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Obama to Meet with Insurance CEOs; House to Vote on Obamacare Change; White House Briefing; Obama Legacy Hanging in the Balance; Mixed State Reaction to Insurance Fix

Aired November 15, 2013 - 13:00   ET

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

DON LEMON, CNN ANCHOR: Right now, the House is getting ready to decide on a new Obamacare plan. The Republican bill would override the president's fix, but will Democrats join the chorus? Stay with us on that.

Right now, President Obama gearing up for a critical meeting on his health care fix. He is holding talks with insurance company CEOs. The White House briefing also getting underway right now. We're monitoring that for you as well.

Right now, stocks are on the cusp of reaching a key milestone, really. The Dow is up again today and marching towards 16,000, but is it a sign of a recovering economy or a bubble just waiting to burst?

Hello, everyone. I'm Don Lemon in for Wolf Blitzer. Do not adjust your T.V. sets. Wolf will be back with you on Monday.

We are moments away now from that vote in the House that we have been reporting on here on CNN. The Republican-sponsored Keep Your Health Plan Act. As late as today, as late as a day ago, it had a lot of Democratic support. So, I want to bring in our Dana Bash. She is on Capitol Hill where she has been stationed there for the duration of all of this. Dana, what do we -- what do we expect from Democrats today?

DANA BASH, CNN CHIEF CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, we're going to find out. That really is sort of the drama that is unfolding in the next hour. If you look at the careen right now, see what's happening on the House floor, there is a procedural vote going on with regard to a Democratic attempt to give their rank and file cover to prevent defections on this Republican bill. We'll see what happens with this and then we're going to go into the Republican vote.

Now, why is this so dramatic politically? And the answer to that is because Republicans planned on having this vote to allow people who are getting cancellation notices to keep their policy. And because so many Democrats, like most members of Congress here, are getting calls from their constituents panicked that they're getting these cancellation notices.

They're -- many of them felt compelled to vote for the Republican bill. That is -- let's just put it out there. That is almost entirely why the president made his announcement yesterday in order to give Democrats cover and to say, look, we're working on it. You don't have to vote for this Republican bill because on its substance, Democrats insist that it is so broad that it undercuts the entire Obamacare law.

LEMON: OK. Well, let's talk about it then. What is the difference between this Republican bill and the president's fix, Dana?

BASH: The main difference is -- well, first of all, it is because -- it is the idea that people who are getting canceled -- the Democrats believe that people who are getting the cancellation notices, they should be able to keep their health insurance for a year as a sort of a bridge. But what the Republican bill does is it doesn't just limit it to the people who are getting the cancellation notices. It would allow new people to get insurance that is subpar, get insurance that doesn't reach the benefit level that the Obamacare law now requires.

And what that means in practical terms, the reason why Democrats say it would undercut the whole system, is most of the people who have the sort of more flimsy health care -- health insurance policies are young and healthy people. And for the risk pool to work for Obamacare, you need those young and healthy people to be in the system in order to sort of balance out the higher cost consumers or patients who tell to -- tend to be older or elderly. So, that's why Democrats are so opposed to the Republican bill. But you're going to see Democrats -- some Democrats vote for it anyway --

LEMON: Right.

BASH: -- because they are getting a lot of pressure from their constituents to do something, to vote affirmatively, not just sit on the sidelines. And so, that's why there is such a tug of war, particularly among Democrats who are tough re-election campaigns next year.

LEMON: The Keep Your Health Plan Act about to be voted on in the House right now. Dana Bash will be reporting on it. Dana, thank you very much. Stand by. We'll get back to you.

Insurance companies not excited about the prospect of undoing what's already done. Reinstating plans that were canceled because of Obamacare rules. They say the logistics are daunting and the change could destabilize the market. An industry trade group told Wolf Blitzer that President Obama's fix could also lead to higher premiums.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

KAREN IGNAGNI, AMERICA'S HEALTH INSURANCE PLANS: Essentially, what it boils down to is this is changing the rules in the ninth inning of the baseball game. And the reason is that what the plans have already submitted their premiums with the expectation that there's a mix of older and younger people, healthy and sick, to balance the pools so that we can have affordable rates for consumers. And what it boils down to today, we're concerned about the issue of affordability for consumers.

