Up First from NPR - SCOTUS Rulings, Trump Megabill, Israeli PM Denies IDF Deliberately Fired on Gazans

Episode Date: June 28, 2025

The Supreme Court rules that individual judges don't have the authority to issue nationwide injunctions, but the court did not clarify the constitutionality of birthright citizenship. The Senate has a timeline to advance Trump's so-called "big, beautiful bill." Israel's prime minister denies a newspaper report that Israeli troops have been firing at will on hungry Gazans at aid distribution centers.Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoicesNPR Privacy Policy

The Supreme Court rules to limit universal injunctions. But it does not clarify whether President Trump's executive order on birthright citizenship is constitutional. I'm Scott Simon. I'm Ayesha Roscoe and this is Up First from NPR News. In a moment, we'll have details on two of the high court's rulings from NPR's Nina Totenberg. Senate Republicans have a timeline to try to advance Trump's big, beautiful bill with the first vote possible today.

Also, an Israeli newspaper reports that IDF soldiers were ordered to fire at Hungry Gazans seeking food from aid distribution sites. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu calls the report vicious lies. So please stay with us we'll have the news you need to start your weekend. This message comes from WISE, the app for doing things and other currencies. With Wyze, you can send, spend, or receive money across borders, all at a fair exchange rate, no markups or hidden fees. Join millions of customers and visit wyze.com.

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It was a day of blockbuster opinions at the US Supreme Court yesterday. And who better to join us than NPR Legal Affairs correspondent, Nina Totenberg. Nina, thanks for being with us. Always my pleasure, Scott. Please give us the top lines here. Well, among the questions resolved by the justices were, can President Trump prevent federal courts from issuing nationwide court orders to block his executive orders?

And do public schools have to provide an opt-out for children when material is offensive to their religious beliefs? And the answers to those questions are yes and yes. All right, well, let's take up the decision about universal injunctions first. That was a case involving President Trump's executive order to limit birthright citizenship. It's a little more complicated than that, isn't it? Danielle Pletka The subject of this case was the president's executive order limiting citizenship for children of illegal immigrants and some legal immigrants too. Now remember that the 14th Amendment to the Constitution says that every baby born in the United States is automatically an American citizen.

And so it wasn't surprising that every judge to have ruled on the Trump executive order struck it down. And the Supreme Court didn't disagree with that. It didn't even address the question at all. But bowing to the arguments put forth by the administration, the court for the first time barred the practice of a single district court judge applying his or her rulings to the whole country. And that's going to make challenging all of President Trump's executive orders and any

future president's executive orders exponentially more difficult. So Nina, what are the implications of this decision? And what's the status of birthright citizenship as we speak? Look, you really can't find any constitutional scholar who thinks that Trump's birthright order is constitutional. And all of the lower court judges who ruled on this question said that.

And even the justices who sided with Trump didn't seem likely to uphold the Trump executive order when it comes back to them. But they did grant Trump's big wish, meaning that for now at least, lower court decisions can only protect the individual plaintiffs or groups that brought these cases. And at that rate, this whole process could take years, except that it won't, because the court did provide some outs, allowing states, for instance, to seek nationwide injunctions and allowing class action suits, which are difficult and expensive, but can be used, the court said, instead of universal injunctions.

In fact, yesterday, the ACLU filed a nationwide class action challenging Trump's executive order. And the other big case now, the court ruled that public school systems are required to provide parents with an opt-out provision that would excuse their children from class when course material conflicts with their religious beliefs. Please tell us what the implications of this are and if the children are going to be pulled in and out of classes, how would that even work? Danielle Pletka Well, public school boards, administrators,

and teachers are worried about how to navigate opt-out demands of all kinds, from courses that include LGBTQ characters in books to science classes that teach Darwin's theory of evolution. During the arguments in this case, the school board had said that opt-out provisions were impractical and noted that it had initially allowed parents to opt their children out of select lesson plans, but they got rid of the opt-out program because it became too difficult and disruptive to class time. The board argued that while it's easy enough to facilitate single-class opt-outs

like school districts provide for sex education, it's much more challenging to take children from the classrooms every time that a book mentions same-sex parents or gay and lesbian kids. But the court, in its 6-3 opinion along ideological lines, disagreed and required opt-outs for religious parents, but giving precious little in the way of guidance as to how to implement the ruling, which of course has school boards sort of freaking out. And, Piers, Nina Totenberg, thanks so much. Thank you, Scott.

