Morning Joe - House Speaker Mike Johnson races to get Trump's megabill approved before deadline

Episode Date: July 2, 2025

House Speaker Mike Johnson races to get Trump's megabill approved before deadline

With this legislation, we are fulfilling the mandate we were entrusted with last November and setting our country and the American people up to be safer, stronger, and more prosperous. I look forward to the House taking up and passing this historic legislation and getting it to the President's desk. Today's vote will haunt our Republican colleagues for years to come. As the American people see the damage that is done, as hospitals close, as people are laid off, as costs go up, as the debt increases, they will see what our colleagues have done. And they will remember it.

And we Democrats will make sure they remember it. The American people will not forget the betrayal, the betrayal that took place today. Well, I just heard that about the Senate, and the bill just passed, and it tells you there's something for everyone. I mean, we have... It's a great bill. There is something for everyone, and I think it's gonna go very nicely in the House.

Actually, I think it will be easier in the House than it was in the Senate. President Trump reacting to the Senate's narrow passage of that massive domestic policy bill yesterday. It now heads back to the House where hardline conservatives say they have enough votes to sink that legislation. Also ahead this morning, President Trump tours a controversial new migrant detention camp in the middle of the Florida Everglades. We'll have the latest on so-called alligator Alcatraz. Plus, the jury in the Sean Diddycombs sex trafficking trial will resume deliberations in just a few hours.

After announcing in court yesterday, it reached a partial verdict with one still dangling out there. We'll have legal analysis on what it all means. Good morning, welcome to Morning Joe. It is Wednesday, July 2nd. I'm Willie Geist with us, U.S. special correspondent for BBC News, and host of the rest is politics podcast, Cady K. Also the host of Way Too Early, Ali Vitale, Pulitzer Prize winning columnist and MSNBC political analyst Eugene Robinson and senior writer for The Dispatch, David Drucker. He's also a Bloomberg columnist, a great panel assemble. Good morning to you all to talk about this.

The Senate yesterday passing President Trump's signature tax and domestic policy bill. The vote, 51 to 50. That 51 came from Vice President J.D. Vance who broke the tie after three Republican senators. Susan Collins of Maine, Rand Paul of Kentucky, and Tom Tillis of North Carolina joined every Democrat in opposing the legislation. Senator Lisa Murkowski of Alaska who had expressed concerns throughout the process about cuts to social programs, was the key vote for Senate Majority Leader John Thune to win over, and he did just that.

More on Senator Murkowski in just a moment. The revised legislation now heads back to the House, where Speaker Mike Johnson will attempt to get it passed before President Trump's self-imposed and arbitrary 4th of July deadline. That's Friday. Several House Republicans are already lining up to oppose the legislation. It would take just three of them to sink it. Congressman Ralph Norman, member of the conservative House Freedom Caucus, says he believes there are enough no votes to stop it from passing. So let's pause right there

before we get into the contents of this Senate version of the bill. And Ali, you were running around Capitol Hill all day yesterday on your beat. So let's talk for a minute about how they got these final votes, specifically from Senator Lisa Murkowski, who took great pains yesterday to talk about how agonizing this process was, how agonizing the vote was, and how terrible, she says, the process of reconciliation is to arrive at legislation. How did Republicans do it? Yeah, agonizing is the word that she used to describe this process.

And we know that she had had various priorities that she wanted in this bill that ultimately fell out. Her central goal was to protect Alaskans from this legislation. And we've seen Murkowski be able to put her very specific Alaska stamp on other major pieces of Republican legislation in the past. Certainly, this one is no different. But I thought it was so striking the way that Senator Rand Paul of Kentucky, who was consistently a no vote on this, said that basically all of the other states in this country are now going to have to suffer for a piece of legislation that was negotiated.

He used the word pork because of Alaska and because of Murkowski and getting her vote on board. She obviously took great umbrage to that. There's a great clip where she stares down our Capitol Hill correspondent as he asks about that comment from Senator Paul. But I think it just goes to show the deep tension here. But also, I would say the Senate passage actually says less to me about the power of Trump and Trumpism than it does about the specific negotiations within this bill to get key senators on board.

