By the George Washington university, this runs about an hour and 45 minutes. Good evening, everybody. [applause] quite a crowd. And there is the overflow room. The school of media and Public Affairs at George Washington university. Whether you are in the room or joining us on cspan or Facebook Live or with streaming live streaming, it is a pleasure to have you. Connecta place where we complex, controversial, fascinating issues of the day with those who are shaping them. Our students, faculty and researchers. I am positively delighted to be partnering with margaret and the White House Correspondents Association for this event. Thank you for turning out tonight. I am president of the White House Correspondents Association. I do analysis for bloomberg and cnn. Its an incredible pleasure to get to spend time with you guys tonight. We represent the White House Press corps, 100 journalists. Whether they are print or tv or radio them online, photographers the cover the white house, and our job is to be a liaison between the press corps in the white house, to educate the public, to raise issues about access and make sure we can get as much of the information as possible to you, the public. We do scholarships. We do awards to honor great work in we champion the First Amendment. This is an important time for the First Amendment. We look forward to be able to bring you the voices of some of the people on the front lines to do this day in and day out. We will take your questions on issues and concerns you care about. Year awe have every student who has one of these White House Correspondent association scholarships. We support that student through their four years here. Dinner withtend the the president , assuming the president goes to the dinner, and spending time with the correspondence. Correspondents. This is timely and remarkable and fascinating. I was a White House Correspondent myself some years ago. I was very young correspondent. A kindergarten correspondent. I covered the Reagan White House and the bush white house, George Herbert walker bush white house. I have interviewed several president s. This presidency changes what we have seen in many ways. Trump was a disruptive candidate and is a disruptive president. And some of the challenges to covering the white house, criticisms on the fake news. I have also in news and shaped things of well. We will touch on that as well. Marget our work every day is about doing our job day in and day out. There are moments in a presidency, and tonight is one of those moments when it is about assessing where we have been, where we are going, and whether anything has changed and how. Frank our panel will join us in a moment. We will ask a question on a different topic of each member of the panel. Then we will open it up for a broader conversation. We will open it up for your questions later in the evening as well. This is a real discussion. Marget when that point in the night comes there will be microphones. You can spend the next hour thinking about what questions you would like to ask and we will give you some instructions later on. We do want to mention thanks to some of the folks that are former president s of the correspondent association. Thank you for being here tonight. We like to welcome all students, media, academic scholars and members of the public. Frank we look forward to it. It is ok to look at your phones as long as you dont do it too much. If you want to engage social oftrump on twitter and instagram. It in a fully respectful way. One of the things we have seen that is most under siege is the notion of civil discourse. We here at gw are very much wanting to stand for that. Serious, honest, direct engagement, but always civil and respectful. Marget tweet or snap away. Please keep enough of your attention focused to you can hear what is actually going on. Frank we are really looking forward to this conversation. We had a couple of drinks, nonalcoholic, yesterday. Where do we begin . A good place to begin with the with introductions. Shall we do that . It is my great pleasure to start our introductions with someone you know, even if you dont know him. You have probably seen him or someone playing him on saturday night live. Please welcome glenn thrush from the New York Times. [applause] frank thank you. Our nextou also know guest from fox news and because President Trump feels safe and comfortable with him. He likes to engage with him. Please welcome john roberts from fox news. [applause] john just because i am trump bait. Frank you know our next guest because we are privileged to have her as one of our turgor fellows. She spends time with faculty and others. She is wellknown to millions of americans for her many years at the white house. April ryan is a White House Correspondent with American Urban Radio Networks and an analyst with cnn. April ryan. [applause] frank do i get one . [laughter] panelist willxt succeed me next summer and also the chief washington and White House Correspondent for yahoo , olivier knox. [applause] frank how many students in the room . Any Political Science majors in the room . Anybody taking a course in Political Science . This person needs no introduction but we will do it anyway. She has a professor of Political Science. She has written about the presidency, congress, legislative gridlock. For next focus on the federal reserve. Her next book is on the federal reserve. [applause] last but not least it is a little intimidating to look at the room like this and a panel like this and think you are the representative of the Trump Administration. We know she is more than capable of doing a great job tonight. We want to thank her very much for her participation. Sarah huckabee sanders, White House