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Trump-Putin Meeting; Trump on Health Care Bill; Democrats Not Working on Health Care; Eighth Person in Trump Tower Meeting; Russian Lawyer Willing to Testify. Aired 1-1:30p ET

Aired July 19, 2017 - 13:00   ET

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

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN HOST: Hi there, I'm Brianna Keilar in for Wolf Blitzer. It's 1:00 p.m. here in Washington, 7:00 p.m. in Hamburg, Germany, 8:00 p.m. in Moscow right now. And wherever you are watching from around the world, thank you so much for joining us.

We're watching developments on two major stories right now, health care and Russia. The future of health care reform is on the menu during the lunch at the White House right now. President Trump invited all 52 Republican senators to the meeting following the collapse of the Senate health care bill.

This morning, the president tweeted that the GOP senators must keep their promise to America.

Another meeting is also making headlines and this is between President Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin. It happened after their official meeting during the G20 summit. The two had a second undisclosed sit-down during a dinner.

We're going to tell you why the meeting is raising concerns and what the White House is saying about it. Just a brief conversation at the end of dinner, that is how the White House describes this second conversation between President Trump and President Vladimir Putin during the G20 summit.

But senior White House officials says the discussion lasted nearly an hour. There were no other U.S. officials present and the only translator available was Russia's translator.

And while this story is unfolding, there are new developments from Donald Trump Jr.'s meeting with a Russian lawyer.

I want to bring in Senior White House Correspondent Jeff Zeleny. We also have Senior Congressional Correspondent Manu Raju.

So, Jeff, you hear the White House. They are downplaying this second meeting, a substantive conversation with Vladimir Putin. What are you hearing from them?

JEFF ZELENY, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Good afternoon, Brianna. The White House is saying that it was simply a social gathering. Simply a -- you know, something that happens and normally in the course of a dinner that all world leaders were having. But it could be more than that. I mean, the meeting, I am told by one official, lasted almost an hour, not quite. But it happened after the two leaders had their longer meeting earlier in the day. This happened on Friday, July seventh, at the end of the G20 summit in Germany.

And it was a social dinner. But according to people who were at the dinner, at one point, the president, the U.S. president got up and walked over to the Russian president and just started talking again.

The reason this is raising some concern, though, is because there weren't any other U.S. officials who were there to watch this conversation, take note of this conversation. So, it's not exactly clear what was said. Something could always be, sort of, misconstrued.

So, it was only disclosed last evening by the White House, so a week and a half after that first meeting. So, it's certainly racing some eyebrows -- Brianna.

KEILAR: And raising eyebrows, Jeff, especially, right, because there was only a Russian translator there, so there wasn't an American translator, right?

ZELENY: Exactly. And the reason is this. So, the president had a translator. But it was someone who was speaking Japanese, because that was his original seat at the dinner. He was sitting next to the Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe.

But then, when he decided to walk across and talk with Vladimir Putin, he was left without a translator. So, he was only using the Russian translator.

So, that is what is raising some concerns here that there was not a U.S. official or a State Department person on hand, you know, overhearing and translating this conversation. So, I expect that this will be one of the topics of conversation at an off-camera untelevised briefing this afternoon -- Brianna.

KEILAR: All right. Jeff Zeleny, thank you for that.

I want to get some perspective now on all of this from California Congressman Adam Schiff. He is the ranking member of the House Intelligence Committee.

Congressman, you heard about this report of this second meeting. It happened during a dinner where the president walked over to Vladimir Putin and they spoke during the G20 summit. The White House is calling this perfectly normal and part of a president's duties. Of course, there wasn't an American translator there. What's your reaction to this.

REP. ADAM SCHIFF (D), CALIFORNIA, RANKING MEMBER, INTELLIGENCE COMMITTEE: I don't think there's anything normal about the president having an hour-long meeting with Vladimir Putin, outside the presence of any American witness, anyone on his staff, any high-ranking national security council people to know what the president said. What the president represented.

I would like to know. I think most Americans would. Did the president raise the issue of the sanctions that Putin wants to do away with? Did he talk about any willingness on his part to give back these buildings that the Russians are alleged to be using to spy on Americans?

So, we have no idea what was in that conversation. It is hard to imagine the conversation going on that long that involves superficial things, like how's the grand kid? You know, how's golf at Mar-a-Lago? An hour-long conversation inevitably was going to involve substantial matters.

