♪ good friday morning. welcome to "squawk on the street." i'm carl quintanilla with jim cramer at the new york stock exchange. david faber is off. it is the final countdown, again, as the market looks to a potential house vote on health care today. the debate now shifting to whether a failure to repeal is bearish, maybe bullish. futures are pretty steady. strong pmis out of europe, but stocks are red there. durables show cap x is improving. ten-year remains in tight range. roadmap begins with trump's message to congress, take it or

leave it. president says he's done negotiating on health care. that crucial vote now set for later today. keystone green light, the president set to officially reverse one of the obama signature environmental policies this morning. and then markets on track for their worst week since november, wall street's keeping close watch on d.c. and any progress for the trump agenda. president's pushing hard for house republicans to pass health reform today. in the past hour he wrote after seven horrible years of obamacare, skyrocketing premiums and deductibles, bad health care, this is finally your chance for a great plan. a lot of people wondering if they move to taxes is that like the market saying let's have dessert first, jim? >> well, look, i expect there could be a quick leg down if he doesn't win. there's always this weird kind of, well, you know what, legislation momentum, trump loses and it's over. no, history says it's not over. so i think that the faster they get no matter what tax reform failure or pass, the problem is pass means seven months in the

senate. >> on health care. >> yeah. >> you would rather bypass that and do something -- >> i would like to have the market come down quickly. you quoted thomas lee in twitter this morning. i'd like to have that quick decline off of either way now, i mean, because i think the senate is not going to like this bill. get this thing out of here. get this thing out of here. but the best thing that could happen is that we would be talking about tax reform. there's a great interview with steve mnuchin -- treasury secretary mnuchin i'm reading, and what i see about mnuchin is he's talking right there about tax reform. we have to have tax reform. and this thing, i mean, if the democrats with a mandate from obama could not get this thing passed for a year. this thing, yes, you'd like to have health care, but what you really want is economic growth and jobs. >> mnuchin is talking to mike allen of axios right now. he's talked about a number of things, the dollar, cyber security and financial systems, and specifically tax reform and

border adjustment. listen to that. >> the border adjustment tax has certain aspects that are v.a.t. like. and that system is a system that most of the rest of the world uses. so, you know, there's an argument that we should be on a system that's similar to the rest of the world. it is very complicated. so one of our concerns about it is that if the currency moves, then the walmart shopper shouldn't be impacted, okay? but if the currency moves, that has an impact for our exporters. so, you know, it's a very complicated issue. we're looking at it carefully. as i said, you can expect that we are going to come out with a plan pretty soon. >> what does it say that we're playing that bite right now and not something else about health care? >> look, i think that it says

all systems go. my work behind the scenes with these guys is saying, listen, this is not protectionism. what they're doing is there are certain industries they want to protect that are not having a level playing field. i think everyone knows that there's certain industries they want to protect. they're not really as interested in this low dollar import. i do know that walmart, we want to clarify walmart would tell you only one-third is imported. it's not so much walmart. walmart has great heft, which is why that stock hasn't come down. pvh on the other side all imported, stock's up big because they have imported, but manny chirico against this, but the main thrust here is he's not talking about tax credits for health care. by the way, can we just understand if you had more jobs, then tax credits are good. if you don't have a job, the tax credit doesn't mean anything. i think that's often been lost in the ryan care shuffle.

ryan care shuffle. ryan care shuffle. >> we're going to talk about political blame games maybe later today. we'll see what happens. your point though about the difference here on policies. peter roskam had a quote where he said the aca had defenders. taxes don't, right? >> but look, everybody loves a tax cut, you know? >> yeah. >> it's not controversial. health care is so controversial. there's 60% of the people do not like this health care bill. nobody's even read it. i mean they send it to the senate, so few people have read this thing. all you hear about is i'm going to lose my health care. how about the dialogue with all i hear about is fedex is going to pay 20%. who cares? it's great. maybe fedex hires more people. i am a huge believer that if we can get to tax we get to jobs. if we get to jobs, we get the market higher. if we don't, then we have the tom lee scenario, which is the change. i only mention because somebody who's been right is someone i always want to listen to,

