaigned on a promise to curb not only illegal immigration, but also legal immigration.

BLITZER: All right, Paula, stand by. I will get back to you.

Priscilla, you cover immigration extensively for all of us here at CNN.

How significant is -- are these decisions, the impact specifically for those fleeing dangerous situations, let's say in Haiti or Syria, for example, seeking asylum here in the United States and being allowed to remain here?

PRISCILLA ALVAREZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT: This is very significant for two different populations of people.

We are talking about migrants who would be coming up to the U.S.- Mexico border to seek asylum and try to do so at a legal port of entry. That is something that is much lower now in numbers than we have seen in previous years, but it is still a pathway that some migrants have chosen to take to try to seek protection in the United States. So, that ruling is going to have major implications, not only now, but

also in the future, because say a future administration is willing to process asylum claims at the border, but has a very specific number or, like in the past, a wait-list until they can do that.

[11:05:07]

Well, that's going to affect those who are trying to come through legal ports of entry. It doesn't foreclose, however, that they may try to cross unlawfully, which is sort of the oddity in this opinion.

The other population of people that we're talking about, however, are already in the United States. Temporary Protected Status, which is a form of humanitarian relief, is only applicable to people who are already residing in the United States, so, for example, Haitians in the United States, who the Department of Homeland Security secretary at some point decided and designated that they cannot return to their home country, given the situation at hand there.

Now, this has been criticized by the Trump administration and by Republicans because they say that this protection, which again provides protection from deportation and allows them to work in the U.S., has meant -- was supposed to be temporary. That's what the statute said.

And it has often been extended time and time again. In fact, we have already heard from the Department of Homeland Security general counsel, who said on X -- and I'm going to quote here -- "In our second Supreme Court win of the day, the court vindicates DHS yet again. The T in TPS stands for temporary. Yet many of these designations became de facto amnesty. This is a win for the rule of law and common sense."

I would say that that very much summarizes how officials at the Department of Homeland Security and within the Trump White House have been thinking about this program. In fact, the secretary, so former Secretary Kristi Noem, had attempted to end TPS for 13 out of 17 countries.

So what does this all mean? It means that the administration will have a lot more latitude to revoke these protections. What that means for the people who have them is that they could be eligible for deportation.

I will say, sometimes, they are already seeking other benefits, and that may protect them. But, in the immediate, this will have massive ramifications for people in the United States who were protected under this form of humanitarian relief because of conditions in their home country.

I will also note it is very interesting that this comes on the same day where there is a massive earthquake or earthquakes in Venezuela, because it is exactly that type of situation where, in the past, a secretary of homeland security might think, we can't deport them there because there's a situation, a natural disaster, that has occurred. How will the administration deal with that now? We will see. But

already under this administration, they did try to revoke protections for Venezuela, and so just a really fascinating moment for all of this to be unfolding.

BLITZER: These immigration cases big wins for the Trump administration.

ALVAREZ: Massive wins, yes.

BLITZER: Massive wins for the Trump administration.

Paula, let me get back to you. There's still, I take it, a few outstanding cases that still have to be decided by the Supreme Court. What else is left?

REID: So, I'm sure the White House is cherishing other wins today, because it's not clear they're going to prevail on the other big questions related to President Trump's authority that are pending before the court.

They also have this outstanding question of whether the president can limit birthright citizenship, which federal officials he can and cannot fire, also some Trump-adjacent questions about transgender athletes in student sports, and also questions about mail-in ballots and whether they could be counted after Election Day.

So, a lot of the big cases still pending before the High Court, so we will likely be back here next week for at least one more day, maybe more one day, to hear what these major opinions are, but, again, not clear the president is going to be as successful on those big questions as he was here today.

BLITZER: Even though there are six conservative justices, Paula, and three liberal justices, you think that it's possible Trump might not be happy with some of the upcoming decisions?

REID: Yes, I think that's likely based on what we saw especially in the birthright citizen arguments. All of the justices appeared skeptical of the idea that the president could limit or eliminate birthright citizenship through an executive order.

And I have spoken with many legal sources inside the administration since that executive order was issued, and they have all been pretty doubtful that they would be able to get this through the Supreme Court, that this is the kind of thing that certainly the president campaigned on wanting to end this and end what he describes as birth tourism.

But this goes far beyond birth tourism. This is something that has been codified in our country's law for quite some time, and the justices just appeared very skeptical. That's why we think he may not prevail.

But I got to tell you, Wolf, these justices, even though I cover this very closely, they have surprised me before. They could surprise us all again.

BLITZER: We will see what happens.

