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CNN NewsNight with Abby Phillip
Musk Moves from Villainizing Workers to Fictionalizing Them; Trump Cedes Spotlight to Elon Musk in First Cabinet Meeting; Bezos Commands Washington Post to Focus Columns on His Two Pillars. Supreme Court Justices Poises to Favor Straight Woman in a Job Bias Case; A.I.-Generated Video of Trump's Fantasy Gaza Sparked Outrage. Aired 10-11p ET
Aired February 26, 2025 - 22:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[22:00:00]
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ABBY PHILLIP, CNN ANCHOR (voice over): Tonight, in his first cabinet meeting, Donald Trump cedes the floor to someone not in his cabinet.
ELON MUSK, ADVISER TO PRESIDENT TRUMP: I call myself a humble tech support here.
PHILLIP: And federal workers are now being recast from villainized to fictionalized.
MUSK: Actually, it was a post-check review.
PHILLIP: Plus, Amazon's billionaire tells his paper how they'll think and what they'll think about, threatening to turn a renowned medium into a mouthpiece.
Also, the Supremes are poised to make it easier to sue if you're white, straight and didn't get the gay (ph).
And it's the new Rorschach test in American politics, were you amused or outraged by bearded bikinis and sippers of fruity drinks in a Gaza made of gold?
Live at the table, Scott Jennings, Alencia Johnson, Tiffany Smiley, Adrienne Elrod, and Toure.
Americans with different perspectives aren't talking to each other, but here, they do.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIP (on camera): Good evening. I'm Abby Phillip in New York.
Let's get right to what America is talking about, their sixth sense. Listening to President Trump and Elon Musk talk, it's like they're living in a horror movie, and their villains are federal workers, except today, those villains have suddenly become walking and highly paid dead.
In the first cabinet meeting of the second term, the Trump President Trump gave the microphone first to Mr. DOGE. Elon spoke for seven minutes. That is longer than anyone not named Trump. And when he was asked about his email, which told federal workers to justify their jobs, emails at some agencies are also telling those workers to ignore, Elon raised another new reason for why he sent it.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MUSK: I think that email perhaps was best interpreted as a performance review, but actually it was a pulse check review. Do you have a pulse?
We think there are a number of people on the government payroll who are dead, which is probably why they can't respond. And some people who are not real people, like they're literally fictional individuals that are collecting paychecks.
Well, somebody's collecting paychecks on a fictional individual, so we're just literally trying to figure out are these people real? Are they alive? And can they write an email?
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIP: Now, Musk didn't provide any evidence of widespread fraud by dead people, but it's hardly the first time that MAGA has used this talking point. In fact, it's been kind of a go-to in the playbook. Here's Trump just last week talking about Social Security.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DONALD TRUMP, U.S. PRESIDENT: We have millions and millions of people over 100 years old. Everybody knows that's not so.
If you take all of those millions of people off Social Security, all of a sudden we have a very powerful Social Security with people that are 80 and 70 and 90, but not 200.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIP: Well, those numbers apparently keep changing. Musk went even further on X, writing, having tens of millions of people marked in Social Security as alive when they are definitely dead is a huge problem. Again, if they have proof, they aren't sharing it. And there's also no evidence of fraud on a scale like that. Let's not forget also that the most infamous use of dead people and stolen elections was this.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: We know the Democrats will have dead people voting and you got to watch it. Dead people, you wouldn't believe how many.
Look at that, dead people, lots of dead people, thousands. And some dead people actually requested an application. That bothers me a bit. Not only are they voting, they want an application to vote.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIP: It's like Groundhog Day, Adrienne. It's almost like you just take the same joke and you just play it over and over again in all these different scenarios. And it doesn't matter whether it's real or not. It's dead people. It's people who are, you know, fraud with no evidence. And this is being said repeatedly from a cabinet meeting.
ADRIENNE ELROD, SENIOR ADVISER AND SENIOR SPOKESPERSON, HARRIS FOR PRESIDENT: Yes, I mean, first of all, this is a page out of the old Trump playbook that I've run against Trump the last three presidential campaigns he's been on. This is what he does time and time again. If you say it enough times, even if it's not true, it becomes the truth in his mind.
Nothing about this surprised me today. They're hanging on to, you know, some tiny little statistics that they either saw or they made up.
[22:05:00]
Trying to suggest that there are people who are dead, who are still getting social security checks. I think a study recently came out that showed that like 0.5 percent of the people on Social Security payroll, something like that.
PHILLIP: It's definitely not many, many, many millions.
ELROD: It's not. It is not. It is not.
SCOTT JENNINGS, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: But there are some, right?
ELROD: Okay.
PHILLIP: It's not anywhere near --
JENNINGS: How many is too many? How many is too many?
ELROD: The margin of error is always going to be like that, but here's the bottom line.
JENNINGS: Of course, you accept some for it.
