mitchell reports." >> quiet hour for you and another busy one for us. i'm peter alexander in for andrea mitchell in washington with the blockbuster breaking news on president trump's legal team. nbc news confirming that john dowd has abruptly decided to resign from his role. this coming after dowd, one of the president's outside lawyers, recently backtracked from public statements calling for special counsel robert mueller's inquiry to end saying he was speaking for himself, not for the president. and only days after president trump made a big shift in strategy with the hiring of this man, a cable news firebrand, jodi again gentleman,jo jojoe digenova. dowd's announcement coming hours before a major announcement on trade. joining me now, nbc white house correspondent, kristen

welker. white house reporter ashley parker. "new york times" politics reporter jeremy peters. nbc national security and justice reporter, julia ainslie. and michael schmidt. kristen welker, start with the news of john dowd's departure. you spoke with imhad just moments ago. give us a sense of why now and what's sense this sort of change in strategy within the president's legal team? >> peter, we have confirmed this report broken by "the new york times." i spoke to john dowd very briefly. he confirmed he resigned. when i asked him why he wouldn't give any details. he said just tell people i love the president and wish him very well. now of course, this move comes, peter, after all of the shakeup that you just mapped out and also after that weekend statement by john dowd in which he effectively called for the special counsel investigation to end. a lot of people say that was a

green light for the president to go on the attack against the special counsel. so we saw all of these tweets. the president really taking aim at special counsel robert mueller. and from the perspective of a number of people within the president's legal team, it was a departure from the initial strategy that had been mapped out which was to not go on the attack against the special counsel, which was to be be transparent, to cooperate with the special counsel, and of course, there are these very sensitive negotiations going on behind the scenes, between the president's legal team and the special counsel's team about a potential interview with president trump. of course, that has not been worked out yet. whether there actually will be one, the size, the scope, all of that still be discussed, so it is a very sensitive moment, peter. but it does come as the president and his legal team are ramping up for this next phase, what they clearly see as a very fierce fight, bringing on joe

dijd digene digeneva. a lot of people asking what about ty cobb? no indication ty cobb is going anywhere. we haven't been able to reach him yet for comment, peter. i will give you this comment from jay sekulow who says john dowd is a friend and has been a valuable member of our legal team. we will continue our ongoing representation of the president and cooperation with the special counsel. they are looking to bring in even more members of the legal team as they prepare for this next very sensitive phase. >> michael schmidt with us by phone. let me ask you what this does say about this legal strategy going forward. just days ago hiring joe digenova. they flirted with the idea of bringing on a legal superstar, ted olson, who declined that offer. what's this say about the president's thinking and what he wants more or less of going forward? >> dowd and ty cobb have said to the president the sooner and

faster you cooperation, you more likely you are to get cleared. the president told his lawyers he had done nothing wrong an they proceeded with that. they said it would be over by the end of last year. obviously it is not. obviously it is intensifying and the president is deeply frustrated by that and now considering a more aggressive posture. he has done some of that publicly on -- over the weekend, mentioning mueller's name on a tweet for the first time, going after mueller's office. he was disappointed with how dowd put ot the statement on saturday saying the investigation should be over, then backing away from it saying he was only speaking for himself. so the president looking at this situation realizing that this is one that has not gone away and that he may need a mother aggressive approach to. now, the president does want to sit down with mueller. he thinks that doing so is a good idea. dowd thought it was a terrible idea, telling folks that he would not be around if the

president was insisting on doing that interview. >> ashley parker, if i could have you join this conversation here. tell me first all, take us behind the scenes into the west wing based on your conversations about the president's thinking right now, about his mindset right now. you consider the shake-ups, not just inside the west wing with be but outside the west wing. some inside as they relate to the staff, others outside as they relate to his legal team. where is the president at this moment? >> well, the shake-up with john dowd specifically was both surprising and unsurprising. it was described to us this morning as we got the tip and broke the story that basically it was mutual in a weird way, mutual with a negative connotation. but dowd had been upset that the president had been talking to a number of other lawyers, trying to bring them in, ultimately bringing in joe digenova and dowd was very unhappy with that. but the president's long wanted a more aggressive staej.

people in his orbit have been telling him that the strategy of cooperation, he's going to get rolled, it is not going to end well for him and there were a number of missteps dowd made both publicly and privately that sort of worried of president, the president loss confidence in him. there was a concern dowd didn't have the right strategy or sk l skillset to get this over the finish line. >> this is not the first attorney to represent the president. marc kasowitz is still representing the president's private interests as they relate to some of the suits, one by summer zervos, one of the stormer "apprentice" contestants that's now suing the president. but talk about this team as it goes forward, what you are hearing about what could happen going forward and how the mueller team may view these changes, if they even care, if it affects them in any form.

