Transcripts For CSPAN Public Affairs Events 20171018

For sessions he did ask our written opinion and we submitted that to him, it did represent any change in either one of our opinion as rosenstein uty indicated, i believe. Asked to provide it and we did. Enator did the president ever mention to you his concern about russia the cloud on the investigation . A. G. Sessions that calls for a had with the ive resident and i believe remains confidential. Senator but you dont deny there was a communication . Do not confirm or deny existence of any ommunication between the president that i consider to be confidential. Did you first speak with the president about what director comey, date . A. G. Sessions i think that is lso covered by my opening statement, i believe the president had the right and i a duty to meet with him on proper occasions and provide advice, legal or otherwise as im called upon to do. Have done that and i believe he has a right to protect that until ntiality appropriate circumstances exist to wavemight not choose that privilege. Of what as part attorney general Jeff Sessions had to say as he testified today at the Justice Department. Watch the entire hearing at 8 cspan. Tern on primetime programming includes on cspan 2, President Trump of the with Members Senate finance committee to talk about tax reform, and on cspan 3, Senate Hearing on federal funding for scientific research. This weekend on American History t. V. On cspan 3, look Controversial Union and confederate generals during a live discussion with authors and historians from the historical park in petersburg, west a. M. And saturday 9 sunday 9 15 eastern, saturday 10 america, the january 1968 weekly series abc scope examines resistance to the vietnam war and the draft. We are in the middle of the beach Lyndon Johnson is a common limits to dissent. Vietnamese women whose child was planes way uprican there in the sky, that is the reflected. Should be the Peace Movement has to go to the streets and use tactic of American People are drunk with apathy. On oral history, we continue our series on photo journalist with diana walker, former Time White House photographer. Accept t that i should their offers to be behind the every time they offered it because, any time you see the of the United States behind the scenes, you learn something about the president see something. I can be there for you, you and everything i see is important. American history t. V. , all on end, every weekend only cspan 3. Earlier today Senate Health ommittee chair alexander discussed healthcare policy after a proposal to help markets for urance the next two years. With eal was reached Health Committee Ranking Member murray. Announced hes against the agreement. This runs an hour and 10 minutes. And now we welcome our host, mike allen. Good morning. [applause] early birdos g fantastic day for health care policy, great day to look at the Nations Health care system. Thank you all for coming out so for joining us online and thanks to cspan for audience here it axios. We want to thank delta dental jason don for sponsoring this event. Coming and you for those following online, please axios360, well get online. Versation going axios events are like all of the axios, we bringf you information you can trust, information that will help you decisions using smart brevity so that you can get smarter faster. We see that also with these events, where were honored to at the ee Senators Center of this conversation, who are going to be here with us oneonone. So we hope that together well have a tour of the landscape and news and make you smarter. Down how many t of those we do and tee this up, stage, health reporter, who has been in the center of this all through the amazing years of health care. Katelyn my colleague owens. Good morning. Thank you for coming, thank you great coverage, appreciate it. 11 30 last curtain, night, what happened . So ive been writing about al aander murray deal, i had just my light and went to bed and got an email. Still writing. So how much of a surprise yesterdays announcement and what was the news in that text you opened at 11 30 . I haveknow alexander and been working since repeal and replace died. I had checked out, if i had been hiking the backain yesterday and came today, tell me what happened yesterday and why it matters. The first bipartisan Major Health Care bill related market since ual obamacare passed. The two parties have been eight about this for years now. Now we have a bipartisan deal, that as struck yesterday, was a big deal. It is just a bill at this point, you know a committee, chairman Ranking Member hasnt passed anywhere, we dont know if it will. Is really significant and it is really significant ecause it has a huge impact on millions of peoples lives. And this often gets lost in the conversation and if i am omebody who was taking advantage of the Affordable Health care plan, how has my the last year . If you are on the exchange right now, you have a lot of what is going to come next. You dont know what is going to mrepremiums going forward, you dont know if your get cancelled. If you are on the exchange, you dont know if you will be able health care, especially if you have an emergency. Is this tries to do stabilize the exchange, give those people certainty they will something they need if something catastrophic happens. Ne the goal here is to keep them it le or lower them to make more affordable for people and ake sure insurers stay in the market and states pass opportunities to come with insurers a stabilize premiums. Axos has Great Health Care coverage. Your coverage from the capital, how do you keep the human imension in mind as you are covering big policy fights . A i think it is hard, this is political thing. I understand. You forget that this is not back and forth about who is right or wrong about health care. People whoillions of really, right now, obamacare has been in place what, three, four years . Involved, ople are this is peoples coverage. Health care is a personal thing, this is your family, your own medical care. O while were up in washington fighting about do we repeal or replace and going to single i mean, i think it gets hard to forget there are people decisions to be made and are along for the ride. No question. Caitlin owens, key part of journalism is being there. Into the i pop capital for lunch or something, youre there, you are in the subway, hanging out at the elevator, waiting for the senators, spending time in the building. There was a great source video axios, one project called source, takes you there. Politics, reality of health care and there was a great source video of you by the elevator, where you spend so much time. What was it like to be in the building yesterday . High drama for people n this room, and others around this city, who feel passionately about the battles. You know, the crazy thing about the health care fight is how quickly things move. Everywhere, the big right . Yes, exactly. So yesterday we didnt have beennotice that a deal had made. Announce at the policy lunch . They have ing lunch, a deal, they are briefing alexander did a giant scrum with all of us. What does trump think, what do republicans think . What is in the bill . What is the impact . Does this work . Are so many things to keep going and questions to be answered. Long. Ay so caitlin, you will be of the us with each three centers were interviewing will join with question, cross the t, make sure or vent missed the news messed something up, why it matters, walk through the mattertoday and why they in the scheme of things. O first guest will be senator t kaine. Ell me his role in this problem. I want to say, everyone here knows im excited about the have today rs we and, you know, i think they might have known today we had a and struck the deal yesterday for us. Democrat on , hes our panel today. Hes, i think, i mean hes been there from the getgo, all four hearings on this topic, hearing, if you know how the hearing works, people go in boring it gets really at times, but hes really been pushing for this bipartisan hes made a goodfaith effort to meet republicans in the middle and hes got thoughts about where health care goes from here, ideas. S partisan secretary hearing from senator cassidy, republican of who is also a member of Senate Health and senator has been headline name in health care. Matter . Quickly why he yeah, supports the deal struck yesterday. He is the author of the plan epublicans say they want to go back to, cassidygraham, that takes federal money and turn block grant. He will have ideas about where fit e going after this deal passes. You know, how it could pass when summer. T last as we say goodbye, our third chairman ma Lamar Alexander. His role is obvious, what is the number one thing you would like to learn from chairman alexander today . Wants to everyone know if this is going to pass, you know, is this going to law . Me if so, what happens after that . Flag on both ite sides standing and refusing to have a ether or do we future when it is conceivable ealth care isnt i mean, omething that creates partisan w partisanfare. And what do you think is the democrats thing that would want to know from senator on ander if they got him truth serum . Does he still want to repeal guess is what they want to know. Where do we go . From here . Go we will try to answer that today. You for owens, thank great coverage, thank you for telling us why it matters. Much. You very for those who are joining us, im mike allen, cofounder of axios, welcome to this event. Welcome cspan, who is joining guests online at axios360. And now were honored to welcome stage senator tim kaine, democrat feels like flubbing at 8 in the morning. Een here all night sghchlt senat. Senator, you have been my mayor, senator and governor. Were a w you when you cub figure, now you are an international figure. Online are pretty standard vanilla, yours has a nifty fact in this. Do you possibly know you are one of 30 people ever to exist and ere mayor, senator governor . I was introduced that way once and said, clearly that is there has to be more than 30. I went back to the senate i was an and said introduced this way, is this accurate . Have been ernors senators. The historian said, you are right, it is only 30. Being mayor will kill you, the been so few. Have senator, the introduction of compromise plan by enator Lamar Alexander, who we will hear from later. Senator patty murray, you lican, democrat, would support it . Senator absolutely. A little back story. American show the public we can do something bipartisan on health care, ive even aking the argument something modest that is bipartisan in this very controversial area will be a sign from congress to the american you are acknowledge hanksgiving is modest, bridge at best . Senator it is a bridge. It stabilizes toughest part of market, if we can get it passed. Put that if in front, not passed yet. The way it came together and you will hear from lamar. Repeal failed y we started talking about bipartisan solutions. A ator alexander and i did dinner, after that failed vote we got 14 democrats and talk icans together to about the essential concept, which is, you know, how do you uarantee the costsharing payments to avoid this uncertainty that the president as created and how do you give states flexibility that the intended through the states rocess, but most feel hasnt allowed flexibility that was intended. Obviously that was a discussion grew in the committee, but beyond, patty and lamar have a record of being good negotiators, they rewrote when peoplet behind thought that wasnt possible. Its been slow and steady and we weeks ago there two and the president poured cold see on it, he did want to whether grahamcassidy could get delaying was a tactic, not stopping. The scene ed behind alexander. A how can he pull this off . Enator i could go on and on about that, something lamar did well and something patty did really well. Lamar did, isolated and identifying and narrowing the problem. A lot of challenges and ways to improve it. Lamar from the beginning of the focused on the individual market, not think about the things arket, there are in there that could be better, that is generally working. Trying todual market, buy Health Insurance not through an employer, it was tough continuese a. C. A. And to be tough. He focused on this particular problem. Sing senator murray . Senator shes got two and a can houses republican white house, to be able to negotiate and get a deal democratic s core principles, Health Benefits, protection for people with conditions, but to know ive got to work with a chair and pass through republican houses, superb negotiator. Ryan, saw with paul her with lamar on rewriting no child left behind and here. Senator, in the spirit of a health care event, next steps on health care, put it your lab coat, be clinical, what are will s this compromise pass . What are chances it will come to a vote . Senator i think it will. That it will is pass as part of some kind of a legislation. Ce of such as . Am omnibus, d be the alone, it will stand but will be connected to something, my sense now. Senator, you made news yesterdays, introduced medicare x, sounds futuristic. Is futuristic. This is by all accounts, even the president said this praised lamars work and said, this will be good for a couple years, we have to discussions about improving the health system. You will hear from senator cassidy, who is a doc, he will think about what a big idea is. But it wto ne, too, talk about the next big idea. Constituents rom is what we hear from our republican colleagues. Choices ould have more and there is a real problem, in 018, there will be 1500 counties in the United States where there will only be one or offering ce companies policies on the exchange. Say that again. 