someone who's been wrong, gundlach, i don't want to pick on gundlach, he's really nice, but if you fought the whole way and still fight it, i'm not going to give you the w. you get the l. but lee's got a w. >> tom lee as you know bullish for basically eight straight years this morning sees a drawdown in the first half. now looking for equities to pull back to 2,200, 2225. >> little more bearish. >> yeah. >> i mean, there are people really believe the narrative that trump is finished if health care doesn't -- if ryan care doesn't finish. they get that way because i'm trying to make a point. my point is there's really historically no such thing as legislative momentum. there really isn't. it's like if you lose one thing it doesn't mean you lose everything. it is not like the cleveland browns. i try to analogize to sports because people understand. they understand the cleveland browns. they can have 17 draft picks, it doesn't matter. and you hear that senator schumer was saying -- i mean, "the washington post" -- "the

wall street journal" is talking about if schumer were on the supreme court he would reject himself. so we got to get away from all these things that are just kind of irritants even though i obviously think supreme court very important. if we goat tax cuts, who is going to fight a tax cut? maybe some severe republicans worried about a budget deficit. >> right. >> i think trump would get a win. yes, it would really help to have a win. and this thing, i mean, i'm trying to go over the bill last night. you know, honestly, i don't know what was tougher, watching arizona lose or just trying to figure out this bill. this bill is really hard. >> legislative language has been tough to come by. >> oh, could you give me a rosetta stone for this thing? >> i know. here's "new york post" as president is playing harder ball my way or the highway. let's get back to kayla tausche who's been doing some yoman's work on this over the past 48 hours. good morning, kayla. >> good morning, carl. for all of the drama and

political theater yesterday it feels a little bit like the calm before the storm here on capitol hill with some procedural meetings happening. a committee meeting going on and a legislative session called by paul ryan all ahead of of course that afternoon vote that will take place some time between 2:00 and 5:00 p.m. where they're going to be taking up the american health care act. and the balance of that vote really is hanging right now. it's unclear which way it will tip because there have been concessions made to either side trying to make some amendments to the essential health care benefits for the more conservatives but also trying to find ways to pay for that for the more moderates. we'll see this afternoon whether they went far enough in either direction or perhaps stayed in the middle enough to keep both of those sides in the camp of voting for it. let's take a look at where the odds are on today's vote passing. we gave you some odds yesterday and a couple of those have changed. first start with goldman's because it hasn't changed. alec phillips still 75% chance

of this passing the house before easter recess. compass point says 60% chance of passing today and that's the same as fbr and evercore moved down to about 55%. one possible point of contention as we get this to a vote is the fact we haven't had a fresh cbo score. so the republicans can really sink their teeth into how much this is going to cost and where they're going to find the money to pay for it and exactly whether that's something they can bring back to their constituents back home. >> well, anticipating that ways and means chairman kevin brady acknowledged that this morning. >> it will survey every state in the nation to determine what type of health care plans are right for them, what congressional budget office will ultimately tell us is that more people will be picking up more plans because they're tailored to their needs. >> he acknowledged it's unusual. chairman walden said there will be a score before it goes to the senate, but guys, just in terms of this discussion around tax reform, we know the president is

a master at messaging. we know he's a master at changing the subject. so perhaps there's a sense that this tax reform discussion is a hedge of sorts because there isn't a current wip count or at least the white house won't give us one, so perhaps putting tax reform out there is a way to keep the market from going overboard regardless which way this vote goes. >> we'll be coming back to you a lot this morning, kayla, as we look for more timing on anything procedural or final. kayla tausche on the hill. >> speaking of procedural, let's go back to what happened with obamacare. there was a super majority in the senate for 60 votes for obamacare. and then pelosi could get -- when she tried to get the house to pass the same bill, huh-uh. i'm convinced it cost the democrats the house because it was so difficult in 2010. you go look at this thing, voters just hate it when the health care status quo gets messed up no matter what. so you really got a lot of things riding here, which if you pull back and the bill fails, again, we got the decline, it's

