Speaker 1: It's Friday, January 24th. If you're born here, you must be from here, right? We start here. In the first legal test of his term, President Trump is smacked down by a federal judge.

Speaker 2: He said that in his four decades serving on the bench, he's never seen a case as clear cut as this one.

Speaker 1: But birthright citizenship is still on the docket, and some families are worried they could become stateless. Meanwhile, a veteran turned Fox News personality is poised to take over the Pentagon. It's time to give someone with dust on his boots the helm. Some Republicans have turned on Pete Hegseth, but are they enough to derail him? And what's the best movie of the year? Well, you'll have some time to think about it. You'll notice that the running time is over three hours. There is an intermission. Chris Connolly is here to walk you through the Oscar-nominated films you need to see. From ABC News, this is Start Here, I'm Brad Milkey. President Trump is not the first president who has talked about wanting to cut down on illegal immigration. He has pushed that idea further than most. He clearly sees deportation as a deterrence tool.

Speaker 3: On day one of my new administration, we will begin the largest deportation operation in American history. We have no choice. This is not sustainable. This is not sustainable.

Speaker 1: Even if it separates families, even if it impacts a child who didn't choose to come here in the first place. If you weren't documented when coming here, he says, you've got to go. End of story.

Speaker 3: And you know what's going to happen. We'll get 10 terrorists and then one woman with two children that are beautiful children and everything. And that'll be the front page of every newspaper.

Speaker 1: It's never an easy thing to do, but we have no choice. But what's also different about President Trump among modern presidents is he's on record as wanting to curb pathways to legal immigration, whether it's refugees from other countries begging for asylum or technical workers seeking visas. President Trump has made it clear that these precepts we've largely taken for granted as American ideals are not necessarily set in stone. However, some of them are set forth pretty clearly in the Constitution.

Speaker 4: The president is directing federal agencies to stop issuing citizenship documents to American born children of undocumented parents starting next month.

Speaker 1: This week, in that avalanche of day one executive actions, legal scholars were shocked to hear that Trump had signed one order that would upend the concept of birthright citizenship. That text that says if you are born on American soil, you're an American. This is a fundamental right enshrined in our Constitution. I have one message for President Trump. I'll see you in court. It took only hours for several people to file legal challenges to this order. And yesterday, less than 72 hours after Trump took office, a federal judge stepped in to block this from taking effect. Let's start today with ABC's Peter Harlambus, who is in Seattle, Washington, where this all went down. Peter, can you just back us up? How did this case really get started?

Speaker 2: So yeah, Trump has promised this for years at this point, especially on the campaign trail this cycle. He said that when he gets into office, he wants to get rid of this idea of birthright citizenship.

Speaker 5: This next order relates to the definition of birthright citizenship under the 14th Amendment of the United States.

Speaker 3: That's a good one. Birthright. That's a big one.

Speaker 2: And that's exactly what he did on day one of his administration, with the swipe of a sharpie. Basically, in the terms of this executive order, he directed the entire federal government to no longer really recognize this principle of birthright citizenship. You think we have good grounds, but you could be right, I mean, you'll find out. Now, this confounded legal scholars, because it's not like this is something that normally falls under an executive order. This is an amendment of the Constitution. This is arguably one of the most important amendments of the Constitution, the 14th Amendment, which guarantees that if you were born within the confines of the United States, barring a few exceptions, you are a citizen. Now, Trump's trying to argue here that a few words in the 14th Amendment citizenship clause allows him to interpret it this way. The terms subject to the jurisdiction thereof, it sounds like legalese, but basically he's trying to say that if you're born to parents in the United States who aren't actually subject to the jurisdiction of the United States, if your parents are undocumented, you don't necessarily become a citizen in his eyes. But again, this is something that was viewed with skepticism by legal scholars from the start and immediately prompted a flurry of lawsuits. At the time we're talking right now, I believe there are six separate federal lawsuits filed by a combined 22 different states and two cities, and some of them, including this one in Washington state, has already proceeded to a hearing and issuing a temporary restraining order.