2018, the this year 2017, there is about 1200, the 1500 tion is next year counties in the United States or e there will only be one no Insurance Companies offering policies on the individual market. Write group policies, but not offering policies to individuals. Rural america the hardest. Rural america has higher the ntage of people on individual market. An insurance company, the fewer s are rural, patients, they are older and tend to be sicker, it hits rural harder. Michael bennett, and i hear our they are saying more choices, affordable. We introduced medicare x, the advantage of medicares provider network, eimbursement schedule and low administrative costs, take advantage of that and direct the to write an ary insurance policy that would cover essential Health Benefits nder obamacare and offer that policy on the exchange. So the x is for extra, the x is offerednded, it will be on the exchange. We would roll it out in 2020 in jurisdictions that have one or no Insurance Companies writing policies. It would be available everywhere, by 2024, available on the shop market for small exchange. What public republican buyin do you have now . No republican cosponsors now. It is a problem. For now. A problem lamar and i talked about this, too. Now is the time to talk about ideas, if we can get murray passed, we stabilize the market. Deliberate discussion about the big ideas. There is grahamcassidy and collinscassidy, elements he table. Ant to put on Bernie Sanders will want to put single payer on the table. Big ideas, g with what is wrong, jamming them through with no public hearings, votes on the floor and reconciliation, no, use the committee process. Lamar was committee, a governor, he knows medicaid, president of the university of had med school and a hospital, patty is a fantastic negotiator. Ou have doctors on the committee. You have another governor, hassan hassan. There are insurance commissions, to is the time for big ideas come to the table and be discussed in a deliberate, careful way with a lot of and openness. A long road, you think the times are right . Peoples ore and more constituents are saying, i live virginia, lorado or rural anywhere, there is just no options for me. To nt think were going long tolerate big parts of the population not being able to buy individual the markets. A tweet there. Talking about big ideas, you the Vice President ial nominee last year, you are from of the most important states commonwealth of virginia in elections, to think big about your party, are democrats moving too fast to hug payer . Senator i tonight think so. Bill, 15 single payer democratic sponsors. Almost a litmus test for want to run in 2020, is that a mistake . Have to decide what system works best and rather than comment on why think single payer is the idea, i think michael and i have come up with one. The e payer and cassidygraham both turned the turvey. Topsy it is a different system. What we do with medicare x, take just stick , we where you are, no new taxes, same, es stay the subsidies stay the same and then we just add one element, there offering on ional your exchange. We take advantage of the system is, we dont blow it up, add one element to it. But whether, what is the right you know, for the health care future of this country . Ork with what you have and add an element or two or turn it topsy. That is worthy of good discussion. Caitlin, i will come to you in questions. For senator, do you believe that the payer needs a Single Health system . Senator i do like more choices, fewer. Than if somebody wants to buy on the individual market and enrich people buy policies all the time from anthem, no skin off my nose. People to have more options and have them more affordable. Caitlin. Hi, senator. You are trying to take a middle of the road approach, been proactive about bipartisan stabilization deal. As you said, you have gone a lot than some of ddle your colleagues. You know, as you were talking, the party is talking about payer and whether or not to do it, are you afraid this is of the lessome kind version of repeal and replace, where, you know, to be frank, it an idea the party rallying the base. D of on the question. But everyone knows there is the vote at this time. Does it become a mythical thing were campaign og and chasing and talking with your off . That you cant pull senator we are in a room of health care people. I dont think there is anything with putting big ideas on the table. There are big ideas on the table. That is a rant idea, big idea, a very different system. Payer, very different. Mine is big, even though it takes advantage of the network. On the table s that are more like built out of background. For example, tom carver and i have National Reinsurance program. Reinsurance in the first three years of the a. C. A. That expired. Back einsurance, it is a stop for high cost claims, that kept premiums down for everybody established this mechanism, high cost claimants would be Companies Insurance g certainty. Insurance, or flood crop insurance, Medicare Part dear, used it on the a. C. A. With republican support. There are big ideas on the table, not a lot of dems will grants, not sure ours will sign on single payer. There are more pros, basic, i help. This will you see states like maine, minnesota, alaska, using profitably under their state. Ray bill givesur states a push. We could conceive doing that. Ing like ideas will spread the zone and spread the difference between see arties and you will ideas that may enable us to do chapter andermurray, 2, next bipartisan thing we do. Congreowes the American Public an important thing, look, we can Work Together and Work Together on something controversial, but that is really important in your daily that is why we need to all focus on getting this deal message and that sometimes success begets success, maybe build on it. You good . , are senator, did you want to jump to. If you want ill follow. Sure her face has nice try on the dot. Er, dot, dot, single payer set you guys up your base. Inting you know, that is a political question. For rying to do something people. I disappoint people everyday and happy everyday, that is my occupational hazard of the occupation i got into. Mayor, governor, good policy, good politics, advocate your be open to listening to good ideas of others and, you now, i am sure if we get medicare x passed, use my own the, it will not be exactly way we wrote it. Listen to ideas of others and that would be the case for any on the table, subject it to tough questions, make it public the committee e, is composed of people who know this stuff well. Nobody should be afraid of in the heir case process. Last couple seconds, touch on news of the day. From puerto rico, when you were there, what is your bottom line . The magnitude of the disaster is hard to convey, but when i i realized what is two saturdays ago with a 10member delegation. I realized, wow, im back being had a massive hurricane in virginia, it knocks out power in a quarter of your state. In the rest of the state, hospitals are running and power works and there is hotels open schools are functioning. People can move a little bit while trying to fix this one of your state. Puerto rico, 78 municipalities, urricane cut across the island from southeast to northwest, every locality lost housing, access, access to water, access to food, access to schools arent open yet. Every jurisdiction, you cant move people here and there. The response has not yet been, you know, a response that says bit american as somebody in texas or florida is. Here is an example, two weeks the hurricane, in virginia when there is a hurricane and i go, when i was governor, travel around and see the indiana utility in virginia back up. Get the grid Mutual Aid Agreements where we help each other out, i wasnt puerto rico. N grade the response. I would say the response enerally, some is administration and some is why havent utility, d response, i why the utility agreements werent clicking in. We asked, you werent sure you get paid. I mean, just order of magnitude. Four vernor told us that weeks later, six weeks after the hurricane, he hoped to have 25 . R up to where else in america would people tolerate, well, okay if back on in 25 of our state, that is okay. Tolerate this anywhere else in the United States. These are american citizens with notable record in our military since world war i. Tolerate the intolerable. And we shouldnt tolerate the good tweet another there for hashtag 360. And last question is, your thoughts about the president s iran on friday in korea text of north senator the three problems with what the president is doing with the the first thing president has done but didnt make me mad, but scares me. Make you mad . It scares me. Here is why. Three problems. Of the joint chiefs and the secretary of defense and the secretary of publicly iran g is complying with the deal. Iran is complying with the deal. Our allies say iran is complying the deal, any step backward is extremely problematic and we dont value diplomacy anymore. Said, iraq doesnt have weapons of mass destruction program. Said, sh administration what do they know and we went to was right and a we were wrong. It brings back bad memories of overrule s trying to or tarnish these experts, that is number one. Umber two, if the president says he wants congress to rethink the deal, what is if is renegotiated what is iran renegotiate give us back enriched uranium, this path put iran back on the to finding Nuclear Weapons program, it would make the world most dangerous. Are in the midst of negotiation with north korea, of getting chances a diplomatic deal . 20 , china could leverage it, you could find and mattis y tillerson and say diplomacy first. If you say the u. S. Will back out of a deal being complied with, you drop the zero the chance north korea deal, that is extremely frightening. The president should not hold diplomacy, if you do, you raise risk of unnecessary war. Landscape, ur of the especially on health care, where you are on the front lines, this area, senator,ic would you come back in six months and tell us the progress from today . Would be glad to. Thank you for joining axios. Appreciate it. [applause] appreciate you. Thank you very much. Do a quick word from delta dental and well be right back. My favorite line is that were trying to save south one tooth at a time. There are challenges with to sportation, getting places and some people are faced with not even having water, they brush their to teeth. When we see a lot of kids that have never been to the an ist and they dont have idea what is going to happen. We have a place in northwest dakota, where you could drop a land mass the size of assachusetts and not hit a dentist and so we take the dental office to the people. Truck dont just buy a and start delivering care. You have to have the sites in order to make a successful visit. You have got to have the staff, have the heart in the right place. Bringing this here in our to the people ge of the town. Ive had parents come in kids were able to get teeth pulled, cavities filled, crowns. Full of medicaid patients and accepting anymore. The dental bus means opportunity and get their ed teeth taken care of. Healthy smile is how you get how you meet and greet people on the street. Everything. We are all the confidence they have. The help they have, it makes big difference in their lives. Just watch the kids smile and you know the power. Its the smile inside that makes the difference, when they feel smile, that gives them the ability to do anything. Thank you very much and now ere honored to welcome to the axios stage, senator cassidy, republican of louisiana, a of the Senate Health education labor and pension doctor. E and an actual dr. Senator cassidy, thank you axios. Ining tell us what you practiced in honest work. Gastroenterologist, paid well from politics. 