30/05/2017 100 Days+

President Trump slams Germany in a tweet

He says the relationship is Very bad for the US.

The German Chancellor hits back - reiterating her claim that Europe

must now take its fate into its own hands.

In a morning Tweet storm, President Trump again

defends his son in law Jared Kushner against accusations he had

All of which may help explain why the White House Communications

Is the big staff shake up about to begin?

And Ariana Grande is heading back to Manchester this Sunday to honour

She'll be joined by some of the music worlds biggest stars.

It's not entirely clear why relations between Germany

and America have deteriorated so fast this week, but there's

Both Angela Merkel and Donald Trump today continued their war of words.

For the American President, that meant taking to Twitter.

"We have a MASSIVE trade deficit with Germany,

plus they pay FAR LESS than they should on NATO

The German foreign minister wistfully suggested it

isn't helpful for the two countries to be communicating with tweets -

but his Chancellor restated her view that Europe now has to look

TRANSLATION: Transatlantic ties are of paramount importance to us. The

only thing I did was to say that the current situation gives more reasons

for us in Europe to take our destiny in our own hands.

So what is Germany and the rest of Europe making

Joining me from Brussels is Elmar Brok - he is a German

politician and Member of the European Parliament.

Whose fault is this row? Thank you for calling me. Do you put the fault

with Angela Merkel or Donald Trump that relationships have got so bad

between them this week? We have to see that the American president has

made accusations with no serious grounds. This is not a way to deal

with partners. And it shows there is no reliability any more and I think

that is another reason that we have to work with America, that Donald

Trump is not all of America. That the United States and Nato are

important for the collective defence of Europe but we must also look to

our own interests and own safeguards. The Europeans do the job

better. We complete the internal market is to strengthen economic and

monetary union. If we strengthen friends again and have our own

defence policy. That also makes Nato better. -- strengthen France. You

know Angela Merkel very well and you are close friend of hers. She is not

a who usually is prone to being quite so outspoken as she has about

the relationship with America this week. What specifically did you

think pushed her to say the things that she has said. Was it the manner

of President Trump at the G-7 meeting and during his trip to

Europe or specific policies? It might be a mixture. I was not

sitting next to them in those meetings but also there are

questions to do with climate change in which Angela Merkel is very much

interested. If there is no joint policy on climate change we cannot

solve problems in Africa, and fighting terrorism and have a

solution to migration, if we have no understanding of international trade

relations. We have to see that BMW sells more cars outside the United

States spent to them. And these are crucial things that are not known.

So I think that is a problem if it is repeated and repeated. You said

Donald Trump has made false accusations about Germany. Are you

referring to his Tweet this morning about the trade deficit? With the

trade deficit he mentioned cars and that is true. But BMW and other

German car-makers make so many cards in the United States. BMW sells more

from the United States then in Germany and sent to the United

States. Such things are not known. But there are other questions, what

is the trade deficit between California and European countries.

