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Stalled GOP Bill; Health Care Bill Delay; President Trump On Health Care Bill; Protesters Gather on Capitol Hill; Europe Learning from Russian Hacking; Russia Will Strike Again; Stopped Syrian Attack. Aired 1-1:30p ET

Aired June 28, 2017 - 13:00   ET

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

WOLF BLITZER, CNN ANCHOR: Wherever you're watching from around the world, thank you for joining us.

Up first, efforts to revive the Senate Republicans' health care bill. Just a little while ago, President Trump struck an optimistic tone.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: But I think we're going to get it over the line. It was a great, great feeling in that room yesterday.

And what also came out is the fact that this health care would be so good, would be far better than Obamacare.

We'll see what happens. We're working very hard. We're giving ourselves a little bit more time to make it perfect. That's what we want to do.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BLITZER: Lawmakers are back behind closed doors today. They're trying to find some sort of compromise. The Senate majority leader, Mitch McConnell, delayed a vote until after the July 4th recess. But will he be able to get the 50 votes he needs by then?

Let's get the latest on this state of play (ph). Our Senior White House Correspondent Jim Acosta is standing by. Our Congressional Correspondent Phil Mattingly, he's up on Capitol Hill.

Phil, what is it going to take for Senate Republicans to come together on this health care bill?

PHIL MATTINGLY, CNN CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: It is going to take Senate Republicans, who have very public, very concrete set positions on this bill and on health care in general, kind of as an ideology, to move off of those positions. And that's not a small thing, Wolf.

I can tell you that over the course of the last couple of weeks, over and over again, senior Senate GOP aides have been waiting for the Medicaid expansion state senators on one side, for the conservatives, as it relates to regulations, on the other side, to start moving towards the Senate. To start giving a -- giving a little bit on their key issues, on their core issues to try and reach that point where you can actually move forward.

What yesterday underscored was the reality of they're not there yet. And, frankly, they weren't very close. If you look publicly, there are nine senators who are out -- opposed to the discussion draft that they were trying to move forward with yesterday. I'm told there are a lot deeper concerns from a lot more members than those that are out publicly.

So, basically, where they stand right now and what they're trying to do, Wolf, is thread a needle between two ideological polls of the party on serious issues with significant repercussions through all of their states. And, right now, they're just not there.

BLITZER: You know, Jim, you're over at the White House. So, what do we expect from President Trump? What kind of role is he going to play to try to get this bill through the Senate?

JIM ACOSTA, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Well, Wolf, they're going to have to strike a careful balance here.

As you saw, the president was reaching out to some of these senators to allay their concerns and that just did not carry the day.

While, at the same time, one of these outside groups, America First Policies, which is closely aligned to this White House, filled with former Trump campaign staffers, even White House staffers, they tried to drop the hammer on Nevada Republican Senator Dean Heller. It backfired. It blew up in their faces. And so, they're going to have to recalibrate the strategy.

But, Wolf, I don't know how optimistic the president is about this. If you -- if you look at what he said in these remarks just a short while ago at this energy round table, he said, quote, "I think we're going to get at least very close." And "I think we're going to get it over the line."

That is not the same kind of rhetoric that we heard from President Trump during the campaign. At a campaign event last October in Sanford, Florida, he said this was all going to be easy. And he's finding out that it's far from easy.

And we're going to hear from White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer coming up at -- within the hour. It's one of -- it's going to be one of those off-camera briefings.

But my guess is he's going to be peppered with questions from reporters about the White House strategy on this and how they could go about convincing these Republican senators to swallow what is, essentially, legislative dog food, at this point from a political standpoint.

The "USA Today" Suffolk University poll just came out today saying that 12 percent of Americans -- Wolf, 12 percent of Americans approve of the Senate health care bill. It's very difficult to get senators to walk the plank with those kinds of numbers. BLITZER: Phil, we already estimate at least nine Republican senators,

at least right now, they're still a no. Mitch McConnell, the Majority Leader, he can only afford to lose two. If he loses three, it's over.