50, you are wondering, if you are over 50, you get the joke. Thank you for joining us on a newsy day, yesterday the senator e announced by Lamar Alexander, patty murray, will you support this compromise . Senator i havent finished reviewing it, it looks pretty good. Administrationma ruled unconstitutional by a federal judge. Trump said he wouldnt do that, through to congress, congress received it and is doing is flexibility for states to lower the cost of health care, that is positive. Is a couple n years, this needs to be something done permanently, allows something permanent within the interim. Do you expect President Trump to support it . Senator ive been told so, he same time, ive been told ndorsed approach like grahamcassidy for the longterm. Outlookwould you say is law . His, will it become senator i think so. You were on the frontlines plan, did you rush it too much . So, just set the stage here a little bit, tell us your happened. Hat senator um, that is not a yes no answer. Our plan was, if you will, begun cassidycollins, which always envisioned states could a program. Senator kaine spoke about block grants, topsy turvey, states could receive the block grant they had ctly what been doing, nothing would have to change for the state. If you are a state like the mark set imploded, of course, it is turvey, do sy something different. Envisioned collins that and was block grant the states. Attempted n that and to socialize that with the other party for about eight months and no one was interested. So when bicker failed, the leaderships bill failed, i had about three to to put together an alternative. Now if you say, did it happen quickly, well, in one sense, cassidycollins pro geniter, no. Which was idy, different, but had at the core iving states the option to do what worked for them, i would say no. On the other hand, to get our changed and right, we were working 18 hours a day seven days a week, didnt have a to push back on the left, which was misrepresenting the ill and that case, clearly was done too quickly and senator kaines criticism is fair, it through the committee process, i totally accept that. I did not control that. Hat was dictated by our shortterm friend. Was that a mistake . Learn about what it takes to socialize and get eople comfortable with such a massive change . Senator again, im going to massive he idea it is change, acceptance so far that some state necessary which the failing would do things differently, but california, if they love what they are doing, they can do what they are doing. What did you learn about what works and doesnt work . Learned, some people push back in a way which wrote this john podestos group and got what wanted. Scored bill over 11 and 20 year when is we wrote it for 10. Had all these people becoming uninsured, in year 11. E ran it through the chip program, when it had to be reauthorized like chip is reauthorized, would not have been a falloff, if you score look likears, it does over 20 years or 10, it does look like trillion dollars and for states. Ces standard and poor picked that thing up. You have to realize there is going to push Standard Poors picked that very thing up. You have to realize theres people who are going to push back and that will be echoed by others. We can argue about different scores, but just to talk about reality, the problem for republicans is that all kinds of protections for preexisting conditions are written throughout the aca. They are tucked in a all caps of places and republicans have to figure out where they are going to draw a line. It really is interesting theres a thought that people have to be protected against a venal corrupt governor scheming to take away their Health Insurance, even though that governor typically is up for reelection or has been recently elected. I say that because in our bill, we specifically say that if a state wishes to do something different, have a waiver, they must show that whatever they do let me see if i can remember the language exactly is adequate and affordable for those with preexisting conditions. This agreement we have just agreed to again, im told. I have not read it myself but that the waivers now just have to show themselves to be of comparable affordability. You could argue theres wiggle room. That is basically the kind of language we have. Contrast this. If somebody here is on the individual market and earning 401 of federal poverty level, for a family of three, about 82,000 a year, you cannot afford the policies now. In my state, you can pay anywhere 30,000 to 45,000 a. Ear thats affordable for a family with a preexisting . Of course not. Lynne casper fact checked me on that. Glenn did not know it beforehand, but i did. Thefact is he checked figure i referenced and i think he said the total could be 46,000. Thats affordable you of course not. Thats status quo. Under our conditions, we give it to the state allowing them to come up with a system which is affordable and we think our way is better. The camera a little bit. If you repeal and replace, the number of people who lose coverage will not be zero, so how does the gop figure out where to draw the line . We could have more coverage under grahamcassidy than under status quo. Everything you are saying i am disputing, but that was echoed by the left. If you think about what we proposed, we would allow states to do so called automatic enrollment. You are in unless you are out. The example is medicare. Can be onn 65, you metacarpal. You can call them up and tell them you dont want to be, but otherwise you are on. We would allow states to do what is called automatic and roman. If you are eligible, you get a credit sufficient for your these premium, and all younger are in the pool. We would adopt under that scenario, more people enrolled than under status quo. So you are committing rself to a plan introducing and supporting a plan under which the number of people who would lose coverage . Zero it would be up to a state because again, washington, d. C. , does not dictate, but it is in the best this interest the vested interests of a state to have as many people injured as possible. I am all about people having coverage. My background as a doctor was trying to bring coverage to those who did not. Im told 6 Million People are paying the penalty. 78 of those households have adjusted gross income of 50,000. I am committed to those working families being able to afford insurance. Under status quo, they cannot. Do you plan to revise revive your efforts in 2018 . If so, how . Yes. Obviously, theres things that have to change. We have a different set of years for our window. Should have been a Better Process, but under grahamcassidy, virginia would have thats news . You are saying the should have been a Better Process . All along. As i said earlier, it was a function. We were given until the end of september to put it together, and we were on recess for much of that time. My staff and i were not, but others were. Doing other things, obviously, but no committee hearings. Under grahamcassidy, there would be billions with a b more in virginia that care for working families, and they have a history of talented governors who would be able to take those dollars and do something in virginia that would expand coverage for the working uninsured. Uninsured. Similarly, missouri would get billions more under Graham Cassidy. People said this is a partisan bill. I just looked at two states represented by Democratic Senators, but i can also list maine, florida, wisconsin, indiana, and others that would do far better under Graham Cassidy then under status quo and they are represented by Democratic Senators. Congress, mostly the same players. Couple things, some of the people voting know if you will complained about the process. We now have more time for a Better Process. I would like to think that we could socialize among our democratic colleagues. They have finally shown a willingness to give a little bit on the aca, and so they have given a little bit, and this deal with senators murray and alexander worked out, so maybe they say their state has working families and maybe they need to look at it more closely, not through the lens of partisan politics, but the lens of what is best for families of my state. If that the case, we think we win. What difference did jimmy kimmel make . Jimmy kimmel a couple things. A couple things. Jimmy kimmels son, and we all oh, my gosh, how can you not feel for this . Was born with a congenital heart disease. My wife, retired Breast Cancer surgeon, but i can imagine what happened. The child was born. Doctors and immediately realized the child was blue, and they made a diagnosis and knew the child onld die, and the baby is his way. They are signing papers, who cannot relate to the emotional response . And i think that First Episode in which i, referring to him, said we should have a step to make sure his childs needs are theessed helped define terms of the debate. Kimmel later came after me and talked to schumer never called me. I wish he had. I wish he had, not to confront to explain. We could probably arrange that. We will make that happen. Please. Cassidy, there would be families in virginia, texas, virginia, florida, maine, indiana i can go down state, who would now have access the states would have billions of dollars of resources. To purchase insurance in ways they otherwise would not have had. The coverage, Jimmy Kimmels statements, soften support, hurt support . I dont think it cost votes. The democrats were not going to vote for it anyway. It could have been the best thing in the world and they would not have voted for. When i was trying to push cassidycollins, i emailed 10 democrats and all said we are not touching this. Here, sovered a lot there is a lot to go over, but something i want to touch on, combining the idea, and you are saying no one will lose coverage under your plan am saying states would have the ability to put in plans that would avoid or expand coverage, but i cannot dictate what a state does. I think the thing about your plan is it shifted money among state. There was a big shift in who gets what compared to current law. Blue states that did expand medicaid, they lost a lot of money. California being a great example. First of all, i think that the plan is shifting these resources. Even if it did not result in a net loss of coverage, how do you that loss in california and people who would almost inevitably lose coverage there, askin turn, how do you Democratic Senators to support your plan . Lets work backwards. Senator whose state gets billions more in the resources then under status quo to support our planned . The way i phrase that begs the answer. How do i ask senator mccaskill whose state gets billions more under our plan . A begs the answer. The people in their state do far better. A transfer of wealth if you will from blue states to read not really. Do have significant growth, but the blue states, which had already expanded end up with far more money because they are getting a set amount over time, and the red states are growing over time. By the way, red states including virginia, missouri, maine, florida, all represented by Democratic Senators, so i also eject the education it is partisan. We actually, by the way, worked to mitigate, so under grahamcassidy, new york was held harmless, and massachusetts was held harmless. There were a couple of states that actually did have money relative to current law that they lost. Let me ask you should the federal taxpayer be on the hook for no matter what expense the state passes on to the federal taxpayer . If you have a high cost state deliberately putting in a system of care which is known to be far higher cost than other states, should the federal taxpayer subsidize those decisions . If you say yes, theres no hope for Controlling Health care costs because the state legislature can give a special deal to this union or those hospitals. The federal taxpayer should have the ability to say there should be some cap on how much is going out if you compare this state to other states. One more thing i will say states actually have the ability penaltiessome of the that grahamcassidy did away with, for example, the employer mandate and the individual mandate. If you reimpose those penalties, that gives the state a heck of a lot of a lot of money that they could then used to subsidize their system. Was reinstituting the Health Insurance fee i think it was, but reinstituting one of the fees that would be lost under trump has executive action. He was going to use that to subsidize the policy. States could have done that which i just said. California proved the example. They did not have to lose resources. They would just have to levy the taxes on themselves as opposed to getting it from the federal government. This has been a great conversation. Youre going to stay on the front lines. Would you be willing to come back in six months and update us on progress in this important area . Absolutely. Senator, we say goodbye. This is an lsu tie . Lsu tie. Geaux tigers. That something you have in common with james carville. You can sit there and rub shoulders with people you otherwise disagree with. Who cares you have to we should be able to put politics aside every now and then. Thank you for a great conversation. Appreciate your great response. Thank you very much. We are going to hear from the Vice President of government relations, and then i will be right back. Jason . Good morning, everybody. This is the part of the program where a guy reads to you. So get ready. In all seriousness, i hope you enjoyed and were moved by the video we just watched because it truly captures who we are at delta dental and what we care about. I understand were not here to talk specifically about dental care, but it is our belief that the Current Health policy conversation needs to include oral health. Polling shows 90 of americans aew dental benefits as welcome for critical part of the public debates around health care legislation. According to the Kaiser Family foundation in 2015, more than a quarter of uninsured adults delayed or went without needed dental care due to cost. Importantly, research from the institute of medicine, hhs, and many other sources showed oral health is a critical component of Overall Health. Good oral health has a positive effect on Overall Health and reflects