>> kasowitz is a name we remember from late spring, early summer of last year when he came on. we know that he actually came on after trump had already reached out to people like ted olson. he had done that in the first round and he went with kasowitz, someone who he had worked with before who, frankly, doesn't have exactly the same experience and resume as a lot of these criminal defense attorneys. but he's someone hot president trusted. what we're hearing now is not necessarily that kasowitz has been brought back but that he's someone that the president has expressed interest in bringing back because he's looking for people he can trust. he is in a place right now where, as you have laid out, he did not get what he thought he would get in exchange for cooperating, in exchange for laying low. so he's ramping up that aggression day by day and he wants to get rid of people who he thinks have given him bad advice and turn back to someone who he could trust like kasowitz. of course, it might not be him at the end of the day but what we are seeing here is a shake-up as the president tries to move in a direction that he thinks might allow him to be a little

more bull-headed against robert mueller. how that will all play with robert mueller depends on how far trump decides to take this. they could kind of play good cop, try to cooperate and lay low. but if the president has it his way, it could be that he goes so far that it could backfire against him and that could be brought into more points against him as mueller investigates obstruction. >> jeremy, to be clear, this is a president who trusts his own instincts other anybody else. frankly, no matter who is representing him, he's going to go with number one thinks, that's always what's within his own head. >> that's what people around trump were most worried about. you talk to his closest advisors, one thing that they feared was that this exact situation would happen, although i think they were more worried about trump firing john dowd and some other members of his legal team. that didn't happen, of course. but the end result is the same in which you lack these human guardrails around trump who were pushing a strategy of cooperation, one that's less

combative. remember from the campaign the slogan "let trump be trump," that cory lewandowski pushed? it is no didn't that this is happening because there are now people around trump, more of them, that are enabling these impulses he has only to listen to imhad ef is and go with his gut, rather than people who will tell him, hold on, let's think and slow down a bit. >> michael, can you preview what we should focus on looking forward? is the earthquake done or is there more shaking ahead? >> it appears that the president is looking at other lawyers. question is what type of lawyers will they be. will they be more like joe digenova, the one they hired on monday, someone that goes on cable news a lot, has pushed theories that the fbi made up its evidence against donald trump? or will it be more of an emmitt flood, sort of a well-schooled veteran respected washington lawyer who works at one of the top firms and could really bring

some stability and some traditional lawyerly approach to what the president is doing. i think a lot of the president's future legal approach will depend on the type of lawyer that at the brings in. >> to say nothing of the fact that the president only 11 days ago tweeted about a "new york times" story that it was wrong when it was suggesting he was unhappy with anybody on his legal team. he said, "i am very happy with my lawyers," including john dowd. well, if that was the case it certainly didn't last very long, which makes you question a lot of the things the president says publicly, either vocally or by twitter. thank you to our team. joining me right now is democratic congressman eric swalwell. he serves on the house intelligence committee and judiciary committee as well. just want your reaction out of the gates to the president's abrupt shift again shaking up his legal team as it relates to

the russia investigation, what you make of that move. >> well, peter, the president could have clarence darrow as his lawyer. i don't think it exchanges the flawed and exposed client that he is. he seems to want to hire more and more. but as far as i am concerned, there's only one version of the truth and we still haven't heard it from the president. i best thing i think he can do for all the american people so we can all go back and do our jobs and there can be certainty in this white house is just come clean with bob mueller and his team, cooperate and let us all move on. >> speaking of coming clean, your committee just voted along party lines to end its russia investigation. i know you think that wasn't the right call. so who else do you want to hear from right now and frankly, what, if any, recourse do you have? republicans control the commit. >> peter, this timing is actually -- it is the possible outcome after learning this week about the expanded role that cambridge analytica played, a

russian graduate student who was giving them data that they used in the operation to help the trump campaign. that's just been unearthed. so the worst thing we could do would be to shut down this investigation. there is a number of witnesses who should have been subpoenaed who refused to just answer our answer like donald trump jr., cory lewandowski, jeff sessions. then jeff nader went over to the s seychelles during the transition period. we learn something every hour who knew something. we're close egg the booing the very inaccurate way. >> what's the risk to the american people it just shuts down like this? the consequence of shutting the house intelligence investigation down today is we are inviting a russian attack this november. not just a russian attack.