[13:05:01] But also, you have the prospect here of the most isolated ruler in the G20, that is Putin, and now with the second most isolated leader, and regrettably that is our president. So, these two isolated leaders on the world stage, making common cause in a way that is not been witnessed by any of our national security officials and that's deeply troubling.

KEILAR: Do you think it was inappropriate for the president to even go over and make -- I mean this was an hour, so we're not talking about small talk. But was it inappropriate for the president to approach Vladimir Putin? Is it the length of the meeting? What's your major concern here?

SCHIFF: Well, I have several concerns. First is, obviously, there's a lot of controversy about what happened in the first meeting in which there were other parties, Rex Tillerson, among others. And whether he broached the subject. How he broached the subject.

It disturbed me, frankly, in that first meeting that we knew about that he would ask Putin whether Putin was responsible for the hacking of our election? Because that says that he doesn't know. Indeed, the president doesn't know. Indeed, the president doesn't believe our own intelligence agencies.

He shouldn't have been asking that question. He should have been telling Putin, we know exactly what you did.

So, you, then, take a second meeting which he doesn't disclose to anyone. And with all the controversy over the first meeting, it seems like an affirmative act of concealment to not even mention to anyone.

KEILAR: Congressman, I'm so -- I am so sorry to interrupt you. Can you -- can you stand by for me? I want to listen right now to President Trump. He's just finished -- or this is a video from a meeting that began just a short time ago.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: -- let's get going.

I intend to keep my promise and I know you will too. Since 2013, Obamacare premiums have skyrocketed. In Alaska, they went up over 200 percent recently. We know that. In Arizona, they've been up 118 percent. And those states are good compared to some of the numberings that are coming out.

Despite the promise that premiums would decrease by $2,500 on average, they have actually increased by almost $3,000 and even much more than that, in some cases. It's crushing the middle class and the families of the middle class. It, frankly, crushing our country.

Obamacare was a big lie. You can keep your doctor, lie. You can keep your plan, lie. It was a lie directly from the president. You can keep your doctor. You can keep your plan. Twenty-eight times he said it. Twenty-eight times. And it was a lie and he knew it was.

And now, it's hurting this irreparably. Premiums are so high that 6.5 million Americans chose to pay a fine to the IRS. Instead of buying insurance, the famous mandate, we will pay not to take the insurance. People don't understand that. They don't even understand what it is or what it represents.

If Obamacare is not repealed in 2018, over 1,300 counties in the United States will have only one insurer; 40 counties will have absolutely no coverage in the exchange. And that number will grow rapidly. And I think those numbers are extremely conservative. I think they're very low.

I've been here just six months. I'm ready to act. I have pen in hand, believe me. I'm sitting in that office. I have pen in hand. You've never had that before. You know, for seven years, you had an easy route. We'll repeal. We'll replace. And he's never going to sign it. So, it's a little bit different.

But I'm ready to act. For seven years, you promised the American people that you would repeal Obamacare. People are hurting. Inaction is not an option. And, frankly, I don't think we should leave town unless we have a health insurance plan, unless we can give our people great health care.

Because we're close. We're very close. The other night, I was very surprised when I heard a couple of my friends -- my friends, they really were and are. They might not be very much longer but that's OK. I think (ph) I'd have to get them back.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: (INAUDIBLE.)

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: That's right. Well, no, you didn't go out there. This was the one we were worried about. You weren't there. But you're going to be. You're going to be. But he wants to remain a senator, doesn't he? OK. And I think the people of your state, which I know very well, I think they're going to appreciate what you hopefully will do.

Any senator who votes against starting debate is really telling America that you're fine with Obamacare. But being fine with Obamacare isn't an option for another reason. Because it's gone. It's failed. It's not going to be around.

[13:10:12] We pay hundreds of millions of dollars a month in subsidy, that the courts don't even want us to pay. And when those payments stop, it stops immediately. It doesn't take two years, three years, one year. It stops immediately.

On the other hand, and I have to say this, a yes vote will let senators debate the future of health care and suggest different ways to improve the bill. And we're going to do that today. That's what we're going to do at lunch.

We are so close. The way I looked at it, you know, we have no Democrat help. They're obstructionists. That's all they're good at is obstruction. They have no ideas. They've gone so far left. They're looking for single payer. That's what they want.

