• President-elect Donald Trump says he wants to declare a national emergency – and maybe even use the military – to deport around 11 million undocumented immigrants living in the U.S. The consequences could be dire: millions of families separated, livelihoods upended, an even bigger backlog of immigration court cases, and a bill that could top $350 billion. Dara Lind, senior fellow at the American Immigration Council, helps us separate facts from fears when it comes to Trump’s plan.
• And in headlines: Trump announces a flurry of final cabinet picks, Israel’s Defense Forces traded more fire with the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah, and the annual U.N. climate summit wraps up with a controversial $300 billion deal.

• Check out Dara’s column – https://tinyurl.com/769bxjxc
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For a transcript of this episode, please visit crooked.com/whataday

TRANSCRIPT

Jane Coaston: It’s Monday, November 25th. I’m Jane Coaston and this is What a Day, the show that will not be paying $500 for a cameo from former congressman Matt Gaetz. He signed up for the app less than 48 hours after dropping out of the running for attorney general. Proof yet again that there are lots of people in Congress who just want to be famous. But there are so, so many other ways to become famous, like winning a lookalike contest or becoming a pop star. Has Matt Gaetz considered becoming a pop star? [music break] On today’s show. Trump’s weekend administration nomination blitz and the annual U.N. climate summit leave some countries feeling pretty angry. Let’s get into it. President elect Donald Trump has said he wants to declare a national emergency and maybe even use the military to deport around 11 million undocumented immigrants living in the U.S. a strategy which the American Immigration Council has said could result in up to four million families being separated. People across the country are already bracing themselves for the potential consequences. Nonprofit organizations and lawyers that advocate for immigrants have been overwhelmed with phone calls from people terrified about losing their homes or having their loved ones taken away from them. And thousands of people trying to come to the U.S. are rushing to the border, hoping to get in before Trump takes office in January. Some experts have questioned whether Trump’s mass deportation plans are even logistically possible. The U.S. immigration system already has a backlog of almost four million cases that would take at least four years to resolve. What’s going to happen when it adds millions more? Where will the government put people while they wait for their cases to play out? Who is paying for flights to other countries? Actually, who is paying for all of this? The bill could top an estimated $350 billion. Stephen Miller, Trump’s incoming deputy chief of staff for foreign policy and white nationalist sympathizer, is not too worried about the logistics of all of this because, of course, he isn’t. According to him, they’re just going to make it all happen magically via executive order and the stroke of a pen. Here’s Miller on Fox News Friday. 

[clip of Stephen Miller] ICE, Homeland Security Investigations. And as I mentioned, the core elements at the Department of Justice are going to launch deportation sweeps to get these criminal gangs out of our country. So we’re going to liberate under President Trump’s direction as commander in chief his plan and his vision. We are going to liberate one town after another. And for that alone, President Trump should be carved on Mount Rushmore for what he is about to do to set American cities free. 

Jane Coaston: Some cities in the U.S., like Los Angeles, have already declared themselves sanctuary cities in an attempt to resist Trump’s deportation plans. Miller told Fox News in that same interview how the administration plans to react. 

[clip of Stephen Miller] The federal government is the entity that has the final say on immigration enforcement. And if these states continue to shield, as they have, people that are raping and murdering children, every federal tool at President Trump’s disposal will be used to bring these cities into compliance. 

Jane Coaston: States rights for some, the boot of the federal government for others. Aside from saying the administration will withhold federal funds, Trump’s pick to be his border czar, Tom Homan, has also threatened to send extra federal agents to essentially invade sanctuary cities. Here he is on Newsmax Saturday. 

[clip of unnamed Newsmax interviewer] What is your message to mayors and governors who are threatening that kind of physical standoff with you? 

[clip of Tom Homan] Game on. Let’s see what happens? Game on. 

Jane Coaston: If that wasn’t clear, he said, let’s see what happens. Game on. Not one person, not one is as tough as these dudes try to be on television. It’s simply not possible. To try and figure out how scared we should be, what Trump can and can’t do, and how we can fight against these mass deportations. I called up my good friend Dara Lind, who is a senior fellow at the American Immigration Council. Dara Lind, welcome to What a Day. 

Dara Lind: Thank you so much. It’s good to be on. 

Jane Coaston: You recently wrote an op ed in The New York Times called What Mass Deportation Actually Means. So what does mass deportation actually mean? 

