White House Tries To Clarify Trump's Red Line In Syria; White House Grapples With How To Sell Trump's First 100 Days
HARLOW: So in just 18 days, President Trump hits a historic milestone, of sorts, 100 days in office. And inside the White House, officials, we've learned, have been holding very urgent meetings with their whiteboards and big pieces of white paper, drafting down what the plan is going to be to message the 100 days.</s>BERMAN: Joining us now to discuss, David Drucker, CNN political analyst, senior Congressional correspondent for the "Washington Examiner," and Salena Zito, CNN contributor and reporter for the "Washington Examiner." Welcome to you both. I think we'll get to the 100-day discussion in a little bit. But first, if we can stay on Syria for one minute and clarity of message, Salena. Because again we heard Sean Spicer briefing people, talking about what we thought the new lines were from this White House when we might see further military action. He said, "If Syria uses barrel bombs," well, Syria has been using barrel bombs, a lot of them. Hundreds and hundreds every month. I think we have a graph to show how many hundreds Syria has been using every month. It's a lot, right? And then the White House said, backtracking, clean it up, and say, we weren't talking about barrel bombs, exactly. We were talking about chemical weapons. But, look, if things are as tense as they are between the U.S. and Russia, if things are as tense as they are in Syria, how much more clarity do you think we need from this White House?</s>SALENA ZITO, CNN COMMENTATOR: Well, I think we need a lot of clarity. This is a very serious situation. Having said that, you know, there were a lot of people in this country that applauded what the president did last week, in taking, in using the missiles and taking that message that, you know, we are not going tolerate that kind of action against your own people. But up until that moment, we really didn't understand sort of what the administration's foreign policy position has been on Syria. And I think we're still unclear as to what it is today, you know, four or five days later. So I think that's an important thing for them to get out. I think that we will see a more clarity after Tillerson returns for his meetings over there, but right now, we're kind of unsure.</s>HARLOW: And one of the reasons, David, that we are unsure is because no one has heard directly from the president on what the strategy is going forward, after his statement announcing the air strikes. A new CBS News poll shows how Americans feel overall. You've got about 60 percent of them supporting the air strikes, but then they're very divided when it comes to what do we do after? Look at these numbers, 18 percent of Americans do favor the use of ground troops, 30 percent say air strikes, but no ground troops, 26 percent want only diplomatic talks, and 15 percent want to more U.S. involvement. Is it time that we hear from the president tonight go- forward plan?</s>DAVID DRUCKER, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: Well, I think for the president to prosecute a successful strategy in Syria and in Asia, and we're seeing how complicated this gets, because this involves the Russians in the Middle East and in Asia, it involves China. He's going to have to be more clear and more vocal so that both our allies and our adversaries know what to expect. I know the president likes to rely on this notion of unpredictable. And unpredictability in terms of tactics is a good quality, but unpredictability in terms of values and frameworks is problematic. Because if the Syrians and the Russians and the North Koreans don't know what the line is and what the line isn't, then they're apt to test the president and see what they can get away with, and their tests could be the kind of provocations that make things even worse. And I think, then in this vein, it's also important for the president to talk to the American people because if we're going to be more active overseas and potentially militarily, and there's a good argument to make that this is something that really needed to be done, the way you bring along the American people is to explain it to them and justify it and ask for their support. You're likely to get it in cases like this, because I think even though there's a lot of hesitancy in terms of more military involvement in terms of boots on the ground, I think Americans understand that the U.S. needs to be a leader, but they're not going to be with you if you're not willing to sell it.</s>BERMAN: Let's talk about the 100 days. We're 18 days away from the 100 days. The White House having meetings because it wants to sell that the first 100 days have been these great things. They're going to point to the confirmation of Neil Gorsuch to the Supreme Court, point to rolling back TPP, point to the Keystone pipeline and things like that, but they've had a lot of other things not go their way. There's no health care bill or travel ban. They've already lost the national security adviser. I'm kind of struck by the fact that they're already having message meetings to how to sell these first hundred days in a positive way -- Salena.</s>ZITO: Well, I mean, first of all, one of the biggest problems the White House had, for half of these, you know, for 40 days is that they didn't have a central person as their communication person and you need that kind of person to help keep the team on message. So they lost half of their time right there. I think it's -- I don't think it's unusual to have a messaging meeting, especially with a president that's this different, unpredictable, disruptive and, you know, sort of outside the lines, but, you know, they certainly have their work cut out for them. As you said, they have had some successes, but they've also had some battles, especially over health care and over the travel ban. I think what's important for them is just to say, hey, you know, this is what Washington is like, this is what we have to fight against. And you know, and we're doing our best, but, you know, those kinds of meetings, I think, are important. What I thought was fascinating was is that with less than an hour after they have the meeting, somebody leaked it out of meeting. I mean, wow.</s>BERMAN: Yes, close up those leaks. All right, Salena Zito and David Drucker, great to have you with us. Thanks so much. The issue of management, press management. The stock market opens in just a few minutes and shares for United Airlines, they're going to take a nosedive after this video of a passenger being dragged off an overbooked flight.</s>HARLOW: All right, we're going to have a lot more on that a little bit later this hour. First, though, our chief business correspondent, Christine Romans is here. This is United in damage mode. A PR nightmare. The stock taking a hit.</s>CHRISTINE ROMANS, CNN CHIEF BUSINESS CORRESPONDENT: Yes, about 2.5 percent, we think. It had been down 6 percent so it's moderated from those losses. But look, this is a company with huge plans for expansion in China, where this video has been seen 100 million times. So that's a number that really matters here. You talk about trying to get the support of the American flying public. This is an international story, at this point here. Look, the CEO has to come out and has come out and supported his employees, but a lot of people thought that was tone deaf. He apologized for having to re-accommodate these customers, didn't apologize for the fact this man was dragged off a plane and is bloody. So there could be some better messaging from this company. We have a "CNN Money" story about how this has turned a bad situation into a PR disaster for this company. Overall for the stock market, we're expecting a little bit lower today. A lot going on, bank earnings coming up later this week, we've got earnings, I think, are really going to drive this overall. And still, again, you're talking about the hundred days and the checklist of what has been accomplished, elite infrastructure spending, infrastructure plans still need tax reform and the president's meeting with a bunch of CEOs, the really important CEOs later this morning.</s>BERMAN: You know, United Airlines, you called it damage mode, not damage control mode. I think (inaudible) has to be true. They are in damage mode. They're still damaging themselves by making it worse.</s>HARLOW: Yes.</s>BERMAN: All right, Christine Romans, thanks a lot. A lot more to come. We'll be right back.