going to make maybe some people accuse say it's like a t.a.r.p. decline 770 points -- >> you don't believe that? >> no. but there are plenty of people who want to panic. it's almost like, hey, let's do some panicking. and i want those people to panic. i want them out. "mad money" people and "squawk on the street" people, don't panic, but this would be the opportunity to change the dialogue because the senate will need until 2018. if we're going to talk about this every day, i got to tell you by the end, carl, if you and i are talking about the tax credit for the 25,000 but not for the 28,000, i can tell you one thing, the stock market's going to flat line. and it's just not -- you want jobs created, this is the worst thing that could happen. worst. >> we've been wondering how long -- how much patience there would be for that kind of policy. >> my way or the highway says it all. i mean he switches from president to chairman of the board kind of thing. back into the notion that he could be the business president

we've got mnuchin talking about the business president. the momentum is lost here. it's just completely lost. the swamp, he wants to get out of the swamp. he wants to be the swamp fox. >> yep. we're going to come back in a moment talk more about the opening bell, today's movers. keystone's going to be a story today as the president issues that permit to build the pipeline to transcanada. we'll talk to former senator tom coburn about everything from keystone to taxes to health reform. take one more look at the premarket on this friday. we're back in a moment. the mercedes-benz of tomorrow will transform not just the automobile, but mobility itself. an autonomous-thinking vehicle protecting those inside and out. and it's the mercedes-benz of today that will help us get there. the 2017 e-class, with innovations

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♪ state department announces it has issued a presidential permit to transcanada allowing the company to build the keystone xl pipeline. project was first proposed in '08 but had been blocked by the obama white house. president trump's scheduled to make an announcement on keystone around 10:15 a.m. eastern time. a lot of winners in this one, jim. >> but don't need to build it. don't need to build it. >> not now. >> no, there was a big work around. thank you rusty bra sile for

showing me, after the defeat other companies found ways to meet it, we even prefer a more permian pipeline, so don't get too excited about this one because it may be too costly. i'm sure they want -- transcanada wants to do it. they'll tell you that, but frankly, you know, we don't need that. >> is it like a comment on the efficiency of the private market around it? >> yes, it is. because $50 oil -- you'll see today they make coining money at $50. permian has so much oil, didn't know that when transcanada was first proposed. don't need that dirty oil. the part of transcanada pipeline already built very good. so, you know, it's a statement. it's definitely a repeal of what we had before. but it's also not that pertinent

anymore because companies just said, look, they kind of bet on hillary winning, frankly. >> we moved on in a sense. >> yeah. >> meanwhile, opec is going to have a meeting in kuwait this weekend, try to assess the state of their cuts. >> saudis need a price higher because they want to do the ipo. some of these countries are cheating to a degree. but the big non-cheater no one counted on is the u.s. adding 100,000 barrels per month without a common increase has made it so we have too much oil. now halliburton's giving a meeting, halliburton they're saying things that are positive they're being interpreted as negative. everything you drill -- drilling is being -- we got this baker hughes count. >> yeah. >> did you know in '80-'82, there was a period actually when i was at goldman sachs we used to huddle. huddle around a machine that gave us baker hughes. we're back in that game. every time we see baker hughes up we say, oh, boy, there goes the permian, scoop, stack, the

two really important shales in oklahoma. you saw an article today about fracking, that's because the more fracking sand the better you're doing these huge lateral drillings in the permian producing so much oil. let's not forget we're swimming in oil. we will not at low 40s. they'll shut it down. but right now it's pretty good. too much oil. i still like some of the oil companies that can produce at these lower prices, but they're permian. >> what about broader plays, lng exporters, airlines, automakers? >> airlines have been going down. >> i know. >> that's called stupid. that's an algorithm. it's their chief cost. i've been telling people to buy the airlines because you see i'm not an algorithm. i am a dollar sign represented by a man, and i can live with that, but i'm not an algo. i do like pets. there is without a doubt some silliness going on in the market. lng, there's $47 billion worth of plants being built nobody

talks about. lng differential is very good for the u.s. because we are -- people used to think kuwait has more. it's no longer the case. we have more and it's $1.15 we make. somebody upgraded cabot the other day, they're not making that much money but boy we have a lot to export. it was needed. what was shocking dominion has the best. dominion is going to open up this copoint and they're already spoken for. they're spoken for. these lng trains, the only trains i like even though someone -- another guy raises csx. people must think this guy hunter harrison, barclays raised 50, 5050, do they turn it into a biotech a phase 3 railroad about to be approved by the fda? no doubt about it a phase 3 railroad he's got going. >> i notice that call this morning they take it to 55, right? >> i had to have an extra cup of coffee just to understand that. >> we'll tackle keystone. you'll see how big a story that is around 10:15 a.m. at the white house.

