--:-- Yasmin Khan: Good morning. It's Friday, June 6th. I'm Yasmin Khan in for Shamita Basu. This is Apple News Today.
--:-- Yasmin Khan: On today's show, we learn more about the Venezuelan migrants at the center of a deportation dispute, what the travel ban means for those who fled the Taliban, and what a Supreme Court ruling means for so-called reverse discrimination cases. But first, to an epic fallout between perhaps the world's most powerful man and the world's richest man.
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--:-- Yasmin Khan: It started around midday yesterday when President Donald Trump was asked by a reporter about Elon Musk's description of his major spending bill as a disgusting abomination. At first, Trump was somewhat reluctant to be too critical of his former ally.
--:-- Donald Trump: Elon and I had a great relationship. I don't know if we're well anymore. I was surprised because you were here. Everybody in this room practically was here as we had a wonderful send-off. He said wonderful things about me. But he seemed to predict where things were heading. He hasn't said bad about me personally, but I'm sure that'll be next. But I'm very disappointed in Elon. I've helped Elon a lot.
--:-- Yasmin Khan: From there, it all escalated quickly as Musk appeared infuriated by Trump's suggestion that his real problem was with a decision to remove electric vehicle mandates.
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--:-- Yasmin Khan: Musk took to X to directly attack the president. Then Trump took to his own social media company, Truth Social, to threaten Musk with canceling government contracts linked to his companies.
--:-- Juan Williams: I don't think anybody should be surprised that you have these two personalities blowing up. I mean, clearly, Musk is the one guy that Trump can't control. You know, who has the money, right? Who has more followers on Twitter? It's Musk.
--:-- Yasmin Khan: And Williams said Musk's threats to go after Trump politically should be taken seriously.
--:-- Juan Williams: He could start primarying Republicans who are voting for the big, beautiful, bad, whatever bill and say, I'm going to go over and challenge you in a way that I think Trump can't control. So clearly, Trump doesn't control Musk.
--:-- Yasmin Khan: Both billionaires have a lot to lose politically and economically. By the end of the day, Tesla stock price dropped 14 percent. Trump's crypto coin also took a hit.
--:-- Gwen Shotwell: The company has about $22 billion in government contracts. That's a lot of money to pull, but it also signals something of a mutual dependency.
--:-- Yasmin Khan: The spacecraft Musk threatened to decommission, called Dragon, is the only reliable route to the International Space Station.
--:-- Steve Bannon: President Trump tonight should sign an executive order calling for the Defense to Production Act to be called in SpaceX and seize SpaceX tonight before midnight. The U government should seize it.
--:-- Yasmin Khan: President Trump tonight should sign an executive order calling for the Defense to Production Act to be called in SpaceX and seize SpaceX tonight before midnight. The U government should seize it.
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--:-- Yasmin Khan: In fact, only days earlier, Musk was on CNBC, saying he still agreed with most of the president's agenda and that he was torn on whether to criticize the administration.
--:-- Newt Gingrich: Musk is the wealthiest guy in the world, but Donald Trump is the most powerful person in the world. And I think probably that Musk kind of forgot that. And in that kind of a contest, there's no question in my mind that two, three, four or five months from now, Donald Trump will still be president and Musk may or may not be relevant.
--:-- Yasmin Khan: It's hard to believe how different things were just a few months ago when Musk posted on X in February, quote, I love Donald Trump as much as a straight man can love another man.
--:-- Kara Swisher: You know, at some point, it was going to break, and Elon outside the tent is not a good Elon to have. In the words of Neil Sedaka, the immortal words, breaking up is hard to do, I guess.
--:-- Yasmin Khan: Let's turn now to the travel ban we spoke about yesterday which bars people from 12 countries primarily in Africa and the Middle East from entering the United States. An additional seven countries are subject to restrictions that stop short of a full ban.
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--:-- Yasmin Khan: The Trump administration has cited visa overstays as one rationale for imposing the ban, though some countries responsible for even higher numbers of visa overstays are not on the list.
--:-- Rick Nowak: When I reached out to Afghan refugees who are still hoping to resettle to the United States, a lot of them expressed really shock. A lot of them found out about this ban on travel to the United States on social media. They woke up to the news. And to a lot of them, it feels like the end of their dreams, really, to resettle to the U.S.
--:-- Yasmin Khan: There is an exception to the ban for individuals with special immigrant visas granted to Afghans who supported the U.S.'s 20-year war, people who served as military interpreters, for example.
--:-- Rick Nowak: Still, Nowak explains that the Trump administration's ban will most likely have the biggest impact on people who fled the Taliban's regime after they were promised relocation to the U.S.
--:-- Yasmin Khan: A lot of them were encouraged by American officials to move from Afghanistan to places like Pakistan to process their cases there and a lot of them have been stuck in these countries for years now with no assistance from the United States.
--:-- Rick Nowak: And this ban essentially feels like the final blow that will make it impossible for them to make it to the U.S.
--:-- Yasmin Khan: Nowak told us about a 35-year-old Afghan man named Amal, who moved to Pakistan with his wife and two daughters a few years ago.
