Monday, July 6 — the long game on citizenship

0:00 The Supreme Court split the government open this term — ruling on the same day that the president can fire most regulators but not the people in charge of interest rates.

0:10 And now, the Speaker of the House wants to write birthright citizenship out of the Constitution. Let's start with the court.

0:20 On the last Monday of June, the justices issued two decisions that land like opposing drumbeats.

0:27 In a 6-to-3 ruling, the court struck down for-cause removal protections at the Federal Trade Commission, the SEC, the National Labor Relations Board — the whole alphabet of independent agencies.

0:41 The president can now fire the people investigating his donors or blocking a merger. Chief Justice Roberts wrote that the Constitution requires removal power over any officer exercising executive power.

0:56 That's a core Project 2025 goal: put every regulator under White House control. But then, about an hour later, in a separate 5-to-4 ruling, the court upheld the Federal Reserve's removal protections.

1:12 The Fed stays insulated. So here's the picture: a two-tier system. The elite financial regulator gets independence; the agencies that enforce labor law, consumer protection, and antitrust do not.

1:28 Now, across the Capitol, Speaker Mike Johnson is taking a different approach to the same project.

1:35 On Sunday, he told Fox News he wants Congress to pass a law stripping birthright citizenship from children born to undocumented immigrants and temporary visa holders.

1:48 This comes after the Supreme Court, on June 30, struck down President Trump's executive order on the same subject in a case called Trump v. Barbara.

1:59 The ruling was 6 to 3, and it affirmed that the 14th Amendment's citizenship clause — settled since Wong Kim Ark in 1898 — cannot be undone by executive fiat. So Johnson is trying the legislative route.

2:15 A plain statutory rewrite of who counts as American at birth. The harm is as concrete as it gets: millions of children born in the United States would become stateless.

2:27 The 14th Amendment's guarantee would be erased, not by a court, but by a vote count. Meanwhile, the machinery of election administration is moving in the other direction.

2:39 California's SB 73, signed by the governor in May, now prohibits federal agents from accessing voter rolls or voting equipment without a court order. The law takes effect about 120 days before a general election.

2:55 And in Washington, Speaker Johnson is also pushing the SAVE Act through reconciliation — a bill that would require documentary proof of citizenship to register to vote, explicitly rejecting a REAL ID license as sufficient.

3:12 No passport, no birth certificate, no ballot. Millions of eligible citizens lack those documents. The bill shifts from self-attestation under penalty of perjury to a costly paper chase.

3:27 President Trump, at a Faith and Freedom Coalition conference, called the Democratic Socialists of America 'animals.' He linked them to ISIS leaders and warned they 'will kill your people.' The context matters: he was responding to progressive primary wins in New York City.

3:47 This is not casual name-calling. It's a pre-legitimizing tactic — the same rhetorical scaffolding that preceded claims of a stolen election in 2020. Stigmatize the opposition, then challenge the result when they win.

4:03 There was also news from Canada.

4:05 The premiers of Ontario and Alberta announced a proposed 3,300-kilometer pipeline called the Northern Shield Energy Corridor — 500,000 barrels a day, expandable to 800,000 — sold as energy security against U.S. tariffs.

4:25 But every mile of new pipeline locks in oil extraction for decades. First Nations groups say they haven't been consulted. The feasibility study is underway; the federal government hasn't endorsed it yet.

4:38 And in New York City, Mayor Zohran Mamdani is advancing what's been called 'consumer socialism.' A city-owned bank. A public takeover of energy infrastructure. A rent freeze.

4:53 But the power to deliver these things is split: the bank requires a state bill in Albany; the utility condemnation hasn't been filed yet; the rent freeze, though, sits squarely in the mayor's own executive authority, with a newly progressive Rent Guidelines Board.

5:12 These are not just campaign promises — they are the active agenda of a mayor who took office in January. It's a concrete alternative to the market-driven model Project 2025 is advancing at the federal level.

5:27 We also corrected the record on data collection. The 2025 American Community Survey is adding a Middle Eastern or North African category, as required by the OMB's 2024 directive. It's not being dropped.

5:43 But the broader federal data infrastructure remains under threat — especially data on sexual orientation and gender identity, which the administration is actively suppressing. Finally, a single deportation.

5:58 DHS announced the removal of an MS-13 member with alleged cartel ties. Verified. One person.

6:07 But isolated enforcement actions do not make an entire community a threat, and the administration knows it uses these press releases to justify mass detention and anti-immigrant policy. That's the day.

6:21 But the week is part of a longer arc. Project 2025 — the document itself — laid out a blueprint for a second Trump term across every federal agency. We've now read, reframed, and logged 147 of its specific actions.

6:38 Total, we track 1,088 actions across the whole federal landscape. The watch is constant. We read each piece, map it, and report what it means. That work doesn't stop when the headlines change.

6:53 What's next: The House is expected to take up the SAVE Act through reconciliation in the coming weeks.

7:00 The Supreme Court's removal-power ruling takes effect immediately, meaning firings at the FTC, SEC, and NLRB could begin at any time.

7:12 And in New York, the state legislature will decide whether to move the public banking bill; the mayor's rent freeze is already enforceable by executive action. There's a lot moving today. We'll be back tomorrow.

7:26 Until then, take care of yourselves.