Meet the Press NOW – June 29

Foreign. Welcome to MEET the Press. Now I'm Checked Todd reporting in Washington. As the Supreme Court has once again overturned decades of precedent in a landmark decision that stands to fundamentally shift American society.

Earlier today, the court's six conservative judges effectively put an end to affirmative action at American colleges and universities, tracking down race based admission policies, specifically Harvard, and at the University of North Carolina Chapel Hill, ruling them unconstitutional and in violation of equal protection clause of the 14th Amendment, the same amendment that has been a cornerstone of civil rights law in America. All six justices in the majority were appointed by Republican president by Donald Trump. The three dissenting justices were appointed by Democrats. In the majority opinion, Chief Justice John Roberts called affirmative action policies their own form of racial stereotyping, writing many universities have for too long wrongly concluded that the touchstone of an individual's identity is not challenges vested skills built or lessons learned, but the color of their skin.

This nation's constitutional history does not tolerate that choice. The court's liberal justices issued some scathing dissents, multiple dissents, by the way. There are also multiple majority opinions too, accusing the majority of ignoring court precedent and willfully disregarding racial inequalities in America. Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson wrote the official dissent.

No one benefits from ignorance. Although formal race link legal barriers are gone, race still matters to the lived experiences of all Americans in innumerable ways. And today's ruling makes things worse, not better. The political reaction to these decisions has been a word intense from the capital to the campaign trip.

Republicans praising the decision and criticizing woke liberals and Democrats condemning the decision and the conservative court itself. That included President Biden, who delivered remarks from the White House today urging colleges to continue using policies that foster diversity, saying we cannot let this decision be the last word. And I strongly, strongly disagree with court's decision. The truth is, we all know it.

Discrimination still exists in America. Discrimination still exists in America. Discrimination still exists in America. Today's decision does not change that.

I know today's court decision is a severe disappointment for so many people, including me, but we cannot let this decision be a permanent setback for the country. The president also responded to a bunch of shadow questions, including one about the legitimacy of this current Supreme Court. Here's how responding is this a rogue court? NBC News senior legal correspondent Laura Jared joins me to help break down this ruling.

In a moment, I'll be joined by NBC News correspondent Antonio Hill, who has reaction from the campus of Harvard. But Laura, let me start with you. You know, we, everybody saw this really coming in a weird way. We saw it coming the day the voting rights decision and the decision in the Alabama redistricting case came out, it was like, oh, look, is John Roberts preparing for what?

For a decision that a lot of people expected? I think what's surprising to me is how many different concurrent opinions they were. John Roberts doesn't seem to be speaking for anybody but himself and one other. And it's interesting that given his feelings about affirmative action, which have not been a secret, that he didn't want to just come out and say, I'm going as far as overruling the past, you know, 40 something years of president.

And instead they've come up with this interesting idea about using race in a very limited way in an essay, as opposed to just saying we're getting out of business of race entirely. We thought this was wrongly decided. It's much like what they did with Roe. Right?

They could have said, we thought Rhoda was wrong when it was decided back in 2003. And just like we thought Roe was wrongly decided. But instead they haven't done that. And yet everybody else, except for Justice Roberts, seems to think that they have done that.

Surely Justice Thomas thinks that they have, and the dissent thinks that they have. And so it's interesting how they've decided to couch this, and it's interesting that they've now sort of opened the door. So I think what's going to be the next set of cases about how you use race and admissions? Well, I was just going to say, Laura, what else does this open the door for?

I saw a lot of reactions from the right. Using DEI is sort of the code word here, the code phrase. I think one group calling it. All right, college DEI is over.

Now on to corporate America. Is there a way in court that we're going to see employment law attacked here? I think it already is. So the conservative financier who has backed these lawsuits for decades, Edward Bloom, has a case in California right now about this very issue challenging scholarships, you know, in corporations.

And so I think that's where this is headed next to the employment context, because just like in the realm of education, There is Title 7, which prohibits discrimination on the basis of race in the employment context. And so I think that that is certainly where this fight is headed next. It gets tricky, though. I mean, the corporate America filed an enormous amount of paper in this case saying, please do not take away affirmative action because we need it for business impairments.

So I think there's an interesting sort of cross currents there. If the court tries to take this on employment Context, Laura. I was surprised there was a distinction between public universities and private universities. Yeah.

And I think many wondered whether they would try to slip the baby in some way on that score. But I think they just decided, if we're going to go this far, we're going to go all the way. And as I said, this is not a court that has been at all secret about their feelings about affirmative action. They just didn't have the votes before.

Does this mean we're just going to have more court cases? Because now if somebody feels as if they didn't get in because of race, because they, you know, I mean, you're just gonna see more lawsuits. Right. Or they weren't considered because of their race, how is this gonna make for a busier court docket?

Perhaps, but they take a while to get here. The one against Harvard and UMC, these have been going on since 2014. So they take a while to actually go through a trial and then go through an appeal and then work their way up to the Supreme Court. But I certainly think this is.

