CHRIS MATTHEWS, MSNBC HARDBALL HOST: - what came out of the House so much to get it to the Senate, the House won`t even recognize it when it comes home. Anyway, Annie Karni, thank you, Astead Herndon and Molly Ball. That`s HARDBALL for now. Thanks for being with us. "All In" with Chris Hayes starts right now.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
CHRIS HAYES, MSNBC ALL IN HOST: Tonight on ALL IN.
DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: It no longer matters because we won.
HAYES: Trumpcare survives in the House.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Do you feel you might have spiked the ball a bit too early? Celebrating?
HAYES: Tonight, Bernie Sanders on the fight to save ObamaCare moving to the Senate. Congressman Tom Cole on just exactly what republicans just voted for.
Is it okay in America for an insurance company to charge a family with a kid with cancer $100,000 a year?
Also, just what this bill would mean for the American people, and what democrats think this means for the mid-term election.
AMERICAN CROWD: Hey, hey, hey, good-bye.
HAYES: When ALL IN starts right now.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HAYES: Good evening from New York, I`m Chris Hayes. At this hour, President Trump is back in his hometown here in New York city for the first time since becoming President. The President set to speak on board the USS Intrepid, an aircraft carrier turned museum docked off the west side of Manhattan after meeting with Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull. We will be monitoring that speech and we will bring you any news from it. We are also keeping an eye on the protest outside the Trump event. This was a scene outside Intrepid just a short time ago. Protesters chanting "shame, shame" at people entering the Trump event following today`s House vote to repeal and replace ObamaCare. It was a vote the republicans have been dreaming about and talking about for years. And as Democrats were all too happy to point out, it was one they may come to deeply regret. Earlier today, after narrowly passing their wildly unpopular health care bill through the House of representatives, 217-213 votes, House republicans held a victory party in the White House Rose Garden where the atmosphere was undeniably one of celebration even though the bill being celebrated must now go to the Senate where it has no chance of passing in its current form. The House bill got zero democratic votes with 20 republicans voting no. It is opposed by almost every major patient advocacy group including the March of Dimes, the AARP, the American Medical Association which today warned the bill could return people with pre-existing conditions to a time "when insurers could charge them premiums that make access to coverage out of the question." The Congressional Budget Office won`t score the bill until next week after it was passed. The CBO score for the previous version found that 24 million people would lose coverage. Medicaid would be slashed by $639 billion. And premiums for older, poor Americans would skyrocket by as much as about 750 percent. The top two percent of households meanwhile would get a massive tax cut. As the vote was being passed, House Democrats broke out into a chant of "hey, hey, hey, good-bye," sending a message the vote could cost many republicans their seats in 2018.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
NANCY PELOSI, UNITED STATES CONGRESSWOMAN FROM CALIFORNIA: It`s an opportunity because the public will now see what they gave their name to. They put their name next to you`re paying more for less. And we`ll make sure that the public is aware of that. I think they walk the plank. They were, I don`t know, duped into walking the plank for a bill that will not become law.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
HAYES: And joining me now, Republican Representative Tom Cole of Oklahoma, a member of the House Republican Leadership Team who voted yes on the bill today. Congressman, thanks for joining me.
TOM COLE, UNITED STATES CONGRESSMAN FROM OKLAHOMA: Thank you, Chris.
HAYES: You guys were celebrating today, and it was an impressive bit of whipping to get this over the finish line. Have you read the entirety of the bill?
COLE: Yes. Pretty short bill, less than 200 pages.
HAYES: Yes. It seems to me that every member of the caucus should probably read it before they vote, right?
COLE: Well, that would be a wise thing. And we made it a lot easier by making it frankly, what, about a 12th the size of ObamaCare so not much excuse not to look at it.
HAYES: What are the things you think are being covered now that shouldn`t be covered? Pregnancy, mental health, addiction?
COLE: You know, I really - no. actually - I actually have a lot of - lot of faith in the people of Oklahoma to make that decision themselves. I mean, they can pick and choose. They may well choose to keep them all. But they know what they`ve got now isn`t working. Look, we`re down to a single provider who is losing money. We`ve got a 69 percent rate increase coming, and since we`re not a Medicaid expansion state and not likely to be, we`ve got a lot of our hospitals, you know, taking care of a class of patients that in some states get cared for and other states now are reimbursed for I should say.
HAYES: Are the hospitals - are the hospitals in your state supporting this?
COLE: You know, again, some of them are and some of them -
HAYES: Which ones?
COLE: Again - well, they would be better off simply because they`ll get federal dish money under this plan. But, again, look, I think most people know this is now going to the Senate. We`ll see what comes back from there. So, we`ve still got a very long way to go with this.
HAYES: There`s a - there`s a central principle here when you take away the coverage for pre-existing conditions or at least the community rating, which is one of the things that can now be waived, which is someone that has a family and they`ve got a kid who`s got cancer, pediatric cancer let`s say, looking at a premium of $140,000 a year. And there`s a sort of core point I`d love to hear your respond to, which is, is it okay in America, as a sort of fundamental nature of the laws, for an insurance company to charge a family with a kid with cancer $100,000 a year?