President Trump's so-called big, bill, the mega spending and tax cut legislation bill is making its way through the Senate. Republicans hope to start voting on it this weekend and GOP leaders have been racing to get a number of holdouts on board with the bill, which contains much of the president's domestic agenda. Trump wants to sign it by July 4th, less than a week away. NPR political reporter Elena Moore joins us. Thanks so much for being with us.

Thanks Scott. And how close are Republicans to reaching a deal on this bill? Well Scott, I think it'll depend on how much they can get done today or really how many outstanding issues Senate Majority Leader John Thune can resolve. He told reporters yesterday that the idea of bringing the bill to the floor today was quote aspirational, but that he would try. It's a tricky situation, since there are still several lawmakers with outstanding concerns and yes, Republicans have a majority in the chamber, but they can only afford to lose

three votes. What are senators still debating? Simply put, there's a math problem. A key part of this bill would make Trump's 2017 tax cuts permanent—those expire at the end of the year—but that is going to be really expensive. One way lawmakers are trying to offset some of those costs is by making changes to Medicaid. But that's created a slew of procedural and policy issues, especially over a proposal to slowly reduce and cap the tax that states can place on Medicaid providers.

What exactly are they concerned about? Well, I mean, some senators with big rural populations say that that change would take away funds for hospitals that serve people without access to other care. The bill would create a fund of $25 billion to spread out over several years to help those rural hospitals. But that may not cut it for some senators, like Susan Collins of Maine, who has said that she wants that number much higher.

Senator Tom Tillis of North Carolina has also been saying the idea of a fund doesn't solve all of his problems. He told reporters that he's run the numbers, and many of these proposed Medicaid changes could really hurt Americans across the country. ... blue states, purple states, red states, in our estimation, they're not going to be fiscally prepared to ramp it down. And some of that has to do with people, some people have just a simplistic view, maybe haven't done the analysis that we have. You know, he told me yesterday that he hasn't seen anything so far that would get him to

a yes on this initial vote. But important to note that this bill specifically states both that the provider tax change and this fund would start in 2028, which is notably after the midterm elections. And of course, elections have a way of adjusting plans. Are any of the skeptical senators likely to be moved by an adjustment for politics? Well, Tillis and Collins, who are both up for reelection next year, that's in the mix for them, but they say this is bigger than that. This change could help them, but we don't know how they're going to respond.

This is a tricky situation. I mean, Medicaid provides health coverage to 71 million low income and disabled Americans, and it's just really popular. A recent poll from the health research organization KFF found that three in four Republicans support it. This bill, Scott, is far less popular. Elena, if senators do come to an agreement, what then happens? Well, I mean, they could hold an initial vote that would kickstart the process, but that's really not a speedy process.

First, they need to debate the bill, and then they have to vote on amendments, and that whole debate the bill and then they have to vote on amendments and that whole shebang could very well stretch into Sunday and then of course once the Senate passes the bill it goes back to the House which also has a slim majority and as for timing like you said at the beginning Trump wants this bill at his desk by July 4th but we should say that's a self-imposed deadline and he even seemed to soften on that demand yesterday at a press conference at the White House But the bottom line is that Trump wants to deliver on campaign promises He made and this bill will do that and Paris political reporter Elena Moore. Thanks so much for being with us Thanks for having me

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has slammed a report by one of his country's most prominent news outlets. It quotes unnamed Israeli soldiers saying they were ordered to deliberately shoot at Palestinians trying to get food from distribution sites in Gaza. Over 500 Palestinians have been killed and thousands wounded in shootings near these sites according to Gaza's health ministry. Netanyahu says the report by Haaretz contains, quote, malicious falsehoods. And Perzadeel Al-Shalchi joins us now from Tel Aviv. Haadeel, thanks for being with us.

