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- [00:02]
Don Wildman
What started the Civil War? What ended the conflict in Vietnam? Who was Paul Revere? And did the Vikings ever reach America? I'm Don Wildman, and on American History Hit. My expert guests and I are journeying across the nation and through the years to uncover the stories that have made America. We'll visit the battlefields and debate floors where the nation was formed, meet the characters who have altered it with their touch and count, the votes that have changed, changed the direction of our laws and leadership. Find American History Hit twice a week, every week, wherever you get your podcasts. American History hit. A podcast from history hit.
- [00:51]
Morgan Chesky
Hey, friends. Morgan Chesky in the chair today for here's the scoop from NBC News. It is vote drama in Washington today as the Senate tries to pass President Trump's big, beautiful bill. Canada is handing the Trump administration a big win in a bid to reopen trade talks. And across the pond, well, the Wimbledon Championships kicks off minus one iconic tennis tradition. We will get to all of that, I promise you. But first, we gotta talk about the trial of Sean Combs, otherwise known as Diddy. For the past seven weeks, the prosecution has been trying to prove that Combs is guilty of five criminal counts, including two counts of sex trafficking and one of racketeering, which alone carries a potential life sentence. Combs and his defense team have denied those allegations from the beginning. And while we're waiting to hear what the jury ends up deciding, we figured now is a good time to catch you up on what's been happening. In fact, our very own Chloe Meloss is literally right outside the courthouse in lower Manhattan watching and waiting for the big verdict. And she was kind enough to join us today. Gotta ask Chloe, are you just forwarding all your mail to the sidewalk outside the courthouse at this point?
- [01:59]
Chloe Meloss
Uh, yeah. I'm like, should I just bring a sleeping bag here?
- [02:03]
Morgan Chesky
You've been there from day one. Today is really one where all eyes are watching.
- [02:08]
Chloe Meloss
Absolutely. Well, I'm sitting here right in front of the federal courthouse in lower Manhattan, like you said, and people have descended on this courthouse in the last few days from all over. I was actually just with a journalist from Germany the other day from a newspaper there, saying that they're closely watching the trial. I think that one of the reasons that people are so fascinated is because Cassie Ventura's civil lawsuit that came out in 2023 was so explosive. And nobody had ever heard the term freak off before. Like, what was that? And now we've heard so much testimony from not just Cassie, but another woman who testified under the pseudonym Jane, who used to date Diddy, and we've really learned what he was into, which his legal team says is a swinger's lifestyle. But the prosecutors, Morgan, say it was a lot more than that. This was transportation to engage in prostitution. This was sex trafficking. And if the jurors believe them, it's a racketeering conspiracy as well.
- [03:04]
Morgan Chesky
And can we just back up for a second here, Chloe? I want to remind people how this case actually came to be. What was the impetus here?
- [03:12]
Chloe Meloss
You know, it all started with Cassie Venturek Holmes's longtime girlfriend. He was with her for about 11 years. They were on and off. She ended up going off to marry his personal trainer, Alex Fine, and nobody had really heard anything about there being, you know, domestic violence. And she filed this wildly explosive civil suit against Diddy in November of 2023, saying that he forced her to take drugs and have sex with escorts. She called them freak offs. We had never heard the term freak off before. Said she was sex trafficked. I mean, the list went on and on. And by the very next day, the suit was settled for an undisclosed amount of money. And now we know, because it's come out in the trial, that it was $30 million. And then all sorts of civil suits started flying with wild accusations naming all these different celebrities and a deafening silence from the music industry of no one of the careers that he had made really coming out and supporting him and saying anything positive. And then several months later, his homes were raided. And so then things just exploded from there. And in September, he was arrested in Manhattan in the lobby of a hotel. And he's been at the Metropolitan Detention center, which is a really scary place to be. He's been there ever since.
- [04:31]
Morgan Chesky
Chloe, I'm a few years removed from my high school mock trial days. What did the prosecution's case really hinge on here?
