robert: the end of the beginning. on the eve of his 100th day in office, president trump talks candidly about his biggest achievement and unexpected setbacks. i'm robert costa. we'll explore why mr. trump thought being president would be easier. since taking the oath of office nearly 100 days ago, president trump says he's tried to stay true with his contract with american voters. his biggest victory, the confirmation of neil gorsuch to the supreme court. but even with a republican controlled congress the president has come up short on other issues including healthcare, a border wall and his promise to withdraw from nafta. president trump: i decided

rather than leaving nafta, we will renegotiate. robert: this week's rollout of a tax reform plan was delivered with big promises. >> this is going to be the biggest tax cut and the largest tax reform in the history of our country. and we are committed to seeing this through. robert: but few specifics. and other initiatives including a travel ban in funding cuts for so-called sanctuary cities are stalled in the courts. on the world stage, former foes -- president trump: china a currency manipulator -- robert: have become frenleds. and unlikely partners against unpredictable enemies like north korea. plus, another investigation involving russia and former security advisor michael flynn. we tackle it all with michael

scherer of time magazine. abby phillip of "the washington post." julie hirschfeld davis of the new york times. and jake sherman of politico. announcer: celebrating 50 years. this is "washington week." funding is provided by -- >> their leadership is instinctive. they understand the challenges of today and research the technologies of tomorrow. some call them veterans. we call them part of our team. announcer: additional funding is provided by -- newman's own foundation donating all profits from newman's own food products

to charity and nourishing the common good. ku and patricia ewing through the ewing foundation committed to bridging cultural differences in our community. the corporation for public broadcasting and by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. thank you. once again, live from washington, moderator robert costa. robert: good evening today marked the final day in the mythical first 100 day milestone that all new administrations are measured by. president trump traveled to atlanta to thank some of his most strident supporter at the n.r.a. annual convention. his message was reinvigorating the republican base after watching the white house reverse course on a few campaign promises. president trump: you came through for me.

and i am going to come through for you. the eight-year assault on your second amendment freedoms has come to a crashing end. robert: julie, fascinating speech by the president defiant in tone. but he gave this revealing interview to reuters the day before talking about how his grappling with power, the brutal reality of governing and the presidency. which trump are we seeing at the end of this first 100 days? julie: i think we're seeing a president who is starting to recognize the limits of the powers of his office and also how much of a paradox it is. he is the most powerful person in the world. but he has very little personal autonomy. there's this sense of being cloistered in and limbed not just in his movements. he talked about not being able to drive a car, being in a cocoon but also being able to flip the switches that he wanted to flip and have things happen.

that's not happening on immigration. and he feels frank in a way that we heard him be about how surprising that's been for him. the question is what's he going to do to change that reality? can he do anything. robert: he keeps coming back, michael to one of his core issues of his campaign to trade. he talked about possibly withdrawing from nafta. the back pedal a bit. what does that tell ug about trump? >> i think about three weeks ago there was a shift in the whole way trump was approaching his presidency. it was wreck everything in site and tear down what obama left behind to the failure of obamacare repeal, the strike on syria, the internal fights between bannon and his sun in law jared kushner. he had to recalibrate. he doesn't pivot. he zigs and zags. but there is something that has

shifted and he is bending now to reality. and he is recognizing it. he has decided that his main goal here is not to fulfill every campaign promise, it's actually to get wins on the board. to figure out how to accomplish things. it wasn't just that that he backed down on. he backed down on the funding for the bored wall -- border wall, backed down on the currency manipulation by china. he has to reckon with something we in the press were not able to force him to reckon with in the campaign which is the reality of the world. robert: if there's going to be a recalibration, who's going to lead the president along? who's the chief advisor in his ear? because we talkinged about the faction nal infighting within the white house. abby: he kept the core group the same which has come as a surprise to some people who know him.

the issue here is going to be determiner of who has the lead, who's next up to bat in this case, he wants to focus on taxes. two of his advisors the cabinet secretary, treasury secretary and his national council are up now. it's their turn to show what they've got. there's no really telling whether they're going to actually be successful. they have some of the same problems that some of trump's other advisors do which is none of them have ever passed anything on the hill. what trump wants more than anything else is a legislative victory. he wants something durable and big in his administration. he thinks tax reform is that thing. so going forward, you know, you have some folks out there like gary cohen who have some managerial ability. can they get legislative wins? we don't know that.