we'll get cramer's mad dash, count down to the opening bell. take one more look at the premarket. speaking of oil that is set for the third consecutive week down, but futures are improving. back in a moment. ♪ the great beauty of owning a property is that you can create wealth through capital appreciation, and this has been denied to many south africans for generations. this is an opportunity to right that wrong. the idea was to bring capital into the affordable housing space in south africa, with a fund that offers families of modest income safe and good accommodation. citi® got involved very early on, and showed an enormous commitment. and that gave other investors confidence. citi's really unique, because they bring deep understanding of what's happening in africa. i really believe we only live once, and so you need to take an idea that you have and go for it. you have the opportunity to say,

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♪ just about seven minutes to the opening bell. let's get cramer's mad dash. my favorite question today is who had the better beat in raise, nvidia or micron? >> well, okay, micron had the forecast raise. i was looking for a buck.

they go $1.43, $1.47. this is better than -- this reminds me of the 1995 cycle. this is the tightest -- remember these are boom bust stocks. a lot of people felt it was going to bust. that they would not be able to raise. this is all about not just drams but flash. it looks like by the way a readthrough to apple, a lot of drams are needed. the margins remain high, there are supplier problems. the skeptics on the call, they were like, well, you can't really maintain this, there's going to be demand destruction. no. isn't there more supply coming? no. it was one of these conference calls it was like, will you shut up analysts and understand that we're doing $5.2 billion in revenues? this is when they get it right, when mu -- well, that's interesting. when mu gets it right, they are a bull saying moo. this was an amazing quarter.

if you want to read a conference call where it's basically saying, guys, you have no idea how much money we're making and it is, there was tightness, there was a fire, a competitor, you can't make these things fast enough. but i think the flash surprised people. flash is tight. >> so on these targets now needham goes to 50, evercore says mid 50s are possible. >> they want to put a ten multiple -- let me just explain the way it works. there is -- though we come a day where one additional dram more than we need -- so if you want to play this game, do it deep in the money calls because one day you're going to wake up and there will be too much supply and not that much demand. but right now it's clear sailing. i think maybe to 35, 40. i'm going to be a little more conservative because i -- remember, we may have a down market because of whatever's going -- >> sure. >> and you'll get a better chance to buy. >> fascinating story today. >> oh, my god, what a conference call. >> unbelievable. >> and the ceo's retiring going out on a really good note.

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opening bell in two and a half minutes. busy day. rules committee has cleared the way for a house vote on health care. lawmakers say we might get it around 3:45, 4:45, somewhere before or after the close. >> yeah, remember the stock market wants it to fail. let's be really clear. because the stock market is now in the mnuchin mode. $1,000 bill, president trump. >> he joked about putting the president's face on a thousand dollar bill. >> i'm glad he was joking. i was going to that super atm machine spitting out the trumps. >> mnuchin is making all kinds of news in this interview with axios, says the dollar can get too strong in the short term. says a.i. as a job killer is not a broad dynamic for 50 years, a hundred years. >> yeah. he said not for a long time. i say whether is it five months or five years, a.i. is here. and a.i. is really, really important. anyone who's been -- you know, if you're on alphabet, google, if you're on amazon, that's a.i., that's turbo charged.