(END VIDEO CLIP) LEMON: So, in just a couple of hours, President Obama is going to sit down with insurance company CEOs at the White House to talk about his healthcare fix. Jim Acosta covering that meeting for us. Jim, the president can't force these executives, really, to implement this fix. So, --

JIM ACOSTA, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Right.

LEMON: -- this is going to be a major sales pitch.

ACOSTA: A major sales pitch, Don, because he needs the help of the insurance companies to make this work. And keep in mind, this is a White House that has, at times, been at war with the insurance companies. You'll remember the buildup to the passage of Obamacare. It got pretty nasty at times. And this is a little bit like putting the toothpaste back in the tube, Don, because you have so many insurance companies that have already sent out cancellation notices to hundreds of thousands of Americans, if not millions of Americans, telling them that their insurance policies have been canceled.

And one question you did not hear the president answer yesterday was not asked of him, and so we may hear about it at the briefing with press secretary, Jay Carney, here in the next hour is what do Americans do? If you're an American sitting at home and you have this cancellation letter in your hands, what do you do? Do you call your insurance commissioner? Do you call your insurance company and say, hey, wait a minute. President Obama says I can get back on my insurance. What do I do? But it's all voluntary. It's up to the insurance companies and, in some cases, it's up to the state. You saw Washington State say yesterday, Don, that they're not going to do what the White House wants to do here. They're going to stay the course and they're going to continue to implement Obamacare as they would like to do it in their state.

LEMON: Jim, is that your cheering section out there? What's going on?

ACOSTA: This is one of the protests that you hear outside the gates of the White House from time to time. They actually planted a tree earlier this morning. So, lots of heavy lifts around the White House these days, Don.

LEMON: Well, I prefer to look at it as they're cheering on your reporting because you're such a great reporter there.

Listen, how is the White House reacting to today's vote in the House on the Republican bill that could really gut a major part of Obamacare?

ACOSTA: Well, no question about that. That is how the White House looks at it. And last night, you saw the White House issue a presidential veto threat. And that threat did not mince words, Don. It accused the Upton Bill of being, quote, "sabotage." And the president who was trying to get on a little bit of offense yesterday was out in Cleveland talking about how he's going to defend any effort to gut this bill. So, inside the White House, inside this administration, they know that they've got a huge mess on their hands. They're not denying that. But they still feel like the public is on their side when it comes to whether or not the Affordable Care Act should exist.

LEMON: Yes.

ACOSTA: They look at the polling that shows that people still don't want to repeal this law and they feel like if they can fix it, if they patch it, make it work better, in time, people will start to forget about this. I will take a lot of time --

LEMON: Hey, Jim, I --

ACOSTA: -- but it'll happen.

LEMON: -- want to jump in here because I may need you for this. We want to go to the briefing right now over in the briefing room, Jay Carney. And Jim, if we need you, we'll get back to you. Let's listen in.

JAY CARNEY, WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY (live): -- take advantage of marketplace plans that would reduce our costs or keep costs the same. And, you know, the president made clear that he feels like a fix was necessary. So, he looks forward to the implementation of this, looks forward to working with Congress, as on any sincere effort, good faith effort, to make improvements to the Affordable Care Act as we implement it.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Having announcing the fix yesterday and having this meeting today, didn't that put the cart before the horse?

CARNEY: But, Jim, I think it is absolutely the case that we have been in consultation with and have had numerous -- and have had numerous meetings with insurance companies over the course of the last several years with the drafting and passing and implementation of the Affordable Care Act. So -- and those consultations continue. The president looks forward to the meeting he's having later this afternoon with insurers and will talk about ways we can work together to help people enroll through the marketplace and efforts we can make to minimize disruption for consumers as they transition to new coverage.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: (INAUDIBLE) given the numbers, the enrollment numbers, has the White House given any consideration or have you set aside any thought of extending the -- extending a waiver period for the mandatory or the individual mandate so that it doesn't kick in on March 31st as it's scheduled to?

CARNEY: Jim, as we've said all along, the individual responsibility provision is essential to the Affordable Care Act because it is what insures that individuals with pre-existing conditions cannot be denied insurance. It allows for the rest of the Affordable Care Act to be implemented effectively so that the benefits that the American people deserve are able to be distributed. So, we are obviously working on a tighter time frame because of the problems with the Web site and the slow -- the slowness associated with the rollout and the enrollment period. But we do have a six-month enrollment period. We are a month and a half into that. So, we're working assiduously to make improvements to the Web site so that that experience continues to get better for consumers and more and more Americans are able to enroll.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: So, under no circumstance would there be a consideration to extend it?

