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President Donald Trump will deliver a speech to Congress on Tuesday night. Newslook
President Trump (Photo: Olivier Douliery / POOL, EPA)
WASHINGTON — President Trump plans to use his first address to Congress on Tuesday to outline an ambitious — and contested — agenda that ranges from tax cuts and regulation rollbacks to road projects and a proposed 10% hike in defense spending.
"All I can do is speak from the heart and say what I want to do," Trump said during an interview broadcast on Fox & Friends.
After a turbulent five-and-a-half weeks in the White House, Trump said he will also discuss his yet-to-be proposed replacement for President Barack Obama's health care plan. The president's speech also figures to touch on his disputed immigration plans, including a wall along the U.S.-Mexico border and a proposed travel ban from seven Muslim majority nations.
In previewing the president's remarks, aides said Trump may express interest in working on a compromise immigration bill with Congress, possibly one with a path to legalization for migrants who are in the country illegally but otherwise have no criminal records.
While not providing details on the immigration section, White House spokesperson Sarah Sanders said the president has "made clear that he’s open to have conversations about that moving forward."
Trump may also use the speech to condemn recent anti-Semitic incidents, aides said, including vandalism at Jewish cemeteries and bomb threats against Jewish community centers.
The address to Congress is scheduled to begin at 9:10 p.m. ET.
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At a meeting with governors, President Donald Trump said his first budget will focus on "public safety and "national security." He also said when he was in college the U.S. 'never lost a war.' His college years coincided with the Vietnam War. (Feb. 27) AP
It comes a day after Trump's team proposed $54 billion more in the defense budget, a 10% increase that would be financed by an equal amount of still undefined cuts in other government programs. In his Fox interview, Trump also touted an aggressive deportation program focused on migrants with criminal records.
“I'll be talking about the military, I'll be talking about the border," Trump told Fox. "And remember this: On the border and throughout our country, we're getting the bad ones out. The bad people, gang members, drug lords, in some cases, murderers.”
Asked about financing his plans, Trump said, "I think the money is going to come from a revved up economy," thanks to reduced regulations on businesses.
In any event, Congress will have to sign off on many of Trump's tax cut and spending plans.
Trump travels to Capitol Hill after a short but heated time in the presidency. While facing mass protests and lawsuits over his travel ban and deportation policies, Trump has also used Twitter and the presidential bully pulpit to attack political opponents and the media. The friction often deals with ongoing investigations into possible contacts between Trump's team and Russians during last year's presidential election.
Polls put Trump's approval ratings below 50%, unusually low for this early in a presidency.
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While Tuesday's speech will have a State of the Union-like quality, it is technically just an address to Congress. First-year presidents are not expected to be able to judge the true state of the union.
Hours before the event, Democrats and other critics are already attacking many of Trump's proposals, saying they will benefit the wealthy at the expense of working people he claimed to represent during his campaign.
"If past is prologue, the president will come to Congress with a populist message in an attempt to cloak what has been a hard-right, anti-working person Administration," said Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer of New York.
While there has been talk of some sort of Democratic protest at Trump's speech, lawmakers said they will be respectful.
Rep. Joseph Crowley, D-N.Y., chairman of the House Democratic Caucus, said that "we'll be polite" to the president, but "we'll show very little, if any, enthusiasm at all, for what I anticipate his speech will be about."
As with previous presidential addresses before Congress, members of both parties will bring guests who can help illustrate their political agendas.
Trump's guest list includes people who have had relatives killed by migrants who were in the country illegally. Also in the presidential box: The widow of Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, who died a year ago. Trump has nominated appeals court judge Neil Gorsuch to replace Scalia.
Guests of Democratic lawmakers include migrants brought to the United States illegally by their parents, and now at risk of deportation. Democrats have also invited Muslims and refugees who could be affected by Trump's proposed travel policies, currently the subjects of challenges in courts.
Seeking to win some support from congressional Republicans, Trump has said he will push for a major infrastructure program.
During a Monday meeting at the White House with governors, Trump criticized the state of the nation's roads and said "we're going to take care of that. Infrastructure: We're going to start spending on infrastructure, big."
While his team is still putting together its own health care proposal, Trump told Fox he will have a "really terrific" plan that is needed because "Obamacare has been a disaster, it's way out of control.”
Under the Affordable Care Act, passed in 2010, more than 20 million people have gained health insurance, dropping the rate of uninsured Americans to new lows.
In his remarks to the governors, Trump said health care was more complicated than he thought, in part because it will affect so many other aspects of the economy. As a result, Trump said he wants to address health care before asking Congress to pass a tax cut.
"I have to tell you, it's an unbelievably complex subject," Trump said. "Nobody knew that health care could be so complicated."
Read more:
The first 100 days of the Trump presidency
Here's how to watch Trump's joint address to Congress
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