D NBA Playoffs, Zion Williamson controversy, Pee Diddy more controversy, Harvard versus Trump, Elon Musk and Trump and Jamal Charlow with a boxing match this weekend in the house.
Personally, there's a lot going on with The Steven A. Smith Show and I'm here for it. Let's roll.
What's up?
Everybody?
Welcome to the latest edition of The Stephen A. Smith Show, coming at you as I love to do it at the very least three times a week over the digital airways of YouTube and of course iHeartRadio. As always, before I get into any subject matters, I like to pause for a moment to thank my subscribers and followers the millions of downloads courtesy of iHeartRadio, a subscriber base over the digital airways of YouTube that has now eclipsed one point twenty two million. Can't thank y'all for the love
and support enough for the show. Keep it coming, and I'm gonna keep on coming. To continue to like and follow the show, just click the bell and get notified for all of our newest content, and you too shall be considered the latest member of the Steven ATE Smith Show family. And while you're doing that, Please don't forget to pick up a copy of my New York Times best selling book, Straight Shooter, a Memoir of Second Chances
and First Takes, now in paperback. Just go to straight shoot book dot com to get yourself a copy once to get that straightsheet to book dot com to get yourself a copy. If you notice usually on the screen, you'll see you know, hey, straight Shooter Media. I named my production company my media company after my book, So that's the correlation.
In case you were wondering. Let's get started with a few things.
Obviously, I got Trump and must to get into Trump and Harvard to get into and what that's gonna bean free speech in the United States of America, Diddy, Oh lord, I got my mayor Ryan Smith coming up. Considering the stuff that we've been hearing that's going on in that trial, Oh my goodness, that's a lot to talk about as well. And of course Jamal Cello, former junior middleweight to middleweight champion of the world, now looking to become super middleweight
champion of the world. But he's got to win. He was enacted for the last eighteen months. We're gonna talk to him for a little bit. But before we do any of that, let's get started with the NBA playoffs and the Eastern Conference Finals, where the New York Knicks have forced the Game six back in Indy against the Pacers to borrow night. The Knicks looked or locked up the Pacers last night, holding them to just ninety four points while Jalalen Brunson and call Anthony Towns led to
charge for New York. Brunton came out swinging, of course, dropping thirty two points on Indy, while Town's finished with twenty four points and thirteen rebounds on a gimpy leg, so give him credit for that. But again, defensively, the Knicks held the Face just forty percent shooting.
For the game.
Tyrese Halliburton, who was the hero in Game four with that thirty point triple double, was held to just eight points on two for eight shooting.
And that is where.
We go because when you look at Tyrese Halliburton, Listen, there's been a debate going back and for Superstar Superstar not Superstar.
And the brother can Ball.
You got a whole bunch of haters in the NBA calling him overrated. That's bs, He's not overrated. The brother can ball. But there's been at least thirteen or fourteen games this year where he scored in single digits.
That's not a superstar in this league.
You're the number one option their game planning for you every single night, and every single night it's a given that you answered the call. The Steph Curries of the world know about this. The Lebron James of the world knows about this. Back in the day, it was Russell Westbrook. It's still Kevin Durant. By the way, you're still Yannis, it's still Jokic. Those are superstars. Anybody else you're not getting that title, can't give you that title. So we
gotta be clear about that. But Tyrese Halliburton can ball, make no mistake about it. And because of how horrid he was in Game five at Madison Square Garden last night, I'm certainly not anticipating he's gonna be that way in Game six. I think he's gonna look to be aggressive. He's gonna look to find this shot him and Pascal Siakam and if the New York Knicks are gonna walk away with a victory, notching the series to three to three and forcing the game seven at Madison Square Garden.
It's going to have to be because Jalen Brunson and Karl Anthony Town show up with their A game, And it's gonna have to be because Michel Bridges and og Annobe show up and handle their business and do what the hell they're supposed to do. Now, let me be very very clear about what I'm saying when I'm thinking about og Anobi. Okay, that's two hundred twenty million dollars. It's two hundred twenty million dollars, two hundred and twelve million dollars. It's contract he got, damn it. You came
out of Toronto when the Knicks acquired you. Bottom line is, nobody expected you to be a two hundred million dollar player, but you've developed into that. And I'm very very happy you got your money because Lord knows you can defend.
You need to tomorrow night. You need to Tomorrow night.
Somebody gotta help shut down Pascal Siakam.
And if you're Michel Bridges, my brother, the Knicks gave up five first round picks for you for unprotected.
If the New York Knicks can't get their hands on a Jannis Anthe, the Gounfo or Kevin Durant to get him to come to the garden or somebody else.
You know, everybody gonna look at you, right because the New York Knicks would be devoid of the.
Assets to appease of Milwaukee or Phoenix or anybody else for that matter. And as a result, we gonna look at it because most of the assets were given away to acquire you. Michael Bridges. I believe in you, brother. I believe in your spirit. I believe in in your reliability. I believe in your presence.
You got to show up. You got to show up. It's just that simple.
I don't think I give the Knicks about a thirty percent chance to win this game. I'm hopeful, of course, because I'm a diehard New York Knicks fan, because I'm a native of New York and I love my Knicks. But realistically speaking, neutrally, just basketball expertise, I give the Knicks a thirty percent chance. It's nice to see Tom Thibodeaux using this bench now. It's really really good to see that. I get it, I understand it, no problem.
But who can we really trust? Can Jayon Brnst to stay out of foul trouble.
Can call Anthony town stop committing stupid fouls and stay out of foul trouble so we can have them on the court so he can make shots that need to be made, particularly since he has his way with Indiana and he drops the average is thirty on fifty seven since shurting. Come on, bro, this is what he's done against Indiana this year during the regular season. It's the playoffs. Now, stop getting in foul trouble. We don't need you on
the bench. And then Tim's gotta put in Mitchell Robinson and they engage in a Hacker Robinson philosophy because they know he's gonna go to the to the free throw line and miss half the shots.
We need Carl Anthony Towns of the game, stay in the game.
Even with all that being said, Indiana's gonna be a lower because Halliburton is no joke.
Siakam is no joke.
Nie Smith and them hard is gonna have something to say about this outcome.
Hell TJ.
Mcconne's gonna have something to say about this this outcome. Not to forget Matherne, who's been good the last two games. The brother had twenty points in twelve minutes in Game four, he had.
About seventeen last night in Game five.
Indiana's d and if I'm being totally honest, they make for better finals then New York against OKAC because I don't know if New York will win a game against it's the OKCE thunder. Whereas I could see, Indiana went into of those games because they have offensive prowess and they could score. But Oklahoma City is gonna win the championship. So that's all I wanted to say for now. Enjoy
the games over the weekend. We'll talk more about this on Monday when the outcome is decided and or you know, unless there's a game seven Monday.
Night, we'll see, we'll see.
Got something else I need to get into right now, because it's time to get to a headline that broke earlier today, literally about an hour or two ago, and that's a lawsuit filed against Zion Williamson of the New Orleans Pelicans alleging rape and kidnapping. The suit comes from a woman using the pseudonym Jane Doe, who claimed to be an ex girlfriend who alleged she dated Zion back at twenty eighteen when he played for Duke.
Jane Doe alleges that.