Press secretary. [applause] frank before you sit down that did not take long. Fascinated about why you came here and what it is you want to be a will to talk about. Maybe you should ask that question in about an hour and a half after this is over. Forums like this are important. The ability for the administration to be open, transparent, answer questions is very important part of my job. I tried to do that everyday. I am hoping maybe this crowd is a little nicer than the one i sometimes speak with. A few of my friends are back here. This is a great opportunity to talk about some of the things we have done over the last year and hopefully have a friendly and fun backandforth conversation. Frank we want to understand how you go about your job, cap give you your job and how your boss is doing his job. Im looking forward to hear in your response. Sarah good, i have time to think on those. Marget we got as close as we could do about a year since the historic election last november. November 8, President Trump and you will be somewhere in the middle of a 12date trip across trip across asia. The Political Landscape, to the way journalists and president s interact. And perhaps some comparisons between the campaign and the way President Trump has governed. I am very interested for gearin inherent about that. I am very interested in gearing about that. Hearing about that. [applause] to getwe will take turns the conversation going and then we will open it up. The audience will join us in the questioning of it later. Sarah, lets start with you. We are taking stock of things. The president made big and disruptive promises as a candidate. Heot of the promises he made said would be quick or easy. Obamacare,epealing tax reform, infrastructure. He has had a lot of trouble with each. In thinking about that and where he goes, this is the question. It revolves around priorities. Secretary mnuchin said last week the tax reform was the top reality. Corey lewandowski was on campus and set of donald trump does not build a wall, he will not get reelected. That should be top priority. Republicansl of shows their top priority was repealing and replacing the Affordable Care act. 53 said that was extremely important. What does the president vicki couldve done there from the to get any of these things done, and what is his top priority now . Sarah i think one of the reasons donald trump is president is because there is such a frustration with the way washington functions. I think we have seen a lot of that over these first nine months in office. You have so many things get lost in the process. It is very hard to push things through, regardless of whether or not you have a republican majority. Particularly when it is a narrow majority. Bigakes it tough to enforce and bold change like donald trump and like to do. We are making a lot of progress. Maybe not as fast as certainly i think the president wants and not as much as america once. I think america wants. That is the Reason Congressional polling numbers are so low. There is such a frustration that they dont have the ability to get a lot done. The biggest priority is tax reform. We are in the heart of that. I think we will get that done by the end of this year and i think a historic tax cut the president has proposed and is pushing through will be a massive change to our economic system. I think it will empower the economy in a new way through these historic tax cuts, help middleclass families, and something i think we will see happen in that couple of months. Frank i just want to ask one mini followup. He said is the Reason Congress numbers are so low. Is that why his numbers are so low . Sarah i will take the president s numbers over congress any day. One of the reasons you have President Trump as is because he is not your typical politician. They were looking for someone to come in and change washington, change the status quo and he has done that. I dont think anyone could argue he hasnt been somebody who has been disruptive to the way the system normally operates. Does that mean we are getting everything done on day one . No, but we have gotten a lot of things done in short order. Isis is on the run. The economy is stronger than it has been in decades. Unemployment at a 16year low. A lot of these things he has been able to do more in those eight months, particularly what it comes to things like strengthening the economy, like the defeat of isis and the position we are in far more than obama did in eight years. Those are big steps in the right direction. Frank we will come back to all of that, im sure. Marget mr. Thrush what she said. Year has trumps first been marked by a lot of wellknown internal competitions. Everyone from michael flynn, jim comey, the hhs secretary, sean spicer, steve bannon. I feel like i might be forgetting a couple of people. There are a couple of remaining cabinet advisors or top advisers who have been under threat of will hewont he. How, other than the kind of political reportage, how has that affected the management of the executive branch and the process of governance in the early months of this white house . Glen the first thing i would like to do this thing sarah for coming. I know it is difficult to be outnumbered. Sarah kind of outnumbered . Glen incredibly cool she would come here and submit herself to this sort of thing. Frank it is just a conversation. Think part of the thatem has been the fact they are learning on the job. A lot of disruption we refer to, and there is no question the mood in the country are restive. Nt is i dont think people wanted it shaken up this way. You see that reflected in a lot of numbers that shows the president lost a significant amount of support from om heendents, without wh