CHRIS MATTHEWS, MSNBC HARDBALL HOST: - hearing all that noise when the door closes. And that`s HARDBALL for now. Thanks for being with us. "ALL IN" with Chris Hayes starts right now.
CHRIS HAYES, MSNBC ALL IN HOST: Tonight on ALL IN.
SEAN SPICER, WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: This is the American Healthcare act, the President is proud of it.
HAYES: A republican revolt grows.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Why House members would want to vote for this bill and pay the political price for voting for this bill?
HAYES: With millions estimated to lose coverage under Trumpcare.
PAUL RYAN, U.S. REPRESENTATIVE SPEAKER OF THE HOUSE: Actually, it exceed my expectations.
HAYES: Tonight, Breitbart goes to war with Paul Ryan and Trump voters are caught in the middle.
How many people in the room are either on Medicaid or someone they know or love is on Medicaid. Raise your hand?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Someone we know or love, absolutely.
HAYES: Senator Elizabeth Warren joins me for an exclusive interview.
ELIZABETH WARREN, UNITED STATES SENATOR FROM MASSACHUSETTS: Trumpcare is one more way to help the rich and powerful and kick dirt in the face of working people.
HAYES: Plus, Congressman Steve King now fund-raising off this.
STEVE KING, UNITED STATES CONGRESSMAN FROM IOWA: You cannot rebuild your civilization with somebody else`s babies.
HAYES: And his shared vision with the White House.
STEVE BANNON, WHITE HOUSE CHIEF STRATEGIST: Congressman King, about that cultural suicide -
HAYES: And the other member of the Trump administration with an alias.
JOHN MILLER: Just off the record, there`s no way he gets married without prenuptial agreement
HAYES: When ALL IN starts right now.
Good evening from New York, I`m Chris Hayes, the simmering tensions in the republican party started to reach a boil today as the harsh realities that Americans will face if the GOP`s healthcare bill passes have begun to set in. On one side of the brewing civil war you have the economic ethno nationalism of White House Chief Strategist Steve Bannon. On the other, the Ayn Rand style limited government philosophy of House Speaker Paul Ryan. And the healthcare bill is a product of Ryan`s philosophy, is a culmination of his career long effort to slash the social safety net. It reflects, as Vox put it, an act of class warfare of the rich against the poor. Republicans can no longer ignore the basic facts of what their bill would do. According to the CBO, 24 million Americans would lose coverage by 2026. As roughly the combined population of Alabama, Colorado, Kentucky, Missouri and Utah. The bill cuts Medicaid, the healthcare program to benefit the poor and those just above poverty by $880 billion, about 25 percent, while putting in place an $883 billion tax cut that mostly overwhelmingly benefits the wealthy. It`s basically the legislative equivalent of Robin Hood but in reverse. Taking from the poor, giving to the rich. You know who gets to the worst off? Older, poorer, rural Americans, the very people who put Trump in the Oval Office.
Last night, we aired our Town Hall from McDowell County, the poorest county in West Virginia - poorest state, where 75 percent of voters cast ballots for Trump. Watch what happened when I asked how many people depend on Medicaid.
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HAYES: How many people in the room are either on Medicaid or someone they know or love is on Medicaid. Raise your hand.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Someone we know and love, absolutely.
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HAYES: Nearly every hand in that room went up. 50 percent of the people in the county are on Medicaid. Now, many people who depend on Medicaid who in some cases would literally die without it are Trump voters. People like Philip Lucion, a coal miner who only recently found a job in the mines.
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PHILIP LUCION, MCDOWELL COUNTY COAL MINER: I`ve been underground for ten years and then got laid off, had to take a secondary job that doesn`t pay, doesn`t have hospitalization or nothing. Now I have all that again and I just hope that it lasts so I can take care of me and my family.
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HAYES: The impact on poor, working poor, lower working class Americans in this bill is just staggering. It would make it virtually impossible for, say, a 64-year-old making just under $27,000 per year to get coverage. Her premium would rise from $1,700 per year under ObamaCare to more than $14,000 per year under the GOP plan. That is not an error. That`s more than half her salary. This reality speaks to why the White House, while ostensibly backing the bill, doesn`t seem particularly excited about it being called Trumpcare.
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SPICER: Well, I don`t think - I mean, I don`t think the Obama administration didn`t label it ObamaCare. They call it the ACA. I mean, this is the American Healthcare Act. The President is proud of it. The President is proud of the fact that we`re working with congress. But this is a bill that is not his, it`s a joint effort that we`ve worked with the House and Senate on.
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HAYES: As Senator Charles Schumer pointed out today, it isn`t a good sign for a bill when people don`t want their name on it.
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CHARLES SCHUMER, UNITED STATES SENATOR FROM NEW YORK: Trump wants to call it Ryancare. Ryan wants to call it Trumpcare. How good could it be if neither of them wants their name on it. President Trump has slapped his name on buildings, ties, stakes, hotels and golf clubs but not on a bill that he says he supports.
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HAYES: The bill directly contradicts numerous promises that President Trump has made, promises that helped him win the election.
