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Obama Invites Lawmakers to White House; Shutdown Debt Threat; Obamacare Sign-up Website Overwhelmed; Government Shutdown; Health Care Rollout Glitches

Aired October 02, 2013 - 12:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

ANNOUNCER: This is CNN breaking news.

SUZANNE MAKVEAUX, CNN ANCHOR: This is CNN NEWSROOM. I'm Suzanne Malveaux.

MICHAEL HOLMES, CNN NEWSROOM: And I'm Michael Holmes. Thanks for your company today.

Breaking news right now. President Obama has invited congressional leaders to the White House on this the second day of the government shutdown.

MALVEAUX: So could this actually be a huge step towards breaking the impasse? We got word a couple minutes ago via a tweet from the White House press secretary saying, "POTUS invites Senator Reid, Nancy Pelosi, McConnellPress and @SpeakerBoehner to the WH later today to discuss the need to reopen the govt, raise the debt limit, " all of that. Want to bring in our major players here. Dana Bash on Capitol Hill. Brianna at the White House.

Brianna, let's go to you at the White House. First of all, I mean we know the pressure's on here, but the president has made very clear he's not negotiating the -- actually the Obamacare and attaching it to the budget. So what is he going to offer?

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Well, at this point, we don't actually expect that he will offer anything. That's what White House officials that I've spoken to are saying, Suzanne. This isn't, as we understand it, going to be a negotiation. We are told that when congressional leaders come here at 5:30 p.m. and they meet with President Obama, that his message will be what it has been, which is that he says he will not negotiate on Obamacare, he wants Congress to pass a clean funding bill, as you've heard it called, so a funding bill without any conditions attached, without any Obamacare delay or defunding, and that he wants them to increase the debt ceiling as well without any conditions.

What we've been watching here in Washington is this kind of endless loop of the House putting a bill out there, the Obama administration putting a veto threat on it, the Senate dismantling it, sending it back to the House. So I think the White House here, after four sort of goes of that, President Obama is having this meeting.

I will tell you as well, Suzanne, as far as we know, at least right now, this isn't going to be on camera. So we may not see it. I think this is President Obama bringing congressional leaders in and telling them to move forward, that they can't mess with his signature health care reform program. And it's kind of more of what we've heard him say, just saying it again.

MALVEAUX: Brianna, is this more about the image here, the perception, the theatrics even if you want to be cynical about all this, if he's not willing to move the line here? What is this about?

KEILAR: I think part of it is, President Obama, it's sort of incumbent on him as president to remain involved in this. But at the same time, you do know obviously that the real action going on here is on Capitol Hill, as Dana will tell you. But I think there's this need for President Obama to continue to kind of come out each day, to do something each day. We saw him yesterday in the Rose Garden. So this, I think, is kind of just keeping up his drum beat.

HOLMES: All right, Brianna.

Let's bringing in Dana Bash now from D.C.

You know, when you look at how this is going to happen, and we were both talking about this earlier, when you saw Speaker Boehner's spokesman say, "we're pleased the president finally recognizes that his refusal to negotiate is indefensible. It's unclear why we'd be having this meeting if it's not meant to be a start to serious talks." It's kind of like, is that a good way to start this off?

DANA BASH, CNN CHIEF CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, listen, the Republican line since last week when President Obama met with the Iranian president was, look, he's going to meet with the Iranian president and he won't even meet with us. So they're getting their wish. Let's just be clear, in some ways, President Obama is sort of calling their bluff.

However, if Brianna is right, and I'm sure she is, based on conversations that she's had and I've had with Democrats, that they are insisting that they are holding firm, that they are not going to negotiate, that they will not do anything beyond just passing a -- one bill that funds the government, you've got to wonder where this is going to go. One possibility is to sort of wrap these discussions about the government shutdown, or funding the government, with the very soon, what is very soon, which is the debt ceiling, which is, of course, we've talked about this so many times. So much more catastrophic potentially to not just the U.S. economy but the global economy, if the U.S. does default on its loans.