In twenty twenty, a little over a year after Williamson left Duke to join the New Orleans Pelicans, the basketball star raped and assaulted her.
In southern California. Look, y'all, I have.
An obligation from this microphone to be very very careful. Rape is a very serious allegation. Sexual assaula is a very serious allegation, and we certainly don't want to summarily dismiss anybody making those claims because history has proven, according to stats and data, that many, many times that women have been abused and assaulted, it's been years before the assaulters have been brought to justice in some kind of way.
So we understand that, and we understand that the times that we're living in is by and large because of some involving no good ass men who would do such a heinous thing to a woman, And in other situations it's involving men who turned the blind eye and a deaf ear to it all. Now, there are plenty of men that have daughters, they have sisters, that have wonderful moms, who loved the women in their life and fine and would never do such a thing and would be ready to kick anybody's ass who is guilty.
Of such a thing. And I'm certainly one of those people.
But I can't help but asking myself, what about the innocent ones? What about the ones who are falsely accused? That's why listen. Jay Z was in the news months ago because of what he was accused of involving a thirteen year old girl, and he fought like hell, case ultimately dropped, and he's still going after Tony Busby, the lawyer representing the accused with the pseuitonym, and we understand that, and maybe Zion Williamson will go that route, maybe he won't.
I just hate the fact that he's in the news years after being in the NBA for something that's alleged to have happened at least five years ago by an accuser whose name we do not know, and now he's in the news for being accused of this crime at some point in time. It's a lengthy discussion, and I welcome ladies coming on his growth associated with women's groups and what have you coming on this show and talking about this subject, but also men who have been falsely accused.
We don't know if that's the case with Zion or anybody else. We get that part, But that brother's had enough problem trying to get healthy to be on the basketball court so he can validate, you know what, We all assumed he would be on the basketball court because he's a man amongst boys on the basketball court, make no mistake about it, and when healthy, he can do major, major damage. He's an all star caliber player. But he's never on the damn court, which is essentially ruined the
Pelicans franchise because you can't rely on him. But you just find yourself saying, damn, damn. Another accusation. And again we don't know what the outcome will be. What we know is that until some outcome has decided, this accusation will be out there about him, and in all likelihood it will forever remain, and this accusation will stain him. I just wish that we can come to conclusion sooner
than later. And if somebody is innocent, particularly after being falsely accused, there's a price to pay for those who falsely accuse others. If you're guilty of such a thing, throw your ass under the jail. Rape, sexual assault, these unforgivable sins in some people's eyes. When you do that to a woman, you have murdered her. You have killed a part of her. And all of us who love women, love our sisters, love our daughters, love our mamas, etc. We ain't down for that. It ain't man who is.
We should want nothing to do with all I can say at this particular moment in time, because I don't have any evidence to speak on anything else.
Other than to say, I hope he's innocent. I really do. I hope he wouldn't be guilty of such a thing. But it's in the news. It's in the news, Damn Shane.
Coming up, President Donald Trump escalated his war with Harvard University. We've got the latest as the administration accuses Harvard of treating the country as a disrespect But first, the latest in the federal sex trafficking and racketeering trial.
Against Sean Diddy Combs.
We'll hear what a former assistant had to say about the rap mobul, and we'll ask a legal analyst if the rat mobul should take the.
Stand in his own defense. All that and more coming up. It's the Stephen N. Smith Show. Don't go away, you got more to come.
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Hey, Hey, rent your game. Welcome back. Now Let's get to the latest in the federal sex trafficking and racketeering trial against Sean Diddy Combs. Testimony resumed this morning from a former assistant using the pseudonym Mia. This is her second day of testimony where Mia said Combs physically and sex assaulted her numerous times when she worked for him. Mia says that she also felt trapped with no safe
way to report the abuse she suffered. The former assistant testified she was suspended several times from her job for different reasons, including accidentally falling asleep after being awake for days, and reacting to one of Comb's violent episodes. The jury saw an email Mia received from human resources following the incident that noted she was suspended without pay for five days. Mia testified she was told her suspension was because Combs
said she was being insubordinate. Colmbs is pleaded not guilty the charges that include racketeering, conspiracy, and sex trafficking. If convicted on all accounts, he could face up to life in prison. Joining me now to discuss this and other elements of the trial this week is Ryan Smith. Contributed to the show Legal Analyst Extraordinaire for ABC Sports Center anchor as well. We welcome back to the show, Ryan, how are you man, how's everything?
Goodness? See step How you doing man?
Oh man? This case is crazy. Man, I'm doing well, but I'm doing a hell of a lot.
Better than Diddy. Let's get that out the way. It definitely hell of a lot better than him. I want to pick up from where I just left off. What's the significance of me A's testimony this morning.
It's huge, not only from the perspective that she talks about how she was sexually assaulted by Ditty, which is a big part of the prosecution's case, but it's also part of their racketeering case. Part of what they're trying to prove is a forced labor element of his racketeering case, essentially saying he had people like Mia working for days in a row under force of threats or cores and
what threats. There's threats that she has over text message of communications where he's saying I'm gonna tell everything things like sexual assault that she experienced in her mind that might be told to Cassie and others that might hurt her. So what they're trying to put together to MEA's testimony
is a couple of different things. First is that there was an element of forced labor going on under Ditty, where people felt like they had to do things that were extreme under force of like threat or violence.
She talks about how.
He threw a computer at hers who spaghetti at her back, concerned led her to be in this forced labor situation. She's also there to cooperate elements of Cassie story, Cassie talking about the sexual assaults she went through, and now Mia talking about what she experienced as part of the overall case of did he having this criminal enterprise, having all these people working for him, planning certain things, doing certain things to cover up the crimes they believe he was committed.
So what else stood out to you in court this week? I mean that seems like more than enough. Was there anything else that stood out to you?
Over the last.
Tipcorn Clark's testimony that was huge. I mean, this.
Woman talking about everything she went through working for him, working with him that contributed to the elements of kidnapping and arson. Because you talk about kid Cutty, that whole situation we talked about this last week Steve and A. The idea of kid Cutty feels that he did he tried to bomb his Porsche.
That's the arson part.
So she's talking about all the different relationships that Cassie have a Kid Cutty, how did he found out, and the reactions he had coming to her house, the gun, forcing her to go one place. That's part of the force, coercion and all of this, and then doing these things like breaking into kid Cutty's house. He talks about everything that happened there, and that seems then assigned to go
and tell him not to talk to the police. All of this works into this criminal enterprise they're starting to talk about here, this idea that he owned or operated and associated this enterprise of doing crimes and had all these people doing things to help facilitate that. When we talked last week, we talked about, hey, where is all of this going. Now we're starting to see stephen a where all this is going. It's not just about the accusations of sexual assault, the accusations of being a bad boss,
the accusations of doing things of threatening violence. It's the fact for prosecutors that he is doing all of these things to sort of facilitate criminal activity, and then on the other end, involving all these people to do these things for him to either conceal it or to keep it going and then doing an under force of threats or coercion, saying to people like Mia, hey you do, or the in situation is hey you do. You don't do this for me, I'm gonna tell everything about what
happened with you and me. You do so on somebody else. You don't come with me. I've got a gun. You gotta come with me, even if you don't want to. This is the prosecution starting to lay out that most powerful case on racketeering. That's what they need to get to get the maximum time in jail.