General Health conditions, and the social and medical impact of oral diseases in children is substantial. To be happy and healthy, reflectsamericans need access o highquality medical and dental benefits. Everybody needs both. As Health Care Reform discussions move forward, we believe oral health must be a central part of the conversation to ensure americans achieve optimal Overall Health. As the largest and most experienced dental benefits provider in the u. S. , we believe delta dental is the perfect partner in helping americans achieve optimal Overall Health because at delta dental, we live and breathe oral health. It is our only priority. We consider this partnership to be an exciting opportunity to elevate this issue in the broader Health Policy conversation. Thats why we are underwriting this event at another event we will hold early next year. Thank you all so much for joining us. Now i will hand things back over to mike. Thank you. For making this possible, and it is our honor to welcome to the stage senator Lamar Alexander, republican of tennessee, chairman of the Senate Health, education, labor, and financial committee. Thank you so much for coming. Senator alexander, i have been covering you since i had hair and you had flannel. Thats a long time. Caitlyn just whispered a scooped me. Said you just got off the phone with President Trump. What did he called me to say that he wanted to be encouraging the bipartisan agreement that senator murray and i announced yesterday. Number two, he intends to review it carefully to see if he wants to add anything to it. He is still for block grants. Ometimes later i was thinking this morning, the sort of harley grammar of washington is that President Trump does not know what hes doing. Around health care, he probably does. In september, against the advice, really, up paul ryan and mitch, he sort of cleaned out the last half of september so the senate could consider the Cassidy Graham bill you just talked about. Completely engineered the bipartisan agreement that senator murray and i announced yesterday. He talked to senator schumer and encouraged him to ask murray to do it. He called me twice over the last 10 days to talk to me about a bipartisan agreement for the shortterm, a bridge so people are not heard, and he checked in this morning. Iswhy doesnt he just say he for . I think he wants to reserve his options. What we are going to do is we have a number of republican and Democratic Senators. We are going to introduce the , put it on the floor so people can see it, and we will see where it goes from there. My guess is it the part of discussions between the president , speaker ryan, senator schumer, mitch mcconnell, and i predict it will pass in some form before the end of the year. My experience is usually most ideas fail for lack of the idea, and this is a very carefully thatht out compromise advances some republican principles that have not been advanced in eight years and some democratic ones as well as i think it will happen before the end of the year, and i appreciate the fact that he encouraged me to do it and that and i understand the fact that a president would want to to addit, maybe try something to it and make it part of a larger negotiation before it is done. What did he indicate as far as his general feeling about it . Did he indicate how he was inclined . He had not read it yet. He has been busy and we just introduced it yesterday afternoon, but he called me 10 days ago and encouraged me to do it. I was impressed with the fact that he was willing. He understands that the grandcassidy bill, for example, or any other bill to replace obamacare does not take effect until 2028. What you do not want to do in the meantime is create chaos and hurt millions of americans by skyrocketing premiums and some counties where they cannot buy entrance, the Congressional Budget Office has said that without costsharing payments, up to 16 million americans might live in counties where they cannot buy insurance. Well, what does chaos to do . It is a fourlane highway to a singlepayer solution, a birthday present for Bernie Sanders. I think the president is pretty shrewd to understand there is a cap here that needs to be filled and the only way to fill it is by bipartisan agreement like the one we suggested yesterday, an. You alluded to the president s mastery of policy, but you said that an health care, you do not believe he knows what hes doing. Tell us about that. I think i just did. Cleared the way so he could deal with the cassidy bill. Recognizede, he there is a gap, and he worked with me so that i would work with patty murray and produce a bipartisan agreement to fill the gap. A better way to ask that is what do you believe either based on what you said what he said or what he into it. I think his big goal is the same as my big goal, which is to make more decisions out of washington back to the states so people have more choices and lower prices. That is 80 of the dispute that has created the partisan stalemate over the last eight years. By the way, there are three or four steps in the Alexander Murray agreement that move in that direction. The first such steps weve had in eight years. There also is a compromise so democrats have some things, too, you dont get a conservative win without a result, and we have not had any results. We had a lot of speeches and a lot of lost votes. That is not a conservative victory. You are sitting down, have you had some coffee this morning you no, i have not. I went to the gym. Ok, you have been to the gym, you are relaxed. You can take questions. Do you expect republicans to revive fullblown repeal and replace in 2018 . I expect president to recommend that and i expect senator cassidy to introduce a bill to do that. If he does and if it is the same bill he introduced before, i would vote for it. Do you believe it will pass . I do not predict the senate. Ery well although i did predict the alexander agreement will pass before the end of the year. The major problem with the Affordable Care act is what i just said, that too many decisions about the kind of insurance policies that are written are written in washington, and do not take into account happens in the states, and in the states, as a former governor, i know we want to help people even more than people in washington do, and we can make decisions about that, and we can lower prices and offer more choices. That is what that is about, and that is why i would vote for it. Is there a risk with the way this is being done in pieces and with bridges . Is there a risk that Insurance Companies will say this roller coaster is too much and exchanges are not worth the trouble . No, i think a twoyear bridge to whatever comes next is something that Insurance Companies can easily plan for. 2018 rates are mostly set, but they now have would have plenty of time to make their 2019 rates. What we will try to do is to find a mechanism to make sure consumers get the benefit of the costsharing payments in 2018, not the insurance, and in 2019, consumers automatically will get those benefits. Ouruld expect if we pass agreement sometimes for the end of the year that it will have some effect on rate in 2018 they will not go up as much and in 2019, rates will go down. You wear a lot of hats, but you are one of the great minds of the republican party, someone who actually knows the country. A toughook ahead to Midterm Election next year, are you actually fortunate that repeal and replace did not pass . I dont think so. I dont quite look at life that way. I am a resultoriented person. Thats why we announced that agreement yesterday. Oh want to get something done while im here. We did that with fixing no child left behind. That was, the wall street said, the biggest evolution of power to the states a 25 years. I do not know if we get elected or unelected based on that, but its the reason im here, so i would like to see us succeed on changing the Affordable Care act. There are a variety of ways to do it. We could have a shortterm agreement to start with. Executive orders are another way. The president started with that, but we do need to take a new look at the Affordable Care act and i would like to see power moved out of washington back to the states. I dont know what the effect of that would be in the november elections in 2018, but its what we ought to be doing. Take your point about no child left behind. You announced yesterday, you were talking to a young senator, someone who wants to be a leader, someone who wants to accomplish things. What is the secret to passing something bipartisan . To pulling secret off even something modest . Number one, get to know them. Its no secret. Its just if you dont know each other, you do not know about areas of agreement. Try totwo, do not always do something comprehensive. Go a step at a time. Number three, have a lot of patience. Number four, keep your word. Those are things that are important. If you do that, you can get a result. I like working with senator murray. Shes part of democratic leadership. We do not agree on a lot, but she can do all those things i just mentioned. I have two questions for you, and im going to ask at the same time so i dont get cut off. First one is about the deal you reached yesterday. Some conservatives are already blasting it as insurer bailout. If you as the republican party, the house, senate, president , successfully passed this bill and sign it into law, is this a win for republicans and something trump gets to say he or goingdeal, especially into the november election, is this something that public ends say they only passed and insurer bailout . We will come back thank you. A conservative victory requires a result. It has been eight years now. Have had 50 votes to repeal obama care. We have lost them all. Weve made 1000 speeches and got no results. Three or four results are embedded in this come from us. One is a catastrophic plan for the first time for people of all ages. A medical catastrophe does not turn into a financial catastrophe. Two is and more importantly, a change in the affordability guard rail. It gives more states opportunities to do the waivers like the alaska waiver, the iowa waiver, the oklahoma waiver, the New Hampshire waiver. All of these are different ways of doing things, and as i said earlier, the single biggest objective of republicans is to of washington back to the states. It also encourages interstate compacts on Health Insurance and streamlines the waiver system. Thats four results in this compromise agreement and for more results than conservatives have achieved in eight years, despite the votes and speeches. Thats what i would say to people who ask about it. Following up on that, did you think if this passes, the president can say this is a deal he directly influenced . If this passes, how much of an impact did trump have . Is this something trump can say he owned . Engineered thet bipartisan agreement by calling me and asking me to work with senator murray to do it. I have talked with him three times in the last 10 days about it, including 30 minutes ago, so he has it out there as an option. If he decides in the and to make it part of something he signs, then, of course it will be something he supports, so i think he has been pretty shrewd in the whole process in this case by giving himself a bipartisan option that could give him three or four conservative wins on the way to trying to give block grants again. Term, justonger asking you as senator alexander, not your entire caucus, you said this is a bridge to whatever comes next. What is your ideal version of what comes next echo i think bill cassidy did a good job with his bills. He has time to improve it between now and the next time it comes up, but the idea again is pretty fundamental allow states to make more decisions of insurancety policies as a goal of having more prices and more choices. That is it. Thats most of the difference with obama care. I think stuff one in the progress is the executive order the president issued last week. Step two would be a bipartisan agreement to make sure that people are not hurt, that we do not have chaos that leads to a singlepayer system, that we histor nobody is trying to repeal it every year. The 21stcconnell said Century Building workout last year was the most important bill in congress. Probably was. We need to eventually get to a consensus on health care. Its just hard to do. When you to take step one, recognize a win when we see it. People would like to see us get results. Going to have to say it a lot, i guess. That you will not get a victory unless you get a result and you do not get results unless you get 60 votes. We might be able to get blood grants with 51 votes, but will. Ot get results the most important ones require 60 votes. As you make progress on your object, would you be willing to come back in six months . Tim kaine has seven harmonicas, one for each key that he knows. We perform at a rhythm and blues festival in virginia. We all had a pretty good time at the birthplace of country music. We call ourselves the amateurs, which is an accurate description. My thanks to our colleagues who have been here all night and are so fantastic. Thank you for coming out so early and senator alexander, thank you. Thank you for joining us. President trump announced this morning via tweet that he is not