COLE: No, of course not. And look, I don`t think that`s going to happen -
HAYES: But you just voted for a bill that allows that to happen.
COLE: No. In my - in my view, no.
HAYES: Yes, you did, though, Sir.
COLE: No.
HAYES: Yes.
COLE: I`m not disputing that I voted for the bill. That`s not my view of how the bill will play out. And -
HAYES: The bill would allow waivers that would get rid of community rating.
COLE: I don`t think - I don`t think that is likely to happen in my state or any other state. And -
HAYES: Likely - wait but this is a key point though. Likely or not -
COLE: Well, can I -
HAYES: Likely or not -
COLE: Can I make - can I make - can I respond?
HAYES: Yes. Go ahead.
COLE: Yes. So first, I don`t think that`s likely to happen. Second, there`s a whole series of conditions that have to be met. You apply for the waiver. You can`t automatically invoke it. And, third, there`s a waiting period here of several years while this thing, number one, transitions, and, number two, you have to build an adequate risk pool that`s, you know, sufficient to fund and help people with pre-existing conditions, and we`ve set aside additional money. So I think there`s multiple protections here that make sure something like you suggest, won`t happen.
HAYES: Right. But it can happen, I mean, I guess that`s the point, right? Like the way - the way the regulations worked in the past is that it couldn`t happen because it was mandated.
COLE: You know, I guess it`s - in my view - in my view no, not likely to happen. But I know what I`ve got now. I mean you`re worried about something that`s theoretical. I`ve got a system in my state that`s collapsing. We`re literally - you know, we may have nobody next year. Iowa is down to, what, they`ve got five counties where you can buy this product out of 99. Tennessee, next year - so, you know, in my view I`m looking at -
HAYES: But there`s a lot of ways you could fix it with, right? I mean -
COLE: Well, I think - I suspect
HAYES: You could fix it with -
COLE: I suspect a lot of ways will be explored in the Senate as well as here. But it was important to have a vehicle and start the process moving. If we don`t do that, we`re basically ratifying the status quo, and that`s not acceptable in my state.
HAYES: Do you feel comfortable knowing - voting on this without a CBO score when -
COLE: I do.
HAYES: Republicans made so much of this in the past, right?
COLE: We`ve already had a CBO score, and frankly I think the amendments that were made in order probably make things better. Second, before it can proceed in the Senate because of the process of reconciliation, there does have to be a CBO score. So, you know, sitting around and when - and, third, just to be fair, and I love the guys at CBO. I work with them all the time because I sit on the Budget Committee.
HAYES: Tom Price named the head of it.
COLE: They`re not - they`re not always right. They were spectacularly wrong on ObamaCare. So it`s a factor -
HAYES: But then why not -
COLE: - you should take into account, but you should never be decisive in your vote.
HAYES: Right. But it just seems a little weird. Like you could wait a week, right?
COLE: Why? I mean, look -
HAYES: To get a better estimate of what you`re voting for.
COLE: We know - we know that the score is coming. And legislatively, I think this is, you know, time to move and I think this was it. So I think our leadership made the right choice. We`ll see what the Senate comes up - we`ll actually let the constitution work this out because, again, they`ll send a product back. This won`t be like ObamaCare where frankly once they knew they couldn`t go back to one chamber, they just sort of pushed it through and then tried to amend it afterwards. This is actually the process working the way it should and I think there will be a lot of checks, balances, corrections and changes and along the way.
HAYES: Why was the tax element of this is so important? I mean, there`s a huge tax cut in this bill, it`s about $600 billion. And it`s mostly - almost entirely the top 2 percent of earners. And I think you and I would both agree enough data would bear out that the people of the top and those are people in Manhattan, Greenwich, Connecticut, lots of places that voted for Hillary Clinton, those people have been doing very well the last ten years, you just gave them a huge tax cut - the republican - House Republican Caucus. Why was that so important?
COLE: Well, I think frankly tax reform is important. But I think we can do this more efficiently. Again, the system may be well funded, but it doesn`t function very well. And in my opinion -
HAYES: No, you by mean you just voted for a tax cut for those folks.
COLE: Well, I voted to repeal a failing health care system and replace it with something that I think will work better.
HAYES: Right, but you voted for a $600 billion tax cut.
COLE: Well, I`m also quite happy to take - you know, the money that I think is being wasted in a system now that is not being productive and that frankly is collapsing - look, insurance companies are raising their rates and still fleeing this system. It`s not working. So, you know, you can either sit here and let it collapse and try to exploit that politically, which I think would be pretty immoral, or you can actually start to try and do something and move it forward. I think that`s what we did today.
HAYES: There`s actually a lot of - you know, and you know this. There`s a lot of regional variation in the health of the system. But I hear republicans saying it`s collapsing all the time, the CBO concluded that it`s not in a death spiral and the American Academy of Actuaries which is the professional society of people who literally make actuarial calculations. Does - have they had concluded it`s not on a death spiral? Are they getting it wrong?