ELROD: Okay, thank you. Great to be back on with you again.
PHILLIP: We've been down this road before.
TIFFANY SMILEY (R), FORMER U.S. SENATE CANDIDATE FOR WASHINGTON STATE: Yes. I mean, the speaker just a few minutes ago said there's $50 billion in fraud in benefits with Medicaid.
PHILLIP: Just one second.
SMILEY: $50 billion. PHILLIP: $50 billion, not people, okay? So, Trump says it's billions of people, it's not millions of people. It's just not. That's a fact. Anyway, continue.
SMILEY: Well, I mean, you can even go back to Elon's message, you know, today. Out in the real world, out in the real America, you're either a buyer or you're a seller, and if you're not that, then you're an expense. And what we've seen in our federal government is it's grown, and it's grown, and it's allowed status quo to prevail. And we have a lot of expenses on the books now. We have expenses in the form of pajamas and slippers that sit at home and don't work. And --
PHILLIP: How do you know they don't work?
SMILEY: Then why aren't they replying to the emails? If I was out in the real world and I didn't reply to my boss' email, I wouldn't be fired.
ELROD: (INAUDIBLE) tell us that don't reply to the email.
(CROSSTALKS)
TOURE, SUBSTACK, CULTURE FRIES BY TOURE: Can we be real for a moment that DOGE is not about cutting money, right? It's not about spending. It's about shrinking government so that it'll be too small to stop Trump with whatever else is in this plan.
JENNINGS: Why would the government stop Trump? Isn't he the head of the government? You're saying the government would be too small to stop Trump. If Trump's the president, why would the government, the bureaucracy be actively trying to stop him?
TOURE: Because he is shredding the Constitution and creating an authoritarian dictatorship. That's why.
JENNINGS: Okay.
TOURE: And we're already eating that dictatorship.
JENNINGS: So, you're suggesting that the unelected bureaucracy should try to stop the elected president.
TOURE: No, the people of this country, some of them who work in the government, should uphold the Constitution. And Trump is not willing to uphold the Constitution.
JENNINGS: How?
TOURE: And as long as Trump is unwilling to uphold the Constitution. It's just a piece of paper.
JENNINGS: It's a serious allegation. How's he shredding it?
ALENCIA JOHNSON, FORMER SENIOR ADVISER, HARRIS 2024 CAMPAIGN: This attack on these federal employees are people who go from administration to the point that Toure is making that I feel like no matter what side of the aisle you're on, these are people who say, you know what, my oath isn't to whoever I may vote for, my oath of allegiance is to the Constitution. And no matter who was in office, I'm going to hold them accountable. But more importantly, I'm going to make sure the government is working for the American people.
Now, what we are doing is inflicting a lot of trauma on these people who are concerned about their jobs and they want to make sure that they're able to provide Medicaid, help taxpayers figure out their taxes. Oh, I forgot DOGE wants to cut all of these people at the IRS so that people don't know how, don't get the help that they need in order to file their taxes.
SMILEY: Well, the good thing is Trump is making major investments. We have Apple, we have foreign investors coming in and providing thousands of jobs here in this country. So, the American dream is still alive and well.
(CROSSTALKS)
SMILEY: What about when the Keystone Pipeline shut down? They said, oh, go get jobs at the New Green Deal.
JOHNSON: So, are they transitioning people from the federal government to these corporate jobs?
SMILEY: I'm just saying it's America.
JENNINGS: Both of you all made an interesting point, which is that your view is that Trump is shredding the Constitution. I'd like to hear more about that. But that it seems to me that you all both believe that the unelected part of our government, the bureaucracy, has a responsibility to resist the political leadership. Is that your view?
JOHNSON: That's not actually what --
TOURE: Not at all.
JOHNSON: We said they are upholding the Constitution, the principles of the Constitution. And at times, we have seen --
JENNINGS: How is Trump shredding the Constitution?
JOHNSON: My God --
TOURE: Should we -- seriously? Do we have to give you a civics lesson that we have. I don't know that we have that we've put all power in the executive branch. The legislative branch, the FBI, now we're in control of the military, we're silencing media. This is what you do in a dictatorship.
JENNINGS: Are you suggesting that the president is not the commander- in-chief of the military?
TOURE: I am suggesting that the president is going to put in charge somebody who is going to contravene the Constitution. And at some near point, this conversation will look very silly for you because it would be obvious. And right now, you're gaslighting. When we get to the actual rubber on the road, it will be clear.
JENNINGS: I'm interested in this conversation. He's going to put someone in charge, who will contravene the -- but who? What do you mean by that? The president is in charge of the military. Is he not? You said he's going to put someone in charge of the military?
PHILLIP: I mean, the president is in charge of the military. That is how it works.
JENNINGS: This is a important conversation.
PHILLIP: Yes, I mean, that's why I'm letting you have it. Yes, I mean, I think it is important because there is this perception that Trump does want to push the boundaries of what is what is in his constitutional lane.
