Tonight, or Else: Trump’s New Deadline for Iran

[0:00] It's Tuesday, April 7th, and the president says the clock is ticking. [0:05] We start here. [0:08] President Trump says Iran has just hours to comply with his demand or else. [0:13] Burning, exploding, and never to be used again. [0:16] I mean, complete demolition. [0:18] With power plants in peril, could tonight be a turning point in this war? [0:23] Astronauts emerge from the dark side of the moon. [0:26] After some tense radio silence, the Orion spacecraft has completed its slingshot path. [0:35] These observations are going to beat them home. [0:37] And does being immune from the rules allow you to make the rules? [0:40] They are prosecuting not only the president's enemies, but dropping charges against some of his allies. [0:47] The legal argument being used more and more by the Trump administration. [0:51] From ABC News, this is Start Here. [0:56] I'm Brad Milkey. [0:56] Today is the 39th day of the Iran war. [1:06] Yesterday, on day 38, the head of Iran's secretive Quds Force was killed. [1:11] Above him, the intelligence chief. [1:13] The entire Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps was taken out as well. [1:17] Israel struck Iran's petrochemical plants, as well as one of the top universities in Tehran. [1:22] And yet, U.S. officials say, starting tonight, this could all get much, much worse for Iranians. [1:28] The entire country could be taken out in one night. [1:32] And that night might be tomorrow night. [1:34] Yesterday, President Trump took to the podium at the West Wing of the White House to issue a threat to Iran. [1:40] Accept a deal, or restart blowing up infrastructure. [1:43] A deal that's necessary for your society to function. [1:46] That threat came with a deadline. [1:48] 8 p.m. Eastern, tonight. [1:50] 8 o'clock Eastern time. [1:52] And after that, they're going to have no bridges. [1:55] They're going to have no power plants. [1:57] Stone ages, yeah. [2:01] Stakes rising by the hour. [2:03] So let's take you straight to Washington. [2:05] ABC's chief White House correspondent, Mary Bruce, was in the room for this briefing. [2:08] Mary, President Trump set this deadline. [2:10] What is it about? [2:11] What is he asking for from Iran here? [2:13] He is asking for Iran to make a deal. [2:16] A deal that is going to allow the Strait of Hormuz to reopen. [2:19] We have to have a deal that's acceptable to me. [2:23] And part of that deal is going to be we want free traffic of oil and everything else. [2:28] Of course, 39 days into this, the president well aware of the economic effect of this war. [2:33] The toll it is taking on American families and the price of gas. [2:37] He said this was a critical period. [2:39] And now he has set this deadline of 8 p.m. tonight for Iran to reach that deal. [2:44] Or essentially, he's warning, you know. [2:46] Or else. [2:47] Or else what? [2:48] Say, if Iran doesn't agree to the president's terms, what is he actually threatening could happen here? [2:52] Well, the president has said the entire country can be taken out in one night. [2:55] And that that night might be tonight. [2:57] The president is saying that he has a plan, basically during a four-hour blitz, to take out every bridge in Iran. [3:05] We have a plan, because of the power of our military, where every bridge in Iran will be decimated by 12 o'clock tomorrow night. [3:15] Where every power plant in Iran will be out of business, burning, exploding, and never to be used again. [3:25] I mean, complete demolition. [3:27] The president warning that if these attacks go forward against this kind of infrastructure, that it could take Iran 100 years to rebuild. [3:35] We don't want that to happen. [3:37] We may even get involved with helping them rebuild their nation. [3:41] And you know what? [3:42] If that's the case, the last thing we want to do is start with power plants, [3:45] which are among the most expensive things, and bridges. [3:48] But Brad, you know, so far, negotiations continue, but there's no clear sign that they're on the precipice of any kind of deal. [3:55] But I can tell you that we have an active, willing participant on the other side. [4:02] They would like to be able to make a deal. [4:04] I can't say any more than that. [4:06] The president said yesterday that Iran's latest ceasefire proposal is a significant step, but he says it's not good enough. [4:12] And the president, of course, making clear, right, they're not accepting this deal [4:15] unless the