When you look at someone like Susan Collins, the reason that they weren't able to get her, I think, is very closely tied to the fact that she's going to be on the ballot again in 2026. And she is in one of the most rural states in the country that would see its hospital system deeply harmed by this legislation. In my conversation with sources closest to her close to her yesterday, that's what they kept saying to me time and again, that the rural hospitals piece of this, the millions of people who could lose their health healthcare, tens of thousands of them in Maine, that all factored in very closely to Collins calculus. For Murkowski, she was clearly able to get a little bit more of what she needed to get to yes here,

but I also think it's really stunning to see her say that even as she votes yes, she wants the House to realize that this is not a perfect piece of legislation. And I think if they were to hold a vote right now, which they're not going to for a lot of reasons, they would not have the votes on it. And it's gonna be a very interesting 24 to 48 hours to see the way that Speaker Johnson cobbles together

this coalition once again, was a tight squeeze the last time. It's gonna be even tighter this time. Even after voting yes, Senator Murkowski talked about how undignified the entire process was and said out loud she hopes the House changes this and basically picks it apart and sends back a different version. So Senator Susan Collins of Maine yesterday released a statement writing in part, my vote against this bill stems primarily from the harmful impact it will have on Medicaid affecting

low income families and rural health care providers like our hospitals and nursing homes. Senator Rand Paul of Kentucky, who also voted no, had this to say yesterday. A couple weeks ago I offered to extend the debt ceiling for three months, which is about $500 billion. I offered that again. There was a time in which they had to make a decision dealing with me and reducing the debt ceiling or giving pork and subsidies to Alaska.

They chose to add more pork and subsidies for Alaska to secure that vote. Senator Paul there referring to Republican Senator Murkowski of Alaska. NBC News Chief Capitol Hill correspondent Ryan Nobles asked Murkowski about her colleagues' criticism. Senator Paul said that this was, that your vote was a bailout for Alaska at the expense of the rest of the country. Oh my. That's what Senator Paul said.

I said it was easy. Senator, we've got the, uh. I didn't say it ma'am, I'm just asking for your response. My response is I have an obligation to the people of the state of Alaska. When people suggest that federal dollars go to one of our 50 states in a quote bailout, I find that offensive. Do I like this bill? No. Because I tried to take care of Alaska's interests. But I know, I know that in many parts of the country there

are Americans that are not going to be advantaged by this bill. I don't like that. A little stare down there from Senator Murkowski. Maybe she was just thinking about it. In a written from Senator Murkowski. Maybe she was just thinking about it. In a written statement, Senator Murkowski said, this is one of the hardest votes I've taken during my time in the Senate. Let's not kid ourselves. This has been an awful process, a frantic rush to meet an artificial deadline that has tested every limit of this institution.

While we have worked to improve the present bill for Alaska, it is not good enough for the rest of our nation and we all know it." End quote. Murkowski also told reporters deciding to vote for the package was agonizing, as we mentioned, adding she hopes her colleagues in the House realize the bill needs more work and demand changes before passing it. So David Drucker, focusing on Lisa Murkowski here, but let's look at now where this lands in the House. You've got members of the Freedom Caucus, as Ali

pointed out, who've said they're just not going to vote for it in its present form, that it needs big changes. There's a whole question about getting everybody into Washington, all kinds of thunderstorms and travel delays. Every vote counts in this process. And a deadline of Friday, the 4th of July, set by President Trump. Speaker Johnson said yesterday, said, we're going to get to it. We're going to get this thing done by the 4th of July. A massive bill that needs all kinds of revisions and debates and votes. How do you see this playing out from here in the Republican caucus?

Well, it's a very good question. I wouldn't put too much stock in members of the House Republican conference saying that they've got the votes to stop this thing. They might have the votes to stop it for a couple of days until President Trump calls them, works them over, and they look at the momentum behind the bill having gotten this far and ultimately I expect they'll roll over one way or the other. Now, I've always thought that July 4th was a bit of an ambitious deadline that the August

recess, meaning the end of July, beginning of August before members depart Washington for about you know four to six weeks depending on the calendar every year. I thought that always made a lot more sense but I think that at the end of the day if this was going to be a debt reduction exercise this bill would have looked a lot different There's just not a lot of support among Republican voters to do that as you've seen most of the tension here whether from whether from conservatives or centrists has been about the Medicaid cuts and even though the so-called Fiscal hawks have made a lot of noise about stopping the bill, every chance they've had to stop the bill, they've found a way not to stop the bill.

