daniel powell becoming the first female mayor of the town because she called heads. congratulations, madam mayor. >> jenna: simple solutions. >> jon: thanks for joining us. >> jenna: have a great weekend. "america's news hq" starts now. >> sandra: health care heating up on capitol hill, as president trump takes executive action on financial regulations and complex tax rules. hello, everyone. i'm sandra smith. the president heading to the treasury department to order a thorough review of the tax code and banking regulations. breaking news right now on healthcare, let's get to john roberts. what do we know, john? >> reporter: sandra, good afternoon. we're learning there's a lot of significant movement on the plan to repeal and replace obamacare. this is the measure that didn't come to fruition before the easter break, but there's a lot of work that's been done over the past few week. here are the two players who are involved. chairman of what's called the tuesday group, tom mcarthur as

well as mark meadows the chairman of the house freedom caucus. we're told they have reached an agreement in principle on new language that will go into the american health care act. it will be a new amendment. here's a couple things it will do. it will maintain provisions for essential health care guaranteed issue and community rating. that's coverage for people who are pregnant, that sort of thing, preexisting conditions will be covered, keeping your children on until the age of 26. and the community rating guarantees what's called premium parity. it means people who are sicker than others do not have to pay more than other people would. it would also allow limited waivers for states to opt out of all of that. the white house is very encouraged by what it's seeing. here's kelly anne conway one of the president's chief advisers this morning. >> we're just happy that congress has been working during

the recess on this issue. the president is in touch with members of congress and the chairmans of the committees. obviously, the speaker. i'll tell you something that hasn't happened on healthcare, something that's not changed at all. it seems that there are no democrats who want to support healthcare reform. i think that's unfortunate. >> reporter: senior administration official told us just a short time ago that the process will be different this time around on getting the language of that amendment to the house. rather than language originating in the house to see if it will pass the so called bird law which limits what you can do in terms of a reconciliation bill. instead the senate budget committee is writing up the language of that new amendment after they get that it will then be sent back to the house for consideration. we're told that language could be finished as early as this afternoon. maybe tomorrow. could become public sometime

tomorrow as well. this all sets up for the potential of a vote next week in the house. the president certainly would like to get this done before the 100th day. that's a week from saturday. a lot though will depend on how rancorous the debate is over the spending measure that the house and senate have to pass to avoid a government shutdown. but we understand from talking to people here at the white house that things are looking good and the omb director told us that he believes they will get an agreement on a spending bill and they will avoid a government shutdown next week. >> sandra: wow. all happening on day 91 of trump's presidency. the timing very interesting, john. so tell us more about the executive order and the presidential memo president trump will sign. >> reporter: one executive order that he will be signing at the treasury department when he goes over for the first time and a couple executive memorandum. these are aimed at dodd frank legislation which the president made no secret of hating during the campaign trail. another one aimed at a lot of

obama era regulations that were promulgated in 2016. in terms of dodd frank, it will address the too big to fail legislation. the ordinarily liquidation authority that the treasury department has, as well as some other financial stability measures. very very complicated. i can't even say that i begin to understand the whole thing so we won't bore you with the details. another is a lot of regulations promulgated by the obama administration during 2016. among them, penalties that were enacted to prevent corporations from engaging what are called inversion. when they take their head quarters out of the united states and head quarter them overseas. the president wants to look at rolling back some of that. he would rather give companies incentives to stay in the united states rather than penalize them for moving their headquarters. but the one thing he will penalize is if the headquarters stay here, the manufacturing moves overseas and then the goods will come back here to the united states.

>> sandra: very interesting stuff. it sounds wonky, those inversions, but this is stuff that affects all of us. >> reporter: it's interesting if you've got an mba. it's wonky for the rest 06 us. >> sandra: there you have it. i love that stuff. we'll dial into that a little bit more later in the hour. john roberts, thank you. a new provocation from russia. moscow has conducted more fly byes near alaska. doing so for the past four nights in a row. we're being told that last night russia sent a pair of nuclear capable bear bombers. national security correspondent jennifer griffin is live at the pentagon right now. jennifer, what should we make of these russian flights near alaska a fourth straight night of them? >> reporter: welsh sandra, it seems the russians are testing the u.s. air force response time. last night, as you mentioned, pair of long range nuclear capable 95 bear bombers flew near alaska and canada, staying in both countries air defense

