WASHINGTON (AP) — The Latest on President Donald Trump (all times local):
11:55 a.m.
A White House official says President Donald Trump plans to give a “major policy speech” next week to address worker training programs.
An assistant to the president, Reed Cordish, says the speech will touch on issues such as apprenticeships and community colleges to develop workers’ skills in order to increase hiring and job growth. Trump is slated to deliver the speech at the Labor Department on Wednesday, June 14.
At a panel hosted by the Business Roundtable on Wednesday, Cordish said the problem wasn’t a lack of government funding for worker training but ineffective programs. He declined to give policy specifics about the speech, except to say that “administrative” steps would be involved and that the president’s daughter Ivanka Trump would be part of the initiative.
___
10:25 a.m.
President Donald Trump is defending his tweeting habit despite complaints from some Republicans that the president’s practice can be a distraction.
That’s the word from Republican Rep. Lee Zeldin of New York who says Trump raised the issue unprompted at a White House dinner Tuesday night with several GOP senators and House members.
Zeldin told reporters that Trump upheld his tweeting.
Zeldin said Wednesday that the president “definitely believes that the tweets are an important, valuable tool to be able to get out his message over and through mediums when there might be another narrative that’s out there that might be a different perspective than what he’s trying to get out.”
Zeldin says Trump “wasn’t like on his heels defensive, but he was talking about it being valuable.”
___
3:15 a.m.
President Donald Trump will discuss his plans for a $1 trillion overhaul of the nation’s crumbling roads, bridges and waterways during a speech in Ohio Wednesday.
The president will deliver remarks at the Rivertowne Marina in Cincinnati. He’s expected to press efforts to repair the nation’s aging levees, dams, locks and ports, as well as his larger infrastructure aims.
The speech comes as the White House tries to push past a series of distractions and focus on Trump’s legislative agenda.
The White House has yet to detail specifics of the plan, but hopes to finance improvements using public-private partnerships.