Speaker 1: That is so helpful, right, because it says all persons born are naturalized in the United States and subject to the jurisdiction thereof. So that's what they're going to end up arguing here. But you were in court for this early, early argument, right?

Speaker 2: What happened? Yeah. So a judge nominated to the bench in the 1980s by Ronald Reagan very quickly granted a request to have a hearing over this executive order. He had it yesterday in Seattle. And basically over the course of 20 minutes, he gave Trump's Department of Justice a legal beatdown. He criticized them. He questioned them. He said that in his four decades serving on the bench, he's never seen a case as clear cut as this one, saying that he doesn't even understand how the lawyers of the Trump administration thought that this could be lawful and scolding the Department of Justice for even entertaining this idea. Judge Kuhnauer actually suggested during the hearing that he had already signed what's called a temporary restraining order blocking this order from taking effect. According to this temporary restraining order, Trump and any officer of the federal government is prohibited from taking any actions to enforce this executive order temporarily. The judge will take this issue up further in the coming weeks. But for now, Trump basically isn't allowed to do anything advancing this executive order.

Speaker 1: Right. I see. So it can't be in effect now, but it's not like there's a final, final decision yet. What was the reaction in legal circles, I guess?

Speaker 2: Yeah. The attorney generals who brought this case were relieved.

Speaker 6: We came to the courthouse today to defend the United States Constitution.

Speaker 2: I spoke with Washington Attorney General Nick Brown after the hearing. He said he wasn't at all surprised by the result of the hearing, but he expects this fight to continue.

Speaker 6: Well, I don't think it ends here. First and foremost, there are other cases being brought across the country. And so those cases will continue to move forward. And this president, this administration certainly has a propensity to keep these fights going. So I anticipate that will happen moving forward.

Speaker 2: And this could possibly go all the way up to the Supreme Court at the end of the day if Trump's lawyers decide to appeal this case upward. Trump's lawyers with the Department of Justice have highlighted the fact that the executive order technically didn't take effect until February 19th. But in the meantime, it's really throwing a lot of families across the country in a state of legal limbo. At this point, there's been three different lawsuits filed by pregnant undocumented women who are expecting to have children in the coming months and are basically confronting a situation where they could give birth to children who are basically stateless under

Speaker 7: this order. My husband and I arrived in the United States in 2019 and sought asylum here. And over the last six years have been building a life here in the United States.

Speaker 2: I spoke with a woman yesterday who filed a lawsuit under a pseudonym. Her name in the lawsuit is Monica. She came into the United States from Venezuela with temporary protected status.

Speaker 7: We've been trying to do everything the right way in the United States. We've been working. We have been paying taxes and we actually were able to buy our own home.

Speaker 2: Her and her husband are expecting a child. She's currently 12 weeks pregnant. But this executive order basically threw their lives into a new stage of limbo.

Speaker 7: This is a really difficult situation where I truly do not see a way out for my child, a way forward for my child to be able to get through this.

Speaker 2: They're from Venezuela, which is a country that is during political and economic turmoil. They don't have a consulate in the United States where a person like Monica could theoretically go to see if they could get their child citizenship. So she doesn't really know if her child will become an American citizen or if they're even eligible to become a Venezuelan citizen. The main Supreme Court decision that established this right, that clarified it into law, was decided more than 100 years ago. And the Trump administration is potentially trying to bring that case back into question, seeing if they can reform this law, change this principle and shape their immigration agenda using the legal system.

Speaker 1: Yeah. And so now Trump saying he'd like to appeal the new leadership at the DOJ says they're going to defend his executive order. But for now, at least the first legal setback for this new administration, Peter Haralambos there in Seattle. Thank you so much. Thank you so much, Brad. One theme of the Trump presidency so far is if you weren't sure he'd go there, oh, he'll go there. It was signaled on the campaign trail. It was signaled in his cabinet selections.