[22:10:01]
And his staff secretary said that apparently he signed an executive order saying that only he and the attorney general get to say what the law is. So, that's the type of thing that I think that Trump has said that has caused people to question what does he mean by that.
JENNINGS: I don't think he has done anything in the first month that is outside the bounds of the power vested in him by the Constitution. He was elected president. We, according to the Constitution, vest all executive authority in a president. And the concept that the military should be an independent agency or that the bureaucracy should resist the political leadership of this government is extraordinarily dangerous.
TOURE: That's not what we said.
(CROSSTALKS)
JOHNSON: That's literally not what we said.
JENNINGS: I'm just repeating back to you your own words. I did not say resist. I know when I say resist.
PHILLIP: I'm going to pivot us a little bit because I think we're kind of getting in a circling the drain here. But Elon Musk, I think, today in this cabinet meeting, there were some interesting optics of it all. I mean, he wasn't at the table because he's not a member of the cabinet, but he was one of the only ones who spoke except for J.D. Vance. He stood in the corner and kind of held forth for a long time.
And the reporting from CNN today is that there are some complaints that cabinet officials were caught off guard, and they've been frustrated by some of the directives at federal employees. About almost half of them have told their employees not to respond at all to that email.
And Susie Wiles was over on Capitol Hill, and according to Josh Hawley, told senators that Musk is working directly with the president, and then the president works with the cabinet secretaries. In other words, he, Elon doesn't tell them what to do. It's almost amazing that she has to clarify that for senators.
SMILEY: I mean, I looked at that picture today, and of the cabinet, and Elon was sitting on the side with all of the staff. The cabinet members were sitting at the table, you had a Kennedy at the table, you had a former Democrat at the table. I mean, it was amazing for our country. Actually, press in the room, a president actually taking questions, Elon being extremely transparent and open with the process. What's -- was he not? Is he not?
PHILLIP: What do you mean by that?
TOURE: No, it's not transparent. It's the opposite of transparency.
SMILEY: How is it the opposite of transparent? Because he's been very vocal and very upfront about what they're doing, that they're finding waste, fraud and abuse. They have found billions of dollars of waste fraud
TOURE: They have not.
SMILEY: They've identified. Yes, they have. And, number two, the American people want it, Democrats, independents, Republicans alike. There was a recent Harvard Harris poll. Did you know what I'm talking about?
PHILLIP: I do, but, again, we discussed this yesterday with Scott. The Harvard Harris poll asks, in very general terms, whether the American people want to see the federal government shrunk. There were other polls asking specifically about Elon's role, and it's a net negative. Most people disprove of what he's doing. They don't approve of the hiring freeze. They don't approve of the attempts to eradicate entire federal agencies. So, let's just be specific about --
SMILEY: Elon's following Trump's presidency.
PHILLIP: Okay, yes, I know.
SMILEY: He is serving at the pleasure of the president.
PHILLIP: But to your point on public opinion, it's not as clear. It's actually much less clear that they support the specific things that are being done.
You mentioned Elon being transparent. I want to play what he said about what happened with Ebola funding real quick.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MUSK: And I should say, also, we will make mistakes. We won't be perfect. But when we make a mistake, we'll fix it very quickly. So, for example, with USAID, one of the things we accidentally canceled very briefly was Ebola prevention. I think we all want Ebola prevention. So, we restored the Ebola prevention immediately. And there was no interruption.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIP: Well, first of all, let me just say real quick before you jump in. You know, that, according to people who actually are involved in Ebola prevention, is not true, that maybe the funding was eventually restored, but the infrastructure that supports Ebola prevention is not restored and has essentially been gutted.
TOURE: Interesting. You know, I think part of the problem, the fundamental problem here is the notion that government should be run like a business, and we can take out different items, and we got to make it as efficient as possible. Government is not a business. It is not meant to run like a business. It is not meant to create a profit. It is meant to help business make money, but not to profit itself. So, this notion that we're going to take out different line items and do it in a way that as if it's a surgeon pulling out organs to see if the patient is still alive, this is a very disgusting and hacksaw approach to something that could be done intelligently, intentionally, and surgically, but they're doing it in this really disgusting way.
ELROD: And can I just build on that really quickly what Toure said? I mean, the bottom line is, yes, they came into this with good faith, with goodwill from the American people, saying, you know what, we would like to see waste, fraud, and abuse reducing government.
[22:15:04]
But the way they've handled this, putting a billionaire who's never stepped foot into a government office building before except for maybe --
SMILEY: Is refreshing.
ELROD: Well, but he -- you have to have people who actually understand government higher than --
SMILEY: Do you really though? Because that's really worked for us. You do.
ELROD: Well, this has not worked for them.
PHILLIP: We got to leave it there. Everyone we have much more ahead.