And so, you know, I think there's going to be a lot of sturm und ram from the Freedom Caucus among House Republicans talking about how this thing doesn't have the votes. Maybe they do want to make changes. Maybe they will make some changes. We could see a little ping pong action here, but this thing is going to pass. The question is just how long this process is going to be drawn out. Yeah, as you say, we've seen this movie before, and it nearly always ends the same, Republicans bending to the will of President Trump.

So let's talk about what's in this version. Nearly 900 pages passed by the Senate, a collection of Republican priorities extends primarily Trump's 2017 tax cuts, estimated to cost $4 trillion over the next 10 years, primarily to the wealthy and businesses. The bill cuts Medicaid by $930 billion and another $285 billion in food assistance that SNAP is slashed. It provides some $350 billion for President Trump's border and national security agenda and would increase the nation's debt limit by $5 trillion. A number of other provisions that reflect Republican priorities also are included here. Analysis by the Congressional Budget Office found the tax cuts would give the wealthiest households a $12,000 annual increase, but would cost

the poorest people $1,600 a year. The CBO also estimates 11.8 million more Americans would be uninsured by 2034 if the bill becomes law and that 3 million more will not qualify for food stamps, also known as those SNAP benefits. So Cady K, this is, as David Drucker said, we've over a decade of watching Donald Trump in national politics now, we kind of know where this goes. We'll hear some protests from principled conservatives talking about the values that they've always held about small government and reducing the debt and the deficit.

But at the end of the day, when they get a phone call from Donald Trump or the threat perhaps of a primary, we know how they'll vote. Yeah, I mean, Congressman Max Frost told our colleague Jen Psaki that there were 20 no's, but those are no's until they're yeses, right? Until they get that phone call. Step back just a second, Willie, because remember what Donald Trump did that was so remarkable in 2016 is he upended

the historical orthodoxy of the Republican Party, which is that people wanted cuts to the social safety net in America. And actually what Republicans realized after Donald Trump was elected is that many Republicans didn't want those cuts to that social safety net. They actually quite liked the government programs that they'd be given, which is, Gene, why this is challenging for Republicans around the country.

But Democrats on the other side are looking at this. I've spoken to them over the last week or two. They're looking at this and saying, well, if we really wanted to make sure we had a good chance in the 2026 midterms, this bill is probably the single best way to get it. Yeah, I think this bill is great for Democrats and great for their prospects in the midterms. And the Democrats can just sort of enjoy the ride, I think. You know, they probably won't enjoy the fact that all this money is being taken from Medicaid, the fact that all this money is being taken from Medicaid, that so many people will not get food assistance, that the tax cuts will become permanent and cost $4 trillion.

But that's all on the Republicans at this point. And it is a strange spectacle. I think we all know how this is going to end. Eventually they're going to pass it and you just have to look at Senator McCroskey and the statement that she released which is just astounding. Really, she votes for the bill and then she talks about how it's a rush process. Artificial deadline. It's not ready. The bill is not ready for the president's signature. Right. So she could have stopped it. She had a choice. She had not ready. The bill is not ready for the president's signature. Right. So she could have stopped it. She had a choice. She had a choice. She herself,

with nobody else's help, you know, because the other votes were in, she could have stopped the bill from going to the president's desk. She says it wasn't ready, yet she voted to send it on. So that tells you a lot about what's eventually going to happen. And the idea that Murkowski is relying on House Republicans to say, oh, actually, we have found so many problems that we're gonna stop this train and actually do the thoughtful work of legislating in a way that more of us can be proud of, I think, is just a complete falsehood

and a misreading of the way that Washington works. And I think that ultimately the senator knows that. She knows that. She knows that. She knows that. Exactly. She's looking for profiles knows that. Exactly. She's looking for profiles and courage. You're going to look at the House Republicans to stand up for Donald Trump. I don't know where you've been the last 10 years.