Speaker 8: When we're confronted with nominations like Robert F. Kennedy Jr., are these the best individuals available?

Speaker 1: Many of these cabinet choices were nontraditional picks. Democrats described several of them as radical.

Speaker 9: You acknowledge that you cheated on your wife and that you cheated on the woman by whom you had just fathered a child. You have been met at that. I will allow your words to speak for themselves.

Speaker 1: You're not retracting that. Certain choices like defense secretary nominee Pete Hegseth have come to be seen as a kind of litmus test. Like if Republicans confirm him, that signals a wide latitude for the new president to appoint whoever he likes. Well, yesterday, senators held votes on several of these nominees, including Hegseth himself. ABC's Rachel Scott has been reporting at the Capitol. She's just been named ABC's senior political correspondent. So, Rachel, I know you're going to be zooming all over Washington now, but fill us in on the Capitol drama. What are you hearing about Hegseth's chances?

Speaker 10: Yeah, Brad, look, you know, Republican senators have been very tight lipped when it comes to Pete Hegseth. A lot of them have been taking this whole wait and see approach.

Speaker 11: As long as they're just allegations and again, that they remain in the past. He can I have he has to convince me of that. But I'm open to being convinced.

Speaker 10: Yes, we see the allegations in there, but we're waiting until we have the chance to talk to him, waiting until we have a chance to hear him at his confirmation hearing.

Speaker 12: It's time to give someone with dust on his boots the helm, a change agent, someone with no vested interest in certain companies or specific programs or approved narratives.

Speaker 10: Well, now all of that is wrapped up. He's made the rounds on Capitol Hill. He had that tense confirmation hearing and now it is decision time. And so the Senate had this key test vote. And this was really an early indicator of how this was going to go down, who was going to be supporting Pete Hegseth and which Republicans were going to be voting against him.

Speaker 13: On this vote, the yeas are 51, the nays are 49. The motion passes.

Speaker 10: And this is pretty critical here, Brad, because even though Republicans have the majority in the Senate, Hegseth can only afford to lose three Senate Republicans. That is not a lot. So Brad, just moments before this vote took place, we got a statement from Senator Lisa Murkowski of Alaska. And she's a moderate Republican. We knew that she had some concerns about Hegseth. Well, turns out she had a lot of concerns about Hegseth. And in a very lengthy statement, she made it clear she is not going to be supporting his nomination. She said, really, this all just boils down to an issue of character. She called it a defining trait required for the secretary of defense. And she alluded to the allegations of sexual assault and excessive drinking against Hegseth, saying that it does nothing to quiet her concerns. Hegseth has denied the allegations against him.

Speaker 12: There was a coordinated smear campaign orchestrated in the media against us. That was clear from moment one.

Speaker 10: And she also references some of his past comments, saying that women should not serve in combat roles.

Speaker 14: What do you have to say to the almost 400,000 women who are serving today about your position on whether they should be capable to rise through the highest ranks of our military?

Speaker 12: Senator, I would say I would be honored to have the opportunity to serve alongside you, shoulder to shoulder, men and women, black, white, all backgrounds.

Speaker 10: Bottom line, Lisa Murkowski said she is not going to be supporting Hegseth. And Brad, she was not the only one.

Speaker 15: Voters voting in the negative Baldwin, Bennett, Blunt, Rochester, Booker, Cantwell, Collins.

Speaker 10: We found out during the vote that Senator Susan Collins also will not be supporting Pete Hegseth's nomination. She argues that he just does not have the experience and perspective necessary to succeed in the job, Brad.

Speaker 1: Well, and so, like you said, Republicans have 53 Senate seats. That was two of them. This ended up passing 51 49, this sort of test vote. That would mean that Hegseth would go through of all these senators stuck to the way they were voting here. Is that going to happen, though? Rachel, like, are there other no votes that might be lurking for the for the big vote?

