$1.3 trillion spending bill, as you said. the diplomatic room is being set up as we speak. the president not entirely pleased with the spending bill, and apparently was fuming and venting this morning when he was expressing his displeasure with parts of the bill. but we are told now by two administration officials that the president does indeed plan to sign that spending bill which would suspend the government until september. certainly a few trying hours as members were wondering if he was going to veto it. but now we're told he plans to sign that spending bill. >> he just tweeted a while ago, i'll read a couple tweets he tweeted. he said, i'm considering a veto of the omnibus spending bill based on the fact that the 800-plus daca recipients have been totally ignored by democrats, not even mentioned in the bill. and the border wall which is

desperately needed for our defense is not fully funded. that's what he tweeted a while ago. then a few minutes ago he tweeted, news conference at the white house concerning the omnibus spending bill at 1:00 p.m. that's 1:00 p.m. on the east coast. the president making a threat, but now apparently he's decided to go ahead ask sind sign the legislation? >> that's what we were told, and i do believe the president to raise concerns that you were just reading there. he is concerned about funding the border wall. at the same time, fiscal conservatives across washington believes this bill spends way too much, it's too big. so the president in some respects is trying to place blame on congress for this to highlight that he's not happy with this but indeed will sign it, anyway. if he would veto this, wolf, he would surprise people and has been known, of course, to surprise and march to his own drummer here.

that would touch off a cascading series of events because the house and senate are not in. almost all of them have left washington, so the government would shut down. but we are not expecting that. we are told by administration officials he is going to sign it and voice his reservations at the same time, wolf. >> they're setting up a diplomatic reception room right now. the white house press pool getting ready to go in. the president presumably will make a statement and then he will sign this legislation into law, and then maybe, maybe, we'll see if he answers any reporters' questions. the president calls it a news conference. we'll see if it actually is a news conference as opposed to a simple signing ceremony and statement by the president. jeff, stand by. i want to bring in our panel, our cnn political analyst david gregory is with us, our cnn congressional correspondent manu raju, our senior correspondent john king and our senior analyst gore gloria borger.

most of the senators have split, they're out of town already, and if he doesn't sign this into law, the government shuts down. >> and he doesn't get to go to mar-a-lago, and john and i were discussing this earlier, i think he's scheduled to go later this afternoon. i think what the president wants to do, particularly if he signs this, is be on the record saying, this is what i don't like about it, and the democrats are forgetting the dreamers, and what about my wall, and i'm going to make these demands. but otherwise he would be shutting the government down, and our reporting says he doesn't want to do that. >> but it is a remarkable moment in a sense that what the president is about to do, assuming the sources are correct and he doesn't pull the rug out from underneath everybody again, sur is under the chaos and dysfunction of his presidency. the people said vote for it, vote for it, the president spoke

for it, now he's going to go in and sign it. rush limbaugh and everybody on the radio said, mr. president, this is a bigger spending bill than president obama could have ever dreamed of. he built up their hopes. new he's going to sign a bill he doesn't approve of. so it's chaos, it's dysfunction and it's presidential weakness. >> also, you get a sense, and maybe i'm wrong, that he wasn't paying much attention to what was in the bill. i mean, it is an omnibus bill so it is large, but clearly he had been briefed on it, but how much attention was he paying to it. >> this is a product of months of negotiations that have occurred between the leadership, between the white house officials. white house officials knew what was in this bill. they knew they were not going to get everything they wanted because they made the calculation that those people who were upset, the freedom caucus, the rush limbaughs of the world, they wouldn't be happy with this bill so they cut him out of the negotiations. they tried to make a deal, get

bipartisan on board. it's something they didn't like because it spent more money than they wanted. and you saw a significant number of republicans support it despite the number of concerns from the right, but the president should have known what was in this bill before friday morning and threatening to veto it because the white house was involved in this. >> it's classic donald trump, right, because he can say this is a swamp at work, this is an ineffective party at work. he transcends the party in his own mind. to state the obvious, he's in a rather independent mode at the moment where he's deciding he'll run the government the way he shall like. no one will tell him what to do. he says, i'll blow this thing up. then decides, well, i can't quite do that so i'll go back to being the outsider guy. it is so head-snapping that i

