Supreme Court Expands Trump’s Power, and a Dangerous U.S. Heat Wave Spreads

0:00Hi, this is Andy. I've been a New York Times subscriber for years and years. And I'm trying to get my teenagers interested in reading it. If they were to have their own logins and we could share articles, I think that would help get them interested. It would also then allow us to discuss over the dinner table or wherever. Thank you very much. Andy, we heard you. It's why we created the New York Times Family subscription. One subscription, up to four separate logins for anyone in your life. Find out more at nytimes.com slash family.

0:34From the New York Times, it's the headlines. I'm Tracy Mumford. Today's Tuesday, June 30th. Here's what we're covering.

0:45The Supreme Court issued a major ruling in President Trump's favor yesterday, clearing the way for him to fire independent regulators. The decision could drastically change the government structure by giving the president more control over independent agencies. The case yesterday dealt specifically with the Federal Trade Commission, which does everything from regulate credit cards to investigate monopolies. It was designed by Congress to be shielded from politics, and the law states that its commissioners can only be dismissed for, quote, inefficiency, neglect of duty, or malfeasance in office.

1:22But President Trump removed a Democrat from her seat on the commission simply because she did not align with his agenda. And the Supreme Court's conservative majority ruled yesterday that Trump had the right to do that, effectively casting aside a 90-year precedent that had prevented presidents from removing regulators solely over policy disagreements. This could potentially affect the leadership of many other independent agencies, like the Consumer Product Safety Commission, the National Labor Relations Board, and the NTSB, which investigates plane crashes. Traditionally, they've been insulated from presidential control.

2:00So what it means on the ground is that the president can go in and continue to try to get rid of Democratic commissioners. And as a result of this ruling, people won't be able to sue and cite these laws and job protections that have been on the books. Anne Merrimal covers the Supreme Court for The Times. She has more about the implications of this ruling on today's episode of The Daily. Right after the ruling today, President Trump went on Truth Social. He called this a big win. He said it's a historic and unprecedented ruling, one of the most important ever with respect to presidential powers.

2:32Right, suggesting that he may be eager to follow up to the ruling with fire eggs. Exactly. Now, in a separate ruling yesterday, the court did carve out an exception for one institution that has traditionally operated independently from the White House, the Federal Reserve. The court blocked Trump's attempt to fire one of the Fed's governors, Lisa Cook, though some legal experts think the court's vague language in the ruling could leave the door open for Trump to keep trying to oust her and exert more power over the central bank going forward. Now, two other quick updates from the Supreme Court yesterday.

3:09The justices issued a ruling on a mail-in ballot case that a lot of states were watching closely. It's said that Mississippi can count ballots received up to five business days after Election Day as long as they were postmarked by Election Day. That ruling will likely allow similar laws in more than a dozen other states to stay in place and is a blow to efforts by President Trump and Republicans to restrict mail-in voting. Also, the court let a$5 million sex abuse verdict against President Trump stand. Back in 2023, a federal jury found that Trump had sexually abused and defamed the writer E. Jean Carroll, ordering him to pay a civil judgment.

3:50Trump had asked the justices to intervene, but they declined.

4:01Since returning to office, one of the main things President Trump has been focused on has been building. We're building the most beautiful ballroom anywhere in the world, right at the White House. Right at the White House. For example, there's the ballroom going up. We are the only major capital. We are the only major place without a triumphal arc, a beautiful... He's talked about a 250-foot arch he's commissioning near the Potomac River. The seats, the decor, pretty much everything. Needs a lot of work. And he's announced a huge renovation of the Kennedy Center. He is constantly thinking about new construction projects, what he can build.

4:43By our count, he has at least 18 major construction projects either underway or in the planning process or that he's pitched to people. My colleague Luke Broadwater covers the White House. He says, in all, the Times has calculated that more than a billion dollars worth of construction projects pushed by Trump are now underway in D.C. Donald Trump has claimed and promised that some of these projects will be paid for through private donations. You know, famously about the ballroom, he said that not one dime of taxpayer money will be used on the ballroom, that it's a gift from him and his donors.