by the way pmi in europe i continue near six-year high. the dollar is let's just say too high versus the euro. the euro is about to have a major ramp here. watch the euro. by the way, go to europe. you know, go to europe right now. maybe this weekend. >> yeah. some of these pmis 56.7 was the eurozone number. germany's number was red hot. france. >> they've got to taper, they've got to stop quantitative easing. they've got to grow up. remember, i tell you they are the ones the trade people -- they are the unfair traders right now. we're surrounded by people who we have to protect ourselves from. i shouldn't say protect, i'm saying don't take our markets. >> as we get ready for the opening bell, dow, s&p, nasdaq on pace for the worst point drop for a week of the year. dow riding a six-day loss, that's the longest since

november, but we might recover some of it mere. >> micron, there can be a readthrough nvidia. remember all the companies doing semiconductor -- [ bell ringing ] >> there's the opening bell and s&p at the big board here celebrating its ipo, enterprise data analytics firm alteryx. and at nasdaq colon cancer alliance marking colon cancer awareness month. >> just watch micron. micron can have that pull. amd there was a nice note. and don't forget, i mean, when you look at micron, you get f.a.n.g. you can even do a f.a.n.g. readthrough. not diamondback, but facebook, amazon, netflix and google now alphabet. >> the semiconductor story is going to rule the early going. micron's the biggest gainer. western dig, applied, seagate. >> western digital, my travel trust name, why?

they are the flash company. fabulous readthrough to flash. this is interesting, we're not focused on health care. i want to bore people to death with health care. i can't do it, carl. i can't. i know i want to bore people. i want to just get into -- it's like college. that really bad class that you had to take. it's like let's do statistics. >> yeah, you're not interested in talking about minimum required benefits. >> i should be. >> the cbo score, which didn't help, i think. >> all i know is my health care premiums went up big like everybody else. and got less. arrest me not to go to the doctor. >> we got retail. finl comes in with a big miss. >> can we understand that foot locker is killing it? finl does not have the good nikes. it's always been the case. foot locker was up five. they get the better nike. so let's please understand that if you do a readthrough, it says sell foot locker off the finish line, no.

finish line is being killed by foot locker. but there are always people who do -- i always like to refer to that very interesting strategy people have called the stupid strategy. and it's often in play. >> yes. down 14% finish line. that's going to take you back to 2010. >> how about the guy who says that macy's is already a failure? the turnaround at macy's. hey, under armour, jefferies says it's bottoming. >> i was going to mention, yes. >> kevin plank is back bigger than ever, kind of like gandhi 2, the sequel. >> jeffries ups to buy, i can't remember. >> he's got 13 above -- he says athletic apparel doing better. he says survey. survey. who does he survey? the field hockey team? but stock has spent some time in pe purgatory. and every dog can have its day. >> yes. 25% more respondents, 32% more

purchasing apparel, their target is seven. >> maybe march madness gets people to buy clothing. >> yeah. >> march madness is exciting. >> i got to get your take on twitter today because the verge has this story that they may consider a paid for product in tweet deck. stock's up 15. >> all right. i see verge and raise them. they're absolutely are considering it. i have a million -- i am considered a heavy user, not a power user, so yes using a term, there's the medium and light. the first thing you get everyone wants is the blue check for verification. >> yes. >> they are testing other features to see what's more valuable, higher level of customer service, perhaps the concierge service. >> what you've been talking about for a year or more. >> yes, everything i wanted. they're doing market research about what people will pay. what is verge? i'm on the verge of verging here. and they're going to have a special 800 number. they've basically taken what i've begged for and codified it. they said, listen, we are only

testing it. so i beg get past testing and let us heavy users, not power users, have that 800 number so we can stop having the same people put the same name, change the name and, you know, just like i got to block, got to block. by the way, i want vala. >> one of the great accounts. >> he even tweets when he's on cape cod vacation. >> i see you looking at your phone but i'm not going to ask you who's giving you -- >> no, this is all me. i'm verging verge. i'm super verge. i'm heavy verge. >> speaking of all of that there's some pieces being written about thursday night nfl bidding. >> tired night football. i've been urging google to take tired night football -- >> apparently youtube, facebook, they're all in. >> everybody's listening to me. i want them to take the china game -- by the way it will be a clean sweep, china, wimbledon,