strait reopens. [4:17] And Iran hasn't shown any sign that they're willing to budge on that. [4:20] But there's a difference between firing on, like, radar sites and military armament depots. [4:25] Like, there's a difference between that and firing on roads and bridges and, you know, power plants. [4:31] What would this mean for the people of Iran? [4:33] Yeah, look, bombing civilian targets, civilian infrastructure could have a devastating consequence for the Iranian people. [4:39] I mean, they could quite literally be left in the dark. [4:41] It could impact the shipment of food. [4:43] It could impact hospitals, schools. [4:44] Their ability to get access to clean water. [4:47] We're talking about basic essentials. [4:49] But the president has insisted that Iranians would be angry if America backed off of this conflict. [4:55] And I press the president on this specifically. [4:57] Why would they want you to blow up their infrastructure, to cut off their power? [5:01] Wouldn't that be punishing Iranians for the actions of the regime? [5:04] They would be willing to—and it's suffering. [5:07] They would be willing to suffer that in order to have freedom. [5:11] The Iranians have—and we've had it. [5:13] We've had numerous intercepts. [5:16] Please keep bombing. [5:18] Bombs that are dropping near their homes. [5:20] Please keep bombing. [5:22] Do it. [5:23] Remember, Brad, it was just a few months ago that the president promised the Iranian people help was on the way. [5:28] And now he's admitting that they will be the ones who will suffer if these attacks go ahead. [5:33] But he says they would be willing to accept that suffering to have that freedom. [5:39] But keep in mind, attacks on civilian infrastructure could amount to a war crime. [5:43] Are you concerned that your threat to bomb power plants and bridges amount to a war crime? [5:47] No, not at all. [5:48] No, I'm not. [5:49] I hope I don't have to do it. [5:50] Is there a reason to be skeptical about any of this, Mary? [5:54] Like, I'm thinking, a couple weeks ago, the president issues a different 48-hour threat, [5:59] again saying you've got to open up the Strait of Hormuz in two days or we're going to rain hellfire down upon you. [6:03] Guess what? [6:04] That got turned into a five-day extension, then a 10-day extension, and then it's still here. [6:08] In the meantime, last week, he said we're actually getting out of the region soon. [6:12] So you've got all this back and forth. [6:13] Is there a reason at all to do that? [6:14] Is there a reason at all to think that this could just be hot air? [6:16] You know, the threats have been head-spinning. [6:18] I mean, there's no question. [6:19] The president has repeatedly moved the goalposts. [6:21] So yes, there is certainly cause for skepticism here. [6:25] So which is it? [6:26] Are you winding this down? [6:27] I can't tell you. [6:28] Are you escalating it? [6:29] I can't tell you. [6:30] I don't know. [6:31] I can't tell you. [6:32] It depends what they do. [6:33] This is a critical period. [6:34] I think there's also a real danger for the White House in terms of its messaging that Americans may sort of start to tune it out [6:40] if nothing comes of all of these constant, you know, threats. [6:44] And then pulling back and reversals and new threats. [6:47] So we will see what happens today, Brad. [6:49] But the question is whether threatening to pressure the Iranian people like this is going to do anything to change the tactics of what remains of the regime. [6:59] And so far we have seen no clear sign of that. [7:02] Right. [7:03] Not to say that this air assault hasn't been devastating for Iran. [7:05] But when it comes to attacking this infrastructure, at some point you think all the threats have to be backed up with actions. [7:10] Maybe that is tonight. [7:11] But if that happens, that will raise a whole other set of questions. [7:14] What happens next? [7:15] Are we staying in the region longer? [7:17] Mary Bruce there at the White House today. [7:18] Thank you so much. [7:19] Thanks, Brad. [7:20] Next up on Start Here, that was 1.5 seconds worth of radio silence. [7:28] Now imagine 45 minutes worth in space. [7:31] We're back in a bit. [7:32] The Earth can feel lonely sometimes. [7:41] But yesterday, four astronauts set a record for being farther away from the Earth's surface than any other human beings in history. [7:49] Yes, other space missions have gone around the moon, but not quite like Artemis II did. [7:54] Last