zones for several hours. on april 19th, a pair of russian spy planes flew near the bering sea, staying in the u.s. air defense zone for a few hours before departing. wednesday night the u.s. air force did not scramble any fighter jets or air borne warning planes, a wac planes. last night two stealth fighter jets were scrambled to intercept the russian bear bombers. the russian jets in both incidents remained in international air space. it's not immediately clear how close they came to mainland alaska. sandra? >> sandra: all right, jennifer griffin. what is the latest on the effort to retake raca as well? >> reporter: well, it's ramping up on the assad regime. today defense secretary jim mattis had a message about assad's chemical weapons. >> there can be no doubt in the international community's mind that syria has retained chemical weapons in violation of its

agreement. and its statement that it had removed them all. there's no longer any doubt the amount of it i don't want to get into right now. we don't reveal some of that detail because we don't want to reveal how we're finding out. >> reporter: fox learned from senior u.s. defense officials that the isis capital raqqa has been surrounded by u.s. backed troops. isis fighters cannot escape raqqa north of the euphrates. there's a small corridor others are using to leave the city. fox has also learned isis has essentially moved its capital. two months ago isis leaders quietly began setting up the bureaucratic functions of their so-called government outside raqqa in a town called myadeen. the looming battle for raqqa is imminent but sadly the isis government is no longer there. >> sandra: all right. jennifer griffin, a lot going on. thank you. the situation in syria just one

of the many foreign policy challenges now facing the trump administration. add that to a list which also includes russia, north korea and iran. where should president trump focus his efforts right now? let's bring in the former adviser to four u.s. ambassadors to the u.n. rick, there is just so much going on, so many challenges that this president is facing so early on in his presidency. i'll go first to secretary mattis words on syria. syria retaining those chemical weapons. he says that the amount we don't know. we can reveal how we know this, but he said i can tell you they have retained some. >> yeah, look, chemical weapons is a whole other level. we all know that there has been consistent death, bombings and all sorts of horrific military actions by the assad regime for years, but chemical weapons are a whole other level.

president trump has made clear that that is a game changer for him. that's why he sent in the tomahawks to try to take out the airplanes that were dispersing these chemical weapons in an attempt to dial that back. i do think that the whole idea of where we go in syria, whether or not we're going to have u.s. troops, whether or not we're going to have a policy that assad should go, that is all under discussion and those are very difficult decisions to make right now because we've waited so long. through the obama administration, all of this was punted onto donald trump. so the situation is much messier and the decisions are even tougher. and we don't really have any good options at this point. >> sandra: matt is saying syria would be well advised not to use chemical weapons again, taking a strict tone there. let's also talk about the president and where he says we are at with north korea.

he had that dual press conference yesterday with the italian prime minister. he was asked about the challenges we face there. here's what he said. >> as far as north korea's concerned, we are in very good shape. i have great respect for the president of china. i can say from my standpoint, i liked him very much. i respect him very much. and i think he's working very hard. some very unusual moves have been made over the last two or three hours. and i really have confidence that the president will try very hard. >> sandra: as we all continue to wonder what role china will play in all of this, the president sounding very confident that china will help put pressure on north korea. >> well, i think president trump has every right to feel confident because his meeting with president xi went extremely well. we saw action from the chinese by moving 175,000 troops to the border with north korea. that sundays a very strong message to the north koreans

that something is different. i have to say that there's been a lot of focus in the media on the military aspects of what the trump administration has done. but there's been relatively little focus on all of the great diplomatic efforts. you look at president trump just diplomacy with other countries. it's been phenomenal and it's been effective because he has a credible threat of military action. not just the threat of military action, but that threat is credible. then you look at vice president pence, who has already been to the region. he's been talking to the japanese, the south koreans. you look at rex tillerson's work, in really making our goals with north korea, dialling them back, making that a priority with our allies in the region. this is diplomacy with muscle, and it's what we've been waiting for. the media should focus on the diplomatic effort, not just the military efforts. >> sandra: very interesting

stuff. rick, thank you very much for joining us this afternoon. >> thank you. >> sandra: paris authorities revealing new information about a note found near the body of the gun man in yesterday's terror attack. what it says about his possible motive. plus, nebraska farmers speaking out against the keystone pipeline. why their opposition has led to a state review. plus, dramatic video of a tractor trailer dragging a car for miles. how the whole thing finally came to an end. all finished. umm... you wouldn't want your painter to quit part way, i think you missed a spot. so when it comes to pain relievers, why put up with just part of a day? aleve, live whole not part. you want this color over the whole house? ♪ everything your family touches sticks with them. make sure the germs they bring home don't stick around. use clorox disinfecting products. because no one kills germs better than clorox.