think he defies people to say, no, no, i'm actually weak. i threatened to do this, i backed off of it but i'm still very much in control. nobody believes that because the truth is he couldn't get what he wanted and yet he's still getting some things out of this. >> he said it would be easy. this is what he campaigned on. the politicians are stupid, they don't know how to cut deals, i will cut better deals. and he said he would make compromises, which is important, but what he tweeted about this morning is he didn't get a lot of wall funding and he's saying it's the democrats' fault that the dreamers don't get protected here. the democrats offered the president that deal. $640 million they offered him, not $26 billion. they wanted a pathway of citizenship for the dreamers. the president didn't want that because it's a midterm election year. the president made that choice days and weeks ago. now he's second-guessing himself

threatening to blow up the deal this morning and now he's apparently going to sign it. >> he's calling his own press conference, can we just say that? he is his own communication director. >> he hasn't had a real formal white house news conference in more than a year. >> john bolton, his new national security adviser, we know having covered the bush white house, the lack of process here, right, the lack of good debates and any kind of thoughtful process leads to really horrible results. it can result in life and death and not just the titilation of the aspects of the presidency. he is not listening to people who advise him. whether you support him, you don't support him, whatever policy you care about, the lack of process here really does matter. >> this is probably why it's important for the president to come out, speak, take questions, too, because clearly his people cannot speak for him anymore. time after time they have been

undercut by this president, whether it's by h.r. mcmaster, secretary tillerson about the spending bill, and mick mulvaney said before the mics yesterday that the president would sign it before this veto threat this morning. the president is the person who should be answering questions. >> he's also taking over his legal strategy. not only is he operating his white house as he operated the trump organization -- someone told me this morning who has known him for a long time, just remember, the trump organization, there were only vice presidents. there were like no executive vice presidents, there were only vice presidents. he says that's what the white house is. there are only vice presidents. there's one guy in charge. as steve bannon said yesterday, if john kelly goes, he'll be his own chief of staff. so the president now is calling his own press conference, calling his legal -- you know, calling the shots for his legal team, calling the shots for his congressional leaders. it's, you know, a man in full.

>> i want to set the scene for our viewers. you're looking at the diplomatic reception room. you'll see the president will make a speech at the micro figurine here. there is a table where presumably the president will sign this legislation, a $1.3 trillion spending bill to keep the government from shutting down. getting briefed by fox news, among other places. even senator bob cork era mid th -- corker amid the threats of veto said, please do, mr. president. i'm just down the street and i'll bring you a pen. rand paul, another republican senator, said, i agree, donald trump, veto this sad excuse for a spending bill.

>> he reignites a debate within his own party. it's party unity, party energy. the democrats have it. we've seen that consistently in the elections. the republicans do not right now and the president puts a match to the fire and pours gasoline on it. why do we win the senate and the house and it's bigger than anything requested by barack obama. the youtube channel says it's a bill signing. the president will sign it after believe building up hopes this morning. if the democrats take back the house or even just win more seats in the house, they will have more leverage or even power next year. this could be the last spending bill the president has any significant influence over and it gives him almost nothing of what he wanted. it does give him the military spending. he wanted more money for the military and he gets it. but he doesn't get his wall

money, he doesn't get his infrastructure plan, and he doesn't get other infrastructure priorities and the president just wants to campaign, and it's possible the next year's budget will have speaker pelosi, not speaker ryan. >> they were upset about his spending. they thought bush was a spender. he was a piker compared to this. if they ever have any doubts about how conservative the president was on fiscal issues, you know, this kind of ends it. >> and the way this is all rolled out, too, was a way to kind of limit the dissension in the ranks. they unveiled this 2200-page bill thursday night that nobody had read. they jammed it through the house and senate on friday also that nobody had read. but let the people let off their steam and then sign the bill,

move on into the weekend. >> they quickly passed it in the house, passed it in the senate. now the president presumably will sign it into law. he's going to be making a statement, then he'll do the signing ceremony. we'll see if he takes questions from reporters. we've also been told the white house press briefing, which had been scheduled for this hour with sarah sanders, the press secretary, has been canceled in lieu of the president's statement. stand by. much more breaking news after this. he's a nascar champion who's she's a world-class swimmer who's stared down the best in her sport.

but for both of them, the most challenging opponent was... pe blood clots in my lung. it was really scary. a dvt in my leg. i had to learn all i could to help protect myself. my doctor and i choose xarelto® xarelto®... to help keep me protected. xarelto® is a latest-generation blood thinner... ...that's proven to treat and reduce the risk of dvt and pe blood clots from happening again. in clinical studies, almost 98% of patients on xarelto® did not experience another dvt or pe. here's how xarelto works. xarelto® works differently. warfarin interferes with at least six blood-clotting factors. xarelto® is selective... ...targeting just one critical factor, interacting with less of your body's natural blood-clotting function. don't stop taking xarelto® without talking to your doctor as this may increase risk of blood clots. while taking, you may bruise more easily, or take longer for bleeding to stop. it may increase your risk of bleeding if you take certain medicines. xarelto® can cause serious, and in rare cases, fatal bleeding. get help right away for unexpected bleeding, unusual bruising, or tingling.