COLE: Yes, in my view they are because they`re basically saying as long as the United States government is willing to dump unlimited amounts of money into it, it will stay afloat. You know -
HAYES: But the professional actuaries have this wrong?
COLE: In my view, they do. In my state, again, it`s not working. You know, why are insurance companies pulling out of it if it`s so actuarially sound? You know, why are we having to shovel billions and billions of dollars into it. So -
HAYES: Well, there`s billions in the bill you just voted for, right?
COLE: Pardon?
HAYES: I mean, there`s billions in the bill you just voted for to backstop, there`s actually premium support annually.
COLE: There is.
HAYES: Yes. But that`s shoveling money into it.
COLE: It is. But I think it`s actually changing this where most people will end up getting a reduction in the cost of their premium because right now, a relatively small portion of the population - and any of us could be there at any moment. This is through no fault of their own. But, you know, most health care goes to a relatively small group of people that have chronic conditions, pre-existing conditions, or, you know, those that`s understandable. But everybody -
HAYES: But those people are going to pay more.
COLE: - is raising prices to unsustainable level.
HAYES: Right. But that the - that seemingly they key thing here. Like, that those people are going to pay more, there`s only - the only way of working is that if they pay more.
(CROSSTALK)
COLE: I have more faith in free markets than you do. And so I think over time we`ll get more competition. We`ll get more alternatives. I`ve talked to insurance companies that tell us they can bring rates down substantially. So, that`s just my view. We`ll see. But I would also tell you, you know, for folks that have a different point of view, the United States Senate is still in this process.
HAYES: Right.
COLE: We`ve got a long way to go. There`s lots of things that Tom Price can and will do over at the Department of Health and Human Services. And finally, we expect there to be follow-on legislation. I think too many people look on repeal and replace as if it`s a single event. It`s really a process and we`re pretty early in that process right now.
HAYES: Well you guys did have rose garden - you guys did have a rose garden party today, which made it feel like it was a pretty big deal.
COLE: Well, it was a big deal. And one of our members said, you know, yes, it`s only a step, but it was a giant step, and that`s true. You know, if you don`t pass this, you can`t move anything else later.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
HAYES: That was part of a long conversation I had earlier with Republican Congressman Tom Cole of Oklahoma. The full unedited interview is on our Web site msnbc.com/allin. Joining me now, Bernie Sanders, Senator from Vermont. Senator, it`s interesting to me how much folks in the House, Tom Cole in that last answer, they`re saying basically, well, this isn`t a done deal. It`s going to go to the Senate. The Senate meanwhile is saying we`re going to start from scratch. What is your job and Democrats in the Senate`s job now?
BERNIE SANDERS, UNITED STATES SENATOR FROM VERMONT: Let me back it up here, Chris, and tell you that the mistake of that last discussion is that you were talking about it as some kind of health care bill. It`s not a health care bill. This is a massive tax break to the top 2 percent, $300 billion and hundreds of billions of dollars more in tax breaks for drug companies and insurance companies. That`s what it was. It is not a health care bill when you throw 24 million people off of health insurance, thousands of whom will die when you defund Planned Parenthood. These guys talk about choice all of the time, but they`re telling 2.5 million women they don`t have the choice to continue going to Planned Parenthood. They talked about defending the working class of this country. That`s what Trump talked about during his campaign. They`re going to raise premiums very significantly for older workers. They`re going to cut Medicaid by some $800 billion. And then you talk about the process. Health care is one-seventh of the American economy. How many hearings do you think these guys had? I`m on the Health, Education, and Labor Committee. And when ObamaCare was passed, we had hearing after hearing after hearing.
HAYES: I remember covering them.
SANDERS: It was an exhausting process. These guys had no hearings whatsoever. They didn`t hear from the AMA, they didn`t hear from the American Hospital Association, both groups opposing this legislation. They didn`t hear from consumers. So what you`ve got now is really an insult to the American people. By the way, especially those working people who voted for Trump, who made the mistake of actually believing him when he said, I`m going to - I`m going to pass health care for everybody, better quality, less expensive. Total nonsense. So the goal is to acknowledge ObamaCare has problems. And by the way, one of the things that Cole is talking about, Congressman Cole, they have problems. These guys are in the process of sabotaging the Affordable Care Act, making it more difficult. Then they say, oh, we`re going to have to junk the whole system. So, you know, bottom line here is, of course, the Affordable Care Act has problems. I am an advocate for a Medicare for all single-payer system.
HAYES: Right.
SANDERS: Deductibles today are too high. Premiums are too high. So let`s address the problems.
HAYES: So, but here`s -
SANDERS: Let`s not junk - go ahead. I`m sorry.
HAYES: Right. So here`s the thing. I mean, because in terms of addressing this problem, so the Senate is now saying, you know, this is DOA. We`re going to build our own bill. But this seems crucial to me in terms of the role that Democrats in the Senate now play because there`s some people - and I`d like to get your take on this. There`s some people are being overly blithe, well, they passed it out of the House, they`ll never pass it out of the Senate. That doesn`t seem true to me. The Senate could very well pass a repeal bill. It will look different, but then who knows?