TRUMP: I`m not going to cut Social Security like every other republican. And I`m not going to cut Medicare or Medicaid. Every other republican is going to cut. And even if they wouldn`t, they don`t know what to do because they don`t know where the money is. I do.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HAYES: With Trump going back on his promises to his base, the populist media outlets that backed his candidacy are rebelling against the bill though they found someone else to blame. Breitbart in particular has lashed out at the bill which it often pointedly calls Ryancare saying a quote "is all but guaranteed to impose crushing costs on voters, hurt Trump`s base, and hand power back to the democrats," and that`s just the headline. Last night Breitbart published a story featuring audio of Paul Ryan in 2016 refusing to defend Trump in the wake of the Access Hollywood tape.
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RYAN: There are basically two things that I want to make really clear. I am not going to defend Donald Trump, not now, not in the future. Look, you guys know I have real concerns with our nominee.
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HAYES: The release of that audio prompting speculation that Bannon, who used to be Executive Chairman of Breitbart, is attempting to kneecap Ryan and distance the White House and President from the bill. Meanwhile, more and more congressional republicans are outright opposing it or distancing themselves including New Jersey Representative Leonard Lance whose district was won by Hillary Clinton and who came on this very show five days ago to defend his committee vote for the bill. Today after the CBO scoring, Congressman Lance said he does not want to vote on the bill because he expects it to fail. Joining me now is Republican Congressman Bill Johnson of Ohio, supporter of the healthcare bill who serves on the Energy Commerce Committee as well as the Budget Committee which will be marking up the bill on Thursday. And Congressman, I want to start with just some simple stuff. Do you know how many people in your district are on the exchanges?
BILL JOHNSON, UNITED STATES CONGRESSMAN FROM OHIO: Well, I can tell you how many people in my district, Chris, are on Medicaid expansion because you know Medicaid expansion was a big part of what Governor John Kasich did. It`s about 700,000 people in Ohio that`s on Medicaid expansion and I`m going to make that down sure that those people are not thrown under the bus. And the bill that we`ve got, the bill that`s moving forward, that`s not going to throw them under the bus.
HAYES: Representative, do you know how many of the folks in the Medicaid expansion are actually in your district? 700,000 for the state, you know how many in your district?
JOHNSON: Well, I`ve got about 721,000 people in my district and I can tell you that - I can`t give you an exact number and I don`t think anyone can but I can tell you that in a district like mine, rural Appalachia that - where the average income is just a little over $30,000 a year, the preponderance of the people, most of the people on Medicaid expansion in Ohio come from my rural district.
HAYES: Yes. I think - the estimates if you aggravate the county numbers if you have, it`s probably somewhere around 60,000 people at least. Here`s my question to you, there`s no way the CBO can score this bill as cutting $880 billion from Medicaid over ten years and for no one in your district to take it on the chin.
JOHNSON: Well, I tell you what, they can`t do, either. You know, that`s the same CBO, Chris, that said that 20 million people were going to sign up for the exchanges and they haven`t so I don`t think - I think we have to take with a grain of salt what CBO says.
HAYES: OK. But -
JOHNSON: But what we`re - but we`re going to do, Chris, is that we`re going to give Governor John Kasich the flexibility and the controls to manage his Medicaid population. We`re not going to pull the rug out -
HAYES: No. But Congressman, there`s going to be less money spent in your state on Medicaid. That is just an arithmetic inescapable fact. And don`t take it from me, Paul Ryan the Speaker of the House was on Hugh Hewitt Show in which he boasted about that fact, about capping the growth of it, reducing the spending and called it bigger than welfare reform. So there just is no way under this bill that as much money in Medicaid is going to be spent in the state of Ohio six, ten years from now, as it is now. That`s going to hurt people in your district.
JOHNSON: Well, Chris, if we don`t do something to reform Medicaid, to make sure that it`s sustainable, what`s going to happen by 2026, when the CBO tells us it that it`s going to cost our nation a $1 trillion a year. It`s better to give these people an opportunity to purchase healthcare they can afford that`s of their own choosing, not something that`s mandated and handed out. And let`s don`t forget something, Chris, many people that are on Medicaid and Medicaid expansion in Ohio, they were victims of ObamaCare in the first place.
HAYES: No. But here`s the question, Congressman -
JOHNSON: They couldn`t afford the insurance that was offered on the exchange.
HAYES: Right. That`s right. So if the insurance is too expensive under ObamaCare which I agree, there are - for a lot of those people -
JOHNSON: I`m glad we agree.
HAYES: Medicaid expansion - Medicaid expansion filled in that gap, right? Some of those people -
JOHNSON: It filled in some of that gap.
HAYES: Right. So if you reduce the accessibility of that Medicaid, those people are just left with nothing. They`re left with the subsidies which we know are going to be less for them than what`s currently provided by ObamaCare.
JOHNSON: Those people aren`t going to be left with nothing. They`re going to be given choices, Chris. Because CBO, the same CBO -
HAYES: You can`t choose -- you cannot choose something if you cannot afford it. Have you looked -
JOHNSON: The same - hold on.
HAYES: Have you looked at the analyses that have 64-year-olds making $27,000 spending $14,000 a year more?
JOHNSON: Look, Chris, I grew up like these people along the Ohio river, the people that I represent.`
HAYES: Yes.