if you've had spinal anesthesia, watch for back pain or any nerve or muscle-related signs or symptoms. do not take xarelto® if you have an artificial heart valve or abnormal bleeding. tell your doctor before all planned medical or dental procedures and before starting xarelto® about any conditions, such as kidney, liver, or bleeding problems. you've got to learn all you can... ...to help protect yourself from dvt and pe blood clots. talk to your doctor about xarelto®. there's more to know. ♪ you said you're not like me,

♪ never drop to your knees, ♪ look into the sky for a momentary high, ♪ ♪ you never even tried till it's time to say goodbye, bye ♪ ♪ everybody fights for a little bit of light, i believe. ♪ geico motorcycle, great rates for great rides. but i'm not standing still... and with godaddy, i've made my ideas real. ♪

i made my own way, now it's time to make yours. ♪ everything is working, just like it should ♪ we're following breaking news. momentarily we're told the president will go into the diplomatic reception room at the white house, make a statement and sign a $1.3 trillion spending bill into law. a while ago he threatened to veto it. he issued a tweet saying, i'm considering a veto on the omnibus spending bill based on the fact that the 8 million-plus daca recipients have been

totally abandoned by the democrats, not even mentioned in bill, and the border wall, which is desperately needed for our national defense, is not fully funded. we'll see if he answers reporters' questions, and there will be a pool of white house reporters inside. they will ask the president some questions. he might just say thank you and leave, or he will answer some questions. i would suspect some of those questions might be questions he does not want to be asked, for example, the russia probe and his new legal team. >> sure. he clearly doesn't want to be asked about that. and pamela brown, evan perez and i are reporting just now that joe digenova who was announced earlier this week is joining the legal team. now, his role on that legal team is in question. joe digenova and his wife victoria tensing met with the president yesterday afternoon, and our sources tell us that while the president liked their message, he is now not convinced that they are right for the legal jobs. so maybe they'll join the legal

team, maybe they won't. maybe they'll be in a more pr role than a legal role. but jay sekulow, one of the president's attorneys, did announce on monday that joe digenova will be joining our legal team later this week, and after this meeting yesterday, we are not so sure. >> one thing you have to appreciate about this president and his presidency is how incredibly transparent the chaos is. because he literally is sharing what he's thinking about, and we are in on every part of the process. the flow of the decision making up and down, again, i think it's no way to run a country or a government because of what the dysfunction creates and what the implications of that are. but we are really seeing that. and you know that trump is lashing out in lots of directions. we haven't talked about stormy daniels and the other accusers who are giving interviews, fearing that could become part of the independent counsel. someone has clearly gotten to

him and said joe digenova is great to go on fox news, may not be the one -- >> i think it might be the president himself. as we know, he is newly emboldened and believes he now knows how to run the white house. i think he has this meeting yesterday. people have raised questions about conflict issues with joe digenova and victoria tensing because they represented other witnesses in the russia investigation. that's one of the reasons john dowd left. >> that box that we're seeing next to the microphone over there looks like it's the actual legislation, the 2200 pieces of legislation. the president will make a statement. take a look at this mon strosst. he's not very happy with this. he has said he will sign it into law. >> the other party is not the

one you control. >> he can control surprising things if he is planning on signing it, unless he changes his mind and decides to veto it and shocks everybody. that will be a pretty remarkable scene to criticize something that was a product of his own white house in republican leadership and democratic leadership that he thought he was fully behind. >> his budget director, john, mick mulvaney worked with the legislators in the senate. he was clearly on board. the director at the white house, he was clearly on board frlt th then for the president to say he was all for a veto. have you ever seen anything like this? >> he came out and said rex tillerson won't be fired, a few weeks later rex tillerson was fired. the president is happy with his legal team, john dowd left the

legal team. this is a dangerous time to have a murky disconnect in your legal team. because anybody who has gone to the special counsel understands this is a solid team, a tried and true panel of prosecutors with a discipline. if there is lack of senior voices, lack of client listening in the camp right now, it's a tough time to be messing around with your lawyers. >> they're still putting out feelers, the help wanted sign for some more lawyers. >> the president of the united states should sit down with a team of veteran, solid, highly detailed, meticulous prosecutors. good luck. >> they tried to get ted olson who is one of those excellent attorneys with a lot of experience here in washington and -- >> he's a grown-up who expects to be listened to. treat him with respect. >> david makes a key point.