So that date is October 17th. We're not that far away. We're, what, 15 days away from there. So it's possible that the president might start to say, OK, look, guys, this is - this shutdown is not - is not going anywhere. We're at an impasse. But let's start talking about the debt ceiling and what we can - what we can work on vis-a-vis that and maybe they can wrap it all together. You know, who knows, or it just might be optics. I know it's cynical, but it might just be so that the president can say, I sat down with leaders.

MALVEAUX: All right, Dana Bash, Brianna Keilar, thank you.

We're trying not to be too cynical here, but it is hard to imagine, what are they going to get done here? I mean they've both dug in pretty hard here. And the Senate Democrats, including the president, say he's not going to deal with this piecemeal -

HOLMES: Yes.

MALVEAUX: Bit by bit refunding the government, you know, opening the government. That is not going to happen.

HOLMES: Well, at least, I suppose, you know, as Dana was saying, at least it looks like they're meeting, and that's what everyone's been calling for, so it's better than not meeting. Who knows? It could be a miracle.

Well, a lot of Americans, meanwhile, watching all of this, frustrated by the shutdown, especially those who are losing money over it.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I'm frustrated because if they don't get this budget fixed, then I don't -- my husband doesn't get paid come the 15th of the month and we may not be able to pay bills.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Our government, who we trust, can't even do their jobs.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I think we need to have the shutdown so we can say, look, we've all got to do hard work here and this kind of hopefully will force Congress and the president to really do some hard work instead of just putting little Band-Aids on the problem.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: They don't understand how the greatest nation on the planet can have a Congress conducting in such a manner. It's a shame.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MALVEAUX: Some of the almost 800,000 federal workers who were sent home without pay, well, they held protest. They are protesting across the country, from Washington to Seattle. They are just so, so frustrated.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CROWD: We all are essential. Furlough Congress.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We want to work.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MALVEAUX: So the message, "we want to work," "we're all essential." The so-called nonessential employees furloughed come from more than a dozen federal agencies, including the EPA, the Pentagon, NASA, Department of Education and the National Institutes of Health. HOLMES: So, as you know, and as we've been discussing, the next big battle is whether or not to raise the debt ceiling. This is a much bigger deal in many ways. The government hits that ceiling October 17th. That's the date the Treasury runs out of money to pay the nation's bills, bills that have already been racked up, unless lawmakers authorize additional credit, which is the tradition.

MALVEAUX: So congressional Republicans have said that they want to tie Obamacare, whether or not it is the debt ceiling is raised. According to the CNN poll, however, more Americans say it is more important to raise the debt ceiling than to delay Obamacare. Fifty-three percent say that Republicans in Congress would be more to blame if the U.S. defaults on its loans. Thirty-one percent blame the president.

HOLMES: Well, the government shutdown and looming debt limit crisis, they're making investors nervous. A couple days ago they were saying that they were muted because they factored in some of this stuff and didn't think it would go on this long. Well, check it out. Right now the Dow is down 74 points, that's half a percentage point. It was down by more than that a couple of hours ago, over 0.8 percent. Now also affecting stocks, the payroll company, ADP, came out with its monthly jobs report. That showed 166,000 private sector jobs were added in September.

MALVEAUX: That was actually slightly below expectations. Despite all of this, some companies hit new 52-week highs. That was including Priceline, Amazon, Netflix, as well as Yahoo!. And as we've mentioned, the government is not going to be able to pay all of its bills on October 17th unless Congress raises the debt ceiling.

HOLMES: Now that threat, combined with the shutdown we're all watching right now, is causing a lot of economic pain. Christine Romans joins us now from New York.

You know, so much to talk about. Let's start with the shutdown. When you talk about the cost of it, how bad could it be? Obviously it depends on how long it goes on, but how bad could it get?