SANDERS: The answer is I think you`re right to be concerned about this. To simply say it will be killed completely or that the status quo will be improving in the Senate, no, I don`t think that is necessarily the case. But I think what we have got to do in the Senate is to say what passed the House today, forget about it. That`s going nowhere. That is a total insult to the American people. And let us, as a Senate, now sit down and say, OK, how do we lower deductibles? How do we lower premiums? How do we make this into a stronger program? That`s what our job is.
HAYES: But isn`t Mitch McConnell - I mean, it is - to go back to your tax cut point, I think it is important to understand that is central to this entire project. And in fact, David Bratt said this earlier. Paul Ryan actually said it. I`ve seen people say it. Basically, we had to do this before tax reform because we get a bigger cut out of the whole thing. Don`t you think Mitch McConnell is going to be focused on that as well? I mean, it seems like the party that, you know, makes up 52, 53 seats in that Senate, that`s - there - that`s what they`re going to be focused on as well.
SANDERS: They are. I mean but what we have is the Senate - you know, we have 48 members in the Democratic Caucus. We have influence. If they`re going to need 60 votes to pass it, they only have52, and they`re not going to get 60. You know, if anything, if a bill looks anything like this. So we have some power. And I think what we also have to do is to use this opportunity to rally the American people to demand that we have a health care system that works for all of us and not just the insurance companies and the drug companies.
HAYES: I want to - the President just spoke. He`s meeting the Prime Minister of Australia. Just spoke about the bill that was passed and about the Senate`s role in this. Take a listen.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: It may be even better. It`s a very good bill right now. The premiums are going to come down very substantially. The deductibles are going to come down. It`s going to be fantastic health care. Right now ObamaCare is failing. We have a failing health care - I shouldn`t say this to our great gentleman and my friend from Australia because you have better health care than we do.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HAYES: They do have - they have universal - I thought - I know.
SANDERS: OK. Wait a minute. Wait a minute, Chris. All right. The President has just said it. That`s great. Let`s take a look at the Australian health care system, and let`s move. Maybe he wants to take a look at the Canadian health care system or systems throughout Europe. Thank you, Mr. President. Let us move to a Medicare for all system that does what every other major country on Earth does. Guarantee healthcare to all people and a fraction of the cost per capita that we spent. Thank you, Mr. President, we`ll quote you on the floor of the Senate.
HAYES: Well, and that - this to me, seems a really important lesson here, which is they`ve made a lot of promises. They`re promises that are contradictory. That deductibles will come down, premiums will come down, more people would be covered, the President said during the campaign he`s not going to cut Medicaid, clearly, they`re going to cut Medicaid. You know, how - I mean it seems to me that ultimately reality is going to matter in the end here.
SANDERS: Do you think? Well, maybe. I would certainly hope so. Look, we`re living in a crazy world. I mean, what this guy just said is preposterous. Everything he said is totally false. But I think when the American people catch on, look, their last bill as you will recall was incredibly unpopular. The American people didn`t want to go forward without legislation. This bill will be even more unpopular. What our job is right now politically is to rally the American people, to work with doctors and nurses and hospitals who will be slammed. Rural hospitals will be decimated by this legislation, shut down. People will lose their jobs. We have the time to do that, and that`s what we`ve got to do.
HAYES: All right. Senator Bernie Sanders, thanks for being with me tonight.
SANDERS: Thank you.
HAYES: Still to come, did republicans take a short-term political victory at the expense of potentially long-lasting damage? We`ll talk about that after the two-minute break.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
PELOSI: You`re walking the plank for what? A bill that will not be accepted by the United States Senate. Why are you doing this? Do you believe in what is in this bill? Some of you have said, well, they`ll fix it in the Senate. But you have every provision of this bill tattooed on your forehead. You will glow in the dark on this one. You will glow in the dark.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HAYES: And joining me now, Anna Galland, Executive Director for MoveOn and Steve Schmidt a Republican Strategist and MSNBC Political Analyst. And to Nancy Pelosi`s point, I covered ACA. I was in - I was in - I was - had an office across the street from Capitol Hill, spent every day talking to people. And as it went on, it was clear. The politics were bad, right? They understood it, right? And when it came down to it, a lot of democrats were, like, we believe in this project. We just really do. I want there to be something approaching universal health care, and we might pay the cost for it. What is the project that the republicans are pursuing?
STEVE SCHMIDT, MSNBC POLITICAL ANALYST: I have to say I can`t believe I`m about to say this on national television. But I agree completely with Nancy Pelosi. I just - when you - when you step back from it, just the incompetence of it at a - at a governing level, no one has read it. We`re talking about one-sixth of the economy. There`s no cost estimate to it. There`s no outside analysis or expertise to even understand what it does. It has zero chance of passing the Senate. I do think they needed to extricate themselves from a self-made political debacle, which is if they hadn`t passed something, it goes down as the biggest broken political promise in our lifetimes by ten.