a lot of the grown-ups in town -- lawyers know clients who say no and disagree with their strategy. but they expect to be treated with respect. they don't expect to have their coffee in the morning and get slammed on twitter. >> they expect to be paid, that's another thing. they expect their advice to be listened to. but now the client is the lead attorney, and that's a problem. because the president is directing all of this. once again, we're standing by. the president is going to be making a statement just before signing this legislation into law. $1.3 trillion spending bill. it will keep the government operating until the end of september. we're standing by to hear from the president. we'll see if he answers reporters' questions. if he does, presumably those questions will be on a whole range of issues he doesn't really want to answer. we'll be right back. little things can be a big deal. that's why there's otezla. otezla is not an injection or a cream. it's a pill that treats psoriasis differently.

with otezla, 75% clearer skin is achievable after just 4 months, ... with reduced redness, thickness, and scaliness of plaques. and the otezla prescribing information has no requirement for routine lab monitoring. don't use if you're allergic to otezla. otezla may cause severe diarrhea, nausea, or vomiting. tell your doctor if these occur. otezla is associated with an increased risk of depression. tell your doctor if you have a history of depression or suicidal thoughts, or if these feelings develop. some people taking otezla reported weight loss. your doctor should monitor your weight and may stop treatment. other side effects include upper respiratory tract infection and headache. tell your doctor about all the medicines you take and if you're pregnant or planning to be. ♪ otezla. show more of you.

the president will make a statement and then he'll sign into law this $1.3 trillion spending bill reluctantly. he complained about it. he told everyone by twitter, i'm considering a veto of the omnibus spending bill. he didn't like it, but apparently on second thought he's going to go ahead and sign it into law. if he didn't sign it into law, the possibility certainly exists the government would shut down at midnight tonight. the house and senate are no longer in session. most of the members have already left washington on various assignments, either gone back to their districts or overseas travel so they're not even around. if he doesn't sign it into law the government will shut down at least for the time being. here's the president of the united states. >> thank you very much, everybody. we have a lot of good news to report. some tremendous trade deals are being made with various

countries. we're negotiating very long, very hard but very quickly. and the deal with south korea, according to secretary ross and bob lighthizer, is very close to being finished, and we're going to have a wonderful deal with a wonderful ally. we're getting very close to it. it was a deal that was causing a lot of problems for our country in terms of employment and in terms of lots of other things. i might ask secretary ross to just say a few words about that, and then we're going to get on to this ridiculous situation that took place over the last week. so, secretary ross? >> thank you, mr. president. we believe we are relatively close to a pretty comprehensive

resolution with the south korean government. it would encompass, if it goes through, both the 232s and broader trade issues. we hope sometime next week to be able to have a real announcement. >> thank you very much, wilbur. i appreciate it. the last time we negotiated something like this, and as you know, it's always been a problem for our country. they get together and they create a series of documents that nobody has been able to read because it was just done. you tell me who can read that quickly. it takes a long time to read it. for the last eight years, deep defense cuts have undermined our national security. if you look at what's taken out, they hallowed our readiness as a

military unit and put america at really grave risk. my highest duty is to keep america safe. nothing more important. the omnibus bill reverses this dangerous defense as crazy as it's been, as difficult as it's been, as much opposition to the military as we've had from the democrats, and it has been tremendous. i tried to explain to them, the military is is for republfor re democrats and for everybody else. but we have tremendous opposition to creating, really, what will be by far the strongest military that we've ever had. we've had that from the democrats. so if we take something for the military, they want something for, in many cases, things that are really a wasted sum of money. it's not right and it's very bad for our country. we're looking to do funding for

our final fight in certain areas. as you know, we've gotten just about 100% of our land back from isis. we have troop increases necessary to accomplish what we have to do, and we have, very importantly, a pay increase for our troops. and this will actually be the largest pay increase for our incredible people in over a decade. it increases total defense spending by more than $60 billion from last year and funds the addition of critically needed ships, planes, helicopters, tanks and submarines. we have submarines being built the likes of which there is nothing anywhere in the world like the submarines we build. our military equipment is the best equipment in the world. one of the things you saw two days ago with saudi arabia and with other countries, saudi arabia as an example is buying hundreds of billions of dollars' worth of our equipment. and we're getting very fast