Correct. I think that's right. But then also when you look at Democrats, yes, on its face, I do think that this legislation presents them a key opportunity to talk about the issues that they've long said they want to talk about. Accessibility to health care was a huge energizer for them in 2018. They're going to see if they can replicate those kinds of efforts, but then also being able to talk about overall concepts of affordability. That's one of the central things that we saw, for example, work for Zoran Mamdani in New York. So this gives

Democrats, Willie, an opportunity to talk about that. But you had Reverend Dr. William Barberon yesterday just talking about the fact that as an activist in this space, he's not seeing Democrats do enough messaging around the specific stories of Americans that will be harmed and they will be by this legislation. And I think that's where there's already some disconnect here. It's an opportunity for Democrats, but they really have to seize it. And that's been something they've struggled with. And that's why you've had people like Chuck Schumer and Hakeem Jeffries promising last

night that the American people will hear these specific stories. So David Drucker, just channeling my good friend Joe Scarborough for a moment, the 1994 Republican revolution, all of the things coming in with Newt Gingrich and the small government. I think it confounds a lot of, let's call it pre-Trump conservatives, Republicans, that someone like Mike Johnson, who has been a conservative his whole life, could celebrate and espouse the virtues of a bill that adds $3.3 trillion to the national debt. Is this just about the power of Trump? Obviously, there's a lot in there for a lot of people to like, for a lot of Republicans to like, especially on the border, on military spending, bringing

down some of the costs of Medicaid and all that. But these cuts that will, in fact, if you close rural hospitals, that's not a blue state thing, that's red state, that's Republicans and Democrats. How do these men and women who've called themselves small government conservatives for their entire lives vote for a package this big? You know, listen, I don't want to make Joe think about his age. I don't like to think about my age sometimes, but that was a long time ago. And this is a different Republican party. You know, over the past decade, Donald Trump has attracted a lot of culturally conservative

former Democrats who are fiscally liberal and were never that interested in small government or spending cuts and didn't feel like they were in the game for the kind of tax cuts that came out of Washington. And, you know, look, this bill would eliminate some taxes on income from tips, taxes on overtime pay. You'd be able to refinance your car and get a, you'd be able to refinance your car and get a, you can be able to finance your car and get a tax deduction if it was American made.

But I think the ultimate answer here, Willie, and this is important I think to understand, is there just isn't a constituency for debt reduction. And so on the one hand, we can and we should focus on Republicans who call themselves fiscal hawks or anybody who does, and then won't stand in the way of a bill like this or fight harder, let's say, to change it. But politicians are in the service business, right?

Ideology is their approach to solving problems or crafting legislation, but they're responsive to the voters because they want to keep their job. Nobody is calling up, no Republican voter or few. I'm sure there's a phone booth somewhere where that you know it's been there are three people on the phone but nobody's calling up uh... republican members of congress demanding debt reduction demanding smaller government but they're saying is protect my program where's my tax cut this is what voters think about right

today that is just not something that's front of mind for them. If you poll voters, they will of course say the government should live within its means. Everybody thinks that. But then when it comes time to make decisions on how to do that, everybody's pointing at their neighbor saying, he makes more money than me, he can afford it.

I need the programs that were promised to me. And so politicians in the Republican Party are simply more reflective of that. And in fact one final thing here, you know, for years before Trump the suburban vote that was a lot more fiscally conservative, at least ideologically, was a pretty reliable Republican vote and that has really shifted over to the Democratic Party for many of these elections and and so you just have a different coalition at play here and Donald Trump is responsive to his coalition now they may not like what they get out of this bill once it's passed and they're experiencing it but I

think the feeling from a lot of Republicans is there are a lot of things in here the president ran on, voters did vote for him. Once we accomplish something, not only do we at least have something to run on in the midterm elections, but people are going to start to feel the impact of this and the positive will outweigh the negative. And we'll see. I mean, as you talk about the inequality, these tax cuts overwhelmingly go to the wealthy and to corporations in this package.

And the cuts will hit, as I say, people all over the country, no matter your political party. So we will see. Senior writer for The Dispatch, David Drucker. David, thanks as always. Still ahead on Morning Joe, we'll break down the partial verdict reached yesterday, the Sean Diddy-Cohm trial, and the one count that's still looming out there for the jury as it resumes its deliberations in just a couple of hours. Plus, President Trump tours a new immigration detention center deep in the Florida Everglades, touting alligators as the guards.