If this was an attempt to sort of close the book on this chapter for the court. And again, saying, getting out of the business of race entirely, I don't think that's what they've done. Well, I was just gonna say, the other question I have is how do they decide whether a university is solely using race or just sort of using race? And that has always been the question.

I sort of wondered, you know, how would anyone ever really know what's going on sitting around admissions tables trying to figure out somebody's file? Because the schools will tell you it's not a checking the box exercise. It' you check the box for one race, you automatically get in. They would tell you, we try to look at the whole package.

Is race part of that? Absolutely. You can't take it out. But it's not as if it's an automatic you get in school because you happen to be one race or the other.

And so I've often wondered, how would anybody really know how you got in? And the truth is that you sue someone, then you get discovery. And in this case, there was some bad emails, and they made their way into the record, and clearly the court was bothered by them. Lord Jarrett, Busy day.

We been preparing for this one for a while, and yet they're still not done. That means we're gonna see you tomorrow. Thank you. Train out of Cambridge, Massachusetts, where Antonia Hilton has been reporting from one of the college campuses at the center today's Supreme Court decision.

Antonia, we should remind people it's late June, which means you probably have a fairly empty college campus today as you're trying to get get some reaction there. But how will this fundamentally change Harvard in the next 10 years? Well, Chuck, first I should say this campus is almost never empty because the students leave, the tourists and the prospective students, the kids applying, all flood in. And so I actually got to talk to high schoolers who are planning to apply to Harvard this fall or in two years and get to talk to them about this because it's actually going to affect them more than it does current undergraduates.

I've also spoken to undergraduates, some of whom have summer jobs, who are nearby. And both groups right now, they are reeling, Chuck. And I think one thing that's important for me to point out is that this doesn't really the conversation here on campus among young people doesn't really break down along the same political lines that we're seeing more broadly across the country. It's not really about left or right.

It's not really about black and white or black versus Asian students, which has been so much of a conversation around this lawsuit here at Harvard. Because what we're seeing is a multi racial coalition of students who are demanding meetings with administrators so that they can talk about what the school is going to do now, what do their new initiatives, their programs, what are they going to look like? And full disclosure, I was a student here who was at time asked to do the task of going out talking to other black and Latino students, encouraging them to feel comfortable applying to Harvard and seeing themselves as part of this community which historically excluded them. Take a listen to the conversations I had with two students.

The first is a black and Vietnamese student. The second is the head of the Black Students Association. And both of them have been reeling and processing this news today. I think it's incredibly disheartening to hear, especially knowing the negative impact that will have on these institutions and on communities of color.

And a decision like this does affect individuals, but it also affects families and affects communities. This is quite a blow to Harvard's community. But I like to think of it as an opportunity for us to take action and put pressure on Harvard. Could include taking away legacy and donor admissions and other things that give unfair advantages to communities of privilege.

At least you just heard from there. Kind of spells out what's going to happen here next chap which you're going to see students and faculty members come after legacy admissions preferences for kids who have parents or relatives who work at schools like Harvard that's going to be the next major stage of the conversation here as they try to make more room for kids for diverse communities. Harvard right now hasn't committed to any one thing, but they have released a statement saying that they're still committed to diversity. This is an important part of their culture and their values here, and that they're taking time to figure out what comes next and how they're going to comply with this new president and, you know, build their path forward.

I think it's going to take years before we fully have a picture of what the result of this is going to look like. And certainly there are going to be people here who are studying that well. The admission process for many people is black box anyway. And now it become more so as university cities try to figure out how to comply with federal law.

Antonio Hilton on campus, Harvard. Antonio, thank you. We bring in now the president of Howard University, Dr. Wayne Frederick.

Dr. Frederick, first of all, I know this is a bittersweet time for you. This is the end of your tenure. You're going to be president emeritus, I guess, and you're handing baton off.

I know that feeling myself. And I'm sure it's both exciting and scary at the same time. But let me ask you about that today. What does this mean for Howard?

You know, this means several things. First and foremost, we've seen an increase in applications recently. And I think some of that obviously is because of what happened with George Floyd murder, and I think a real strong look at race in this country. But some of it also is because of the excellence that we put forward in our appeal to students.

As a result, we have our largest enrollment at 13,000 plus. The reality, though, is a large number of those students are still from low income backgrounds. And so from a capacity point of view, I am concerned that we are already close to a limit of what we can bring in. And then I think when you look at the entire historically black college and university pool, as it were, you have 3% of the higher institutions in this country accounting for 25% of the Bachelor's degrees awarded to African Americans.

So clearly these institutions have been important. But clearly the rest of the institutions in the country are not carrying their load. This could decrease their interests and involvement in educating a diverse population even further. How much do you feel like this ruling impacts your admissions policy or the admissions policies of HBCUs in particular at home?

