5 Major Supreme Court Decisions to Watch, and the Rise of Sewage Surveillance

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0:34From the New York Times, it's the headlines. I'm Tracy Mumford. Today's Tuesday, June 23rd. Here's what we're covering.

0:46The Supreme Court is in the final stretch of its term. It's set to announce decisions for more than a dozen remaining cases over the next two weeks, including several that will be major tests of President Trump's power. Those decisions could start coming down as soon as this morning. Here's some of the big ones to watch for. First, birthright citizenship. The president signed an executive order on his first day back in office to end the longtime understanding that babies born in the U.S. are citizens, even if their parents are undocumented. If the justices uphold his order, it would redefine what it means to be an American and affect hundreds of thousands of children each year.

1:30Also to watch, two cases testing who the president has the power to fire. Trump tried to remove a member of the Federal Reserve Board, Lisa Cook, last summer, citing mortgage fraud, though Cook has not been charged and has denied any wrongdoing. The decision will be a test of how much discretion the president has to remake the central bank. Trump has also repeatedly fired independent regulators, like a member of the Federal Trade Commission, despite laws meant to insulate them from political pressure. A ruling in Trump's favor would be a major expansion of presidential authority over independent agencies.

2:08And the last ones that I'll highlight, the cases of two transgender athletes who have challenged laws in Idaho and West Virginia, prohibiting them from playing on women's teams. The outcome of these cases will have implications for 25 other states with similar laws, and for athletes who compete in K-12 and college sports around the country. The Times will have live coverage when all of those decisions are handed down. And for a full list of the remaining cases, including one on mail-in ballots that could shake up the midterms, go to the Times app or nytimes.com.

2:51The Times has learned that Bill Pulte, the new acting director of national intelligence, is planning to carry out mass firings, cutting hundreds of jobs in an office that oversees the work of the CIA, FBI, and other intelligence agencies. Current and former officials say Pulte could announce the cuts as soon as today. They said the exact number of employees is still in flux. Some could be fired outright and others put on leave. There is some bipartisan support for making trims to the agency, which critics say has become bloated and inefficient since it was formed in the shadow of 9-11. But some lawmakers are questioning whether Pulte should be the one making those cuts.

3:32This administration continues to put people in places where they can't do a job and non-serious people up for serious jobs. Democrats, along with some Republicans, have said they're concerned Pulte is a political loyalist with no national security experience. I think it is stunning that President Trump has chosen someone who has shown not just a willingness but an enthusiasm to go after President Trump's opponents. In addition to their concerns about his qualifications, Democrats have also raised questions about Pulte's other role in the administration, saying he used his position as head of the Federal Housing Finance Agency to carry out a retribution campaign for President Trump.

4:13In that role, which Pulte continues to hold, he's been accused of breaching federal privacy laws as he opened investigations into Trump's perceived political enemies. Now, Democrats worry he will use his new position to pursue Trump's grievances even further. Trump has said that Pulte is expected to work on election security matters, which has raised concerns from some officials that Pulte could try to influence the midterm elections.

4:46I recently traveled around Tempe, Arizona with a city crew as they lifted up manhole covers and collected wastewater samples to be tested twice a week for evidence of illicit drugs running through the city sewers. Jan Hoffman is a health reporter at The Times. She says wastewater testing for drugs, which is similar to the method used to track COVID during the pandemic, is becoming increasingly common across the country. It's not to ID individuals' drug use, but to get a sense of what's happening in a specific area. Officials have been collecting samples from high schools in Missouri and New Mexico, truck stops in Kentucky, and Super Bowl and Mardi Gras celebrations in New Orleans.

5:31Supporters of wastewater drug testing say this is the best and fastest way to look at drug use and drug trafficking in real time as it's happening. This can be a way of finding out which neighborhoods are suffering from infiltrations of new drugs. Ambulances can go out with more Narcan, the overdose reversing medication. Pamphlets for emergency services and rehab can be scattered throughout a neighborhood. and lots of prevention and other intervention techniques can occur. But critics say that particularly when police get hold of the information, it can be used to punish people rather than to help them and heal them.

6:12And beyond the tension between public health and law enforcement, now some private employers are beginning to discuss whether their office buildings should be occasionally tested for drug use as a way of randomly drug checking their employees. Jan says that at town halls and hearings across the country, some residents have raised fears that the testing is taking place without consent and that some of the agencies collecting data, including police, don't disclose how they're using the test results. Still, experts say that wastewater searches are almost certainly legal. In the 1980s, the Supreme Court ruled that when people put their trash out on the curb, they abandoned privacy claims to it.

6:58By extension, Jan says, no warrant is needed to check whatever you flush down the toilet.

7:12And finally, cottage cheese did not used to be cool. It hit its peak in the 1970s when the average American was eating about five pounds of it per year and just dropped off from there. For a long time, a lot of people thought of it as soulless, bland. that tub at the end of the salad bar you were not touching. But in the last few years, it's come roaring back. And that is if you can find it on the shelves. Cottage cheese is having such a moment, stores are having trouble keeping it in stock. Today I'm going to show you how to make this high-protein buffalo chicken dip. Naturally, we had to make a new cottage cheese dip recipe because I cannot get enough of this.

7:50A big part of it is that Americans have become obsessed with protein. They are protein-maxing. And thanks to cottage cheese's high protein content, it has become the star of a lot of viral recipes. When people found out you could make ice cream with it, oh boy, game over. Oh my word, you guys, it's so freaking creamy. One dairy company told The Times cottage cheese was basically dying off before TikTok made it a thing again, and sales took off, quote, like a brush fire. Manufacturers are trying to keep up, but you can't rush cottage cheese. In some cases, it takes 16 hours to culture. More production capacity is coming.

8:33One company is going from making 24 million pounds a year to 90 million pounds, for example. But for now, people are reporting shortages, especially for the in-brands. Because yes, there are now hot brands for cottage cheese.

8:51Those are the headlines. Today on The Daily. It was like every couple weeks we were getting mass firings of judges. Six, seven, eight, nine, ten judges at a time. And a lot of those judges were like walked off the bench in the middle of the day. A look at the chaos inside the immigration court system as President Trump has purged judges and pressured others to carry out his mass deportation agenda. You can listen to that in the New York Times app or wherever you get your podcasts. I'm Tracy Mumford. We'll be back tomorrow.

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