NBC's Julia Ainsley joins us with her reporting on the facility they're calling Alligator Alcatraz. And a reminder, the Morning Joe podcast is available every weekday featuring our full conversations and analysis. You can listen wherever you get your podcasts. You're watching Morning Joe. We're back in just 90 seconds. The GERDIDYCOMB sex trafficking trial will resume its deliberations a short time from now after announcing yesterday it had reached a partial verdict. NBC News correspondent Chloe Malasse has the latest. We've reached a verdict on counts two, three, four, and five.

Read the note from the jury that came just after 4 o'clock. But we cannot reach a verdict on count 1, they wrote, because some jurors have unpersuadable views. That means they've reached a unanimous decision on whether Sean Diddy Combs is guilty of sex trafficking and transportation to engage in prostitution. But the jury of 8 men and 4 women is split on the most serious and complex charge, racketeering conspiracy. For that count, jurors must decide whether they believe Combs ran a criminal organization

and committed underlying crimes like kidnapping and arson. The judge urging the jury to keep deliberating, to try to reach a decision on that last count before revealing their verdict. As the jury's note came in, Combs' attorneys hugged and formed a circle around the music mogul who put his head in his hands at one point giving a thumbs up to his family during the 7 week trial prosecutors alleged that the music mogul ran a criminal enterprise and used power violence and fear to get what he wanted calling 34 witnesses,

including 2 of combs's former girlfriends, Cassie Ventura and another known only as Jane combs' former girlfriends, cassie ventura and another known only as jane. combs opting not to testify, his defense team calling no witnesses, telling the jury that the claims against combs were badly exaggerated and that physical abuse and love of baby oil are not federal crimes. NBC's chloe melas reporting there. Joining us now, NBC news and MSNBC legal analyst Danny Savalos and MSNBC legal analyst Charles Coleman. Good morning to you both. So, Charles, the jury has reached a verdict on

four of the five total counts. This one racketeering charge looms out there. If you're in that court room, if you're a prosecutor as you have been, what are you reading into what you heard from the jury yesterday? Well, you're reading into the notion that this is a jury that is having difficulty determining whether in fact there was a criminal enterprise. Clearly they have established the predicate crimes that are necessary in order to get to the question of racketeering because if they hadn't, we wouldn't be here. But this notion of this as a racketeering criminal enterprise case is something that the jury is having challenges with.

And I suspect really it's because in part, number one, the charge itself is complicated. But then number two, this is not the typical context that you see racketeering appear. It's usually around organized crime and the underlying crimes are a bit more clear. But this is something of a different nature that I think the jury is maybe struggling

to wrap their minds around to say, look, we believe that he may have done these things with respect to the sex trafficking and the prostitution and even the arson, for example, but we're not certain and we're not ready to move forward with the notion that unanimously we believe that there was a criminal enterprise that existed for the purposes of furthering these other illegal activities. So Danny, from the defense side, if you hear this from the jury you hear basically that we've reached unanimous decisions on these four charges two sex

trafficking two transportation to engage in prostitution but not the racketeering. What are you thinking? How are you feeling? I'm feeling bad if I'm on the defense. This is not a good sign and here's why and actually I think this is no surprise whatsoever. I think counts two through five, sex trafficking and transportation for prostitution, are relatively easy to understand compared to racketeering conspiracy. If the jury was going to get hung up, it was always going to get hung up on count one. What I find interesting is that they appear to be communicating that they

have differing opinions, not that they're just confused by the charges. And I got to tell you, even lawyers, including me, are often confused by racketeering conspiracy. The concept itself, especially as Charles said, applying something that was designed to combat organized crime and the mafia infiltrating labor unions into a guy, a really rich guy who just wants some kinky sex and is a domestic abuser, and I'm not minimizing it, but this is essentially what the defense argued, that this is something that belongs in a court for domestic violence and assault, not the federal prime of racketeering conspiracy.

So if I'm the defense, I'm very concerned because take a look at the Mann Act, transportation for prostitution. They had transportation evidence, They had prostitution evidence. In fact, they had a very rare form of prostitution evidence. Willie, they had the prostitutes come in and say, hi, I'm a prostitute. And I engaged in this and oh, by the way, here's a video of us doing it. You don't get this level of evidence in terms of the Mann Act.