Coming up next, Jeff Bezos is under fire tonight. He's accused of threatening the independence of The Washington Post, the paper he owns. Another special guest is going to join us at the table.
Plus, an A.I. video of Donald Trump's fantasy resort in the Middle East illustrates the state of our politics. So, are you outraged or amused by it?
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[22:20:00] PHILLIP: All right. Let's just get this part out of the way. Jeff Bezos owns The Washington Post and he can do whatever he wants with it. But the question is, is he taking the free out of the free press? Backlash is already erupting inside of his newsroom once again after the billionaire has now ordered the opinion page to focus solely on two very specific viewpoints, free markets and personal liberties. Any views opposing those pillars, well, good luck elsewhere. And the man who runs the opinion section, he just quit in protest.
And, as a side note, those two pillars, by the way, they're at odds with his new MAGA friend, Donald Trump. The president's policies are constantly trampling on free markets and liberties, like tariff wars, strong-arming businesses, gender identification, abortion, free speech.
Fifth seat at the table is Jeff Jarvis, a visiting professor at Stony Brook University and the author of the Gutenberg Parenthesis. Jeff, this is, if you've been paying attention the last six months, not a huge surprise. But is it a sort of cloak and dagger effort by Jeff Bezos to make the paper go a little bit further to the right by claiming that this is about freedom and not about ideological alignment with Trump and Trumpism?
JEFF JARVIS, VISITING PROFESSOR, STONY BROOK UNIVERSITY: It's a ridiculous word game that's going on here. I mean, who doesn't believe in individual liberties? Who doesn't believe in free markets? Until a month ago, we lived in a democracy and capitalist country. Now, we're in an oligarchy and a plutocracy and things have changed. So, for him to say that this is all about individual liberty and free markets is rather like being fair and balanced, if you remember that phrase from another network. It's meaningless, it's vacuous, it means absolutely nothing. Who's going to be against those things?
So, clearly, he's signaling that he's going to use these kinds of made up words to say I'm with Trump. And, as you said, it's his paper, he owns it, he can drive it in the ground, which he's doing, having lost 300,000 subscribers after not endorsing Kamala Harris. It's his choice, but it's an important institution in this country that he's destroying.
PHILLIP: So, Marty Baron, who was the editor of the paper when Jeff Bezos first bought it, and I worked under Marty Baron for years, he was not an anti-Jeff Bezos person. In fact, they worked extremely closely together. Here's what he said to the Daily Beast today. He said, there is no doubt in my mind that he is doing this out of fear of the consequences for his other business interests, Amazon, the source of his wealth, and Blue Origin, which represents his lifelong passion for space exploration. He has prioritized those commercial interests over the Post, and he is betraying the Post's longstanding principles to do so.
You can't not take that seriously as a possibility here.
TOURE: No, of course. I mean, this is what's going on. Billionaires have too much control over our media and are bringing their business concerns into our media. He can, as far as the human right of an owner to do whatever, but this is an incredible responsibility, or at least we used to think about it that way, to own an important piece of the media, a legacy piece of media. To treat it this way is to use it to --
PHILLIP: Well, it's a commodity. It's another business that is being used as leverage in an effort to protect his other businesses.
JENNINGS: Well, I'm interested in a couple of the comments you made. You said it was destroying the newspaper because they failed. I mean, what does that say about a newspaper that you have to endorse a certain political party and for it?
JARVIS: That's not the way it happened. What happened was that the editorial board had an editorial done and ready, and that was the process.
JENNINGS: Right.
JARVIS: And then suddenly to say, well, now we're not going to endorse. Well, they've endorsed other things since. It was the process by which it went under there. And there's other things going on constantly in the paper. I now use the hashtags broken Times and broken Post. The headlines in both papers, I think, are constantly off, constantly trying to soft pedal what's going on. You're not going to like what I'm saying next, but we are in the middle of a totalitarian fascist coup in this country. And when we don't call it that when we soft pedal it, we don't have a real discussion about it.
At least here, I can say those words, we can have that discussion, but you will not see those words in The New York Times or The Washington Post.
TOURE: But if we were being honest, there should be a breaking news banner on CNN and MSNBC all day long. We are in dictatorship right now.
PHILLIP: Let me just say, from the perspective of free speech, right? You disagree with what he just said.
TOURE: Yes.
PHILLIP: But he has the right to say it.
TOURE: Of course.
PHILLIP: I'm not sure that he would have the right to say that in the pages of The Washington Post. Does that seem problematic?
JENNINGS: Well, my second point was going to be that I think the categories of personal liberty and free markets are quite broad.
[22:25:01]
You could fit a number of column topics. I've written thousands of newspaper columns in my life. You could fit a number of column topics under those two things. I also read his note and he was saying that, you know, there's lots of opinions out there and we're going to focus on these sort of big ticket items. I don't think they're narrow. I think they're very large. I'll be interested to see what they're willing to publish.