CHRISTINE ROMANS, CNN BUSINESS ANCHOR: Absolutely. I mean it depends on how long it goes on. It's counterproductive no matter what. I mean when you have people who are federal employees that are not getting paychecks, that's going to hurt. And you're talking about 800,000 people who have been furloughed here.

When you look at the economic numbers, it looks like a two-week shutdown, by one economics - by one forecast, about 0.3 percentage points off of GDP. That means you're not seeing as much growth as you like. Last four weeks, you're going to knock about 1.4 percentage points off GDP. That's cutting economic growth in half. That's just a shutdown, not a debt ceiling, just a shutdown. Counterproductive. Very counterproductive.

MALVEAUX: And, Christine, the cost to the country here, however, if Congress fails to raise the debt ceiling, what are we looking at in terms of numbers, in terms of employment and really long-term? ROMANS: This is so critical. And there's so much misinformation about the debt ceiling. There are folks who really truly believe that if you don't run the debt ceiling, you're somehow forcing fiscal austerity in Washington. America has always paid its bills on time. That's why United States treasuries, U.S. bonds, are the cornerstone of the global financial system. Because the U.S. does not go back on its word. If you say we are not going to raise the debt ceiling, you are saying you endorse America going back on its word.

When the U.S. -- October 17th there's going to be $30 billion in the bank according to the Treasury. On November 1st, $25 billion has to go out to pay Social Security checks. Then there's a Medicare payment right after that. Then there's some interest payments after that. Who's going to decide who gets paid? Are you going to pay Chinese bankers, Chinese lenders first and Social Security second? Are you going to pay Social Security but not your lenders and then interest rates spike? The stock market collapses and suddenly it becomes even more complicated and difficult for investors to grow jobs. It's such a dangerous situation. And I feel as though, you guys, the politics -- the politics of it have sort of taken the truth out of it almost. You know, it is incredibly dangerous to say that the U.S., the gold standard in the world, it's economy, we're not going to pay our bills because our Congress can't figure out how to pass a budget.

HOLMES: And, again, the international ramifications of that, as you say, the dollar, the cornerstone. Everyone looks to the U.S. as the world's largest economy. The impact, we've seen it on European stocks today, as well. We've seen the uncertainty doing that, didn't we? And that's happened the last day or two. That could be enormously damaging to the world economy.

ROMANS: And when you talk to the people who are really moving a lot of money, the big insiders, the people who are - who are bond managers or who are running companies, they think that there's no way the U.S. government is not going to pay the interest on its loans. We would just never, never do that, which means you're going to have to cut some other things. And some of the biggest things are Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security. I mean those are some of the biggest things sitting right there.

And who - you know, for people who, on the right, who may dislike this administration and its priorities and goals, I mean, so you're going to - now you're going to imbue the president and the Treasury secretary with deciding which bills to pay? That's not at all why they're fighting about budgets. You know, they don't like the president's spending and his priorities, but now you're going to hand them all the authority about what to spend because Congress doesn't have a budget.

MALVEAUX: All right, Christine, thank you so much.

HOLMES: It's unimaginable. It really is.

MALVEAUX: I mean hopefully this is the kind of thing the president's going to be pushing for and at 5:30 meeting with these leaders saying, look, you know, this is - this is the bigger problem that's looming. It's down the road here. Let's -

HOLMES: Hopefully they get it.

MALVEAUX: Let's get the politics out of this -

HOLMES: Exactly.

MALVEAUX: Because, I mean, this is talking about the world's - the world's economy essentially.

HOLMES: Exactly. It is.

MALVEAUX: It is just day two of the government shutdown and Obamacare enrollment as well. Yesterday, a lot of folks who wanted to sign up for the health care exchange, well, they were greeted with an error message there. We're going to check on how it's going today. If it's getting any better, the CNN NEWSROOM.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

HOLMES: All right, day two of open enrollment on Obamacare.