JOHNSON: I grew up on a - on a mule farm with no indoor plumbing and I grew up having to struggle to find healthcare so I know what these people are feeling. But I can tell you that many of these people that were victimized by ObamaCare and fell into Medicaid, they want to go back to work and when we give them an opportunity to purchase health care of their own choosing and give them a tax credit by which to do that, they`re going do that and the same CBO - the same CBO that -
HAYES: But Congressman, congressman, I hear you on this, I understand that, but Congressman, I just want to be clear about this, right. I get what you`re saying about choice, I understand that Medicaid is restricted in many respects, I get that, and I don`t think it`s - that`s a legitimate critique about Medicaid and its delivery services, I totally get that. If people don`t have Medicaid, if they go from Medicaid to not having anything, then they get to buy insurance but they have less money to buy that insurance and they can`t afford the insurance, how have they been made better off?
JOHNSON: You`re only looking at one aspect. You`re only looking at step one of what the GOP -- what the republican plan is. When competition and innovation enters the market, when the - when the individual market recovers and they have better options at lower cost. And let`s not forget, Chris, coverage does not -
HAYES: Why do we think that`s going to happen? Why do we think that`s going to happen, Congressman? That - I mean, look, I would love it to be the case and I think everyone watching this program would love a universe in which there was more competition and lower cost but there`s nothing in the mechanisms of this bill that suggests that`s going to be the case and that`s the finding of the CBO as well.
JOHNSON: Then, if you`re going to love it, Chris, then you`re going to be one of the most ecstatic happy people on the planet because that`s exactly what we`re going to do. When we start -
HAYES: Why? What is the mechanism that produces that?
JOHNSON: When we start offering insurance across state lines, when we start making insurance -
HAYES: That will not do what you`re saying it`s going to do.
JOHNSON: But that`s not all we`re going to do, Chris. That`s not all we`re going to do.
HAYES: Are you talking - let me just - let me be clear here, Congressman. Are you talking about the phase two and phase three of this?
JOHNSON: I`m telling you that you can`t look at this in a microcosm -
HAYES: Right.
JOHNSON: - and say this is all what - that we`re going to do. That`s not the republican plan. It`s a three step process. The President has (INAUDIBLE) into that, Paul Ryan has articulated that very well, I believe the three-step plan and everything that we`re planning to do is going to bring innovation to the market. You`re going to have an individual market where people are going to be able to have a choice. Remember Chris -
HAYES: We`ll see.
JOHNSON: - coverage does not equal care.
HAYES: That`s right.
JOHNSON: If that`s your measuring stick.
HAYES: I completely agree with that and a lot of people on the - on the single payer left have been making that argument for years but absence of coverage certainly doesn`t mean care either. Which is - that`s the part of that that`s hard for people to understand. People keep saying coverage doesn`t equal care and you say, we`re going to take away that coverage, where does the care come from?
JOHNSON: The care comes when people are able to go out in a market, an individual market, with a job, Chris. Remember that we are experiencing one of the worst and slowest economic recoveries in American history.
HAYES: Right. OK.
JOHNSON: When we get jobs back -
HAYES: Job growth.
JOHNSON: And we are going to - yes, you`re going to get job growth.
HAYES: OK. Congressman.
JOHNSON: Those people are going to be able to go off of Medicaid and then they`re going to have choices for health care.
HAYES: I`m telling you this from the bottom of my heart that I am rooting for the people of your district to come out on the right side of this bill. Thank you for joining me. I really appreciate it.
JOHNSON: Thank you very much, Chris.
HAYES: All right. I`m joined now by the Josh Barro, Senior Editor of Business Insider and MSNBC Contributor. You know, part of the dynamics here, I mean, he`s a perfect example, and he`s supporting this although I think it`s political suicide for him frankly too. Having just come from West Virginia, is that Medicaid is the thing - this bill talks about how ObamaCare is collapsing but the thing that really takes it on the chin is Medicaid.
JOSH BARRO, MSNBC CONTRIBUTOR: Right.
HAYES: And that is used by a lot of people in republican districts.
BARRO: Well, and it`s also the part of ObamaCare that seems to have worked the best.
HAYES: Right.
BARRO: A lot of people really hate these plans that are offered through exchanges. They do, indeed, have high deductibles and high co-payments in a lot of cases. Republicans have been making hay out of that for years, going around and saying this insurance isn`t really insurance. It doesn`t pay for the care you actually need. And then they come out with a bill that would make those plans have even higher deductibles and higher co- payments in a lot of cases. But you`re generally - I think seeing higher satisfaction among people who are on Medicaid because Medicaid even though not every doctor, not every hospital accepts it, it does make it possible to go get care essentially for free in most cases. So I think that it`s interesting, you saw this friend of Donald Trump`s Chris Ruddy who publishes Newsmax, this conservative publication who wrote today, you know, "this bill is suicide, you can`t do this, you need to build something around Medicaid because Medicaid is the part of this that works."
HAYES: It`s amazing, you got Laura Ingram, Breitbart and Newsmax on an axis defending Medicaid -
BARRO: Right.
HAYES: - against the sort of like "Ayn Randian" attacks of Paul Ryan.
BARRO: Yes. And I mean, that there`s a certain conservative logic to Medicare. I mean, because you know, people on the left like to talk about Medicare for all.