TOURE: Scott, you're saying we are only doing one side of those issues, these issues, and not exploring both sides of the free market issue. You said it's going to be about the monopoly of a Jeff Bezos to control the market.
JENNINGS: One more thing. You said who would be against individual labor to go in this country when they're vehemently opposed to individual liberties? It must be defended all the time, including the most important one, free speech, which you and I must agree on, has to be defended at all costs.
JARVIS: Well, right now we see that Donald Trump is kicking the Associated Press out of the press room, and, by the way, the rest of the press is not standing up.
JENNINGS: They're not out of the press room.
JARVIS: That's not about --
JENNINGS: They have a seat in the briefing room.
JARVIS: That's not about free press. That's about being afraid of what they're going to say, afraid of what they're going to do.
SMILEY: He's the most open, honest president.
TOURE: It's so good. That's ridiculous.
SMILEY: Look at what we've experienced the last four years.
TOURE: Are you kidding? This whole notion of we're going to choose who we answer questions from, that is insane.
JARVIS: He's frightened to death of free speech.
JOHNSON: The White House is going to choose who they're going to answer questions to. This attack on journalism and freedom of speech, that is the last bit of our democracy to uphold. And, quite frankly, the fact that a billionaire is controlling how our media is going to cover this president when we understand --
SMILEY: Who's controlling -- Elon's controlling the media?
JOHNSON: Elon, well he has social media, but the billionaire, Jeff Bezos.
JENNINGS: How many radio stations does George Soros own?
JOHNSON: A few.
JENNINGS: Here's the thing, here's the thing. JOHNSON: But George Soros is actually --
JENNINGS: There are more information sources than ever. We have the most democratized media that we've ever had. We have more people than ever that have access to disseminating information. It's not a bad thing.
And, look, he has one paper. There's lots of newspapers. There's lots of ways to get information right now. I think what's going on here is --
PHILLIP: So, are you agreeing -- I mean, I think that what they're saying over here is that Jeff Bezos is actually moving the paper ideologically in a particular direction. It sounds like you're saying that is what he's doing because he's trying to create a niche for The Washington Post.
JENNINGS: What I read -- Yes, I agree that he's trying to carve out a niche for that opinion page, which may not be a terrible business idea. And I don't know what direction he's going to move it, but these two big topics are vital topics.
JARVIS: It's ridiculous. It's not a niche at all.
PHILLIP: What's interesting about what he said was that he didn't define really what he meant by those topics, but he said, any opinions that are in contradiction to them cannot be printed in the newspaper.
JARVIS: He thinks he's coming up with a niche though, Abby. What's The Wall Street Journal? What's Rupert Murdoch? Will Lewis, who's the head of the company now, and Matt Murray, who's the editor, are both Murdoch trained. This is kind of a quiet, subtle takeover of the Murdoch world here. So, it becomes another New York Post, Fox News and Wall Street Journal.
And, you know, that's okay. If he owns it, he can do what he wants. But as far as I'm concerned, it's my opinion that destroys the institution and it's one of the few we have left.
TOURE: If he told us that he was moving rightward because he thought that was a good business model or that it's where the country is, we could listen to that.
PHILLIP: I think that is what he's saying though.
TOURE: No, he's saying I'm doing this for my business and this is better for my business relationship with Trump.
PHILLIP: I do think that one of the things that he's saying, and I think this is the reason why you can read between the lines, that this isn't just about free markets and personal liberty, this is about ideological alignment, is that he points to the election results from 2024 to justify this change. And, again, like, you can say you want a free press, but if you want a free press that is ideologically aligned in one particular direction, then you're just doing the thing that you say you hate. If you hate the liberal media, then you're creating a conservative media on the other side.
JARVIS: It's not liberal media anymore.
PHILLIP: Well, I mean, I'm just saying from the perspective of conservatives.
SMILEY: No. I think he realizes that there's a majority of Americans out there that would, you know, love to hear these stories, love to read these stories, love to contribute to these stories. So, he does understand that, and it's very smart. I think what's wrong with new ideas?
JARVIS: There's no new ideas. This is about repression of ideas. This is about saying, you are not allowed to say this in our newspaper.
SMILEY: He's talking about free markets and personal liberty.
TOURE: And only one side of the conversation about free markets is allowed to be discussed.
PHILLIP: You're okay with him saying that certain viewpoints are allowed here, other viewpoints are not, you're fine with that from a free speech perspective?
SMILEY: I mean, how has it been up to here until now?
JARVIS: Because that's why the editor of the section quit. The editor of the section, by the way, he's done some awful things.
SMILEY: Because they can't --
JARVIS: And told us his cartoon that he killed. And that obedience didn't get him anywhere because now he said to Bezos, in conversations, it's been reported, that he wanted a variety of opinions.
[22:30:03]
And Bezos said no.