approvals on that. therefore, as a matter of national security, i've signed this omnibus budget bill. there are a lot of things i'm unhappy about in this bill. there are a lot of things we shouldn't have had in this bill but we were, in a sense, forced if we want to build our military, we were forced to have. there are some things we should have in the bill. but i say to congress, i will never sign another bill like this again. i'm not going to do it again. nobody read it. it's only hours old. some people don't even know -- it's $1.3 trillion. it's the second largest ever. president obama signed one that was actually larger, which i'm sure he wasn't too happy with, either. but in this case it became so big because we need to take care of our military. and because the democrats, who

don't believe in that, added things that they wanted in order to get their votes. we have to get rid of the filibuster rule. we have to get rid of the filibuster rule and go to 51 votes in the senate if we're going to have really sustained, continued success. daca recipients have been treated extremely badly by the democrats. we wanted to include daca. we wanted to have them in this bill. 800,000 people. and actually, it could even be more. and we wanted to include daca in this bill. the democrats would not do it. they would not do it. to prevent the omnibus situation from ever happening again, i'm calling on congress to give me a line item veto for all government spending bills, and

the senate must end. they must end the filibuster rule and get down to work. we have to get a lot of great legislation approved, and without the filibuster rule, it will happen just like magic. i want to address the situation on border security, which i call national defense. i call it stopping drugs from pouring across our border. and i call it illegal immigration. it's all of those things. but national defense is a very important two words, because by having a strong border system, including a wall, we are in a position militarily that is very advantageous. and before i get off of that subject, i would like to ask

secretary mattis to talk about what we've accomplished in terms of the military, because there has never been anything like we've been able to do. our military is very depleted but it's rapidly getting better, and in a short period of time it will be stronger than it's ever been. i would like secretary mattis to say a few words, please. >> thank you, mr. president, ladies and gentlemen. in 1790 in george washington's first annual address to congress, he stated to be prepared for war is one of the most effective means of preserving the peace. as the president noted, today we received the largest military budget in history, reversing many years of decline and unpredictable funding. and together we are going to make our military stronger than ever. we in the military are humbled and grateful to the american people for their sacrifices on behalf of this funding.

now it's our responsibility in the military to spend every dollar wisely in order to keep the trust and the confidence of the american people and the congress. thank you. >> thank you very much, general. the border we've worked very hard on. we have a lot of, really by any standard a lot, but not by this standard, but we're going to make it go a long way. there's a lot of money coming to the border and it will be coming in a period of time. we funded the initial down payment of $106,000, but we'll be start work literally on monday on not only some new w l wall -- not enough but we're working on that very quickly -- but also fixing existing walls and fixing acceptable fences.

you have to be able to see through the other side to see what's coming. in many cases it's not a pretty picture when you look. but you have to be able to see it. so we have $1.6 billion for the wall. that will start immediately. this is a short-term funding but it's immediate, starts immediately, and i'd like to ask secretary nielson to say a few words about what we've done in terms of homeland security and what the bill does for homeland security. thank you. >> good afternoon. we at the department of homeland security work very closely with the department of defense and we support this omnibus in the defense of our country. as the president has stated, under his leadership he has delivered for the americans. this is for american enforcement.

this will help us with our aviation security with some badly needed upgrades, and we look forward to working with congress on some additional needs that we have. i will say, however, it's unfortunate that congress chose not to listen to the security on the front lines. we will continue to make sure the wall is where we need it, how we need it as the president described and to make sure it serves the american people and the security of this nation. we will also work with congress to close the dangerous loopholes that the president has mentioned many times and to continue to increase our overall security. and finally, we thank those in congress who support the department of homeland security. i will continue to make myself available to them. i look forward to working with them, but we must fund the department and giff ve it the ts and resources it needs to execute the mission the american people have asked us to do. thank you. >> thank you very much, secretary.

so we have many elements in the bill that we wanted. just to look at a few of them, we're providing $654.6 billion in total discretionary funding for defense. it's a record. all records for defense. there will be nobody that says that our military is going to be depleted like they've been saying over the last long period of time. long period of time. frankly, beyond president obama. that won't be happening. we're spending a lot of money on nuclear, our nuclear systems, to upgrade, and in some cases, brand new, whether it's submarines, nuclear submarines and others. so we'll have by far the most powerful nuclear force on earth,