Thank you. Good morning. And let us begin with what the report says, that in Israeli soldiers, they talk to, called these food distribution sites, quote, killing fields. Why? So just for context, Haaretz is one of Israel's respected, left-leaning news sources that's known for investigating

the Israeli military and government. Now, NPR cannot independently confirm Haaretz's reporting, but in the story they released yesterday Haaretz says it spoke to a number of unnamed Israeli soldiers and military officers who described fatal scenes near food distribution sites of an organization called the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation or GHF and the Israeli army is meant to keep those sites secure. One soldier for example in the report said that Palestinians coming to receive the food were treated like a hostile force, that Israeli troops were told to fire at them with heavy machine guns or mortars to drive them away, that even if there was no danger to the Israeli

soldiers, they'd still shoot. The troops would charge at civilians from close range. And the soldiers said that they weren't aware of any return of fire. The report also alleges that the Israeli military advocate general has called for a war crimes investigation at those sites. Of course, NPR has been reporting on the killings near those GHF sites. How does this R.S. report fit in? You're right. So we've been following the story of these sites since they opened up in May. After almost three months of a total Israeli blockade on aid into Gaza, the Israeli government

gave GHF the task of distributing food. That's because Israel blames Hamas for stealing aid, even though the United Nations has said that there's been little diversion. Now GHF operates four sites and Palestinians have told us about the utter chaos they run into in the fatal danger when trying to get this food. We also know from organizations like the International Red Cross that its field hospitals have received wounded, killed from these sites. So now for the first time the Haaretz report alleges to show the point of view of the Israeli soldiers and their testimonies

match as much of what Palestinians have told us about what goes on around those sites. And GHF said that it quote is not aware of the incidents in the Haaretz report, but did call on Israel to investigate them. And how does Israel's government respond? Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Israel's defense minister released a statement yesterday they rejected the Haaretz report calling it blood libel. Netanyahu said that it was designed to defame what he called the most moral military in the world. The Israeli military also rejected the report saying it had not instructed its soldiers to deliberately

shoot at civilians and that it was quote examining reports of incidents of harm to civilians. Anadeel, what else do we know about the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation? So GHF is a little bit of a murky background. We know that the United Nations and other aid organizations refuse to cooperate with it, saying it breaks humanitarian laws, weaponizes aid. It's also unclear where GHF gets the majority of its funding but this week the US State Department said it would give it 30 million dollars as the first known US government funding by GHF. Palestinians

have no other choice but to go to these sites for food. Israel has restricted organizations like the UN from distributing aid and we know that convoys that do get in are usually looted by armed gangs, which Israel blames on Hamas. And Piercedillo Schultzsche in Tel Aviv, thanks so much. You're very welcome. And that's up first for Saturday, June 28th, 2025. Today's podcast was produced by Michael Radcliffe with help from Fernando Naro and Gabe O'Connor.

Our editors are Krishna Dave Colomore, Kelsey Snell, Alex Leff, Martha Ann Overland, Jacob Finston, and Melissa Gray. Zoe VanGoonhoven is our technical director with engineering support from a mighty fine crew of Tom Barquito, Nisha Hines, and Damien Herring. Our director is the mighty Andrew Craig. And where we are the heads that wear the crowns. Our acting senior supervising editor is Shannon Rhodes. Our executive producer is Evie Stone.

Our deputy managing editor is Jim Kane. Tomorrow on the Sunday story, the Biden administration was fully invested in electric vehicles and gave incentives to auto manufacturers. But the Trump administration is putting those policies in reverse. NPR's Kamila Domenoski explains how the car industry is trying to navigate this changing political landscape. And for more news, interviews and analysis, tune in to Weekend Edition on your radio. You can go to stations.npr.org to find your local NPR station and have a friend for life. Exactly. It would mean so much.

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