HAYES: Right.
SCHMIDT: And so -
HAYES: So that was - that`s the project. The project they`re pursuing is that?
SCHMIDT: (INAUDIBLE) to be able to go back and say to republican voters, hey, you know, we voted to repeal and replace ObamaCare. Now, if you`re one of the 14 republicans in the 23 districts that Hillary Clinton won and you understand coming into a midterm that you`ve only had three elections in the last 118 years where the incumbent President`s party picked up seats in the first midterm.
HAYES: Right.
SCHMIDT: You know, I think there`s an outstanding chance that those 14 have walked off the - walk off the plank. And I would be watching closely this Georgia Six special election and see the impact there.
HAYES: That`s it. Anna, you work for MoveOn, and I really was curious what the perspective is from where you`re sitting because this seemed to me like rocket fuel for the resistance. And I remember back in 2009, those ACA votes inspired organizing the tea party. People gave money. They showed up. What does this look like from where you are?
ANNA GALLAND, MOVEON EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR: Yes. Well, first of all, I mean, it`s worth saying at every juncture, let`s reground ourselves on the substance. This is first and foremost a moral obscenity. This is 24 million people being kicked off their health care so that there can be a tax break given to the wealthiest 2 percent of Americans. Like, let`s ground ourselves in stories of people who like my friend Laura Packard, MoveOn member who was just diagnosed with stage four Hodgkins Lymphoma. She not only has to worry about whether her treatments will work but whether she`ll have access to treatment at all. Think about that times tens of millions of people.
HAYES: Right.
GALLAND: So let`s start from there at every juncture. Secondly, this is not only a moral outrage. It`s political malpractice and absolutely this is rocket fuel for the resistance. What we are seeing today, MoveOn sent out a text message just after the vote came down, and we had the biggest fund-raiser via SMS that we`ve had in our history in the wake of this bill. People are so outraged. They`re so sickened by the craven, cowardly, awful politics behind this, at the cost of humans` lives, that they are ready to hit the streets now to take back these seats in 2018. And not just that, they`re ready to get to work to show the Senate that this should be dead on arrival. This is not going anywhere once it goes to the Senate. This is one place where I agree with Tom Cole, there`s a long road ahead and at the end of that road, we`re going to win.
HAYES: So, to Anna`s point, there`s an asymmetry here that is fascinating to me. I was going through and looking at conservative websites before I got on air and none of them are leading with this. I mean like literally, the front page of conservative websites is not what is on the front page of The New York Times and will be on the front page of every paper. House passes the ACA. It`s the religious liberty order or something about Susan Rice. And I`m thinking to myself - or Berkeley, Ann Coulter. It`s like what`s going on here? This was a big victory. I can`t find conservatives who are anywhere near as enthused as people on the left are, as Anna is saying, angry about it.
SCHMIDT: It just shows the degree to which none of this stuff is on the level, right? It shows why hey, the American people are so angry, so disgusted, so fed up with Washington, D.C., with politics. I mean after seven years, you know, however many dozens of votes to repeal ObamaCare, I mean, a couple of things are clear. Republicans came in with full control of the government, had absolutely no idea what to do about it. There`s no actual plan. There`s no actual plan even in the bill they voted for without reading, with no analysis about how to reorder one-sixth of the - one-sixth of the economy. And then the signature issue of the conservative movement in the United States over the last seven years, on the day they finally pass it, is like it`s been buried, you know, in the bottom of the - bottom of the lead. It`s just crazy. Crazy.
HAYES: Anna, in terms of the Senate, you know, it strikes me that there was - there`s this period of time when you looked at all the red states, the Trump states that democrats were up for in the Senate, Heitkamp, Manchin, a whole bunch of others, those were vulnerable people. They don`t seem to me disposed to vote for this.
GALLAND: No. I mean why would they?
HAYES: Yes, I wonder what you read us on that.
GALLAND: This bill has 17 - what was it? It had a 17 percent approval rating before they made it worse by saying that if you have had a C- Section, you have a pre-existing condition and we might turn you down for care. If you have diabetes, we might turn you down for care. Like this was an awful bill that no one liked before they made it worse in order to give a huge tax cut to the wealthiest Americans. So I don`t care what state you`re in, ostensibly blue, ostensibly red, somewhere in the middle, this is awful politics to pass this bill as well as being a moral outrage that should and will have everyone in the streets heading into the House recess, you`re going to see people at Town Halls the same way you did as you referred to, Chris, in August 2009. That`s going to replay at this Congressional Recess, this August, and between now and 2018, at every juncture, people are so ready to kick these bums out of office and not to wait until 2018 to make that message heard.
HAYES: Well, I`m predicting fewer Town Halls. Steve Schmidt, Anna Galland, thanks for joining us. I appreciate it.
GALLAND: Thanks, Chris.