Since no Democrats are going to support this Senate legislation, the Republican bill, they want to come up with some new compromise, what, by Friday so the Congressional Budget Office can spend the July 4th week, the recess, assessing it and coming up with a new score. Is that right?

MATTINGLY: Yes, that's the goal. And I think it's not a hard and fast deadline. There's recognition that senators will be going home soon for that recess. But they want to give their members time to actually digest this. They want to give, Wolf, as you noted, the CBO time to score it, to put out more public numbers on what they come up with.

But there's a lot of work left to do. As we're speaking right now, two Alaska senators, Dan Sullivan, Lisa Murkowski, crucial senators, particularly Lisa Murkowski, are in a meeting with Senator Mitch McConnell or were in a meeting with Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, as they try and figure out those paths in forward.

This is really the states they're at right now. If you look at the senators that are out that are already opposed, those that haven't publicly said that they're opposed but kind of have a lot of concerns, too, they're going to be going member by member, really, kind of, state by state to figure out what parochial issues matter, what they're willing to bend on and what they can give them to try and get them on board.

[13:05:02] Again, I think the question right now is, can you do that in this short period of time and actually move something forward? The goal is, yes. Can they? It's an open question -- Wolf.

BLITZER: Yes, it certainly is. All right, Phil Mattingly, Jim Acosta, guys, thanks very much.

Now, let's get some perspective on where the fight over health care stands, where it's headed. Joining us now, our CNN Political Analyst David Gregory, our Chief Political Analyst Gloria Borger, and we also have CNN Editor-at-Large Chris Cillizza who's with us.

Gloria, the Republicans have a lot of work. They only have 52 Republicans in the Senate, 48 Democrats. If they lose three, it's over.

GLORIA BORGER, CNN CHIEF POLITICAL ANALYST: They're done. And, you know, this is a difficult process for them, obviously. And it's hard to know where to start in explaining why it's so difficult.

First of all, they've never had to write a health care bill. They've only had to oppose a health care bill. It's a more difficult to write legislation than it is to oppose it. They've spent seven and a half years opposing Obamacare. And, as John Boehner famously said, you know, the Republicans have never agreed on health care legislation. These are large, ideological differences. These are not parochial differences that a congressman and his district might have. The moderates believe that there should be more government involvement in health care and the conservatives believe that there should not.

You have a poll, as Jim Acosta was pointing out, that now has this health care bill at 12 percent popularity. Another one has it at 17 percent popularity. So, you are trying to force feed these members something that is very difficult for them to defend in their states.

On top of that, there are a lot of members who believe that Donald Trump would not go out there and defend them if they walked a plank for him on this health care bill. So, you put all that together, and it's a really toxic brew for them to swallow.

BLITZER: It's interesting, Dave, because a bunch of Republicans, they don't seem to be very scared of the president.

DAVID GREGORY, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: Well, they're not very scared because he's not that popular. But he's still popular enough among conservatives. But this is one of the big problems with the health care bill. It's not a conservative piece of legislation.

And I think Republicans are trying to figure out what a governing philosophy is. You know, the problem with health care for Republicans is they really wouldn't otherwise be involved in this much, you know, government reach into the health care system. That's not their thing.

They have to deal with the fact that it's the law of the land and now they want to pull it back. It's tough to take an entitlement away.

I think we're working toward an end point. It's not clear to me how you get there which is you do some -- George Will wrote this morning in "The Washington Post", some tweaking, declare victory and move on.

I think that's what the -- I think that's what the president would like to do. He can't -- he can't get in front of a television camera without saying how hard this is and how it may not work.

BORGER: Well, no, (INAUDIBLE.)

GREGORY: Right. But not only that, he is acknowledging that this thing may go down and that this is probably one of the hardest, most complicated issues to win on. That's the point. Winning is hard on this.