HAYES: Right.
BARRO: And you know, republicans turn their head out. That would be extremely expensive. Ross Douthat, the conservative columnist at the New York Times wrote this couple of years ago about the idea of Medicaid for all that basically, you don`t want the government to become the insurer for everyone but you make it the backstop so that - you know, people - you know, the first line of defense is that you get insurance through work or you acquire it privately but if none of that works for you, then you can go on Medicaid, it`s stripped down, it`s relatively inexpensive but it`s a -
HAYES: Right.
BARRO: - but it`s a safety net for everyone. And that`s sort of where Chris Ruddy is pointing. It would be something that would make a certain amount of sense for a populist like Donald Trump to land at.
HAYES: But let`s be clear, complete orthogonal or in opposition to the structure of this bill as it is.
BARRO: Right.
HAYES: It`s the opposite. This bill is pure Ryanism. This bill is everything that sort of Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan stood for in 2012, what Donald Trump`s primary opponents stood for and he beat them by not being them.
BARRO: Well, it`s not everything that Romney and Paul Ryan stood for in 2012. Because in 2012 Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan were insisting that they were going to restore all the money that was cut out of Medicare.
HAYES: Right. That`s right. That stays out of it.
BARRO: Right. And so, this - they keep the all the Medicare cuts, they ran against six years ago.
HAYES: That`s such a good point.
BARRO: But I - you know, it definitely -it is - it is that approach and I think they`re going to have a lot of trouble selling that.
HAYES: I agree. Josh Barro, thanks for joining me.
BARRO: Thank you.
HAYES: Still ahead, my exclusive interview with Senator Elizabeth Warren on Trumpcare, the firing of Preet Bharara, and much, much more, next. How did CBO just put another nail on the coffin about ObamaCare talking point. And then there`s what`s about to happen on the "RACHEL MADDOW SHOW" tonight. You may have noticed the countdown clock ticking to 9:00 p.m. There`s a Trump taxes exclusive coming on Maddow tonight, and basically I know two things about what she has in store. One, I know David Cay Johnston is going to join her to break some news. Two, I know it has something to do with President Donald Trump`s taxes. We`ll all find out the rest together when we tune in for Rachel at 9:00 p.m. Stay right here. We`ll be right back.
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SPICER: One of the issues that has to go back to overriding this issue and the President has stated this on numerous occasions. If we do nothing, if we just allow this to continue, it will collapse on its own.
HAYES: White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer once again making the central argument for republicans who want to repeal ObamaCare. The law is causing an insurance market death spiral, ObamaCare is collapsing and therefore repeal is an act of mercy.
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RYAN: ObamaCare is collapsing. If we did nothing, the law would collapse and leave everybody without affordable health care. We are doing an act of mercy by repealing this law.
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HAYES: As we`ve explained on this program before, that is not true. And not just because insurance actuaries say so - because they do. Take a look at the most significant and overlooked part of the CBO score the GOP plan quote, "the non-group market would probably be stable in most areas under either current law or the legislation." The non-group market under current law is the health care exchanges under the Affordable Care Act which the CBO says will probably be stable, not collapse, not go into a death spiral. The CBO even explains why those ObamaCare exchanges will remain stable. Subsidies for those buying health care and penalties for those who don`t, it stabilizes the market over time. The other thing the CBO score shows into sharp relief is the staggering distribution of wealth under the GOP plan. Cuts to Medicaid, the poor and working poor totaling $880 billion over ten years, tax cuts primarily for the wealthiest, total $883 billion over the same ten year period. That`s $880 billion shift from the working poor to the very rich. Joining me now Andy Slavitt former Acting Administrator for the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services. Andy, let`s talk about the death spiral finding, because it`s gotten less attention than I think it deserves because in some ways, the cornerstone of the whole argument is we cannot abide the status quo because it`s imploding. CBO says not true.
ANDY SLAVITT CENTERS FOR MEDICARE AND MEDICAID SERVICES FORMER ACTING ADMINISTRATOR: Well, you`re absolutely right, Chris. And it`s not just the CBO, Standard & Poor`s came to the same conclusion last winter, so as the - so have the Society of Actuaries, so as the Independent Office of the Actuaries, so I think what the premise of an exploding market, I think really as you`ve said on your show, it`s a - it`s a neat justification for a big tax cut perhaps but it`s just not true in fact.
HAYES: So what do you think about the other parts of this bill? I mean, to me, this redistributional aspect is so striking. I mean, here you`ve got huge, huge tax cut, mostly to the top 1 percent. In some cases, I think, the overwhelming majority, the 0.1 percent. And that`s basically being taken out of Medicaid. I mean, that`s the exchange the bill is doing, right?
SLAVITT: Yes. That`s exactly right. You think about the Medicaid program and what this really amounts to is a 25 percent cut in the Medicaid program and then a cap so that the Medicaid program will be - and, in fact, a rationing program. When you think what does the Medicaid program do? Medicaid program does what? It takes care of kids, in fact half the births in this country are paid for by Medicaid. Two-thirds of the budget goes to take care of people with disabilities or people in long-term care facilities. That`s basically us when we get older. So if you ask a governor where are you going to cut 25 percent from your Medicaid budget? They`ll either laugh or cry.