robert: the president seems torn between the populace wing and the more business wing of his white house. he's talking about in this reuters interview how he's a nationalist and a globe list. julie: with nafta back and forth. you have steve bannon whist -- whispering in his ear that the trade agreements haven't been fair to american workers is a really important them. we need to get that withdrawn from nafta. you have rines priebus and thing a culture secretary showing him a map saying well, yes, this is how it would affect american farmers. this is how it would play out in realtime. that was a realtime example of the struggle that's going on for him. he has to figure out -- and i think in a way that he didn't reckon with before he took office which of those roots he's going to take. he's the decider. and with nafta he basically

coming out where he started which is we're going to renegotiate. if i don't like the results, then we'll withdrawal. robert: he's going to atlanta to talk to his base. but when you think about the conservative base, so many of our sources, you and were in the capital reporting. they say his failure to pass the affordable care act is being sometimeyed again and again. it's a revealing about how he's not been able to get a handle of the republican controlled congress. jake: first he tried to negotiate and work with speaker ryan to pass this bill, the repeal and replace bill. that went up in flames. now he's working with mark meadows the chairman of the freedom caucus. he doesn't have anyone who's guiding him and figure out who are the honest brokers, who are the people he should spend time with. on healthcare, he's starting to contend with the issues that you and i have covered for so long. this is a very deeply divided

house republican conference. you're seeing a reality that about 10 to 15 and minute -- maybe even 20% does not believe he's political advantageous or smart or good politics to repeal this law. it's taking away benefits, they think. republicans were telling us we're never going to be able to take this away. this is a benefit. robert: for american who are out there wondering if this repeal effort is for real or not. they look at the house. the house hasn't brought it up for another vote. where is it going? is there going to be a vote to repeal the affordable care act? and even if it passs the house does it stand a chance in the senate? we're talking about reality or political drama? >> police cal drama. they are closer than -- political drama. they are closeer to passing this. i don't mean to under estimate mitch mcconnell who is the

senate majority leader and political guru, but i don't think it stands. it's got to be significantly changed. whether that can come back to the house where it would need another vote and get the president's signature, i'm deeply deeply skeptical of. >> republicans are positioning themselves who they can blame for the repeal and replace not coming out. this negotiation with meadows allows the freedom caucus allows them to say it's not us, it's the moderates. if they figure out how to get some turkey out of their body and goes to the senate. and they say it's the senate blocking and if mitch mcconnell can send it back to something like a conference, then it would be back like a house. we're going o see this football passed around. ideally they will get closer and closer to something they can come to agreement. what's happening with meadows doesn't seem to be in closer to

what could pass in the senate. robert: i picked up that there's a frenzy of activity in the white house. but when it comes to actual law moving forward, it's moving a a glacial pace. that turns to the tax reform issue. the president announced a sweeping tax reform. they laid out his tax policy which is one of his biggest campaign policy. the plan will reduce the corporate rate from 35% and create 25% and 35%. repealing the alternative minimum tax and estate tax. democrats call the plan wildly unrealistic and even some republicans are raising questions about the lack of details. i was reading, julie, your front

page of the "new york times." they say they're moving about this, but they don't have many details. julie: when president trump said i'm going to have my tax plan by wednesday, even a lot of people said really? we didn't know about that. that's news to us. they've been talking about this and working on it behind the scenes for weeks. there's no question that the timing of the announcement was designed to come before the 100 days. if he's not going to have a healthcare bill or a tax bill, he wanted to have a proposal out. but what we got on wednesday was a sheet of paper that was a wish list of cuts. independent wasn't a tax reform plan. independent wasn't a plan of any kind. it was basically a list of ingredients and a piece of legs that he was endorsing. and because it didn't have any cost estimates, because it didn't have any, you know, specifics about which income

