Good Friday morning. I'm Jake Sherman and welcome to your political playbook audio briefing, sponsored by Davita.

And I'm Anna Palmer. Consider this. Many came to the conclusion this week that President Donald Trump was in control.

He held his own during a 55-minute impromptu back and forth with members of Congress, during which he showed a decent enough command for immigration policy.

But on Thursday, Trump said he canceled his trip to London because he is not a big fan of the Obama

administration, having sold perhaps the best located and finest embassy in London for peanuts,

only to build a new one in an off location for $1.2 billion.

Bad deal.

Wanted me to cut ribbon?

No.

The decision was not, in fact, made by Obama, but was made by George W. Bush in October 2008.

And it was made for security reasons.

The U.S. Embassy could not be altered to meet security needs.

Trump also tweeted that the Foreign

Intelligence Surveillance Act was used to, quote, surveil and abuse the Trump campaign and

others. At the same time, his administration, including his chief of staff, was lobbying for

a key section's renewal hours before a vote on the House floor. After some lobbying from the Hill,

Trump walked back his tweet and the House renewed FISA. That wasn't all. Trump called Haiti and

African nations a shithole and said the United States should instead accept more immigrants from

Norway. AIDS told multiple media outlets this comment would help with the president's base. Why do we need more Haitians, Trump said, according to people familiar with the meeting? He also told the Wall Street Journal, Mexico would pay for the wall through NAFTA. And he told the Wall Street Journal also that he probably had a very good relationship with Kim Jong-un of North Korea. Asked if he ever spoke to the leader, Trump said, I don't want to comment on it.

Here's why this all matters. Next week, Republicans will be trying to keep the government open,

squeeze through what will be a massively controversial immigration bill, and boost government

spending by nearly $100 billion. None of this will be possible if Trump expresses a shred of doubt on the deals

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