He even went on to say officials collected information from the president which, of course, sounds like a big deal, right . Except for some huge asterisk. Nunes said the new information did not contradict his earlier statement that president obama did not order a wine tap of trump and that the communications were intercepted legally and collected incidentally which would suggest that trump and his allies were not the target of the surveillance. Nunes refused to say where he got this information, referring only to sources and, amazingly, he then went to the white house to brief the president on what he knew and hold another press conference. Keep in mind, nunes is supposed to be leading the house investigation into Trump Campaigns relationship to russia, not telling the possible subjects of that investigation what he knows. In fact, if nunes did, in fact, learn that communications involving Trump Officials have been intercepted incidentally, he should probably be pretty curious, even perhaps concerned about who exactly they were talking to. Nunes actions left veteran congressional observers as well as Many Democrats absolutely gobsmacked. Because nunes did not even tell the top democrat of his own committee, representative adam schiff, what he supposedly knows. I can say this. The chairman will need to decide whether he is the chairman of an independent investigation into conduct which includes allegations of potential coordination between the Trump Campaign and the russians or he is going to act as a surrogate of the white house because he cannot do both. And unfortunately i think the actions of today throw great doubt into the ability of the chairman and the committee to conduct the investigation the way it ought to be conducted. Earlier this evening, republican senator john mccain told nbc news he was taken aback by the actions of nunes. What this is now really, greta, is a requirement for a select committee. I believe the Intelligence Committee in the senate between senator warner and senator burr, but this shows a tremendous chasm between the two senior members of the house Intelligence Committee. What we need is a select committee. No longer does the congress have credibility to handle this alone and i dont say that lightly. Meanwhile, after saying sunday the evidence regarding possible Trump Campaign collusion with russia was circumstantial, schiff went a step further. All you have right now is a circumstantial case. Actually, no, chuck. I can tell you that the case is more than that and i cant go into the particulars but there is more than circumstantial evidence now so, again, i think so you have seen direct evidence of collusion . I dont want to go into specifics but i will say there is evidence that is not circumstantial and is very much worthy of investigation so that is what we ought to do. Joining me now, democratic senator ben cardin, Ranking Member of the Senate Committee of foreign relations. The house intelligence chair says a source has confirmed that the possibility or that it was the case that transition and perhaps the president were swept up incidentally in surveillance, he doesnt say who the source is, he goes to the white house to brief the president , comes forward and tells the press without telling the Ranking Member, what is your reaction to that set of actions taken by devin nunes today . This is hard to understand how a person could get confidential information and have a press conference, not talk to the ranking democrat of the committee, release that information to the white house and hes supposed to be doing an independent investigation. I agree with senator mccain, there is no credibility in the ability to hold an independent investigation by the house Intelligence Committee. I go one step further, though. I think we need an independent commission made up of fulltime experts that can look at all the aspects of this russian connection to the United States and be able to give a full report to the American People and congress but its clear to me the way the house is conducting their investigation by releasing this information is just outrageous. When you talk about an independent commission do you think theres any bipartisan support for that kind of thing . Well, we know that when we were attacked after 9 11 we had strong bipartisan support for an independent commission. We had an independent commission and it brought out changes we needed to do in our government to keep us safe. With this attack of russia against our free election system we need a similar commitment and to me a Bipartisan Commission is the only way you can get the credible investigation that will give the American People confidence that we really are taking this issue seriously. Obviously things work differently in the house than they do in the senate. But youve been in the senate long enough to have been on both sietsds of the majority and minority. For those of us that do not work in the United States congress, what would it mean for the chair to do Something Like this without telling the Ranking Member . Ive never heard of this done before, ever. Ive been involved in a lot of Sensitive Information with the Ranking Member, with the chairman and i have