CARNEY: Well, I'm going to speculate about the future. What I'm going to tell you is that right now, we are focused on making the changes and fixes necessary to the Web site to improve that experience for consumers and also to work in a variety of ways to make it easier for Americans to enroll. I mean, one of the things that remains true is that there's enormous interest in the quality affordable coverage available in the marketplaces and where we were unsuccessful is in making that access to that coverage easy from day one, October 1st. And as the president I think made clear to you here yesterday, he takes responsibility for that. We take responsibility for that. And we're about the business of making the fixes necessary to insure that those benefits are available to the American people who so clearly want them.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Jay, Henry Chao was raising red flags back in July about the Web site saying a plane could crash on takeoff. Was the White House aware of these concerns at the time?

CARNEY: Steve, we've said all along -- I know that there is the selective leaks going on out of various House committees of -- as they conduct oversight into this. But we've said all along that there were, in the testing of this, instances where there were problems that were identified and fixes that were undertaken to the Web site. What we did not expect was that we would have the size problem that we had come October 1st. And if we had expected that, we wouldn't have been promoting the launch of the Web site and the run up to it in the way that they were. The president was very candid about that.

I mean, it does not stand the test of logic to suggest that we somehow knew that the Web site would perform as poorly as it did. And a week before or four days before, we were encouraging people to go to it and talking about how it would be fairly functional and effective. So, there's no question -- if the point of the selective leaks is to get everybody to recognize that the Web site performed terribly on October 1st, I don't think that's a point that anybody here is denying. So, what we're --

LEMON: All right. So, you're listening to the White House briefing. There's Jay Carney talking about the Obamacare Web site, that debacle. And then the smaller screen you see right there. We're watching two things really. You're see the House, a Republican sponsored bill, the Keep Your Health Plan Act, being voted on right now in the House. It will probably pass. But the president has said he will veto it. Jay Carney saying in that briefing that they're working to get the Web site fixed and the president is looking forward to working with Congress to try to -- on some sort of either legislation or ways to improve the Obamacare, the entire system. So, we'll keep you updated on that. In the meantime, the president says the buck stops with him on health care problems. You heard him live right here on CNN yesterday. So, does he need to be a manager and fire some staffers, specifically Kathleen Sebelius? We're going to take a closer look with our Gloria -- with our Gloria Borger, next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

LEMON: Welcome back, everyone.

President Obama's apology and administrative fix may have smoothed some Democratic feathers but that doesn't mean Republicans are going to stop targeting his signature law. Our chief political analyst is Gloria Borger, of course, and she joins me now from Washington.

Hi, Gloria. How are you?

GLORIA BORGER, CNN CHIEF POLITICAL ANALYST: Hey. How are -- good.

LEMON: Hey, listen, you have a new column which I found very interesting on cnn.com on the problems of the insurance exchange rollout. And in it you have quote a lengthy quote here. I hope I can do it justice. Here's what it says. It says, "people who have served in top jobs at the White House seem to agree on one thing, a president who wants to get at the truth has to understand the extent of his own isolation and then establish a zone of immunity for truth tellers. As the dry runs continued to produce red flags over and over, the president remained in his steely cocoon. If this were the presidency of George W. Bush or Ronald Reagan, the obviously theories would abound, the chief executive is disengaged or incurious or worse. But since Obama is none of the above, what gives?"

Gloria, that's a good question, what gives?

BORGER: Yes. Well, there are a lot of things that give. I -- look, I this that reflectively, you know, if this were Regan or Bush people would say, oh my God, it's a disengaged president and criticize them perhaps unfairly. With this president, he's known to be very detail oriented. He's not disengaged. And so the question is, how did this screw up occur? Why didn't it get to the White House?

LEMON: Right.

BORGER: And in talking to a lot of former chiefs of staff types and people inside the administration, there are a few things that they say. First of all, there was no czar. There was no one in charge of the whole big picture. So people might have heard a little bit of this and a little bit of that and it kind of filters into the White House, but there was no one at the top of that pyramid inside the White House dealing with this. And that can be a real problem.

Number two, in this White House, it's kind of no drama, stay in your lane, stick to your job, which is a very often a good management tool. But if you go into someone else's lane because you hear something bad and you tell someone about it, you may be regarded as a tattletale, to use a third grade term. LEMON: Right. But that doesn't really -- you said it's a good management tool. I agree with you.