BLITZER: Yes. And he has basically said, you know what? If it goes down, it goes down. We'll be fine.

CHRIS CILLIZZA, CNN EDITOR-AT-LARGE: Right. I mean, his statement before the closed-door meeting with the senators at the White House yesterday was amazing. Which was, I mean, I hope that it works. And if it does, that'll be good. But if it doesn't work, then that'll be OK, too. You know, I mean, -- GREGORY: We all understand that, yes.

CILLIZZA: I think that Gloria makes a really important point and I'll add to it which is one of the things -- members of Congress never want to do anything that's hard, in terms of votes. They like votes that are 80 percent polling in their favor, certainly not 80 percent against them.

They like to do hard things even less when they feel like the head of their party may not only not campaign with them, but may actively undermine them.

I keep returning to the Donald Trump, the House bill was mean, thing. Right? There was a whole micronation, did he say it, didn't he say it? Of course, he then cleared it up and said, yes, I said it. If you're a House member in a swing district, and there were a fair number of them who voted for this, not all but a fair number who voted.

And the president of the United States, in your party, says, that was a mean bill? How do you have any faith that this is going to be that -- not only won't campaign with you, and -- but could actively undermine.

GREGORY: But can we just say that there is a -- there is a golden opportunity for the president if he could really seize it which is he could swoop in at the end and say, you know what? Let's actually do this the right way. Let's work with Democrats, shore this up and declare that Trump health care is better than Obamacare ever was.

I think we're a long way from there. But who knows, the process could actually work out that way.

BORGER: You know, Mitch McConnell said this morning in a tone that I think was supposed to be threatening to Republicans, if we don't do this, we're going to have to sit down with Chuck Schumer.

GREGORY: Yes.

BORGER: As if that is the worst thing in the world that could possibly happen. When, in fact, there are probably a lot people in this country who say, fix Obamacare. You know, perhaps get some -- you know, get some goodies for conservatives in there. Work with Schumer or some other Democrats and actually get something done here.

CILLIZZA: And to your point --

BORGER: What would be so awful about that?

[13:10:07] CILLIZZA: -- to your point, polling, which a lot of Trump supporters dismiss out of hand. But polling suggests, what Gloria is saying, is exactly what people want. They don't really -- even conservatives -- lots of conservatives don't want to get rid of Obamacare. It's, really, tweak it, make it work better is the --

BLITZER: Well, you heard Mitch McConnell emerge from the White House yesterday and say, the Democrats aren't interested in a reform --

CILLIZZA: Right.

BLITZER: -- in the markets or Medicaid. There's really no need.

(CROSSTALK)

CILLIZZA: Well, Mitch McConnell -- Mitch McConnell is -- at some level, it's -- when the score of, let's say, the Nationals -- the Washington Nationals are losing a game 13 to one in the sixth inning. Dusty Baker is not going to -- the manager is not going to come out and say, well, we're going to lose. I'm going to sub some players out because we're not going to win.

Everybody knows that's almost the certain outcome. So, McConnell is not going to do that because then you give up your hand.

But Gloria had mentioned John Boehner. John Boehner must be sitting there and thinking that he is watching a video -- a documentary of his life with Mitch McConnell playing the role of John Boehner. Because this is exactly --

BLITZER: By the way, --

CILLIZZA: -- what kept happening.

BLITZER: -- these are --

CILLIZZA: He would --

BLITZER: -- protesters who are outside the office of Senator Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania. And police have just come, Capitol Hill police, to remove them. They're angry about this health care bill.

The senator of Pennsylvania and police, Capitol Hill police to remove them, they're angry about this health care bill.

CILLIZZA: And, you know, David mentions there's a possibility that you will eventually see a deal that is bipartisan in some way. That's what -- remember what kept happening to John --

BORGER: We're a long way from that.

CILLIZZA: They are. They will -- they will exhaust every other option before that. But that's what kept happening to John Boehner. He would say, hey, conservatives, this is the best that we can do and it's going to be better than any compromise. And they wouldn't vote for it.