And it's interesting that you bring that up because obviously when we've had you on, we've had you on covering this for us, and we really really appreciate it. You made a point to say, basically, be patient, just wait. They're just starting to make their case. You know, when you're talking about him and his behavior domestic violence, that's not sex, sex trafficking, that's not racketeering. They're laying the
groundwork for their case. You kept emphasizing that. Right now, How are you feeling about what the government is doing and how they're doing in presenting this case against Diddy? What kind of a grade would you give them right.
Now gundplus to a minus, maybe even a.
And here's why they have their duck in a row, and they have their information set and their witnesses from what we're seeing in court, are testifying very very well.
What do I mean by that, Well, the groundwork part of it, like.
You talk about when you first, when we first started talking about this, you asked me how long this case would last. I said six to eight weeks. Now they're even saying it could go five weeks. So this case is picking up steam. The prosecution is not only efficiently presenting their case, because Steve and you got to think about this as like people are sitting in that court room.
Every day for hours hearing this stuff.
If it drags on and on and on and prosecution can't be very efficient with their points, you start losing jurors. They're going fast, they're going smoothly, and they're getting out information very quickly and very precisely.
That's helpful for the jury.
Not only that, cross examination becomes huge here because these people are getting pressed back.
Let's say, for example, me and capitals, we're getting pressed Yeah, they're getting pressed.
Back on their social media posts, all these things they posted with Diddy. These witnesses are prepared though they're talking about, hey, I posted this on this day, Yes, but it didn't mean I didn't feel this way at the time they're talking about with Capricorn Clark, they tried to press her on the fact of did he have a gun? Yes, he had a gun. I had to go with him because they had a gun. That's witness preparation right there.
You don't want that witness getting up there hemming and hauling, opening up other lines of questioning.
Now, the defense is doing what they can do.
But what the speed of this case and the witness testimony I'm reading is showing me are prosecuting witnesses that are very well prepared and a prosecution team that is slowly and methodically but efficiently building that case for Rico.
It's not an easy thing to do.
And from what I'm seeing so far reading because we're not able to see it on TV, what I'm reading so far, they seem to be doing a very good job.
Well, we're just reading. You're not just reading. You're in the legal profession. You got sources all over the place. I know you listen to Ryan Smith of me. How is the tell us.
Tell us how the legal profession feels.
The defense is doing in light of how good the prosecution looks right now, what are you hearing about what the legal system I'm talking about your colleagues, your contemporarate lawyers.
What do they feel about how the defense is doing.
Lawyers I know and people I talk to, they think the defense got an uphill taste to begin with. I mean, this was a tough This is a very tough taste to be Steve, and you and I have talked about this before. This prosecution office one of the best in the world. I mean, this is top notch, best lawyers you can get. That's number one. So you're fighting a really good lawyer on the other side. The second thing is he has a lot of bad facts against him.
He's got lots of people coming forward talking about sexual assault abuse, So he's got a lot of people talking about the systems, how things ran, how use threats and coeris them to get them to do certain things. This is the Rico case. So they've got so much going against them. How are they doing? From people I talk to, the defense is doing well because you play the hand
that you have. That's the key with defense. I think sometimes people think, well, defense lawyers are going to come out and have this smoking gun that nobody saw coming.
That's not gonna happen. That's not gonna happen because there's so many bad facts.
I apologize, I wasn't. I didn't mean that.
Ask how to lawyers your contemporaries feel the defense is doing in terms of are they doing a good job or are they not? I'm meant to ask, are they do are they confident they're gonna be able to get this man off?
That's what I'm asking to win.
This case because you can have lawyers, you can have lawyers there. I think they're doing good based on the hand of debt, they're doing an excellent job. I'm asking are there chances improving or dissipating towards getting them off?
You're asking me what I think or you're asking what they would tell you if they were being honest.
I'm asking you and your contemporaries, what do y'all peel from what y'all have read, what y'all have heard?
What's the scuttle? But in your profession about how it's looking for.
Diddy get worse and worse by the day.
Get worse and worse by the day, and every every bit of testimony, I gear it's.
Getting harder and harder for him.
To get off.
I think his chances are well below fifty percent of beating these charges.
And you and I talked about this last week.
Perhaps they're is a way this jury looks at this, doesn't believe certain witnesses and does what we call a compromise verdict. We're gonna convict on some things that are lesser charges, and maybe not on racketeering.
That's perhaps something that might happen here.
But I got to tell you, stephen A, what I'm seeing here is this racketeering case being built very well.
That's the main part of this case.
When you have witnesses coming up and talking about he did this violence, he did that violence.
We expected that.
What I think is really interesting to me is how these witnesses are testifying that he would use that. I'm gonna say this about you. If you don't do this, I brought a Glenn. You're coming with me. You're gonna do this with kid cutting. You're gonna talk to him and tell him not to talk to This is exactly what people say happens in regal cases, and you got a jury who might be looking at it like well,
regal cases. I think of mob cases. I think people have to understand what do you think happens in those cases? It's a my boss allegedly telling somebody else to do this, do that. I'm not getting my hands dirty, You're gonna do all these things, and I'm directing and Steve nay. There's a no part of this that I think might resonate with this jury that I think we have to
keep our eye on. These are women, in particular, young women coming forward talking about the forced labor, the violence perpetrated on them, the ways in which they were forced to do things at gunpoint. If you believe capricainclar if you talk about what Capri Capricorn Clark talked about the things that he would say about them, will jurors look at this and say he's treating women like this? And when we think about a mob case, we think different
men trying to prove things to other men. I wonder if there will be a dynamic of this of these young women in MIA's case, somebody in their twenties trying to work in the music business and all of a sudden realizing they're in these situations.
Right.
You know, I appeared on Law and Order recently. You know, I got killed. I got killed in first five minutes, you know. But it was on my bucket list because I'm a Law and Order fanatic. I always watched the show, right, and we often see the defense coming to the prosecution looking to make a deal, okay, and sometimes the prosecution except it because obviously you represent the state, and you know, the quicker the case ends, the less money you have
to spend, et cetera, et cetera. In real life, in the real world, what if Diddy's defense came and went to the prosecution and saying, they're not looking pretty good for us, but you know what, we'd like to plead to a lesser charge.
This prosecution the Southern District of New York.
They strike me as a bud. They're gone for blood. They want this man. They ain't trying to settle. They don't want to settlement. That's how That's what I'm getting from this to that.
You say, what a ship has sailed? That deal ship I think has sailed. Look, stephen A, I'm not a part of their office, so I can't say if somebody there might say, hey, if here's what we don't know.
We're in week two, week three of this case.
If something goes really wrong for the prosecution that's unexpected, that might change this dynamic. But if it keeps going the way it's going, I would say that ship sailed.
That ship probably sailed.
Not long after the raid or not, maybe a couple months after they started whispering things of charges, because for him, the more he has been defiant, the more you put a prosecution in a place of well, he's been saying for months, these are all lies.
This isn't true. I didn't assault anybody, didn't do any of this.
And now the prosecution has to deal not only with their case, but the fact that in the public opinion, this case has taken on huge attention, and you don't want to be perceived as I'm letting them off the hook, especially if you have a strong case. So in my opinion, that ship has sailed unless there is something that we don't know or something unexpected happens for the prosecution.