never heard of this being done before. There is an unwritten rule that you dont go to the press without having conversation with your counterpart on the other partys side, the Ranking Member or the chairman. Thats the way you do business. It really undermines the credibility of the confidence of the committee that the chairman is interested in the investigation. You also have to say, the president came forward to say basically that the tweet storm that has famously sent all of washington searching for its justification that this was essentially a validation of what he said. What do you make of that . Im not surprised by the president s comment. He interprets anything he wants the way he wants to interpret it. But its absolutely clear. It was absolutely clear russia used Cyber Attacks to try to influence our election candidate trump and President Trump was very late to endorse that finding. Its very clear there was no wiretap on trump by the obama administration, that has been clearly established and mr. Trump is going to be late in accepting that finding but the findings are what they are and mr. Trump will use the information in a way that suits him but its not the fact. Senator ben cardin, appreciate that, thank you. Im joined by matt miller, former spokesperson for attorney general eric holder. What is your reaction to the actions of chairman nunes today . Astonished. I have never seen a Committee Chairman come out in front of the press and pour gasoline on himself and light himself on fire, which is basically what he did. If you look at what he did today he, one, potentially leaked classified information. Two, he compromised the investigation his committee is supposedly conducting by briefing the president on it, and, three, he completely ruined his own credibility and exposed himself as a partisan shill and it was all for no reason. The thing he came out and revealed doesnt even back up what the president said in his original tweet so its hard to know what he was trying to accomplish. The only thing he did today with this kind of stunt is add more credibility, more voice to the calls for an independent commission which you now see senator mccain joining the calls for. I want to start with the first thing you said because it struck me as well that a huge part of the testimony before that House Committee with comey and rogers the other day, from the republican side, focused on leaks. If it is the case that incidental surveillance were to have swept up people in the Transition Office or the president himself, i assume thats probably classified information. That seems fairly closely held. So for the chairman to for the republicans to spend all day monday to talk about leaks, i was astonished he would come forward and disclose that if it is in fact true. Its absolutely classified information. Its obviously classified. That hearing was a real disaster for them on monday because it didnt just you didnt just have the two big headlines from it, one that the white house is under federal criminal investigation and, two what trump said about wiretapping was completely false but you saw the republican members talk about leaks in a way you know, when you have the fbi director say were investigating whether members of the president s campaign conducted treason and the only questions you can ask are about leaks it already made them look really bad so for them to come out today and then not only continue to look like he has no interest in investigating the underlying charges but then to come out and leak classified information himself shows what a mockery they were really making of that hearing on monday. You were the spokesperson at the department of justice and you noted today earlier i saw you notice that theres something improper fundamentally about the chair of this Committee Going the first thing hes doing with the information he received to brief the white house which, again, is at the center of the entity that is currently, as we know, as confirmed by james comey, being investigated. Yeah, thats exactly right. Its important because there arent its not just that nunes hurt the credibility of his own investigation, depending on what it is that he has, what it is that his source came and told him, if its something that relates to the investigation that the fbi is conducting and he went and briefed the president on that, and that goes to other people in the white house, including people that may be under investigation, it could compromise that investigation. Its absolutely another way and what he did is just so inappropriate. So far outside the bounds of what he should be doing as a Committee Chairman. Matt miller, thank you. Thank you. All that is just one part of the larger story around the Trump Campaigns potential ties to russia. Tonight, new explosive revelations about President Trumps former Campaign Manager Paul Manafort who the Associated Press reported today was secretly working for a russian billionaire a decade ago to advance the interests of vladimir putin, eventually signing a contract paying him 10 million a year for his work. Manafort proposed in a confidential Strategy Plan as early as june, 2005, that he would influence politics, business dealings