supporting the Health Care Agreement introduced by Lamar Alexander and patty murray. Here is a look at our primetime on cspan networks, starting at 8 00 p. M. Eastern on cspan, testimony from attorney oneral Jeff Sessions oversight is is that the Justice Department. On cspan2, President Trump and senators talk about tax reform, and on cspan3, a Senate Hearing on federal funding for scientific research. Cspans washington journal every day with news and policy. Ssues that impact you discussing a new report looking at the physical conditions of the Social Security and Medicare Trust fund. Then the u. S. Ambassador to nato talks about vulnerabilities with the u. S. Voting machine. Join the discussion. Cspan where history unfolds daily. As a79, cspan was created Public Service by american Telephone Companies and is brought to you today by your cable and satellite provider. Now remarks from the parents of a young man who died of a heroin overdose on their experience of losing a child to opiate addiction. This is 20 minutes. Good morning, everyone. I am the health and medicine reporter here at the washington ost. Of onee with the parents of the estimated 62,000 people who died of Drug Overdose in 2016 and the Washington Post video journalist who made that remarkable video that you just saw. Can you tell us a little bit about how thads painkiller addiction began . Had ananuary 2015, he injury. We took him to the emergency room and everything. They prescribed painkillers. We had no idea that he got addicted to painkillers. Around october 2015, his mom locks him into his room. Of course, i was upset, i yelled at him. He told us about his addiction to painkillers. I looked it up online and went back upstairs to the top of the steps and told him, im sorry, i love you. Whos attempting to read his painkiller addiction right. He was attempting to beat his painkiller addiction . Right. First i went to rehab, what it to get clean, wanted to be good. First time he went to rehab, wanted to get clean, wanted to be good. Get vivitrol, the blocker. It only lasted 30 days or so. Milton thatlace in they only prescribed patients that went through treatment at their treatment center, so i was not able to get it for him, and eventually, he relapsed. Relapsed is common. Were you hopeful . Well, i thought this was just because hehe road andly wanted to do better he just i mean, it was im out of our realm just going to say it just does not happen to us. When he did relapse, what . Ues did you have just some behaviors. I just said you are reminding me of how you were then. Was he on pain pills or using street drugs . When he did not have pain , that is when he would turn to heroin. Rehab, and back to he did not do good when he came home as he did the first time. Went to drug court and had all the anxiety and everything. And then, like, about three days i think drug court would have been good for him because it would have held him accountable and been structured. He would days before have had court is when i woke up to my wife screaming in the up ng, thad, wake i knew what was going on in my head, grabbed the phone, dial room, heto my sons had stopped breathing, turned blue. I started chest compressions. Police and Emergency Personnel arrived. My wife went and got narcan. Do anything. Thats the antidote that reverses and overdose . Yes. Didnt it work . No. Apparently they came down and said there was nothing more they could do. Y pronounce our sun dead our son dead, and we went in another room while they were bringing his body down. What had he overdosed on . Heroine. Do you know how he obtained it . Not exactly. Groupording to the grief can you tell us about the years since thad has died . Sort of a ridiculous question, but what has the year been like for you . Someone told us about a group he went to years ago in indiana called grief share. We jumped in about week four of 13 weeks. Helpful, to go with other people, and talkheir grief about this. It is a faithbased program, so that was good. And i thought we were doing ok, doing things the right way, and then we went to david bauer,met and he told us about a group that meets, and we then going monthly. We cry together, we laughed together, but we all have unfortunately one thing in common. Have you learned anything , about this particular way of losing a child in this epidemic . Has it been helpful . Yes. One thing i learned right away was just that theres nothing i. Ould have done in the beginning, you were. Retty guilty they were telling you it was nothing you could have done. Is nothing i could have done to change, and94 that is hard as a mom. Spent months on this folks. Met with all these what was your ambition when you started . I think it was important, and this was something we discussed early on, that we wanted to show the face of those affected by this. Its easy to talk about numbers, but to really get to the heart of who this is hurting the most was something we wanted to get when we met with tina, it sounded like a good place for shared the same thing in common, which was losing a loved one to this epidemic. We first met with the group, it was in the backyard of the. Ounselors home it was heartbreaking hearing all , seeing howries many people have been impacted in this community. Im actually curious because you guys were also at the ik, 10k 5k, 10k run, were you aware how many people have been impacted or touched . Last year was the first year that they did that 5k, and it happened to be probably about three weeks after thad passed, and my sister was in the williamsburg area. There were probably 30 like, and iews, there friends think last year the First Time Ever they had over 60 people, year, i think it surpassed that. Was surprised because story, if itss or a nephew or cousin, friend, grandchild. It seems like theres no more than one degree of separation at this point. If you dont know someone who , then youersonally have a neighbor or cousin or. Ephew or someone so many of the stories are the same about how it starts with hank hellers. I have heard so many stories so many of the stories are the same about how it starts with painkillers. Likeheard so many stories that. Was his a football injury . Know, an accident. By whatyou surprised you found doing the work on this . I think especially when you are physically in that space and are seeing everyone there and how many people have an affected , for people who do not know, it is the home of Little League baseball. It is as american high as you can get. It was an interesting surrounded to be in by all these people who have been impacted by this epidemic. Or are some u. S. Senators waiting to come out here and speak on the opioid epidemic. A bunch of folks from the d. C. Area who may in their own corner of this world be able to do something. As parents of someone who passed , overdosed on opioids, what do you want them to do . What needs to be done to bend her . Well, as people have seen, that one bill needs to change, i cannote life of me understand why the dea switched sides. It is unethical for them to be the attorneys for the dea and then be attorneys for the big Drug Companies. Enforcement. Law yes. The i was first told about im againstght of theg taking power out hands of a federal Law Enforcement agency to do their job. How about treatment . Was it difficult to get treatment . People already pointed out that it was not the most effective, although relapse is such a difficult subject. We were so naive. How to do know anything. ,ust ok, fine him a place to go but our daughter is quite the researcher. Thad loved to lift weights and was at the gym every day, and she said she found one that has ym, and everything just fell into place. It was not that far from our home. So we just, you know, wish the end results would have been better. You know a reason why thad relapsed . Maybe the anxiety of his upcoming appointment in drug court. Metad friends that he through meetings and things that were going through it and maybe ,ave not done well and failed and he did not want to go back. I see you have a tattoo of thad. Do you mind telling us about that . Yeah, this is a portrait of my son. This is the crest for switzerland, for my greatgrandfather. He had this on his back. I wanted this arm to represent my son. He has always lived in my heart and he is here on my arm. This is what we take when we travel places so our son is always with us. Different places in pennsylvania and out in indiana at the lakes where he liked to go. When he passed, there was a little bit left in here, so i dumped that out. And he did not like to travel so much. Thats all the time we have for this session. I want to thank you so much for coming down and speaking. Your story is heartbreaking and hopefully can have an effect in the war on opioids. Alice, your video speaks for itself. Going to ask questions of the next panel. Thank you all very much. [applause] senators maggie hansen, rob portman, and joe manchin took part in a panel on what is being done legislatively to stop opioid abuse and addiction. This is 45 minutes. Hello, everyone. Good morning. Im a congressional reporter with the post, joined now by two senators, which have seen their States Affected by the Opioid Crisis and are working to find solutions. Please join me in welcoming senator Maggie Hassan and senator rob portman. [applause] also have senator joe manchin, who was hoping to join us today. Perhaps he will be joining us a little bit later, but we are delighted to have two leaders in this sphere who have been working every day. Senator Maggie Hassan is in her first term representing New Hampshire. Her efforts to combat opioid did not start in january. New hampshire increased penalties for fentanyl distribution, began investigating opioid Overdose Deaths as homicides, informed the states rules and expanded the state Prescription Drug. Onitoring she is a cosponsor of multiple bills. Senator rob portman of ohio, delighted to have you here. Senator portman is in his second term representing ohio and his former director of the office of management and budget. He is one of congress for most efforts on fiscal and trade matters, but he has also had a long interest in combating drug asse dating back to his days a house member. He established an antidrug coalition in his hometown of cincinnati and is the author of the comprehensive addiction and recovery act, the first major reform of federal addiction policy in two decades, which was signed into law last year, and he is chairman of the he has done where significant engines of oversight on the response of the epidemic. Thank you for being with us today. To those watching, i want to invite you to please tweet your questions at us. We are collecting them under the postlive. With as a member of the post, when we have an investigation that has had an impact as we saw on sunday, it is important to address that and i want to ask you both, we learned through this investigation, most of us, a lot of us that congress acted last that keysing a bill figures of the dea say took tools away from them they needed to combat this epidemic. Both of you are authors of legislation that aim to stop the epidemic and help its victims. When did you learn about the effects of this bill and what is your reaction to knowing that case,y have in your senator portman, you were in congress when this happened, you may have laid a part in supporting a bill that may have exacerbated the crisis, just so people understand, this is a bill that passed by unanimous consent. Republicans and democrats alike. Anyone senator could have stopped the bill but it seems there was not an understanding of what the impact of the bill would be. I would ask you to start. Assume portman i would it is a complicated issue. Opioids and it requires a comprehensive response. That is why the comprehensive addiction act was landmark legislation because it covers the whole gamut. Some of the legislation got ed in a in a weaken conversation of the house. Maggie is a cosponsor of the bill. Did we hearhis one, from anybody and the answer was no and the irony is that it passed the Judiciary Committee, i am not on the Judiciary Committee but it went through at the same time as the comprehensive addiction act. The emphasis was on the Opioid Crisis and the prevention education, treatment, and thevery and narcan which is miracle drug that reverses the effects of overdoses, that effect was on the comprehensive addiction act and that is the reason it slipped through because it was unanimous consent in committee and on the floor. That is one of the issues we need to relook at, we need to examine that. I did look this morning at what the dea Enforcement Actions were around that time and they were reduced for the legislation was passed. There was already a pullback of the Enforcement Actions. It is a very complicated issue, there is no silver bullet, no one way to address the issue that will solve the crisis. It is a crisis. We got to meet the family coming out who we saw briefly here. I have met with 1000 recovering addicts in the last couple of years alone. I focus a lot on that issue but everybody has. I think you have to start with the Drug Companies coming up with a nonaddictive pain medication. There was a task force , applications are being accepted for people to be on that task force. We need to push the Drug Companies