5:21That is just not true. You can look at spending documents and see that hundreds of millions of dollars from the Secret Services budget are going to work on the ballroom in terms of security and the reinforced walls and the bunker underneath. So taxpayers are very much involved in the ballroom project. And then as you go down the list of more and more projects, you'll see more and more taxpayer expenses. You know, President Trump said that the triumphal arch would probably be paid for through private donations, but we see taxpayer money going to that project. He's raising private funds for his National Garden of American Heroes.

6:05But we already know$40 million of taxpayer money has been dedicated to that project. And the costs associated with that project are going to continue to rise. So we are likely to see at the end of this potentially multiple billions of dollars, including a lot of it from taxpayers, that are going to construction projects in Washington, D.C.

6:35In early March, Representative Tom Keene, a Republican from New Jersey, voted yay to support President Trump's immigration crackdown. He made a few remarks about some other legislation, and then he more or less vanished. For weeks, his neighbors said there were no obvious signs of him at home, and his family's vacation house appeared shuttered. His aides told reporters that Keene, who's 57, was being treated for a health condition and was expected to fully recover, but they offered no additional details, just saying over and over that he was working remotely and would be back in D.C. soon. In May, when pressed, his chief of staff told the Times, quote, There's no cameras where Tom is.

7:17And in private, Keene's own colleagues in Congress began to speculate wildly about what was going on, wondering if it could be rehab for a stroke, an addiction issue, or a case of plastic surgery gone awry. The mystery could be resolved today, when Keene, who has now missed more than 130 floor votes, is finally expected to return to the Capitol and address his absence. While members of Congress generally do not provide information to the public about their health or medical status, Keene's unexplained, months-long disappearance could test the limit of what voters will tolerate. Keene won his primary election earlier this month.

7:58It was uncontested. But in the fall, he's facing a Democratic challenger in a difficult re-election battle that could help determine the balance of power in the House. And his long absence has already started coming up as a campaign issue.

8:18This week, a dangerous, drawn-out heat wave is spreading from the Midwest to the East Coast. 6.33 right now, a.m. in the morning. And I tell you, right now, it's already hot. In Chicago yesterday, the heat index reached 101 degrees, with furnace-like temperatures baking the city. We have extreme heat warnings that are in effect for all areas of southern Michigan and northwest Ohio. Today, the high temperatures and high humidity are starting to hit further east and south, reaching deep into Ohio and down into Tennessee. And by later this week, major cities on the east coast could start to see extreme record-breaking temperatures.

8:59In Philadelphia, officials have already said they plan to limit 4th of July celebrations. and the mayor of New York City announced a heat emergency plan, since the city could potentially see multiple 100-plus degree days. This is all being driven by a sprawling area of high pressure known as a heat dome, the same kind of conditions that were behind a deadly heat wave that's been roasting Europe. Because of climate change, heat domes are becoming more common worldwide.

9:33And finally, about 200 miles above the Earth, a vital space telescope is in desperate need of help. For more than two decades, the NASA telescope, known as SWIFT, has captured data from across the universe, helping scientists better understand how stars collapse and collide. But all that time, the telescope has also been falling slowly back to Earth. And scientists say within a few months, it will get torn apart in the atmosphere. Building a replacement would likely take years and cost hundreds of millions of dollars. So NASA came up with a daring and unprecedented plan. Send a spacecraft up there to catch the telescope and nudge it back into a higher orbit.

10:17The agency partnered with a private company to build the device that can hopefully pull this off, and it's set to be launched this morning. NASA scientists say they're cautiously optimistic about the mission, which they hope will eventually push the telescope about 100 miles deeper into space. That could allow the telescope to stay in orbit for another 10 years.

10:41Those are the headlines. I'm Tracy Mumford. We'll be back tomorrow. Love You