and News Coverage inside the United States. Europe and the former soviet republics to benefit the putin government the a. P. Reported. In a statement, manafort responded i do not work for the russian government. Once again, smear and innuendo are being used to paint a false picture. Trumps connection to manafort dates back to the 1980s when trump hired manaforts lobbying firm to fight the expansion of indian casinos and change the flight path of airplanes over maralago. Manafort would go on to buy a condo in trump tower and last march trump hired manafort as adviser and promoted him to chief strategist and Campaign Chairman giving him control of Daily Campaign operations. I have fantastic people, manafort just came on. Hes great. He doesnt have to do this, like i dont have to. He didnt need to do this but he wanted to. Manafort was fired in august after ledgers surfaced suggesting he may have accepted more than 12 million in undisclosed Cash Payments from a prorussian Political Party in ukraine. At the time, trumps allies lauded manaforts contribution. I thought paul did an important job in getting through the convention and getting the campaign more of a national campaign, more of a professional campaign. Nobody should underestimate how much Paul Manafort did to help with this campaign to where it is right now. This week White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer claimed manafort had played a very limited role in the campaign. And today spicer cast manafort as little more than a delegate wrangler who, was involved in the campaign who was involved just under five months. Thats two months longer than the famous and controversial steve bannon. Spicer had this to say. Can you say today with certainty that manafort never tried to pressure or encourage the campaign to take on a more prorussian position on any issues . Not that im aware of, i cant but theres nothing that suggests that that was the case. Spicer was also asked if he could say with certainty that no one in the white house is working in the interests of a foreign government. I can tell you that every form has been filled out that it reporter so you trust absolutely. Youve got to i mean, people are filling out forms, to sit here and ask me whether i can vouch for whatever it is, a few hundred people that have filled out everything, you know, that would be ridiculous for me to stand here and suggest that i possibly could. Joining me now, olivia nuzzi, washington correspondent for new york city magazine. That answer was so interesting to me. It was definitely interesting. Of course i can vouch for the honesty of the people that work for us that they havent lied on their forms and are not working as foreign agents. When asked if he could assure the public theres no foreign agents working in the white house, his response instead was they have filled out the forms. Its like bad satire. I cant believe that that was his answer on something so important. Hes probably concerned like a lot of people right now of saying something incorrect and later being proven to be wrong so i dont blame sean spicer but its shocking to see him not be able to answer that question. Watching them try to minimize the role of manafort is somewhat absurd because we were all there during the campaign but one other thing thats come through is this is not a relationship with manafort that started during the campaign. It extends much further back than that. Not only in the 80s when trump hired him but manafort is a longtime associate of roger stone whos known trump since the 1970s. They were all friends with royko hen who is trumps political mentor. So its absurd to suggest manafort was a minor intern on the campaign herding delegates when he was an instrumental part of it. It was only five month, sure, but the campaign was not that long in general so five months was quite a large chunk of the campaign and he was an instrumental part of the campaign. They hired him not only to heard delegates but to professionalize the operion. Remember, trump didn have any establishment figures working for him. He had people like Corey Lewandowski who had never been part of president ial campaigns before so manafort, he was seen as someone who would come in and professionalize trump and bring in this president ial donald trump who obviously never arrived in the end. And not only that, the reporting youve done and others indicates that and this i think is crucial, is that his relationship to the campaign didnt end after he lost his job. In fact, reporting he was a key figure behind the scenes during the transition. In november at the daily beast where i worked at the time i reported along with my colleague that two sources confirmed to us that Paul Manafort was working on the transition, was advising on Personnel Matters and was in direct contact not only with president elect trump at the time but also with Vice President elect mike pence almost in daily contact with him so its absurd for anyone to suggest he just sort of vanished right when he left the campaign in august and also remember he was not paid by trump during the campaign so its difficult to be able to measure during which period he was working for the campaign. Remember