We talk about Microsoft and all those businesses. I think it is more

complicated to look in one branch of business and make that an example

for everything. I think it is much more complicated. If you assemble a

parts come from for five different countries. What is the country where

you have to ask that has a trade surplus. It is so complicated and if

that is destroyed, it means there will be a loss of economic success

for all of us. We will all lose. And we need openness from the United

States and if we do not find a solution to these questions the

Chinese will be the winners. And that cannot be in the American

interests. Thank you very much. President Trump is not wrong

when he says there's a trade Germany exports 114 billion dollars

worth of goods to the United states. While the US export just 49 billion

dollars worth to Germany. That's a trade deficit for America

of 65 billion dollars. A lot of the trade comes

from pharmaceuticals and cars. And a lot of those German cars

are actually built in America. German car-makers employ 33

thousand people in the US. And 77,000 more US workers

are employed by German By the way BMW's largest

factory in the world Ron Christie is with me. And your

first car came from that factory. From South Carolina. Talking about

the trade deficit, Donald Trump is angry about this and there is a

trade deficit with Germany and many other countries have complained

about Germany and their trade policies. Is this some fault on both

sides? I think there is fault on both sides but this is not how you

do diplomacy, not through Twitter. If the president of the US has a row

with Angela Merkel I think they have a telephone and they should use

that. They had a great opportunity at the G-7 last week to iron out

some differences. The former president Obama had a great

relationship with Angela Merkel and we saw them together at the

Brandenburg gate. They have warm relations. So President Trump wants

to find a way to reduce some of the rows we have with foreign allies,

the way to do that is through personal diplomacy. Many questions

about how he is creating a row with Germany and perhaps Moscow could

benefit. And sitting in the Kremlin as Vladimir Putin today, I would be

enjoying every moment of that. Senator John McCain certainly seems

to think the Russia issue He's told ABC Australia that

Russian President Vladimir Putin is a bigger threat to world security

than the Islamic State group, I think he is the premier and most

important threat, more so than Islamic State. I think Isis can do

terrible things and I worry a lot about what is happening with the

Muslim faith. I worry about a lot of things about that. But it is the

Russians who are trying, who tried to destroy the very fundamental

democracy and that is to change the outcome of an American election.

And for more on the investigations into Russian interference

we are joined now by James Woolsey, who formerly served as the Director

Do you agree with Senator John McCain that the real concern and

real threat at the moment for the United States National security is

not so much Islamic State but Russia? I would say Iran and North

Korea and Russia. Iran and North Korea both have strong elements of

instability about them and ideology, who knows what the ideology is for

North Korea. Iran it is Islamist terrorism. And that is a very

serious problem. Russia, we're used to dealing with, we fought a Cold

War against them for several decades and more or less prevail. And

several times we almost came to nuclear war. But we got through it

and part of that was because Russia has a certain element of stability

about it in spite of its habit of wanting to capture its neighbours

and whenever it is bordered seems to want to grab a neighbour. And that

is not a good thing from our point of view. I think it lost a lot at

the end of the Cold War and might want to get them back again for the

President Putin reiterated his claim today that allegations that Assad

had used chemical weapons were just that, allegations and put out as it

distractions Western powers could put pressure on the Syrian

government. It is almost a good example in the midst of these

Russian investigations, of the kind of reality we're dealing with with

with President Putin. Russians have a propensity for disinformation

which is not just misinformation but a total and complete plan for

constructing lies about almost everything. And their approach to

our elections, and German elections, elections in Eastern Europe, has for

decades been to distract democracy. That is what Russia does. It is not

an exception but what is different is cyber war, you can do it in a lot

of ways you could not before. You did at one stage advised the Donald

Trump campaign, how concerned are you about all of these reports and

the investigations into links, possible links between the Donald

Trump campaign and must go and what that could mean for America? I think

a lot of that is overblown. We have had informal back door contacts with

foreign countries including some that were front and centre enemies

for decades. And other countries do that as well. Often historically

they've used intelligence chiefs to make private visits to another

country and conduct negotiations. Here are sometimes they have and

sometimes not. But I think a lot of this is really overblown. And people

ought to calm down for a while and get their facts sorted out. Then we

can see whether they should be upset or not. My question picks up on what

we said a moment ago, so much of what we have heard, misinformation,

about the Russians, has come through leaks. I wonder having run the CIA,

how much of an impact does this have on our ability to collect

intelligence and also, more importantly, these crimes being

committed, can the CIA and intelligence gathering operations

find these individuals looking this information? Unless it is coming

from someone in the CIA which seems unlikely, these links are the

business of the FBI and law enforcement. The CIA does not

investigate Americans to find out who is leaking what. But I think the

leaks themselves are extremely damaging to the country. They're

verging on treason. And I think we need to let the FBI and other parts

of law enforcement in the country do everything they can to find at least

a few of the people doing this and prosecute them and have them

punished severely. Because people now figured they go to lunch with a

journalist and why not talk about what I heard yesterday in the

office. Thank you very much. And clearly those leaks caused many

problems between America and Britain after the Manchester bombing.