Dara Lind: So because it is not a defined term, it’s not a like, oh if you deport two million people, then it counts as mass deportation, but at 1,999,000, etc., it doesn’t like because of that. We need to move beyond thinking about it as like something that is going to be accomplished or not, you know, like box check style. Like it’s not going to be it’s not it’s not a pass fail situation. Right. So the question is, to what extent is a second Trump administration going to ramp up the interior immigration enforcement apparatus? How quickly and like how aggressively in terms of deployment of resources and interpretation of existing law, um the restrictions that are on them, especially in the immediate term, are much less legal like. There are millions of people in the United States who are deportable, and that means that they can be taken into federal custody and the deportation process can be started. Then they are logistical that once you take them into custody, you need some place to put them while they go through whatever legal proceeding they’re they’re entitled to, which for many of them will include like at least one court hearing. And even if you get to the end of that process, you need planes to put them on, seats on those planes and an agreement from the country that you’re trying to land them in to accept them. And those are the kinds of things that, you know, those are potential pinch points in the process that are obviously going to prevent them from deporting 11 million people on day one. But that also are like flags for people who are paying attention to this to be looking at, because that’s going to be relevant to how many people they can, you know, sweep up in a raid or take into custody or deport in the future. And so for those of us who, like have loved ones who are potentially under a deportation dragnet or who are, you know, concerned about making sure that people in our communities are informed, that’s a very important consideration. 

Jane Coaston: So let’s talk about some of those pinch points and let’s talk about where you put people. There’s a lot of conflicting information between people saying any of this is impossible. And then places like Texas essentially saying we will give you hundreds of acres for camps effectively. So how serious is either side? 

Dara Lind: I think that to write off any expansion of deportation because they don’t have the capacity right now is a little shortsighted, like what makes mass deportation very interesting in terms of like what we heard about it before the election is that, you know, as early as November of last year, there were articles about, you know, Stephen Miller and company are putting a lot of thought into how you would do this. They have plans for camps, etc., and then Project 2025, which had so much detail about so many other policy areas, had very little on interior enforcement. So we’re playing a little bit in the dark as far as what they already have lined up for the first day, first hundred days, etc.. So especially if there is going to be an emergency declaration where under the first Trump administration that was used to dedicate funds that, you know, that unlocked some pockets of funds that got moved to the border wall, if that sort of thing happens, that’s money that’s going to be moved into the into like, we can spend this for detention. That said, it isn’t free. And even if you have the land, the staffing is you know  there are the federal government does have, you know, standards it has to follow for federal detention centers. So I think that this is it’s something where we’re going to see how it pans out. But it’s definitely the the more money they throw at it now, the less money they will have available in the future, because there really is a big difference between putting up a temporary facility and investing in building a permanent building where you’re going to be able to have detention [?]. 

Jane Coaston: I think another perhaps pinch point of a different nature is public opinion. And one of the challenges that Trump had during the first Trump administration was that he would try some pretty extreme immigration policies like the Muslim ban, get a ton of pushback and then not be able to actually do all of the things he said he wanted to do. He will now have the support of the courts and the House and Senate. Will it be different this time? 

Dara Lind: I worry about this a lot um and I worry about it a lot because of family separation, which on the face of it was the most successful case of what stopped Donald Trump was not the courts. It was a sustained public backlash that led them to assume to believe that it wasn’t worth it. The problem is that that happened in summer of 2018 and for the next two years of the first Trump administration. I and a lot of other people in the immigration space were trying to raise attention to things like the Remain in Mexico policy to the consequences of Title 42. And there wasn’t the ability to get even a fraction of the same purchase with public opinion, even among people who were telling pollsters that they valued immigrants. And so I’m a little bit worried that family separation just fried everybody’s circuitry. There were some very interesting features during the first Trump administration about people who had been deported in like the first year, which is when they were doing really stepped up interior enforcement and how with the exception of like their literal, immediate family and loved ones, the rest of their community was like, yeah, it sucks, but it had to happen. Um. And so I’m worried right. I do think that there’s a very important imperative on people who have expressed opposition to, you know, people, people who voted against Donald Trump, people who do not want this to happen. It really is important to pay attention to what’s happening and to be willing to mobilize against it, because it’s not really that we saw big public outcry that didn’t do anything during the first Trump administration. But we did see things where public outcry that we would have expected to materialize didn’t happen. 

Jane Coaston: So I think on that point, you’re talking to an audience of people who are very informed, very passionate and prepared to get very mad. So what can people do and how can people, one, how can people learn more about these different policies? Because I think that the degree to which education matters here, it can’t be overstated. But also, like, what can people do? How can people get involved in the fight to help immigrants? 