BORGER: Yes.

LEMON: But that -- does that all stay in your lane work - does that always work politically?

BORGER: No, obviously -

LEMON: I don't think so.

BORGER: No, obviously it doesn't work. At some point, somebody has to go out of their lane. And somebody said to me, you know, when Rahm Emanuel was chief of staff, he encouraged people to leave their lanes. It might have been a less organized White House, but it was people who were disagreeing.

LEMON: It was more effective though.

BORGER: Yes, in a way, disagreeing publicly with each other.

LEMON: Right.

BORGER: But I think the important thing here is that nobody likes to give a president bad news. You don't like to give your boss bad news. I don't like to give my boss bad news, right? Nobody wants to do that.

LEMON: Yes.

BORGER: But somebody needs to be the designated bad news person. You would assume that's the White House chief of staff. But they have to have this kind of stature, immunity, if you will -

LEMON: Right.

BORGER: To say to the president, OK, don't, you know, don't blame me, but this is what we're hearing and we need to deal with this.

LEMON: But isn't that -

BORGER: And I know the president's trying to figure out what went wrong because he is not happy.

LEMON: But isn't that Valerie Jarrett though? Just quickly because I want to get to Kathleen Sebelius.

BORGER: Yes. It might be Valerie Jarrett. But is she in the - is she in the loop enough on this to have understood all of it?

LEMON: Right.

BORGER: You know, this is technical. This is wonky.

LEMON: And --

BORGER: This -- you know, this is - this is very complex across many parts of this huge government -

LEMON: And, Gloria (ph) -

BORGER: Including the IRS, including HHS, right?

LEMON: Right. And that's what you're saying, is she and the people around him who may have come from Chicago, are they Washington politically savory enough to wade through all of this?

BORGER: Yes, by now, sure.

LEMON: Well - well, I don't know.

BORGER: Yes.

LEMON: OK, let's move on. Let's move on.

BORGER: Yes, they are. I think it's the management system, yes.

LEMON: OK. OK.

So one member of that staff, right, is HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius.

BORGER: Yes.

LEMON: Should he just fire her? I mean would it help him to get back on rack?

BORGER: You know -

LEMON: I mean he says the buck stops with him, but would it make a difference if he fired her?

BORGER: This is -- this is not this president's style. And I think the feeling is that it wouldn't help him get back on track. I mean imagine this, OK. Say he fired her, right?

LEMON: Right.

BORGER: Who would be in charge of fixing it or be very involved in fixing it -

LEMON: Right.

BORGER: Since she was involved in building it? If she were fired, you would have to appoint somebody else.

LEMON: Right.

BORGER: That person would have to get confirmed. Would that person get confirmed? Would you - would it be a vehicle to relitigate the pluses and minuses of Obamacare? Do you want to do that right now? At some point, I think there are going to be people who are going to lose their jobs over this. It would not surprise me at all. But this is not this president's style or inclination. I mean, you know, this is a guy -- you know, when Joe Lieberman, remember Joe Lieberman -

LEMON: Yes. Yes. Yes.

BORGER: Who supported John McCain, he left him in his committee chairmanship. So, you know, he -

LEMON: Yes.

BORGER: This is not what he does.

LEMON: Yes.

BORGER: He's very deliberate. In the end, will she go? Eventually.

LEMON: Yes.

BORGER: But there are lots of other issues she's got to deal with first.

LEMON: You just said -- you just said what I was thinking. It's probably not good to fire her now because then it would take so many more steps, right? It would just put them that much further behind. But after this is all over, she might - she will probably go, right?

BORGER: Well, it's another political vehicle for everyone to talk about an issue he needs to fix.

LEMON: OK.

BORGER: And then pivot from.

LEMON: They're yelling at me. The people in my head are saying we've got to run.

BORGER: OK.

LEMON: Thank -- always a pleasure, Gloria Borger.

BORGER: The people in your head.

LEMON: A great column. Cnn.com.

BORGER: Thanks, Don.

LEMON: I wrote a similar one that said the president lose - has he lost his mojo? And I agree with everything you said. It was a great column. Read it, guys. Read it if you - you know, on cnn.com.

BORGER: (INAUDIBLE). Yes.

