SCOTUS Birthright Citizenship Ruling, USMCA Trade Pact Expires, Nigeria’s Christian Genocide | Your News Talk America | July 2, 2026

Your News Talk America July 2, 2026 show card. Birthright citizenship ruling, USMCA expiration, and Nigeria's Christian genocide.

Show Notes and Rundown

Your News Talk America with Jake Smith

Daily Show Notes · Thursday, July 2, 2026

9:00 · School Choice and New Bills to Fight Antisemitism in Schools

How important is school choice in America right now, and are public schools becoming the seed of rising antisemitism? A new package of legislation on Capitol Hill aims to protect Jewish students and counter the spread of antisemitism across the nation's education system.

How important school choice is in America today
Whether public schools are feeding the growth of antisemitism
Three new bills in Congress aimed at protecting Jewish students and countering antisemitism across the education system

Source: The Jerusalem Post

Guest: Sydney Altfield, CEO of the Teach Coalition, an organization that works to make Jewish day schools more affordable, safer, and stronger.

9:20 · Media Bias as America Turns 250

As the nation marks its 250th anniversary, Jake looks at how legacy media covers the country. As the Supreme Court wrapped its term, NPR's Nina Totenberg used the once taxpayer funded network's website to publish a false report claiming that Justice Samuel Alito was retiring. The prewritten analysis went out without anyone contacting Alito's office, and Totenberg later brushed it off as a rookie mistake. A new NewsBusters compilation also documents how some of the biggest names in media use July 4th to attack the country rather than celebrate it, and CNN's Paula Reid is leaving for MS NOW amid uncertainty over the Paramount Skydance takeover.

NPR's Nina Totenberg falsely reported that Justice Samuel Alito was retiring, then called it a rookie mistake
A NewsBusters roundup of the media's worst attacks on America, from calling the flag frightening to dismissing the Constitution as outdated and racist
CNN's Paula Reid jumps to MS NOW as the network's next era looks chaotic after the Paramount Skydance merger

Sources: NewsBusters on Totenberg · NewsBusters media compilation · Fox News on Paula Reid · Fox News on the Paramount takeover · Variety

Guest: Tim Graham, Executive Editor of NewsBusters.

9:35 · Jake's Monologue

Jake takes the mic for his daily monologue.

9:45 · The SCOTUS Birthright Citizenship Ruling

How consequential is the Supreme Court's birthright citizenship decision? The ruling leaves birthright citizenship intact while limiting the scope of nationwide injunctions. Massachusetts politicians and immigrant advocates are celebrating, but what does it mean for the constitutional debate over citizenship, federal authority, and immigration policy going forward? DHS reports that on average 10,000 people in the country illegally are arrested every five days. The real question is how many are actually being deported, and how fast.

Sheriff Mack breaks down:

Why the legal and political battle over birthright citizenship is far from over
What the Constitution actually says, and does not say, about citizenship
How immigration policy affects states, local communities, and law enforcement
The growing divide between federal authority and state sovereignty
Whether the ruling strengthens or weakens constitutional limits on government power

Source: murderofamerica.com · book page

Guest: Sheriff Richard Mack (Ret.), founder and president of the Constitutional Sheriffs and Peace Officers Association (CSPOA) and one of America's leading advocates for constitutional government, individual liberty, and local law enforcement authority. He is the coauthor, with Dan Perkins, of the new book The Democrat Murder of America.

10:00 · Nigeria's Christian Genocide

What is the latest on the slaughter of Christians in Nigeria? Judd Saul is just back from another trip inside some of the country's most dangerous regions and can speak firsthand to the violence on the ground, why it has been called a silent Christian genocide, and what US policy and the Church could be doing differently.

Source: TruthNigeria.com

Guest: Judd Saul, founder of Equipping the Persecuted and TruthNigeria.com. An award winning documentary filmmaker and American missionary, he has spent over a decade working inside Nigeria's most dangerous regions, building a network of local pastors, reporters, and security contacts.

10:20 · One Year of the Working Families Tax Cuts

As America marks its 250th anniversary, taxpayers are also marking one year since President Trump's signature tax law, the Working Families Tax Cuts. The National Taxpayers Union says the results are tangible: permanent lower rates, a higher standard deduction, an expanded child tax credit, and targeted relief for tipped workers, seniors, and Americans who work overtime.

The numbers tell the story:

The average tax refund topped $3,600 this year, an 11% increase over last year
Working families earning between $15,000 and $30,000 saw their taxes cut by 21%, the largest reduction of any income group
Growth oriented provisions let businesses immediately deduct capital and research and development investments, projected to create more than 800,000 jobs
Several states raised their gasoline taxes on July 1

Sources: National Taxpayers Union · New York Post on the gas taxes

Guest: Thomas Aiello, Senior Director of Government Affairs at the National Taxpayers Union.