- [04:37]
Chloe Meloss
Well, what the prosecutors relied on were 34 witnesses who took the stand over the last seven weeks. And you heard from former assistants who claim that they worked all sorts of crazy hours without sleep. You also heard them, some say that they bought drugs for him, even prescription drugs under their own name, that they would set up these hotel rooms for these hotel nights, these freak offs. When you listen to the prosecution side of things, they say, well, see, that's a criminal enterprise. And this was his kingdom, is what they refer to it. And people were at his beck and call to do all sorts of things for him which fall under a RICO conspiracy. And then we also heard, you know, from these girlfriends who say that they were brutally Beaten and that they had to have sex with these escorts in order to not have him blackmail them and release videos from those encounters. And so it's been a fascinating wild nearly two months. And I'm really, really interested, like, super anxious. I have, like butterflies in my stomach to see what these jurors think because I've been staring at their faces and trying to figure out what's going on in their head. You know, I've been trying to, like, game it a little bit.
- [05:51]
Morgan Chesky
Right? Eight men, four women. I'm curious. You have these 34 witnesses from the prosecution come up. You hear each of them, but then you have the defense say they are not calling anyone to the stand. No one. Help me out. Why would they do that?
- [06:06]
Chloe Meloss
Well, we knew that Diddy was probably not going to testify because that just opens the door for so much drama, right? I mean, he could just look even worse. But I was surprised because initially one of their attorneys, Mark Agnifolo, said that they needed almost two weeks because they had so many different witnesses that they planned to call. So to have none and rest their case in 30 minutes, I mean, I was shocked.
- [06:29]
Morgan Chesky
I think we all were. As everyone watches and waits, you, Chloe, if he is found guilty, what does that mean for Diddy here?
- [06:37]
Chloe Meloss
He's gonna keep fighting. He's not gonna take it laying down. He has these very expensive attorneys. He already has an appellate attorney who specializes in appeals. Her last name is Shapiro, and she's been in the court every day putting things on the record when it comes to the law in case of an appeal. So he will appeal for sure and he will fight that. But as we saw with Weinstein, Weinstein got his New York conviction overturned. I mean, it is possible to continue to appeal. Appeal, appeal. Maybe he'll seek a pardon from President Trump. Right, we've heard about that. And I think we'll continue to see civil suits come out, especially if he is found guilty across the board or on sex trafficking. I think you'll see more civil suits.
- [07:19]
Morgan Chesky
Chloe Belas, cannot thank you enough for braving the crazy weather of Manhattan over the past several weeks to bring us the latest and greatest on this all consuming trial.
- [07:30]
Chloe Meloss
Well, thanks for having me and congrats on the podcast.
- [07:32]
Morgan Chesky
Appreciate you, Chloe. Okay, we're going to take a quick break to pay the bills, but we'll be back to talk about a different kind of bill. Specifically one that's being called big and beautiful. Stick around.
- [07:51]
Sean Williams
Do you want to know what it's like to hang out with Ms. 13 in El Salvador or how the Russian mafia fought battles all over Brooklyn in the 1990s.
- [07:57]
Morgan Chesky
What about that time I got lost in the Burmese jungle hunting the world's biggest meth lab? I'm Sean Williams.
- [08:02]
Sean Williams
And I'm Danny Gold and we're the host of the Underworld podcast. We're journalists that have traveled all over reporting on dangerous people and places. And every week we'll be bringing you a new story about organized crime from.
- [08:13]
Morgan Chesky
All over the world, available wherever you get your podcasts.
- [08:16]
Sean Williams
Hey everybody, it's Hoda Kotb and I would love for you to join me for new episodes of my podcast, Making Space. Each week I'm having conversations with authors, actors, speakers and dear friends of mine, folks who are seeking the truth, compassion and self discovery. I promise you will leave these talks stronger and inspired to make space in your own life for growth and change. To start listening, just search Making Space wherever you get your podcasts and follow for new episodes every Wednesday.