LEMON: Still ahead, state insurance chiefs can reject President Obama's fix for the health care law. So what does that mean moving forward? We're going to take a closer look.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

LEMON: Welcome back, everyone. Don Lemon in today for Wolf.

So far, state reaction to President Obama's health care fix has been mixed. The insurance commissioner of Washington state, a Democrat, is rejecting it. He says it's about keeping costs low, saying, quote, "we are staying the course. We will not be allowing insurance companies to extend their policies. I believe this is in the best interests of the health insurance market in Washington."

But California, where about a million people are being dropped from their current plans, the insurance commissioner told CNN this morning he thinks insurance companies should call and reinstate their customers with the rates they were promised initially.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DAVE JONES, CALIFORNIA INSURANCE COMMISSIONER: First of all, the rates are set for 2014. So, again, rates should not rise and can't rise on the 2014 policies. Thirty-five states have given their insurance commissioners the authority to regulate rates, so they have the ability to actually reject excessive rate increases. In California, we don't have that authority. We should have it. There's a ballot measure next year to give the insurance commissioner that authority. But in the meantime, again, rates have already been filed and already set for 2014 and they shouldn't raise.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

LEMON: All right. Mr. Chris Frates is our investigative correspondent and he joins us now.

So, Chris, California's state insurance commissioner seems to be the most upbeat about the president's announcement. You have been gaging the overall reaction. What are you finding?

CHRIS FRATES, CNN INVESTIGATIVE CORRESPONDENT: Well, Don, I'll tell you that right now this is not being received very well across the country by most insurance commissioners. In fact, the National Association of Insurance Commissioners tells me that the president's plan, quote, "threatens to undermine the new market and may lead to higher premiums," unquote. So the commissioners there, their worry is that continuing the practice of applying different rules for different policies will increase the price of premiums. So, you know, what is unclear for many of these insurance commissioners is exactly how these new rules will take effect because remember, in 2014, you have a situation where the insurance markets from state to state have already set rates, they've already set these rates all across the country. So there's a question of, if you change the rules this late in the game, then we're probably going to see premium increases.

LEMON: Oh, interesting. OK. So then how is this playing out around the states? We heard from Washington state. We heard from California. How is this playing out around the states, Chris?

FRATES: Well, there's a mixed reaction, Don. You know, I've talked to some folks in Colorado and what they told me was, well, it's pretty much status quo. In fact, there's not much change. Before we had the president's announcement yesterday, we already allowed our insurance companies to extend their current policies into next year. So things aren't going to change here. The insurers will be able to continue to do that and we can't force them to do it.

Now, when I talked to folks in Kentucky this morning, they said their insurance commissioner is going to be meeting with insurers today to try to sort out what all this means. And so the governor there has said that they want to make the president's plan go into effect. But again, even there, you have the governor saying that we cannot require anybody to extend their plans. We would like them to, but it's a business decision in the end.

LEMON: Chris Frates, thank you very much.

We need to get back now to the Capitol. Let's go to Dana Bash.

Dana, that vote is starting, the Keep Your Health Care Plan Act. They're voting on that. What's happening?

DANA BASH, CNN CHIEF CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: That's right. They just began the vote on the Republican bill. This is going to be a pretty short vote and we're -- the thing again that we're watching for not is whether or not it's going to pass, because Republicans run the House and it is -- they have the votes for sure for it to pass. The question is going to be, how many Democrats defect and vote for this, as well.

There have been so many votes to repeal, to dismantle Obamacare in many ways, dozens of them. The high water mark, the most that Democrats lost their rank and file, it was 35 Democrats. So we'll see if this exceeds that or not. And so that -- this really is a political vote, a symbolic vote to see how many Democrats feel the need to do what they need to do for their constituents who are panicked and worried to be able to say to them, look, I tried, I voted affirmatively for everything I possibly could or whether they feel compelled by their leadership not to vote for it because they're arguing it undermines the law.

LEMON: And the president says, hey, listen, I'm' going to veto it if it does pass. So we'll see.

BASH: Exactly.

LEMON: OK, hey, Dana, stand by, because we're getting - three minutes and 10 seconds left in the vote. Just a little bit under that About three minutes. And we'll be back in time to see what that vote is.

We're also going to talk about this, the unraveling of a legacy. Will the rocky rollout of the health-care Web site define the presidency of Barack Obama? Can he recover, or will he be a historically weak lame duck?

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)