HAYES: There`s one part of the CBO score that was interesting which is premiums, average premiums. And you do get to a point, it`s bizarrely sort of structure, right? Premiums shoot up for the first two years according to CBO and they come down and they end up averaging 10 percent lower so you saw some republicans touting that, lower premiums. How does that - how do they get there?
SLAVITT: They get there really by making the product unaffordable for older people and the product becomes unaffordable for older people for two reasons. One, the premiums have moved up and second the tax credits, as you illustrated earlier in your show, go down pretty significantly. So if older people aren`t buying the product, and only younger people are buying the product well, then, I guess in a manner of speaking people are paying less for it. The problem is, you got 25 million people, 24 million people depending on, if you believe the White House numbers it`s 26 million, if you believe CBO it`s 24 million, who are no longer buying the product. So it`s not - it`s not much of a victory to pay less when most of the people who need the product can`t afford it.
HAYES: Andy Slavitt, thank you for your time tonight. I appreciate it.
SLAVITT: Thank you Chris.
HAYES: Coming up, the straight line to be drawn from Steve Bannon`s Breitbart White House to Congressman Steve King`s abhorrent comments on white cultural supremacy. More on that, after this quick break.
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HAYES: Republican Congressman Steve King of Iowa is not backing off his endorsement of white cultural supremacy. Over the weekend, he set off bipartisan uproar with a tweet about Dutch politician Geert Wilders who`s running for President on an anti-Muslim platform. Quote, "wilders understands that culture and demographics are our destiny. We can`t restore our civilization with somebody else`s babies." As despicable as that phrase is, frankly, somebody else`s babies, that comment probably doesn`t come as a surprise to viewers of this show. The congressman, who`s been up on this show a number of times, including last week, expressed a similar world view back in July at the republican convention.
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KING: This does get a little tired Charlie. I mean, I`d ask you to go back through history and figure out where are these contributions that have been made by these other categories of people that you`re talking about, if - where did any other subgroup of people contribute more to civilization?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Than white people?
KING: Than western civilization itself.
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HAYES: Asked yesterday about his tweet, King responded he meant exactly what he said. In fact, he`s now fund-raising off his comments. In an interview on Iowa Talk radio King expanded further in the argument, explaining the supposed difference between Latin American culture and that of the U.S.
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KING: They live in a third world culture that doesn`t have the rule of law, doesn`t have the educational foundation, doesn`t have the industry and doesn`t the growth and the creativity and the economy that was created as by western civilization which is descended from, generally, western Europe. And yes, the majority of the people who established the foundation of western civilization were White.
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HAYES: King closed that interview by recommending a book called "The Camp Of The Saints" a grotesquely racist semi-obscure French novel about dark- skinned migrants invading Europe and overthrowing white society. And you will never guess who else is a fan of that book. Hint, he works in the White House. We`ll tell you who it is next.
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BANNON: Why are we letting anybody else in here? Not that we`re not a charitable nation, not that we`re not a giving nation, not that we`re not a nation built upon Judeo-Christian values. But, hey, this is insanity.
KING: Well, yes, it is. I`m watching as Europe is committed -- it`s almost conclusive now that they are committing cultural suicide by pouring in millions of migrants that don`t share their values.
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CHRIS HAYES, MSNBC ANCHOR: Congressman Steve King in a 2015 interview with Steve Bannon, now chief strategist to the White House, laying out a scenario pretty similar to the plot of a racist book called "The Camp of the Saints," quote, "A chilling novel about the end of the white world."
King has explicitly endorsed that book as a parable for today`s world and he`s not alone, Bannon too has invoked "The Camp of the Saints" on numerous occasions.
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STEVE BANNON, WHITE HOUSE CHIEF STRATEGIST: It`s been almost a "Camp Of The Saints" type invasion into central and then western and northern Europe. The whole thing in Europe is all about, you know, immigration, it`s a global issue today, right? This kind of global "Camp of the Saints," really it`s not a migration, it`s really an invasion. I call it the camp of the saints.
When we first started talking about a year ago we called it "The Camp of the Saints" off of the apocalyptic novel written in France back in the 1970s that people said was racist and nativist. I mean, this is "Camp of the Saints," isn`t it?
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HAYES: I`m joined by Karine Jean-Pierre, senior adviser, national spokesperson from movron.org. Karine, I`m curious on your perspective on all of this. It seems like a few Republicans have condemned it. Paul Ryan kind of condemned it. The White House was incredibly tepid. What do you think should happen here?
KARINE JEAN-PIERRE, MOVRON.ORG: Well, if the Republicans were really serious about condemning his remarks, Steve King`s remarks, they would have actually taken action by now. Do what Nancy Pelosi`s urging Paul Ryan to do, which is to take away Steve King`s chairmanship from the subcommittee that he currently chairs and so they`re not serious about this.
But here`s the thing, Steve King is not someone who`s out of the mainstream of the Republican Party, he is the mainstream of the Republican Party. You have a white supremacist that`s 20 feet away from the oval office. You have an attorney general that has made racist comments.
You have the president himself who has made racist comments. You have a Republican Party who`s purging black people from the voting rolls so this not surprising. This is the Republican Party that we are seeing of today.