BORGER: And don't forget -- don't forget, anything would have to go back to the House.

CILLIZZA: That's right.

BORGER: Where conservative Republicans are in very ruby red districts. CILLIZZA: And have more sway.

GREGORY: And we're going to see a lot more of this, too, in the next week. I mean, remember, the --

BLITZER: A lot more protesters --

GREGORY: Right.

BLITZER: -- at town halls and elsewhere.

GREGORY: Right. And remember the summer of our discontent, you know, in 2010, in Obamacare. That was tough.

And they were facing so much incoming fire about not having the communications strategy down right because it was subject to so much protest when it got out there. And I think this is going to happen now.

Because, look, fundamentally, you know, Republicans aren't speaking with one voice on this. Most of them -- conservatives don't believe that government should be involved in the way that it is with regulations and with taxes and whatnot.

But you have to -- but you've got an entitlement and you're threatening to take it away from a lot of people. Even in the name of efficiency, it's very tough to take that away.

BLITZER: Do you think that, Gloria, the opposition could actually grow during the recess?

BORGER: Yes, absolutely. I think it could. The problem that Republicans have is they had a message, repeal and replace. Every Republican campaigned on it. It worked for them. That was great. What's their message on this health care bill now? What are they trying to tell the American public?

Because you've got the CBO report that says, OK, you're going to have 22 million more people uninsured over the next decade. What is their message to people about the benefits of their health care plan? I haven't heard a message. Have you heard a message from them on this?

CILLIZZA: And you're caught in between because this is the best that we can do which is, sort of -- that's not the message. But if they say, this is the best that we can do doesn't satisfy people who are wavering and certainly doesn't satisfy your base.

BORGER: Yes, but maybe they can say, what about a message, we're going to get your premiums down?

CILLIZZA: Right, pick a thing.

BORGER: Where -- pick a message about premiums and about how we're going to help older people, which it doesn't, but let's say, how we're going to help uninsured. What we're going to phase out some parts of Medicaid but some parts we're going to strengthen. I mean, they just need some talking points here about what their plan does to help people who are worried about health care.

GREGORY: But very few people understand it. I mean, the complexity of just this legislation on top of understanding how it's actually going to work in the market. It has taken years for us to really understand how implementation of Obamacare has created successes and failures and difficulties and higher prices and health care exchanges that don't work.

I mean, I -- when my wife started her law firm. You know, we went through the Obamacare exchanges. That was a very frustrating process for us.

BORGER: Sure.

CILLIZZA: And the --

GREGORY: And so, it is for so many Americans of all different levels, trying to navigate that.

BLITZER: Here's the problem with the Republicans have. They've been opposed to Obamacare., the Affordable Care Act, for seven years. Repeal and replace. Repeal and replace. They've had seven years to come up with an alternative to Obamacare.

And only in the last few weeks have they really focused in on it and they've tried to do it largely in secret. And it doesn't seem to be gaining the support, even from Republicans, that they need.

CILLIZZA: No, I mean, to paraphrase President Trump, it's hard, right? I mean, there is -- there is a reason that six presidents before Barack Obama tried to reform our health care system and failed. And Barack Obama succeeded only at the cost of massive seat losses in the House, seat losses in the Senate, seat losses at the state legislative level.

[13:15:00] I mean, this is -- does not come without a price because unlike deficit reduction -- I think if you ask most people, do you think we should -- the deficit should be smaller? Most people will say, yes.

But it's not - everybody in - around this table and everybody watching has a story like this. You try - someone you know or you is trying to figure this all out.

BLITZER: All right -

CILLIZZA: It touches - health care touches everybody -

BLITZER: All right.

CILLIZZA: In a way that is not abstract.

BLITZER: I want to go to CNN correspondent Boris Sanchez. He's up on Capitol Hill.