I'm not feeling very good if I'm on the defense. I think the trafficking charges, by the way, are the most serious in terms of punishment. So in a way, this case is over. So yeah, when you think about racketeering, you think of Rico and the Gambino crime family and all those things, as you said, Charles, but could this, if the jury is deadlocked on this count one, the racketeering charge, does that have any impact on the rest of the trial? It doesn't, not to the extent that there are that have any impact on the rest of the trial? It doesn't, not to the extent that there are

unanimous verdicts on the other four counts. The judge, if the judge ultimately decides, and I've practiced in front of Judge Supermarroney before, he's a very thoughtful, very smart, very methodical judge. I don't believe that he's going to call a mistrial prematurely, but if they are in fact deadlocked on that one charge, Willie, what's gonna happen is the rest of those counts will go forward, the verdict will be read fact deadlocked on that one charge, Willie, what's going to happen is the rest of those

counts will go forward. The verdict will be read. The jury will likely be polled and then Judge Summarani and at some point in the future will issue a sentencing on those four counts where there is a conviction. So do you think, Danny, just based on what you know, that the jury came back relatively quickly with unanimous decisions on these other four? You say if you're in the defense team, you feel bad about that.

You're expecting guilty verdicts on those four charges? I am. I mean, I am expecting that. I could be surprised. I mean, everything comes down to credibility. But if you look at the jury instructions, the elements essentially are all there. The transportation for prostitution is literally transportation plus prostitution.

And really, and I'm oversimplifying it, but the sex trafficking really just adds the element of force, fraud, or coercion. And that's an oversimplified approach, but the elements are relatively easy to understand. I don't see how the jury, unless they found everybody not credible, could arrive at a not guilty,

but here is another possibility. And it echoes the theme that a lot of people have talked about, whether they be lawyers or regular folks, that this doesn't feel like a case that belongs in federal court. So there's always an option. And this, among lawyers, and Charles will tell you, is the name that shall not be spoken is jury nullification.

Juries are never told this, but they do technically have the power to go in there and say, look, this crime, everything he did meets all the elements of this crime, but we have the unreviewable power to simply say, we're gonna quit him anyway because we feel like it's the right thing to do. There would be no comebacks, there's no appeal, and we lawyers are not even supposed to talk about this.

So I'm gonna be checking my email from the disciplinary board, but I'm just saying that it's something that exists out there in the ether. Are you seeing this the same way, Charles, that counts two through five likely guilty verdicts here? Likely so, given the evidence that's been presented and the fact that there was so much evidence that was presented, it would take every witness being found to be not credible and every piece of evidence essentially either ignored or not given any sense of credence

or validity for this jury to, for these counts, this early, unanimously decide to acquit. So all sides point to this being a conviction pretty much down the verdict sheet, with the exception of course being this first count that they have yet to agree on. We may find out in just a few hours. The jury set to reconvene a short time from now. MSNBC legal analyst Charles Coleman and NBC News and MSNBC Legal Analyst Danny Savalos. Thanks so much both.

Appreciate it. Coming up, the Trump administration doubling down on efforts to strip citizenship from some naturalized American citizens. MSNBC Legal Analyst Joyce Vance is writing about that. She joins our conversation straight ahead on Morning Joe. Live picture of Fort Lauderdale, Florida, 635 on this Wednesday morning. President Trump toured Florida's new migrant detention center yesterday, calling it part of a blueprint to speed up the mass deportation efforts of his administration.

NBC's Gabe Gutierrez has more. Deep in the Florida Everglades, President Trump says this massive migrant detention camp, built in just eight days, has an unusual deterrent to prevent any escapes. Don't run in a straight line. Run like this. He calls it alligator Alcatraz. The more I thought of it, the more I liked it. With Gators clearly visible outside, NBC News getting a first look inside.

The partnership with the state has been great. Acting ICE Director Todd Lyons telling us the goal is to keep detainees here no longer than two weeks where they can appear before a judge and be deported from the camp's existing runway. How would you respond to critics who think that this is not where immigrants should be housed? Well what I would say is that obviously individuals that want to come here to enjoy the American dream should think about returning on their own so they're not in a detained setting, right? President Trump was elected pledging to deport the record number of migrants who crossed

into the U.S. under President Biden. I ran on the issue of illegals and we have to get them out. According to data reviewed by NBC News, almost half of those currently in ICE custody have neither been convicted of nor charged with a crime. Is the administration still going after the worst of the worst? We are. The administration stresses the priority is violent criminals, but anyone who is here illegally is breaking the law.