JENNINGS: You did say the most important thing at the top of the story Abby which is he owns the newspaper and this is the business direction he wants to take it it's like any other business you own if you own it you can take it and if it works it'll be great and if it doesn't it won't be but he's the owner he's got to make the business decisions he thinks it's a good one.
ABBY PHILLIP, CNN ANCHOR: This is a little bit of a tightrope because the reporters on the news side of things are already looking at this and wondering how long they can remain if they have an owner who is willing to put his hands in the editorial decisions of the newspaper which typically despite what you're saying typically the owners keep their hands out of those types of decisions for a reason.
Jeff Jarvis thank you very much for joining us. Everyone else, stay with us. Coming up next, the Supreme Court appears poised to make it easier for
Americans to file reverse discrimination lawsuits. We'll debate what that could mean next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[03:35:00]
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
PHILLIP: Tonight if you are white and straight it may get easier for you to sue if you've been denied a job. The Supreme Court is hearing a case of a woman who claims she was passed over for a promotion and then eventually demoted because she's heterosexual. The job that she wanted along with her old one were given to folks who identify as LGBTQ and today the nation's highest court seemed likely to take her side.
(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP)
JUSTICE BRETT KAVANAUGH, ASSOCIATE JUSTICE OF THE U.S. SUPREME COURT: So all you want for this case is a really short opinion that says discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation whether it's because you're gay or because you're straight is prohibited. And the rules are the same whichever way that goes.
JUSTICE NEIL GORUSCH, ASSOCIATE JUSTICE OF THE U.S. SUPREME COURT: It applies same to everybody.
ELLIOT GAISER, OHIO SOLICITOR GENERAL: Well we agree that the court should say that at the very, very minimum.
GARUSCH: We're in radical agreement today on that it seems to me.
(END AUDIO CLIP)
PHILLIP: Adrienne is back with us at the table. I think this is a really fascinating question and it's exactly where we are as a country which is that now there is this push anti-DEI, anti-diversity and the corollary to that is that we are going to see more people like this woman saying I was passed over because a black person, a gay person, a lesbian person got that job instead of me.
And then what, we just have everybody suing each other over not getting jobs?
ALENCIA JOHNSON, FORMER SR. ADVISER, HARRIS 2024 CAMPAIGN: Well I think some of this speaks to there has been this undercurrent and all of this conversation that there is a bit of entitlement, right? And that there's not this honest conversation of why you may have been passed over for this promotion.
And instead of having that conversation or figuring that out you'll say look at this person over here who looks different than me or expresses their life differently than me. And this is a slippery slope that does not acknowledge, I think, the beautiful thing about America's promise and opportunity is that we are what we are in this as a nation because of diversity and inclusion, diversity of thought, diversity of expression, diversity of background, diversity of experience.
And I'm concerned that this is going to be what we continue to see. We saw it with the affirmative action Supreme Court decision that was overturned and we're seeing it immediately after Donald Trump put all these executive actions around DEI.
JENNINGS: But you would agree if this woman can prove in court that she was discriminated against based on sexual orientation that she would be entitled to relief, yes?
JOHNSON: But it didn't -- there was no conversation in here about her orientation.
JENNINGS: But that -- she is seeking to go to court over these grounds. I mean what you heard the justices say I don't know how anyone could disagree with it. If you're being discriminated against on the basis of sexual orientation no matter which way that flows then you should be entitled under federal law to get some relief.
There is some evidence in this case if you read through what happened to her that she may have a point here and so I guess my question would be why wouldn't it be okay for someone who was facing any kind of discrimination in violation of federal law to go to court and get relief?
Every case is different. Some may be able to prove it, some may not.
TOURE, SUBSTACK AUTHOR, "CULTURE FRIES BY TOURE", PODCAST HOST FOR "TOURE SHOW", AND HOST OF "RAP LATTE" ON YOUTUBE: I don't know the specifics of this case. She said she was passed over twice for a person who is gay. I don't know, we don't know the specifics of the situation.
What I do see is a country where white people are saying we are victims too right and we want to get victim status. There was a Harvard report years ago that was titled white people see race as a zero-sum game that they are losing, and that is the racial identity of this country right now that white people are saying we are victims we want power and the whole Trump ascension in this 2024 moment -- 2025 moment has been about elevating white people to the status that they seem to believe they deserve.
PHILLIP: To that point I mean that's not just Trump of 2025 that's Trump of 1989. Let's play the clip.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DONALD TRUMP, THEN-BUSINESSMAN: A well-educated black person, male or female, has a tremendous advantage over a well-educated white person and I felt that for a long time. I'm talking now as a person that employs thousands and thousands of people.
A well-educated black has a tremendous advantage over a well-educated white in terms of the job market. I've said on occasion even about myself if I was starting off today I would love to be a well-educated black because I really believe they do have an actual advantage today.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
JENNINGS: But this case is about sexual orientation.