But single payer will bankrupt our country, because it's more than we take in for just health care. So, single payer is never going to work, but that's what they'd like to do. They have no idea what the consequence will be. And it will be horrible, horrible health care, where you'll wait in line for weeks to even see a doctor.

But we're going to expand tax for the Health Savings Accounts, the HSAs, to increase health care coverage, getting Washington out of the way and giving more control and funding back to the states. Stabilizing exchanges so that those pre-existing conditions are protected.

You know, you listen to Schumer, and before he even knew what the plan said -- he didn't see it. Most of the people in this room never saw it. And he was saying, death. Everyone's going to die. Death, death, death. That's the only thing they're good at.

And this is a great plan. This isn't just a good plan. This is far better than Obamacare and more generous than Obamacare. Saving Medicaid which is on an unsustain -- really, an unsustainable path and let's states spend those dollars freely. So, the states are going to be able to spend their dollars.

And as a smaller entity, the states will be able to take better care of a person with a bad back, with a bad prognosis, with a problem.

I'd like the federal government to focus on the Middle East, to focus on North Korea, to focus on things where we have very big problems. The states can do a better job than the federal government when it comes to health care. And that's what we're letting you do.

And we're committing $45 billion to help combat the opioid epidemic and some states in particular like that.

So, my message today is very simple. We have to stay here. We shouldn't leave town. And we should hammer this out and get it done. And not a repeal. Hey, it was, sort of, early on along with a few of the other folks at the table. The repeal was fine. I was with it (ph).

But we ought to get more than -- I think the people of this country need more than a repeal. They need a repeal and a replace. And we were very, very close, and then little things happened. But now, we're very close again. We have to get it there. Now, with John Cornyn the other night, we had a couple of things that we put down on paper. I'm just going to read them really fast, but these are some of the things that are done. Because the Democrats are always selling their plan, but they don't do that anymore. They don't talk about Obamacare anymore because they can't because it's failed. They know it.

So, they're selling their plan and we never sell our plan. If we're weak on anything it's on letting people know how good it was.

So, we wrote down these few things. Repeals the individual mandate. How big is that? Where people are paying not to have insurance. Nobody ever talking about that. Repeals job killing employer mandate. How big is that? Will substantially lower premiums.

And remember this, cross country lines, cross state lines. Where you have -- where it's almost impossible for insurance companies to compete in different states. We can't because of, unfortunately, the 60 votes, put that here.

But it's going to come very soon. We're putting it in a popular bill and that will come. And that will come and your premiums will be down 60 and 70 percent. People don't know that. Nobody hears it. Nobody talks about it.

But your premiums are going to. We're going to have to cross state lines knocked out, and you'll have insurance companies bidding. You'll have forms of insurance that you don't even know about right now because that's the way it works. There's going to be tremendous competition.

[13:15:06]

So, your premiums will be substantially lower. Repeals, burdensome taxes, big (ph). We'll restore choices.

The bill also provides for expanded coverage option. So you can have a tremendously expanded coverage and options. We'll stabilize insurance markets.

The markets right now, by the way, are gone. They're a mess. And depending on what happens here, depending on what happens over the next couple of weeks, the insurance companies are all fleeing.

We'll protect preexisting condition coverage. You listen to the Democrats. They say, oh, they're giving it up - you're going to have better preexisting than they had in their plan and you're going to be protected.

We'll allow the use of pretax dollars to pay premiums. We'll expand the HSAs. We'll devote substantial resources to fight opioid and other substance abuse. We'll provide better coverage for low income Americans. By the way, low income Americans, under our plan, and we're doing things at this meeting which I think you'll be very happy about, because we're going to spend some more money to make sure everybody is protected. We'll provide better coverage for low income Americans. We'll improve

medical outcomes for low income Americans. Puts Medicaid on a sustainable path, which it's not on right now, levels the playing field for states when it comes to federal dollars, reforms major entitlements, now a principal driver of the $20 trillion debt that we have, and will redistrict authority from Washington, D.C., to the state, which I've already said, where they can innovate and develop the best practices and on a smaller basis they'll be able to take care of people better.

So we can repeal, but we should repeal and replace, and we shouldn't leave town until this is complete, until this bill is on my desk and until we all go over to the Oval Office, I'll sign it and we can celebrate for the American people.

Thank you very much. Thank you. Thank you (INAUDIBLE). Thank you very much.