Speaker 10: It seems likely, Brad, that Pete Hegseth will ultimately be confirmed, despite these two Republican senators coming out against him. We have our eyes on Senator Mitch McConnell, who, of course, was the Senate majority leader for a long time. I was told that he did not meet with Hegseth, even though Hegseth's team reached out to him and wanted to schedule a meeting. While McConnell did vote yes for this to move forward on this key test vote, it's really up in the air on whether he's going to end up supporting Hegseth's nomination. Either way, Brad, even if McConnell is a no, Hegseth seems to have the support he needs to be confirmed.

Speaker 1: Yeah, I was going to say you had people like Tom Tillis and Bill Hagerty, like people had wondered if they might vote no. It seems pretty clear at this point they're going to vote yes. Hey, Rachel, there are other people being confirmed, right? Like we had Marco Rubio got a unanimous confirmation just yesterday. John Ratcliffe was confirmed as CIA director. I mean, what other nominations are going to be under the microscope here? And does it just look like they're all going to go through if Hegseth does? They all do.

Speaker 10: Brad, it really seems that way. It seems like Republicans are really falling in line here and rallying around President Donald Trump's cabinet nominees. Even some of the most controversial picks like Robert F. Kennedy Jr., Tulsi Gabbard. You have some senators on both sides of the aisle that are concerned about some of the statements they've made in the past. But it does seem like Republicans are going to ultimately confirm President Donald Trump's picks. We know at least the two of those nominees, they're going to have their confirmation hearings next week, Brad.

Speaker 1: All right. Rachel Scott tracking everything in D.C. because she is our senior political correspondent right now. I'm going to start repeating that just so I get it right. Thank you, Rachel.

Speaker 10: Thanks, Brad.

Speaker 1: Next up on Start Here, stop me if you've heard this one before, but you probably haven't. The films that flew under the radar until awards season after the break. You know, Los Angeles has not had a lot of reasons to celebrate lately. But in a town where so much runs on the film industry, the Oscars are on par with the Super Bowl. So it was a big deal yesterday when the Academy came forward with their nominations. And now that it's officially Oscar season, who better to break this down than ABC's own Chris Connelly. Chris, what are the big takeaways for you here? Because last year, I remember being like Oppenheimer Palooza, right? Is there a film that's going to be that that's just going to kind of sweep everything?

Speaker 16: You would probably start with Emilia Perez, which is, I think, got 13 nominations at all leading the pack. That's a kind of it's almost like an opera, really. It's a sort of an opera slash dynasty. The old nighttime soap in Mexico City story, big emotions, big things happening, all sets

Speaker 4: of music and dance.

Speaker 16: It's wildly entertaining. And it's got, you know, some remarkable performances from people like Zoe Saldana, who is nominated in Supporting Actress. She's a potential winner in that category. Carla Sofia Gascon in Best Actress, your first trans woman ever nominated in an acting category and lots of other nominations kind of around the board. So this is obviously excited the, you know, the voting folks at the Academy in lots of different directions. It will be a contender all the way through. That leads the way. Then you've got movies like Wicked and The Brutalist. They each have 10 nominations. Wicked, you obviously know a great deal about. Acclaimed, a huge success, nominations in Supporting Actress for Ariana Grande. Big news. Here's a pop star really making a splash now on the big screen for the first time. And Cynthia Erivo, her on-screen frenemy, nominated in Best Actress. So that's exciting news for the folks who love Wicked so much. They're very much represented as this film keeps going further. And then The Brutalist.

Speaker 11: Tell me, why is an accomplished foreign architect shoveling coal here in Philadelphia? I'm afraid it is not so simple.

