robert: president trump rattles global markets after threatening china with billions in new tariffs. i'm robert costa. u.s. troo head to the border and t embattled e.p.a. chief fights to keep his job. tonight on "washington week." trade war. president trump: you have to go after t people that aren't treating you right. robert: president trump calls for an additionalli $100 b in tariffs on chinese goods, escalating the feud between the world's two largest economies. plus -- >> this president has shown tremendous courage. robert: will e.p.a. administrator's scott pruitt's unwavering support t f president help him with a storm of controversy. questions about h housing

arrangement, first-class travel. and president trump continues on his crackdown on undocumented immigrants. president trump: we cannot let people continue to come through. until we have a wall and proper security, we're going to be guarding our border with the military. be : we discuss it all with kayla tausche of cnbc.r michael schef the "washington post," geoff bennett of nbc news andn susaasser of politico. >> this is "washington week." corporate funding is provided by -- >> their leadership is instinctive. they understand the challenges of today and research the

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common good.o d patricia yuen for the yuen foundation, committed to bridging cul iral differenc our communities. the excellence and either i said in journalism foundation. the corporation for public broadcting and by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. thank you. once again, from washington, moderator robert costa. robert good evening. another volatile day on wall street after president trumpoo by his threat of new tariffs on $100 billion in chinese imports. the stock mart plunged on these trailed fears and a weaker thann ed jobs report. mr. trumpis definitelied decision during a radio interview on friday. president tmp: we don't have a trade war. we've lost the trade war. thehi easiest t for me to do would be to close my eyes and forget it. i'm not saying there won't be a

little pain but the market has gone up 40%, 42% so we might lose a little bit of it but we're going to have much stronger country when we're finished. robert: the standoff comes af china proposed $50 tpwhlariffs pl beef, pork, soy beans and wheats, aes and cars. kayla, the administration in spite of all what hd today with the market. they're still standing by their sition. why? kayla: they believe that this is what will bring cna to the table. the president's cabinet and economic advisors have defended the president and said he's the first president to actually stand up to china, to do what no on else has but then other people, outside advisors, corporate executives are saying we don't seep how this gets resolved. and you ha larry culled low, steven money chin talking about

potential trailed negotiations within china s their they're not going on right now. that's something the markedi 't like. they don't want these tariffs to come intoesque. robert: that's a good point. the president ss one thing. the white house's neeconomic director says another thing. who is speaking to the administration, culled low or the president? >> good question.er appears to be a good cop/bad cop strategy. i was on the lawn of the whit house when larry cudlow was give talkingo the press just as the markets opened, trying to tamp down fares but i was talking to somebody who's bone the -- known the president for a while and says that the way the president reflects these negotiation reflects the way

he's done things his entire adult life. he talks touch and expects the opponentsel to ultim give in. it's not entirely clear what a win looks -- looks like and in thee -- chinese president, you have someone who's president or life. robert: they called the u.s. arrogant today in a statement from the ministry o congress. they're not pulling any punches. >> that's right. i think it's signifint that there are not any ghorkse negotiations already underway. cond of all, the chinese are playing this pretty savvy when it ces to american politics. they have tried to, in theirre onse to president trump's initial round of proposed tariffs, they've tried to go into the united states and respond with thingshat are maximizing pressure on trump from within his own party. the american farm belt, the chinesee, h i think, smartly calculated voted overwhelming for donaldrump.

their hope and calculation is that the potential pain hitting american food producers, hitting the american farmers will cause them to put pressure on donald trump. you saw that already happening, by t way, with republican senator joanie against from iowa, not known as a big opponent of donald trump coming out yesterday saying i called up the president and i saidhis is not a good idea. i think it's really interesting. the chinese are learning to play american domestic politics. robert: you reported on this michael, this week. are the congressional republicans actually going to push in administration around? michae they're not gist going after the farm belt. their microtargeting some of these tar riches. you look at washington state, honey, pears and apples. the strahm valley, almonds. big business. iowa is huge and the whole midwest. pork, soy beans. the politics of this domestically are rather

complicated. you have chuck schumer coming out saying i actually think this is a good thing. and mitt romney today, traditional conservative run for senate in utah said als h thae thinks this is a good thing. everybody is just playing this as a butch at tes point. chinese have two big advantages. wudge, it's authoritarian regime. they don't have tot worry ab political factors and two, trump has yet to rally the world around his cause. the u.s. keeps acting unilaterally and china keeps dressing itselfn the language of the international. >> last week they called a truce on the harmed line on trade rhetoric so they could get everyone rallied around that one issue. after tax reform passed, you saw .comsenators and members of the white house coming to the white

