--:-- Gideon Resnick: Hi there, I'm Gideon Resnick. Before we get into today's episode, we have a question for you. Do you have kids? And if so, do you have rules for social media in your house? On our interview show, Apple News in Conversation, we're putting together an episode all about youth mental health and social media. And we wanna know what you think, what's working or not working when it comes to social media in your family.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: If you'd like to share how you're navigating this issue, use your iPhone's voice memos app to record yourself. Tell us your name, where you're from, and your experience. And please try to keep it to about a minute or so. You can send it to us at AppleNewsToday at Apple.com. Again, that's AppleNewsToday at Apple.com. And we might include your voice on the show. Thanks.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: Good morning. It's Tuesday, July 2nd. I'm Gideon Resnick in for Shamit Abassu. This is Apple News Today. Coming up on today's show, how the Supreme Court just changed the presidency. What to expect in the UK's elections this week. And how dinosaurs got involved with the wine we drink. But first, to that Supreme Court decision.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: In a 6-3 ruling along ideological lines, the court granted partial immunity to Donald Trump from prosecution on criminal charges that he plotted to subvert the 2020 election. Now, this decision has huge implications for his pending criminal cases, but also for the future of one of the most powerful positions on the planet.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: Very little a president does in office could in the future be subject to any kind of criminal prosecution. That's Wall Street Journal Supreme Court correspondent Jess Braven, who spoke with us from the court yesterday.
--:-- Jess Braven: For the majority, the striking thing, the troubling thing, the threatening thing to democracy was prosecuting Donald Trump. In fact, the majority seemed to view Jack Smith as a greater threat to democracy than letting Trump escape having to answer for these allegations in court.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: And in the dissenting opinion yesterday, the liberal minority, Justices Kagan, Sotomayor, and Jackson, did not hide their disdain for their colleagues' ruling. They thought that it was a very very dangerous troubling decision that effectively made the president an unaccountable king for his official acts while in office.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: That was quite clear by the way that the dissent was signed. It said with fear for our democracy as opposed to with respect which is the typical way that a dissent is signed off.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: Sotomayor called out a hypothetical situation that she argued could now potentially be legal under federal law. The example that the president ordering SEAL Team 6 to assassinate someone. Under the terms of this opinion, the president could not be prosecuted for that because that's an official action as commander-in-chief ordering the military to do something.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: Members of SEAL Team 6, they could be prosecuted if they broke the law, of course. They're not the president. He would not be able to be held to account for that, at least in a court of law.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: Three Trump appointees sit on the court, whose term has been defined by large ideological gulfs and personal controversies, while public trust in the institution has eroded. The decision on Monday is the third in which the conservative majority has handed Trump a victory in cases stemming from January 6th.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: As for what the latest ruling means for Trump, he's already started an effort to toss out his recent criminal conviction in Manhattan. He was convicted of falsifying business records to cover up hush money payments to an adult film actress. Now, that happened before he was president. But his attorneys reportedly argued that because the case introduced evidence that included official actions while he was president, the conviction should be set aside.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: And Braven says Trump's three pending cases face delays, potentially months, even years. A lower court judge will have to determine whether federal election interference charges relate to official or unofficial acts while Trump was president. And if he is elected again, he could order the case dropped and attempt to pardon himself.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: Now let's take a quick look at some other stories in the news, starting with President Biden's reaction to that Supreme Court ruling.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: No one is above the law, not even the president of the United States. With today's Supreme Court decision on presidential immunity, that fundamentally changed. For all, for all practical purposes, today's decision almost certainly means that there are virtually no limits on what a president can do.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: Biden called it a dangerous precedent. And he says the ruling is a disservice to America because it makes Trump less likely to be held accountable for his role on January 6th.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: Elsewhere Hurricane Beryl is churning through the Caribbean with at least two people dead And it got stronger. When it hit Category 5 status, it became the earliest hurricane on record at that level. It's forecast to potentially hit Jamaica next.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: And in sports, the U.S. men's soccer team is out of the Copa America tournament. The 1-0 loss to Uruguay ended a disappointing run for the team. Many expected the U.S. to last longer in the tournament. The poor result comes ahead of the 2026 World Cup, where the U.S. is one of the hosts.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: Let's turn now to the U.K., where voters are gearing up for Thursday's general election. Polls show that it could be a historic loss for the Conservative Party that's been in power for 14 years.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: British voters appear to be tired of the party and Prime Minister Rishi Sunak. John Curtis, a top UK elections expert, recently talked about the scale of the loss that they're facing on BBC.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: In terms of vote share, the Conservatives are at the moment heading for their worst performance since the First World War, since the advent of the mass franchise by a country mile. According to one poll, the party may win just 53 seats out of a possible 650 in Parliament.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: If the Labour Party does as well as predicted, former human rights lawyer Keir Starmer from the Labour Party will be the next prime minister.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: Matthew Holhouse, a British political correspondent for The Economist, spoke to NPR about the Labour Party strategy in the election.
--:-- Matthew Holhouse: What Labour understand very well is that this is a change election. So the proportion of British respondents who tell pollsters it is time for change at this election is in the 70s. But they've been seeking to flesh out a platform. And there's a big debate in the UK actually how well developed it is for what they call a decade of national renewal.
--:-- Matthew Holhouse: So a big focus on sort of restoring public services. But above all, trying to do something about the UK's chronic poor growth. Voters are angry about a strained health care system, stagnant wages and a high cost of living.
--:-- Matthew Holhouse: And I think the other factor, and I think this is what makes Keir Starmer such a fascinating figure, is that he has been much much more assiduous and successful in courting those voters the people who voted for Brexit than he is given credit for.
--:-- Matthew Holhouse: So even though he is you know by background you know a human rights lawyer from a very sort of liberal, fashionable part of North London, his whole political operation for four years has been utterly consistent in winning back the trust of those voters.
--:-- Matthew Holhouse: And he's not done it by sort of shouting or antics or coming up with very sort of radical policies. It's by a very sort of quiet, sort of small-c conservative cultural agenda.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: If the results go as polls indicate, Starmer will become Britain's fifth prime minister since only 2019. One didn't even last for two months. Starmer would be the latest to try to lead the country in a period of political instability.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: If his party pulls off a historic victory, there is a tough job ahead after the celebrations are over. But some may just be happy for change.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: Finally, when you pick up a glass of Sauvignon Blanc, do you think of the mighty Tyrannosaurus Rex? Well, perhaps you should. That's because according to a new study, when a massive asteroid hit Earth 66 million years ago, killing dinosaurs, it also gave us wine.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: This mass extinction allowed for grapes to grow in new places. The Times of London explains that scientists recently discovered fossilized grape seeds in what is now Colombia, Panama, and Peru.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: They are the oldest ever found in the Americas, dating back to the years after that asteroid. Researchers think that dinosaurs knocked down trees and forests as they roamed around, so when they were gone, more vine plants could flourish.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: And with more diversification of animals in the years that followed, like birds and mammals, the seeds of grapes could be spread as well. The fossil seeds that researchers found were tiny, but they tell a big story.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: So the next time you have a glass, maybe offer a toast to that asteroid. After all, you might not be drinking wine without it.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: You can find all these stories and more in the Apple News app. And if you're already listening in the News app right now, we have a narrated article coming up next from The New Yorker. It's a profile of Democratic Senator John Fetterman. The magazine spent time with the Pennsylvania lawmaker talking about his approach to politics, his misgivings with his party, and the disillusionment that some members of it feel for him.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: If you're listening in the podcast app, you can follow Apple News Plus Narrated to find that story. And I'll be back with the news tomorrow.