- [08:51]
Morgan Chesky
And welcome back to here's the scoop. A voterama got underway in Washington this morning as Senate Republicans try to push President Trump's big, beautiful bill, the centerpiece of his domestic agenda, closer to the finish line. Now, a vote a Rama is really a quirky Senate only process where senators can propose any last minute amendments to a bill. It rarely offers any monumental changes to the legislation, but it can drag debates on for hours and hours. Joining us now to break it down, NBC News chief Capitol Hill correspondent Ryan Nobles. Ryan, glad to have you.
- [09:24]
Sean Williams
Morgan, I'm so excited to be on. Congrats on the podcast and hopefully we can shed a little bit of light on this complicated bill making its way through Congress.
- [09:32]
Morgan Chesky
Ryan, I wanna remind folks, this is the president's domestic agenda bill and I know there's a lot in it, but what are you keying in on?
- [09:41]
Sean Williams
This is really the foundation of his campaign promises, right? In order for him to make good on the long list of things that he promised the American people, he needs this bill to pass. Probably the most important plank from Donald Trump's perspective is the extension of the tax cuts that he implemented during his first term. That's a $4.5 trillion tax cut. If this doesn't pass, it means that almost every American is going to be getting a tax hike because it's going to go back to the tax levels prior to 2017. He also is using this as the foundation of his mass deportation plan, which I know you've been covering a lot in Los Angeles. They are running out of money to pay for the border agents And ICE agents that are executing this deportation plan, they need hundreds of millions of dollars, hundreds of billions of dollars in order to keep that program up and running. But. But the other thing he wants to do, what President Trump and what Republicans want to do, is that they would like to cut government spending in a big way. The problem, though, is there aren't very many places to cut the federal budget, because so much of the federal budget's gobbled up by two or three really big programs. The social safety net programs, Medicaid, Medicare, Social Security. And then, of course, the other big one is the Pentagon. Republicans do not want to cut defense spending, so they're not even touching that. In fact, they're going to actually boost Pentagon spending a little bit here. So the only place they can really do it is through Medicaid and the SNAP program, which is also known as food stamps.
- [11:04]
Morgan Chesky
Ryan, you mentioned Medicaid. In fact, it was just yesterday North Carolina Senator Thom Tillis said he would not be seeking reelection. And for context of which I know you are highly aware, he was a huge critic of the Medicaid cuts.
- [11:18]
Sean Williams
Yeah. So what's interesting about this kind of back and forth is that almost all the disagreements around this bill exist within the Republican Party. They don't need any Democrats to pass this. The rub has come from moderate Republicans that are really worried that these Medicaid cuts are going to hurt people in their communities. So if you're a senator like Thom Tillis in North Carolina, you have a huge section of your constituency that relies on Medicaid. And what Tillis was trying to tell his colleagues behind the scenes for weeks is that we are going to regret this, because once these cuts are begin to be implemented, it'll be right around the 2026 elections, and our constituents are going to say, why did you vote for something that ripped health care away from the people I love? So he voted against a procedural step that would have moved the bill forward and then announced that he's a no on the whole package and then shocked everyone by saying that he wasn't going to run for reelection.
- [12:12]
Morgan Chesky
Ryan, if it doesn't happen right now, how much more difficult does it become for the Trump administration?
- [12:17]
Sean Williams
It makes it really difficult what the President has attempted to do here. And the reason he calls it his one big beautiful bill, the one is important, was because at the beginning of this debate, they initially talked about separating out some of the different pieces and trying to pass them individually. Right. They could break this up again and perhaps just pass the tax cuts in the immigration Policy, deal with the Medicaid cuts and the other aspects of the bill at a separate time. There's no deadline for them. Right. They've created a self imposed deadline of 4th of July just because the President wants this done as soon as possible. Really, their only deadline is the next election. Right. They have control of the House and Senate until the 2026 midterm. So even if they're failed this time around, they'll get other cracks at it.