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yesterday's deadly shooting just days before france's fiercely contested presidential election. senior foreign affairs correspondent greg palcott is live from paris with the latest there. greg? >> reporter: >> reporter: it is looking like pretty much of a normal friday night here in paris. anything but normal just about 24 hours ago. i'm standing exactly at the place where you got out of the car with an ak-47 automatic rifle. we now learned shot point blank into the driver's side of a police van, killing one police officer officer seriously injured two others. according to eyewitnesss we spoke to, rounds of fire came from the police, brought him down and killed him. the man now identified by police as kareem sherfield. he was 39. he's a french native, but a very long police record. we know he spent 14 years in

prison on four different crimes, including a failed assault against police several years ago. in all that time in prison, they didn't see any signs of radicalization, but they do confirm tonight that athey found a hand written note in defense of isis on his body when they recovered him here last night. all of this happened on the eve of the first round of presidential elections here in france. campaigning was halted because of the attacks. but many of the candidates came out and had strong words, including one of the front runners. the right wing anti-immigrant national front. she said, we are at war. we need to crack down on any terror suspects here in the country, as well as cracking down on problems at the border. finally, we had a chance to speak with some folks who had a

very upclose experience with this terrorist. they're from kentucky. they came eye to eye with terror. take a listen. >> we saw the shooter with the gun and he started shooting bullets in the air. police were in the street. so it was a very terrifying moment. >> had he shot the policeman already? >> we saw a man go down. >> the incident went in this direction. when he did that, i could see very clearly the machine gun. >> unbelievable. >> i knew it was an attack. >> reporter: amazing stuff. they say that, in fact, somebody was looking down on them last night and protecting them. not protecting everybody though. back to you, sandra. >> sandra: thank you. the key stone pipeline facing another challenge. this time from a group of nebraska farmers.

why they say the project could hurt the state's economy. we'll hear their story. plus john kelly visiting the southern border, praising the agents that, in his mind, have been mistreated for the past eight years. what's it like to be in good hands? like finding new ways to be taken care of. home, car, life insurance obviously, ohhh...

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>> sandra: now to the key stone pipeline and some of its toughest opponents, farmers and ranchers in the state of nebraska. about 90 landowners are taking a stand against the project. president trump has argued the pipeline construction would

bring new jobs, but the whole thing is now in the hands of a state regulatory board. with us now, one of the farmers is joining us now. art, thanks for coming on. >> you're welcome. >> sandra: i understand this is a very personal story for you. that you own 160 acres of land in the state of nebraska which is, by most standards a small farm, but it's a family farm that's been passed down by generations on your wife's side. what is your goal here? >> our goal is to keep this pipeline out of the eastern sand hills of nebraska and off the aquafor. our premium goal would be to leave the tar sands in the ground and move more rapidly to renewable fuels. >> sandra: most people would be devastated if they found out there was going to be a major project like this happening in

their back yard. would you be fighting this aggressively, along with these other 90 landowners that are in the path of the keystone pipeline, would you be fighting this as aggressively if it didn't affect you and if it wasn't in your back yard? >> yes, we would. after we learned how destruckive the chemicals and the tar sands are, we have come to realize that this type of fossil fuel should not be happening. it doesn't matter where it's at. we need to look for other sources of renewable energy. we would fight it wherever it was. >> sandra: those who support the keystone pipeline, like the president, say that this is the best economic and the best solution for the native plants and the animals of these areas, considering it's a lot less dangerous than transporting this

fuel by rail. what do you say to that? >> well, i'd say to that when something is out of sight and under ground and when transcanada's fancy detection system doesn't work most of the time, it's much more dangerous because you don't always know when those leaks happen. a year ago there was a leak discovered near the town of freeman. that leak has probably been leaking for six or seven years because it was a very small leak. and thousands and thousands and thousands of barrels of tar sand and chemicals were leaked. >> sandra: let me ask you, what's the solution? we all want to achieve energy independence in this country. this was an effort, a step in that direction. how you achieve it? >> well, first of all, this isn't american, this is not

american oil. and it is going -- >> sandra: it's coming from canada rather than the middle east would be the argument. >> that's true. but it's going across america to be refined and exported, which is not for america's use. if they do not mix some high quality crude with this to refine it, the best they get is poor grade diesel fuel, which we can't even burn in this country. >> sandra: well, you are opening the door to so many controversial discussions that would take all day to get there. we definitely wanted to hear your story, at the very least. this affects you. it runs through your family's farm, through your own back yard. there's 90 other landowners talking about this. but still, there is fierce stock on the other side of this, that this is the best thing for this country. but we love to hear your story as well. art, thank you. >> okay. thank you.