MALVEAUX: So many people tried to sign up on day one. Actually, the website couldn't handle it. People repeatedly received error messages. Now, federal officials, they are promising that there's going to be some improvements here. They're working on all this. And our Dr. Sanjay Gupta, well he's in Lexington, Kentucky. He's got more on how this is all being sorted out, the glitches, the health care law's impact on those who are already insured. Watch.

DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Suzanne and Michael, glitch did seem to be the operative word yesterday. You heard about that a lot. We were in South Carolina. Hundreds of people coming up to us, asking lots of questions. And we couldn't find an example of one person who had been successfully able to actually sign onto the site.

Supposedly things are better today. We're here in Kentucky now, Lexington, Kentucky, and we hear about 2,900 people were able to sign up yesterday. Those numbers may be improving today.

An interesting sort of collision here. We heard about 3 million people signed up around - or 3 million people tried to sign up around the country, but we couldn't get an exact number of how many people were successful, in part because one of the people at the Department of Health and Human Services who was giving us this information has been furloughed as part of the government shutdown. A little bit of irony there, but it makes it harder to get that information.

A lot of people asking me about premiums, how much is this going to cost? That's one of the most common questions.

Some of those numbers are going to come out still in the weeks and months ahead.

What we're hearing for people who are joining the healthcare exchange, the marketplace for the first time, people who have not had healthcare insurance before and are also getting subsidies, the average cost is about $100 a month or even a little bit less than that.

Again, 60 percent of people paying around that much money, but again, those numbers are a little bit of a moving target. Want to keep an eye on them in the weeks and months to come.

Another common question, how is this going to affect people who already have insurance? And you've heard many times, Suzanne and Michael, that, if you have insurance don't worry about it, this doesn't affect you.

Well, that may not be entirely true. For example, here in Kentucky, UPS has one of their largest distribution facilities. UPS is actually telling spouses of their employees, spouses who can get their healthcare insurance elsewhere, to start doing so because UPS is no longer going to provide that coverage for them.

So you're starting to see some impact, especially on big companies in terms of how they insure their employees.

Again, a lot of moving parts, this is some of the most -- this is some of the biggest health reform in this country in nearly 50 years, so not unsuspected to have some twists and tumbles along the way.

As we get more information, Suzanne and Michael, we'll bring it to you. Back to you for now.

MALVEAUX: All right, it'll take a little time to sort it all out, but you know, it's just the beginning

HOLMES: Sanjay is there. It will be OK.

MALVEAUX: OK.

And we're looking at live pictures here. This is (inaudible), World War II veterans who are gathering at the memorial site. And you see tourists as well as protesters.

We're going to go live to Washington to talk with veterans who are outraged, outraged about the government shutdown.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SENATOR CHUCK GRASSLEY (R), RANKING MEMBER, JUDICIARY COMMITTEE: World War II veterans coming in on honor flights, and barricades around something that I'll bet, 24/7, 365, I could walk into that anytime.

And so the show of putting barriers around because of a shutdown and spending all the money to do it and then have every other department talk about shutdowns causes me to be a little cynical.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HOLMES: That is Republican Senator Chuck Grassley feeling cynical about some of the ripple effects of the government shutdown. Others are feeling, well, let's call it outraged, especially those World War II honor veterans who moved through barriers to visit what was a closed national memorial, closed because of the shutdown.

They are emerging as heroes in this D.C. drama. More veterans gathering right now at a rally there.

Jake Tapper is at the World War II memorial where things are pretty charged. It was great in many ways seeing them move on in there to what is really an open memorial.

What is happening at the moment?

JAKE TAPPER, CNN CHIEF WASHINGTON CORRESPONDENT: Well, about 200 veterans from World War II and Korea came to visit the memorial today. No barricades were up.

They came from Missouri and they came from Illinois. Veterans almost entirely from World War II, some Korean veterans here through the program honor flights that flight veterans to the memorial.

There have been many politicians here, as well as well as some protesters against the Democrats, and also a bigger group of protesters just recently against the Republicans.