Dara Lind: I definitely don’t have all of the answers here. This is something that, like everybody in the immigration movement, is trying to work out at once. And what the first thing I would say is, especially if you’re in a city or if you’re in a community that has a pretty well-established immigrant population and like organizations serving them, try to figure out if there is a local rapid response network that you can be a part of because those are getting spun up. They are often the most important thing when things like raids happen, because for one thing, they are providing resources and representation to the people who are caught up. And on the other hand, those are also the networks through which information is being shared. So like in 2017, when the first residential raids under Trump happened, a lot of people are, you know, calling around in a panic, like, is there an ICE checkpoint on the way to school? Can I literally drop off my kids today or not? And having accurate information is so essential and letting people who like, you know, when there weren’t ICE checkpoints, as there weren’t in most cities, letting people like go about their lives and not shut down and not, you know, put themselves and their children into like states of misery and doldrums just because of misinfo. Um. But I think that there’s also, you know, a role in making sure that state and local officials are not planning to to roll over. It’s going to be very interesting to see how much the Trump administration can use the threat of withholding federal funding to force places to accommodate, say, other states National Guard, if they try to go that route or to force them to maximize information sharing with ICE. And the more that officials can be put, you know, can be held accountable in advance and put on the record in advance saying, we’re not going to do that. The better off it’s going to be. But I do think that getting in the habit now of making sure that you have accurate information, like a mix of immigration focused reporters, news outlets. Documented in New York is great, Sahan Journal in Minnesota is great. Um. And organizations that are trying to kind of get facts out there, just getting in a habit of having that be part of your media diet is going to be really essential to knowing when and where you need to be mobilized. 

Jane Coaston: Dara, thank you so much for joining me. 

Dara Lind: Thank you. 

Jane Coaston: That was my conversation with Dara Lind, senior fellow at the American Immigration Council. We’ll get to more of the news in a moment. But if you like the show, make sure to subscribe. Leave a five star review on Apple Podcasts. Watch us on YouTube and share with your friends. More to come after some ads. [music break]

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Jane Coaston: And now the news. 

[sung] Headlines. 

[clip of Scott Bessent] Donald Trump is has staged the biggest political comeback in history. And I think that we are on the verge of a golden age in the economy for the next four years where we can have a growth agenda, where we deregulate, get energy prices down and get interest rates down. And that will drive growth like we have not seen for years. 

Jane Coaston: Scott Bessent, Trump’s pick to be the next Treasury Secretary, was on Fox News just after the election. The billionaire and hedge fund founder was talking about Trump’s economic plans. He was one of nearly a dozen picks Trump announced on Friday and Saturday. Trump has now filled out the remainder of his incoming cabinet. Also on Friday, Trump named outgoing Oregon Congresswoman Lori Chavez-DeRemer as his labor secretary. She’s seen as a moderate Republican and had support from the Teamsters Union. For his Secretary of Housing and Urban Development, Trump picked former NFL player Scott Turner. He served in the White House during Trump’s first administration. And yes, Trump once again selected a Black American for HUD. Because, of course he did. And for everyone who naively thought Trump was serious about distancing himself from Project 2025, well, think again. He tapped Russell Vought, the coauthor of the radical right wing policy tome to head the Office of Management and Budget. Vought held the same job during Trump’s first term. Trump also named picks to head the CDC, the FDA, and for surgeon general. On Saturday, he named longtime ally Brooke Rollins as his secretary of agriculture. Rollins also served in the first Trump administration, and she currently heads the America First Policy Institute, a think tank tied to Trump that promotes his agenda. All of these picks will require Senate confirmation. Israel’s defense forces traded more fire with the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah over the weekend as diplomats continued talks for a cease fire. The IDF says Hezbollah launched 250 missiles into the country on Sunday, wounding at least six people. On Saturday, the Lebanese health ministry said that an Israeli airstrike killed at least 29 people and wounded 66 others in Beirut. It was the IDF’s fourth attack on the region in less than a week. Israeli military officials say the attack was aimed at one of Hezbollah’s leaders, but it failed. The US continues to push its proposal for a cease fire to avoid an all out war in the Middle East. Amos Hochstein, a mediator for the Biden administration, visited both countries last week. He left these talks saying that a deal was, quote, “within our grasp.” Josep Borrell, the EU’s head of foreign policy, traveled to Lebanon to rally support for the proposal from world leaders. He spoke with reporters in Beirut on Sunday. 

[clip of Josep Borrell] This conflict has already taken an international dimension, and the international community cannot stay idle in front of what is happening here. 