PHILLIP: I understand that but I think the idea here is and this is the broader issue that the court is going to talk about is whether or not people who are from the majority group can sue for discrimination.
[22:40:07]
Typically the minority group: black people, gay people, Hispanic people, minority religions even, would be the ones suing for relief. So Trump just to point out, to go back to Trump there you know he said that back in 1989, it was patently false then but even today it is patently false. I mean when you look at the numbers in terms of medium wealth in this country, the Asian Americans, white Americans, their wealth is you know multiples of that of Hispanic and black Americans.
When it comes to LGBTQ people who are represented at the highest levels of corporate America we're talking about fewer than three percent.
TOURE: Of course this is about race. She has race. She is white. She is suing because she was victimized, she says because she's white.
PHILLIP: Because she's straight. It's a sexual preference case that she's making.
JENNINGS: But are you in disagreement with sort of federal employment law that protects you on the basis of race, sexual orientation? I mean shouldn't it flow both ways?
PHILLIP: I think that you're making a good point that the discrimination protections are there to protect people from being discriminated about anything about them but the idea that civil rights law can then be used to allow white people and straight people to say that they are discriminated against is not something that I think is typical and this is from the head of the H.R. organization. He said this in the "Washington Post."
This is Johnny C. Taylor. "If she wins, the flood of reverse discrimination claims will be like nothing we've ever seen. Straight white people everywhere could be filing."
And that is not what we have seen where you know straight white people are they -- have the vast majority of the jobs, the vast majority of the wealth. They are by far outstripping gay people and black people and Hispanic people in this country in terms of outcomes.
TOURE: But they see diversity as an attack on whiteness so that's why we get stuff like this that that us being included in the situation is an attack on their dominance. JOHNSON: Well and that it's taking away from jobs that again back to
the entitlement thing jobs or positions that they feel entitled to, right? And so that we're going to continue to see this as the protections that you talked about you have been chipped away at.
JENNINGS: You guys are speaking of this as though it would be cases that were class action in nature these are individual cases. In this particular case but in this particular case she has facts and she thinks she ought to be allowed to pursue those facts that would be true for any of these people if there is a flood of litigation.
They would have to go to court with actual facts. It doesn't mean they would automatically get the rulings they want, it just means that hey we're going to be able to get into a courtroom if we think we have a case to make not everyone will but I suspect some might.
PHILLIP: We'll have more ahead. Coming up next, is it a serious plan or just a joke or both? President Trump posted this A.I.-generated video outlining what he thinks Gaza's future could be.
We'll discuss the very differing reactions to that video next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[22:45:00]
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
PHILLIP: It's the latest Rorschach test in American politics. Were you amused or just outraged by this late-night A.I. video that President Trump shared? It showed his luxury resort vision of a war-torn Gaza after he expels the Palestinian people of course.
Now you have to watch the full video just to really understand what we're talking about here.
(VIDEO PLAYING)
Yes, apparently no guardrails in the White House anymore. Anything is just getting to the president including bearded belly dancers but it is interesting because I mean is it funny? I mean it could be funny I guess if you weren't also talking about a real place.
ADRIENNE ELROD, FORMER SR. ADVISER AND SPOKESPERSON, HARRIS FOR PRESIDENT: Well it's not funny when the lives of so many people are on the line when so many Gazans have lost their lives, Palestinians have lost their lives but I think the bigger picture here, Alencia is my former Democratic colleague here on this panel, where are the college kids? Where are the protesters?
The people who protested President Biden time and time again the last two years since this conflict has happened the last year and a half.
Where are they on this? I mean that Trump has taken a complete 180 on his posture on the Israel-Palestinian conflict. Why are we not hearing the outrage? PHILLIP: Do you think it's also because people don't take it all that,
this is kind of going back to what we were talking about in this block, do people not just not take it that seriously?
ELROD: Well that's the problem.
PHILLIP: He tweets videos like this and they're just like, it's a fantasy.
ELROD: But they should take it seriously. He puts somebody who is his ambassador to Israel who believes in the biblical version of what that region looks like which does not include a Palestinian state. Where are they going to go?
TOURE: There's nothing funny here because they're not going anywhere because it is baked into the culture of the Palestinian people that they are connected to their land. They would rather die than leave their land. So for any of this to happen, they have to all be killed.
[22:50:03]
So is he embracing that too? Are we going to be a part of that as well? Because that makes this really disgusting.
TIFFANY SMILEY (R-WA), FORMER U.S. SENATE CANDIDATE: Well Trump is owning the media and he's brilliant at it. That's what he's doing. He's getting the Democrats.
ELROD: I would not call this brilliant. This is not brilliant.
SMILEY: This is all the Democrats are talking about now.
ELROD: No it's not.
SMILEY: They're going through every little lecture. But I would like to address President Trump's policy in the Middle East. The most substantive piece in the Middle East that any of us have seen in our adult life with the Abraham Accords was under President Trump.