other countries with similar capabilities will look at this now as an unwillingness on the united states' part to stand up against enemies who seek to attack us, to call them out, to batten down the hatches and protect the ballot box. that's one of my biggest fears, we have an election coming up and we are more vulnerable. >> mark zuckerberg broke his silence on cambridge analytica yesterday on cambridge analytica's ability to collect personal information, harvesting the information, as it is described, from at least 50 million facebook users. this is what zuckerberg said about whether he would testify before congress. >> so the short answer is, i'm happy to if it's the right thing to do. facebook testifies in congress regularly on a number of topics, some high-profile and some not. what we try to do is send the person at facebook who will have the most knowledge about what congress is trying to learn. so if that's me, then i am happy

to go. >> if that's me, then i am happy to go. so you're one of the people who's part of this conversation. should zuckerberg testify? should he go? and would you support subpoenaing him? >> it's him, peter. he is the right person to go and it is the right time to do it. right now. the question that i think is most important with respect to facebook is did they have knowledge that cambridge analytica had this ill -- illicitly obtained information and still chose to work with the trump campaign anyways. if that is the case, there will have to be consequences for that because they will have made a decision to work with the trump campaign knowing that the trump campaign had in its possession 50 million illicitly obtained user data. that's a big problem. that needs to be further developed. as it relates to our investigation, we want to know what the russian role was in this because there is a connection between cambridge analytica and russia. >> did you hear enough

assurances from mark zuckerberg in the interviews he's now done in the last 24 hours that facebook has this under control? are you satisfied that this is a problem in the past? >> in. i'm actually concerned that we have -- we're at the tip of the continent actually as far as how social media companies were weaponized. i asked facebook when they testified before the house intelligence committee, can you tell us at this hearing that you understand fully how your platforms were weaponized and i didn't really get a straight answer. i think the fact that we're learning more this week is all the more reason that an audit needs to be conducted independent of facebook, but i think by an independent commission or the house intelligence committee. >> congressman swalwell, nbc news has learned the formeder fbi director, andrew mccabe, had authorized an investigation into whether the attorney general

jefgs li jeff sessions lied to congress. does this raise concerns. >> firing andy mccabe and the way he was fired was wrong. i think it was meant to send a message that anyone who has information hon donald trump or any of his allies will be punished and have their careers tarnished. without going into that investigation, i can just say that i have concerns that jeff sessions was not straight with congress and that he's had shifting stories just like most of the trump campaign team and the president's family with their prior contacts with russia. again, all the more reason that one of the most important committees that would look at this should not shut down its investigation in the way that we did today. >> congressman eric swalwell, democrat from california, we appreciate your time. thank you. >> my pleasure, peter. coming up, more on that breaking news out of the white house as we speak. the personresident's personal l, john dowd, resigning. what it means for the president as he faces challenges on multiple fronts. that's next. this is "andrea mitchell

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back now live on "andrea mitchell reports." i'm peter alexander. more now on the president's abrupt change within his legal team. to our legal analyst, katie phang and ari melber. we've learned in the last hour john dowd, one of the

president's outside lawyers, is departing with being resigning. at one time he was the lead outside lawyer on the russia probe, quitting so abruptly at such a critical stage. >> on a scale of one to ten when it comes to organizing your legal team in a defense context, this is a nine. this is a huge deal. john dowd was the lead criminal defense attorney. if you weren't the president, you were a normal person, that's the one person standing between you and a potential guilty verdict, between you and jail. it is not your white house counsel, it is not your pr lawyer. it is your defense lawyer. number two, donald trump famously tweeted within the last two weeks that the reporting that journalists had done wanting to shake up his legal team was false and fake. no, it looks like the denial was fake and what was real was the reporting because he's axed john dowd or john dowd's out. that's a term of art. we can bear down on what that means. john dowd is the one with

attorney-client privilege. his secrets say with imhad. he can maintain donald trump's confidence even as an ex-member of the team. he and the president both saying positive things about each other, on his way out the door. number four, our colleague, julia ainslie, reporting two well places sources say donald trump is interested in bringing back marc kasowitz, a more combative lawyer known more for his criminal work than his defense work. but the writing on the wall is clear -- donald trump is moving away from a largely cooperative framework, avoiding mentioning mueller by name, having ty cobb come out every few weeks and say this thing's almost wrapping up and we are cooperating. jay sekulow's statement today says they will continue cooperating, the "c" word is in there. but they aren't staying with that cooperative vibe, if you will. they're adding people who want to attack the entire fbi and doj, attack it with conspiracy