Through the course of another law enforcement investigation, we do come across people that are just here illegally. We will no longer turn a blind eye to that. Donald Trump has got to go! Still, environmental groups are suing. Get the hell out of our Everglades. While Trump supporters are cheering this detention center. I think it's great.

Get the ****** out of here. NBC's Gabe Gutierrez reporting from Florida. Joining us now, NBC News senior homeland security correspondent Julia Ainslie. Julia, good morning. So let's talk a little bit more about how this particular facility came to be and why the president clearly and the governor, DeSantis and the head of DHS, also seem to like the idea that it's surrounded by alligators, that the guards, as President Trump said, you don't even have to pay them.

They're alligators and pythons. What do you, how did this come to be and symbolically, what does it mean? Well, in the first Trump administration, Willie did this come to be? And symbolically, what does it mean? Well, in the first Trump administration, Willie, this was a joke. In fact, in the book, Border Wars, by Michael Sheer, they write about how Trump wanted a moat and around a detention center, and he wanted to use the Rio Grande,

and he wanted alligators to be able to keep people from crossing into Texas. In this case, it's actually a reality. And so it's right. It almost started as a joke, but now it's this deterrent and it's really a place where these people could be. And, you know, when Gabe walked through there, that was soft-sided facilities. So not brick and mortar buildings.

It's clearly intentionally being put there, really is a symbolic form of deterrence, but possibly a real one too, if there were really injuries to people. really intentionally being put there really is a symbolic form of deterrence, but possibly a real one too if there were really injuries to people. The other thing I would say about this, Willie, is that ICE is not supposed to be punitive. Immigration detention is not supposed to be punitive. That is still on their website. That is mandated through court orders. ICE detention is for the purpose of detaining immigrants before they are deported or while

their immigration proceedings are still going on. And that is up to the discretion of ICE, whether they should detain everyone during that process. But it is not supposed to be like you were sentenced to time in jail, like what you would done if you had committed a crime and been sent to a Bureau of Prisons facility. And so they're now deviating from that. The other thing, when you talk about the Florida partnership, obviously Governor DeSantis has made immigration a platform of his since the beginning of his political career, just like Trump has.

And now what we're seeing is that Florida would really be, has been building this with reimbursements coming from FEMA. So even though Gay was talking to Acting ICE Director Todd Lyons there because ICE would send people to this place, it's not clear that ICE would have much oversight. And that means it would be apart from a lot of the regular check-ins that they have from people checking on things like food safety, checking on immigration detention standards and safety and medical care. Those

things have already been drastically cut in terms of manpower under this administration. But if they're outside of ICE completely, it's not clear what kind of access oversight or legal teams would have to this detention center. Julia, I think we're in a world where what's supposed to be was kind of jettisoned, you know, quite a long time ago on various fronts. We've seen Kristi Noem in situations like this before, of course, when she went down to El Salvador and had that photo opportunity and that video was made of her down there. What do you make of President Trump touring this facility? What's the message he's trying to get out by being there with her?

It seems almost like, you know, she'd had that opportunity. Now he wanted to get in on that opportunity as well. That's true. I mean, when Kristi Noem went to El Salvador, it was seen as a way of her trying to show to Trump how tough she was on immigration. That would have been an opportunity that Tom Homan or many others would have liked to have in El Salvador. And now not only does Kristi Noem not get the spotlight to herself at the alligator alcatraz, she's sharing it with the president.

This is something that I think it was just a publicity moment that would have been hard for the president to pass up. And he wants to go down there and show his willingness to go this far when it comes to this key platform issue for him. And the acting director of ICE, who we saw in Gabe's piece there, has said, right now there are 500 beds at so-called Alligator Alcatraz. They plan to expand it to 3,000. So this wasn't just a photo op.

This is going to become a place where they rely on to bring people who have come to the country illegally. NBC's Julia Ainsley, thanks so much. A new report, meanwhile, reveals the Justice Department is aggressively moving to strip some Americans of their citizenship. NPR reports department leadership is directing its attorneys to pursue denaturalization in cases involving naturalized citizens who commit certain crimes and giving U.S. attorneys wider discretion on when to carry out that move. It's according to a June 11th memo published online, NPR points out the tactic is aimed at U.S.

citizens who were not born in the country. According to 2023 figures, nearly 25 million immigrants are naturalized citizens. Let's bring in former U.S. attorney and MSNBC legal analyst Joyce Vance. She's a co-host of the Sisters in Law podcast. In her latest piece for Substack, Joyce writes about this threat to revoke citizenship. So, Joyce, good morning.

