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Brian Boitano Comes Out as Gay; Seniors' Insurance Companies Dropping Doctors; President Obama's Brother's Book Details Father's Domestic Abuse; Legal War of Words Over Arrested, Strip-Searched Indian Diplomat
Aired December 19, 2013 - 13:30 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
WOLF BLITZER, CNN ANCHOR: A statement from Brian Boitano, gold medalist from 1988 Olympic Games in figure skating, going to Sochi, Russia. Let me read the statement right now. This is from Brian. "It is my desire to be defined by my achievements and my contributions. While I am proud to play a public role in representing the American Olympic delegation as a former Olympic athlete, I've always reserved my private life for family and friends and will continue to do so. I am many things, a son, a brother, and uncle, a friend, an athlete, a cook, an author, and being gay is one part of who I am."
All right. There's the statement among -- part of the statement from Brian Boitano, representing the United States in Sochi. He will be the third openly gay member of the presidential delegation. Billie Jean King earlier announced part of the delegation, Caitlin Cahow. So Caitlin Cahow, Billie Jean King, Brian Boitano, at least three members of the presidential delegation representing the United States in Sochi, Russia, at the Winter Olympic games, are openly gay, underscoring the diversity of the delegation, precisely what the president wanted, and certainly coming amidst anti-gay laws in Russia right now. So we'll continue to watch this story for you. That statement from Brian Boitano.
Other news we're following, thousands of seniors across the United States certainly facing a health care dilemma they never expected. Their own insurance companies are dropping their doctors, often with little explanation. But some physicians and patients say they do know why. They believe insurers are using a back-door strategy to get rid of costly patients.
Our Chris Frates explains.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
JODI SAVATINO (ph), HEALTH INSURANCE DROPPED HER PHYSICIAN: I'm decorating and making curtain there's.
CHRIS FRATES, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Jodi Savatino (ph) is like many seniors. She sees multiple doctors and takes lots of medication. How many prescriptions do we have here?
(on camera): How many prescriptions do you take?
SAVATINO (ph): OK. One, two, three, four, five.
FRATES (voice-over): Last month, the 79-year-old got some jaw- dropping news. Her insurance company, United Healthcare, cutting four of her six physicians from its Medicare Advantage plan, including her most trusted doctor, Dr. Lawrence Mitchkowski (ph), or Dr. Mitch to patients like Jodi. The cardio-metabolic specialist will be unceremoniously dumped from United Medicare Advantage network on January 1st with little explanation, or as United put it in a letter --
DR. LAWRENCE MITCHKOWSKI (ph), CARDIO METABOLIC SPECIALIST: "United Healthcare is amending your agreement referenced above to discontinue your participation in the Medicare Advantage network. This amendment does not require your signature."
FRATES: But the doctor thinks United is trimming physicians from its network because, under Obamacare, it's harder to drop patients.
MITCHKOWSKI: Let those high-cost patients move out of the United Healthcare Medicare Advantage plan over to Anthem or Humana and let those poor suckers, so to speak, pick up the cost.
FRATES: United's decision left Jodi and her 94-year-old husband, Nick, facing a tough choice, do they stay with United and find new doctors or try to keep their doctors by finding a new insurance plan?
SAVATINO (ph): Dr. Mitch has been my doctor for 20 years. No one knows me better than he does and it's silly not to continue to go with him.
FRATES: So Jodi went shopping.
SAVATINO (ph): This was expensive, this was expensive the.
FRATES: And the plan she bought is going to cost her much more.
(on camera): Do you have any sense how much more that will end up costing you?
SAVATINO (ph): Double.
FRATES (voice-over): Jodi is not alone. United and other insurers have taken similar action in at least a dozen states. In Connecticut, for example, United cut about 20 percent of its doctors, according to state medical society. And here in Ohio, the insurance giant dropped hundreds of doctors affecting thousands of patients.
TODD BAKER, OHIO STATE MEDICAL ASSOCIATION: The patient costs a lot, and United is going to those patients' doctors and dropping them and, therefore, getting rid of the patient.
FRATES: United concedes it is reducing the size of its network, but declined an on-camera interview request. In a statement to CNN United said, "Many health plans are making changes to their net works to improve quality and keep health insurance affordable. These changes are necessary to meet rising quality standards in an era of Medicare funding cuts."
The Insurance Industry Trade Group argues the changes are a direct result of Obamacare. To pay for health care reform, lawmakers included $200 billion cuts in the Medicare Advantage program, and a new tax on health insurers.