eagles are playing, i arranged it this week i will be there and then give handoff to the united states. >> what would that mean a winning bid for some of these other companies, not twitter? >> i do a lot of work with alpha -- talking to alphabet about the tragedy of how they're going to lose all these accounts. they're going to fix this problem. they were behind on trying to fix like, you know, your ad being next to superty duper porn, whatever that is. i think they will solve that problem. these guys are all playing hardball because google will have the channels and when they have the channels all these companies will come back and advertise. you can't leave that audience. it's too great. but the press hates google. the mainstream. >> yes. >> president, he's with google on this. >> kbh, we're looking at you got to go back to 2014 for a price near. >> yeah, i saw that. they don't realize kbh has $21

book value and own in san francisco where one bedroom goes for $1.3 million. my daughter was thinking about moving to san francisco. >> virtually impossible. >> not going there. no. i mean, she can go to oregon, that's very close. >> i mean, we got good results from l.e.n. >> no dem -- this is supposed to be a sleepy friday in march, by the way. a tad disappointing, listen to what they said, the quarter more difficult than we thought. we lost share, stiff headwinds, physical games down 15%. but don't worry, things are getting better. okay. >> yeah. >> not. >> difficult transition. >> they're in the mall too talking about 35% of their business not being games, but that's because the games have dropped so much. come on, guys.

i like paul, he's a really good man, but these guys are in the mall and they're physical when you want digital. i mean, wow. they did say the dividend's okay. >> yep. speaking of the mall, macy's, city you mentioned goes buy to hold. we do now have official succession as terry moves on. >> yeah. interesting finish line talked about their macy's business up gigantically. but macy's is really, when you go into macy's, it's got to be a little more different. talking about not being able to differentiate. i don't want to writeoff macy's instantly, but i do think that you are in the mall with some same-store stuff. pvh by the way very big client. they do a lot with macy's, but pvh was saved by international. macy's is a tough one now that they're no longer have an agitator and saying real estate's worth more than the store. perfume by the way is big margin for macy's, just so we know. >> intel will be our biggest dow gainer. i guess that's the micron halo

at work. >> well, i mean, intel -- mobileye, a lot of people don't like that deal. i think they're wrong. you've got to be in autonomous. i am a big bryan krzanich believer, he's the ceo. they raised the dividend. don't give up on intel. don't give up on brian krzanich. he's too good. by the way he's an intellectual. he said there's only a 27% chance that i am kind of, you know, a hologram. >> people write in why is cramer so pumped up today? >> busy day. >> is it because health care might not be on our plate? >> well, i like the micron call, but yes, i would like health care -- i mean, if you want to get it -- there's three senators who may like the tax -- i am so tired of senators and congress people. i want jobs. but yes, i mean, we got to go through it. i understand it's just -- it's a very tough thing. yeah, we get through, we get that decline, we get people to

want to go back in, we get tax reform, we get repatriation, everybody likes tax cuts. and we can move forward. but right now we're purely bogged down if the house bill passes seven months in the senate is my prediction. >> yeah, you don't want to see that. >> no. we've had enough -- we've had enough congress representatives on. do you know the senators are even more boring and cerebral than these guys. everybody wants a microphone down there. and we're happy to give them one. >> the house is generally a little more fiery. >> the senate they're like, wow, let me -- can i talk to you about the notion of the $200 additional tax credit and united health might come back. >> as we mentioned intel's going to lead the dow for now, up 22. we're going to keep our eye on washington and the dollar. >> i don't want to make -- look, we need some form of health care, but i think trump with his statement basically put it in their court and says -- mnuchin's interview today makes me feel like they're ready to

move on regardless. >> yeah. >> let it destroy itself. one of those things. >> let's get to bob pisani on the floor. >> i think jim is right. they're ready to move on. i can tell you down here on the floor on trading desks i've talked to in the last 24 hours, they're ready to move on. more in that in a second, but look at sectors here, number one tech is again the leader. leadership group for the entire year on micron i think largely, but semiconductors have been the leadership group throughout the year. and more importantly the banks are leading, ten-year yield's holding up fine here. the market seems to be implying that we're going to get some kind of action on tax reform. health care even here and energy is bouncing a little bit, energy as you know has been a big drag. so overall a very good open for the markets considering the uncertainty. the guys talked about micron a lot. i won't be labor the point pricing and demand has been very broad based. they're selling the data centers in addition to the pcs. look at smh here, this is the key etf you want to watch for the semiconductors.