10:30 · The Energy That Powered America to 250

Another group deserves a place in the 250th celebration: the men and women who produced the energy that made American greatness possible. Writing for Townhall, Power The Future's Larry Behrens argues that coal, oil, and natural gas did not just power machines, they powered American freedom, strength, and leadership. America did not become a world leader by managing scarcity. It became a world leader by producing abundance. The lesson of 250 years is simple: nations that produce energy lead, and nations that beg for energy follow.

Coal lit the cities, forged the steel, moved the railroads, and powered the first electric homes
Oil replaced whale oil, moved families, and helped win world wars
Natural gas heated homes, transformed the grid, and gave America's allies an alternative to hostile regimes
Behrens warns the long war on American energy will intensify as the DSA gains influence, pointing to New York's Mamdani urging residents to set their thermostats to 78 degrees

Source: Townhall · Power The Future

Guest: Larry Behrens, communications director at Power The Future, a national nonprofit that advocates for American energy jobs, and author of Sabotage: How Joe Biden Surrendered American Energy Independence. His work has appeared at The Hill · Daily Caller · Daily Wire · Townhall · Washington Examiner · The Federalist · Washington Times · video clips.

10:50 · Historic Trials That Still Shape America

As the nation marks 250 years since the Declaration of Independence, former trial lawyer and judge Lise Pearlman revisits controversial criminal trials in her book With Justice for Some: Politically Charged Criminal Trials in the Early 20th Century That Helped Shape Today's America. Drawing on decades of later reporting and historical scholarship, she reveals how cultural bias and political pressure shaped verdicts long before the full truth emerged.

The book examines trials that made national headlines, including:

The murder that launched the modern KKK and the Anti-Defamation League
The cover up behind the eight players blamed for fixing the 1919 World Series
The dark truth about the Scopes trial, with white supremacists on both sides
The white sheriff who risked his life to save the Scottsboro Boys from a lynching
False charges of gang rape that set the stage for Hawaiian statehood
The police cover up of key evidence in the Lindbergh baby case

Source: Amazon

Guest: Lise Pearlman, acclaimed nonfiction author, filmmaker, former trial lawyer and judge, and nationally recognized speaker on famous trials of the 20th century.

11:00 · Military Recruiting Surges as Iran Tensions Rise

All five active duty military services met or exceeded their fiscal 2025 recruiting goals, which Pentagon officials described as the strongest recruiting performance in 15 years. Who gets the credit, and do America's enemies pay attention to those numbers? Meanwhile, Iran's IRGC has plenty of its own problems. The Jerusalem Post reports that two IRGC members were shot dead in northern Iran, and Kurdish rebels have clashed with the IRGC in a major border escalation.

All five active duty services hit or beat their fiscal 2025 recruiting goals, the best in 15 years
Iran ramps up attacks on Kurdish opposition after days of clashes, targeting the historic KDPI, whose leaders it assassinated decades ago
With peace talks now underway in Qatar, whether any breakthrough is likely on Iran's nuclear ambitions and access to its nuclear sites
Why the war in Iran has strained relations with Saudi Arabia

Sources: Jerusalem Post on the Kurdish clashes · Jerusalem Post on Iran and Saudi Arabia

Guest: Captain Morgan Murphy, USN (Ret.), national security expert, former Trump White House official, and former Pentagon spokesperson.

11:20 · Why the US Is Letting USMCA Expire

Why is the United States allowing the USMCA to expire? Wasn't it one of President Trump's crowning achievements from his first term? The US has decided not to renew the trade pact and will instead seek separate deals with Canada and Mexico.

Whether the USMCA really was Trump's signature first term trade achievement
Whether Canada is the bad guy in this standoff
Whether two separate trade deals are the likely outcome

Source: Fox Business

Guests: Dr. E.J. Antoni, Chief Economist for the Thomas A. Roe Institute for Economic Policy Studies and the Richard Aster Fellow at the Heritage Foundation; and Dr. Thomas J. Duesterberg, senior fellow at the Hudson Institute.

11:30 · A Sealed Envelope and a Mother's Hidden Past

Most families hold stories that were never fully told, and retired journalist and former journalism professor Paul T. O'Connor believes many of them can still be recovered. His new book The Missing Child began with a mystery surrounding his mother's so called adoption and a cache of private papers discovered after her death, including one envelope marked with a startling instruction: burn without opening. He opened it instead, and it launched a years long investigation into a life shaped by secrecy, instability, and quiet resilience.

How a single sealed envelope sent O'Connor searching into his mother's past
Piecing together a hidden life through public records, private memorabilia, DNA results, and conversations with those who knew her
What the search reveals about identity, ancestry, and found family, and the truths people conceal to protect the lives they have built