Alleged US ties to Russia have barely been out of the headlines

since Donald Trump took over as president almost four months ago.

That's also how long his top communications

That's Mike Dubke - who you may well never have heard,

but don't worry you don't need to get to know him because

Mr Dubke - who had the official title of White House

communications director - offered his resignation earlier this

month but said he'd stay on during President Trump's

Is this the beginning of the great White House staff shake-up? It could

be. When I worked there are chief of staff used as they use over the

pleasure of the President for the time being. And both the privilege

and the time being could end more quickly than you want. That is what

we're seeing here. Interesting that it is the communications director

suggesting that the White House or the president thinks he has a

communications problem and not an issue problem. Absolutely, White

House staff are to be seen and not heard. We hear all the time about

this allegation, and it is not good for the agenda of the President. We

need to focus on what his policies are. That might not be the fault of

the communications or of Mike Dubke. That could be the fault of numerous

people within the White House again looking to reporters and talking to

them and a general sense of dissatisfaction of staff. The

linking is coming from the staff and this White House, or they do is link

something to the press. Ultimately the communications director must

manage the internal process and say stop this, we are not disciplined,

we're not talking about staff but policies. Sean Spicer is at the

podium right now and we will go to him shortly. There he is, still in

his job for the moment. German police have detained

a 17-year-old Syrian suspected of planning a suicide

attack in Berlin. Brandenburg police say

the suspect was arrested Special forces raided a home

for unaccompanied refugee children after the boy sent a message

to his family telling them he had become a jihadist

and saying goodbye. Officers are still searching

the home where he's thought to have At least 26 people have been killed

in two separate car bomb attacks The first was just after midnight

on Monday at an ice cream shop in the Karrada district as people

had broken their Ramadan fasts. Hours later the second blast went

off a few miles away. The so-called Islamic state says

it was behind both attacks which targeted "gatherings" of Shia

Muslims. Police say Tiger Woods

was "asleep at the wheel" of a stationary car, and didn't know

where he was when officers woke him The golfer apologised

after being charged with "driving under the influence" -

he says he reacted to prescription Ariana Grande announced today

that she will return to Manchester on Sunday for a benefit concert -

it'll be less than two weeks after a suicide attack at her show

in the city killed 22 people. She'll be joined by Justin Bieber,

Coldplay, Katy Perry, Miley Cyrus to raise money

for the families of those who died and were injured at her concert

in Manchester Arena. Our correspondent Roger

Johnson is in Manchester. Ariana Grande had made it clear she

wanted to return to the city after the attack at Manchester Arena last

week. In a statement she said she would not let hate win. So on Sunday

she will be joined by a number of international stars including Justin

Bieber, and Coldplay. The proceeds of this concert will go to the One

Love Manchester emergency fund set up by Manchester City Council and

the British Red Cross. The total currently stand for that kind of

around ?6 million. The British Red Cross today praised the singer and

her gesture of solidarity stop the proceeds as I say will go to this

fund and tickets for the concert will be on sale on Thursday. For

anyone who attended the concert at the Manchester Arena there will be

no charge. This show will also be broadcast live on BBC Television and

BBC Radio as well as Capital Radio and streamed online on the intranet.

Earlier today Greater Manchester Police had said they had been

working with the management of the singer to ensure the benefit gig

could take place. There's nine days to go now

until the UK's general election. The supporters of the two main

parties have both claimed victories after their leaders appeared

on a live televised programme. And it was business as usual today

with both candidates back out on the campaign trail trying

to build on last night's momentum. You do not negotiate the right

Brexit deal for Britain from a position of weakness but the

position of strength. With the Prime Minister 100% committed to the cause

and a strong majority government with a clear plan to see it through.

And you cannot negotiate the right Brexit deal for Britain if you do

not have confidence in our strengths and in all that we have to offer

either. You can only deliver for Britain if you believe in Britain.