But generally speaking, this has been about the veterans and allowing them to come and pay tribute to those men and women they left behind in Europe and Korea.

HOLMES: Yeah, it's extraordinary the things that have been shut down.

What is the level of anger there or frustration or whatever it is among the people there generally about the shutdown and the impacts of it?

TAPPER: Well, among the veterans, and I spoke to a few dozen of them, they were mainly focused on coming to the memorial.

They had all heard about the shutdown for the most part, and some of them had their opinions about which side was to blame. It was a fairly bipartisan crowd, but generally speaking they were here to pay tribute and honor.

There were some individuals who were angry about the shutdown, angry at President Obama and the Democrats, angry at the House Republicans, depending on their point of view.

And, of course, there are many politicians from both major parties here, but generally speaking, the anger was on the sidelines and whenever people started yelling, others said let the veterans have their moment, don't ruin this for them, and people generally respected that.

HOLMES: Jake Tapper there in D.C., thanks, Jake. And we'll see more from you on "THE LEAD" at 4:00 p.m.

Suzanne?

MALVEAUX: Notice they said vets did their jobs, and they want the government, Congress specifically, to do theirs, as well.

A lot of people feeling that way, and it is impacting real people.

One woman has been squeezed since those forced cuts, called the sequester and now taking a second hit with the shutdown.

Plus, what furlough means for some federal workers.

That's next on "CNN NEWSROOM."

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

MALVEAUX: You're looking at live pictures. This is a deeply divided Capitol Hill of Congress.

It is day two of the government shutdown, and the question, the big question, will lawmakers reach a budget agreement to get the federal government running again in full force?

And this impasse, as you can imagine, has outraged many of us who just can't seem to figure out, why can't they get this together?

I mean, this is funding the government. This is the U.S. government partially shutdown.

HOLMES: How could this happen? And it could get worse, of course. We're talking debt ceiling.

Right now, you're talking countless people across the country being affected, directly or indirectly.

Directly, let's talk about the 800,000 almost federal employees who have been sent home without pay indefinitely at the moment.

Elizabeth Lytle is a member of AFGE Local 704, among those furloughed yesterday. She works for the Environmental Protection Agency in Chicago.

MALVEAUX: We also have Trish Gilbert. She's executive vice president of the National Air Traffic Controllers Association, and she is now working without pay.

So, Elizabeth, I want to start off with you because we read a little bit about your background and how tough things have been for you because you had to be furloughed once before because of those forced expense cuts for the government here.

I understand that you might not be able to get a root canal because you can't afford it because you've got to make some really tough, tough choices.

ELIZABETH LYTLE, ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION AGENCY: That's correct.

MALVEAUX: Tell us about what you're going through.

LYTLE: It's tough. I mean, I look at it this way. I have to pay my bills, no matter what, and yet, I see congressmen who are fussing and fighting over simple little things because they want their five minutes of fame, and it's time to pay their creditors.

But who's at fault? I don't know. Who's paying the price? We are. I have to take and make cuts everywhere just to make ends meet.

HOLMES: A lot of people around the country are paycheck to paycheck, and it really does hit them.

Trish, tell us about air traffic controllers. They've received letters about furloughs and paychecks after this week, but they've had to show up. They're essential personnel.

How are they being impacted? How might air travelers be impacted if this goes on?

TRISH GILBERT, AIR TRAFFIC CONTROLLER: Air traffic controllers are excepted employees meaning they are essential and must come to work.

Whether they'll receive a paycheck remains to be seen because, as you know, there's no funding bill in place right now.

So it's basically come to work, do what you need to do to keep the system safe and you will be paid at a later time.

In addition to that, the rest of their team, their staff support, our engineers, plans and programs, quality assurance, all the people that keep all of the day-to-day stuff together, the strategic planning, the changes to the air space so we can make it more efficient and safer moving forth, are all furloughed.

We're in a hiring freeze right now for air traffic controllers. We were set to start that process to start hiring again this week.