Requirements. This bill achieves our top cry priorities. This bill also increases budget caps and provide certainty for the next two years. Defense spending will match the request made by the pentagon and will reflect what the president signed into law. The bottom line is that thanks to the president , we can now have the Strongest Military we have ever had. Additionally, this still increases the debt ceiling to march of 2019 which moves us away from crisis to crisis budgeting. Two discuss this agreement and more death depth, we have secretary mattis today. He take a few questions on the important of funding our armed forces. Thank you. Good afternoon ladies and gentlemen and thank you for taking time out of your schedules to be here today. I have spent the last day and a half on capitol Hill Briefing the members of congress on our 2018 National Defense strategy. Theglad congress recognizes importance of this for the military. Two days from now, i will visit our nations First Security force assistance brigade. They are preparing to deploy to afghanistan. To advance the security of our nation, these troops are putting themselves in harms way. Military has been operating under debilitating resolutions for more than 1000 days during the last decade. During last weeks stay of the union address, President Trump weakness is the surest path to complacency. Failure to implement the strategy will leave us with a bece that can dominate yet irrelevant to tomorrow security. We need congress to lift the spending caps and support the budget agreement for our military. America can afford survival. For too long, we have asked our military to carry on with a success at any cost not attitude. The fact that they have performed so well is a credit to their professionalism. We expect the men and women of our military to be faithful. We have a duty to remain faithful to them. Absent the budget this year, americas military this year will not the of it able to provide pay for our military at the end of this year. We would not be able to maintain our ships at sea with the proper balance between operations and time for training and maintenance. We would have to ground aircraft degrading our pilots efficiency. We would delay contracts for vital acquisition programs necessary to modernize our force. I cannot overstate the negative impact. Action congressional will ensure our military can defend our way of life, preserve the promise of prosperity, and pass on the freedoms that you and i enjoyed to the next generation. Thank you. I could take a couple of questions. How much damage would a Government Shutdown the . Be . N down the government would be very damaging to the military for all of the reasons that i decided. Just cited. It paralyzes everything that we do. Other than the ongoing act of operations at sea, the troops will continue to fight and the ships will stay at sea. The bottom line is that training is delayed, the impact ripples through the force. It does not just happen today, it ripples out on as people who are no longer applied are no longer gaining the level of skills. He mentioned you meant spent the last couple of days on capitol hill. Side equallyican as enthusiastic . Service secretary said the funding problems are not a contributed tot the death of seamen in the south china sea. If this money is provided, all of the problems associated with training and maintenance, will be eliminated . That what thestic house did earlier this week and what the senate did today can come together this week and give us the budget that then, enables us to carry on our responsibilities. Obviously, a lot of work goes into the execution. You can count on us. We will earn your trust. We will spend the money wisely. I want to ask you about the recently released Nuclear Posturing review. You are on record as saying, there is no such thing as a tactical nuke. How does this new review add to global stability . There are many people that if you have Nuclear Weapons, you will be more inclined to use it. What we are talking about here is the nuclear deterrent. We believe that some nations can miscalculate and that nation auld assume that if they use small yield bomb, we would not respond with a very large yield bomb. Our response to this is, to make a small yield bond and tell them not to miscalculate. Remember that a deterrent is dynamic. It changes decade to decade. , the idea is to raise the threshold. Do not even think about lowering the threshold to a conventional fight and escalating it to a one small yield Nuclear Weapon to strategically change the game and think our choice is either surrender or suicide. Kenny talk about where things are in the lighting stages can you talk about where things are in the planning stages . I think we are all aware of the president s of affection and respect for the military. We have been putting together some options that we will send up to the white house for decision. You just laid out the argument for fully funding the military and why you think every dollar counts. Why denver time, energy, Financial Resources to the planning of vapor aid . Time, energy, Financial Resources to the planning of a parade . As far as the parade goes, the president respect and fondness for the military is reflected and him asking for these options. Think the war is actually closer with north korea than it was at the time that the Administration Took Office . Can you support any sort of meeting between Vice President pence and the north Korean Leader . As far as, the situation with korea, it is firmly in the diplomatic line. We have seen much stronger the romantic action. For example, the last three United NationsSecurity Council resolutions were unanimous. How often do you see france and russia, china and the United States, great britain, and other countries all voting unanimously. I think that makes it very clear that it is it firmly in the diplomatic lane. Thank you very much. Secretary. U mr. Due to timing and a tight timeline, we will jump right into questions for today. Nancy pelosi is wanting to add immigration to this budget deal. This is something the president would like to see . I think we have made it clear that the budget deal should be a budget deal. Nancys of Congress Like pelosi should not hold our military hostage over a separate issue. We have laid out what we would like to see. I think it is something that nancy pelosi should support