we can track Corey Lewandowskis involvement with the campaign after he had formally left the campaign because we saw the payments still going to his firm but we never got that with Paul Manafort so for all we know hes still talking to donald trump. We dont have any solid facts about this. I want to highlight one thing in the manafort statement to the a. P. Because i think its worth pointing out to people. The a. P. Reports that he had a contract with an oligarch closely aligned to putin who paid him to further the interest of putin. The denial that came from Paul Manafort in which he called it smears and innuendo, he said i never worked for the russian government which is not the allegation made in the reporting. Thats a minor fact. Its ridiculous and i think hes expecting people to just sort of accept that answer and to not press him further and hope it will go away, maybe something more important will happen and all of our attentions will be deflected towards that. But this is a big story and theres a dripdrip happening and i think its going to continue for a very long time. Yeah, hes wanted for questioning in ukraine and there are questions still swirling about the payments that ended up getting him kicked off the campaign not to mention the things surrounding him now. Olivia nuzzi, thanks for joining me. Thank you. Still to come, senator al franken on calls to halt the gorsuch vote until the trump russia investigation is completed. Plus hours away from the vote on trumpcare and the republican defections appear to be mounting. Senator Bernie Sanders joins me on the battle over health care after the twominute break. After the twominute break. 52 reporter how confident are you that the bill will pass . And if it doesnt pass, is there a plan b . There is no plan b. Theres plan a and plan a. Were going to get this done. Sean spicer made very clear today the affirmative argument for the Gop Health Care bill now has nothing to do with its substance. The argue system that you have to pass it because theres no plan b and if its not passed, it will be a disaster. But that argument doesnt seem to be working so well. The chairman of the group that appears to be the most intent on sinking this bill, the House Freedom caucus, is calling for tomorrows vote to be postponed. We believe that we need to postpone the vote and get it right. They are fully engaged but i can say this at this particular point, we need changes to the underlying bill before we vote on in the the house. Theres not enough votes to pass it tomorrow. There are more than enough Freedom Caucus members to be against this to keep it from passing tomorrow. Freedom caucus members may have their own ideological reasons but it appears to be losing moderate votes as well. The more we learn, substantively the worse it looks. A Kaiser Family analysis finding deductibles would rise under the Gop Health Care plan from an average of about 2,500 to 4,100, an increase of 1500. And if theres one thing in the white house and congress have hammered on, its been high deductibles under obamacare. Their plan,ing to kaiser, would increase those deductibles. Joining me now, senate orr Bernie Sanders of vermont. Senator, lets start on deductibles. This has been a genuine critique of the plans offered on the exchanges, that they have been high deductible plans and also apparently something this bill would exacerbate. Chris, i think its probably wrong to refer to this legislation as a health care plan. Its primary purpose is to give some 300 billion in tax breaks to the wealthiest 2 . Its a tax plan to help the very wealthy and the pharmaceutical industry and Insurance Companies with huge tax breaks. In terms of the essence of their socalled plan, theyre going to throw 20 Million People off of insurance, defund planned parenthood and according to the aarp if you are 64 years of age trying to get by on 25,000 a year, your Health Care Costs are going to go up from 1700 today to 13,000. As you just indicated, as difficult as the deductible situation is now and it is a real problem for millions of people this plan makes it even worse. I know you think this is primarily driven this is basically a tax bill. Its a tax cut thats got health care wrapped around it but if thats the case, why are they going through all the trouble to do this when they could straight up pass a tax cut. I dont get it. Chris, trust me, theyre going do that as well. Coming on down the pike are massive tax breaks for the wealthiest people in the country but this is the start. There is Something Else involved in this legislation and that is this is the implementation of the Koch Brothers ideology which basically wants to eliminate every piece of legislation passed in the last 80 years which protects the elderly and working people and children and the sick and the poor. These guys believe this is the Koch Brothers, that government should not play a role in helping people in need or working people. So it decimates medicaid. It will make medicare less solvent, cuts three years of solvency off of medicare and theyre going to come back with more and more cuts to programs working people need. And remember this is from a president who campaigned, the guy who