levels were going to be paying which rates, it's almost impossible to say what the net result is going the be other than most of it is going to go to the wealthy and big and small businesses and family that have a lot of wealth that's going to be inherited. it may be that in the end the way that the brackets are designed, the way that the deductions are condensed and eliminated and replaced does help the middle-class, does help folks other than big businesses and wealthy people but what they provided were cuts if the rich and not really a reform. they were talk about simplification and the overhaul and you heard steve saying this is going to be the most significant reform in 30 years. this is not a reform. this is just a package of cuts. robert: when i spoke to the economic advisor to the president, he said the president just wanted to move on taxes. but abby, when you're reporting on the white house, how is the

white house dealing with the fact that it's base, blue collar areas of the country, how are they dealing with tax cuts for the wealthy? >> there are a lot of internal disputes about some of those details that julie mentioned that are so unresolve. one of the big disputes that happened this week anded the parts that they did release about who gets a tax cut? do wealthy people get a tax cut? and there were some people in the white house arguing not do -- to do that because that does not jibe with the president's message that he had on the campaign trail. but those people lost that fight. and the tax cuts are both for high income earners and also for corporations. there are quite a few unresolved things that stouch on this question dush touch on this question. how popular are his are going to end up up being? that has some people worried about how this is all going to go. the white house is still trying

to figure out how to get the president something that -- that feels really big. and i think the tax reform plan that they put out, they've convinced him is reform even though as julie says a lot of people are looking at it and are saying this is really just a lot of tax cuts. when you don't pay for it, it's going to have to sunset at some point and that's going to look like the bush era tax cuts that have to go way after 10 years. and it's not a sort of big systemic overhaul that we saw reagan do. robert: jake, i feel like i'm coming to you for cold water on the congressional side. the president has these ambitions on taxes but how has congress reacted? >> this is a nonstarter. he might as well put nothing. there's nothing that looks like this that's going to ever pass capitol hill. it was a nice exercise to satisfy an itchy and aggravated president but i think the people on capitol hill who have been working on this for up wards of a decade say, thanks but no,

thanks. it cannot get to the senate. what we call reconciliation. it has budgetary issues. it doesn't have any plans. now, i do think that there is a process that's going to begin, the ways and means republicans are here this weekend, the tax writing committee and they're having a conference, a private meeting where they're going to discuss the actual plan that they're considering. robert: we'll see how this moves. >> remember, minushan said they'll pass it by august. i don't think 2018. we're a long way away. people should be very patient. robert: the big picture i keep getting from everything you're saying is on taxes and healthcare things are stalled. big initiatives are stalled but let's turn to the world. beyond the domestic agenda, the president has endured a number of flets. he lunched a missile report in sish yeah after the assad regime

launched a chemical attack on its citizens. he drop the mother of all bombs in afghanistan. and he forged with the chinese president to reform diplomatic pressure on north korea. are we seeing a world view from the president, michael, in the first 100 days? michael: i think we're seeing not an ideological big picture view, there's no trump doctrine that's intelligible. but we have seen a shift from his campaign which is i can fix and change everything to a recognition that the world is far more complicated than he thought and toward following his national security team. ander think there's an enormous sigh of relief across the city of the last month or so that people now believe he's listening to the right people even people like john mccain and lindsey graham are saying we're not as worried as we're used to be. he's listening to very smart

people. and he has recognized in office that there are real lives at stake here, that this is not just rhetoric. it's not something i can say to get a tweet going or get a rally. he's become more cautious. i think what we've returned to is something closer to the con sen active the plunl and national concensus. robert: but his rhetoric are not always cautious. there was breaking news about north korea firing another ballistic missile, the 75th of kim jong-un's tenure. we're seeing the president saying there could be a major, major conflict. the city as much as they see a more traditional world vee view -- world view it's on wedge north korea. >> in the first few weeks of trump's administration, folks were on edge with what kind of policy player on the world stage he was going to be, really nervous about some of the

statements he had made on the campaign trail. that has subsided a lot on recent days. but on north korea he has been talking pretty tough and a leader who is known for his own insen area, crazy statements is -- incendiary, crazy statements. and it started with fox where he said we're sending the armada. he talked about the submarines and how powerful the submarines. they're nuclear tipped submarines. there's a little bit of weariness what is he going to say that might up end this whole process. what is going to happen if china does not have the kind of influence on north korea that president trump is constantly saying he hopes that will have? how is this going to be different for the trump administration than any other administration that has been confounded to deal with north korea? >> would -- this week the