It can be dramatic. We've graduated more black citizens in this country since medical education started. And in our medical school application process in particular, we Have a supplemental application that speaks to whether you're from an underserved or underrepresented minority population. It speaks to what your experience was like in high school, what are the disadvantages, circumstances, and also what is your intent in terms of future work to work in such a community.

My concern is, despite Justice Roberts opinion that he wrote, he specifically outlined that you can write that in an essay. You specifically didn't say you can ask that question. And I am concerned about what types of lawsuits could be filed as a result of somebody, for instance, not getting into my medical school. Why am I concerned about that?

We got as many as 11,000 applications for only 130 spots. We have the fifth most elective medical school in the country. So that could be a challenge. So you expect to get.

You might be sued on your admission practices just based on this ruling in medical school. You're sounds like you're anticipating this. We definitely are going to have to anticipate this. We definitely have to prepare ourselves to defend our position because of how important our production of black doctors and the overall health of Americans has been.

Let me ask you a larger picture question here. The case that was brought against Harvard involved Asian American students. How do you parse the idea that they had students who believed their race was impacting them negatively? I mean, this is what almost we're pitting minorities against each other.

Yeah. You know, I think that's also a very complicated discussion. I think the issue here was not to compromise anyone by affirmative action, but to ensure that you were supporting those who otherwise, throughout their lives and 12 generations didn't have the same opportunity. Again, one of the opinions written.

I believe the opinion written by Justice Thomas outlined the fact that this current generation should not be responsible for what happened before. But the reality is generational wealth for black Americans have been impacted. Generational opportunities for education have been impacted. And if generational wealth is impacted, it means the opportunity to go to certain types of schools, live in certain neighborhoods, and to have certain opportunities have been impacted.

So when a student writes an essay, for instance, about the experiences, they don't necessarily have diverse experiences. They didn't get to play water polo, they didn't get to go to concerts, etc. So I don't see how it doesn't issue Asian Americans versus, you know, others. I think again, it's about educational opportunities that people may have had coming through the system and trying to make sure that you're giving an opportunity for everyone.

If you look at Asian American admissions, they've been consistently on the rise at highly selective schools. And I don't think that has been compromised by phone interaction. Dr. Wayne, I.

Wayne, hey. Frederick Howard University. This is like I said, I believe it was your last graduation, your last commencement, but I look forward to staying in touch. Appreciate you guys sharing your.

Good luck to you too. You've been absolutely fantastic. So I appreciate you. Thank you.

Appreciate you as well. He's a public policy fellow at Stanford University, Hoover Institute. He's an alum of Harvard and he has a lot of degree. Mr.

Chen, it's good to see you. So, hey, Chuck, I feel like California went through this and you quite a bit over the last 30 years with the in state battles. I'm thinking of Ward Connerly back in the 90s here. What was your reaction to today's rule?

Well, surprising given the composition of the court. I think they've been signaling this for some time and I frankly think that those who argue this is some significant sea change are misreading the case or misreading the law. At the end of the day, what we have here is we have a court that's referring a couple of basic principles. One being that, you know, the explicit use of race in college admissions in the way that it was done by both Harvard and unc.

Harvard to detection of Asian Americans, that is a proven matter, would no longer be allowed. And that's not inconsistent with what the court has said before, by the way. So in my view, this is one of those things where the impact we'll see, but the reality is a lot of states, affirmative actions, you know, is already outlined, California being one of them, and other popular states are part of that category as well. So, you know, universities allow this to play out, but the notion this is a massive sea change or some massive movement away from where the law is, I think is a misapprehension of what law has been.

Look, you're familiar. You're not in the UC system, you're Stanford, but you're familiar. You sure you know exactly how difficult that admissions process is. They went to zip code based, correct?

I believe. I mean, what would you say, what have you, what have you observed that has maybe been effective at creating diverse populations? Well, first of all, accounting for the entirety of students experience, and that includes, for example, their socioeconomic background, that includes their life story. There are many different elements.

And by the way, the court leaves the door open for that in this decision. They leave the door open for individuals to express as part of their backgrounds the role that race, socioeconomic status, any number of different Factors can play. And it's a challenging balancing act. I get it.

Universities are going to have to look at what they're doing and figure out whether it's consistent with what the court is called for a day. But I think fundamentally, this notion of seeing the individual as an individual as opposed to set of characteristics, I think that's the system that we're trying to migrate toward. And I think colleges and workplaces, they will adapt. They will adapt and they will be better for it.

Do you think, though, that this impedes an institution's ability? You know, let's talk about freedom. You know, various freedoms here. An institution of higher learning believes it needs this diverse student body to provide the education they want to provide.

How much leeway should they be given? Because they used to be given a lot of leeway for that, and now they're giving less. But it's also not really defined on what that looks like either. Yeah, and I think we're going to have to see.