theories about the deep state or framing of the presidency, which is an explosive thing to say. this is all coming -- again, so much has happened, people may forget, this is all coming in the context of the firing of the deputy fbi director who is a potential witness to the president's alleged obstruction, and that just happened. so i think it is very clear this is a nine. this is a shift away from the cooperative framework of the past ten months. >> much of this previewed by the president himself who last weekend for the first time called out the investigation by name, the mueller probe. he used that language, referring to the special counsel by lang for the first time. katie phang, what do you make of this? >> so it is a clear sign, peter, that trump is now beginning the process of circling the wagons. as ari said, this cooperative stance is clearly out the door. one of the worst things you can do as a client is surround yourself with lawyers that are only going to tell you what you want to hear and almost be

borderline sycophants. at this time you see who's left on the trump team in terms of his legal defense. that's joe digenova, a trump surrogate when he goes on the cable shows. the only person who's left holding the bag in terms of the passing of the baton is ty cobb. even ty cobb has said through his own words that he thinks his time is limited in terms of remaining in the white house, cooperating and working with the mueller investigation. as you recall, peter, ty cobb was brought onboard with help with the document production. mueller has recently sat down with the trump legal team and said, we are going to focus on some specific issues in terms of the mueller investigation and that deals with the trump tower meeting in 2016 and it also deals with the comey firing and the flynn firing. so now we know that we're on the cusp of maybe, just maybe, have an agreement in terms of trump's interview with the mueller investigation. but right now with this current

legal team? i'm going to say right now you're not going to see a serious sit-down interview with trump and robert mueller. >> let me ask you about the white house counsel, don mcghan. a name we rarely refer to anymore other than what he may or may not have known in relation to russia investigation, to rob porter's status in the west wing. do you think his situation is see or someone we should be eyeing right now? >> well, according to "the new york times" in multiple reports, don mcghan is the person who prevented donald trump from removing bob mueller in the first place. that is a huge deal and the "times" followed up that reporting by saying that trump then said to mcgann, i didn't really try to fire mueller. mcgann said to him, a, yes, you did, and b, now i have to go report this back to mueller don mcghan and others have a legal obligation to report in certain types of factual information in the middle an obstruction probe. so i think mcgann has played

that role, threatened to resign and is still there. that tells us something about donald trump's very intelligent, very thought-out and methodical approach to this probe. it is very clear that many of donald trump's critics are wrong to suggest that he is impulsive or just shoots from the hip on this issue. he has been moving very methodically through trial and error, experimental, to figure out how you can restrain parts of this probe to the many parts he doesn't like, does so publicly, while not falling into the trap of richard nixon while having an explosive set of firings which actually imperil the presidency. this is, as i've said before, the markings of more of a slow-motion saturday night massacre that's harder to pinpoint than the way nixon did it. that's one reason why donald trump who we know removes people -- there are a lot of people leaving -- that may be one reason to your question bwh

don mcghan is still there, because donald trump thinks it is in his best interest to keep him there. >> ari melber and katie phang, thank you as well. tune in to "the beat" with ari melber tonight right here on msnbc. the mark zuckerberg apology tour is under way. facebook's founder and ceo on a media blitz right now sending a message to the social media platform's 2 billion users, many of whom are concerned about their private info after learning about cambridge analytica's harvesting of 50 million facebook profiles. >> so this was a major breach of trust and i'm really sorry that this happened. we need to make sure that there aren't any other cambridge analyticas out there. right? or folks who have improperly accessed data. so we're going to go now and investigate every act that has access -- every app that has access to a large amount of information from before we

locked down our platform. >> nbc's jo ling kent is outside of facebook headquarters in northern california right now. jo ling, start with sort of the gut reaction from this wave of interviews, what's the take-away within the industry, and frankly, among users to zuckerberg's now public apology? is. >> reporter: the take-away is this is step one. inside -- employees inside the company are telling me that they want to see more. you see some of the industry reacting in how facebook is performing. the idea really here is for facebook to lock down personal data and re-establish that trust. that is what zuckerberg is trying to do in this particular situation. he's going to have to conduct thousands of audits of those third party companies that are accessing facebook on your phone and be able to audit those companies and see what happened to that personal data. that's a very big uphill climb. it will be very expensive for the company. meanwhile the federal trade commission is also asking major questions here. if history is any indicator,

they may end up paying major fines on a daily basis per count. that could add up to the billions. so we're looking at both consequences in washington in addition to the industry consequences. of course, the 2 billion users. what happens to how much time people are spending on facebook? we've already seen a decline over the past six months or so. >> decline over the past six months. that's interesting. read code's karen swisher also interviewed zucker. here's what she said this morning about the facebook founder. >> at one point he was talking in the television interview, yeah, well things happen. it is sort of like he owns the restaurant. he owns the building. should know what's going on in it. he is not just a passer-by and he is responsible for the platform. i think that's what everybody has to keep in mind. facebook did not do enough to monitor what these third party developers were doing with their data. >> feels like that's really a reality check for facebook executives about the perception that exists widely right now.