I kind of agree with you because I believe even if they don't do anempt an exemplary job of proving sex trafficking and racketeering. I think they made such a case for depicting him as a monster that you're going to have jurors that say, no, his ass going to jail.
The hell with it. I'm gonna say he's guilty for this too.
I mean, I really feel like it can get that bad. But let me move on to this next quest because I know you got to get you out of here. Suge Knight called in the CNN last night, said Combs should take the stand in his own defense. Combs actually did back in two thousand and one, if you remember, when he testified in the Manhattan nightclub shooting that sent rapper Shine a prison for ten years. Combs was acquitted of all charges in that case. By the way, we've
got to mention that. But Ryan Smith, is it possible that he'll end up taking the stand in this trial?
And should he? Would you advise him to do so?
No, not at all.
I don't want to get on the wrong side of Shug now, that's number one.
But look, neither do we. Neither do we.
But I'll tell you what that is a last resort of last resorts. I know that people watch long look. Steven Amal on order fan too. I know people watch shows like that. They see people take the stand. Sometimes they see people hers minds being changed, something comes out.
Oh my god, I can't believe it. That is a rarity. This is something you don't do, not want.
The moment he takes the stand and opens his mouth, everything about his life is fair.
Game, including stuff that they would not bring into court.
Now he's opening his mouth, Let's talk him about those things that wouldn't have been admissible because he opened his mouth on him. Once he opens the door on some of that stuff, things that he might not even be thinking about, ways in which he might want to defend himself that his lawyers tell him not to say, but maybe he could say, because anything can happen on that stand. Now you're diving yourself into an even deeper hole. So for me that I do not think he should do it.
I would never advise it. And honestly, even if everything was against him, I would still say no, because once you open that door, that could change everything about what you as a defendant. With you as a person who's on truck, things could happen to you.
And I think it's easy for people to think about it outside of that, like I'm gonna prove myself. But that is not how it plays out in the court room.
Maybe I'm just maybe I'm thinking a little bit differently because I got.
To open my mouth for a living.
I mean, you host, I commentate, you know, and so I'm thinking about, Oh my.
God, people accused of it.
I got the city and listen to all of these people talk, and I can't say anything in my defense.
Not for all you want, Ryan, but steven A, I see you get cross examined.
But now let's imagine you getting cross examined on.
Your own words for days in a row, and not only that, on things that might have flowed from those words that you didn't even bring up.
That's the problem with cross examination.
You open a door, and that door can be so much wider than you think.
Let me throw this by you.
I don't know if you've seen the reports percolating right now, my man, they're talking about how Trump President Donald Trump has not closed the door on pardoning p Diddy.
For this sex trafficking and racketearing case. I mean, what do you make of that?
Ryan, I mean, and how do you anticipate something like that could potentially influence the prosecution.
I don't even know what to say to that.
Okay, So the first thing is if Diddy's convicted, he can do it.
Yeah, President's not can do it. That's number one. Number two. Other than as a prosecutor, I would not let that affect me in any way. Here's the deal. My job is to prosecute the case. That's it. My job is to prosecute the case.
If the president chooses to do something else, then he choose to do something else. Now, some people might be out there thinking, Okay, if the prosecution here's this, maybe that makes them want to make a deal.
That is not how I would approach it.
If I was a prosecutor, I would say I can't control those things. What I can control is the case I prosecute. And also what I can control is what my office does. And what my office does is we brought this reco case, and we brought this sex trafficking case, and because we believe that we could win it, so.
We're gonna pursue that.
If something happened in the courtroom to change that and we needn't make a deal, fine, but I wouldn't do that on the basis of what someone outside of the case, says, because to me, that's where you start second guessing yourself, and you erote your case once you start doing that. So if I'm prosecutors, that's noise. My case is my case inside the courtroom, and that's what I focus on.
Any idea, how you think that would influence the deal or dare I say, a jury if they somehow, some way became aware that the president is just lurking being quoted as saying, did he once.
Liked me a lot?
You know?
I mean we would we got along just fine.
I mean, could you imagine it having any kind of impact on a.
Jury or the defense and its approach?
Knowing there's a possibility, maybe that's an angle they could work in a month to come.
I don't think it would have much of an impact on the defense other than they too have to kind of go with what's in that courtroom. They're bound by the in that courtroom, the judge is what matters, the jury is what matters. Outside actors do not matter. So for them, they got to focus on that.
Now. Could they use that later? If did He is convicted they're trying to appeal.
If there's rumblings about that, maybe that's a different discussion. But what I really worry about, stephen A, is what you just said. A juror somehow finding out about this. You know, I just want to say this as a person who's practiced law for decades, the courts are just
we don't realize how precious this institution is. We don't realize how amazing it is that we live in a society where people can be on trial and jurors can sit there and they can actually not read anything, see anything, and take the process so seriously that nothing outside affects them. It makes me sad that someone on the outside would say something maybe or not realizing how that could taint
somebody and possibly take this process. Because I gotta say, step and and this is not me just saying, this just the greatest process in the world. And I know a lot of people feel like courts go against us, go against black folks.
I understand that part of it.
I'm just saying, like, the integrity of the court system is so vital to making these cases in any way fair.
And if we start having.
People say things on the outside that could perhaps get to a djur man, that's disappointing because that's a slippery slope.
We don't want to go down before.
I let you go, uh Zion Williamson. You see the accusation that has been leveled against him. A former girl that he was involved with is saying that he raped and assaulted her. I believe it was twenty twenty. I spoke about it a little bit early on the show. Just make listen. I don't know what the hell has happened. I don't know what's going on. I wasn't an eyewitness.
I can't I know, I can't speak to it. I just think that the times that we're living in, when somebody can make an accusation, I find myself saying to the guilty, I hope they throw your ass under the jail. To those who are innocent and being lied upon, it's sad because the presumption of guilt in this day and age, adding a social media and beyond, is going to be attached to you. What are your thoughts about that as a legal mind, as a journalist as well, what are your thoughts about that?
Well, first of all, I look at a situation like this, and again you said it, we're just finding out about this.
We don't know all the details.
But the moment I looked at it, I think it's important to say, first of all, it's a civil case.
This is not a criminal case.
This is someone filing a complaint, making an allegation. I think the first thing I look at in these situations and Stephen ABC a more or more these days, was this a consensual relationship that in some way didn't go the way one party or another planned? Or was this a situation where there were elements of assault?
And to me, it goes like this.
The first thing, and you mentioned it because the times we live in, I wouldn't be surprised to see an NBA investigation into this. They're gonna follow what's happening, and in some way, that's going to follow Zion no matter how it plays out. The second thing, though, and I think the more pressing thing for him is this legal process.
I think there is a playbook we've seen sometimes with folks who say, when these accusations come, they're false, they're based with I understand that that's essentially what Zion Williams since people are saying.
But I think what's going to be really important for.
Him is to make sure that in this case that if it's completely false and completely baseless. Then he's going to need to make sure he is saying that specifically and not just saying this person is lying.
I think what we've learned more and.
More nowadays is conduct that people have when one person thinks it's one thing, somebody else thinks it's something else.
It can be used in these kinds of cases.