night. [7:55] Well, actually, was it night? [7:56] Was it day? [7:57] Where are the sun and moon right now? [7:58] Who even knows? [7:59] Let's go to ABC's Brianna Alvarado, who covers space. [8:01] In fact, this mission has basically been her full-time job for the last week. [8:05] Brianna, I said it was lonely. [8:06] Maybe that's for the astronauts. [8:07] It was so unifying for the rest of the world to hear these descriptions. [8:10] But this was like the main event yesterday of this whole mission. [8:13] Yeah. [8:14] So yesterday was the lunar flyby, which was the most highly anticipated event of this entire mission, because this was going to be the first time in nearly a decade. [8:23] In nearly 50 years that humans would fly by the far side of the moon and just get to see just a beautiful picture of, you know, the geographical features on the moon and to be able to paint that picture for scientists back home on Earth and for the rest of us, too, because a lot of us that were listening in, we were getting to hear those live, you know, descriptions of Victor, from Reid, Christina, Jeremy, just painting that picture for us, for those of us who can't really be on the spacecraft. [8:52] Right. [8:53] So it was a wonderful thing to be on the spacecraft with them. [8:54] It was just a wonderful thing to, like, be a part of and to hear back here on Earth. [9:09] Yeah. [9:10] And can you explain how this actually plays out? [9:11] Because, again, the moon is just facing us. [9:14] Like, it's not rotating the way Earth rotates, right? [9:16] It's just always facing us. [9:18] The same side is facing us the whole time, so you never see the other side of it. [9:22] What happens when they're up there? [9:24] So really, the lunar flyby day got started early in the morning, at least here on Earth. [9:30] That's when the four astronauts entered the lunar spacecraft. [9:31] The astronauts entered the lunar sphere of influence, which they were around 41,000 miles away from the moon at this point. [9:39] And this is also the point in which they're more in the gravitational pull of the moon than they are in Earth's gravitational pull. [9:47] And then from that moment, we moved into preparations for just getting ready for the actual lunar flyby, which would begin around 2.45 p.m. Eastern. [9:55] Even before that, they surpassed, Integrity surpassed the Apollo 13 distance record, [10:00] which was previously set in 1970, of about 248,655 miles away from Earth. [10:07] From there, that's when we really started to move in and rev things up for the lunar observation during the flyby. [10:28] So during this period, you know, the crew was really trying to paint that picture for the science teams back in mission control, back on Earth. [10:35] They eventually did lose communications. [10:38] And we have confirmation of loss of signal of the Orion spacecraft as it flies behind the moon. [10:44] We expect to regain communications with them for in another approximately 40 minutes. [10:49] We knew this was going to happen. [10:51] They regained communications right as we expected at 724. [10:54] Integrity. [10:55] They made contact with Orion, and it was a beautiful moment to see, you know, Integrity, we've got you here in Houston. [11:01] It was wonderful. [11:02] Integrity, we have you loud and clear. [11:04] Now, Brad, these photos are going to take a while to get to us. [11:08] I mean, the teams are going to be working overnight. [11:10] They're going to be working to make these photos available. [11:12] They're going to be taking a look at it. [11:14] They're going to be doing it for themselves for the first time even. [11:17] So it's going to take a while. [11:19] But, you know, that's why it's so awesome that we're even getting these descriptions in real time from the crew. [11:30] They're painting the picture for us before we get the picture. [11:34] Okay. [11:35] So what does it look like then? [11:36] Like how do astronauts describe it since we don't have the photos yet? [11:38] So, yeah, when I was listening in yesterday, I was hearing the crew members really work through those descriptions. [11:43] It is a little rougher or jagged. [11:45] It starts to get into more loose looking. [11:47] One of the crew members was describing it. [11:49] One of the crew members was describing something that I found that was really interesting. [11:52] They were describing the far side of the moon to be a little more rugged. [11:54] And they were specifically referring to something they call the terminator of