--:-- Rick Nowak: The decision to relocate to Pakistan was prompted by fears that he may be detained by the Taliban. He's been essentially stuck in Pakistan, waiting for his case to be processed by U.S. authorities.
--:-- Yasmin Khan: When he found out about the travel ban this week, he told us that essentially this puts him back to point zero. He doesn't know what to do.
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--:-- Yasmin Khan: There are estimated to be thousands of Afghans in Pakistan who fled their country. Many of those people had been allowed into the U.S. following the withdrawal of U.S. troops from Afghanistan, though Trump has rescinded some of those routes.
--:-- Melissa Sanchez: When she and her colleagues reviewed data from the Department of Homeland Security, court records, and police records, they learned out of the 238 men sent to El Salvador, more than half had no convictions or pending charges.
--:-- Yasmin Khan: 32 had criminal records in the U.S., but the vast majority were for low-level, nonviolent crimes, like retail theft or traffic violations.
--:-- Melissa Sanchez: As Sanchez and her reporting team looked for foreign offenses on these men's records, they found evidence of just 20 arrests or convictions, 11 of which were for violent crimes.
--:-- Yasmin Khan: And none of these men were listed on watch lists that Interpol and Venezuelan law enforcement uses to track alleged gang members.
--:-- Melissa Sanchez: I think what the data that we obtained shows is the government knew when it sent all these people out and publicly has described them all as criminals that that information just simply wasn't true.
--:-- Yasmin Khan: In response to this reporting, the White House said ProPublica should, quote, be embarrassed, and it repeated its claims that all of the men it deported are criminals.
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--:-- Yasmin Khan: A spokesperson for DHS described the men as dangerous, but did not provide any evidence.
--:-- Yasmin Khan: When Trump deported these men to the notorious Sacat Prison in El Salvador, he justified it by invoking the Alien Enemies Act. He claimed the Trende Aragua gang had invaded the United States. He labeled the group a terrorist organization. He claimed that these men were members, which journalists have since disproven, and he deported them with little or no due process, advocates say.
--:-- Yasmin Khan: A lot of these were guys who never even stepped foot in this country as free people. They have always been detained, and then they were shipped away from this country without having committed any crimes and sent to like a maximum security prison in a country that many of them never even walked through on their way here from Venezuela.
--:-- Yasmin Khan: One of them was this guy Leonardo whose family I spoke with. And he was a soccer coach for children in Venezuela. He left because of the economy and he was detained since last October at the border.
--:-- Yasmin Khan: The Supreme Court has temporarily blocked the administration from deporting Venezuelan immigrants under the Alien Enemies Act, and a federal judge ruled this week that the administration had stripped deportees of their rights by not allowing them to appeal.
--:-- Yasmin Khan: Before we let you go, a few other stories we're following. Donald Trump spoke with Chinese President Xi Jinping by phone yesterday, marking the first known conversation between the two leaders since Trump retook office.
--:-- Ling Ling Wei: Fundamentally, it's not really changing much. You know, no one's expecting the one call can solve all the problems. And though both sides do seem to have softened their tones, by Trump's own admission, making a deal with China is proving much harder than he thought.
--:-- Yasmin Khan: Clearly, what Xi Jinping wants is a different kind of negotiation. So he is playing hardball, and we expect him to continue to play hardball.
--:-- Yasmin Khan: And finally, two unanimous Supreme Court judgments yesterday. In one case, out of Ohio, the court ruled to make it easier for people from majority groups to sue for discrimination.
--:-- Yasmin Khan: Marlene Ames, a heterosexual woman, alleged that she was discriminated against at work when her supervisor, who's gay, passed her over for promotion and demoted her with a pay cut.
--:-- Yasmin Khan: She argued that he was favoring her gay colleagues. The lower court had previously ruled that she would need a heightened standard to prove discrimination because she's straight, but the Supreme Court yesterday overruled that decision.
--:-- Yasmin Khan: And in the second ruling, the court blocked the Mexican government from proceeding with a claim that U.S. gun manufacturers were helping arm Mexican drug cartels through unlawful sales.
--:-- Yasmin Khan: The court concluded that although U.S. gunmakers likely knew that some of their guns were being resold in the illegal market and that they were being designed specifically to appeal to cartel members, Mexico did not sufficiently prove U.S. gunmakers should be held liable for how their weapons were used.
--:-- Yasmin Khan: 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, stick around for the latest episode of Apple News and Conversation.
--:-- Yasmin Khan: This week, in light of the recent news that Taylor Swift has reclaimed full ownership of her back catalog, we're revisiting Shamita's conversation with Rolling Stone's Rob Sheffield.
--:-- Yasmin Khan: Taylor is really, really fond of taking up impossible challenges that any rational, sane, sensible person would talk her out of. But she's just determined to do them.
--:-- Yasmin Khan: As she said once at the Tribeca Film Festival, people often underestimate how much I will inconvenience myself to prove a point.
--:-- Yasmin Khan: If you're listening in the Podcasts app, you can find it by searching for Apple News and Conversation.
--:-- Yasmin Khan: Enjoy the weekend, and I'll be back with the news on Monday.