and it will be absolutely in perfect shape and condition, and hopefully, praise be to god we don't ever have to use it. but there will be nobody that's even close. this will give a substantial increase to people even outside of the military, but military related. some of the many things that we're buying in the military, we have $23.8 billion to procure 34 navy ships. our navy is at about the lowest point in terms of ships that it's been in over 100 years. and we're adding a significant number of extremely advanced vessels. $10.2 billion for 90 f-35

aircraft. that's the most sophisticated aircraft in the world, jet fighters. they're hard to find, they're hard to see, therefore they're hard to beat. it's very tough to beat a plane when you can't see it. this is the most advanced in the world. 10.2 billion for 90 f-35. we have 2.9 billion for 15 kc-46 tanker aircraft. the tanker aircraft is very important based on everything. it allows our planes to travel anywhere in the world without landing. 1.8 billion for 24 fa-18 ef super hornet aircraft fighter jets. 1.7 billion for 10 p ara -- the

poseidons. incredible stuff. 1 billion for the black hawk helicopter, fighting machine. 1.1 billion for the upgrade of 85 abrams tanks. 75 million for the cooperative programs that we're working with israel and others on various missile defense systems. we're spending a lot of money on missile defense. we have a lot of offense that's been recently installed. we're spending tremendous money on missile defense. you understand what that means? everybody does. with what we have out there, missile defense is very, very important. we are funding our border patrol agents and our i.c.e. agents. they are working long hours under tremendously dangerous conditions.

we're adding large numbers of immigration judges, high quality judges. not only are we adding them in the district court level and the federal level of court of appeals, but we're adding immigration judges at a very high level. so while we're very disappointed in the 1.3 trillion, nobody more disappointed than me because the number is so large, we'll start coming down. we had no choice but to fund our military because we have to have by far the strongest military in the world. and this will be by far the strongest military that we've ever had. so when you look at all of these pages, a lot of that is devoted -- a lot -- to the military. i just want to thank members of congress for working so hard.

while we can be disappointed in some ways, we have to also know that there are a lot of strings pulling everybody in different directions. the republican senators, the republican congress men and women have been steadfast on their fight for the border and steadfast for their fight on the military. we're also spending $6 billion on, as you know, various forms of drug control, helping people that are addicted. it's a terrible problem, but this will be also -- this will be a record. we'll be suing certain drug companies for what they've done with the opioids and we'll be bringing the suits at a federal level.

the level of drugs that are being put out there and the power of this addiction is hard to believe. people go to the hospital for a period of a week and they come out and they're drug addicts. there has to be a better way. doctors are way down now in their orders of the opioids, way down. it's a great thing. we're also looking for, in our research funds, we're looking for a medicine that can stop the pain without the addiction so that people aren't going to become addicted to these incredible drugs. that's part of what we have. we're going to have $6 billion having to do with opioids and other problems that this country, and in fact the world, is having with drugs. so we're extremely proud of what we've been able to do when it comes to our military. our military will be far superior than to any military

anywhere in the world. that's very important for us. you see the players out there, you see what we're dealing with. we are very happy with what's happened with opioids. we're very happy with what's happened with certain elements of the border. not happy with 1.6 billi$1.6 bit it does start the wall and we'll make that $1.6 billion go very far. i can say this, and i say this to daca recipients. the republicans are with you, they want to get your situation taken care of. the democrats just fought every single inch of the way. they did not want daca in this bill. and as you know, daca is also tied to the wall for the major funding, the $25 billion for the wall and other things.

so i think that will be coming up very soon. but i do want the hispanic community to know and daca recipients to know that republicans are much more on your side than the democrats who are using you for their own purposes. with that being said, i just want to thank everybody for being here. we're very proud of many of the items that we've been able to get. we're very disappointed that in order to fund the military, we had to give up things where we consider, in many cases, them to be bad or them to be a waste of money. but that's the way, unfortunately, right now the system works. but we have a great country. we are going to have the greatest military we've ever had, and lots of good things are happening. the trade situation we'll be

talking about next week. we have many trade deals, not only a deal being made on south korea which looks like it's very close to being finalized, but many other countries are now negotiating fair trade deals with us. so we'll be rolling them out as you see them. part of the reason, frankly, that we're able to do that is the fact that we have the tariffs on steel and the tariffs on aluminum. because it showed how unfair some of these trade deals that have been in existence for many years, how unfair they've been. so it will be great for our country, and frankly, it will also be great for other countries. and it will be fair and it will be reciprocal. thank you all very much. i appreciate it. thank you. >> mr. president -- [ inaudible question ] >> we're going to figure it out. i looked very seriously at the

veto. i was thinking about doing the veto. but because of the incredible gains we've been able to make for the military, that overrode any of our thinking. >> how concerned are you about tariffs with the stock market? >> i think the stock market will be great. when i came into office, the stock market was from a different planet. it's way up. china is going to end up treating us fairly. for many years they had free rein, they don't have free rein anymore. we're very friendly with china. we have great relationship with china. it's time. it's time. last year we lost $500 billion on trade with china. we can't let that happen. thank you all very much. >> are they lying about the affair? >> there you have it. the president signs into law the 1.3 trilli$1.3 trillion spendin even though he doesn't like it.