the moon, [11:58] which is really that boundary between the illuminated and dark parts of the moon. [12:02] They had over 30 lunar targets, meaning like different sites on the moon that they were studying specifically. [12:23] The purpose of this is to figure out why is it somewhat different from the near side of the moon. [12:28] So what happens now? [12:29] They are on the way home, I assume. [12:31] Yes. [12:32] The astronauts are earthbound now. [12:33] Mission control even flipped their patches around to, you know, signify that moment because it's time to bring the crew back home. [12:49] They are anticipating, obviously, a splashdown happening on Friday, which we're all looking forward to welcoming the crew back home to Earth. [12:57] Wow. [12:58] Just unbelievable. [12:59] All these sort of decades after the Apollo program. [13:01] So I think there are four brave souls out there just went beyond where anyone could even see or hear them on their way back to Earth, hopefully safely right now. [13:10] Brianna Alvarado covering all this. [13:11] Thank you so much. [13:12] Absolutely. [13:13] Thank you so much, Brett. [13:14] Supreme Court decisions can be complicated. [13:19] The rulings can be long, technical. [13:21] Sometimes you got dissents where justices disagree, sometimes even concurring opinions where a justice agrees, but kind of through a different lens. [13:28] It all adds up to a lot of writing. [13:30] Well, yesterday, the biggest news from the court came in a ruling just one sentence long that could overturn the conviction of former presidential adviser Steve Bannon. [13:40] Remember Bannon? [13:41] Far-right activist ran the Breitbart News Service. [13:44] He was on the White House website, ended up advising Trump in his first term, and then went to prison for refusing to testify before Congress about January 6, 2021. [13:54] I am proud to go to prison. [13:56] If this is what it takes to stand up to tyranny, if this is what it takes to stand up to the Garland corrupt criminal DOJ. [14:05] He's already served his time. [14:06] He no longer works for Trump. [14:08] But this could still have implications for legal parameters around this Trump White House. [14:12] As senior Washington reporter Devin Dwyer covers the court. [14:14] Devin, this was a contempt of Congress charge, right? [14:17] Like if Congress subpoenas you, that's almost like being subpoenaed by a court, right? [14:21] You got to show up. [14:22] And he didn't. [14:23] So what's the issue? [14:24] Yeah. [14:25] I mean, congressional committees that draft legislation have the power to compel testimony from all sorts of people. [14:30] As we recently saw, Brad, former President Bill Clinton being dragged in to talk about Jeffrey Epstein. [14:34] So this was a case back to 2022 when the bipartisan House Select Committee investigating the January 6 attack wanted to know, [14:40] wanted to talk to Bannon. [14:43] He, of course, had been fired by Donald Trump and was advising the president from outside the White House. [14:48] And his attorney at the time advised him not to comply. [14:51] He said that he invoked executive privilege and, you know, a host of things. [14:55] No one in this country, no matter how wealthy or how powerful, is above the law. [15:01] But the committee referred that defiance to the Justice Department, then run by the Biden administration. [15:08] And they prosecuted him. [15:09] They prosecuted and won a conviction against Steve Bannon. [15:13] And he was sentenced to four months in prison. [15:15] He served that time. [15:17] But even in light of this, he has sought to have that conviction overturned. [15:21] The appeals court judgment that upholding it tossed out. [15:25] And the new Justice Department, the Trump Justice Department, has signaled that it will not pursue this case anymore. [15:31] And in fact, then yesterday, the Supreme Court said, all right, we will vacate that appeals court ruling. [15:38] And it essentially clears the way now for the case to be dismissed because the Trump Justice Department and its prosecutorial discretion told the judicial system that it thinks it's in the interest of justice to drop these proceedings against Steve Bannon. [15:53] And that will now happen. [15:55] But so Bannon already served a prison sentence for this. [15:58] So I guess some might wonder, like, who cares? [16:00] But if you decided, hey, any time the White House tells me I don't have to show up to something, I'm not going to. [16:04] Even if courts and