we needed to have the vote in order to bring it to a conclusion. plus, today there s new reaction from one of the lawyers representing christine blasey ford in an interview with msnbc last night. there was no effort to leak this letter and have this unfold as it did. that s an absolute falsehood. we keep hearing there are no corroborating witnesses, but, affect, there are corroborating witnesses who have haven t been interviewed or talked to, and those witnesses can say several years ago well before judge kavanaugh was ever consider for the supreme court, she told me that he sexually assaulted her. they cherry picked who they spoke to. let s go straight to nbc s mike viqueira on capitol hill. what do we know as the senate was trying to charge democrats to changing what the outcome might be. good morning to you, richard.
really tried to twist final arms to get them on board. it was vice presidemike pence w shuttling back and forth to capitol hill having face-to-face meet force weeks now trying to take this piece of legislation over the finish line. president trump getting involved, but he didn t go out on the bully pulpit. he didn t travel the country to try to get this passed. he s really trying to walk a little bit of a fine line here. but look, there s no doubt the political stakes are high for this president. this is an issue he, obviously, campaigned op and then just this past weekend he promised that this legislation would cover those with preexisting conditions and that s really going to be a flashpoint, not only as we watch the debate unravel in the house but if this does, in fact, move to the senate. now, that amendment that vick was talking ability would put $8 billion over the next five years to lower costs for those with preexisting conditions. but yesterday, i pressed press secretary sean
addition we re both yeses. a last-minute amendment provides billions of dollars for preexisting conditions. but huge unanswered questions this morning, how many people are actually going to be covered and here s a good one how much is it going to cost. one month after the health bill went down in flames. i m disappointed because we could have had it. the president now on the verge of victory. we begin the end of obamacare once and for all. all right then. we re going to start with break. house republicans gathering at this very moment behind closed doors, a final meeting less than one hour before the first procedural votes related to the health care bill. i want to take you first to nbc s mike viqueira on capitol hill. do you think they got the votes? they say they do, stephanie, but it s really going to be touch and go. you ll see mibehind me members congress being chased by a hoard
republicans are holding a closed-door meeting on capitol hill right now. just hours before the house is expected to vote on the gop s latest health care bill. joining me now is republican congressman thomas garret from virginia. congressman, you were a no on the original gop health care bill. then an undecided. and now supporting the latest version. what changed your mind? the fact that i was invited to the closed-door meeting. we have a bill that allows a lot of latitude to drive down the cost of premiums and deductibles in their states, the concept of 50 laboratories of democracy to see what wcan do not to have coverage for people, but care for people. the paradigm we ve been working under on the aca and saw the cbo that said 24 million would lose coverage is false. when news media tell us
welcome back. i m stephanie ruhle. you re watching msnbc. time for your primer everything you need to know to get your day started. we begin on capitol hill. republicans are still in a closed-door meeting before votes about begin at the top of the hour for a bill to repeal and replace obamacare. top republicans are confident they have the votes needed to pass. james kemi wi comey will ret to the hill for a closed door hearing before the house intelligence committee. he testified in front of the committee for four hours yesterday in an ongoing investigation into russia s interference in the 2016 election. the house passed a $1.1 trillion spending bill wednesday to fund the government through the month of september. the bill increases spending for defense and border security but does not include money specifically for a border wall. it heads to the senate for a vote before the friday night deadline to avoid a government shutdown. and prince philip stepping