campaigned as a champion of the working class. This Health Care Proposal their budget will be horrific for working class families all over this country. You say this is an embodiment of this Koch Brothers vision which is to strip away the social safety net, its true. It will cap and cut medicaid, it will reduce medicare solvency but respond to the argument being made by the most politically potent force that threatens this bill, the House Freedom caucus. They say this is republican welfare, that youre throwing money at the problem, youre guy who campaigned as a champion of the working class. This Health Care Proposal their budget will be horrific for working class families all over this country. You say this is an embodiment of this Koch Brothers vision which is to strip away the social safety net, its true. It will cap and cut medicaid, it will reduce medicare solvency but respond to the argument being made by the most politically potent force that threatens this bill, the House Freedom caucus. They say this is republican welfare, that youre throwing money at the problem, youre creating a new entitlement, that this betrays conservative principles. Those are the true believers. What people like ryan understand the that you cant do it all at one time. You cant go before the American People and say we are tomorrow going to pass legislation to eliminate social security, medicare, medicaid, well wipe out the Postal Service and the veterans administration. They understand you cant do that. What the Freedom Caucus is about is theyre more ideological. They want to move quicker. They say, look, lets end this whole damn thing, why are you talking about tax credits . Forget about it. Government should not play any role or almost any role in providing health dire the American People. If youre middleclass, if youre working class, if youre poor and you get sick, tough luck, youre on your own. You may have to die, you may have to go bankrupt, government is not there for you. So they are leading the effort but ryan and his friends are not all that far behind. You are a veteran legislator. Youve been in both the house and the senate, youve had and youve played a unique role because youre an independent even though you caucused with democrats what would it mean to bring this vote to the floor of the house and have it fail . Well if it fails a lot of the reason for that, i think, goes to people all over this country who stood up and said to republican legislators, sorry, youre not going to decimate medicaid because my mom is in a nursing home and i need medicaid to help pay for her care. Or for people who have preexisting conditions who understand that they need that protection when they go to a doctor. So i want to thank all of the people whove stood up and fought back from a pitical point of view, yeah, i think it will be clearly a defeat for ryan and forrump. I think they will regroup and come back, but i think the good news, chris, that in the midst of this trump disaster, millions of people, a lot of working people, some of whom voted for donald trump. Remember, trump said i am going to bring you a wonderful program, health care for all people. Well, guess what . He lied. Hes going to throw 24 Million People off health insurance. The American People are catching on. Our job is to not forget for a second we remain the only major country on earth not to guarantee health care to all people as a right and the fight continues for a medicare for all single payer system. That is my longterm goal. All right, senator Bernie Sanders, thank you. Thank you, chris. Still to come, much more on what tomorrows big vote means for the president and his agenda going forward. Plus, the democratic push to suspend any voting on the Supreme Court until the investigation of trump ties to russia are over. Senator al franken on the credibility crisis in the white house and judge gorsuch ahead. Were following breaking news out of london tonight where a man apparently acting alone plowed a car into pedestrians and stabbed a Police Officer outside of parliament in what police are calling an attack inspired by international terrorism. The Police Officer, 48yearold keith palmer, was killed along with three civilians and about 40 people were injured. The attacker was also shot and killed by police. We, will of course, be following the latest developments in this story and bring you more updates as they become available. It is unseemly to be moving forward so fast on confirming a Supreme Court justice with a lifetime appointment while this big gray cloud of an fbi investigation hangs over the presidency. Senate minority leader Chuck Schumer says this is not the time to be voting on the president s Supreme Court nominee while the fbi is investigating possible collusion between Trumps Campaign and russia. Senator Elizabeth Warren also seems to be suggesting a pivot towards obstruction tweeting neil gorsuch is up for a lifetime appointment to the Supreme Court, for a president Whose Campaign is under investigation. But despite those protests, the confirmation hearing for judge neil gorsuch continues. Yesterday at the hearing, senator al franken called into question not the judgment of the president but the