ROBERT ZIRKELBACH, AMERICA'S HEALTH INSURANCE PLANS: Washington can't cut and tax the Medicare Advantage program this much and not expect seniors in the program to be harmed.
FRATES: Even though Jodi Savatino (ph) was able to fine a plan that included Dr. Mitch, she will lose two other doctors.
SAVATINO (ph): We're walking away from people we known and trusted and counted on for over 10 years and that's hard.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
BLITZER: Certainly is.
Chris Frates is here with us.
What's the prognosis, if you will? What's going to happen in the immediate period ahead?
FRATES: It's not good. I asked this is going to get better? We're going to look at higher premiums. We're going to look at narrowing those networks even further, higher out-of-pocket costs. In the foreseeable future, under Obamacare, insurers say seniors can expect more of this.
BLITZER: They're not going to be happy about that.
FRATES: They're not.
BLITZER: All right. Thanks very much, Chris Frates, reporting for us.
Writing about one -- writing about family is one thing. But when your half-brother is president of the United States, your book is bound to gain notice. A new autobiography by Mark Obama Ndesandjo details their father's domestic abuse, and that's coming up next.
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BLITZER: President Obama's half-brother is coming out with a new autobiography that details domestic abuse by their father. Mark Obama's Ndesandjo's book will correct factual errors in the president's 1995 memoir, "Dreams from My Father."
Brian Todd has been looking into the story for us.
Brian, this is not the first book by the president's half-brother. What's different this time?
BRIAN TODD, CNN CORRESPONDENT: It's different, Wolf. This is more of a factual account. This is not a novel. This is a journey into his past, how he made his way to China and some of that. The part that most of us are more interested in is the family dynamic. And what Mark writes is about the abuse that he and his mother suffered at the hands of their father. Their father was Barack Obama Sr, the same father that Barack Obama has, but had different mothers. Mark's mother was Ruth Ndesandjo. Ruth is an American. Like Barack Obama's mother, she was Barack Obama Sr's third wife.
Mark Ndesandjo, in this book, recalls an incident where the father held a knife to his mother's throat because she had taken out a restraining order on him. Barack Obama himself was not there at the time, didn't witness the incident, really had very little contact with his father. Only was with him one time in his life for a period of a couple of weeks in the early '70s. But Mark feels that the president doesn't really acknowledge or embrace the domestic abuse at the hands of their father.
This is an excerpt of our interview with Mark Ndesandjo.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MARK OBAMA NDESANDJO, AUTHOR & HALF-BROTHER OF PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA: Barack, I don't think accepts or at least does not want to know details of beatings that occurred in our family. And I can understand that, perhaps. But I think, to a certain extent, that's colored a lot of relationships within the family between family members, including myself and him.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
TODD: We're reaching out to the White House for some response to this, if they care to give it. We've not heard back interest them yet, Wolf.
But again, this is -- these are sensitive family matters. Some of this has aired before in books and other venues, and Barack Obama, in his own book, did write about his father's problems with alcoholism and he didn't treat his families well but maybe he hasn't got noon the details of the abuse. Again, abuse, according to Mark, happened with his own mother and not with Barack Obama's part of the family.
BLITZER: Two half-brothers, what kind of relationship do they have?
TODD: Mark Ndesandjo says it's pretty cold right now and he thinks he has alienated his brother by some of his writings. He did say, "I think he's a great president but sometimes he's a lousy brother." Again, he thinks it's because maybe Barack Obama hasn't embraced some of the violence and some of the really gritty details.
BLITZER: Do they have any contact at all?
TODD: Not much. They met a few times, first in 1988, a few times while Barack Obama was president, but not much at all over the years. BLITZER: And you'll tell us later. You know, more about this, including what he's doing in China right now.
TODD: Right.
BLITZER: Brian, thanks very much. A fascinating story. We'll see if we get reaction from the White House on these sensitive family matters.
The legal war of words over the arrest of an Indian diplomat in New York City showing no sign of letting up right now. The latest on what the diplomat's lawyer is saying in an effort to ease diplomatic tensions.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BLITZER: New Mexico has now decided same-sex marriage will be legal in New Mexico. The New Mexico Supreme Court has just ruled the state may not deny same-sex couples the freedom to marry, saying the current laws in New Mexico are unconstitutional. This ruling today is another victory clearly for gay and lesbian couples nationwide seeking to legally wed. It was a unanimous decision by the New Mexico Supreme Court, ordering county clerks to immediately begin issuing marriage licenses to qualified same-sex couples. They join 16 states plus the District of Columbia in allowing same-sex marriage. An important development out in New Mexico.