would not have been elected president. [laughter] check your phone. My phone is dead. It makes you even more questionable. [laughter] glenn i will just let that one go. I think in general part of the issue is this guy is learning on the job. He had no experience in this. I think part of the problem is his brand precludes him from you cant necessarily do what a lot of president s in this say ion due which is to am ramping up. That reflects itself in the way that, with all the respect, some of the communication comes through. With general kelly a couple of days ago what was noteworthy was not that he made what appears to be a significant error in facts about this congresswomans characterization, the conversation and the characterization of the gaveesswomans speech she at the opening of the fbi office a couple of years ago. The fact that there was not an immediate attempt to deal with that. Clearly the general misremembered about what occurred. That is a fairly easy matter of fact a clear up. I will not name the Senior Administration official who sent this to me, but early on during the presidency, probably february or march i dont think i made an error in a story but there was a failure to communicate. I did not yet someone to comment on deadline. They called me up to complain about it. Then i said to them, i am really sorry about this. Then that person said dont apologize. It is a sign of weakness. I dont view apologizing or admitting error or that you made a mistake is a sign of weakness. It is a sign of strength. I think in terms of the president and his Approval Ratings in his interactions with all his branches of government and the iraqi people at large he would be doing the American People at large he would do himself a favor if he admitted everyone is capable of seeing that he is learning on the job. Roberts, talk politics today. Corker, dave bob haveert, russ lightman either announce retirement or been defeated in a special primary race. Our boss and former advisor to the President Trump steve bannon spoke of a season of war against the gop establishment. What impact from your perspective, and you know this very well marget that is not a joke about your age. Just because a cover the first roosevelt presidency. [laughter] does the ofimpact people have on the Republican Party and conservativism . John i think the ultimate effect remains to be seen. Steve bannon does really push a lot of alternate candidates. Going into the midterm elections, i think they could have a dramatic effect on the Republican Party. Mitch mcconnell thinks it is a bad idea to float the kind of candidate steve bannon is behind. He said the other day for the president again on sunday that his goal was to get candidates that can be elected and therefore maintain a majority in congress. I think the biggest problem for the Republican Party is they have been screaming long and loud, give us the house, give us the senate, give us the white house and you will see things get done. But things in congress have not gotten done yet. The president has suffered a stinging defeat twice. There are a lot of people in this country that are thankful that did not get done, but if you are a republican and you want to get elected in 2018 or a republican president and you and to get things done, you are looking at that saying we gave the keys to the kingdom and 99 getting anything done. You have been promising for the past several years the first thing you would do when he got the majority was to repeal and replace obamacare. They have run three elections on that and did not get it done. After all those show votes they took into congress, we will vote yes. When the rubber that the road they choked. A lot of republicans are looking at that and saying we keep sending Unit Congress on the promise you will get something done and you dont do it. Then all these alternative candidates start to surface more. Many of those are people that Mitch Mcconnell said will not get elected. The Republican Party could end up shooting itself in the foot because he could not get done what it promised to get done. It is a little early to see the full effect. April covers urban communities across the United States. It is a big focus of your reporting. April among other things. Marget if you were to highlight one or two policy issues you think of have the biggest impact on urban communities, which ones would you highlight . Are those the same issues that got the most coverage . April no. What we are gearing in the news affecting the urban community this president has a major microphone to write the narrative saying things about the flag and the soldiers of this country. Areho are taking challenging the system that is been a problem for a long time when it comes to police and mass shootings. That issue still has yet to be addressed. We know the president , when he was president elect and also when he was a candidate he was supporting policing. Supports community releasing to weed out that policing. Think about then candidates from running for the oval office. He was talking about an innercity fix. I asked him about that and he talked about issues of crime. It talked about issues of health care, education. I asked him about the they did have a meeting. A lot of those issues are yet to be dealt with. When it comes to issues of crime, there is a big problem. The Congressional Black Caucus is talking about this right now. The Trump Administration now is dealing with or in the midst of working out this plan that the cbc considers hooveresque. If you are black identifying and gettingng, they are now a file. That is very hooveresque. When it comes to education, lets talk about hbcus that are flattering. Historically black colleges and universit