>> sandra: all right. the trump administration taking new action against so-called sanctuary cities. what the justice department is now asking those communities to provide. plus, john kelly standing up for the men and women of ice. what he says about the dangers they face day in and day out. >> these laws exist to keep our people safe and our nation sovereign. me and the guys walked into this place. you woulda thought from the name it was gonna be packed with sailors. so i immediately picked out the biggest guy in there. and i walked straight up to him. now he looks me square in the eye, and, i swear he says, "welcome to navy federal credit union." whoa friendly alert! i got a great auto rate outta that guy. now i have a wonderful hybrid. slate blue. crème interior. he was so nice! open to the armed forces, the dod, veterans and their families. navy federal credit union.

>> sandra: the justice department taking the first

major step to crack down on sanctuary cities demanding proof of cooperation with immigration authorities if they want to continue receiving federal funds. trace gallagher live with more on that. trace? >> reporter: hi, sandra. pretty plain and simple. department of justice is telling san clue wear communities to comply or pay the price. eight letters were sent to the california department of corrections as well as chicago, new orleans, philadelphia, las vegas, miami, new york and cook county, illinois, which includes the greater chicago area. the bottom line is the letters are asking for proof that these cities are cooperating with immigration enforcement, which is a very tall order considering all of these jurisdictions have laws on the books that restrict the ability for law enforcement officers to honor detainers. meaning when illegal immigrants are about to be let out of jail or prison, they won't be turned over to immigration and custom enforce ment or ice. the justice department said the cities are crumbling under the

weight of illegal immigration and violent crime, specifically the increase in murders and gang violence in chicago and new york. here in california, the doj said, i'm quoting, just several weeks ago in california's bay area after a raid captured 11ms-13 members on charges including murder, extortion and drug trafficking, city officials seemed more concerned with reassuring illegal immigrants that the raid was unrelated to immigration than with warning other ms-13 members that they were next. the mayors of california's biggest cities as well as chicago and new york have already vowed to fight the doj, but they all risk losing their chunk of $2.2 billion in federal grant money used to pay for things like jails and extra police officers. and the funding is for 2016, which means sanctuary cities won't get paid back by the feds for money that has already been spent. nonetheless, 2017 money would

never come in. it's interesting because officials from new orleans just got back to us saying they are not a sanctuary city, don't know why they got the letter, but they do not fear losing federal funds. sandra? >> sandra: trace, thank you. for more on this, vince collenaise, marjorie cliffton. thanks for joining us. vince, i'll start with you first. sanctuary cities receiving a very, very stern warning from the justice department. comply or pay the price. >> if you listen to any of these sanctuary cities when they defend their position on why they think they can get away with nonenforcement federal law, they defer to federalism. we don't have to enforce federal laws if we don't want to. but that's not true. and especially if you're receiving federal funding. in this case you've got the justice department saying we give federal grants to you for

law enforcement. if you can't even begin to enforce federal law, there's no reason federal money should be going olice department. >> sandra: it reminds me of the words of jeff sessions last week. this is the obama -- sorry, this is the trump era. the law will be followed. now we have this. >> well, most of the cities are, in fact, following law. what they're asking for are warrants, in order to uphold the detainers. these are law enforcement officials that are largely implementing these kinds of policies. what it means is they understand fundamentally the source of crime and what creates unrest in this community. they're diverse communities so they understand that law enforcement is not only keeping things safe, but it's making people feel safe coming to the police when things happen. what they are seeing in a lot of cities where they are holding these policies is that more and more people are coming to them. federal ice is providing the warrants they need to provide the legal backing, as well as keeping those cities safe.