hoe in drovels to try to lobby the president not to do what he's doing now and the president sat there and listened and you had people like joanie earns, grassley, like pan roberts of kansas sayin please don't do that and the president did it anyway. robert:hat's next? a bilateral negotiation between the u.s. and chinar es the world trade snep and try to mediate. >> the office of the trade s representative left an open window. nothg will go into effect for at least a couple of months at this point. we're looking at lat may that the administration has to either meet with china or figureut a way to resolve this through appropriate trailed exanls -- channels but china h a lot of powerful tools that it hasn't used yet. if the u.s. keeps talki tough,

china won't back down. robert: sit just tough talk? politically, the president just wants to go back to his cpaign pledge. >> i spoke to someone close to the president andpehey said the president to talk about trade and immigration. the omnibus bill will be the last big thing done if a while. he's talking to be same things that made him effective as a presidential candidate. robert: we also have more turmoil inside of the administration. president trump said today ontw ight they are e.p.a. administrator p scottruitt is doing a "great job" but is totallyndereem. that statement left pruitt, on a barrage of controversy over

travel expenses and residents hanging on forow. pruitt has been questioned about his travel and unrest on the e.p.a. staff. as all these stories piled up. pruitt took to fox news to defend himself. >> president trump said drain the swamp. is draining the swamp renting an apartment fromhe wife of a washington lobby insist >> i don't think that it's even remotely fair to request -- ask that question. >> why did you then semi$50 a night to rent a condo from the wife of a washington >> that is something that's been reviewed by the officials here, they said it's market arraignment. >> you're renting from the life of a -- wife of a lobbyist. robert: pruitt reported used an obscure rule toe sec tens of thousandses in pay rates for

two senior advisors and "the new york times" rerter said he asked a security detail to fla e lights last year to get tonn in washington on the way to le diplomat. amid all this, he survives. susan: that's right. listen, if anybody would be immune to firing somebody because they overly enjoy the perks of their office, it might be donald trump but there's a substantive issues ll. pruitt has a lolled of -- lot of defenders among donald trump's conservative supporters. he's perceived as carrying out the ideological ideas of the administration. even predating his tenure donlt trump's cabinet. so i think trump is reluctant on sub stan active grounds to fire him. re-he ahao has contemporary streak in him.

a few weeks ago when it wasrt re that h.r. mcmaster was out. donald trump was alrean planning firing him but he didn't like the "washington post"li rev that before he was ready to do it. he still did b it he didn't want to do it right away. are we looking at a situation where programs the coverage of this and burginening struggles around pruitt have extended his li by a few additional days or does trump not wa to get rid of him there were not one but two storn s today, onee "new york times" and one in the "wall street journal" saying that white house chief of staff john kelly had urged president trump to dump pruitt and trump was still res. to me that seemed like really undercutting john kelly so maybe his is the one whose job is -- job is on the lin

robert: everyone says they're job isn trouble when you're in the white house. >> i think scott pruitt is quite sleeping well. there aref a lot reporters working on stories about scott pruitt now because there's so much there to dig into. thether thing is how do you replace probably tve most contial head of an agency, the e.p.a. he got through 52 votes when he was first in the senate, when he was first confirmed. you've lost one of those reblican senators -- robert: do they even have time in the senate? >> that too. amount vote and john mccain isn'tw. voting right robert: business likes pruitt. when you talk to people on wall street, because of all the regulations he's cut away, there's not only support among the movement conservatives but the business communities. susan: and the president is in touch with executives from the

oil and gas industries, the mining industry, the companies eling the benefits from the de legg regulatory agenda. he hears that the president likes what pruitt is doing and that's what nfls his view of pruitt. if you look at the white house's own dashboard, the e.p.a. is right up there with some of the highest volume rollbacks of nip agenn the governor and that's something tt you hear the administration talking about quite often. t the white house said they're investigating this and whatever they find could be impermissible. robert: geoff, you were at the white house all day. what do you make of the meeting with the president and the advice falm gen kelly last week to get rid of pruitt? geoff: that's right. general kelly and other top white house aides have told the

president it's time for pruitt to go.g as l a cabinet member stays in the president's personal good graces a lot seems to be overlooked. robert: we've seen ben carson have trouble.se thetary of housing and urban development. a lot of these outsider come to washington, join the cab net and they don't realize reporters realize it -- everything that's public information gets coverage. a lot of officials come in and don't realize every part of the scrutiny. under >> a lot of times in government people take their cue from the person above them. president obama ran a pretty frugal straightforward operation. a lot of these things, first-class airfare, private planes, redecorating the office, a lot of these echo the lifestyle that the president lives. i think a lot of people came in

saying i shouldn't have scusms on my desk or a torn carpet. if i have to fly overnight, i should be flying first class. >> you don't have headlines from the members of the cabinet wloor independently wealthy. betty des and others. only from people who are career government officials or who have perfectly affluent lives but perhaps not to the level of others sitting aroe ble >>ustd last week kelly brought together a group and basically told them to get their acts together. robert: but the president is digging in on pruitt. it's prilled from night. we'll check our phones after the show but for now he's there. the president is digging in on a lot of things this week. on another front, immigration. mr. trump has ordered 2,000 to 4,000 national guard troops to secure the u.s.-mexican bordct.