HAYES: I want to play devil`s advocate against that because I think there are some Republicans who say, look, I do not -- I mean, what Steve King very explicitly believes in this kind of ethno-nationalist vision of Americans, somebody else`s babies, there`s some kind of Americans who are really Americans and there are some who are other people`s babies and I think there`s a portion of the GOP, I would imagine, who just do not buy into that world view, right?
JEAN-PIERRE: But they need to take action, Chris, right? If they truly, truly are condemning what he`s saying they have to do something because at the end of the day his words were racist. He has a long history of saying racist things. When you have David Duke, the former leader of the KKK, praising his words, that`s a problem. So Republicans need to take action here, not sit back.
HAYES: We should say that white supremacists, not just David Duke, a whole variety of white supremacists, have been exultant, ecstatic. They`ve sort of celebrated the fact that here is an American congressman saying exactly and precisely -- I`m basically paraphrasing them now -- what we avowed white supremacists believe.
JEAN-PIERRE: That`s exactly right. We have to remember, Steve King is a federal -- he`s a Congressman. He works for the federal government. He sits at the table making policy. He is a chair of a subcommittee, a judicial subcommittee, this is a problem.
HAYES: Karine, my understanding is your parents are immigrants.
JEAN-PIERRE: Yes, absolutely.
HAYES: I just wonder what -- that phrase, I keep thinking about that phrase, it`s such an awful phrase in so many ways, "somebody else`s babies," what do you think when you hear that?
JEAN-PIERRE: It`s insulting. It is really insulting because this is not what this country is about. We are a country of immigrants. My parents came here decades ago looking for a better life, hoping that their kids would be able to go to college, would be able to not live in poverty and raise their own children have something better than what they have.
So when you hear someone -- a representative, a congressman say those type of words, make those statements that is hurtful. I mean, we have about more than 40 million people in this country are immigrants. So why are we turning our backs on immigrants when this is what our country is supposed to be about. It`s disgusting.
HAYES: All right, Karine Jean-Pierre, she`s right about Nancy Pelosi calling for his chairmanship to be stripped. We`ll see what Speaker of the House Paul Ryan does about that. Thanks, Karine, appreciate it.
JEAN-PIERRE: Thanks, Chris. Appreciate it.
HAYES: Still to come, Senator Elizabeth Warren on members of the White House blurring the lines between working for the American people and working for their own profit. That`s ahead.
Plus, one thing President Trump and Rex Tillerson have in common -- they both love a good alias. That`s tonight`s "Thing 1 Thing 2" next.
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HAYES: "Thing 1" tonight, aliases and the people who use them. You may remember this bizarre thing that we learned during the campaign last year - - in the `80s and `90s, New York reporters often received calls from supposed PR reps for Donald Trump who sounded a whole lot like Donald Trump under the pseudonyms John Baron and John Miller, Trump would brag about his successes in business and with women.
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"JOHN MILLER", "PEOPLE" MAGAZINE: He`s somebody that has a lot of options and, frankly, he gets called by everybody. He gets called by everybody in the book, in terms of women. They just call him. Actresses, people that you write about just call to see if they can go out with him and things.
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HAYES: Well, it turns out our president isn`t the only member of his administration with an alter ego. The strange case of Rex Tillerson and "Wayne Tracker" is "Thing 2" in 60 seconds.
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HAYES: Secretary of State Rex Tillerson reportedly used an alias e-mail account for years while he was CEO of ExxonMobil. New York State Attorney General Eric Schneiderman, who`s currently investigating Exxon for allegedly covering up what they knew about climate change and global warming claims that Tillerson used an e-mail account under an alternate name, the name "Wayne Tracker, to talk about climate change.
Tillerson whose middle name is Wayne, used the account for at least seven years, according to the attorney general. Unfortunately, there aren`t any recordings of those e-mails.
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"MILLER" (via telephone): Ivana wants to get back with Donald but she --
UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: Really? After saying on Barbara Walters that she never would?
"MILLER": I mean, he`s living with Marla and he`s got three other girlfriends and then -- she`s not going to say, all right, I really want to get back, you know? She wants to get back, she`s told it to a lot of her friends and she`s told it to him, but it`s so highly unlikely.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
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HAYES: A $4 billion investment deal for a Chinese firm is raising concerns over a potential conflict of interest for the president`s top adviser and son-in-law, Jared Kushner. The "New York Times" reports the real estate company owned by Kushner`s family is negotiating to sell a $400 million stake in its Fifth Avenue flagship skyscraper to a Chinese insurance company with ties to leading families of the Communist Party.
The cash pay-out is part a of a $4 billion investment in the building by Anbang (ph) Insurance Group and according to "Bloomberg," the deal includes terms that some real estate experts consider it unusually favorable for the Kushners.
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UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I wonder if the White House has a view on reports from Bloomberg that Jared Kushner`s family stands to gain around half a billion dollars from a real estate deal with Anbang Corporation, which is linked to the Chinese government or has been linked to the Chinese government in the past?
SEAN SPICER, WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: I don`t -- I`d refer you back to the Kushner companies to talk about their entities. Jared went through extraordinary lengths as you all know, we provide documentation on this to make sure he`s not taking a salary here that he complied as if he was an employee and went through extraordinary lengths to make sure that he de- conflicted himself.