>> peter, i think you've got a good point here. if you listen to mark zuckerberg and the full interview he did with cnn, you can really see that this is an executive who's trying to come forward, he's trying to actually speak out for the first time in a very long time but he is very aware of the major hurdled and obstacles in front of him. looking ahead to the 2018 mid-terms, we already know according to zuckerberg himself, there's likely to be attempts at meddling on the platform. he is hoping to deploy some new technology and get that under control. but looking at 2016 and what we know from that, it looks like so far the challenge is going to be a major uphill battle, that facebook does not have a handle on that right now and we spent to see the meddling continue, as we've already reported. >> a lot of concerns with 2018 approaching and 2020 just a couple years away. jo ling kient, thanks so much. up next, tricks of the trades. we are keeping an eye on the

white house where we expect president trump to announce $50 billion worth of tariffs any minute now, all focused on china. but will these new tariffs cost you money? this is "andrea mitchell reports" only on msnbc. (vo) make her day with

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back now live on "andrea mitchell reports." the house about to start voting on the final passage of this massive spending bill they need to complete by the end of tomorrow to avoid a shutdown. we see the speaker, paul ryan there. garrett haake is live. >> paul ryan is going to probably be one of the last speakers wrapping up on this bill. earlier today some republicans used hardball political tactics on the floor to allow themselves to have this vote today, closing a vote on a procedural measure while some democrats had not voted yet. they had the majority, they used it, they ended the vote right on time and moved on. they are up against the clock here, peter, trying to get this passed through both houses of congress and signed by the president before tomorrow night. we don't spent there to be much more drama in the house about this today. democrats, largely, support what's in this bill. so do most republicans except the most conservative ones.

on the senate side, there's once again the possibility that a single senator, perhaps rand paul, perhaps john kennedy of louisiana who doesn't like this bill, could drag their feet on it. they can't stop it but they could slow it down long enough that we could conceivably have a government shutdown friday night if they choose to. there's some anger this is essentially a 2,000-page bill they haven't had a chance to read. >> garrett, you'll keep us posted and we'll keep watching as that develops. we are also waiting to hear from president trump where he is expected to announce $50 billion worth of tariffs designed to punish china for stealing technology and trade secrets. a live look inside the diplomatic room. this move would affect chinese products coming into the country. the market's down 300 points now. ali velshi and carlos gutierrez,

former secretary of the treasury under george bush. you are a republican, mr. secretary. some may be surprised that you may not necessarily agree with this move. this is obviously an aggressive tactic towards china. is this the best way to go to punish china? >> well, most companies i would say are in agreement that something has to be done because we are talking about technology transfer, intellectual property rights violations, so, yes, there's a problem. what companies are asking for is address the problem but don't damage everything else. can you do it without damaging the u.s. interests? >> the risk is a straytrade war simple terms. >> absolutely. china's ready to retaliate. they've already got their products. there is no question there will be retaliation. the problem here is we first picked the fight with our allies. and then we went after the real target that we've been talking about -- >> you mean like getting out of tpp -- >> well, it's tpp, renegotiating

the korean agreement, nafta, european union with the aluminum and steel tariffs. i think what's happening now is we're making the rounds in the world to be able to get some allies so that we're not alone when it comes to addressing china. >> let me ask you, lot of americans at home, this is a lot of big stuff that may be complicated to understand. they do know what happens to them at home and to their wallets. so why should american consumers be concerned and will this ultimately -- >> it is going to be hard to undery stand understand it in the current context. but going back 40 years, more specifically since 1994 when we reduced all trade restrictions on china, there is a reason you don't feel inflation in america. everything you used to buy that used to be made in america is now made in china. the trade-off is we got really cheap goods for a very long time and we have started to see how it affects our jobs. what neither republicans nor democrats have done a good job at is explaining to americans even while gdp goes up and corporate profitability goes up,