the perse threw out his prepared remarks at a west virgia round table where he was schuled to talk about something else, instead he seized on immigration. president trump: remember when i said things and people said he was so tough. rember what i said about rape. women are remained at levels never seen before. we have to change our laws. robert: prosecute george w. bush and prosecute barack obama both sent national guard deployments to the border. ritics called those costly and infirst quarter. michael, you covered the president on the campaign trail. again this week, to the trailed issue and immigration what is going on with thispresidency at this point? >> when the president won election, if you go back andt look a that first "60 minutes" interview, you can alst see in

his face that he was nervous about it and i think it was very evident in those first few months. he wasn't sure he could do the job and nd surr himself with a group of advisors he's never been happy wit d now this late estrogen race has kind of gone out the door t andhink the presidenteels, as he's felt throughout his lime and career, in moments like this he should go back to his gut feelings. he has to get back on message, get republicans excited to vote and he's taking a gamble here. robert: it's atut t core base voter and also about the media that bails watches. so much of this was griffin by conservative coverage of centr american migrants moving up through mexicot and the way t was covered and the white house watched out. it was under the spotlight this week as well. >> that's a very charitable way of putting it.

this is literally brought to you by fox news crisis. this is, they covered a caravan of immigrants thawas supposedly on its way to invamed and rampe in the united states. donald trump is ordering troops to the bder inesponse to a manufactured, not-real crisis. in the pasou talked about both president bush and president obama have had to, as various points in response to real events, order national guard troops too temporarily go to the border so this is a --er salts in every possible way. so i find that to -- it's basically a real metaphor for the pinolitics we're lin right now. you see president trump throwing up the papers. to me,t' t like the signature -- signature visual of the presidcy. ah, this script is boring. i'm going to offer you a new immigrion-related plotline.

put i want to go back to this idea that he's in campaign mold. i think he is. he feels unat the timeered or that he's out there doing what he wants to do. having the cabinet want to have, the presidency i want to have. what i'm struck by i that he's still treating it as a reality show or as if everything is a. campai actions do have consequences in meco this week in response to this manufactured on tv crisis, you saw tde pre of mexico, after two years of forbearance, actually givessn addo the mexican people and say enough is enough, basically. donald trump, ifo you want t talk about american domestic politics, you should do thatnd leave mexico out of it. he may lose his job in the july 1 mexican presidential election because of the american politics here. >> to susan's point, this crisis wasn't just brought to us by fox news but also by the president's friends and allies who were in his ear a mar-a-lago next --

last weekend.s fo like shapiro, sean hannity. told that the base was growing impatient and softening with the president's perceivedn giving i on immigration. remember, he signed that omnibus bill that didn't have funding for the wall. >> by the way, mexico is not going to pay for the wall.: robe are congressional republicans going to back up and change their tune to immigration or would they rather sell the tax cut? >> i think thaveped ramp sell the tax cut. i think there's still confusion out what type of immigration plan would pass congress the white house would sign off on and at this point there's the loomin deadline. >> the real problem the president has is that the people whoim electedn 2016 are not

going to decide who controls congress. there are moderate in a couple of years. rumor areas. the not depressed working class parts o michigan or pennsylvania who delivered him the white house. so he has the same playbook but he's not playing the same game and it's not clear wo do me dma dkth t woheeer h a lot of these candidacies if he keeps on this path. robert: hi -- he keeps talking about voter fraud as well, the >> but his own commission decided to disband,inng no evidence that existed. robert: where do we go next? >> that's a good question if there's not a legislative agenda. michael's point is really what districts is he going to be welcome in to campaign?e >> went back to west virginia

this week. he can always go back to west virginia. wild and wonderful west virginia. robert: we'll have to leave it there tonight. we'll discuss president trump's battle with amazon in the webcast. find that all week and later tonight atbsrg/"washington week." i'm robert costa. thanks for joining us. >> it was t the hostilee over of the republican party. >> the fight between the president and his own party. swoop, the ll republicans sent a message, you're not a king, you're a president. >> don't mess with donald trump. >> donald trump doesn't forget. >> somebody needs to stand up and say this is notr party. in is not normal. >> watch onle or on air beginning april 10. ♪

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