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HAYES: Kushner has in fact divested himself from the 666 Fifth Avenue property specifically or de-conflicted himself as Spicer put it, but the Kushner family is poised to make a sizable profit from the Chinese company all the while Jared Kushner is in the White House helping to craft U.S. foreign and domestic policy.
As an expert in Chinese politics and corruption told the "Times," the chairman of Anbang Insurance Company is quote, "purchasing political prestige, and that is a priceless asset for somebody like him."
Meanwhile, as "Propublica" reported last month, Jared Kushner is keeping parts of his family`s real estate empire leaving the door open to further conflicts of interest, ones we don`t yet know about.
Last week, Senator Elizabeth Warren was one of three Democratic lawmakers who wrote a letter asking for Kushner to disclose any potential conflicts of interest. I talk to the senator about that letter among other things. That conversation next.
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HAYES: I sat down for a wide-ranging interview with Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren yesterday. I began by asking her about former U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara, who was fired last week by the Trump administration. And since it`s entirely customary for new presidents to replace U.S. attorneys, I wanted to know why she thought this was different.
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SENATOR ELIZABETH WARREN (D), MASSACHUSETTS: First of all, the president said he was going to keep him, so this is not your standard. This is a guy who was going to stay there and then the president decides that he needs to have a phone call with him, which we know is a violation of ethical standards that presidents are not supposed to be talking to the prosecuting attorney.
HAYES: I should note the White House says it was a "thank you for your service" courtesy call.
WARREN: You know, whatever it was, it was a phone call that was not supposed to occur. And only then does he get fired and the particular guy who gets fired is the one who is in the area where Trump Tower is and who presumably would be the one who would investigate all kinds of things that go on, including the allegation that the president made that Barack Obama tapped his wires.
HAYES: So I guess my question to you is if the idea is that the concern is that there were some sort of untoward concern that Bharara was investigating the president in some ways and he had to get rid of so he can be replaced with his own person, right, what could be demonstrated to allay that fear of yours?
WARREN: You know, I think the concern is the whole Justice Department now. This is a president who fired his acting attorney general. It`s a president who decided that he wanted Jeff Sessions and wanted to keep Jeff Sessions even after it became public that Jeff Sessions had lied to the Senate --
HAYES: You think he lied?
WARREN: Of course, he did. I mean, that`s just -- he didn`t tell the truth. You want to pick another euphemism for it? He told a boo-boo? I mean, pick whatever word you want. But the point is he did not tell the truth and didn`t have to come back and be accountable.
And I think what`s going on now is a fundamental question in our government about whether or not the Justice Department, including our U.S. attorneys, are truly independent and committed to the rule of law or whether or not they are tame and more committed to Donald Trump and Donald Trump`s agenda.
HAYES: We now have the CBO score for the replacement bill, the repeal and replace bill. Looks like 16 million people lose their health insurance in 2018, 24 million by 2026, a huge bulk of that coming from Medicaid.
The line from -- there`s two lines coming from Republicans, one is we`re going to cover everyone, we`re going to expand coverage, that seems implausible, but the Paul Ryan thing is we`re not going to win a beauty contest, that this is about freedom and choice.
WARREN: Freedom and choice to have a heart attack and not have health care coverage. Freedom and choice to have a child with complex medical needs and not have health care coverage? Freedom and choice to access to nursing home care and not have any way to pay for it? It`s only the Republicans who can come up with this kind of double speak.
There is nobody in America who thought that knocking millions of people off their health insurance was the way that we were going to improve health care in America. And let`s be clear, because even after all these people are denied health care coverage, they`re still going to get sick.
They`re still going to need help and that means one of two things is going to happen -- either we`re going to have community health centers that are not going to get reimbursed for the care they give.
We`re going to have rural hospitals who are not going to get reimbursed, we`re going to have hospitals, doctors, everyone in the health care profession is going to have to absorb those losses and either pass along the cost to everyone else or find other ways to cut their care or it`s going to bankrupt families.
That`s the only way this goes. You know -- and that`s the part that`s so frustrating about this. Look, there are a lot of things we needed to do and still need to do to improve the Affordable Care Act. There are ways that we need to work to bring down the cost of health care for everyone and we were working on those.
We continue to work on those. There are things we can do. There are ways we can change the compensation system around it, for example. There are ways that we can make better investments in low-cost health care like preventative health care.
So that we don`t have to pay as much as the back end on health care, but at the end of the day, it`s about delivering health care services to hardworking people across this country. And if we fail to do that then this is a serious economic blow to America`s middle-class.
This is just a punch in the gut saying, hey, more and more of you are on your own. That is wrong economically and it`s wrong morally.
HAYES: You know, I`m glad you spoke about patches to Obamacare because one of the things that`s happened is that that conversation has been lost because of repeal and replace, right. So one of the arguments that Republicans at the White House make that seem to me that arguments should Democrats should take seriously is this choice question in a third of U.S. counties, that are down to one insurer in that county.
You see a real kind of geographic divergence of how well the system is working. It`s working fairly well in Massachusetts. It`s working in a lot of places particularly the expanded Medicaid, a lot of places like Arizona it`s not.
What is the solution? If the Republicans didn`t exist, if you, Elizabeth Warren, and your colleagues could say here`s what we want to do, what does that look like?