I do think one side effect of all of this is that we are going to see litigations around a number of different systems, both sides of the ideological spectrum here, I think. Yeah, yeah, absolutely. And so we'll have a clear sense in a couple years about how it all sorts out. But I think requiring university to think through what they're trying to do.

And the goal of promoting a diverse student body, as the court reaffirms, is an important one. I think the question becomes, how do you get there and what do you do to achieve those aims? And I think one of the challenges the court rightfully points out is at what point does that goal. Is that goal achieved?

At what point can you say we have done what we need to do to reach that goal? This has been the problem with the goals of diversity. What is the measuring stick on affirmative action? Is it income inequality between whites and blacks being less than 5 percentage points?

Like, what do you measure? And the court didn't outline that either. No. And I think the challenge is that the proponents of affirmative action have tough time articulating what their goals were as well.

And I think both sides have that challenge going forward because I think that they're, you know, a student body in a workforce that reflects America's diversity is an important thing. But the question is, is that in and of itself the goal, or is there something more? And I. Some of these questions remain unanswered.

You'll see it in some polling. Generally, people are in favor of the idea, and they get. They get tripped up over the specifics and implementation. And I have a feeling that's basically the conversation we just had, I think there.

Anyway, thanks. Great to see you, Chuck. Thank you all. We're going to stick with breaking news from the court and as I hinted at it, interesting polish to make you understand how the public views this.

Also, new reaction from President Biden and some reaction from the campaign trail. That's next. Plus, on the issue, race in America, a first in the nation's reparations report happened to come out today laying out the recommendations to compensate black Californians for the harms of slavery. May recall we did press reports on this couple weeks ago.

Watch these press now. Welcome back to our coverage of the breaking news out of the Supreme Court, which today struck down affirmative action in collegiate admissions. And as I mentioned before the break, it's an issue that divides the American publican one it could be front and center as we head into 2024. So join me now.

The big word for look at the polling on this issue is our own Steve Fornacki. And Steve, boy, the difference between saying the phrase affirmative action and race and ethnic based seems like those phrases alone can change public opinion. Yeah, I really think we look at the polling on this. There's a lot out there that comes at it from different angles.

It's almost how wide the lens is. Here's what I mean by this is our own NBC poll. When you just ask about affirmative action as a concept, is affirmative action still needed with the stipulation that there's no rigid quotas? That's what we asked.

This was just in April, a majority, 53% said they agree with that statement. Affirmative action is still needed. In fact, over the last decade, that's an increase. It was 45, 45 in 2013, 53, 42 now the biggest movement actually among white voters over the last decade to get it to majority support for affirmative action.

Then here's another poll, this one from the Washington Post, that asked more broadly about the concept of diversity, about encouraging diversity in college admissions programs designed to increase the racial diversity on college campuses. You find very strong support here for that general concept, almost two thirds that goes across racial lines. Nearly 60% of whites agree with that larger with African Americans, Hispanics and Asian Americans. But it's when you narrow the lens to what the Supreme Court was deciding today and you ask specifically and explicitly about race and ethnicity being factors used in deciding making decisions about college admissions when the numbers change.

So here again, the Washington Post poll, Supreme Court banning colleges and universities from considering race and ethnicity in admissions, again, almost two to one folks say they support that Supreme Court banning using race and ethnicity. And again, look across racial, ethnic lines here. Strong support among whites, 60% among Hispanics, 65% among Asian Americans, even among African Americans, it's close to 50, 50 in this poll. So when you talk really specifically about what the Supreme Court is doing today, you get some result like this.

And then I think one other thing worth mentioning quickly, we're talking about this with Lonnie Chen. We do have a real world experience. Get outside the polling world. You get to California and what happened in 2020.

As you mentioned in 96 Biden Initiative petition, California banned affirmative action. Supporters of affirmative action in 2020 thought the world had changed in California. More diverse, more liberal. It was time to put it back on the ballot.

They believe voters would reinstate affirmative action for public universities. Instead, it went down 57 to 43. Same day that Joe Biden was winning California by 30 points. Reinstating affirmative action in public colleges and universities in one of the most liberal states in the country lost by 14 points.

Steve Kornacki with some important context on the polling on this issue. Again, sometimes it's hard to get black and white response, no pun intended there on a nuanced question like this. So moments ago, President Biden weighed in again on the affirmative action decision with MSNBC's null walls. He expounded on what he met earlier today when he said this Supreme Court is not normal.

Here's a long reclination. You said this court is not normal. What did you mean? What I meant by that is it's done more to unravel basic rights and basic decisions than any court in recent history.

And that's what I meant by not normal. It's gone out of its way to, for example, take a look at overruling Roe v. Wade. Take a look at the decision today.

Take a look at how it's, how it's ruled on a number of issues that are have been precedent for 50, 60 years sometimes. And that's what I meant by not normal. I got a panel here now. Leanne called what watching the slide anger go off the daily two or two newsletters from the Sanders Townsend, the former senior vice versa Vice President Harrison, Host of Simone, MSNBC Republican strategist NBC News playlist Rick Tyler.