man hes nominated for the Supreme Court. It is absurd to say this company is in its rights to fire him because he made the choice of possibly dying from freezing to death or causing other people to die possibly by driving an unsafe vehicle. Thats absurd. Now i had a career in identifying absurdity. [ laughter ] and i know it when i see it and it makes me, you know, it makes me question your judgment. Joining me now is senator al franken, democrat from minnesota. That moment in yesterdays hearing struck me because largely i feel like observers have said that judge gorsuch has no inflated glove on him, et cetera. That moment got attention. I guess my question is what do you say to people who say you are cherry picking among many, many opinions one specific set of facts to cast him in the worst possible light . Well, senators on our side of the aisle asked him about all kinds of cases and this is one in which the facts were i dont want to go through all the facts but everybody in that big hearing room when this driver had to face the choice of either staying there in 14 below weather while he had hypothermia, staying there with this disabled tractortrailer where the trailers brakes were frozen or take off with it knowing that the truck wasnt sound and possibly being a danger to everybody, what he did was he took out separated the trailer and went with the cab and he got found a place to get warm. He was very in danger of dying from freezing to death. He had fall on the sleep already once and so when i asked everybody basically in the hearing room what would you have done . Would you have done what the driver did . And he was fired for this and judge gorsuch said well, i hadnt thought about it. So he was the only one there who would havent done the obvious thing that he was fired for and there is a sort of plain meaning clear meaning test that he applied to this statute because he operated the you cant be fired for refusing to operate an unsafe vehicle and he focused on the word operate and he did operate the vehicle and i said, well, yeah, but theres an exception to that rule which is absurdity and having to choose between possibly dying or possibly killing people another way, requiring that is absurd and thats what i was talking about and i think it connected because it spoke to some kind of rigidity in his judgment but basically we talked about all these 54 decisions the roberts courts had made. Go ahead, sorry. I want to ask you your opinion on what Chuck Schumer has said and what Elizabeth Warren seemed to hint she might also be moving towards which is the idea that against the backdrop of a world in which the fbi is actively investigating the possibility of collusion between the president s campaign and a foreign adversary that this lifetime appointment procedure should be essentially put on pause. Well, ive been in these hearings all week and we had an unusual thing where we had a Supreme Court a nomination hearing on monday and all the attention was on the house Intelligence Committee so i think it wouldnt hurt to take our time on this because i dont think the American People really had the time to Pay Attention given this very, very serious news that came out of that hearing and that weve been hearing since. Senator al franken, thanks for joining us. Sure, thank you, bye. Still to come, less than one day before the vote on a longpromised Republican Health care bill, the republican defections are mounting tonight. Well have the update ahead. Plus tonights thing 1 thing 2 starts right after this. Long ago, an empire was born evony the original empirebuilding game that started it all. So what became of this legendary game . Well. It just arrived on your smartphone evony download it now and play for free thing 1 tonight, remember when the president claimed without a shred of credible evidence that millions of americans voted illegally and thats why he lost the popular vote . The commissioner of the fec, ellen weintraub, has not forgotten and again today demanded answers in a letter to the president writing this country should make policy based on facts not unsupported statements no matter how highranking the source. Facts matter, mr. President. But today we did get evidence of voter fraud, not thousands or millions but one single case involving this exrepublican party chairman. It seems to me and correct me if im wrong that virtually every case of voter fraud i can remember in my lifetime was committed by democrats. Am i on to something here or do i just not have facts . The irony of this story is almost impossible to believe and its thing 2 in 60 seconds. There is still no evidence to support the president s claim that millions of illegal votes were cast in 2016 but one case of voter fraud just popped up. Et steve curtis, the former colorado gop chairman who said on his radio show just last year that only democrats commit voter fraud and who has now been charged with wait for it voter fraud. For allegedly filling out and mailing in his exwifes 2016 ballot for president. The state was tipped off after his exwife tried to register to vote in South Carolina only to find out her ballot had been cast in colorado. A local reporter caught up with curtis at the