micron is 5% of this index. so it moves it around quite significantly and as micron has moved up so has the semiconductor index um 10% for the year. that is one reason tech has been a market leader overall. we've got a few new highs today and interestingly besides micron lam research is at a new high, kla 10corp also at a new high today. as for what the market wants, my unscientific poll of traders in the last 24 hours, it's very clear, they want to move on. and they want a clean tax bill, not the complications with the border adjustment tax. a clean package of tax cuts, obviously they would like 20%. seems unlikely that will happen, but some kind of cut with no border adjustment tax. too complicated, too difficult, and to satisfy the conservatives who are not going to vote for a clean bill, we've seen the freedom caucus enboldened, they certainly won't do anything that will increase the deficit, some

time of provision, a sunset provision after ten years exactly what happened with the bush tax cuts. everybody seems to feel that's the clean way to do this to get something going, of course 20% is not going to happen so maybe it will be 25%. that's the hope right now here. mr. mnuchin of course talking this morning saying he'd like to think they can get tax reform done by august. meantime, ipos continue. we're waiting for alteryx to open behind me. $14 was the high end of the range. they help enterprises make more efficient use of data and analytics. this is the fourth tech ipo here, we had zero tech ipos in january and february. zero. so right now we're going to move forward here. we're going to have four in the month of march, that should say four here. tech ipos this year we've had snap. that's done well up 36%, presidio up 5%, mulesoft up 35% and of course today we're going to get alteryx, that's four for the year.

i maintain some time in the next three to four weeks the ka calendar is looking full. we're going to get six, seven, eight or nine ipos right in a row, that's when i can finally say yes the calendar is open. of course a lot depends on where the stock market is. speaking of ipos, business insider very interesting comp this morning that saudi arabia was having serious discussions with the new york stock exchange over the aramco ipo. no official confirmation on that, but i can confirm discussions have been serious for quite some time. so obviously if that happened a huge win for the nyse. right now the dow up 28 points, we're waiting for alteryx to open. no indications right now. carl, back to you. >> bob, thank you very much. this story is a tad local, forgive me for just a moment, but rail service has been suspended in and out of penn station in new york city due to a derailed amtrak train. that's from new jersey transit. we have had past experience last

year or two of some derailments. i'm thinking of hoboken about a year ago. we'll see how serious this is and what it might mean for commerce here in the new york area. in the meantime dow up 24 points. let's get to the bond pits and rick santelli. rick. >> hi, carl. you know, it's an interesting session, very similar to yesterday where we spent a good deal of time unchanged or thereabouts fairly similar today. twos are up one on the day, down six on the week. tens and 30s both highly unchanged as they sit down eight on the week. so there's some curve implications. you can look at that one-week chart of ten-year note yields, really tightly packed. most of the move was earlier in the week. if we look at another very interesting chart, i always like to talk about the basis point difference, subtracting our ten-year note yields from bund yields, knowing that mario draghi and the issues of europe may be changing from many perspectives including central bank, qe is going to take a taper. tens minus bunds, overlay that

note on generic ten-year note yields there's a correlation on direction there. many traders look at it. so as that starts to hold under 200 basis points, for the moegs part maybe yields will continue to move lower. we want to pay close attention to that dynamic. look at a one-week of dollar index, shall we? the one spike down there that held right around that 99.50 and change, let's zoom in on that, shall we? start a chart third week in january. you can see end of january that little v. that's the area on a closing basis 99.50. hey, the dollar is fighting to hold that level, very significant especially should it close below it. today a weekly close is a higher priority if you're a technician. and finally, let's look at dollar/yen, one-week chart, keep in mind that this thing closed last week at 112.70, it's just barely above 111 now. big move not in favor of the dollar. and year-to-date of the euro versus the dollar you can see this chart just like the dollar index is hovering at a very key level, but it's actually on the

sunny side of it just barely hovering at the best levels against greenbacks since november. carl and jim, back to you. have a good weekend. >> you too, rick. we'll talk to you soon. when we come back we'll talk all things trump with pulitzer prize winner jim stewart of "new york times." has a unique perspective on the president's tax returns. dow's up 28. we're waiting for a procedural vote on health care this morning. more in a moment. it's a very simple procedure, mr. diaz. we're just going to make one small incision here, then we're gonna go in and remove your '67 corvette. my vette!? it's just a gall bladder! you don't have.. aflac! paying you cash, so you might have to sell that sweet little muscle machine just to cover your rent. more funny juice. but my papa gave me...that...car. what do you wish you had? aflac.