HAYES: Coming up, fiery reactions from democrats today as the health care bill came to the floor. We`ll play that after the break.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SHEILA JACKSON LEE, UNITED STATES CONGRESSWOMAN FROM TEXAS: I want you to look and keep your eyes on who will feel the Trumpcare`s mother of all bombs of health care dropped on the American people. God have mercy on your soul.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REP. LINDA SANCHEZ, (D) CALIFORNIA: The truth is, the Repulicans lack the bravery to call this bill what it really is, a massive tax cut for the rich on the backs of working mom and dads and the sick.
REP. MICHAEL DOYLE, (D) PENNSYLVANIA: This creates a survival of the fittest health care for America. If you are young, if you are healthy, if you are wealthy, this bill is for you. You`re going to do okay.
REP. JOE CROWLEY, (D) NEW YORK: But to force through a bill that you know is going to hurt -- it`s going to hurt 24 million Americans, it`s more than irresponsible, it`s just plain wrong.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HAYES: House Democrats filled with righteous anger today as the GOP health care bill came to the floor for a vote. Republicans insist Americans will be better off under the bill, maintaining it contains plenty of protections for vulnerable people like the elderly and sick. The truth about what`s really in this bill coming up next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REP. MARK MEADOWS, (R) NORTH CAROLINA: Based on the bill that we have today, I don`t see really any losers.
REP. CHRIS COLLINS, (R) NEW YORK: We`re protecting everyone with preexisting conditions. No if, ands or buts about it.
REP. KEVIN MCCARTHY, (R) CALIFORNIA: We`re not taking a benefit away. Nobody on Medicaid is going to be taken away.
REP. LOU BARLETTA, (R) PENNSYLVANIA: Nobody with preexisting conditions will lose their health insurance, which it will do -- will happen under the Affordable Care Act.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HAYES: There are no losers in the health care bill according to Freedom Caucus chair Mark Meadows, that`s the spin.
In reality, the bill would drastically cut Medicaid. Millions of Americans would lose insurance and enable premiums to skyrocket for people with preexisting conditions.
I`m joined now by Stacey Stewart, president of the March of Dimes Foundation, which works to improve the health of babies and moms, and Wendell Potter, former health insurance executive, founder of Tarbul.org, which examines the impact of money in politics.
And Stacey, let me begin with you. It was notable to me March of Dimes came out against this bill, because you work with people that are, you know, dealing with children with really severe illnesses. Do you think Republicans are right when they say no one`s going to be hurt, preexisting conditions are protected?
STACEY STEWART, MARCH OF DIMES: You know, Chris, it`s really clear that the impact of this bill, if this is ultimately signed into law, we know that 24 million Americans would stand to lose their health insurance. And within that, 6.5 million women of child-bearing age, low-income women, would also lose their access to their health care as well.
We know that this bill has the potential to hurt many millions of people, especially mothers and especially babies. Mothers who need access to prenatal care to have a healthy pregnancy. We know at the March of Dimes, we work every day on making sure there are healthy moms and healthy babies. There are almost 400,000 babies born today that are born pre-term. And if those mothers don`t have access to adequate health care, it`s potentially more chance of more babies being born unhealthy with all kinds of issues around pre-term birth, birth defects and more.
So this bill is -- we`re very disappointed in it. And we understand that the effects could be quite severe for many millions of women.
HAYES: So you do not buy that there are no losers?
STEWART: What we estimate is that there could be millions of people that could lose. And what`s really important is that this is really a debate that we really need to have. We want to make sure that -- and I think everybody agrees that when a baby enters this world, we all can agree whether we`re a Republican or a Democrat that that baby ought to have the best chance to have a healthy life.
I don`t know why this is a political issue. And I don`t understand, and we don`t understand at the March of Dimes why we have to have a debate about it, but apparently we do. And one of the things we want to make sure that the senate understands is that we should not put on the table maternity coverage for women. We should not put on the table whether or not babies have a chance to have healthy moms, to make sure that they can start their lives in the healthiest way possible.
HAYES: Wendell, you worked in the insurance industry. You know it well. And it`s been really interesting to watch how the insurance industry has played this. They have been very silent, notably silent. You have groups like the AMA, the Hospital Association, the March of Dimes, the AARP. A- HIP, which is the industry group, released this statement today.
It believes that every American deserves coverage and care that is affordable and accessible including those with preexisting conditions. The American Health Care Act needs important improvement to better protect low and moderate income families who rely on Medicaid or buy their own coverage. We stand ready to work with members of the senate and all policymakers offering our recommendations for how this bill can be improved to insure the private market delivers affordable coverage for all Americans.
What are they up to?
WENDELL POTTER, FRM. HEALTH INSURANCE EXECUTIVE: Well, what they`re up to is -- that`s gobbledygook, obviously. There`s nothing that really says what they`re truly believing. The reason for that is there`s not just one size or one kind of health insurance company, there are many health insurance companies that are thriving and doing very, very well, profiting off of the Medicaid expansion. So those members of AHIP certainly are concerned about what this legislation would do.
A lot of the companies, like the ones I used to work for, the large for- profit insurance companies, they really couldn`t careless what happens to people in the individual market because it`s not a market that they care about.
