House Democratic Whip Steny H. Hoyer (MD) joined MSNBC's Meet the Press Daily to discuss TrumpCare and the bipartisan Russia, Iran and, North Korea sanctions legislation that passed the House overwhemingly today. Below are excerpts from the interview:
On TrumpCare
"I'm confident that if they get a bill through, that needle they're going to thread that the President refers to, is not going to be a pretty one for them and a lot of Americans are going to be very, very upset. The reason they've had so much trouble, is the American public are not with them. The American public are substantially for the Affordable Care Act now, which is a change from eight months ago. They've looked at what the Affordable Care Act gives them, what they would lose under the Republican proposals, and they decided they want to stick with the Affordable Care Act. And 75% of them say look, fix the Affordable Care Act."
" We need to stabilize the market, clearly, whether that gets Republicans on board or not. Republicans are worried about the small market. They're correct to be worried about the small market, the individual market is too expensive for most people. We've got to deal with that. They have some things like health savings accounts and competition across state lines. We don't think those would work particularly well, but we could talk to the Republicans about that. But the fact is what we need to keep are the essentials in the Affordable Care Act that make it accessible to people, make it accessible to people with pre-existing conditions, make it affordable for people of limited incomes, and keep them healthy. Those we can't bend on or compromise on. That doesn't mean we can't sit down and talk and compromise as we have done, by the way, on the Russian sanctions bill, Iran sanctions bill that just passed.
On Russia, Iran, and North Korea Sanctions Legislation
"It passed 419-3. If [President Trump] doesn't sign it, we'll override his veto. It passed 98-2 in the Senate. He will look at those numbers, I think. Some people on his staff probably are going to advise him, Mr. President, we lost this fight, sign the bill, move on. But he is not very predictable as we've all seen. So I don't know whether he'll sign it or not."