Jane Coaston: The agreement would require Israel to withdraw troops from southern Lebanon within 60 days. Cop 29, the annual U.N. climate summit wrapped up late Sunday in Baku, Azerbaijan. Leaders announced a major new deal to help developing countries transition to clean energy and offset the costs of damage from extreme weather. It calls for wealthy countries to put up $300 billion a year in financial support by 2035. That’s triple the existing commitment. U.N. Climate Change Executive Secretary Simon Stiell said the deal is an insurance policy against a worsening climate. 

[clip of Simon Stiell] No country got everything they wanted, and we leave Baku with a mountain of work to do. The many other issues we need to progress may not be headlines, but they are lifelines for billions of people. So this is no time for victory laps. 

Jane Coaston: Here’s the problem. A lot of people aren’t happy about the deal. Climate experts, activists in developing countries say the ten year deadline to meet the financing goal is too far away and the real need is way bigger. More like a trillion dollars annually. India’s delegation representative, Chandni Raina, called the deal, quote, “abysmally poor.” 

[clip of Chandni Raina] It is not something that will enable conducive climate action that is necessary for the survival of our country and for the growth of our people, their livelihoods. And I’m sorry to say that we cannot accept it. 

Jane Coaston: Also weighing on this year’s climate summit, Trump’s reelection. The U.S. is one of the world’s top emitters of greenhouse gases, and Trump has vowed to pull the US out of the Paris climate Agreement and expand drilling for fossil fuels. 

[clip of Elon Musk] If they waste a ton of taxpayer money, they’re going to get fired. That will immediately improve the situation, immediately. 

Jane Coaston: Over the weekend, billionaire Elon Musk used his massive platform of 205 million followers on Twitter to casually dox and harass more people who don’t deserve it. This time, random federal workers. Musk is gearing up to co-lead the very real and not fake Department of Government Efficiency or DOGE, when Trump assumes office. And one of his big promises for DOGE is that he will get rid of several federal agencies simply because there are too many of them. 

[clip of Elon Musk] I call this like a sort of strangulation by overregulation, um and this is crazy. 

Jane Coaston: Many are concerned that Musk will keep that promise and cut thousands of jobs purely because he doesn’t think those jobs matter. And they’re right to be worried because he keeps singling out random government employees by name and saying that their jobs are unnecessary. In one repost, you said, quote, “Sorry. Insert name. Gravy Train is over.” It’s worth noting that Elon Musk is a government contractor who receives significant federal funding. He also spends lots of time screaming at people on the Internet at 4:00 in the morning and retweeting memes people make about him. I’d say that is a waste of taxpayer money. And that’s the news. [music break] One more thing, at COP 29, the U.S. promised to put its money where its metaphorical mouth is on fighting climate change. We joined a bunch of other rich nations to pledge $300 billion annually to the cause. But whether or not the U.S. actually keeps that promise depends on Lee Zeldin, Trump’s nominee for head of the Environmental Protection Agency. He is a lot of things. A former New York congressman, a guy who loves Donald Trump and a 2020 election denier. But he has very little experience on environmental issues. And what experience he does have doesn’t fill me with confidence because Zeldin isn’t interested in how the U.S. could help fight climate change. Actually, it sounds like he has some ideas on how to maybe make climate change way worse. Here’s what he said on Fox News after his nomination was announced. 

[clip of Lee Zeldin] We have the ability to pursue energy dominance, to be able to make the United States the artificial intelligence capital of the world, to bring back American jobs to the auto industry and so much more. 

Jane Coaston: I don’t remember the EPA being a cheerleader for the American auto industry, but hey, maybe I just forgot. Anyway, I wanted to dig into the AI of it all, along with how Zeldin and Trump’s other nominees will shape U.S. climate policy. So I called up Crooked correspondent and longtime climate reporter Stephanie Ebbs. Stephanie, welcome to What a Day. 

Stephanie Ebbs: Thanks for having me. 

Jane Coaston: So I think a lot of listeners might hear I want to make the U.S. the AI capital of the world and think, what the hell does that have to do with the EPA? Could you help explain what all that means and what this has to do with Zeldin’s job? 