To be real assault, to be real litigation, to have real civil consequences. So I don't know what happened between Zion and this particular person, but I think the consequences here could be very big based on what happened in that relationship, And I think it's very important for Zion Williamson and his people to come out and not just
do the thing of hey, this person is false. I know there might be nuances here, but also to understand that we live in a society now where people who make these accusations, we need to be looking at these carefully, and we need to be making sure that his conduct in some ways, if it did cross the line, he needs to be addressing that. He needs to be addressing that and not simply be dismissing someone if something crossed the line.
Ryan Smith Legal Landlas's extraordinaire for ABC News as well as the Sports center hosts for ESPN. My buddy, I appreciate the contribution to the show as always, my man, take care of yourself and have a wonderful weekend. I would like to say, we'll be talking a little bit down the road, but it's gonna be real sooner than that, because I'm coming in the finals.
You know me, see you soon. I'm ready, I got you, I got you coming up.
President Donald Trump escalated his war with hum the university, going after the ability to enroll foreign students.
But what does it all mean.
I'll get into that next right here, Steven Nate Smith Show, Don't Go Away.
Welcome back to Steve Nate Smith Show.
My next guest has a boxing record of thirty three and zero.
With twenty two knockouts.
Tomorrow night, he returns to the ring after an eighteen month hiatus at the michelob Ultra Arena in Las Vegas, Nevada, to take on South Jersey's Thomas Lamana, whose record is thirty nine to five and one with eighteen knockouts. He's been here before, even though I'm his brother's been here before.
He's here now.
The one and only Jamal Charlo, the hit Man, the modern day hit man.
What's up, big time? How are you man?
How's everything from Stephen? How you doing?
Man?
Now? Where the hell have you been?
Man?
I mean, you're too damn great, You're undefeated, You're too damn good for us not to go eighteen months without seeing your fight.
Where you been?
Man?
You know, sometimes uh pim here wounds, you know, and sometimes you know, I had to step away and you know, get myself back focused and get back right. And some of the fights that I was looking for, they wasn't happening, and you know, getting a little holders, just had to take care of.
My kids and just just you know, hid none of the rock working.
You know, I saw you and the last time we saw each other face to face was at the Aerospinch Junior and Turns Crawford way in and I remember talking to you because your little brother was about to fight Canelo, and I'm like, wait a minute, you bigger. You know, I said, you' the one that's supposed to be in that ring with him, and that didn't happen. And I thought that that would have been an epic fight. When you look at your career and the bottom line is
you're undefeated, but people barely talk about you. How much has that resonated with you and made you eight to get back in the ring?
Man, it does feed my eagerness. Uh.
And then now I'm getting a little bit more educated or like, you know, uh process and how everything you know happens. And some of these fighters that is trying to fight me on that big level of that big stage, it's not even on them. It's it's these promoters, uh, some of the stingy people, some of the people that's uh that's over the headquarters it you know, it's it's so hard to make these fights happen, and we with
the same handle as half of the time. So honestly, uh, you know, the big fights is you know they're on the way. But now we're starting to the fighters themselves are starting to promote the fight. They starting to make the fights happen now, so it's fighter versus fighters.
You know, I get criticized because listen, listen, I'm a fan of you and your brother.
I always have been, and damn it, I'm always gonna be because I like y'all.
I like y'all both, okay, and I remember you know, when you got yourself into some issu, used the crash into the Lamborghini and got arrested, all of this other stuff. I was saying to you when I saw you, I was saying to you what I had said on television.
You've been through a lot.
You've been going through a lot emotionally, and I'm glad you brought up that stuff about, you know, other fighters, because it seemed like you looked at the system, whether it was the fighters, the promoters, you were struggling to figure out what the hell was going on and why you were going through some of the things that you've
gone through. What do you have to say to the boxing audience right now about all you've been through and why they should believe you're back and you're here to stay for the foreseeable future, as opposed to being somebody that's going to disappear in another year.
Or two from Baltimore. Heart.
My fans still with me that that honestly knew what I was going through at the time. I really wanted those big fights and they wasn't happening. And a lot of times, you know, we don't know what we're going through at the moment, and yeah, I was that on that verge of crashing out, but you know, I stay focused. And the reason they should know that this is not gonna happen ever again, because like you know, I moved forward and I gave it all the guy now, so
I know God got the best interest of me. Fans that that have been there for me and that you know understand me. They know that I'm here to go get another world tight away at one sixty eight, and I'm here to stay.
I'm here to stay. I'm back, I'm better.
The little time off is something I needed to heal myself and I did mentally physically ani muscling.
So I'm back in the ring.
When you say that you were close to crashing out, not my words, Your words tell an audience specifically what you mean by that.
I was giving up in my mind. You know, I gave up on myself sometimes, some of them dark nights. And when I was in my dark places, I you know, I didn't have no one to turn to.
Uh.
I was actually embarrassed to go to my mom. I was embarrassed to go to my brother. I started me going around my brother then and my mom and my family and my friends. People that were close to me like that I was bringing negative energy that they might want to be around. Nobody wants to try to handle
it on my own. But then I just stepped out the little box and kind of gave it to God and started giving everything, you know, all my problems to put it on the table facing them and batter on myself crashing out like I was, you know, of not caring about what the next person thought about me or how I felt about it. To my fans and my you know, people who really understood me, I just didn't want to listen at the time, and it took me some you know, some some shaping up to do.
I got back, and I feel like I'm back and I'm stronger and I'm better.
How much, if at all, has your brother helped you? And how close are you guys?
Now?
My brother definitely helped me. I even said some things to him when I was going through I was going through that, you know, I regret saying. And we got that one bond where you know, we talked about it.
We figured that wasn't the move. And you know, and me and my twin brother we real close. Now. We see how he understood what I was going through.
You know, it's just one of those things, you know, Like my brother always got me, so he motivated me more I got. We're back training together. We went back to our whole roots. We both got our first trainer, back to amateur trainer that we started this boxing stuff off with, and we both trained together.
We got our boxing gym together. We you know, we're back on.
You know, he went through the Panella fight and I wish I could have been there a little bit more, but I blame that on me. So now it's my turn to get in there with him.
I'm wondering whether or not that's ever gonna happen. I think you got business to handle with Caleb Plant first. However, you got this fight because you can't take anything for granted in the boxing when you know that a hell of a lot better than me or most people talk to me about this fight coming up. Who this brother is and what you think he brings to the table, particularly going up against the likes of you, this guy Thomas Lamana.
I mean, I'm not taking nothing away from Thomas Lamada. He has experienced, he has like thirty nine fights or WHATNOTU He's a tall guy. Rangeye he's been in the amates, he's been around boxing for a while. He's not it's not like a push off in o'halko. He's just you know, he's never been in there with a Jamal Charlotte. I don't come to lose, I don't.
Come to play.
I'm gonna try to be as precise as I can. I'm gonna feed him everything that he's developed for. The defense makes a championship, you know that. So my defense will be on point. I'll be sharp, I'm faster, I'm better. I'm telling you I only could talk about it, but I rather to show you, you know. But had time to timas Mamala for stepping up and being you know who he said you're gonna be you know, I mean, we're gonna see you know, hopefully he can stand up to the punishment of it or not.
You know, it is what it is.
We fight for the w b A so to be my third world title and in my third vision.