how we haven't dealt with the american worker. so this is satisfying on some fronts, ah, we'll punish the chinese and it helps us. but ultimately the conversation is more sophisticated than that. we are dependent on inexpensively made chinese goods. the proportion of things that we buy that are chinese made will boggle the mind so this is not the most sophisticated way to deal with this matter. secretary says, there are real problems with what china is doing, particularly as it relates to intellectual property but this may not be the way -- >> irony is a lot of the imports are done by u.s. companies who manufacture their inputs in china. so this is going to be inflationary. we'll get higher prices and in many cases we could get lower unemployment. >> what's this do considering the fact the president is relying on china right now vis-a-vis north korea in that region. mr. secretary, what's the impact on our relationship to china? the president obviously was wowed by the chinese. i traveled with him to beijing and elsewhere on that recent

asia trip several months ago. what's it do to that relationship? >> my sense is the one issue the president really cares about is trade. you talk about south korea and the they're helping us with north korea. but trade is -- he's been after trade since the 1980s. this is his opportunity. i think he will risk a lot of the other priorities in order to get his way on trade. >> that's uniquely dangerous given the place we are in the world right now, particularly with south korea. we know there is a little bit of head room left on what we can do with south korea, but china controls much of that head room. if there's money and stuff going in and out of north korea, it is going to and from china. >> the other thing to watch is whether we exclude the european union from the tariffs on steel and aluminum as a way of getting them to side with us. >> those tariffs turned out not to have the bite that many anticipated because he said mexico, you're all right, china, you're out. let me ask you, the market down 330 -- >> better than earlier.

>> it is better than it was earlier but what are the markets saying? >> they don't like this. this isn't necessarily a democratic or republican thing. we have to be careful. we know we've got sophisticated trade relationships and everybody agrees in both parties they have to be fixed. but if you do it willy-nilly, take sledgehammers -- don't be too worried, this is 1.5%. we've seen bigger. this is not terrible. to the secretary's point -- >> but the president watches this. >> yeah, he does. >> the other thing that will be included in this 301 is reciprocity on foreign investment. >> that's section 301 of this trade act -- >> right. if they block off some investment in certain industries in china, we will do the same. so it is a tit for tat, not just on trade, but actually on foreign investment into china. >> so put yourself in this administration. you are sitting around the table with peter navarro, later kudlow, someone you know well, back in that room, what do you

say if you're in front of the president as he considers this? >> i would say that everything that has been accomplished with tax reform, with regulatory reform, with energy reform is at risk. so we are shooting ourselves in the foot. the thing to keep in mind is china's president xi is at peak power. he just received approval to extend a third term. >> president for life. >> president for life. so you are dealing with someone who cannot afford to look weak. >> what should we be watching going forward? >> exceptions. things that they're going to say don't affect the chinese. they're actually conscious of the things they don't want. what they don't want to do is take away chinese investment in the united states because there is a lot of that. when asking what would you say to the president, the secretary is a very different secretary is different than the commerce secretary. the current commerce secretary has a different view on trade. >> as we speak about that we see the current commerce secretary

wilbur ross. again this is the diplomatic room if our camera allows us. there they are gathering. notes have been placed on the president's lectern as he prepares to make his remarks just moments from now. kristen welker is joining us. she's at the white house right now. i know we've. given some guidance from the white house about what to expect. there were some questions if this would be $30 billion as initially discussed, then $60 billion. sounds as if peter navarro one of the trade advisors there as well, now they've settled on $50 billion. >> that's right. $50 billion. there are concerns, peter, quite frankly, that these new tariffs that are going to be slapped against chinese goods will ultimately sbas lly spark a tra. china threatening sharp retaliation once the president announces this. i spoke with a senior administration official earlier today and put that question to this official, will this move in fact spark a trade war. remember it comes on the heels of the president announcing

several days ago that there would be new tariffs on steel and aluminum imports. this official didn't deny, peter, that it is a possibility, but underscored i think the argument we're going to hear from president trump which is he believes china has been taking advantage of the united states, that the united states has been on the raw end of a trade deal with china. so this move is necessary. now we asked -- we just got a briefing from mark short and mick mulvaney, the omb director. i asked them about that, peter. they wouldn't weigh in. they said they're not going to get ahead of the president. again, the significant announcement we are expecting just moments from now. this is really a president following through with one of his campaign promises. this was a priority for some of his core supporters. it is also, peter, a move toward a more protectionist stance on the united states closing its borders as opposed to opening them up. that is reflected in this new budget that mick mulvaney was

referring to as well which includes some funding for a border wall. >> we have the two two-minute f the warning. i work at the white house every day. that can be fluid, as we say. give us a sense about the protectionist approach now by the president. this does say a lot about the hiring of larry kudlow, gary cohn's departure, peter navarro, a name some of our audience might recognize. what's it say about the people the president is surrounding himself in terms of his thinking? >> i think the president likes the idea that he surrounds himself with people with different points of view and he likes the debate, he likes the discuss. that's where larry kudlow fits in. >> as he takes the podium, here's the president. >> well, thank you very much, everybody. this has been long in the making. you've heard many, many speeches by me and talks by me and interviews where i talk about unfair trade practices.