>> sandra: i want to bring up secretary kelly because he said that the border wall will move forward by the end of the summer. last night with martha mccowan, he also addressed the criticism of ice and those men and women just trying to do their job. listen to this. >> they're remarkable men and women that really for the last eight or so years have been very very under appreciated. not allowed to do their job. now they're simply doing their job and they're happy to do it. i'm reminded of a guy who patrolled these borders. i called brian terry's mother and offered my condolences and told her we caught one of the animals that murdered her son. that's my last comment. these are wonderful men and women. >> sandra: vince? >> look at general kelly through the lens of his time as a marine general. this is once again sort of giving all of the glory and all of the credit to the guys on the front line. these border patrol guys do face real dangers. every single day that they go out on the job.

and his line of reasoning on this has made sense which is, if the government doesn't like the way border patrol and ice agents are doing their job, they need to change the law. responsibility of these law enforcement officials is to enforce the law as it exists on the books right now. >> sandra: marjorie? >> i absolutely agree. these are men and women who are putting themselves in dangerous situations and ultimately for safety. but the pecking order comes -- the orders come from other places. mayor is not the ones at fault. demonizing criminals and painting an entire population of people who are, in fact, undocumented as animals or as all murderers is not where we want to go. in order to have productive policy, we need to be able to talk about it in a civilized way, whether it's the law enforcement or the people we're trying to manage. >> if undocumented people wrrpb here, it's the people that commit crimes within that subcategory wouldn't either. >> sandra: let's continue with obamacare. we had news breaking at the top

of the hour. john roberts came tprout the white house saying that there's significant movement on behalf of republicans. where does this go? >> well, are we talking healthcare? >> sandra: yes, healthcare. >> so, on healthcare, i do think that ultimately this is kind of -- hopefully, it's a good start for them. they're sort of renegotiating what they did in the first place. their first job right now is to establish consensus. but i think there's a false start involved, which is looking at the symbolic deadline of the 100 days at the time they have to get this done by. remember, the first time they went after this, they tried to do it on the day obamacare was passed. now they're doing it against another symbolic deadline. i don't think they should allow those type of deadlines to force that. >> sandra: if we were to take the temperature of republicans in congress, only 36% according to a recent poll of american voters say republicans in congress should try again to repeal and replace obamacare,

the 2010 affordable care act, while 60% say the republicans should move on. >> yeah. i mean, the failure of the last go around, the attempt to repeal and replace, was a real hit. the other interesting thing, when the topic of repealing the bill came up, public opinion about the affordable care act went way up. it's one of those things, when you put these packages like social security, like medicade and medicare in the hands of american people, it is very hard to take it away or change it dramatically. again, there's a lot of questions. there are some big fundamental factors that are still in debate between the big sectors of the republican party. they have a lot to do with the economics of what will work and what will not. i think, again, putting this at risk for the public is not a popular, not a popular topic. so most people are thinking, safer to move along, focus on something else. we're kind of okay with where it is right now. >> sandra: marjorie, vince,

thanks for joining us. republicans will have a few days to pass a massive spending bill. if not, partial government shutdown is a very real possibility. white house office of management and budget director tells fox news there will be no shutdown and he is confident a deal will be reached. doug mccowan is live in washington. what are the realistic chances of a government shutdown? >> well, they appear to be slim but yesterday mick mulvaney said they need to fund some of the president's top priorities. well, as you can imagine, that did not sit well with democrats. chuck shumer's office fired back, quote, everything has been moving smoothly until the administration moved in with a heavy hand. not only are democrats opposed to the wall, there is significant republican opposition as well.

further complicating the negotiations, democrats are making their own demands. >> also you have democrats saying they want obamacare payments into this funding bill. so republicans are not gonna like that. there's certainly some brinksmanship going on. this is going to take some twists and turns, but at the end of the day, i think they'll get a deal done. >> reporter: adding to the budget deadline problems, the white house wants to resurrect the replacement bill for obamacare next week. democrats want to keep obamacare in play so that may poison the well for budget negotiation. keep in mind republicans cannot pass that budget bill without some democratic votes because some of their own conservative members or just any budget that is not truly fiscally conservative. >> sandra: but if there is a shutdown, who gets blamed this time around? >> it's always republicans who get blamed for government shutdowns. it may be different this time because republicans control both houses and the white house,

meaning democrats are playing the role of obstructionists now. that's not how it will be portrayed in main stream media. it helps to explain the president's tweet this morning in which he wrote, quote, no matter how much i accomplish during the ridiculous standard of the first 100 days, and it has been a lot, including supreme court, media will kill. we shall see. sandra, back to you. >> sandra: all right, doug. thank you. san francisco experiencing a power outage across a large section of the city leaving tens of thousands in the dark. many local businesses are closed, courthouses shutdown and at least one subway station is dark. residents are being told to call 911 in case of emergencies. no word so far on what caused that outage. tractor trailer driver in california unwittingly dragging a car.