to come up with nonaddictive alternatives created is crazy we are using opioids for things like extracting a wisdom tooth. It does not make any sense. The Distribution Network which is the focus of that story is a huge part of it. The Prescription Drug monitoring acts, i encourage members to cosponsor and lets get the darn thing past, require states to have a Prescription Drug Monitoring Program that holds the pharmacies and doctors responsible on the prescription side to stop overprescribing and requires states to get involved in the and a state compact so you have interoperability in ohio, people get the prescription and go to another state to get another prescription filled and we have to stop that. On the treatment and recovery side, narcan and the enforcement side. We have another bill, maggie and i, it is a bipartisan bill that deals with how do you keep the Illegal Drugs from coming in. And want to talk about the act little later. Let me ask you what is your reaction to these revelations, i know that you have some tough toughons and had questions for the dea. You would expect the agency that is enforcing these laws to speak up when congress is about to act to take tools at of their toolbox. What is your reaction to what happened . As is true with rob, i have been meeting with an hearing from families, people who have struggled with addiction, people who lost people to addiction. Ever since i got into office. But over the last three to four years in New Hampshire. The epidemic has spread like wildfire. Part of what we see in the story is the structural underpinnings of this epidemic and while it is very true that we have been focused on prevention, treatment, recovery, Law Enforcement, one of the other things i did as governor was with republican colleagues in the legislature stand up Medicaid Expansion so people could get treatment. It is a credible critical part of the Affordable Care act. Onl we have been focusing getting resources to the front lines, we need to do much more on that. Underpinnings are much harder to crack. Because of the various forces involved. I along with senator mccaskill and senator manchin, we wrote a an animuspassed by consent. Now that we understand what the impact has been. I think that one of the things real challenge here is there are these structural components. There is a pharmaceutical industry that encouraged doctors to treat pain as a vital sign and use opioids aggressively. There are doctors who obviously, the vast majority of them trained to help people, alleviate pain, save lives. Somewhat i think resistant at the beginning to think that they had a role in this. So changing prescribing roles was difficult. We have Drug Companies making in our miss amounts of money on these drugs and then we have an people who arech suffering from the disease are stigmatized. I do think if this were an that did not carry the stigma that Substance Use disorder does we would have gotten that the structural issues sooner. We have a lot of work to do and we have to push incredibly hard in addition to asking and encouraging and providing incentives for Drug Companies to find nonaddictive pain relief. We have a medical Device Industry that does have some nonaddictive alternatives for pain treatment but they cannot get coverage through things like medicare and medicaid worried we have a lot of work to do. How gratefulo say i am not only for the family we heard from but around the state and country, people suffering from addiction and their families have stood up to my parents have begun to write breathtakingly difficult obituaries about their children. They have brought attention to this by being willing to stand up and talk about their pain, their suffering, and this disease, and that is what is going to make a difference ultimately. That is how we will beat this. We are joined by senator joe manchin. Thank you. It is great to have a treo with us. I will give a brief introduction to senator manchin. Westepresenting what virginia. He has worked tirelessly to bring attention to the Opioid Crisis and his state before the national dimensions of the epidemic came down. Became known. He was a leader to get hydrocodone rescheduled. From schedule three to schedule too. Dramatic decrease in the amount of prescriptions were that drug. He has cosponsored a number of bills related to the crisis, he is a cofounder of the Prescription Drug abuse crisis. Every day youre talking to constituents and talking about this issue. Youd you saw the report we had in the paper on sunday. That we did with 60 minutes. You have spoken out about it. For representative marino to withdraw his name. I gave senator portman a little bit of a hard time before you showed up but you were in the senate when the ill past with unanimous consent. What was your reaction when you learned as the author of a number of bills to address this epidemic that you may have led a bill through that made it worse . We were incensed. When you look at the timeline, a piece ofut legislation in the house and he had great resistance from the dea and doj saying it would harm their ability to do the job they were supposed to do. They hired people from the the dea which was mr. Barber, lynden barber. No objections from the house in 2015. Came over to the senate, it came into the senate and they worked on the language to make it smoother. It comes out of the committee and there is no one, if we are not on this committees and our staff is not involved we rely on the agencies. The dea and doj said we do not think this will harm them. We want to make sure that patients with severe pain and endoflife will be helped. It was never intended to open up the floodgates. In West Virginia the floodgates were already open. You tell me something was not flagged there. Everybody is at fault here. How do you stop it, you stop it by getting the enforcement people back to do their job. Them from going from the dea, the people that know what to look for and how to investigate, how to prosecute and prevent them from going into the pharmaceutical Industry Business within the same week and get a big paycheck. This is not a partisan failure. Kratzicans and him cosponsored. President obama signed it. Silent is, it has been a killer and it does not have partisanship. It does not care about who you are, it will get you and we keep our mouth shut a cousins Family Members we were afraid to embarrass anybody, embarrass ourselves. Every Family Member i know, everybody in this audience probably know someone who has been affected. And want to ask one last question. What needs to be done to fix bes, should this bill repealed or at least the provision in question here, would you support that and what are you willing to do to make sure that . We want to cosponsor it on behalf of Claire Mccaskill anam sure will be a bipartisan effort. I was happy to see this morning that the Judiciary Committee held a hearing and that is the first step toward addressing the issue. It will be reexamined. That hearing will take lay soon. When i looked at the data this morning, enforcements were already down before the legislation passed so it is a deeper problem than the standard of proof which is what changed in that legislation. This is in the Obama Administration but it is the same career people who need to be given the tools to do their job. That robs point it seems there was this concerted effort i the industry to get the dea to work with them. The Administrative Law judge who you cited in your reports, i read some of his article yesterday and he said the language just about makes it impossible. So now that we have a judge in charge of interpreting the law saying the language whatever it was intended to do, this is the person whose job it was to interpret their regulation. As you learned in your hearing and the Health Committee yesterday, the da takes a different view. This was the industry. When i asked industry whether the judge was wrong who said the law made it impossible to bring enforcement action to suspend shipments of opioids, the judge said it was impossible. Isbn industry yesterday and they said the judge was wrong and they were not misleading the public so we have some work to do. Amendment wasute the substantial likelihood of immediate threat changed everything. And want to follow up with you, you chair and oversight you have done a lot of work on opioids. Do you see any opportunities on this issue to step in or are there other committees looking at this . Judicial has made it decision , sometimes we managed to crawl those communities committees to be more progressive. Is home of quickly. There are other things to do. I do not know if that is there thing that is out that we are familiar with is there is a White House Commission looking at this, has been looking at this for a number of months. They are due to put out a final report by the end of the month. We already know they made interim recommendations in july. One of which was to declare and a map a National Emergency. That is something that got a lot of attention at the time. We heard the president earlier this week indicate that it would be happening soon. Thed we talk about declaration of a National Emergency, what doesnt mean, what does it not mean, how important is it or is it shorthand for other things i need to be done . We have been waiting for details on what the president and the commission maine. Joe knows as a former government like me the type of emergency you declare matters. We have been waiting for details from the white house. It was disappointing that the president said we were going to declare a National Emergency which i assume meant and then garner resources. The care act, karen cure helped us get some resources out in the field. They are not nearly enough. The commission about the distribution formula. New hampshire has one of the highest per capita rate rates of death the wheel he got 3 million of the money of the comn about the distribution formula. New hampshire has one of the the 500 million. This administration has said that it cares a lot about this and has not followed through and we are losing people every day. The highest,e i am i have more deaths per capita than any other state. Coalfields and my state got hit hard. I go around and being former inernor being in my position the senate. And seeing the devastation that has gone on. Thinkingll in denial that if you were there did you were a criminal. We will put you away. We did that for 20 or 30 years. We never cured anybody. We understand, those who are not naysayers or deniers that addiction is an all this and an illness needs treatment. Have Treatment Centers forget about it. We have to start with prek up as far as education in schools. We have no place to take put the children, foster care is almost impossible to get. We are talking about orphanages again to get them out of the drug infested home. How do you clean up the person if you do not have Treatment Centers so i introduced a bill called lifeboat. That produces 1. 2 1. 5 Million Dollars to 2 million. It is a treatment. We can start putting these Treatment Centers and helping people. This second one we cannot get people into the workforce. I am down to 50 of working age people. Three things keep you out of the workforce, you have addiction, incarceration, or a record, or you have a lack of skill sets or a combination. You mayre addicted, have a criminal record. If there is not a Violent Crime or a sexual crime, the person goes to one year of treatment and passes, one year of mentoring, helping other people, they ought to have a right to go back to the sentencing judge if they can have that one time expungement. You have been outspoken in saying it is not just about the whys and the regulations, it is about the funding. You have worked to get the funding in place. In otherhat was done bills passed last year. There is moreid than needs to be done. How does clearing emergency help or is the bigger issue Getting Congress to act appropriating money to get people the help they need . I think it is both. What has happened the last year and a half is positive. Four years to get the support for the care legislation and we had conferences about s practices from around the country. It is the First Time Congress has acted to Fund Recovery programs. The point that maggie and joe made, this is not going to be solved was only one approach. It has to be multifaceted. It has to include longterm recovery. That is what legislation does. It does provide grants to the state. Well we actually overfunded it and that was a good sign. We find it more than what was authorized. We will take some more. We need more and that was in the last year and now we passed the cure act. It sends money directly to the states so care can go to there are three grants that are going to Service Providers and nonprofits. It is half 1 billion a year. This year and next year but nothing beyond that. We have to make sure we get that 500 million in this fiscal year , get as much as we can because the crisis is not getting better, it is getting worse and we have to make sure we have a longerterm strategy. We have been working on that to figure out how you can have something that is more permanent so states can plan. The commission did a good interim report. I spoke to governor christie over the weekend about the final report. He is passionate