pentagon launched a new investigation into weather former national security advisor michael flynn broke the law by receiving hundreds of thousands of dowell doll -- dollars in payments from russia and turkey. the chairman of the house oversight committee is asking the pentagon to confiscate the money from flynn as it continues its probe. elisha cummings accused of covering up flynn after president trump fired him. when you look at shafitz, it makes you wonder where is oversight of flynn of russia stand? >> it's very difficult with a republican controlled house. you don't get the oversight. everything has to check out. and everything goes to the top. speaker paul ryan is going to have to approve a lot of these investigations because you are

pressuring the white house for documents. the white house wasn't willing to cough up some documents and then you get into the question are you going to subpoena something. this might have a little pause because jason said he returned to utah. he's not going to run again. he singled -- signaled he's going to have foot surgery and he might be away for three or four weeks. this might get paired back because of his foot. robert: does the white house recognize how much this has in some ways hampered their ambitions for the first 100 days? >> do i think they recognize that this story is just like a dark cloud hang over their heads. they can't get past it. but the problem for them it's unclear that they understand the depth of what is -- what is even there. it's hard for them to control a story when they don't know what they're trying to control. and that's where they are right now. there was not a lot of attention

to detail, not a lot of attention to staff and to vetting during the campaign and in the transition. they are -- robert: the trump administration is actually blaming the obama administration for not vetting flynn enough. >> the obama and ministration fired michael flynn. in spite of what they're saying they're right about that. it was cleared under obama but no one forced trump to take on michael flynn and then make him his national security advisor at a time when people were raising questions about his actions in that dinner that now is the subject of so much of this conversation. so the white house does not know the depth of where this investigation goes. it makes it pim possible for them to deal with it. so they are going to stone wall for as long as possible and see how far that gets them. it may get them pretty far because as jake notes, it's a republican controlled congress. they can kind of control the pace of how this whole thing

goes. >> one thing that has changed is that the white house is no longer escalating this issue. for the first cup of months you saw the president tweeting about obama wiretapping which wasn't true. even before he took office saying that the intelligence community was making a lot of stuff up about russia. they've backed out of those. whenever they try to elevate the issue they lose the fight. and now they're sort of doing typical damage control. it's a much more conventional approach. it may help them over -- >> although, it's worth noting that none of those times when they've escalated has been strategy. it's often because the president sun able to control his urge to fight back. so it's unclear whether he will ever get that control. >> and what is unusual about this damage control effort is that in a conventional white house, you would actually have the people who know something about this and have access to the information go back and try to recreate -- what actually did

happen? what can we say? what is reality and what is not? that's not happening here. they just want to push this away. it's unclear how long that's going to be able to be possible. robert: we'll be watching. thanks, everybody for coming tonight. and welcome, jake, to "washington week." our conversation continues online on the "washington week" extra. we will tell you who president trump signaled may be his democratic challenger in 2020. you can find that out on pbsorg/washingtonweek. check out some of the headlines of president trump's first 100 days an follow the top stories of our panelists over the next 100 days with news you need to know. that's every day at pbs.org -- washingtonweek. i'm robert costa on "washington week."

announcer: funding for "washington week" is provided by -- boeing. newman's own foundation, donating all profits from newman's own food products to charity and nourishing the common good. ku and patricia ewing through the ewing foundation committed to bridging cultural differences in our communities, the corporation for public broadcasting and by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. thank you.

[female narrator] tonight, an untold chapter from an explosive era that changed our nation. in august 1970, journalist ruben salazar was shot dead by an l.a. county sheriff. [phil montez] he died believing in the constitution and the billf rights. that's probably what got him in trouble. [narrator] accident or assassination? i am absolutely convinced that he was assassinated. [narrator] for over 40 years, this question has been a mystery. he began to talk about what he really felt about things... ...and became more of an activist. the mexican-american in this country has been sold a bill of goods. people were shocked.