Welcome to all of you. Leanne. It was interesting to see the president immediately almost piped back the row. I think that you know as a campaign issue here.

But I want to focus more on affirmative action first. Let's Talk about the Supreme Court. This was telegraphed for arguably all year long. And then almost added the telegraphing.

John Roberts got. Got Kavanaugh or agreed with him. What happened? Alabama redistricting.

And almost to soften the blow here. Should I get that political cycle and politically cycle. Look at this. I think you're just saying what many people who are political are thinking.

We don't know if there's any connection. We never will. He passes away and we read his notes and he never puts the notes in. Right, Exactly.

So who knows? But those previous decisions were relatively surprising and so makes us think what was going to happen with the affirmative. The affirmative action case. I thought it was going to come down to the last case that came down before being the last case before they headed out of town.

But anyway, you know, I was speaking with a dean of a public university earlier this week and she told me that I asked about this and she said that colleges for the past year have been making alternative backup plans on what to do next. And so it's going to be really fascinating. And I think there's going to be a lot of lessons learned from those nine states that have already banned affirmative action and what those schools have done to try to maintain some sort of fairness and diversity at their universities. And you see a lot first generation college scholarship, first generation, your first time going to college, things like that.

On that front, someone I found I thought was interesting, and this is what I'm not sure is Justice Robertson Kavanaugh had one opinion of what they will not. There were three other concurring opinions. This tells me none of those conservatives want John Roberts speaking for them. Which.

And why would the other justices seem to read something more to this ruling than what Robertson Cavill wrote? Oh, yeah. And I mean, I do think people should read the actual majority opinion as well as all the concurring and the dissenting opinions. Because in the majority opinion, the court writes in the majority opinion that says, look, they make the case that all of the cases that have come before the Supreme Court since Brown versus the Board of Education are all driving towards this one particular piece about the equal protection clause.

And that piece is that there should be no, as they say, government race based discrimination policies within the government. Okay? They're saying race based discriminations, ie, anything that takes race into account. I was very shocked by Justice Thomas's current opinion where he, Justice Thomas, I mean, a man who is frankly a beneficiary of race based conscious policymaking who literally says in the last page of his comparing opinion I understand for people that look like me, they're still economic and political.

Basically, he is drastic gaps. But I believe that America's gonna do their best to right those wrongs and live up to our consciousness, live up to our creed. Okay? The way that those wrongs survive it is by active and oftentimes searchable, very intentional policies, of which race based, conscious decision making has been one of them.

Okay. I think this is the frustrating thing about this. Whether your opponent or not, proponent of affirmative action, which is we've never agreed upon the measuring stick. Not the measuring stick of which to decide what we eat or don't eat it.

We don't know we have it. Well, we know it, it isn't good yet. And that sort of. It becomes almost everybody's own gut feel.

We don't know what it is. And Harvard would like us to leave it to them to determine the composition. Why is that wrong? They are private institutions.

They are private institutions. And I would say that institutions are strengthened by diversity. I think that's a legitimate goal for institutions to have. And the question is, how do we go about it?

Now, Harvard is a bit hypocritical here because one, by saying by race consideration, Harvard implicitly implies that certain races fall, stereotypically fall into some category that they need help to get into school. We don't know if that's true or not. Two, we don't know what Hispanic really means. We don't know what Asian really means because there are lots of different Asian subgroups.

And so are they going to decide? What are they exactly going to decide? Plus, Harvard, by the way, admits roughly 43% of their admissions are not race based. They are legacy based.

That means you have to be a relative or a faculty or someone who works at the college or a recruited athlete to get in. So before everything starts, you're already half the admissions are cut off from people who went there before. So the best way to get in Harvard is that your father went there and gave a $5 million contribution to Harvard. That's how you get into Harvard.

So if there's an economic argument, then the economic argument should have been to get rid of legacy students and not the affirmative action students. The question though is to what end? But let me just say this because we're just talking about affirmative action, broad based. To be very clear, what the Supreme Court weighed in on today was race based consciousness, race based decision making, race conscious decision making.

It didn't do any affirmative action altogether because if you look at the numbers, white women are the biggest beneficiaries, affirmative action. So we take gender into account. Right. So we're only talking about race.

The argument that Rick just made here I think is a very important one. We talk about economics, race based race conscious decision making. It benefits people of color who are in fact not poor. Okay.

It also benefits people of color whom are not that opportunity because someone says so bad debt. Where does the politics go from this next? Because I've already seen on the right, you know, almost a rebranding of this as college DEI because we know that there is a obsession on the, on a small band of folks on the right run the same displex to talk about this going after business for having diversity initiatives. Is there, should we talk about, should we talk lawsuits there?

I think so. I'm not sure. I mean I'm not a lawyer and I'm not involved in these lawsuits. But politically speaking, I mean this has already been challenged for a very, very long time.