about this and committed, he is the chair of the commission. The report was due october 1. They asked for an extension. That is fine. I want to make sure they do make the and of the month deadline. Governor christie made that his intention. See his he is passionate about this. He has a personal commitment to this that is impressive. O not think the mast National Emergency is as important as what results in terms of congress. The administration cannot appropriate money. With a cando and this is positive, i have met with the president on this issue area they can declare an emergency that requires agencies to work better together. Told by theies are if itis is an epidemic is, this is a National Emergency, it will make a difference and that is good. Congress has to also do this as an emergency and that requires us to do a better job of providing some longerterm funding here. Not just funding. It is a matter of finding what works. Whatfour years of study, treatments are better than others. We will talk about the stop act in a second. There are more people dying in sametoday and i think the is true in your state from fentanyl than heroin. That is an outrage, we have to deal with that. The stop act which megan and i have worked on for your now has been stuck. Before we move on i want to a couple ofwe had questions coming in from viewers. Lets talk about the stop act. Were learning is an incredibly powerful drug that , it has killed people, it has affected numeral bowl lives and we have this problem that it is coming in through the mail from overseas. Talk about the problem and what the stop act is. And New Hampshire 70 of over as a Overdose Deaths are result of fentanyl. It is 50 times more powerful than heroin. We have had 10 deaths from carfentanil which is 100 times more powerful than fentanyl. It was intended only to tranquilize large elephants. Are synthetic. The Profit Margins are easy to make, you do not have to grow a plant as a precursor. Theyre huge and flooding rural areas of our country. I do want to add one other thing to the overall picture of what we need to do. The last thing we should be doing is destabilizing and repealing our health care in this country in terms of making sure that there is treatment accessible to people who need it. In this mix while we talk about the stop act which is critically important to getting data so we can go after the fentanyl producers and dealers, we cannot ignore the fact that an integrated Health Care System that treats Haverhill Health and Substance Use disorder is an absolutely essential piece of this and if we repeal the Affordable Care act, if we cut weicated substantially, if fail to invest in longterm treatment and have a variety of treatment modalities, we will not turn the tide on this thing and beat it. The stop act made seems like a nobrainer that we would want to crack down on Something Like this. Why is it difficult to for congress to act, to change the laws that keep these powerful drugs i can tell you the reasons but it is a mystery. This is a shock when people find out. Fentanyl which is killing more people in our state than heroine is coming into the u. S. Mail. This is not coming overland like from mexico like heroin or from countries next to us, it is coming from china and the choose the u. S. Mail because the u. S. Mail is not required packages have information on it. You have to provide events advanced data. Screenseen ups and dhl and theyre able to identify these packages. It is like finding a needle in the haystack if they do not have that information. Three flakes of this stuff can kill you. This is incredibly powerful, incredibly cheap and we have been giving Law Enforcement officials the ability to find these packages and stop them. That is not the only solution. Will increase the cost and get a little less on the street. Thist to return to is a question from a viewer. To what extent is harsher punishments for fentanyl effective . Senator feinstein has one that is involved in that aspect. Something, the Chinese Government may get serious about shutting this down. We know where it is coming from. They know where it is coming from. We can tell them how serious, will not keep letting them kill americans. This is serious and we are not standing for it. We can show to rethink down. We can try to stop the flood. Unless the Chinese Government israel and is real and gets real, we will do everything we can to put pressure on them. If there is no quid pro quo fence, the money keeps pouring in, they will keep doing it. Like the two indictments of chinese nationals as traffickers. That is the first time the Justice Department has taken this. It is moving in the right direction, it is moving too slow. There is a criminal justice aspect to this. Senator manchin, you have been outspoken in saying you cannot incarcerate your way out of this problem. You have to treat this as the alist that it is. There is another interesting another coming from viewer. What do the senators think about establishing Safe Injection Sites to curb the crisis . Giving addicts a place with a can go and be monitored while they use . We have heard about other harm reduction, Risk Reduction strategies like little exchange, is that something that would work . Let me talk about methadone, suboxone. We have other people saying you are just stringing me out. Everyone has a different approach. Places in West Virginia, Treatment Centers called recovery point. A clean slate and goes with it and these are run by severe attic, people who almost bottomed out and they are working and running these recovery points. They do not tolerate suboxone or methadone. They do not tolerate any of that and they have a 60 basically curate. They really work with we know that people need different kinds of treatments. There are also many problems that come from ongoing addictions. We need to beat be smart. We also need to hold people accountable. Weve got a lot of work to do. We are losing people every day. I will givent you that. I dont disagree with what was said. Owing back to the Drug Companies and to the need to come up ,ith nonaddictive medication we need to come up with other treatment options. Joe talked about methadone and some oxo methadone and another drug. Maggie is right, it needs to be customized to the person. Alvid trawl vivitr decreases cravings, and that has been successful for some people. Its been incredible it is incredible to me that we dont have more options for people to look at that are nonaddictive. I think thats, again, if you look at this is a broad sense, we need to go back to the board, how we went from overprescribing to being addicted into the first to the in the first place. You come up with now, nonaddictive medications. On the other hand, and, better therapies. If it wasnt for the Washington Post article and i read it sunday i knew right then that ponce and marino was that not the person to be leading this. Hes the wrong person. I applaud the president for moving as quickly as they are moving in a different direction. Its time to take action. All. T to thank you if you hadnt done that, this would still be simmering. Words. Ppreciate the kind i think thank all the senators for joining us. [applause] thank you for responding. Absolutely. Makes a tremendous point. Think the First Responders who were responding and we are going to move on to the next portion of our program. Bear with us with just a moment. Thanks again. [applause] the Washington Post and 60 minutes held an investigation looking into pharmaceutical companies, and the influence they have over federal agencies and congress. Heres more about that investigation. This is a half an hour. So great to see you here. Im one of the Washington Post on air reporters. It is great to have you guys here. Lenny bernstein, health and medicine reporter, scott, the investigative reporter, and the producer at 60 minutes, who made this happen. E will talk about two things where we go from here, but also, i want to start with how this collaboration came to be. The post and 60 minutes havent worked on Something Like this in nearly a decade. But start with where the reporting story starts. How did you even get the idea we see the end result 18 months later where did this chart start . In the beginning of 2016, we had a project launched, the National Desk at the post. The idea was to explain to people why so many people were overdoses,ioid america, middleclass whites. Editor who wanted me to explain how these hundreds of millions of opioid pills get on the street. It doesnt make sense to me why we cant just keep them in the supply chain. I started reading up on it, and calling around. Thee had been coverage of manufacturers, and doctors, pharmacies, but nothing on these wholesale distributors. I started calling around, individually, someone said you have to call joanne cc. And i did. But peer look joe ran as easy rannizizi. I got an earful, couldnt get him off the phone. If you want to join this conversation, you can tweet us postlive. Key, and autors are want to pause for a moment. These are companies ive never heard of before, but they ended up being a crucial part of your reporting. The distributors are the the three big distributors are among the top 25 Largest Companies in america. No bs ever heard of them. We had not heard of them. They take drugs of manufacturers, and bring them down to pharmacies and other places. That makes him the most important in the supply chain if you want to choke off pills that are getting out onto the street, being used. Did you know that story on the time . You get the sky on the phone, joe ran as easy. Rannizizi. Most reporters have had that conversation, where the guy on the other end says, everybody is corrupt except for me. [laughter] then, you start checking it out. Everything joe said checked out. Far as i could. Smart editors realized it needed an investigative reporter, so they connected with scott. Where did they go from there, scott . We kept hearing the stories that the dea was slowing down its cases. These companies it was going nowhere, hitting a brick wall in d. C. We put together a list of people who were either current dea investigators, or who had to retire recently, and began coldcalling them, sending them emails. We soon began to connect with people who were very upset. These people worked for something called division of diversion control at the dea, something lenny and i had never heard of before. Ive been a reporter for almost 30 years, and never knew this division existed. Its a group of dedicated men and women who do nothing but regulate the pharmaceutical industry, make sure pharmaceuticals are not on the street. They were making cases to try to stop the flow of drugs. These cases were getting stalled at headquarters. They couldnt understand why. People in these immunities were dying left and right in these communities were dying left and right. People would come in and say, what are you guys doing to stop this epidemic . Theyd say, we are doing the best we can. That was one of the first things we did. Documented the slowdown of cases at the da, what we later found out was intense rusher from capitol hill and the pharmaceutical industry. How does 60 minutes get involved . Blessed to be working with these guys. They are fantastic reporters, but i think all of this begins with the fact that people have to trust each other. Had a relationship with a fantastic investigative editor here. We did a story with john solomon when he was reporting here. A number of people getting freed from jail the lab changing their analysis of things to read we had a great experience to build on. Jeff and i had stayed in touch over the years, and we talked about, what could we do, what ould be the right story to do . It ended up with the executive producer of 60 minutes, one phone call. That is the first story think marty or jeff had brought up in the call. They said, thats what weve got to do. I said, lets hear what else they got. He said, no. This is what weve got to do. How did he know . When you have 200,000 people dying in the United States, and still many people are unaware of the scope of this, thats a big story. Here,oked with my friends if you dont have to hunt you dont have 200,000 people dying without leaving a paper trail. Approached it. What was wonderful about this collaboration, each one of us brought a different talent, like bringing three chefs into a different restaurant to each have different skill sets. ,e were able to share sources editorial approaches, we stole lines from each others story. It was really we trusted each other. They, they looked at our copy, we looked at their copy, provided suggestions both ways, and it was really a true collaboration. Did a fantastic story in october 20 16. Unfortunately it dropped a couple weeks right before the president ial election, so it was buried, nobody really noticed it. With the approach to a new bell, it gave it a new impetus to take a second look at this it gave it a new bill, a new impetus to take a look at second look at this. Its different talking to a reporter rather than a camera. Joe easy rannazzisi we sat around for a couple of hours, chatted. With anyts the same relationship. A certain level of trust develops. Bill whitakers a guy who is a total gentleman, total honest guy. He has been in the business forever. He did the