for four miles, by the way. maybe he didn't check his rear view mirror. i don't know. many passing drivers honked their horns, but the big rig driver remained oblivious. a passing driver pulled up next to the driver getting him to finally stop. all right. we are expecting new executive action from president trump aiming to make some financial regulations simpler. our guests weigh in on the next step for hot button issues on tax reform. and people casting their votes sunday for the country's president. how last night's attack in paris could affect the outcome of that election. there's only one egg that gives you better taste and better nutrition in so many varieties. classic. cage free. and organic. only eggland's best. better taste. better nutrition. better eggs.

>> i'm bill hemmer. today president trump at any moment set to take new executive action targeting financial regulations and your tax. he's promising a tax reform plan

next week. and he says it may include the biggest cuts ever. but there are potential looming battles on the hill. the president approaching 100 days. healthcare push under way and a possible government shutdown to be fought. we'll speak about all that with chris wallace as i fill in today for shepard smith reporting. top of the hour. >> sandra: french voters heading to the polls for the first round of the country's presidential election. the far right leader and the centrist candidate emerging as the two front runners in a very close race. kenny logan live in london. this is getting very interesting, this race, obviously. >> yes, hi, sandra. the candidates have been campaigning for months, but this race, the first round, it's still too close to call. today, some of those candidates pulled out of final rallies because of yesterday's attack on the streets of paris which killed a police officer.

if you look at some of those polls, most polls anticipate the far right leader will make it through to the final vote on may 7th. that appears to be boosted slightly by the shooting in paris, as she vows to deport foreigners on a terror watch list. also 39-year-old newcomer pitted to do well. if the polls are correct, he could beat le pen in both rounds of this election possibly by a significant margin in the second round. there also a conservative candidate. he's slightly behind, but is close. he, too, is calling for a tough response to extremist attacks. now, as they prepare to go to the polls, extra security is being put in place. this includes bag checks and body scammers at polling stations and more than 50,000 additional police and security services will be on duty. an extra 7,000 soldiers on

patrol. the polls will open at 8:00 local time sunday morning. so far, apart from yesterday's incident, this campaign has been peaceful without any particular attacks. but, of course, all eyes will be on voting on sunday. hopefully, it will pass off peacefully. sandra. >> sandra: we will certainly be watching it. thank you. president trump at the treasury department as he gets ready to take executive action on financial regulation. our next guests discuss what is still to come for tax reform and what it means for you. aleve with direct therapy tens device, a relief from lower back pain. i put it on my back. i feel this electrical pulse grabbing at my muscles. it was more powerful than i was expecting it to be. it worked. i believe aleve. learn more and read reviews at aleve.com.

>> sandra: fox news alert. president trump is at the department of treasury and he will be signing a new executive order and two presidential memoranda.

hoping to simplify the tax process and cut back on financial regulations. joining me now charlie gasparino is here and adam shapiro. it said charles. are you charles now? >> chuckie. just call me chuckie. >> sandra: let's go to adam first. you're in washington. what is happening now? the p is at the treasury. what are these actions that he is taking? >> the key action for you and me and 330 million other americans is the review of tax policy and regulations that were put in place by the obama administration in the last year of the administration and whether those regulations are cumbersome, burdensome, maybe even exceed the statutory regulatory authority of the law. this would be one form of perhaps a tax break without having to go through congress and legislation. that's the executive order that he's about to sign. >> sandra: we're looking at the tezry department. steve mnuchin at his side.

what do you expect out of this? >> nothing, to be honest with you. >> sandra: then why watch? >> we have to delineate between form and substance. there's a lot of form and very little substance. the second one is important, too. theoretically, if they would get rid of the stepping into an unwinding of financial institution, if you can get rid of that part of dodd frank you would end too big to fail and that means taxpayers wouldn't be on the hook for failed out banks, if they really did this. here's where it becomes less substantive than meets the eye. these are executive orders. these are symbolic gestures. if you really want -- my view is, he has to do less of these executive orders and more legislation that gets rid of the stuff permanently that he's trying to take credit for. >> sandra: do you remember on the campaign trail and he said i'm gonna put h&r block out of business. >> they're still in business. >> sandra: they are still in business. we're 91 days in, come on, charlie.