he likes the extra spending for the military. he said he signed this out of military concerns. he said he will never sign a bill like this again, and he insisted that nobody, nobody has actually read this 2200-page piece of legislation. and you saw it there sitting on that little table. it's interesting, he signs this, gloria, into law, 2200 pages, even though he says no one has read it, including himself. >> right. >> which raises the question, why sign something into law that you haven't even read? >> as he said, he said he had no choice because, you know, he makes it a binary choice, which is about the military. i've got to fund the military. if i had vetoed it, i wouldn't have funded the military. but let's take a look at what we watched here. this is the president of the united states who tweeted out this morning that there was

going to be a press conference that he was going to hold. then he went to the podium and he became not only his own press secretary but his own communications director. we know on other fronts he is acting as his lead attorney. so what we saw the president do today is what sarah sanders would normally be explaining at a press briefing, but we know donald trump believes nobody can do this better than he can do it. so he put forward the only argument he had, quite frankly, which was this is about military spending. we've done so much. you know, he had a little show and tell with mattis and with wilbur ross. he said we've got to get rid of the filibuster and i want the line item veto, which is unconstitutional, but he said i want the line item veto. so he said all of that because he knew it was a problem for him and only he could explain it. >> it's interesting how we see time and time again -- i made the point earlier that he tries to stand outside of the process that he is in charge of.

and i have to say as easy as it is to look at this and look at the chaos and all the counter-arguments about republicans control congress, he's a republican president. he knew these things before he issued the veto threat about the bill. he comes out of this and are saying to supporters of his and detractors by the way china will come around, tok market will be okay and the whole process i'm involved in is absurd. i'm both victim of it, as are you, the american people. but i'm strong enough through all this chaos. this is the picture in his mind that gets presented out without some of the realities that we can -- >> so remarkable -- >> only he can do it. >> stand there and say that he was forced to do this. several levels, because he knew what was happening. white house was involved in the negotiations. he could have said i don't like the direction this is going. let's pass a continuing resolution, keep the government open for another few weeks and negotiate a better bill, break

it down. not do a 2200-page bill. it's also interesting this is a president who essentially is conceding that the congress has rolled him on this major legislative package. coming in, he said he was smarter than everybody in washington that he alone could fix it and everybody here was stupid. turns out that the president is the one who got rolled by republicans in congress, and democrats, too. >> let rewind the tape a little bit. why is donald trump president? he ran as an outsider, said washington is broken, and hillary clinton, a clinton, an established person isn't going to fix it. i'm the art of the deal president. they're stupid. i'm going to make it work for you. he just signed a spending plan -- the republican president with a republican senate and a republican house. he said it's full of ridiculous stuff. it's not right. it's very bad for our country. there's a lot of things i'm unhappy about. i was forced to do this and they forced me to do this. where is the strength of the donald trump deal making

presidency if they, his own party, can force him to sign something that is full of ridiculous stuff and everything else? it's a remarkable moment of this is what he was supposed to be best at. and he's being mocked, by the way. rush limbaugh ann coulter, the voices he listens to on twitter are mocking him for being weak. >> another short-term spending bill for two weeks, as manu said, negotiate these issues. instead he deferred to the republican and democratic leadership of the house and senate and said i hate this, i signed it out of national security. i will never sign another bill like this again. >> he could have gotten $25 billion, as pointed out, for the wall. it would have really angered his conservative base which, by the way, today is really upset. he just signed a huge spending bill under the guise of complete government control. >> i want to go over to kaitlan

collins at the white house. give us your perspective t sounded like the president was venting. >> reporter: that's exactly what it was. he threatened to veto this bill, a threat that not even his own advisers took seriously but sent a scramble over at capitol hill after reporters and lawmakers were assured that the president was backing this bill. you saw the president say yes i'm going to sign this bill, begrudgingly. here is what i don't like about it, main ly the lack of funding for his border war, when back in the campaign he said mexico would pay for it. and nothing on daca, something that the president failed to reach a deal with in the first place. a venting session in the diplomatic room. he said it would be a news conference. he spoke for 30 minutes criticizing this bill, saying he will never sign a bill like this again. to be clear, that was a venting