All right, Paula Reid and Priscilla Alvarez, excellent reporting. To both of you, thank you very, very much.

And joining us now, the former acting ICE Director John Sandweg. He served during President Obama's second term.

Thanks very much for joining us.

(CROSSTALK)

BLITZER: You just heard Paula and Priscilla break down these two major immigration rulings by the Supreme Court. Let's begin with asylum, first of all.

How significant is that decision for immigrants seeking a safe refuge here in the United States?

JOHN SANDWEG, FORMER ACTING ICE DIRECTOR: You know, Wolf, in many ways, this preserves the status quo, right?

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This idea of keeping immigrants from coming to these ports of entry, where they can make their asylum claims, has been a centerpiece really of both the Trump administration's fight against the asylum flow in the first go-round, but also the Biden administration.

Now, Biden technically suspended this metering program that was a subject of the court's decision, but this kind of concept of using whether that's Mexican authorities or U.S. CBP authorities, of stopping people before they can get into those legal ports of entry, has really been a centerpiece of this kind of fight against this mass asylum surge we saw.

Now, Wolf, I will tell you two things. One is, that created an unintended consequence. It drove a lot of people to cross the border unlawfully. So, a lot of those images we saw of people flooding across the Rio Grande River or coming through holes in the border wall, all of that was driven in large part by this effort to keep people from those 52 ports of entry.

But, of course, we have seen a massive drop at the border since the Trump administration came into effect. And so now we're looking at 10,000 people a month, whereas we saw 250,000 a month. So, in terms of the immediate impact, I think it would have been problematic had they reversed it for the administration, but because they just affirmed the status quo, it should not have a significant immediate impact.

BLITZER: And, as you know, the court also ruled that the Trump administration will now have the authority to end TPS, Temporary Protected Status.

What's your reaction? SANDWEG: Yes.

Well, I will tell you, Wolf, this one is tough. You have 350,000 Haitians who live in this country legally since at least 2010. During that time, they integrate into our country, right? They get jobs. They have families. They have children who would -- well, depending on the outcome of the birthright citizenship case, are U.S. citizens.

They go through background checks every 18 months to make sure there's no criminal history. Now, a lot of this case centers around the Trump administration, as Priscilla reported a moment ago, saying, hey, this was always intended to be temporary.

I will tell you, Wolf, from inside DHS, the problem is, when you look at every 18 months whether you're going to renew this, typically, A, conditions and like in Haiti have not materially improved, right? Haiti was initially designated because of the 2010 earthquakes.

But also, B, you look at it and you say, boy, this is a tough call to say to 350,000 people who've now been living legally here for so long, who are not committing crimes, who in many ways are contributing to our society, that we're going to say, hey, you now have just a very short amount of time to pack your bags up and leave the U.S. or to be deported.

So, certainly, in terms of the immediate impact on a population, the TPS ruling was more significant and more impactful.

BLITZER: Yes, I suspect you're right.

All right, John Sandweg, thanks very much for joining us.

Still ahead: bipartisan backlash after President Trump upends the housing bill for political leverage. Senator Andy Kim from a key housing committee standing by to join us live.

And, later: history waiting in the wings. How the U.S. men's team could do something tonight that none of the predecessors have done.

Stay with us. You're in THE SITUATION ROOM.

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BLITZER: New this morning, the U.S. Senate walked back its rebuke of President Trump's handling of the Iran conflict just one day after passing a resolution to limit his war powers.

GOP Senators Rand Paul and Bill Cassidy had supported the measure, but changed their votes last night. Paul voted president, while Cassidy opposed it. The Louisiana Republican clashed with Trump earlier in the day behind closed doors, but Cassidy later said he got a -- quote -- "thorough briefing on Iran" from Vice President J.D. Vance and special envoy Steve Witkoff.

Joining us now, Democratic Senator Andy Kim of New Jersey. He serves on the Homeland Security Committee.

Senator, thanks so much for joining us.

Were you at all surprised by your Republican colleagues' decision to change their positions on this war with Iran, the Iran war powers issue, as it's called? What's your takeaway?

SEN. ANDY KIM (D-NJ): Yes, look, Wolf, I don't I don't think that's the right approach. I think it's very clear that there is bipartisan opposition to the Iran war, the fact that this is still just a cease- fire, that we don't have full confirmation of how this is going to end.

I mean, what is clear, and the American people see this, is that this war has been a strategic failure, that the American people have spent upwards of $60 billion to $70 billion more on fuel since the war. It has cost us tens of billions of dollars more when it comes to the military problems that we have had.