That's right, you're already wanted general middleweight in the middleweight title, and you're undefeated, and now you're going for a super middleweight title. Everybody believes that this is the setup. Obviously, you're on the undercard. Caleb Plan is on the main card, the main event that night, And everybody's heard about y'all history where you know, you know you, you grabbed his
bed and supposedly slapped you and all this stuff. Y'all don't like each other, but according to reports, y'all have talked to each other, and y'all like, I ain't gonna call y'all friends or anything like that, but y'all understand the business that comes with it. Right now, everybody's looking forward to you ultimately fighting that dude. How much are you looking forward? How much does this fight service motivation?
Knowing that in all likelihood Caleb Plant will be next, assuming he handles his business Saturday night.
Right, he has the interim title.
Uh, the super should be the super champion should be vacated Zoon and me and Kelen Plant, it.
Should be fighting for that world title.
I want to fight. That's the fight that the fans want. That's the fight that needs to happen. No if ends a buss about it. Uh, you know the Canelo fight here, that's a cool fight, But the fans and all people around the world, they rather to see me fight that fight that's a fight I want to have.
Yes, we we talked about it. We we handle business together.
You know, he gotta take care his business. I gotta take care of mine. You gotta take care fam I gotta take care of mine the same. But you got a different hunger in Jamal Shallow. Now that's the fight I want. That's a fight we're gonna have.
So you want the Taylor Plant fight more than you want Canelo more do you want David Videz?
Yeah at this point for sure.
Okay, all right, So.
I rather I'd rather fight for my legacy rather than just go, oh been to vi there because he so called the Mexican mon said Canelo, because he's Canelo. You know, he's an all time great or whatever Hall of famer you know, can't take nothing away from none of these fighters. Key, he's one of those uh high guard champions on me. But I feel like this is one of those fights. Me and Keyler Plant, we uh this, this would be
better right now at the time. This would be a better fight than a Canelo fighter being to be there.
But but why do you want him so badly?
Put it?
I don't want to expeculate for why do you tell the world why you want him so bad?
History, We got history. He snuck me at the thing.
He want to be tough, he want to be you know, uh he a coach or vulture. I want all that, you know, if you really want me to go there with you? You know, ky not on my level. You know what I'm saying from Houston, from he from Tennessee whatever. We both southern, but you know, uh, just speaking on it like as wed as I can. I want to fight somebody that like, I won't that fight. I'm more eager for that fight of anything.
Right, Well, then that means you're gonna handle your business even more Saturday night? Can I get a prediction for I let you get on out of you? Are we looking at a knockout? And Saturday night way, We're looking.
For batu ass for the whole twelve miles and if I knock him out, I'm knock him out.
I got you.
I'll see you soon, man. I'm happy to see you back. Handle your business so you can stay back. I don't want to see I love your brother, you know, I love your brother. But I was so mad when he was in the ring with Canila because I was like he's moving up.
Two weight classes. You were supposed to be in there against that brother a little bigger.
And we both for madding because I was mad at you for picking on Lebron Lebron alone.
Oh you stopped that. Man, Me picking on Lebron picked.
I'm picking on the six eight, two hundred and sixty pounds, dude, I'm picking on him.
I'm picking. That's when we doing tomorrow.
You're showing up at the fights is just like me showing that at Taylor Plant them fights.
You you're taking.
All the best.
Man.
I'll be watching Saturday night.
Bro, We'll talk to and we'll talk about that Lebron share when I see you too, we'll talk about all right, head.
Of your business, all.
Right, bro?
Taking these to good luck man. That was Jamal Taller. I'm wishing him luck man. You know I had a love conference, a few conversations with him in the past.
Man, it's good people.
I'm really hoping that he handles his business Saturday night. I think he will, and I would like to see him against kaylor Plant, to be honest with you, really.
Really would coming up.
President Donald Trump bids farewell to Elon Musk and escalates his war with the university. I'll get into all of that and then some right here on the Stephen the Smith's Show.
Don't go away to Steven day Smith Show. Let me get to another matter now, please.
President Trump bid farewell to Elon Musk in an Oval Office event made for the cameras. Trump thanked Musk for his work with DOGE, the Department of Government Efficiency, a role created to reduce the size of the federal workforce. The TESLA CEO concludes his government service after.
Four months of leading DOGE.
Musk worked for Trump as a powerful and obviously a special government employee, after spending approximately two hundred and eighty eight million dollars of his own money to help get the president elected. Ladies and gentlemen, I don't know about the rest of y'all, but I just see all of
this as nothing more than pomping circumstance. You know, if you're Musk, Okay, you spent Listen, you spent anywhere from one hundred and nineteen according to some reports, to two hundred and eighty eight million in helping getting President Trump elected. You have to remember that this is the same muscle one's vote for Hillary Clinton, who wants voted for Joe Biden. So him changing course shows how alarming of a direction he saw the.
Country going in when led by the left. Having said that.
Him departing from Trump, to be honest with you as much ado about nothing, because where's he going. He literally said, he's a friend of Trump. He's gonna still be an advisor to Trump. He'll still be making some visits to the White House. Well, ain't that essentially what he was doing. All of his pieces are in place, The personnel that he wanted overseeing DOGE are in place. Now they want to sit up there and they want to brag about some of the cuts that have taken place, to some
of the money that they've saved American citizens. I'm just looking at some of these stories here, trying to decide which one I want to get into. Like the American taxpayer has been saved about one thousand and eighty six dollars, says according to DOGE dot gov, Musk and his crew have saved one hundred and seven twenty five billion dollars so far and estimated one thousand and eighty six dollars per taxpayer. Well, it has a taxpayer seeing that extra
dollars in their pocket. Musk sat up there and said, Hey, in the end, I think we'll save the government about a trillion dollars.
This is a billion. Ain't a trillion?
Okay, there's one hundred and seventy five billion. He thinks he's gonna save them about a trillion dollars where you got about eight hundred and twenty five billion to go. Really, how many jobs are gonna be lost? We're talking about eradicating waste, fraud and excess, right, how many jobs are gonna be crossed?
How man?
How many federal jobs are gonna be lost? How many people a gonna end up unemployed? I think these are illegitimate questions. I also think that as much ado about nothing, Because listen, Musk wasn't talking about going away until Tesla stock.
Dropped Rember in the first quarter.
Last year, there was a seventy one percent this year. Rather, there was a seventy one percent drop in first quarter earnings for Tesla when he announced that he was gonna step back from his duties with Doge and ultimately go back to work overseeing his company for Tesla, which is Tesla one of them anyway, stock.
Jump twenty percent.
So all of these things are the kind of things that I'm looking at and I'm saying, Okay, we get it.
Your company is losing money.
Listen, you really don't have to be here in the White House talking to me in order to oversee this to some degree. And you're no longer gonna be in an official capacity, but you still have the President's here, which means that whatever you think should be done, the President will probably side with you. And you don't have to answer to Congress, to the Senate, to elected officials anywhere because you no longer have this job. Seems to be against the best of both worlds. Goes back to Tesla,
raises his stock. He's already worth over four hundred and twenty four billion dollars, richest man in the world. Tesla stock goes up once you return. Okay, specifically, this stock search twenty percent, like I said, after MUCKs pledged. According to the Business Insider, the news came in the wake of a challenging first quarter for Tesla, which saw significant dropping profits. We get this, Tesla was losing money. You're going back to work, save your company. Make sure you
got competition in China. You got competition in Europe because they're electric vehicles. They're coming with their own You recognize that you got to lock in and zero in, so you don't be on the job with Doge anymore. But your influence isn't dissipating any way imaginable. So to me, ladies and gentlemen, it was much ado about nothing. It was a press conference to let the world know he's back looking over Tesla instead of being a special employee
for the government. So, in other words, I stock can rise again. I don't need to be losing money. But my influence is cemented. It's all it is.