HAYES: They`re not making much money there.
POTTER: They`re not making much money there. They never did. And despite what the members of congress have said, before the Affordable Care Act, they just were not in that market. They didn`t want to be there. They weren`t there unless they were mandated by states to provide coverage.
So it`s just nonsense that this will be good for anyone, even for many insurance companies. So I`m assuming behind the scenes, some of the individual companies are lobbying separate from AHIP quite frankly.
HAYES: Yeah, do you think they`re lobbying. This is where it goes to the Senate, right, and these pressures I think are going to be brought to bear much more forcefully. Can you see companies that are playing in the Medicaid expansion market really fighting to make sure those Medicaid cuts don`t happen?
POTTER: Oh, absolutely because they`ve been able to convert those revenues into profits. And if that revenue stream dries up, as it will in future years, their shareholders will not be happy.
So they`re speaking -- they`re there on behalf of their shareholders primarily. Yeah, they care about the states providing that revenue, the federal government providing that revenue and their being able to provide coverage to people who wouldn`t otherwise have coverage, but their biggest stakeholder are their shareholders.
HAYES: Right.
Stacey, are you - the March of Dimes or other groups that do the kind of work you do -- and it`s incredible work, I just want to say, so thank you for it.
STEWART: Thank you.
HAYES: Are they going to be working over the senate?
STEWART: Oh, my goodness. We`re going to be making sure that all senators really understand what`s really at stake here.
We don`t feel confident that the bill as the House has passed will stand in its current form. We do believe that the senate will give a very thoughtful and thorough look at the legislation, and we hope that they`ll entertain a lot of different opinions and expert opinions and data that we can provide and many other groups can provide to make sure that they can make the most informed decision.
Look, this is really about life and death for too many millions of families and individuals. And we should take the time to make sure that the legislation that gets developed in the senate is responsible, is one that actually produces better results for the many families who depend on health care, but also if there`s a way to make sure that it`s fiscally responsible. Of course everyone wants to make sure that that happens, but we cannot put at risk the many lives that may be put on the line as a result of the house`s actions today. We have to make sure that especially mothers and babies, but all Americans have a chance to access health care that is affordable, that is available to them, and that protects them in the event of health changes.
HAYES: Stacey Stewart, Wendell Potter, thanks to you both.
STEWART: Thank you.
HAYES: Still to come, the other controversial Rose Garden ceremony today. (inaudible) and Dan Savage join me to talk about that executive order and more ahead. Plus, a feel-good story, a feel-good story in tonight`s Thing One, Thing Two. It`s incredible and it`s after the break.
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HAYES: Thing One tonight, it is the feel-good viral video of the day. A 7-year-old girl`s first day back at school after receiving a new prosthetic leg, a pink sports blade, and here`s how her classmates reacted.
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GIRL: That`s your new pink leg.
GIRL: Wow.
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HAYES: Her name is Anu, and she lives in Birmingham, England. Her leg was removed shortly after she was born. But now with her new blade she gets to run alongside her classmates thanks to the medical device paid for by the British National Health Service.
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ANU: It makes me run faster and do my street dancing faster.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Is it comfortable?
ANU: Yes. It has the sock to make it comfortable.
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HAYES: Back here in America, there was another first day back, also an individual with a preexisting condition, Congressman Jason Chaffetz`s early return to Capitol Hill to cast a deciding vote is Thing Two in 60 seconds.
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REP. JASON CHAFFETZ, (R) UTAH: Americans have choices, and they`ve got to make a choice. And so maybe rather than getting that new iPhone that she just love and they want to go spend hundreds of dollars on that, maybe they should invest it in their own health care.
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HAYES: That was two months ago when House Republicans first unveiled their health care plan. Last week, that congressman, Jason Chaffetz announced a medical leave from congress. He flew home to Utah for immediate surgery on a foot he injured 12 years ago and was supposed to be out until mid-May. But then came this week`s Trumpcare push, a health care bill so toxic that the GOP`s 29-seat majority didn`t ensure passage. So Jason Chaffetz rolled in, cutting short his medical leave, racing back to Washington, this photo went viral. Chaffetz riding through the Capitol building to cast his vote for Trumpcare, or as the communications director for Senator Dick Durbin put it, "Chaffetz is all smiles as he scoots back from a fully insured surgery to repeal health coverage for millions."
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HAYES: All eyes are on the second Rose Garden ceremony today, the one harolding the House Republican vote to repeal and replace Obamacare, but there was a morning Rose Garden ceremony as well marking yet another executive order from President Trump. The executive order attempts to do two things principally, first ease a legal prohibition against churches taking explicitly political stances. Second, instructs the government to issue new regulations making it easier for organizations or businesses to raise religious objections to contraception and health care policies.
The Conservative National Review derided the executive order as worse than useless. The ACLU tweeted we thought we would have to sue Trump today, but it turned out the order signing was an elaborate photo op with no discernible policy outcome.