lawyers are telling me, like, you're not protected by the White House. [16:07] Right. [16:08] I guess, like, what was the Supreme Court's rationale or does it matter? [16:11] Well, they didn't explain themselves, Brad, other than to say because the current Justice Department does not want to pursue this case anymore, you know, it's in their discretion to do that. [16:22] They've invoked their discretion. [16:24] So therefore, we will vacate and side with these people want to get rid of this. [16:29] No one's arguing with it. [16:30] So that's right. [16:31] So, you know, it's a symbolic win, no doubt. [16:34] I mean, Bannon's paid the price. [16:36] The message was sent. [16:37] You know, he will always have lived that time behind bars and the public knew what went down. [16:43] But this was a massive exercise in prosecutorial discretion. [16:48] And that, I think, is the bigger theme out of this story that's now coming to a close just over the past 24 hours is that this is an administration that has exercised in a way many experts say that has been emboldened by the Supreme Court's 2024 immunity decision. [17:06] So much discretion in how they are prosecuting not only the president's enemies, but dropping charges against some of his allies. [17:16] And ABC News reviewed a number of court filings, dozens of court filings at the Supreme Court, Brad. [17:22] And in new reporting out this morning, we discovered that nearly a third of Donald Trump's appeals, unprecedented number of appeals to the United States Supreme Court in his second term have invoked that immunity decision. [17:34] Like the court basically said, no. [17:35] Like the court basically found like what you do as president, as long as it's part of the job, like you are immune from the president is immune from prosecution. [17:42] Yeah. [17:43] I mean, he couldn't be prosecuted. [17:44] Right. [17:45] That was the big takeaway. [17:46] But in that opinion, written by Chief Justice John Roberts, was all of this language effectively formalizing and enshrining the exclusive power of the chief executive as the top law enforcement official in the country. [18:01] And so what we found in our review is that that decision. [18:03] We found in our review is that that decision has given this White House an unbelievable charge to dictate when and where these prosecutions happen. [18:13] The president himself personally directing them. [18:16] So because the Supreme Court says the president is immune in his official acts from his time in office, that then makes it what he gets more latitude to them to decide who is prosecuted and who's not prosecuted by his Justice Department. [18:31] It's not that simple. [18:32] It's not that simple. [18:33] So it wasn't just that. [18:34] They said he was immune. [18:35] It was. [18:36] Why? [18:37] What they said was the Constitution gives a president, any president exclusive and preclusive authority over certain things right? [18:38] Conducting foreign affairs. [18:40] If a president of the United States does not have immunity, he'll be totally ineffective because he won't be able to do anything because it will mean he'll be prosecuted strongly prosecuted perhaps as soon as he leaves office by his, you know. [19:03] office by his by the opposing party relevant to this conversation directing law enforcement across [19:10] the united states speaking directly to the attorney general is not a crime whether it involved [19:16] allegedly attempting to overturn results of an election or whether it's telling the attorney [19:22] general hey drop that case against steve bannon that is allowed according to the words of chief [19:28] justice john roberts in the court's majority and so that you know many people are talking about [19:32] that as sort of a sleeper aspect of that case and when you go and look at what it says about [19:37] the power of a president and why that's why a president trump was immune from prosecution [19:44] it is sort of mushroomed into a much more impactful decision and we see it in cases [19:50] like the one of steve bannon it's interesting because we're used to the concept of pardons [19:53] like bannon himself was pardoned by president trump in a federal case a few years ago where [19:58] he was accused of bilking americans out of donations for a private fundraising [20:02] effort and then the president was pardoned by president trump in a federal case a few years ago [20:02] called We Build the Wall, but here he did end up having to serve this time for this