It's all it is. Now let's stay at Washington.
Where yesterday a federal judge extended the temporary order that blocked the Trump administration from revoking Harvard's ability to enroll international students. The extension came after the administration said it would give the university thirty days to challenge the decision. Court documents on Wednesday show the Department of Homeland Security asked Harvard to quote submit sworn statements and documents or other evidence to rebut the grounds for withdrawal of certification
end quote. Harvard enrolled students under the federal student in exchange visitor program. Just last week, the Trump administration revoked Harvard's ability to enroll foreign students, and then hours later a US district judge temporarily blocked that effort. Joining me now to discuss the administration's ongoing feud with Harvard University is a national political reporter for The Wall Street Journal who wrote the article The Punch that launched Trump's war
on American universities. Please welcome to the show, Eliza Collins, Eliza Howard you.
How's everything good?
Happy to be here.
Thank you so much. Let's get right to it.
For those who have not been keeping up with the escalating few between Trump administration and Harvard University.
Eliza tell us, how did we get here?
Well, it really goes back decades. But basically, the conservative movement has had issues with universities for a very long time. They have felt the universities have moved leftward. I mean we saw this with President Nixon. He actually tried to do what Trump is doing now, back with the anti war Vietnam protests. Now, his own administration stopped him at that point. But this has been sort of circulating for a long time. There's been tension with conservatives and universities
going back decades now. In Trump's first term in office, this was on the radar of some of the nationalists in his party. You might remember Steve Bannon, his former advisor now talk show host, were talking about this a little bit, but it really launched onto Trump's radar when a like you said, a punch a kid got punched. He was literally tabling trying to recruit conservative students at
UC Berkeley. He got punched in the face. He showed up on Fox News with the black guy got in front of Trump, and Trump said, let's do something about this. So conservatives started attempting to basically take on universities. In his first term, he had an executive order that did a little bit of this, the federal funding thing.
But it didn't go really anyway.
Trump ended office, and then in the four years in between, conservative think tanks thought leaders, they started mapping this out and saying, how can we take on universities, not just Harvard.
That they feel have moved to the left.
The anti Semitism argument that we're hearing now, that came onto the scene in twenty twenty three after Hamas at tact Israel in October and then Israel attacked back. The gods of protests exploded on campuses, and that was when conservatives really saw their moment. They've been sort of laying this ground. We're having tension with universities now, they say these universities are allowing anti.
Semitism on campus.
Trump takes office again and we've seen this explosion. They're trying to take federal funding, they're trying to ban international students, they're trying to get rid of their tax exempt status. So they're really trying to hit them on all sides, and Harvard's fighting back in court.
So essentially, what you're selling us is that this isn't just about Harvard. This is about This is about any university that the Trump administration, the conservatives, the nationalists that are associated with this administration well with the GOP, their belief that there are a lot of quote unquote liberal universities out there and we need to change the way our youth are being educated. Harvard is just the first stop. Is that an accurate way to depict this.
It's absolutely an accurate way to depict this. Harvard has become sort of Trump's obsession on our reporting shows because it's the richest university in the nation, so they have a lot of money. They are able to fight back. The administration has done this to other schools. We've seen Columbia, some other elite universities. They are basically negotiating with the government. They have tried to appeal to what the government is doing. Harvard is not. Harvard is saying we are not dealing
with you on this. We are going to court. So it's a broader strategy from the government. You're absolutely right to get elite universities, and then ultimately they want to get down to the state level. But Harvard has become sort of the point of the sphere on this.
A day or so go to General Services.
Administration directed all federal agencies to explore ways to cut remaining contracts with the university. According to a senior administration official, is that legal.
Well, we'll find out. This is all going to end up in court. Basically with the research funding in particular, Congress appropriates government funding that does not come from the president or his executive branch, and so there are a lot of questions about the government restricting funding to universities that has already been allocated. All of these different cases, the international students funding government contracts.
I imagine we will see them all.
Ultimately make it up to the Supreme Court you talked about this international student ruling. International students can continue to enroll in Harvard for now, But there's a lot of questions really about the administration's power and how much power the president and his other agencies have.
Harvard has an endowment worth about fifty three billion dollars, if I remember correctly, by far more than any other American university.
What would argue, why.
Can't they tap into that as a pos to needing federal assistance or requiring federal assistance. Why would they not just tap into their own funds and be independent so they don't have to worry about needing federal dollars in order to do what they want to do. That way, trumpet the administration, the nationalists or anybody else wouldn't have.
But so much power, Well, they might have to.
And I think that's why Harvard, unlike some other universities, actually have some staying power in this fight. You know, fifty three billion dollars is an obscene amount of money, but Harvard spends a lot of money, and they do have a lot of research. They've said that these government funding cuts will affectings like cancer research, and so they've become really reliant on the federal government, as have a
lot of these elite universities for research funding. Another thing is that a lot of these universities make money from international students, because those are the students who are.
Generally coming in.
They're paying full price, they're not getting scholarships, and they're really reliant. And Harvard I think it's about a quarter of their student body is international.
That's a huge chunk. And if they can't get that money.
It's not tomorrow that their funding stream runs out, but it is a big deal. If they lose their tax exempt status, then they suddenly have to start paying taxes on things like their property, which I imagine Boston area pretty expensive.
So I think they spend a lot of money. They have a ton of money. It's not going to happen tomorrow.
They have to do things, but there's a lot less hope for schools like maybe UC Berkeley, which is an elite state level institution, if their state funding gets cut off, I think it's a lot harder for them to fight back in the long term, sorry, federal funding cut off.
And clearly people are going to be in panic mode because you got these smaller universities that don't have that endowment base that Harvard has, and as a result of Harvard loses, Okay, then everybody loses. That's they're probably their mentality. I must ask this goal. Going back to the international student body that you pointed out exist at Harvard, Conservatives will say those are not because again you have a lot of people that nationalists view. That's the national perspective.
Remember Trump America first, America first, America first. He never said America only, but he says America first, and people in America who support him take it like America first last and always. So with that mentality, one would ask the international student body, how does Harvard explain how such a student body is that large as opposed to more
American citizens being enrolled in their universities. Do they ever try to discuss that kind of argument, because it's certainly one that the folks on the right has made against them.
Yeah.
I mean, I think we've just seen the Harvard at least in court related to these international students. They say these students are instrumental in making Harvard.
Harvard.
Harvard, of course is an elite university, so they have really smart people from around the world. They have incredible athletes. I'm not sure if they've made exact case saying this is why we have so many.
They're not the only school.
Most of these Ivy League schools have large populations of international students, as do a lot of these sort of state ivys like a UC Berkeley or a Michigan. They've just over the years become really reliant. I'm sure a large part of it is their funding. And then of course, you know they're bringing in smart students now the universe the government, as you said, sort of this America First agenda.