There's been affirmative action cases before the supreme. My entire adult lifetime. There's been something, you know, whether it's been California, it's been because of propositions people put on the ballot. And we've been, we've been litigating ever since we started.

Right. And every time there's a new effort at diversity that is also challenged. And you mentioned DEI and that's the latest thing and that's something that you in Congress, they are Republicans are talking about trying to defund DEI programs in the federal government to balance the budget. Of course that's a very small fraction of federal spending.

So I don't know where this goes next. I think the right is championing this right now. But coming up, I think that legal employment is perhaps an obvious place. Rick, it's funny, I had somebody say, you know, quite young and runs, we're got killed on dei, you know, meaning you couldn't be a conservative and had wanted diversity at a company you ran.

Where does this go? I'll ask the way you go about it and you know, look, we have to decide. We're going to live to a higher standard which Lincoln outlined saying, are we dedicated to the proposition that all men. Today we say men and women are created equal.

And it was JFK who said that race has no place in American life or law. Now he was referring to people who were discriminated against. And so the policies of both University of North Carolina and Harvard are by nature discriminatory. Now they discriminate against different people because there is a zero sum of people that are gonna be admitted to those schools.

And so they have to so someone is gonna get discriminated against one way or another. So there's a lot of talk about Asian students are discriminated against. I think that as I said, diversity is an important goal. But we have to acknowledge the fact that the 14th Amendment is sort of unequivocal about this.

You can't say the 14th Amendment applies to certain, a certain race at certain times, certain conditions and then suddenly doesn't apply to a certain race of certain conditions. I think it's very important. Everyone has a definition of discriminating, unjust or presidential. Distinct prejudicial distinction in the different kind of boys of people, especially in the ethnicity, sex, age or disability, prejudicial, harmful to someone or something unjust, not based on or behaving according to what's morally right or fair.

I think it is very dangerous when people start to assert that diversity initiatives that bring equity. Right, because equity means that we now the same claim 214 years between the 214 years between the laws that the literacy laws for enslaved people and property education. I mean one could argue the 58 year gap. It is the 58 year.

They'll make that all the way up. Well, and what's interesting today, all this action, we have a report about reparations. I wonder if this strengthens the case for advocates about reparations to keep taking confirmation America, if that is what happens. Simone, Leanne, wonderful.

Thank you very much. We're also following some break news out of Florida this afternoon. A jury has acquitted the now former sheriff's deputy who was on trial for not confronting the gunman in the Parkland High School shooting. Scott Peterson was found not guilty in 11 counts that included child neglect, inculpable neglect.

The 60 year old was very emotional, broke down in tears as the verdict was read. Peterson was the only armed resource officer at Martinre Stoneman Douglas High School. One gunman opened fire there in February 2018, killing 17 people and injuring 17 others. He was charged after a 15 month investigation by Florida Department of Law Enforcement concluded that Peterson refused to investigate the source of the gunshots, retreated during the active shooting while the victims were being shot and directed other law enforcement ride on scenes remain 500ft away from the building.

Up next, NBC's exclusive interview with Mike Pence in the country of Ukraine as presidential candidate meets with President Zelensky and her Republican voters who embrace the fight against Russian aggression. You're watching ME Press. Welcome back. Vice President Mike Pence is now the First Republican candidate to visit Ukraine during the presidential campaign.

He met with Ukraine President Zelensky and visited three cities that were previously occupied by Russian forces. He spoke to residents and participated in a ceremony honoring Ukrainians who've been killed in the war. Pence's visit comes at a time when former President Trump and his skepticism about aid Ukraine has been resonating with GOP primary voters. Early 17 NewsPol finds that majority of Republican primary voters say they are less likely to vote for candidate who supports funding for Ukraine.

Well, my colleague Dasha Burns traveled to Ukraine to interview former Vice President Pence in an exclusive on his visit and his place in this version of the Republican Party. The majority of Republican voters are less likely to support a candidate that is in support of funding for Ukraine. So this is not likely to be a campaign stop, so to speak, that is particularly fruitful for you with the GOP voters you're trying to court. So why.

Why are you here? I'm here because it's important that the American people understand the progress that we've made and how support for the Ukrainian military has been in our national interest. I truly do believe that now more than ever, we leaders in our country who are articulating poor importance of American leadership in the world, honestly, ever since we left office, it seems like the world's become more dangerous by the day. And for my part, I'm always going to step forward and speak the truth to the American people.

We'll let the polls and politics take care of themselves. But for me, it was important to be here. There's a clear and stark divide on this issue in the Republican Party. And I think, you know, five, 10 years ago, that wouldn't have been the case.

So the Reagan era, the Reagan Doctrine that you're talking about, do you still recognize that within the Republican Party, what do you think is going on, that there is such a division on this issue that for you seems to be very clear? Well, first off, this is bigger than politics. Let's be clear about that. But politics has an impact.