In our previous segment, we're talking about people who came to this country illegally, but now what we're talking about in front of us are people who are American citizenship, who are American citizens. You can be born in another country, come here, be naturalized and become a U.S. citizenship. Donald Trump and this administration now looking at taking away their citizenship. How do they do that?

Right. So there are legal mechanisms for doing this, although it's used very rarely. Something like 11 people a year have been denaturalized for the last several decades. And this news, Willie, it comes in a relatively innocuous memo entitled Civil Division Priorities for the Justice Department. And the sense you take away from this memo is that this will now become sort of a performative evaluation where US attorney's offices across the country may be in fact graded on the speed and the alacrity with which they pursue these

denaturalizations. The language is very vague. There are no clear standards for who should be denaturalized. And so we can all imagine cases, you know, for instance, former Nazis who came to the United States and lied about their pursuit of the Holocaust. Those were people who were convicted and denaturalized. But now there's the risk that it could be anyone who runs afoul of this administration, that for instance, someone who's a naturalized citizen maybe who's written a couple of bad

checks that they might become a target and the real issue here is the lack of specificity and the vagueness over who now qualifies to lose their citizenship. Joyce, how is this a thing? How is it a thing to take away US citizenship? I thought once you were a citizen you were a citizen. Has this been tested up at the Supreme Court? Is the precedent on this or has it always been this way? Well there is. There's precedent. There's a statute that provides that if you, for instance, lie about your background or if you conceal information about yourself when you're going through the citizenship process then it can be stripped from you. But

typically that's been used with restraint and reserved for the most serious cases. The real issue here is there might be some cases where people would agree it's appropriate to strip citizenship but because of the way they're rolling this out, you could envision this administration, which has taken old statutes used in understood ways and souped them up so that they can be used for political purposes to target, for instance, people who don't comply with this administration's policies. That's the concern here.

The devil will be in the details. As Joyce points out, previously, denaturalization has been used for people who've committed war crimes, found to have committed war crimes, or even terrorists. But now, the Trump administration might try to apply that much, much more broadly. Former U.S. Attorney Joyce Vance, the new piece is up on Substack. Thanks, Joyce. Still ahead, Zoran Mamdani officially clinches the Democratic nomination in the race for New York City mayor.

We'll go over the final ranked-choice voting results, as well as the new threat from President Trump over immigration arrests, should Mamdani win the general election. Plus highlights from another day of major upsets at Wimbledon, including America's biggest tennis star. They just sound different off his bat. A fourth inning solo shot. Shohei Otani's national league leading 30th home run of the season. His third season in a row with at least 30 home runs before the All-Star break. That's incredible tying Ken Griffey, Jr.

For the third most seasons in MLB history. The Dodgers win for the 13th time in 15 games playing very well. They beat the White Sox 6-1 to open a season-high eight game lead now atop the National League West. Meanwhile in Toronto, the Blue Jays celebrated Canada Day by tightening the gap in the AL East against the New York Yankees. George Springer homered twice, including a grand slam, driving in seven runs yesterday as the Jays beat the Yankees, 12 to five. They now move to within one game of New York for the division

lead with the Rays just a game and a half back Yankees got to get it together. A lot of action at Wimbledon a flurry of upsets in the first round including for second seeded Coco Goff. Now just the third woman in the open era to lose in the opening round at Wimbledon on the heels of a French Open championship. She was undone by 29 unforced errors last night, said afterward, I'm just mentally overwhelmed coming off the French Open.

Goff's exit followed the fall of fellow American Jessica Pagula. She's the number three seed she lost in her earliest defeat at a major since 2020. She was beaten in straight sets yesterday. Not a great day for the American women. Meanwhile, number three seed, Alexander Zverev, became the highest men's seed to be eliminated, losing a five-set marathon after an overnight postponement. A total of eight top-ten seeds, four men, four women,

have been eliminated in just the first two days of play at a steamy Wimbledon that sets the record for the most ever at a major in the open era.