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN ANCHOR: All right, that - those were some pretty extraordinary comments from President Trump. Some rather long remarks, in fact. And it was quite the scolding for Senate Republicans after the health care bill collapsed there in the senate. He said, you've got an easy route for seven years, vote to repeal and replace, and he, meaning President Obama, would veto it. And you heard him there. He told the senators, they need to stay in town and they need to work on this. And he also said they can't just repeal, they need to repeal and replace, which has been sort of back and forth that we've heard from them.

I want to bring Democratic Congressman Adam Schiff back in to talk about this.

You heard his remarks there. He said Democrats have been obstructionists. Do you see any point for Democrats, or even an opportunity here for Democrats who have not seen an avenue and certainly I don't think politically have wanted to work with Donald Trump on this, to perhaps do something. Should there be more of a plan or some sort of overture from your party?

REP. ADAM SCHIFF (D), RANKING MEMBER, INTELLIGENCE COMMITTEE: Well, I think the fact is, we've made overtures all along. What the president's really saying is, we want to dismantle the Affordable Care Act. Why won't the Democrats help us dismantle it? And he seems surprised that we're not willing to do that.

Well, of course we're not willing to do that. We are willing to work with the president to improve the current health care system, but we're not willing to throw 20 million to 30 million people off their health insurance. And what the president proposes is to do exactly that, to cut Medicare and to cut Medicaid.

Basically when he says we want to get rid of the requirement, as you just heard him, that people buy health insurance, he's essentially saying we're not really going to cover people effectively who have preexisting conditions because if you don't have to buy health insurance when you're healthy, and you can simply buy it when you're sick, one one's going to buy health insurance until they get sick. That system just doesn't work. It is why, I think, the Republicans have had so much difficulty among themselves coming up with any kind of a replacement that doesn't really cost people their access to health care.

So we're willing to work with the president. We've always been willing to work with him to improve the system, not to jettison tens of millions of people from their health care.

KEILAR: I - it is difficult, I will certainly give you that, as you hear him making all of those big promises about what this plan will do, and we know that actually the plan does not do those things. But at the same time, what is - what has been the genuine overture from Democrats to do something that is within your realm of acceptability, not talking about jettisoning the individual mandate, but doing the things that you want to see that would improve Obamacare?

[13:20:15] SCHIFF: Well, you know, there are lots of ways that we can explore, introducing more competition into the exchanges, bringing more young people into the plans to help keep costs down.

KEILAR: But what's the overture to the White House, the overture to President Trump to do something?

SCHIFF: Well, the overture is, look, if you want to fix some of the problems in the Affordable Care Act, we acknowledge they're there. We acknowledge in some states that the plans are not competing, there aren't enough plans in the exchanges. We're willing to help change that.

What we're not willing to do, though, is to be complicit in booting millions of people off their health care. So this is the area we want to work on.

All of us acknowledge that a bill that was written seven years ago affecting one-sixth of the economy isn't a static process. You can't say, OK, we've passed health care reform, now we're done. But because we've had this endless fight to repeal, we've never had the opportunity to make the fixes that we should. So our offer to him before, now and in the future is, when you're ready to sit down with us and improve the operation of our health care system, we are ready, we are willing, we are able, we are eager, but we won't be part of cutting poor people off their health care so you can give wealthy people a tax cut. That's not where we're coming from and if you can't deliver your own members for that, don't ask us to do it.

KEILAR: Congressman, I do want to get back to Russia. That's what we were originally talking about here.

And we're learning more, as you know, about this eighth person who was in this meeting with Donald Trump Jr., as well as Jared Kushner and Paul Manafort. They met with a Russian lawyer. Ike Kaveladze. He's a senior vice president at a company that was run by the Russian businessman who initiated scheduling this meeting. What is your reaction to this news? SCHIFF: Well, look, I think it's very significant who was at the

meeting and how it was set up. And you see now all these contradictory statements by the oligarch, Aras Agalarov. You see contradictory statements of the person he sent to the meeting. You see the contradictions now with the Russian lawyer, Veselnitskaya, about who set up the meeting and why.

Plainly, I think the oligarch wanted his person there, Kaveladze, wanted him present because they were going to deliver some damaging information about Hillary Clinton and the oligarch wanted credit for setting up the meeting, for delivering the goods. And we've also had contradictions now by the Russian lobbyist who says that, in fact, a folder was passed to Donald Jr. and Kushner and Manafort from Veselnitskaya, the Russian lawyer.