interview with joe. He is the correspondence on the broadcast. I think that develops great chemistry between bill and joe, almost instantaneously. Room, and wen the watched it happen. The way it has unfolded, news going on scott and lenny are down suggestions. Thats what i mean by a true collaboration. I asked lenny if he had worked with 60 minutes before, and you looked at me as though i had asked if you are the king of a england. Did this feel like a unique opportunity . Im a health reporter. I dont get an opportunity to work with 60 minutes. I dont get an opportunity to work with scott all that often. It was like a dream come true for me. I also want to say, there is about when youal sit a guy down in front of those 60 minutes cameras with bill. Hitaker three feet away we had talked to joe many, many times. We had gotten great information from him. Then, he read what comes out of his mouth when hes talking to 60 minutes. You are like, oh my god. Theres something about it that gets people to talk. Its a testament to his interview style. I dont know her many you have seen im sure many of you have see him in action. Basically, what he did is set down, helping behind the scenes down. His ira set joe their knees are practically touching, and they basically didnt let him get up for almost four hours. Maybe a bathroom break, but that was it. They gave him water. He was being interrogated by the caa. You are being interviewed by a guy who is so skilled, and such a gentleman, and puts you at ease. I learned so much watching bill, interview him. It took them from their very beginning of his career and the the narrative arc, bill walked him through his own life. Youill knows about this have to have a conversation with somebody. Listen to the persons answer, not just try to check off and go through questions. That, it gets him to go to the next level, and it gets him deeper. In many ways, its sort of what television brings to an interview. Not saying newspapers dont, but sometimes they get the quote, see you later. Tv explores the deeper aspects of things. It kinds of kind of brings it out. N you have Something Like when they were talking about drug dealers and lab coats, the quote in the piece. Immediately reacted. You know what a horrible thing that is she says, i know it, i was there and i arrested those guys, i authorized it. There was a whole sequence that develops from Something Like that, that you get on tv. You can join the conversation by using twitter, postlive. Another element of this is the accountability question. You try to talk with congressman tom marino of pennsylvania, nominated to be the drugs are the drug star czar. Is this to display out how i pictured in my head, showing up with the 60 minutes crew, the scariest thing i could think of . Are not sure how many of you saw the broadcast. Im sure many did, because it was one of the most viewed in recent history. When we walked in, and bill turned to the poor guy sitting behind the desk and said, we are with 60 minutes, we like to talk to punishment reno, the guy looks like he was going to faint marino,ressman reno the guy looks like he was going to faint. [laughter] i worked there for 17 years, ive interviewed lots of people. A lot of people will hang up ive worked here for 17 years, ive interviewed lots of people. A lot of people hang up, but not a lot. Www. Cspan. Org only in new york. Www. Cspan. Org only in new york. [laughter] but no, its never happened in washington. Weve done a number of these situational walkins. Frankly, most of the time, congress would try to make the best of it. This was extraordinary, in terms of the reaction. Yeah. To be clear, we made numerous attempts to set up interviews. We contacted his office, sent over emails, so this was our lastditch thing. We really felt like he owed the next donation to the public as towhy owed an explanation the public as to why he should be held accountable for this. He refused to talk about that. We want to pay him a visit. Talk about whats happened since the 60 minutes broadcast, the Washington Post piece aired sunday. Is not to decide which change is effective. You guys are telling the story, but we did see President Trump presss this on a conference, as well as on a radio show. Look. Rino said, if theres even a perception of conflict of interest with Insurance Companies, he doesnt want anything to do with it. Do you get has the white house responded . Are they savvy to whats this story broke, and what the future of this was . Wasnt the white house was . Do i think the white house was . Yeah. Yes. Didnt know what the impact would be. One of the things of collaboration, it caught is all areas of social platforms. You are covering tv, news. We have different audiences, the Washington Post and cbs. The Washington Post audience is being introduced to 60 minutes, and vice a versa. It brings up everything. From what i know, President Trump is a regular watcher of 60 minutes. Im a regular reader of the Washington Post not a regular reader of the Washington Post. [laughter] i think one of the things you is the hundreds, hundreds, maybe into the thousands of females that we are. Etting from people two things. Number one, at the time when the press is under some pressure and under attack from the highest levels of our government. Thanks for doing this. Is, i know someone who died of an opiate overdose. If i had to break it down into two very broad categories, thats what im reading and hearing. Combined with other elements of this story, or whatsproducing are producing this sense of outrage. I want to reflect on a comments. Story burkey is here with her husband. She said her thought was, it doesnt happen to us. [indiscernible] we are not the family who has someone die from this epidemic. We didnt expect that, basically. Are you hearing from people who have that same sense of this continuing to get worse, and continuing to affect people on a personal level . At this point in the epidemic, it does happen to people like the burkeys. Liktheres no more segregatig of populations with feelgood epidemic. Ethnicity,party, where you live. Those lines are gone now. Bethe future, therell thousands who died from Drug Overdoses, more than half over dont opioid. They are shocked, because there is such a normal, average, working class, middle class family while they are a working class, middle class family. Everyone, with from the wealthiest folks on down. Is is going to get worse before it gets better . I suspect it is. Suspect thatut i the curve has not been bent yet. I fear whats going on right now. Im hearing anecdotally, theres indications of 2017 being worse. One glimmer right now is that doctors have started to reduce the number of prescriptions for these things that they write. T will keep future sus to that will keep the number of future substance abusers down somewhat, but i do hear we are going to see larger numbers before we see smaller ones. What do since has happened in the last what you think is happened in the last couple of days . Ash fore is a madds czarbody to run the drug office, theres also pressure on the lot mr. Marino has introduced, along with a handful of other members of congress. We will see what happens with that. The dea chief judge has written a 115 page legal analysis of this bill, and what she said this upends 40 years of law, and it makes it difficult for the da to do its job. A. G. Sessions yesterday, along the Deputy Attorney general, said they were looking at this seriously. People theres a lot of at the Justice Department, perhaps the white house legal counsel, taking a look at the law, and what it says. Toyou are i word to were read this law, its a lot of gobbledygook. If you are a drug lawyer or Something Like that, you know what those words mean and what they do. This is white slipped through congress. People say well, its the ensuring Patient Access and Drug Enforcement act, why would you be opposed to that . I does nothing to ensure patient acces. It does nothing to ensure access. It does the opposite. Think thats the next step is what happens with that law, calls to repeal it. We will have to see what happens. We just heard in the green room from senators, that the senate Judiciary Committee will be holding a hearing soon on the bill. I would not be surprised if Joe Rannazzisi is their first witness. I heard from scott as well that youve got so many emails. Also this story gets the fundamentals of government, right . The bill doesnt hit my schoolhouserock memory, where a bill becomes a law, everybody discusses it, changes it, and votes. Are you getting feedback from people who are glad that you are taking the scales from our eyes, about how legislation really happens here in washington . Absolutely. Weve got a lot of readers calling and saying, thank you very much. You are Holding People accountable. This is exactly what journalists are supposed to do. Ive got notes from people saying, ive never written to a reporter on my life. Thank you very much. Its been a humbling experience. I think what we were able to do is pull the curtain back on how washington works. Its not pretty. Legislation. Ight members of congress do not Pay Attention to that legislation. A lot of them lobbyists to write legislation. A lot of them take money, are not sure what is behind that money, turning a blind eye to what corporations want. These companies dont give money to members of congress for nothing. They usually want something in return. What the Washington Post and 60 minutes has shown the country, our elected representatives need to pay more attention to whats happening. Onwe have a comments section the 60 minutes webpage. Normally, after a story i have done, its about 50 50. This is the first time, reading the comments, its a most universal, good for you guys. Story in thed a years ive been there that has been so positive. As you know, the United States is divided. Not divided. S were that goes back to what libby and lenny were saying. This knows no bounds. Everybody knows somebody who has been affected. Everybody knows somebody who has died, or knows somebody who knows somebody who has died. These are republicans, democrats, families that have had no political and whatsoever political bend whatsoever. This is not a political issue. It is been an outpouring of prewitt appreciation from all kinds of people. People on twitter are generally wondering, are enough epidemic . Ering the are enough news organizations covering the epidemic, and has especially from an investigative lens . They are asking, where else can go . Reporting we dont inspect you guys to divulge exactly what you are working on. [laughter] so, what insight can you give us . Regional newspapers have been hit hard over the past 1012 years. All of them are covering the opioid epidemic, but dont have the luxury, sometimes, of our two news organizations, to spend six months on an investigative piece like that. We are grateful for that opportunity. I think some of them are doing a damn good job of reflecting whats going on in their community, and making people aware who can change things, of whats going on. Coverage of this epidemic, thats really inspiring to us to see these small news organizations struggling because theyve lost so much advertising over the last decade, still putting resources into the story. Its really important. Cheer all those people on. Where does is go from here . I think the story we did will get local television stations now to say, lets cover it in our area in a bigger way. Lets not just cover the car crash with local free alarm fires. To this. Resources when that happens, heres how it works in washington. Those stories happen, people at home get outraged, they call their congressman. The congress then looks at the mail and says, i better do something. Nations proposed an explanation is proposed to remedy it. Ultimately, it goes to the executive branch that says, this will be a voting issue in 2020. Then, it happens. In many ways, it begins with the media coverage. Its being recognized now in the local level, the most important level in media at the moment. Its that happens, it finds way to washington. Should we watch out for more collaborations between the Washington Post and 60 minutes . Yes. Yes. [laughter] [applause] anything else you want to say about that . The journalist in me is we wont be doing the chicago cubs. [laughter] muchntlemen, thank you so for sharing some insight. What we just remind you, we have been talking, of course, producer of 60 minutes, and our producer scott, and lenny bernstein. Im libby casey. Thank you for joining us today. You can follow all of our Upcoming Events at Washington Post live. Com. Thank you so much, everyone. [applause] [captions Copyright National cable satellite corp. 2016] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. Visit ncicap. Org] obsessions testifies before the senate Judiciary Committee. Sextet general Jeff Sessions testifies. Later, secretary of state rex tillerson. Later, centcom commander general joseph hotel on the mid votel on the middle east. Testifying before the senate Judiciary Committee today, attorney general Jeff Sessions defended President Trumps position to fire fbi director james comey, and the decision to rebecca Obama Administration criminal justice reforms. While serving in the senate, Jeff Sessions previously sat on the