we've lost over a fairly short period of time 60,000 factories in our countries. closed. shuttered. gone. 6 million jobs, at least, gone. and now they're starting to come back. you see what's happening with chrysler, with so many other companies wanting to come back into the united states. but we have one particular problem, and i view them as a friend. i have tremendous respect for president xi. we have a great relationship. they're helping us a lot in north korea. and that's china. but we have a trade deficit, depending on the way you calculate, of $504 billion. now some people would say it's

really $375 billion. many different ways of looking at it. but any way you look at it, it is the largest deficit of any country in the history of our world. it's out of control. we have a tremendous intellectual property theft situation going on which, likewise, is hundreds of billions of dollars. that's on a yearly basis. i've spoken to the president. i've spoken to representatives of china. we've been dealing with it very seriously. as you know, we're renegotiating nafta. we'll see how that turns out. many countries are calling to negotiate better trade deals because they don't want to have to pay the steel and aluminum tariffs. and we are negotiating with

various countries. we are just starting a negotiation with the european union because they've really shut out our country to a large extent. they have barriers that they can trade with us but we can't trade with them. they have very strong barriers, they have very high tariffs. we don't. it's just not fair. nafta's been a very bad deal for the united states but we'll make it better, or we'll have to do something else. the deal we have with south korea is a very one-sided deal. it is a deal that has to be changed. so we have a lot of things happening. but in particular with china, we'll be doing a section 301 trade action. it could be about $60 billion. but, that's really just a fraction of what we're talking about. i've been speaking with the highest chinese representatives,

including the president, and i've asked them to reduce the trade deficit immediately by $100 billion. that's a lot. so that would be anywhere from 25%, depending on the way you figure, to maybe something even more than that. but we have to do that. the word that i want to use is reciprocal. when they charge 25% for a car to go in, and we charge 2% for their car to come in to the united states, that's not good. that's how china rebuilt itself. the tremendous money that we've paid since the founding of the world trade organization, which has actually been a disaster for us. it's been very unfair to us. the arbitrations are very unfair. the judge even has been very sun

fair. and knowingly, we always have a minority and it is not fair. so we're talking to world trade. we're talking to nafta. we're talking to china. we're talking to european union. and i will say every single one of them wants to negotiate. and i believe that in many cases, maybe all cases, we'll end up negotiating a deal. so we've spoken to china and we're in the midst of a very large negotiation. we'll see where it take us. but in the meantime, we're sending a section 301 action. i'll be signing it right here right now. i'd like to ask bob lighthouser to say a few words about the 301 and where we are in that negotiation. we're doing things for this country that should have been done for many, many years. we've had this abuse by many other countries and groups of countries that were put together in order to take advantage of

the united states and we don't want that to happen. we're not going to let that happen. it's probably one of the reasons i was elected. maybe one of the main reasons. but we're not going to let that happen. we have right now an $800 billion trade deficit with the world. let's say we have 500 to 375. but let's say we have 500 with china but we have 800 total with the world. that would mean that china is more than half. so we're going to get it taken care of. and frankly it's going to make us a much stronger, much richer nation. the word is reciprocal. that's the word i want everyone to remember. we want reciprocal, mirror. some people call it a mirror tariff. or a mirror tax.

just use the word reciprocal. if they charge us, we charge them the same thing. that's the way it's got to be. that's not the way it is. many, many years. for many decades, it has not been that way. i would say the people we're negotiating with smilingly, they really agree with us. i really believe they cannot believe they've gotten away with this for so long. i'll talk to prime minister abe of japan and others. great guy friend of mine. and they'll be a little smile on their face. and the smile is "i can't believe we've been able to take advantage of the united states for so long." so those days are over. ambassador leithizer, thank you. >> thank you very much, mr. president. first of all, for those of you who don't know section 301 is a statute that gives substantial

power, authority, to the president to correct actions in certain circumstances where there's unfair acts, policies or practices by our trading partners. in this case, the area is technology. technology is probably the most important part of our economy. at 44 million people who work in high technology areas. no country has as much technology intensive industry as the united states. and technology is really the backbone of the future of the american economy. given these problems, the president asked usgr to conduct a study. we conducted a thorough study. we've reviewed tens of thousands of pages of documents. we talked to many, many businesspeople. we had testimony, as i say. and we concluded that, in fact, china does have a policy of force technology transfer, of requiring licensing at less than economic value, at state capital system wherein they go and buy

technology. and then finally of cyber theft. the result of this has been that the president has analyzed it. we have a 200-page study which we'll put out. he has concluded we should put in place tariffs on appropriate products. we can explain later how we concluded what products. with respect to high technology. and that we'll follow wto case. because one of the actions here does involve a wto violation. this is an extremely important action. very significant and very important. for the future of the country. really cost industries. i thank you very much, mr. president, for giving me the opportunity to work on it. >> secretary ross. >> intellectual property rights are our future. it's no accident that in june of this year, the u.s. patent and trademark office will issue its