But here we have one person, Kaveladze, who has a history of opening bank accounts that the GAO suspected was used for money laundering of Russian money. You have a second person, a Russian-American lobbyist, who has a history of litigation of employing Russian hackers to steal e-mails and discredit a rival company. And then you have a lawyer, Veselnitskaya, with a history of working to repeal U.S. sanctions against Russia for human rights abuses. That's who's in this meeting where the promise is to deliver dirt. So, to me, it's very significant who was sitting around that table.

KEILAR: You - and Natalia Veselnitskaya, who you just mentioned, she is now saying that she's willing to appear before Congress. She told this to RT, which, of course, is Russian state media. Here is what she said. We should mention, this has a translation on screen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

NATALIA VESELNITSKAYA (through translator): Let's put it this way - I'm ready to clarify the situation in today's mass hysteria only within the legal field through lawyers or by testifying in the Senate.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): You are ready to go to the Senate?

VESELNITSKAYA: Yes, if I'm guaranteed safety. Today, I have to think about my safety first and safety of my family, my four children.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KEILAR: OK, so she says certainly with conditions, she wants to guarantee her safety, that she would be willing to testify before the Senate. This is, of course, the attorney who Donald Trump Jr. met with in the hopes of getting information about Hillary Clinton. Does the House Intelligence Committee, the committee on which you are the top Democrat, have a desire, any plans to hear from her?

SCHIFF: Yes. We expect to invite her to testify, as well as everyone who was sitting and participating in that meeting. We expect any that are willing to cooperate, particularly any of the Russians who have to come to this country, we'd welcome their cooperation. But I think a really key part of that interview also is where she

claims not to know who set up this meeting or why. That's simply not credible. We know from the e-mails why this meeting was set up. And to suggest, as she does, that she doesn't know these other parties, we're to imagine that somehow she flies from Moscow to this meeting with without any idea of how it was set up or by whom and for what purpose.

[13:25:12] That just isn't very credible. We have to expect, even though we would like her to come testify, that there's probably an effort on the Russian end as we speak to get their stories straight. But you also have contradictions by the oligarch, who was part of arranging this meeting, who said initially he had nothing to do with it. Now is forced to acknowledge the presence of his person in the meeting. So a lot of contradictions that our committee will want to work through with these witnesses.

KEILAR: You called for the Russian-American lobbyist at this meeting, the man that you just referenced as someone with sort of questionable tactics in the course of his job as a lobbyist, you want him to testify before the Intelligence Committee. Where do things stand on that and also on other sort of outstanding areas in this investigation.

SCHIFF: Well, he'll be invited to testify as well and we'll want to seek any documents that he has. He has said publicly that Veselnitskaya, the Russian lawyer, gave a plastic folder of information to Donald Jr. or the other participants there. That is being contradicted by Veselnitskaya. So we'll want to find out who's telling the truth, what they received.

But I think of even greater significance is, what happened before this meeting. What are they referring to when the e-mails say, as part of the Russian government's efforts to help Mr. Trump. That sounds like there's been preexisting work. We'll also want to know what happened after this meeting in terms of follow-up and whether the suggestion by Donald Jr. that last summer would be the most helpful time to release the dirt is a coincidental timing with the publican of the stolen DNC e-mails which happened in late summer or whether there's more to it than mere coincidence.

KEILAR: So you - you think it would be coordination with - I mean that's a difference in saying later in summer, meaning closer to the election. You actually think it goes as far as to be tied to the release of emails. Is that just something to you that makes sense or is that something that you have evidence of in your capacity on the Intel Committee?

SCHIFF: Well, it makes sense to me and I can't talk about what evidence we may or may not have. But it makes sense to me, and I think you've heard this from the former CIA agents that you've had on the program, or CIA officers, is Russian tradecraft would employ just this kind of means of testing whether a campaign is receptive to a relationship in which they get something of value, and that is dirt on their opponent, in exchange for something of value they want, which is repeal of the Magnitsky Act.

So the message sent loud and clear by the Trump campaign in this meeting is -

KEILAR: Yes.

SCHIFF: We would love that kind of relationship. An the deliverable may have been in the form of these e-mails that are dumped. This gives them a cut-out and plausible deniability. But nonetheless delivers on the offer of help that was implicit in those emails.

KEILAR: All right, Congressman Adam Schiff, thank you so much for talking to us.

And up next, more on the president's comments on health care and his message to Republican senators. Stay with us.

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