courthouse yesterday. Reporter did you vote for your exwife in the last election, steve . Were not going to talk about this. Reporter im going to talk about it. Did you vote for your exwife in the last election . Do you owe her an apology . Steve curtis is the only 2016 voter Fraud Investigation in colorado that resulted in criminal charges. Curtis now faces up to three years in prison, a 5,000 fine and i guess he has to become a democrat now. It seems like theres something about being a democrat that either and maybe this is the chicken or the egg but something about being a democrat that lends people to criminal behavior or something about being prone to criminal behavior that draws people to the democrat party. There was a claim that. Positively radiant® overnight facial. Get the benefits of a spa facial. Overnight. Aveeno®. Naturally beautiful results® the whole country booking on Choice Hotels. Com. Four words, badda book. Badda boom. Let it sink in. Shouldnt we say we have the lowest price . Nope, badda book. Badda boom. Have you ever stayed with Choice Hotels . Like at a comfort inn . Yep. Free waffles, cant go wrong. I like it. Promote that guy. Get the lowest price on our rooms, guaranteed. When you book direct at choicehotels. Com. Book now. There was a claim that theres 24 votes against it. Were getting a lot of Freedom Caucus members to support this bill. Were adding votes by the day, were not losing, were adding and we feel like were getting really close. The speakers optimism does not appear to be supported by the events of the past 24 hours in which the momentum shifted strongly against the American Health care act. We heard from the mouth of the chairman they alone have the votes to kill the bill but other House Republicans are not part of the Freedom Caucus coming out against it today. Congressman Daniel Donovan of Staten Island, which voted for donald trump why i will vote no. Congressman david young of iowa i cannot support it in its present form. Congressman Frank Lobiondo of new jersey, i cannot support this bill. Thomas massie of kentucky sorry to let you down, im changing my vote from no to hell no. There are enough votes publicly stated to sink the bill but public whip counts in these situations are notoriously unreliable and theres also reporting the gop leadership is going to bring the bill to the floor even if they are seven votes short so theyre planning to go through with this without knowing if they have the votes. The tremendous risks and consequences for a president already playing defense next. I want to get to taxes, i want to cut the hell out of taxes but, but i had no choice. This is the silverado special edition. This is one gorgeous truck. Oh, did i say theres only one special edition . Because, actually theres five. Ooohh aaaahh uh hooooly mackerel. Wow. Nice. Strength and style. Its truck month. Get 0 financing for 60 months plus find your tag and get 5500 on select Chevy Silverado pickups when you finance with gm financial. Find new roads at your local chevy dealer. I want to get to taxes, i want to cut the hell out of taxes but, but i had no choice. I had to go with Health Care First, you know how it works. Frankly the tax would be easier, in my opinion. I would have loved to have put it first, ill be honest. But for statutory reasons and budgetary reasons we have to Submit Health care sooner. Well be doing trade deals as soon as we get health care finished. Im looking forward with these trade deals. But we had to go with Health Care First and were doing well. I think were going to have some great surprises. I hope its going to all work out. Then we immediately start on the tax cuts. Joining me now, betsy woodruff, politics reporter for the daily beast and msnbc contributor josh barro. His latest piece republicans lied about health care for years and theyre about to get the punishment they deserve. I love that montage because the president is selling health care as a chore that you need to get out of a way before you can get to the fun stuff is how hes selling it. Betsy, what is your judgment. What about the House Freedom caucus . Are they bluffing . I dont think theyre bluffing. This bill is in serious trouble and one point a source made to me is that the House Republican Leadership Team as it stands right now does not have an impressive record of be able to count votes well. In the last year theyve brought bills to the floor under suspension of the rules and havent been able to get them passed. In my understanding thats unprecedented. You dont normally bring bills if you cant pass them. Among House Freedom caucus members theres a sense that paul ryan may be overplaying his cards here in projecting more confidence than is warranted and i think theyre comfortable with where theyre at. The thought theyre going to put this on the floor tomorrow and might lose it seems catastrophic but the catastrophe is baked in. Your piece does a great job of explaining why they are in a bind whether they pass or do not pass this bill. I think its a disaster either way because either way they have to break a zillion promises theyve been making for seven years. The bill doesnt lower premiums, it raises them. It makes health care