and hopefully she will come on board. We can get this budget deal done and then we can focus on the immigration. Is the president going to extend the march 5 deadline for daca . We wille hopeful that make a deal with congress and we will see what happens after that. We do not want to keep kicking the can down the road and we would like to see a solution and have laid out a plan that addresses everyones concerns. Signed the president budget agreement that was laid out by the Senate Senate . We are going to need to see what is in the final bill. We are happy in the with the direction that it is moving. The house tolike pass the senate deal . We would like to move forward on this front but yes, we need to see the final components. Also, it helps meets the need of military spending laid out by secretary mattis. Havees the president confidence in the staff secretary . Always been our policy. I can tell you that rob has been affected in his role as staff secretary and the president and chief of staff has full confidence in his performance. Rob has put out a statement which i can reach you know. Read to you now. These outrageous allegations are simply false. I have been transparent and truthful about these vile claims but i will not further engage publicly with a smear campaign. I have also always put duty to country first. Grateful for the opportunity to have served in the trump administration. Is he leaving the white house anytime soon . He will not be leaving immediately but he is resigning. The white house released several station statements praising rob. Why would the president accept his resignation if he thinks he did nothing wrong . I think it was a personal decision that rob made. Did he have a security clearance or not . I am not sure why this is complicated, we have addressed it quite a few times. As has always been the policy at the white house, we do not discuss security clearances. Chief of staffd this said yesterday that memo was different in content. General kelly said it was not as clean. Republicans are saying that it contains a substantial amount of references to sources. My question to you is, do you believe the white house is being difficulthat position by the democratic minority . We are still going through the process that we went through with the republican memo. We are going to continue to do that. As of this point we do not. Can you clarify, the president yesterday said he would like to shut the government down if he does not get funding for the wall. What he said yesterday is no longer operative operative . As i said yesterday, the focus for us has always been to get a twoyear budget deal. We have also laid out the priorities we would like to see. We expect to see that. We have made no secret of the president wants funding for the wall and he wants order security. We expect to see that in the budget. Changed. Sition has not , the only people who have shut the government down are the democrats. We have laid out exactly what we want to happen and we are working towards achieving those goals. He said he wanted to shut the government down. I am not understanding. He said he wants a shepherd Government Shutdown. If he if we are going to have that fight, we think it is month that the democrats started and we want. We think we would one again win again. How does the president still have confidence in his deputy security general . Yesterday, the president feels vindicated because he feels like the russia investigation has been politically motivated. The memo clearly vindicates the president s position that there was political bias. Has he actually read it . He has met with the general to discuss the differences yesterday. General mattis was saying that the general president has great affection for the military. Yet, he has not been to afghanistan. Nothing has been decided or locked in some. This is in the early discussion phases. It is something the president has been looking at. Does the president have any concerns about these Domestic Violence allegations raised against rob porter . The ve not asked in asked him that . Onthe president weighed in twitter about the stock market. We expect the president to continue to weigh and on these daily fluctuations. Is he going to let the market take its course . Is obviously a very focus for this administration. It is something we will continue to talk about. We feel very confident in the direction that we are moving and certainly, the focus on the longterm economic fundamentals of this administration has been advocating for. With the president with agreementent be in with funding for the border wall and a legislative fix for daca . The textesident called messages a bombshell. Does he believe there is a conspiracy and the fbi to undermine his candidacy . Can you explain his thinking buying beats behind these Text Messages . Augusta show that there is a great cause of concern in these Text Messages it goes to show that there are great concerns in these Text Messages. I want to give you a chance to respond to the concerns over this parade. That is people think not the way to go. What do you think . We have not made a final decision. The president is simply exploring different ways that he can highlight and show the pride we have in the military. The people who have served and sacrificed to allow us all of the freedoms that we have. The president is very proud of the United States military and everything they do. We are simply exploring options. Far to it is way too speculate and way and on whether weigh in on anything. President rue that the gave a directive to the military . The president asked them to explore ways. Does the president believe that former president obama was involved in the Russian Investigation against him . Thatam not aware of specific concern but i think that there is a lot within those Text Messages they give us great cause for concern. Thank you. Does the white house condemn the messick violence in all violence inmestic cases . We look at the possible budget deals to avoid another Government Shutdown. Then, we talk about the history of politics and the olympics. Using the olympics to highlight issues concerning north korea. Join the discussion. Black lives matter cofounder with her book, when they call terrorist. We knew we had to get people on board. Interrupt what people have tried to coopt. To not say,d people to really matter but focus on black people