Boris, you're there where we just saw some dramatic pictures, protesters gathering outside a Republican senators' offices, and then police, Capitol Hill Police, showing up and carrying away some of those protesters. Tell us what you're seeing.

BORIS SANCHEZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hey there, Wolf.

Yes, this whole thing started about 20 minutes ago. About a dozen protesters from Pennsylvania went to Senator Patrick Toomey's office. They started talking to some of his workers and explaining to them who they were and why health care was such an important issue for them. One woman was telling officials there that she had been on dialysis for six years. At one point they started chanting, "kill the bill, don't kill me." They're still chanting that right now.

There are about a dozen of them. Most of them have been removed, as you can see, but there are still two people there. They've not been violent at all. But from what we understand, these are Pennsylvania voters. We were told some of them were supposed to be medical students, doctors, nurses, patients living with HIV, people that have pre-existing conditions. From what we can tell right now, again, they are being peaceful. They're being restrained and led out of here.

There were some tense moments, but nothing got out of hand, Wolf. We're going to keep watching this and let you know if it does get out of hand soon.

BLITZER: All right, Boris, thanks very much. Boris Sanchez up on The Hill.

I want to thank David Gregory, Gloria Borger and Chris Cillizza.

And, by the way, very, very important to all of our viewers here in the United States and around the world, if you love Washington politics or you're interested in Washington politics, this is what you need to do. You can subscribe to Chris's brand-new newsletter getting underway just today. It's called "The Point with Chris Cillizza." It debuts today. Go to cnnpolitics.com/thepoint and you can get that. We're looking - it comes out every night.

CILLIZZA: That check is in the mail.

BLITZER: Monday through Friday.

CILLIZZA: Monday through Friday, cnn.com/thepoint and you can get it.

BLITZER: Cnn.com/thepoint.

CILLIZZA: Cnn.com/thepoint.

BLITZER: I screwed it up. Is that why you're -

CILLIZZA: No. Well, I mean not - I'm not the one who said (ph) it.

DAVID GREGORY, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: I'm subscribing here.

You know, you -

BLITZER: You can subscribe even as we speak.

GREGORY: It used to be you could just read something. Now you have to subscribe to everything.

CILLIZZA: That's right.

BLITZER: Cnn.com/thepoint.

CILLIZZA: Gregory's a hard - he's hard to win over.

BLITZER: The point, one word.

CILLIZZA: Cnn.com/thepoint, one word.

BLITZER: No space in between.

CILLIZZA: Thank you, sir.

BLITZER: Thanks very much.

CILLIZZA: Thanks, Wolf.

BLITZER: Coming up, so why did the vote on the Senate health care bill get delayed and what will it take to get at least 50 Republican votes to pass it? Republican Senator Shelley Moore Capito and Democratic Senator Chris Van Hollen, they will be joining me live later this hour.

Also, why the U.N. ambassador, Nikki Haley, now says President Trump has saved lives in Syria. We'll update you on that and a lot more when we come back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[13:21:44] BLITZER: Russia is not done. They will try it again. That was the consensus during a Senate Intelligence Committee hearing up on Capitol Hill today on Russian election meddling. The U.S. intelligence committee says Russia tried to influence the 2016 U.S. presidential election. Russia also tried to influence the U.S. intelligence community says several other elections in Europe.

Joining us now from Capitol Hill, the former U.S. ambassador to NATO, Nicholas Burns.

Nick, thanks so much for joining us.

NICHOLAS BURNS, FORMER U.S. AMBASSADOR TO NATO: Thank you, Wolf.

BLITZER: So what was your - you testified before this panel. What was your bottom line on the cyber threat from Russia?

BURNS: My bottom line was that we're seeing a systematic attempt by the Russians, not only to interfere in the U.S. elections, but in Montenegro, the Netherlands, France and Germany in this coming September. It's a combination of fake news and disinformation filling the air space with untruthful lies about these countries and that there has to be a response that President Trump has not investigated this. He doesn't have a plan to handle it. He's not even raised this issue with the Russian government. So it's time for Congress to lead. And there's this Senate bill, Wolf, that you know about, 97-2, to impose very tough sanctions on Russia. I suggested - I testified this morning that Congress needs to lead now, and we need tough sanctions on Russia to respond to this.