session for the president who said he signed this bill. we know that this morning he was watching the news coverage of this bill. lot of negative coverage about how this bill did not fund his immigration priorities. he sat there, complaining about it in the diplomatic room. as manu said, this has been in the works for several weeks now, especially in the last few days, and a process that the president has not been engaged on. his complaints there, they could have aired those before they voted on it and pass this had spending bill. he signed this bill and, wolf, it capped off a frenzied morning this morning on the white house and capitol hill with the president starting -- threatening to veto this bill. in the end, he is signing it. >> and as we pointed out, kaitlan, and you're right there at the white house, his budget director, director of legislative affairs at the white who us and other senior officials were working closely with top republican and

democratic leaders to work out this $1.3 trillion spending bill. the president was not that involved. as a result, he threatened to veto it a few hours ago but then went ahead and signed it into law. >> he certainly did. they've been telling people for weeks, just yesterday on camera, mick mulv a. ney said to wrap things up, to keep things short. paul ryan said he the assurances of the president. it really caps off the perfect end to this week here, wolf, where the white house says one thing, not only his press secretary, but other officials speaking on his behalf, saying he's going to do one thing and then he goes and threatens to do the complete opposite. it's not just with the spending bill. but also with his national security adviser who we were assured last week was not on his way out. he got fired yesterday and was replaced by john bolton, also his legal team, who he said he was perfectly happy with. he wasn't going to add or replace anyone and then we saw the lead lawyer quit this week

and he hired joe digenova. what we learned these last 14 months at the white house, the only person who speaks for the president is the president himself. >> kaitlan, stand by. new conference at the white house concerning the omnibus spending bill. that was not a news conference. he makes an opening statement and then calls upon reporters of various news organizations to stand up and ask questions n this particular case he made a statement, showed the 2200-page document, walked out. couple of reporters in the pool shout aid question and then he left. >> it's whatever the president wants, his version of a news conference. he is the communications director, press secretary. he tweets it out. he is the only one, as kaitlan was saying, who can speak for himself.

he decided to do it his own way. he didn't take any questions because he knows that it could be about stormy daniels and the "60 minutes" interview airing sunday night, national security adviser who everyone said was going to be replaced and he said no and then he replaced him. he didn't want to deal with that. what he wanted to do was hijack, it which he did. >> two quick points. to be continued. when the president is mad about things, venting about things early morning tweets on the weekends have been a classic. get up early on the weekend and pour your coffee. number two, the president promised to drain the swamp. lobbyists are getting calls from all over the country, is he really going to veto the bill? he is the best thing that's ever happened to the swamp. >> one different thought on all of this, we tend to pay attention to the minutes of this

presidency. a lot of people are looking at the broader overview. this president stood up today, said some things that show he's being hypocritical. the broad overview is a guy who is trying and people not paying as much attention to the chaos of the day today. i'm not sure he's thinking it through in all of those ways. there's something to be said about that, to going his own way. >> this whole episode also underscores the uncertainty that this president brings to a republican effort to retake the house in the fall. they need him to shore up their base, fire up their base. when he's railing against his own party, they have distorted messages. it's never a good thing going into a midterm election. >> great point. this is what democrats learned about barack obama, he was protecting the obama brand over the democratic brand, president

trump protecting the trump brand over the republican brand. >> he did manage, at least for a little while, to change the subject from some of the issues that he clearly doesn't want us to be talking about, including, for example, stormy daniels. >> sure, he did. he's not going to talk about it. it's interesting that's one story he has not seen fit to tweet about, nor will he, i don't believe. how they're making progress on the wall, on trade. then general mattis comes out and says this is the largest military budget in history. these were his talking points. i go back to the point that he believes very clearly they are best delivered by him. and he is the one alone not only who can fix it, but deliver it.

>> credibility issue out of this white house, wolf. if the people who represent the president cannot be trusted to deliver what the president is say iing, how can they say anything? >> a lot of news happening. we'll stay on top of all of it. that does it for me, at least for now. breaking news coverage of the president's bill signing event will continue right now. here we go, back on the breaking news. i'm brooke baldwin in washington, d.c. the president sign this had $1.3 trillion into law. he did it begrudgingly, calling it ridiculous. after a threat of a government shutdown saying he was considering vetoing the legislation. that was the tweet that everyone woke up to. he called this impromptu press briefing to sign this bill whi