Steve Bannon told me that when he was talking about this idea in Trump one point l far before the conversation about anti Semitism, he felt like students on American universities were becoming anti American. And so this really goes back exactly what you're saying to that nationalist idea of who's American and who is patriotic, and that is a priority for Trump.
Any idea, whether he's in good he's in a good position, or whether the hall that is in a good position. Who who's got the pole position right now?
As they say, you know, I'm not a legal reporter, so I can't. I can't guess.
I think it's we have reported at the Wall Street Journal that even if Harvard wins these cases, the damage at least in some point is done. Right if you're an international student, yeah, you can stay right now, but are you going to come back in the fall if it could be revoked, or you're going to try to go somewhere else at home? You know, there's a lot of federal funding that's been cut off. They might get some back, but is it all going to be reimbursed,
you know, at the same levels. I think there are a lot of questions, especially for people making decisions.
Now.
If you're a student who is supposed to go to Harvard in the fall, do you have pause?
Maybe not, but.
Especially if you're in an international student, it has to be on your radar because you could be sent home at any.
Moment any specific institutions other than Harvit that that the administration is targeted in your estimation.
Yeah, so we can talk about Columbia a little bit.
Columbia Universe City also got demands from the government and basically we should be clear that the government demands on Harvard were pretty extensive. Basically, they said they should have say over who the university hires, who the university admits, who the university's curriculum. Basically, the government says, if you're receiving our money, we are we should have a say in what happens at a university. Now, that bucks a long standing tradition of universities getting to do what they want,
and that's why Harvard pushes back. Columbia had a little bit less of a list of demands, though basically the government does want a say. And as someone at the DOJ described me, they said, Columbia is playing dead. Columbia is in negotiations with the government, has agreed to do some things. I know one of the requests from the government at Columbia was to ban masks. That was something that we saw students wearing during these protests to disguise their identity.
Seems like col agreed to that. So it's a similar.
Situation at Columbia, though they are negotiating with the government. Now we know Trump is he's obsessed with Harvard in this case, and it's really because Harvard is pushing back in a way that other schools are not. And they have so much money. So Trump feels like what you asked earlier, why do they need our money if they have so much money.
I'm curious to know if you can't answer this, I certainly understand because you're a reporter, and I certainly don't
want to put you in that kind of position. But I'm curious to know what level of support Trump has from the Jewish community because in the aftermath of what you alluded to earlier, with Hamas attacking Israel on October seventh, a couple of years ago, right, what transpired thereafter, obviously is reel has been you know, after Hamas, and there's a lot of Palestinians that people have been viewed as suffering tremendously, and you have pro Palestinian supporters primarily on
college campuses. They're scene more so than any place else. And Colombia is one of those places. Harvard was another one of those places. You see Berkeley, if I remember correctly, I think was one of those places you pointed out these kind of things. I'm wondering what role it's perceived that they're playing in pushing Trump or supporting Trump to take these positions against universities. One would argue they've supported
the Jewish community is supported for years. I don't know the answer to that question, but I think it's an appropriate question.
Well, we can definitely say that Trump's win in November, he did better across basically every demographic group, including young people. I think it's really important to say he closed the gap with that Biden had won young people in twenty twenty. I think it was by like twenty five points. Harris won young people by four in twenty twenty four, So young people in general of all religions were moving towards Trump.
That has emboldened him Jewish supporters. I think it's it's a smaller group, so we haven't seen a ton of pulling. But we do know that Trump's hardline approach to Hamas strong support of Israel did help him with Jewish, especially conservative Jews who are pro Israel. Of course, not all Jews are, as you know, pro the current Israeli government, but those that Jewish section of the population we've seen
is more aligned with Trump. I think it's also really important to note that the frustration over Gaza, while there were a lot of progressive voices advocating for Gaza.
They didn't show.
Up for Democrats in November, and so in some ways they actually even helped Trump even if they didn't support him, because a lot stayed home, a lot voted third party. I live in Arizona. That's a key battleground state. We did some reporting on Arab Americans here. It was amazing how many I talked to who didn't vote at all. Arizona's a state. Trump won it pretty easily this time around of five percent, but in twenty twenty Biden wanted
by ten thousand votes. So if Michigan huge air of American population where this was an important issue, so Trump was helped by those voters too, even if they didn't necessarily mean to, because some of them were protesting Harris and the Biden administration's policies.
Last couple of questions for I'll let you get on out of here. How soon should we anticipate the decision being made on this matter between the Trump administration and Harvard University.
Well, there are several different lawsuits, and like I said, I think with Harvard, and with a lot of these cases we're seeing with Trump in general on immigration on
government cuts. I mean, these are cases that are making their way through the courts and ultimately probably will end up at the Supreme Court, because the Supreme Court has the final say, and these are real questions about how much power the President of the United States and his executive branch have, and so I don't know, you know, each court has to decide to take something up.
They have their own timelines.
The Supreme Court has all sorts of rules about when they can take cases up. So I think we're months away from decisions. And of course, like that international case is one case, federal funding something else. You know, we're seeing fight over tax exempt status with the IRS. I mean, there's all these different fights. So I don't think anything's going to be tied up with the bow, and certainly not all of it at once. I think we can plan for this is going to be going.
On for a while.
Very last question to you.
I've seen various conservatives even lamenting Trump's push towards this this issue with Harvard because they talked about it compromising our First Amendment rights, free speech, etc.
And so you got to wonder about that. I guess the question would be.
If Trump were to win this case against Harvard and these kind of changes were to be invoked. What would that mean for universities throughout the country. What's the perception rather of what it would mean for those universities and for America as a whole, Considering the fact that an administration in a White House could pull off such a feat.
I mean, I think it would have the facts that if what the government was asking to do to Harvard was have a say over who they hire, who they admit, what they research, and so if they're able to win that case and that is implemented at universities across the country, I think we would see a major shift from how things have been further, as long as you know, the US has been around. I think it's really important to note that polling shows Americans overwhelmingly opposed cutting medical research
and funding from universities. If you ask that question simply, but if you get into details and say what about doing it for anti semitism on campuses, the issue basically evens out. So basically half and half would support funding cuts. There is a lot of polling that shows Americans feel, you know, elite universities do not represent them. They feel that college is too expensive. They feel that the value of education a degree doesn't go.
As far anymore. So I think not. I think.
I know that the administration feels they have a lot of polling and a lot of anger at universities, but there also is that counterpolling that people do not like the idea of medical research, in particular that funding being This is of course decided in the courts, not by vote, but I think the where the American public is on this issue is important.
Lots of Collins, National reporter for the Wall Street Journal covering this particular issue with the Trump administration at Harvard University. Outstanding column just the other day in the New Washington in the Wall Street Journal, the punch that launched Trump's war.
On American universities.
Elizah, thank you so much for coming on the show, taking time out of your busy schedule. I really appreciate it. It was wonderful talking to you. Thank you so much, and feel free to come back anytime. That was a fully loaded show, so I don't need to give you anything else. Okay, you got plenty of stuff to soak in and absorb over the weekend. This is Stephen A. Smith signing off. Thank you for staying with me. Really really appreciate it. Look forward to talking to you on Monday.
Until then, Peace of love everybody, enjoy your weekend.
God bless