BLITZER: Because, as you know, President Trump has been very critical of President Obama for not doing enough while he was in office to deal with this Russian threat. What, if anything, as far as you know, has President Trump done since taking office, now, what, approaching six months in office. For example, when he met with the Russian foreign minister, Sergey Lavrov, and the Russian ambassador, Kislayak, Sergey Kislayak, in the Oval Office, did he raise this use with them and warn them, stop it?

BURNS: Wolf, I don't believe the White House has ever indicated that the president has raised this issue on the phone with Putin or in person with Lavrov and Kislayak. And that's a dereliction of duty. And that was, frankly, the thrust of my testimony this morning. We're in an extraordinary position. No American president in the past would allow the Russians to engineer a massive cyberattack on the United States on our elections, they would respond, they'd investigate, they'd pull the NATO alliance together. We had witnesses from NATO countries today. They're looking for American leadership. And, frankly, Wolf, I sense a lot of support on The Hill, in the Senate especially, that they want to do something significant in the way of sanctions, and they're right to do that.

BLITZER: Well, what about going beyond sanctions. What, if anything, can the U.S. do, assuming the Russians continue to try to interfere in U.S. and other elections in Europe, whether in Germany or France or Italy or elsewhere?

BURNS: Well, as Jim Comey testified to the same committee, the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, he thinks that they'll try again. I do. And so I suggested that the United States obviously has to work with the allies to learn the lessons from all these elections where the Russians have interfered so that we're prepared during our 2018 midterm elections and the 2020 presidential elections.

The French seem to have handled it best. They reacted very quickly to Russian disinformation in the Emmanuel Macron campaign decisively, and the French media also shouted down some of these - the pro-Russian disinformation attempts. So there are lessons, Wolf, I think for the media here, but also particularly for our government.

[13:25:09] BLITZER: I want to turn to Syria for a moment. At a House Foreign Relations Committee hearing that just wrapped up, the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, Nikki Haley, said this about the threat of Syria once again using chemical weapons against civilians, including children.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

NIKKI HALEY, U.S. AMBASSADOR TO THE UNITED NATIONS: I can tell you that due to the president's actions, we did not see an incident. What we did see before was all of the same activity that we had seen prior for the April 4th chemical weapons attack. And so I think that by the president calling out Assad, I think by us continuing to remind Iran and Russia that while they choose to back Assad, that this was something we were not going to put up with. So I would like to think that the president saved many innocent men, women and children.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BLITZER: All right, so are these latest threats from the Trump administration of more U.S. strikes potentially against Bashar al Assad's regime an effective strategy in preventing the Syrian regime of launching chemical weapons attacks?

BURNS: I think it's what we have to do and that's a significant statement by Ambassador Haley. And she's right to say it. We have to uphold the international prohibition on the use of chemical weapons. No other country is going to be willing to do that. And so I think President Trump is right to warn them. But, Wolf, he has to have a larger strategy because we see this big power play by Iran over the last couple of weeks. They're gaining territory. The Shia groups on the ground. They want to connect Iran through Iraq and Syria to Lebanon, obviously to bolster Hezbollah. So the United States needs, I think, a more pronounced and a tougher policy using the - our friendship with groups on the ground to try to counteract that.

BLITZER: Ambassador Nicholas Burns, thanks so much for joining us.

BURNS: Thank you. Thanks, Wolf.

BLITZER: Up next, deep divisions over health care here in the United States. I'll speak with one of the Senate Republicans who, at least for now, is a "no" vote, West Virginia's Senator Shelley Moore Capito. I'll also try to find out why she's a "no," what it would take for her to become a "yes." Stay with us.

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