more expensive. It means higher deductibles. President trump said he wanted insurance for everyone that is much cheaper and better so if they pass this they have to be held to account for breaking those promises and if they dont theyve broken promises to repeal obamacare and their promises to improve health care. So i think the disaster is baked in either way. I dont think the votes are there. The particular reason i believe that is politico is reporting tonight that the white house is willing to reopen the bill again to add new provisions that would win over those conservative members. Theyll create new problems with themselves and then there will be the open question of you have some moderate members who are unwilling to vote for the bill. If you make it even more to the liking of conservatives you can create problems and then when it gets to the senate the changes will be unacceptable to republicans in the senate. This is a great point because the attention has been on the House Freedom caucus but you got 22 members of the house from districts Hillary Clinton won then you have people like dan donovan whos from a district that donald trump won, he won Staten Island in new york but this is him talking about whats happening in terms of how hes thinking about the bill there are portions of it i have great concerns with donovan said. Calls to his office are running 1000 to one against the republican plan, though donovan said he couldnt be sure all the calls are from his district. The socalled moderates, theyve been getting less attention but the possibility of a lot of defections there as well. Without a doubt and i think the branding by the opponents of this bill has been effective. It hasnt had the president s name connected to it very closely. You have Jenny Beth Martin referring to it as ryancare, a riff on the term rinocare. On the right and particularly from reporters at breitbart, the way they craft their headlines the messaging is this bill is paul ryans problem, not Donald Trumps problem for so for these Trump Supporters its not necessarily seen as something that would be a blemish on his record even in that montage you played earlier, trump isnt pushing it extensively. He sees it as something to get done, not something hes staking his reputation on. Which is different from the way president obama pushed for health care reform. He presented it as a rideordie issue. Something that would be worth democrats losing their seats over. Trump isnt doing that. Thats why you see members in the trumpfriendly districts kind of saying maybe we dont want to do this right now. And what people are forgetting, too, is that anything that paul ryan and trump do to this bill to make it more amenable is going to make it harder for it to pass in the senate. Were talking about the house like its the end all be all but youre barely halfway there when youre finished with it. The Susan Collinses of the world is going to be stress and the desperation, what josh said, theyll open up the regulatory side of this which they hadnt done in the beginning because it cant pass through reconciliation. Now theyre saying maybe well get to that but then you screw yourself in the senate. And when you get rid of regulations you have members voting so insurers can sell plans that dont cover Substance Abuse treatment which is a big issue in statements that have been hit by the opioid epidemic. They have to sell plans that dont cover pregnancy so its making the vote tougher for moderate members who have their own various concerns in donovans case, new york is a state that spends a lot of medicaid. There would be big negative budgetary conferences so these changes will only add more for them to answer for to vote for a bill that likely wont become law anyway. So theyll take the bad law and wont even get the policy. Betsy woodruff, josh barro, thank you. Thank you. I am in the midst of my book tour, i came straight to the event in boston to do this show. Thanks to the great folks who came out to do that. Tomorrow ill be at the free library of philadelphia, then ill be on the west coast. Theres an excerpt of the book in vanity fair that you can read that draws on the reporting i did for this show where i got experience that a Virtual Reality Police Training simulator. I hope you check it out and pick up the book a colony in a nation thats out now. Thats all in for this evening. The Rachel Maddow show starts right now. The last conversation i had with my dad, chris hayes, it was him calling me so excited he could barely speak because he got tickets to see you in california. He could have pulled a string. He could have probably pulled some strings. Please let me know if theres anyone else in the family i can get seats for. I will. I will tell you the reason he was so psyched is because he could not get into his firstchoice venue and he had to go to a farther away venue in order to see you. He got in on his second choice. Anyone you need. Ill hook him up. Thank you, chris, well done, my friend. Congratulations. Thanks at home for joining us this hour. Boy, this has been a heck of a day in the news, right . Well start with a mineral called bauxite
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