How is that not true?
JOHNSON: Back to the issue Anne here. We're talking about what we're talking about here at Gaza. I actually want to go back to the fact that Donald Trump was talking about rebuilding or building something new in Gaza before he was elected.
And how inhumane this is to Toure's point. I don't find this funny at all.
Yes he loves the shock and awe. Yes, he loves to retweet or whatever, re-truth, whatever you want to call it. These A.I. pictures.
But we are talking about a people that have been there for generations who are forced to leave their homes or have lost their lives and family in their homeland. And this is embraced by the United States and by people that voted for
Donald Trump. And people who quite frankly have no sense of, I'm sorry, but the grace for humanity is just lost here.
And the fact that people are laughing about it is the disgusting part. Regardless of what you believe, regardless of what side of the issue that you are on, the fact that we're seeing this and we're talking about this because the President of the United States has put this out.
PHILLIP: No one will be talking about this tomorrow.
JENNINGS: Can I just address Adrienne's point about, I think you're getting at the idea that there should be a two-state solution.
I was walking into the studio tonight and saw that the Empire State Building was orange in honor of the Bibas family. I think the idea of a two-state solution died with the Bibas family and the disgusting carnival-like display that was put on by Hamas and the Palestinian people when they were handing those remains back.
There cannot be a two-state solution for people who celebrate the death of those little babies. It's terrible.
ELROD: You're trying to get us off the topic of how distasteful this A.I. video is that Donald Trump put out and how cruel that is to do the Palestinian people.
JENNINGS: I'll tell you what's cruel. Other little babies have a carnival for their funeral and then send their remains back while cheering about it. That's distasteful.
SMILEY: No one will be talking about it tomorrow. People will be talking about Donald Trump wanting to help Palestinians.
PHILLIP: We cannot all speak at the same time. All right, we got to go. Thank you very much.
The panel is coming up next with their nightcaps and tonight's theme involves George Clooney of all people and what they'll be doing in 30 years.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[22:55:00]
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
PHILLIP: We're back and it's time for the News Nightcap, in 30 years' edition.
George Clooney, he says that he's doing a Broadway show right now because he's always wanted to and doesn't want to be 90 years old and full of regret.
So now you each have 30 seconds to tell us what is something you want to do in the next 30 years before you're 90. You won't be 98.
ELROD: Which will be in 30 years, not really, but close. Abby, I'm a big hiker, and in Colorado, there are 58 peaks that are over 14,000 feet. I've always said that I want to do at least one or two of them.
So now is the time. That is one of my goals to try to do a couple of those peaks before I turn 90.
PHILLIP: That sounds brutal.
SMILEY: So I love sports. I played sports in college and I can't quite do those sports anymore, so I picked up golf two years ago. I want to golf with my boys, but golf is really hard and you have to put in a lot of time and I'm not that good.
And I was telling my golf buddy this summer after a frustrating day, I said, when are we going to be good? She's like, when we're 80, Tiffany, we'll be good.
So I want to join the LPGA.
PHILLIP: Wait, what's your sport? What's your real sport?
SMILEY: Soccer, basketball.
PHILLIP: Okay. All right. Yes, those are tough on the joints.
TOURE: It's similar to you. I want to talk about something sporty. I'll be really honest.
I want to learn how to swim. I don't know how to swim. I hate to live up to the stereotype.
I'm sorry, mom. It's my fault. When I was seven, she said, mom said, we're going to learn how to swim and then I got really good at tennis. We started training, playing tournaments. I'm still playing tournaments to this day.
When I get too old to play tennis, mom, then I'll go back and learn how to swim.
PHILLIP: I have a great swim teacher for you. I'm taking some lessons right now for that very reason.
JOHNSON: And I just actually finished some swim lessons two months ago, but my bucket list item is not any of these. I would actually like to be on, before Olivia Benson retires, I would like to be a meaningful extra on "Law and Order SVU" with a role that is meaningful.
I don't want just one line. I want to be a meaningful part of the story in a good way.
PHILLIP: All right.
JENNINGS: Well, I'm in a similar boat. It's been my dream for a long time to appear in a movie.
So I'm going to shoot my shot with our overlords at Warner Brothers. I understand you make some movies and have for some years.
I just want to be in a movie. I will do a nude scene, tasteful or untasteful, but I just want a chance. I promise you, I will not disappoint you.
[23:00:03]
You give me a chance, Warner Brothers. I've seen some of your movies. You could use new actors.
I will literally kill it for you in a movie. Just give me 30 seconds on the big screen.
I will do it. I will do it.
PHILLIP: Okay, Scott. All right. It's been relayed to the people above us.
JENNINGS: HBO. We own that too, right? You guys? We don't.
PHILLIP: Everybody, thank you very much. Thank you for watching "Newsnight." "Laura Coates Live" starts right now.