contempt of [20:06] Congress charge. Now, perhaps that about to be dismissed in retrospect. Devin Dwyer, thank you. [20:11] Thanks, Brad. [20:13] Okay, one more quick break. When we come back, the U.S. Postal Service just ordered a lifeline [20:18] from Amazon, and it might have been shipped overnight. One last thing is next. [20:25] And one last thing. Do you know how much a first-class stamp costs right now? Go on, [20:32] take a guess. It's 78 cents. That is five cents more than a year ago. The U.S. Postal Service [20:38] says by next year, that could be 90, even 95 cents. That should tell you how much financial [20:43] trouble the USPS is in right now, but at least it's held on to its biggest customer. [20:51] Yesterday, the USPS announced it had struck a deal with Amazon to retain much of its shipping [20:56] business. Now, I knew the post office delivered a lot of Amazon packages. I did not quite realize [21:02] how many that is. Approximately 1.7 billion Amazon packages were delivered by the Postal [21:09] Service last year. [21:10] Reuters has reported that out of the USPS's $80 billion budget, about $6 billion of that annual [21:17] revenue comes straight from Amazon. But there's a problem. Amazon has been threatening to pull [21:22] out of this business arrangement. Until the recent changes to the network, [21:27] we didn't have a network that could even compete with FedEx and UPS and Amazon. [21:30] It just couldn't compete. You see, the U.S. Postal Service still has one [21:34] superpower that none of its rivals can match, the so-called last mile of deliveries. [21:39] Think about it. It's the last mile of deliveries. It's the last mile of deliveries. It's the last mile [21:42] of deliveries. Think about it. It's easy enough for UPS or FedEx or Amazon to load up a truck or a [21:47] plane and dispatch that to a huge loading dock. There's no advantage for USPS there. It's also [21:55] possible for those companies to sort all of their packages and get them to the center of a town [22:00] somewhere in the U.S. But to take each of those packages and get them to every single mailbox, [22:06] apartment building, warehouse entrance, back road porch, that requires an enormous amount of [22:12] vehicles, an enormous number of mail carriers, and a lot of other things. So, I don't know if it's [22:13] going to be a good idea. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. [22:13] There's an enormous number of mail carriers and infrastructure that only the USPS has. [22:18] FedEx and UPS both deliver well under 10 billion packages a year. Well under 10 billion. We deliver [22:25] 110 billion pieces per year. You might see brown UPS trucks or blue Amazon trucks around more than [22:32] you're used to, but none of them has been able to conquer that last mile. It's what still gives the [22:37] USPS a kind of leverage in setting shipping prices. But recently, Amazon has balked. They've announced [22:43] they were probably going to be able to deliver more than they used to. They've announced they're [22:44] going to be able to deliver more than they used to. They've announced they're going to be able to deliver [22:44] more than they used to. They've announced they're going to be able to deliver more than they used to. [22:44] pouring $4 billion into upping their last mile abilities, and this year reportedly told the USPS, [22:50] hey, you know all those packages we pay you to deliver? We're going to take away about two-thirds [22:54] of those and deliver them ourselves. USPS said this could sink the mail service as we know it. [23:01] This week's deal appears to be a compromise. The USPS will get 80% of its regular Amazon traffic. [23:07] Amazon will get that last mile delivery to all those hard-to-reach addresses. But if this trend [23:12] continues, or if it's going to be a compromise, then it's going to be a compromise. [23:14] Amazon scored a huge discount in this deal. 95-cent stamps aren't going to begin to cover it. [23:22] When I was a kid, I mailed a shoe to my friends just because you could. I had read that if you [23:27] attach a bunch of stamps to something, as long as the address is legible, as long as the postage is [23:32] correct, it will get there. That little experiment now, man, that would buy the postal service a new [23:38] truck probably. Hey, how good was Mike Dabusky filling in yesterday? Many thanks for the assist. [23:43] Hopefully we'll hear from him more in the future. I'm Brad Milkey. I'll see you tomorrow. [23:46] Thanks for watching.