I really do believe that if Vladimir Putin and the Russian military were to overrun Ukraine, it wouldn't be too long before they cross the border where our nine men in uniform would be required to go and fight. And frankly, the second half of the 21st century could look an awful lot more like the first half of the 20th century. I think we, I think we stand with the Ukrainian military here, give them what they need and, and, and, and so much more important than politics. And Dasha Burns joins me now.

From Kyiv and Dasha boy, I caught him doing it with you and he does it with me. And on one hand, he wants to make such a clear contrast with his former running mate on this issue. There's no clear contrast between the two. Funding for Ukraine versus not.

Friendship of Vladimir Putin versus not. And yet I noticed he said since we left office, I mean, he still struggles with figuring out how much of the four years with Trump does he promote and how much does he criticize his former running mate. Yeah. And it makes this visit quite complicated considering former President Trump's history with Zelensky, his history with Putin, writing and Chuck, what I saw on the ground here in and around Kiev today was really a collision between the 2024 presidential campaign in the United States and the war here in Ukraine.

And hence, really trying to carve out a unique foothold in this election, in this primary. Foothold that you heard me say there would not have been so unique, maybe just five, ten years ago, but now there really is such a shift in the way that the Republican Party views this conflict, views Russia, views Ukraine and Pens as somewhat of an outlier here. But the way that he's having to balance. Right, right.

His very clear eyed view that he went so far as to visit Ukraine and spend a lot of time on the ground here, talking to people whose homes were destroyed, visiting important sites where atrocities were perpetrated by the Russians on the Ukrainian people. That is quite a message to send. Right. At the same time, he has not fully rebuked what transpired during the Trump administration.

And I want you to take a listen to some of our conversation about that. While you were vice president under the Trump administration, the former president repeatedly praised Putin, defended Putin at critical moments. Looking back at that time, you didn't speak up publicly about that. Do you have any regrets as you stood by and watched that by his side?

Well, in 2016, as a candidate for vice president, I said Vladimir Putin was the small and bullying leader of Russia. I've never had any illusions about Vladimir Putin. That's why I was pleased that our administration is probably tougher on Russia in practical and meaningful ways. Rhetoric matters.

And we've seen that. Well, rhetoric doesn't matter as much as Javelin missiles, which the Obama Biden administration refused to give any military weapons to Ukraine. We came in and reversed that and we allowed the transfer of military weapons and Javelin missiles to Ukraine. They were better equipped to confront this invasion because of the support of the Trump.

Pence administration. Still took a really significant day here and a very welcome day by the Ukrainians to see this kind of support from a presidential candidate. The first up presidential candidate perhaps the only that will be visiting. I'm very curious about that.

Going to be fascinating to watch. You know it is notable the former president's last secretary state Mike Pompeo went to Kiev to visit Wisalinski. I think about week before he said he was going to run for president himself but in April. So now here you have Donald Trump's former vice president and former secretary of state have both shown support for Zelensky in a party that seems to be a little eerie the whole thing, it's fascinating.

Dr. Burns on the campaign trail in Ukraine didn't have that in your video card yet. Thank you. Silicon Race and reparations California's released recommendations to compensate black people in the state for the harms of slavery.

When talking to the president of NYCP about this development, what's it altaming with today's historic Supreme Court ruling to watch me President welcome back. On the same day the Supreme Court struck down affirmative action in college campuses, a California task force unanimously approved its final recommendations for statewide reparations for black Californians. The weight of this moment an American history was not lost on the task for members who said the court's ruling would not impact their recommendations. I would encourage the Supreme Court to read the interim report.

I would encourage them to read the final report and to understand that the legacy of enslavement, the ongoing harms are with us to this very day. And so this country is disingenuous. First they used race to exclude us and now they're refusing to use race to include us. The Task Force 1,100 page report recommends a California prove a state apology for racism and that they compensate eligible black Americans in California for the harms of slavery.

The task force says it wants to create a reparations blueprint for the rest of the country. But despite the years of work by the task force, questions are made about when, if ever black Californians will ever see any actual reparation payments. Turning out ABC's correspondent. So Dana, this was, this was something that was passed by the legislature to make this task force happen.

Now what, what are the specifics? When does Governor Newsom have to make this decision? Well Chuck, it's gonna be a while because this report is now going to lawmakers and they may spend the summer going through it. But the legislative session is going to end in September so they can try to squeeze in some bills based upon these recommendations.

But then it has to again go back and pass both houses and then the governor, of course, has to approve it. And honestly, we've seen a little bit of, of not response, we'll say, from not only the governor but also lawmakers, even Democrat lawmakers who were in the port of this because, you know, they were tasked with creating the task force after the death of George Floyd. But it may have lost some momentum because a lot of people are saying we want to wait to see the final report before we say whether or not we're going to support it. Well, that report is now in.