In New York City, a lawyer for an Indian diplomat is at the center of an international dispute, and that lawyer is firing right back. He's accusing marshals in New York City of heavy-handed treatment when they arrested his client on charges of visa fraud and making false accusations, the allegation she underpaid her housekeeper is just plain wrong.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DAN ARSHACK, ATTORNEY FOR DEVYANI KHOBRAGADE: There are two contracts. One says send about $500 a month to my husband in New Delhi. And the other contract is the original contract. The balance of the money that wasn't sent to New Delhi was paid to her here in New York. All of the records support that.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BLITZER: The lawyer speaking to CNN's Chris Cuomo on "New Day."
Deborah Feyerick is following developments for us.
I understand, Deborah, the lawyer for the Housekeeper is disputing what the diplomat's lawyer is saying. We shouldn't be surprised that lawyers for various parties are disputing each other. What is the latest going on because there are severe diplomatic ramifications for the United States and its relationship with India at the core right now?
DEBORAH FEYERICK, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, there are, and there's a lot of smoothing over that's going on right now.
The lawyer for the diplomat has really said, look, the allegations against this client are false. That, in fact, she was paying the nanny what she was supposed to and she was treating the nanny well. The nanny's lawyer said, no, that wasn't the case, not by a long shot. That these two contracts you keep hearing about, one was submitted to the U.S. State Department in order to get a visa for the nanny housekeeper. The second one, however, was a different contract that basically took out all reference to the number of hours she was going to work, the amount of paid time off she was going to get, and basically had her accepting a much lesser salary, the 30,000 rupees, which amounts to about $3 a day.
Both lawyers confirmed there were negotiations, a settlement agreement or talks to try to resolve this. But the lawyer for the dependent said the Housekeeper was being unreasonable, that she asked for a permanent visa, not the diplomatic visa that she was traveling on, that she asked for $10,000 in cash, and she also wanted any allegations dropped against her. These allegations because, after the housekeeper fled, the diplomat filed a missing persons report, but then also told police there were things that were missing. It's a little bit sticky, tricky here -- Wolf?
BLITZER: I know the Secretary of State John Kerry has issued a statement expressing regret in the way the U.S. is handling all this. Is that seen by the government of India, for example, as a formal apology that the U.S. blundered in treating this diplomat the way the U.S. Marshal Service did?
FEYERICK: Secretary of State Kerry is definitely trying to smooth things over, trying to make right. He did reach out to India's national security adviser to express his regret that this happened.
But last night, the U.S. attorney came out with a very forceful statement saying, look, this woman was treated differently from common people who are arrested, whether they be U.S. citizens or people who are here from elsewhere, that she was given every due courtesy in terms of not being handcuffed. And she was able to sit in the arresting officer's car, using her cell phone to try to make arrange child care and reach out to other people in the consulate.
The strip-search was done in private. It was done by a female deputy. And it was important because they don't let anyone into the system without making sure they're not carrying anything -- Wolf?
BLITZER: There's a lot going on, a lot of questions that have come up. We'll have a lot more in "The Situation Room" late on today, Deb, as well.
Thank you.
Dennis Rodman is in North Korea. We'll hear what he hopes to accomplish during this controversial visit. That's next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK) BLITZER: Dennis Rodman arrived in North Korea today. The former NBA star has returned at the request of his good friend, the Korean leader, Kim Jong-Un, to coach North Korean basketball players. As he left China, Rodman was asked about the recent upheaval in Korea, including the execution of Kim Jong-Un's uncle.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DENNIS RODMAN, FORMER NBA BASKETBALL PLAYER: That has nothing to do with me. Nothing to do with me. I mean, what is done is done. I have no control over that. These things have been going on for years and years and years. Whoever's going to be a political insider over there for America or somewhere in the world want to try to come over and try to get a hold of it, go ahead. I'm just going over to do a basketball game and have some fun.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BLITZER: Just going to have some fun, he says.
There has been some hope that Rodman potentially could secure the release of the American missionary, Kenneth Bae, who has been held in North Korea for 13 months, serving a hard-labor sentence there. Let's see if he can bring Kenneth Bae out of North Korea. That would be good.
That's it for me. Thank you for watching. I'll be back 5:00 p.m. eastern in "The Situation Room."
NEWSROOM continues right now with Brooke Baldwin.