Speaker 16: Something you might not have heard much about yet, because if you don't live in New York and Los Angeles, you might have had a hard time seeing it. But this is, once again, this is Adrian Brody, who won, you'll recall, for The Pianist way back when. Now he's playing an architect who's escaped from a Holocaust and is trying to find his way in post-World War II America in Pennsylvania. And it's a very compelling story. You'll notice that the running time is over three hours. There is an intermission. I like an intermission. Yeah, I like an old school, sort of theatrical vibe. I'm not sure what you do for 15 minutes inside an AMC theater. Like five is fine. Fifteen feels like maybe you should try lots of the different beverages. But it's really, you know, it's well-timed and it's really well thought out. And so that's very much a player and has the scope and ambition that we're used to seeing from Oscar movies in the past. Same with something like Conclave. You'll recall that's Grapevines and John Lithgow and Stanley Tucci as cardinals trying to pick the next pope.

Speaker 1: It is a conclave, Aldo.

Speaker 16: It's not a war. It is a war. And you have to commit to a side. And then there's a complete unknown. The kind of movie that you have to show an ID to get into just to prove you're over 75. It's the story of Bob Dylan's rise and eventually his decision to go electric. And I'm exactly the kind of guy you don't want to get trapped at a party with talking about Bob Dylan because I'll never let up. If you're traveling in the North Country Fair, they say no one wants to hear what a

Speaker 12: kid wrote last month.

Speaker 16: And so while I would have thought maybe I would object to this, Timothee Chalamet is wonderful as Bob Dylan and not only did he get nominated, but Ed Norton, Edward Norton is nominated as well for playing Pete Seeger in Supporting Actor. He's phenomenal.

Speaker 1: I was just about to ask, are there like particular categories that you're like, I don't see any daylight between these actors or these actors? Like what are the categories that are going to be the most contested?

Speaker 16: The category that really jumped out at me and it was clear right from the beginning was Best Actress. This was a 20-car pileup from the jump. They were just so many wonderful performances. The ones that are nominated are phenomenal. You've got Fernanda Torres in I'm Still Here. This is an amazingly powerful story out of Brazil. She is starring in the true story of a woman who lost her husband during one of the repressive regimes down there. She appears with her mother, Fernanda Montenegro, who was nominated in 1999 for a film called Central Station. Incredibly moving to see those two on screen again. That's phenomenal. Cynthia Erivo, Carlos Sofía Gasco, and Mikey Madison from Enora. And Demi Moore, Demi Moore, who we all knew so well in the 90s, who was such a figure of fascination for her personal and professional lives.

Speaker 14: There's been a slight misuse of the substance.

Speaker 16: She's now an Oscar nominee in Best Actress for The Substance, which is a fascinating movie all in itself. So those are the nominees, Brad. Here are the ones who not nominated. Yeah, yeah. I was going to say, what are the snubs? I want the dirt. Kate Winslet in Lee, a tremendous performance from her. Amy Adams in Night Bitch. Angelina Jolie playing Maria Callas. You know, there are some amazing performances that were not nominated. And so to have made the cut in Best Actress, well done. You're already a winner.

Speaker 1: Well, so then here's my last question for you. What should I go see if I feel like I want to get caught up and like see some movies that I'll like and be relevant at the Oscar party, whether they were nominated or not? I mean, do you have like a list of three or four movies that I should go see right now?

Speaker 16: Well, you should probably see Amelia Perez. It's really ambitious. It's a lot of fun. It does a lot of great things. There's a lot of music and dancing, and it's going to win a couple of awards. And that's great. I think The Brutalist is worth your time. And that's a lot of time you're committing an evening to it. It's like, you know, it's like going to a college football game or a Yankees Red Sox game from, you know, before they changed the rules on how many pictures you could use. It's a real experience, but I think it's it's worth the time. And then I'm a big fan of the ambitious and Best Picture nominated Nickel Boys. You don't remember? Remember what? You really don't remember? Which I think is is, you know, maybe the bravest of the movies in terms of how it's shot and how it's how it's imagined and stuff. So I'm big fans of those. And if you haven't seen A Complete Unknown, the Bob Dylan movie with Timothee Chalamet, just rocking it as Bob Dylan, that's worth your time, too. So none of these is a blockbuster, I'm going to admit, aside from something like Wicked or for Dune II. But they're worthwhile films and they leave you wanting to get a slice of pie afterwards and talk about them. And that's what we love about movies.

