The Supreme Court Upholds Birthright Citizenship and Bans on Transgender Athletes; What’s in a Heat Wave?

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What is the main topic discussed in this episode?

Savannah Sellers 0:01
I mean, I think it's like the biggest wedding, biggest celebrity wedding of the last decade. Maybe longer. No, it's crazy. It's like our version of the royal wedding. Hey, everybody, and welcome to Here's the Scoop from NBC News. I'm Savannah Sellers filling in for Yasmin Vesugian. Today on the show, Taylor Swift, Travis Kelsey, and 1,100 of their closest friends and relatives are descending on Madison Square Garden for what? Plus, millions of Americans are under heat alerts with record high temperatures expected to hit much of the U.S. this week. We'll talk about what might be causing the heat wave and how El Nino could make the rest of the year's weather even more severe. But first, the Supreme Court saved some of its biggest rulings for the very last day of the term.
Savannah Sellers 0:48
The justices are blocking President Trump's attempt to restrict birthright citizenship, allowing states to bar trans women and girls from participating in school sports, and striking down longstanding campaign finance rules. There is obviously a lot to unpack here, so we're going to jump right into it with our senior Supreme Court reporter, Lawrence Hurley. Hi, Lawrence. Thanks for being here.
Lawrence Hurley 1:08
Hi, good to see you.
Savannah Sellers 1:09
You too. All right, let's start right with birthright citizenship. Of course, this highly anticipated decision coming on this very last day of the term for the Supreme Court. The president had wanted to restrict it. He even showed up at the court for oral arguments in what was a very rare scene to have a president there in the Supreme Court. 6-3 decision here. What did you make of what we learned from the justices and how the votes landed?
Lawrence Hurley 1:31
Yeah, I think as soon as President Trump announced this plan, a lot of legal experts were saying it would probably not survive a visit to the Supreme Court. And that is, in the end, how it played out. But I think it was probably a little closer than some people thought it might have been. Some people even thought maybe it could be a nine to nothing decision. But instead, the justices were quite divided. I mean, it was six to three on ruling against the president, but there's also other divides, like Justice Brett Kavanaugh was saying he would side with President Trump on the constitutional issue, but against him on a different ground. So there were actually five to four on the court saying, that the 14th Amendment doesn't allow the president's executive order.
Lawrence Hurley 2:11
So that's like a pretty close divide, as we all know. And that's certainly not what people were thinking coming into this.
Savannah Sellers 2:18
Where do you think this means the question of birthright citizenship goes from here?
Lawrence Hurley 2:23
Well, of course, whatever Congress does, it can't subvert what's in the 14th Amendment, right? So that's the sort of baseline that, unless the Constitution is amended again, won't change. So there are potentially things Congress could do that would... could go back up to the Supreme Court and could be tested again that would kind of clarify some areas of ambiguity, I suppose. But it's going to be hard, as we all know, for anything to get through Congress with the Republicans needing 60 votes and the Democrats probably opposed unless there's some kind of big deal that they could come up with, which in recent months, the Trump administration has shown not much interest in. So I think it seems unlikely that Congress will actually do anything on this.
Lawrence Hurley 3:05
Yeah.
Savannah Sellers 3:05
Let's talk about another decision we got today. This was actually two cases with one decision coming down on this with transgender athletes.

What are the Supreme Court’s major rulings announced on the final day of the term?

Savannah Sellers 3:13
The court affirmed some of these states like West Virginia, Idaho, that they could bar trans women and girls from competing on girls teams. First, tell me what was in these opinions and also in the dissent.
Lawrence Hurley 3:27
Yeah, so there's about 25 states or over half the states that have these types of bans on transgender girls and women participating in student sports. And the court is basically endorsing that as the court's conservative policy. majority in the majority again, saying that it doesn't violate equal protection under the 14th Amendment or Title IX, the federal law that outlaws sex discrimination in education.

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