WARREN: So I want to do exactly what we did in Massachusetts and that is we passed our initial law back in 2006 with the aim of having both universal coverage and driving down the cost of health care. We looked at the numbers and said we have to do this.
But here`s the key, we kept adjusting how we did payment, we kept adjusting how we did Medicaid and then when the Affordable Care Act came along, we didn`t just say that`s OK, we`ve already fixed this problem.
We said wait a minute, there are new opportunities here, new obligations here, we want to integrate this and that`s what we`ve done. Health care is not something you can come in, write one law and say we`re done with this unless your idea of health care is let`s just knock people out and not give them the coverage that they need.
It`s something you`ve got to work on and you`ve got to keep dialling in on the pieces. As it gets better, you need to make it even better.
HAYES: So I have noticed something and I`m curious because you work with these individuals. Two people that have been very prominent critics of the House bill are Tom Cotton and Rand Paul. And I can`t help but notice they`ve been attacking it from the right, but I can`t help but notice that these are two states that did expand Medicaid.
Arkansas in a strange way, the private option it`s called, Kentucky in a more straightforward way but they have really driven down the roles. I mean, how much do you think was driving those two individuals, their ideological disposition despite the fact their own constituents are on the nose.
WARREN: In other words, are you asking how much is reality now sticking its nose into the ideology here? And the answer is a lot, there are a lot of people. There are a lot of people in Arkansas, Kentucky who say wait a minute, it may not be perfect but, boy, this is a lot better than what I didn`t have before.
This is a lot better than a system where I could be thrown out for pre- existing conditions. This is a lot better than when I didn`t have some help getting health insurance again. The measure is not -- is it perfect? No, it`s not perfect.
That`s what we have to keep working on. The measure is are we moving it in the right direction and I think both Cotton and Paul are making an admission, yes, the Affordable Care Act moves us in the right direction.
HAYES: You`ve written a letter about your concerns about Jared Kushner in particular and his conflicts. He`s part of the massive construction empire. We still have not seen his disclosures for the Office of Government Ethics.
We don`t know what`s been filed. There`s news recently about a big deal with the Chinese firm that`s happened in one of his apartments. What is the concern here that you have about the level of conflicts happening? Bracketing the president for a moment, right, just an individual like Kushner.
WARREN: Actually I don`t want to bracket the president if you`ll permit me because the real point is one of -- it starts at the top in terms of what the rules are going to be. We need to know that our public servants are working first, last, and in between for the American people.
And that they`re not keeping just a little eye out on how well it feathers their own nests. And that`s true for the president, that`s true for the president`s family, and that`s true for president`s team that he assembles.
And one of the things that has just been deeply shocking about where the Trump administration has gone is that they have brought in people and said, hey, you know, what the heck?
Wilbur Ross says he`s going to be secretary of commerce, make a lot of decisions on how business goes, but he`s going to keep a billion dollar interest in his oil tankers that are all around the world and he`s going to maintain interest in 11 different corporations while he is the secretary of commerce?
Rex Tillerson, we asked him, we said, hey, listen, you`ve been at Exxon forever and ever and ever, you`ve been CEO. You`ve done everything you can, can we at least have a promise that while you are secretary of state that you will recuse yourself in matters that are going to directly affect to Exxon? And his answer was no.
I`ll do it for a while, but then I`ll wade right into this. It`s the notion with the president`s own family, with the president`s own team he has assembled that there is a giant blurring between who exactly are they working for?
Are they working for the American people? Are they working just to make themselves richer or is it some secret blend somewhere in between? The American people should never ever have to ask a question like that.
HAYES: Let me ask you this finally. The president has spent -- I think I`m reciting this correctly, 15 percent of his time as president at Trump properties.
WARREN: Yes.
HAYES: He`s gone to Mar-a-Lago. He`s gone to Trump golf courses. Is that appropriate? I mean, look, Mar-a-Lago, he owns it. It`s his home. He wants to go play golf.
WARREN: But what is he doing when he does that other than promoting Trump hotels and golf courses and his Trump brand? Like I said, being president of the United States is an extraordinary honor and extraordinary responsibility.
And the American people should never have to ask the question about any decision, no matter how small about whose interests are coming first and with Donald Trump every single day he does things that sure seem to help Donald Trump.
HAYES: All right, Senator Warren, appreciate your time.
WARREN: It`s good to see you.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
HAYES: All right, final bit of business, we are now one week away before the release of my new book on policing and democracy in law in order. It`s called "A Colony in a Nation." It`s available for pre-order now.
I also kick off my book tour that same day, on the 21st, I`ll be in Washington, D.C., on Wednesday. I`ll head to Boston, and then Philly on Thursday, and that`s just the first few days. There are bunch more events. You can find all the details on our facebook.com/allinwithchris. I should say that some events are selling out so you definitely don`t want to wait.
All right, you`ve seen the box in the lower corner of this show and I have been checking Twitter during the commercial breaks and people seem fairly interested in what exactly is about to transpire on this network.
The White House is responding to it before we`ve even broadcast it. So without further ado, I pass the baton to my friend and colleague, Rachel Maddow. Your show starts now. Good evening, Rachel.
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED. END