>> my point is, be clear. these executive orders won't do what he's saying they will do. they're symbolic. they don't have any teeth. >> charlie, i prefer to call him chuckie like the creature from those movies. no, charlie, look. the executive order is an order for a review of these regulations. >> of course. >> it's the first step. if the treasury secretary and administration are going to make the case to congress as to why these things need to be repealed they have the ammunition. >> let's be real clear here. it's a photo op. you can review them without making such a big deal out of it. just review them and get rid of dodd frank, please. >> sandra: give them a chance. steve mnuchin is speaking. the president at his side. let's listen. >> -- of our tax code which consumes billions of productive hours in compliance cost. a significant amount of time has passed since the crisis. with the passage of time and with your leadership, we are now well positioned to evaluate what

works and what doesn't. we believe in clear and effective regulations, but not regulations for its own sake. where we can do so, we will lift the burden of excessive regulation to make sure that banks can lend, small businesses can borrow, and americans work can thrive. so on behalf of the entire staff here at treasury, who worked tirelessly to make this country prosperous and safe, i want to extend our warmest welcome. ladies and gentlemen, the president of the united states. [ applause ] >> thank you very much. thank you. thank you very much, steve. great honor, i must say. it's a great pleasure to be at the united states treasury department and to meet so many dedicated public servants. i went through that beautiful

hallway with those incredible paintings of past secretaries. it was really very interesting. i wanted to read every one. i want to learn ab every one. but we have one that i hope will go down as one of the greats. i think hamilton is tough to beat, but maybe you do that. we'll take it, right? but thank you very much. the treasury department is the guardian of america's wealth. and a worldwide symbol of american prestige. this department was first led by the same gentle man, alexander hamilton, a man who understood that the government must protect the jobs of its citizens and the wealth of our nation. secretary mnuchin, who i have known for so long, and he's so good and so smart and so financially adept, is working very hard every day to do just

that. to protect the working citizen of america and to safe guard our finances from anyone, anybody, any nation who would try to take advantage of the united states. his vast experience and financial talent are now being put into service on behalf of the american people. and you'll see what i mean very soon. we have taken unprecedented action to bring back our jobs and return power to our citizens. it's been taken away. we've lifted one terrible regulation after another at a record clip from the energy sector to the auto sector. we have many more to go. and that's going to be happening over the next, i would say, four to five weeks. and we've begun a historic effort to protect our manufacturing and our manufacturing businesses, companies and our workers from unfair foreign trade. protecting our treasury also means getting other countries to

finally pay their fair share for the cost of defense, and many other global projects that, for too long, have fallen under our guidance and unfortunately fallen under the united states taxpayer expense. we're gonna end that. gonna end it quickly. we want fairness. we don't want to take advantage of anyone. we want fairness. we're now in the process of rebuilding america and there's a new optimism sweeping across our country like people have not seen in many, many decades. we are here today to continue this great economic revival. i will be signing three presidential directives to further protect our workers and our taxpayers. the first executive action instructs secretary mnuchin to begin the process of tax simply tpeu kaeugs. such a big thing. people can't do their returns.

they have no idea what they're doing. they're too complicated. this regulatory reduction is a first step to a tax reform that reduces rates, provides relief to our middle class and lowers our business tax which is one of the highest in the world and has stopped us from so much wealth and productivity. secretary mnuchin is a leader in our effort to make america competitive again. gonna make it great again. we're gonna make it strong again. we're gonna make it safe again and we're gonna make it competitive again. i'm also issuing two directives that instruct secretary mnuchin to review the damaging dodd frank regulations that fail to hold wall street firms accountable. i mean, they've done really, in many cases, the opposite of >> these regulations enshrine too big to fail and encourage

risky behavior. we're taking steps to make our economy more fair and prosperous for all. as part of our broader financial strategy, we're working to open up lending to small businesses and entrepreneurs, including our incredible women entrepreneurs who are doing better and better and better. we want an opportunity for everyone and in every single part of our country. secretary mnuchin and my entire administration are working around the clock to help struggling americans achieve their financial dreams, earn a great paycheck, have a job that they love going to every single day and have real confidence in the future. together we will restore prosperity to this nation, a nation that we so dearly love and to bring people who