So this is something that across the board we recognize, are we any safer now than before? And the answer is no. Are we poorer now than we were before? Yes, that is the answer. And so that is what we are trying to stand up against, seeing how Trump has led our country recklessly down this path.

Meanwhile, he's gutting the support that we should be giving to the American people when it comes to housing and other things that he clearly is not interested in.

BLITZER: What do you say to Trump's argument that he's effectively eliminating the possibility of Iran, a state sponsor of terror, eventually getting nuclear weapons?

KIM: I mean, this is -- I mean, it's absurd what he's saying. I mean, he can live in his magical fantasy if he likes, but that's just not what bears out.

I'm someone who worked at the State Department and the Pentagon on the Middle East. We know full well that Iran has the ability to be able to rebuild their ballistic missiles. We know that they have other capabilities that this war has not closed the door off to. In fact, this has just made things worse, with the Strait of Hormuz, which wasn't a problem before.

If you look at these Iranian leaders, if they're thinking about what's going to actually prevent America from attacking them in the future, they could very well answer that by saying they need to have a nuclear weapon now. We saw that in North Korea before and elsewhere.

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So this is something that is not leaving us any safer than before.

BLITZER: You also serve on the Housing, the Banking, and Urban Affairs committees, which worked extensively on the bipartisan housing package that passed the House and Senate. President Trump is now refusing to sign that legislation into law

until Congress first passes his voter I.D. and elections overhaul legislation known as the SAVE America Act. Do you have any insight at all, Senator, into what the path forward is from the Senate leadership?

KIM: Yes, first of all, this is an absolute chaotic mistake here. I mean, I have an 8-year-old and a 10-year-old, two little boys. I know what temper tantrums are like.

But what my boys would never do is do something that would harm other people. And that's what Trump's doing. He's throwing a temper tantrum, but it's going to be at the expense of the American people, who can get so much out of this bill in terms of support for their housing.

Look, I'm from New Jersey. We are used to Trump screwing us over. He screwed over Atlantic City. He screwed over so many people in our state. And I will just say to him, if he really wants to see what people need right now, next time he comes to New Jersey, he shouldn't go to his golf course in Bedminster.

He should go to Newark, New Jersey, talk to the people there who need affordable housing, maybe go back to Atlantic City, the city he screwed over, and talk to the people who are living there in the aftermath of his disastrous Trump Taj Mahal.

This is what we need to be focused on, is delivering for the American people. If he seeks to block this or veto this legislation, Congress will stand against him, and he will be publicly humiliated before the country.

BLITZER: I want to play for you, Senator, what some of your Republican colleagues told my colleague Manu Raju about this after President Trump canceled that signing ceremony for that housing bill. Listen to this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MANU RAJU, CNN CHIEF CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Is he hurting your chances of keeping the majority?

SEN. LISA MURKOWSKI (R-AK): I'm just going to say I don't think it helps. People want us to be able to deliver on priorities, absolutely. And they want to focus on things that they're talking about back home.

RAJU: Wouldn't it be helpful if you guys were rallying around a big housing bill, talking about affordability in this election season?

SEN. KEVIN CRAMER (R-ND): It's a real -- and we are. I mean, this may not be a big thing to him, but we're talking about it. We're grateful for it. But what will be more important...

RAJU: Would it be helpful if he were?

CRAMER: Yes, it would. It would. It would.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BLITZER: We're also learning, Senator, that the House speaker, Mike Johnson, is expected to send his chamber home a day early amid GOP mutiny over the SAVE America Act.

As a Democrat hoping to take control of Congress in the midterm elections coming up in November, what do you say to that?

KIM: Well, first of all, when I hear from my constituents back home and, frankly, Americans around the country, housing costs is at the top of the list of concerns, affordability and high cost of living writ large, but afford -- housing is right at the top of that list.

So the fact that we actually had Congress work together to be able to address that need, I mean, look, that is something that President Trump could have tried to take credit for and actually say, look, I'm focusing on affordability. Instead, he decides to just completely blow that up and show that he doesn't care at all.

And he said it just a couple weeks ago, that he doesn't think about what the American people's finances are like, and he's showing it now in action. He's putting his own obsessions over so -- over his lies about election fraud ahead of the number one issue for the American people.

So, I mean, I think he is making himself more and more irrelevant in politics in terms of what's on the people's minds. He's going to make it much harder for his party in November. And I think it shows that the Democrats are the ones that are focused on delivering for people, rather than starting rogue wars that are just raising our costs, while meanwhile gutting and blocking legislation that would help millions of Americans.

BLITZER: And, as you know, Senator, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled this morning on two major immigration cases, allowing President Trump to end what's called temporary deportation protections for Haitians and Syrians and permitting him to restart his controversial asylum policy.