- [12:58]
Morgan Chesky
And speaking of the future, what actually gets this over the finish line? Ryan?
- [13:02]
Sean Williams
I think it's Donald Trump. I think when push comes to shove, the President is gonna come in and tell any senator that's on the fence, now is the time to vote and now is the time to vote yes. I just do not envision a world where there are three or four Republicans in the Senate and four Republicans in the House that actually have the guts to stand up and tell Donald Trump, I'm voting no.
- [13:26]
Morgan Chesky
And as the vote Arama continues. Ryan, what's your personal cutoff for the number of Red Bulls consumed?
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Sean Williams
I'm actually not an energy drink guy. I'm much more of a coffee guy. We have a little trick that we do up here on Capitol Hill. Our favorite snack is we take popcorn and mix it with M&M's and that's a nice little pick me up halfway through the day to keep you going.
- [13:46]
Morgan Chesky
You heard the secret here first. Love it. Ryan, thanks so much, man. Appreciate you.
- [13:49]
Sean Williams
Thanks, Morgan.
- [13:52]
Morgan Chesky
All right. Staying in the wild world of Washington. Hours before Canada was about to hit US tech giants like Amazon and Meta with a 3% tax, the Canadian government has pulled the plug in order to hopefully restart trade talks with the US Prime Minister. Mark Carney and President Trump are now aiming for a New Deal by July 21st. After the president blasted the tax as an attack on American innovation, Canada says they will scrap it entirely and push for a global fix. So why does all this matter? Well, if talks collapse, tariffs could hit tech, cars and more, raising prices for all of us. The WNBA is going full court press on expansion, adding teams in Cleveland, Detroit and Philadelphia over the next five years. Each franchise comes with a $250 million price tag backed by NBA owners and big name investors like former NBA star Grant Hill and Jared Goff, the quarterback for the Detroit Lions. Philly is even committed to building the team their own arena within the next few years. League Commissioner Kathy Engelbert says this staggered rollout will protect the league's talent and keep the encore product elite. Bottom line, more cities More stars and no slowing down. You can't be serious, man. You cannot be serious.
- [15:15]
Sean Williams
That ball was on the line, chalk flew up.
- [15:20]
Morgan Chesky
Love it or hate it, that infamous John McEnroe rant still lives rent free in tennis history. But at Wimbledon 2025, there is no one left to scream at. For the first time in its 147 year history, Wimbledon has officially benched all human line judges, replacing them with more than 450 AI powered cameras delivering instant laser precise calls. Players can still unleash a good old fashioned meltdown, but now they'll be yelling at an algorithm that doesn't blink or argue. Even the signature out calls have been automated, leaving center court quieter, colder and perhaps a bit less theatrical. Human officials have dropped from 300 to just 80. Downgraded to match assistants managing all the tech. Behind the scenes. Wimbledon says it's all about consistency and aligning with the Aussie and US Opens. But for the fans of that on court drama, well, the golden age of the good old fashioned tirade might just be over. Alright, that's it for us at here's the scoop, I'm Morgan Chesky. We'll be back with more tomorrow. But in the meantime, I'm taking over the helm of NBC nightly news. A 75 year old broadcast. It's a great responsibility.
- [16:48]
Sean Williams
Good evening, I'm Tom Yamas. You have to go out there to bring people at home.
- [16:52]
Morgan Chesky
Closer to the store. Wildfires continue to be a threat. With that massive hurricane comes the massive response.
- [16:57]
Sean Williams
The best reporters in our business know how to listen.
- [17:00]
Morgan Chesky
And when you listen, you get the truth. For NBC News, NBC News, I'm Tom Yamas. That's what we do every night.
- [17:07]
Sean Williams
NBC Nightly News with Tom Yamas. Evenings on NBC.