Stephanie Ebbs: So the the relevant thing to know here about artificial intelligence, and I’ll be specific that we’re not talking about all artificial intelligence, but specifically generative A.I.. So these models like ChatGPT that are really doing a lot of work. They’re powered by these data centers with millions of servers, and they use a tremendous amount of energy. Models like ChatGPT can use ten times as much energy as your standard Google search. And the other thing that happens is if you have an aging laptop like I did and you’re working on it all day long, it gets pretty hot. These data centers use a lot of water to keep those computers cool. So both of those things kind of intersect with EPA jurisdiction because EPA regulates pollutions from power plants and they regulate water quality. And a lot of these data centers are using the same water system that residents in that community are using. So Zeldin and other officials in the Trump administration might be talking about the need to grow artificial intelligence as a way to justify saying, well, we need more energy to power artificial intelligence, so you shouldn’t regulate methane from these power plants as much because the fossil fuel industry argues that those regulations make it more costly to do their business or make them less likely to expand. 

Jane Coaston: What else do we know about Zeldin’s vision for the EPA beyond his plans for AI? What promises did he make or Trump make on the campaign trail? 

Stephanie Ebbs: Their big talking point is deregulation, right? They want to get rid of the Inflation Reduction Act. It’s a very similar playbook that we heard from Trump’s first term. There are a bunch of climate oriented rules. They want to get rid of those in favor of helping business. 

Jane Coaston: I want to also talk about two of Trump’s other picks for his administration that will have a huge impact on climate but aren’t getting as much press. Let’s start with North Dakota governor and failed presidential candidate Doug Burgum. He’s lined up to be secretary of the interior. What does that role entail and what has Burgum promised to do if he’s confirmed? 

Stephanie Ebbs: The Interior Department deserves just as much attention when it comes to climate change. The Department of Interior manages all of the country’s public lands. The biggest kind of climate related question there is about leasing on federal lands. There’s a big expectation that Burgum, which has a lot of oil and natural gas production in his home state of North Dakota, is going to advocate for expanding leasing on federal lands and waters offshore. That includes the Gulf of Mexico and a lot of coastal areas. Leasing doesn’t necessarily equal production. A lot of companies will snatch up these leases because they can hold on to them for a long time. But whether or not they develop and produce them is going to depend on whether they think they can make money off of that. 

Jane Coaston: And then there’s Chris Wright. Trump tapped him to serve as the country’s energy secretary. He’s currently the CEO of a giant fracking company, which I think might be kind of telling. But what are his plans for energy? 

Stephanie Ebbs: He’s made some comments that that lead people to associate him with climate denial. And part of his philosophy when it comes to that is supporting all kinds of energy. Like he will argue there’s no such thing as dirty energy and clean energy. All energy has consequences. And the Department of Energy is the agency that supports a lot of the research into these climate solutions. So we could very well see less of a focus on clean energy or renewable sources like wind and solar in favor of of more of a prioritization of fossil fuel related technologies, as well as nuclear or technologies like geothermal power. 

Jane Coaston: And with all of this in mind, where does AI come in when we look at all three of these people and how they’ll impact the global effort to combat climate change? 

Stephanie Ebbs: The way I’m kind of reading the situation so far is that AI goes along with this narrative that energy is about supporting business, and energy is about the economy way more than it is about climate change. And energy is a huge driver in the economy. But I think what we can expect to see is that the incoming Trump administration will be focusing more on this energy dominance and supporting artificial intelligence as a big business sector, which could mean allowing more fossil fuel development to continue in order to support that. I think kind of the flip side of this is that there’s a lot of potential and work going on to use AI as a tool in addressing climate change as well. It can really speed up research into climate solutions. It has great potential as a tool, but if growing it also adds to the pollution problem and the emissions problem. Is the tool really that helpful? 

Jane Coaston: Stephanie, thank you so much for coming on. 

Stephanie Ebbs: Thanks, Jane. 

Jane Coaston: That was my conversation with Crooked correspondent Stephanie Ebbs. [music break]. 

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Jane Coaston: That’s all for today. If you like the show, make sure you subscribe. Leave a review. Don’t pay Matt Gaetz $500 and tell your friends to listen. And if you’re into reading and not just the list of Fox News hosts who could find their way into Trump’s cabinet like me, What a Day is also a nightly newsletter. Check it out and subscribe at Crooked.com/subscribe. I’m Jane Coaston. And seriously, don’t pay Matt Gaetz. No one wants to hear from Matt Gaetz. [music break] What a Day is a production of Crooked Media. It’s recorded and mixed by Desmond Taylor. Our associate producer is Raven Yamamoto. Our producer is Michell Eloy. We had production help today from Tyler Hill, Johanna Case, Joseph Dutra, Greg Walters, and Julia Claire. Our senior producer is Erica Morrison and our executive producer is Adriene Hill. Our theme music is by Colin Gilliard and Kashaka. [music break]

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