Like me, you're a son of immigrants. What's your reaction?

KIM: Yes, look, I talked with a lot of people in the Haitian community in New Jersey. We have one of the largest Haitian communities in the entire country, and they have shared just heartbreaking stories of how terrified they are of being sent back to Haiti, where there is no government control over the country, run by largely gangs, and real worries about their safety.

I mean, so much so that the Trump administration tried to ban people from visiting the United States from Haiti. Meanwhile, they're saying, oh, they can send back these people who have been living here within our communities, growing families here, working in businesses here.

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Again this is something that should be, as we're thinking through -- I live in a state that's right there in the shadow of the Statue of Liberty, where the Haitian community is living. And that is something that I think is so out of line.

And, again, this is an administration that's putting tens of billions of dollars towards ICE, towards CBP, towards this enforcement on the immigration side. Meanwhile, it's standing in the way of legislation that would help millions of Americans when it comes to housing.

I hope the American people see the choices that this president makes, because I believe that they don't stand with what the president is doing.

BLITZER: Before you go, Senator, I quickly want to ask you about the recent elections in your neighboring state. We're talking about New York, where multiple incumbent Democrats lost their primaries to progressive challengers endorsed by the New York City mayor, Zohran Mamdani.

In your view, is Mamdani's vision of the future of the Democratic Party -- is he the future?

KIM: What I will say is that I think that right now the people of America see what I see, which is that we have a broken status quo in politics.

There is, of course, a hunger for a new generation of leadership to step up. We have a great candidate in New Jersey, Rebecca Bennett, standing up against Republican Tom Kean Jr. I think that's an example of a new generation of leadership, someone who was a Navy helicopter pilot, serving in different ways.

There are many ways that one can be a new generation of leadership, but what will unite us is saying that our politics is fundamentally broken. And so wherever you are on that political spectrum, I think that message is something that is resonant right now, whether from New York or elsewhere around the country, and that's what's going to be the future of the Democratic Party.

BLITZER: What message do you believe, Senator, that Democratic voters are trying to send from these elections that we just saw in New York this week? Are you confident that your party's current leadership is receptive to that message ahead of the midterm elections?

KIM: Well, what's receptive is, again, what these candidates are putting out there.

I ran in the 2018 midterm elections, when Trump was president and the Republicans controlled both -- branches of both chambers of Congress. What we want are candidates who are authentic, not candidates that are reading off a talking points given to them by pollsters or others, but people who have genuine passion for changing things, a story of their own commitment to this country.

That's what's going to be resonant, and that's what's going to change. And I believe, my 2018 class, we helped change our politics. We helped move forward on legislation like banning members of Congress from trading stocks. That's something that leadership told us not to do. But we wanted to push forward otherwise because we know that the

American people stand with an anti-corruption agenda, and we're seeing this class of candidates pushing things forward. And I think that's good for our nation.

BLITZER: Democratic Senator Andy Kim of New Jersey, thanks very much for joining us.

KIM: Thank you.

BLITZER: And we're also following the breaking news out of Venezuela, terrifying new video showing the force of two powerful back-to-back earthquakes.

Right now, rescuers are digging to reach survivors trapped in the rubble. At least 160 people have been killed, nearly 1,000 injured. Those numbers are certainly likely to go up. The scope of the damage is only now beginning to come into focus.

CNN's Stefano Pozzebon is in neighboring Bogota, Colombia, for us, and he has the latest.

STEFANO POZZEBON, CNN CONTRIBUTOR: Yes, Bogota also felt this earthquake, which occurred around 5:00 p.m. local time.

And Bogota sits at more than 1,000 kilometers from the epicenter. You can only imagine how badly it was felt in Caracas, which, to confirm like the morphology of the area surrounding Caracas, both Caracas and La Guaira are these region just north of the capital that seems to have registered the most impact at this moment.

Both of these are hilly, mountainous area, where the population have built houses, and especially high-rise buildings, up on the slopes of the mountains. This could have caused, of course, further damage if, for example, one building would collapse on top of each other.

We were able to speak with survivors, who told us the feeling of standing in their flat, maybe of the fourth, fifth or sixth floor of their building, and feeling like literally the earth opening up, the ground opening up beneath their feet, and the floor turning into water.

One person described it to me as feeling as she was drowning into the collapsing building. Luckily, she survived, as many others have survived, but, correctly, yes, at least the 164 Venezuelans have been found dead, and that number is probably going to grow and rise in the coming hours.

BLITZER: All right, Stefano Pozzebon, reporting for us, thank you very much.

And we will be right back.

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