And I do. And that is why I have been clear about my plan for Brexit

at every stage. But things didn't go quite so well

for the opposition leader. Jeremy Corbyn announced a new policy

on extending free childcare But when quizzed by the BBC

about how much that would cost the taxpayer he was unable

to give an answer. How much will it cost? I will give

you the figure in a moment. You do not know? You're logging your iPad.

You have announced a major policy and do not know how much it will

cost? Can I give you the figure in a moment? This is the issue with

people and the Labour Party that we cannot trust you with our money. Not

at all. You do not know the figure. All our manifesto is fully costed

and examined. You're holding your manifesto, you have iPad and have

had a phone call, you do not know how much it is to cost. Can we come

back to that in a moment? Our political correspondent

Rob Watson joins us live now Everyone seems to think Jeremy

Corbyn had a good night at the debate but was it a problem that he

could not enter basic facts are that interview? My favourite verdict on

the debate came from a colleague who said everyone was a winner apart

from the poor people watching. I think that was a reference to the

idea that Theresa May had been having a bit of a wobble over the

last week or so in terms of the Conservative manifesto. Nothing

truly terrible happened to her in the debate, she is a bit wooden but

she held her own. And expectations were quite low for Jeremy Corbyn,

but again he managed to keep his humour and so in that sense everyone

felt, the leaders, no one thinks they're great performers but they

did OK. So therefore I think it was a bit disappointing for the Labour

leader and his team to see that he was stumped on how much a key

proposal would cost. It reminded me a little of that moment where George

Bush, the first, did not know how much a pint of milk costs. This

slide in the polls, how serious is it for Theresa May? I think it is

immensely serious. At the start of this election she made the campaign

about herself and leadership. The campaign which has been less than

stellar, her ratings have gone down by half and perhaps more. I'm sorry

I must interrupt to give way to Sean Spicer. He is at the White House.

Jared Kushner has volunteered to share with Congress what he knows

about these meetings. I'm not going to get into what the president did

or not discuss. Your question assumes a lot of facts that are not

substantiated by anything but anonymous sources being leaked out.

You're asking if he approves of action but that is not a confirmed

action. I think Secretary Kelly and general McMaster have both discussed

in general terms back channels that are an appropriate part of

diplomacy. Your question presupposes fact that have not been confirmed.

Did the President, he tweeted an article this morning about that back

channel based on a source that said there was an effort to set up a back

channel and that it was the Russians who suggested that. And it was to

talk about Syria. What I just said speaks for itself. But you said the

article was based on anonymous sources. But the president tweeted

something also based on anonymous sources. So why would that be more

credible? I do not think, one issue is that the statement provided by

the attorney of Jared Kushner and second, the dossier was largely

discredited in the first place. Most publications refused to publish

that. So there is an ongoing investigation and I'm not going to

get into confirming stuff. First the president for the second time in one

month tweeted his desire for the Senate to reduce votes to pass

anything which would effectively stop the filibuster for legislation

as for nominations. Is this something he discussed with the

majority leader or any of the Senate leadership? I think the consent he

had with the pace of the Senate are long-standing. The use of the

filibuster and rules of the Senate are apt to Senator McConnell but he

has had some frustration with the pace of legislation and obstructive

tactics employed by the Democrats. That has been well documented. Sean

Spicer at the White House. He gave a summary of how the trip had gone and

said it had gone well for the president and then he was asked

about these Russian allegations. He seemed to say he did not have much

to say. The little we heard, what I found striking was all this was

about Twitter. The presence tweeted this, this is the peril of using

social media to get out the message. It shows what a mess he has made of

his press relations. You think we're going to hear more of the president

on twitter? Yes. Thank you very much.

And you will hear more from the president tomorrow morning when he

The weather is looking sunnier and warmer for tomorrow.

The skies are already clearing across some

northern parts of the UK, and tomorrow promises

This is what it looks like, then, through this evening.