10 millionth patent, 10 millionth patent. there's no history in the country of the world that remotely approaches that. the steel and aluminum actions we've taken deal more or less with the present. this action on intellectual property rights deals with the future. so we're trying to solve both today's problem and problems that otherwise will be forthcoming. that's why these actions are so important and so important in unison with each other. we will end up negotiating these things rather than fighting over them in my view. >> mike pence, would you like to say something? >> thank you, mr. president, and all our honored guests. today's action sends a clear message that this president, our entire administration, are determined to put american jobs and american -- the action the

president will take today under section 301 also makes it clear that the era of economic surrender is over. the united states of america is taking targeted and focused action to protect not only american jobs but america's technology which will power and drive an innovation economy for decades to come. it is just one more step of a promise made and a promise kept by president trump. >> so we'll sign right now. i just want to let everybody know just for a second time that we are in the midst of very major and very positive negotiations. positive for the united states. and actually very positive for other countries also. we have some of our great business leaders and leaders period right behind me. i may ask maryland lockheed, the

leading woman's business executive in this country, according to many, and we buy -- >> we've been listening to president trump right now as he announces what will be a $50 billion -- he said about $60 billion. the white house told us a short time ago, a $50 billion trade -- tariffs skushs me. ali velshi, let's walk through some of the numbers. the president deserves a little fact checking on his numbers. >> to the point about the 60 versus 50, put that aside, the president says we have an $800 billion trade deficit with the world. it's just not 500. i don't know why he says that. maybe i'm 185 pounds or maybe i'm 150 pounds. it's just one fact. there's not two facts on this. the president is loose with dealing with goods, trade and services trade. when you are talking about trade with a country, you include both. when you include both, we have a $500 billion -- roughly $566

billion trade deficit with the world and a 300 -- roughly 300 -- >> the president saying the first of many. you go ahead. i want to listen to this. i think he'll be peppered with questions. >> the interesting word, he uses negotiation. he kept talking about negotiation. i don't believe he's talking about negotiation with china. because there's no way they can strike a deal in two months. >> right. >> he's talking about negotiation on aluminum and steel. and potentially using that to establish some kind of a coalition against china. >> let's listen quickly. >> -- testify -- special counsel robert mueller, sir -- >> thank you. >> you can see the chief of staff john kelly coming in there thanking some of the other individuals in the room. the president, as he walked away, was quickly asked whether he planned i believe to be interviewed by robert mueller there. he said thank you and some other words that were mumbled. hopefully our colleagues, our reporters in the room, might

have heard what was said. the headline the white house wanted to focus on today was this one, the slapping of new trade penalties on china. obviously the headline is now driving at least the last couple of hours the fact there's been another shake-up within the president's orbit. in the past, it's been his staff. now it's his private counsel, his legal team, as it relates to the russia investigation. john dowd, one of the president's lawyer, his lead criminal attorney on the outside, announcing within the last hour and a half as nbc news has confirmed he is resigning his part, his role as part of the president's legal team. we'll be focused on that for the rest of the day. that will do it for this edition of andrea mitchell reports. you can find me @peteralexander. craig melvin is up next right here on msnbc. craig, we hand the reins to you. >> craig melvin here at msnbc news headquarters in new york. trade war. president trump just announcing those new tariffs on chinese imports. now china saying it is ready to

fight back. we'll walk through the shopping that could get more expensive for you very soon. also, dowd and out. president trump's personal lawyer representing him in the russia investigation, john dowd, just quitting. it looks like the president wants to bring back a familiar face. >> and status update. facebook ceo mark zuckerberg apologizing for letting other firms access millions of user's private information. so what's next for facebook? and what would regulation of that social media behemoth even look like? but we start with president trump trying to convince voters, even members of his own party, that tariffs is a winning message for 2018. >> speeches by me and talks by me and interviews where i talk about unfair trade practices. we've lost over a fairly short period of time 60,000 factories