But today`s two Rose Garden ceremonies still offer a pretty good sampling of where this administration priorities are, the White House condoning discrimination, eviscerating health care protections in this country, Jenni Jardins and Dan Savage join me, next. (COMMERCIAL BREAK)
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TRUMP: You know, coming from a different world and only being a politician for a short period of time, how am I doing, am I doing OK? I`m president.
Hey, I`m president, can you believe it, right.
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HAYES: Can you believe it? Joining me now Xeni Jardins, who is a breast cancer survivor and founder and co-editor of Boing Boing. And Dan Savage, nationally syndicated columnist and host of the Savage Lovecast.
Xeni, let me start with you because we`ve had you on before to talk about your own experience with Obamacare, cancer treatment, and I was thinking about you today about how you felt, processed what happened today?
XENI JARDINS, CO-FOUNDER BOING BOING: It`s devastating, Chris. It`s kind of like getting a cancer diagnosis.
You know, one of the first things I thought was how people always talked about cancer like a battle. Cancer was just a disease. It`s just cellular biology. It was just some of my cells deciding they didn`t want to behave any more and they wanted to create tumors and infest my lymphnodes and metastasize. And that`s kind of what it - it feels like that`s what`s happening.
You know, America is like a body. And we have to take care of the entire body. Every single cell in this country, every single person in this country deserves life. And we`ve got to get our priorities back in order. I don`t understand how our lawmakers, our leaders can be so lacking in empathy that this day happened. I didn`t survive chemo and radiation and surgery and more surgeries only to wonder if I`m going to be able to live, if access is going to be taken away entirely, not just for me but for 24 million or more people just like me who just want to live.
HAYES: You know, today was a day that I think a lot of people was going to come earlier, you know, the day one, people thought, well, they`re going to repeal and replace Obamacare. And they fought and they fought and they lost the initial rounds. They passed this today. They still have a long way to go.
The other thing that happened in the Rose Garden today was another thing where it looked like it was going to be a big bad day substantively for a lot of people in this country.
DAN SAVAGE, COLUMNIST: For the LGBT community.
HAYES: For the LGBT community. We had early leaks about what it might be, people were prepared. And then this thing happened, and ACLU said, OK...
SAVAGE: It`s a big nothing burger.
HAYES: And it feels like if one or two things connect them to Xeni`s point about battling is that, you know, the fight of politics matters a lot, probably more than it has in a long time.
SAVAGE: And they keep threatening the LGBT community and rattling the saber, and that`s nerve wracking and unsettling. And it`s important to remember that people who need health care, immigrants, women of color, people who need access to reproductive health care services, are also queer people, many of them. So, queer people are being attacked by the Trump administration on many, many fronts, even if they haven`t targeted us yet, although they do keep threatening to target us.
And the executive order that was here today would have created this huge carve out that basically allowed for discrimination against LGBT people and women who had abortions or premarital sex if it violated someone`s deeply held sincere religious beliefs.
And basically we (inaudible) wholesale discrimination against people.
HAYES: But here is The National Center for Transgender Equality, which I think is an important statement to read, because it gets to the elemental issue here. "Thanks to the overwhelming pushback from so many communities, President Trump stopped short of explicitly endorsing anti-LGBT discrimination, this vaguely worded order is clearly aimed at providing a license to discriminate, President Trump has simply asked others in his administration to do much of his dirty work."
SAVAGE: But it feels I think in the LGBT community like there is a gun pointed at us. And finger is on the trigger, but it hasn`t been pulled yet. And the religious right is freaking out. Brian Fisher, American Family Association.
HAYES; They`re furious.
SAVAGE: They`re ferious at Trump.
HAYES: And they`re going push - right.
And Xeni, that gets to this sort of question of where you think of yourself and other folks like you for whom this is life and death and millions others who have family members whom this is life and death, like the energy of investing yourself in fighting for the political outcome you want to see happen.
JARDINS: It`s not a political outcome, it`s a human outcome. This isn`t the American that I love. The America that I love cares about my right to life, even though I`m 46 years past being a fetus. The America that I love loves diversity, it knows that children like Jimmy Kimmel`s kid, god blessing for saying what he did the other night - knows that those babies weren`t born into the world with some kind of original sin that makes some of them worthy of death and the others worthy of life.
This isn`t robbing Peter to pay Paul, this is killing Peter to pay Paul. This isn`t America.
SAVAGE: One of the ironies, I think, of this moment is that I think that partly in thanks to Trump and the lies that he told to the Republican base while he was campaigning, there is majority support in the country for the idea that the government does have a responsibility to provide all citizens with all access to health care and that is a seachange.
HAYES: To Xeni`s point, and to the the point that Jimmy Kimmel was making tacitly, I have never seen support for single-payer as a kind of common assumption higher in my adult lifehood and there`s a lot more fight left to go and I`m really curious to see where this ends up.
There are people on the right already warning that that is the path that we`ve been put on.
Xeni Jardins, thank you as always. And Dan Savage, thank you.
JARDINS: We`re going to fight for every single one of you, America.
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED. END