Our producers are still going through it, some 1100 pages. And it's interesting what's in it. Some of the recommendations we can actually, I'll tell you a little about them includes abolishing the death penalty, getting rid of cash, cash bail, and also reimbursing those who have been exonerated. But take a look at the state budget and how much this could all cost if these reparations are implemented, including cash reparation that could cost the state some $800 billion right now.

The current budget that was just approved on Tuesday by Governor News them is some 300 billion and there's a 300 deficit. So whether or not people receive cash reparations, it's gonna be a long road before we see that. You've certainly laid out what could end up absolutely being legislative obstacles there. Dan Griffin reporting first from California.

Thank you. We took a deep dive into the battle of reparations, particularly what's going on in California on recent episodes. Take a look at it. Stream the right now, right after we're done with the segment.

Peacock, YouTube, wherever you stream your programming and join me now is Derek Johnson. He's president and CEO of the naacp. And boy, where to begin. And I know we booked you to talk about the California report today.

Obviously we've got form of action. Let me just start with, you know, the whole premise of the NAACP was to fight on behalf of half of African Americans for, for rights that weren't given to them. And then the government took over that for a while and I guess now it's back all on your shoulders. Am I, am I over exaggerating here a little bit?

I don't think you're over exaggerating. I think you're spot on. And it's always been on African American shoulders to blaze a trail to ensure equal access and equal treatment under the law. Today is the booking reality of where we've always been, a Supreme Court who are applying to deny African Americans opportunities and a Commission who was pushing forward a set of recommendations to ensure that African Americans, the descendants of slave, the descendants of Jim Crow, are made whole because of state federal, government sponsored discrimination.

And so that's where we are. You know, it's interesting to put the two together. If there were reparations, maybe we wouldn't need affirmative action. And that could be the case.

You know, the thing about this report is not just about money. It's about public policy and the harms that public policy have done against African Americans. And so there's an overemphasis on the money and money should be a part of it. Absolutely.

But if we don't fix the public policy, how Africans still today are being mistreated through the implementation of laws, we're going to find ourselves in this same conversations for three additional decades. You expect to be in court a lot more than you were before this ruling. Whether it's employment or college admissions, what the destination of the NAACP are roles to make democracy work, to show equal protection on the laws of the force to everyone. So we was in Court in 1930, was in court 1928, was built in court 1960.

And I believe until society embraced diversity, treat all citizens equally, we will be in court 30 years from now. What do you think of a university? Let's take the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill. They want to have a diverse campus.

How do you think they're going to have to go about it? What would if they come to you and say help us do this within the confines of the Supreme Court ruling, what would you recommend? Well, I commend the president and his speech today to talk about adversity standard. A standard that take into account one's going to paper college or the history of the family, take into account whether or not that individual face adversity, including discrimination, take into account the quality of education.

Because we know that where a person goes to school that zip code determine whether or not that person been denied access or quality education. An adversity standard is race neutral, but it could address the very ills that we have spoken about for decades now. Public policy sanctioned violence against African community through the denial of equal opportunity and access to a quality of life. So is there is a legislation to be passed or is this more of we gotta expect institutions to develop their own policies.

Well, for us, we are an advocacy group, so we're gonna be pushing for public policy. If the court said we cannot use race as a standard because of strict scrutiny, we have to look at our race neutral policy. And I think the President today in his speech led the way an adversity standard. I can support that.

I grew up in the city of Detroit doing a decline of the city and resources was taken out of education. And because of that, many of my schoolmates did not make it out of many traps that was put in front of them. That is unfair and we're robbing this nation of a future that's inclusive and the best talented individuals. How do you harness this following sort of conundrum of public opinion?

There's broad general agreement, we need to verify diversity. And then when you say, okay, well, we don't have to do it this way to get it, no, no, no, no, don't do that. Right. Everybody's for diversity as long as it doesn't impact them.

Being a little facetious, how you harness that? Let's be clear. The American public, about 63% said the Supreme Court do not mess with affirmative action. So there's strong public support for diversity and we must embrace diversity at all costs.

It's going to be hard. Some people will be uncomfortable, but there's a track record for that. People didn't support reparations for Japanese Americans in the permit cake. You still have people who are Holocaust deniers, but people should be made whole when they're state sanctioned violence for public policy or physical, there should be state sanctioned repair.

Interesting way to put it. State sanctioned, very important phrase. Derek Johnson, President, thanks for coming on, sharing your perspective. Thank you all for being with us this hour.

We got Tomorrow morning, the Press continues with my friend Ali Jackson. Right. Hey, it's Kate Snow, NBC News anchor and host of the Drink. This month, Demi Lovato is my guest.

The global superstar tells me that she is the happiest she's ever been right now. But getting there, it wasn't simple. Demi opens up about starting in Hollywood young and why she now thinks she may have started too soon. She talks about recovery, her new marriage and the deeply personal reason behind her new cookbook.

The Drink is always about the journey to the top. And this was an honest conversation about what that takes. Hope you'll listen and follow the Drink wherever you get your podcast.