Speaker 1: And that is the that is the currency of movies, right, where they actually want to hang out later and discuss them. All right. Chris Connolly could discuss this all day with you. Thank you so much. Thank you for having me, Brad. Great to talk to you. All right. One more quick break. And speaking of acting, let's talk about athletes flopping on the field. One last thing is next. One last thing. All right, football fans. This is it. The weekend that will decide who's in the Super Bowl. On Sunday, the Philadelphia Eagles will host the surprising Washington Commanders and the Buffalo Bills will head to Kansas City to play Patrick Mahomes and the Chiefs. But it's Mahomes that's actually set off a debate. Does the NFL have a flopping problem?

Speaker 17: And then slide down.

Speaker 1: They're going to throw a flag on that. This is what it sounded like last week when the venerated quarterback slid to a stop against the Texans, causing defenders to slam against each other. But it was the Texans that were flagged for a penalty.

Speaker 18: I could not disagree with that one more, and he barely gets hit. That's the second penalty now.

Speaker 1: This was the second time Mahomes had drawn a dubious flag in this game. Houston fans were already upset. Even the announcers started getting into it. You can hear ESPN's analyst Troy Aikman say, come on, as the penalty is announced.

Speaker 5: Personal foul, unnecessary roughness. Defense number 39. Come on. 15-yard penalty.

Speaker 1: But it's what happened next that sparked outrage.

Speaker 17: Mahomes fakes that little pass and then puts it in his left hand.

Speaker 1: Later on the drive, Mahomes is being chased towards the sidelines. He kind of tiptoes until the defenders get close, and then flings himself to the ground as if he had just been shoved. He kind of flops out of bounds.

Speaker 17: They're not going to throw a flag. Mahomes trying to get a free first down, won't get it.

Speaker 1: This time, the rest recognized it for what it was, an obvious dive. This week, on a Kansas City radio program called The Drive, Mahomes seemed to acknowledge with a chuckle that he was selling contact that wasn't there.

Speaker 19: I would say that the only one I felt like I probably did too much was the one on the sideline where I didn't get a flag, and the ref saw it and didn't throw a flag. I understood it immediately and know that I probably shouldn't have done that.

Speaker 1: If you watch other sports, this might not seem like a big deal. The NBA sees its fair share of flopping. Soccer players famously drop to the floor like they've been shot upon the slightest contact. NFL fans, though, have traditionally thought of their sport as the last refuge for tough guys who don't need to upsell the violence. There are enough big hits here without pretending. Well, now, analysts like Aikman say if something's not done, you are going to see more of this. The incentives are too high, and there are hardly any consequences. But in recent years, referees in these other sports have been empowered to address diving. You can now actually be penalized for pretending. Will that happen in football? Aikman hopes so.

Speaker 18: They've got to address it in the offseason. You can't, as a quarterback, run around and play games with defenders and then be able to draw a penalty.

Speaker 1: For years now, the pendulum of football has been swinging toward protecting players, particularly quarterbacks, despite the complaints of defenders. Some fans say the momentum is turning because they say the only thing worse than witnessing terrible injuries is witnessing fake ones. And if this wasn't Patrick Mahomes, we wouldn't be talking like this, because a lot of people already don't like Mahomes because he's gotten these calls before and because he's beaten their teams over and over. So not a lot of sympathy here. Start here is produced by Kelly Torres, Jen Newman, Vika Aronson, Anthony Ali, Mara Milwaukee, and Amira Williams. Ariel Chester is our social media producer. Josh Cohan is director of podcast programming. I'm our managing editor, Laura Mayers, our executive producer. Thanks to John Newman, Tara Gimbel, and Liz Alessi. Special thanks this week to Chris Berry and Arthur Jones II. I'm Brad Milkey. See you next week.