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what piece of currency would you most like to spruce up? >> well, i think we should look at putting president trump on the thousand dollar bill. >> is that chase? who is that now? >> we don't have a thousand dollar bill, i'm only kidding. >> that's treasury secretary steven mnuchin at an axios event this morning with mike allen, taking a lighter tone. they covered a lot, health care, tax reform. wasn't joking when he came to the stock market.

take a look at this. >> i think there is some good news that's baked in, but yet i think there is further room for significant growth in the economy, which would be reflected in the markets. >> you are a bull. >> i am a bull absolutely. buy america. >> you attributed the 5% gain in the s&p to one word, the president. of course if it comes down then that also means it's the president -- >> no, no, if it comes down, it's congress. >> he did say they'll push for comprehensive tax reform by the august recess. >> well, the only way you can really do that i think is if this vote fails. because otherwise you got the senate tied up. the senate will look at this bill very seriously. they know it's health care and they'll debate it. can't zip right through the senate. again, i feel like perhaps it's a foregone conclusion. now, i just don't want people to panic again. i think that's very important. mnuchin is very funny.

>> he is very funny. he's very funny. >> i work with his dad, his dad is -- we called him coach. hysterical. >> very colorful career. i was watching sully the other night and the closing credits there's his name, executive producer steven mnuchin. he's the treasury secretary. >> well, look, he's very -- but i think to link yourself -- link the president with the market is probably a mistake. the only reason i say that is because he made a joke that it's congress, but that does set you up for a big decline blame on trump. >> we will get stop trading with jim in a moment. dow adding to early gains up 47 now. don't go away. go after it the same way?use soy chasing after short term returns. instead if getting caught up with the crowd, the investment managers at pgim take a long term view, teaming specialized active investing with risk-management rigor, to seek out global opportunities. we manage over a trillion dollars this way,

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♪ time for cramer and stop trading. >> halliburton was down really badly and then said the magic words. it's hard to add resources to keep up with demand, that doesn't sound all that bearish with me. i know the chart's horrible, people want out of the group. keep in mind there's two sides to every story and i continue to believe oil can bottom in the 45 range because that's where

people stop the spigot. don't forget as bob pisani talked about there's this saudi aramco deal. saudis do not want to see oil go through the floor and they are in charge. >> jim, what are you going to tackle tonight? >> we have apple hospitality, hotels are really the judge of how where countries doing in various regions and then boxed i like private companies i think one day could come public. i was out to dinner last night with my friend his birthday and a bunch of other guys, all people could talk about was peloton. >> really? >> i think peloton will come public this year. yeah, my wife likes the hip hop, so do i. >> we're still waiting on sole's eventual -- >> yeah, seoul cycle, fly wheel, got rachel w, i mean everybody has their person. it's a really interesting thing. but this peloton is taking the world by storm. >> we're going to watch that space. >> what a fun show.

>> we had a good one today. >> yeah, it was good. >> we'll see you tonight, jim. >> okay. >> "mad money" 6:00 p.m. as jim says we're going to continue to talk health care, keystone and a lot more with former senator tom coburn. dow holding onto gains up 36 points. don't go anywhere. our first name has always been 'american'. at at&t, we employ more than 200,000 people with good-paying jobs. connecting consumers and budiness through mobile,

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♪ good friday morning, welcome back to "squawk on the street." i'm carl quintanilla with kelly evans who is back. >> good morning. >> mike santoli at the new york stock exchange. rules committee now clearing the way for a procedural vote around 11:15 eastern and then maybe a final vote 4:45 at the latest some say that's going to be the story of the day. >> our roadmap here begins with negotiations underway on health care. the president's message, pass it or live with obamacare, is moving on a positive or negative for the market. >> white house issuing approval permit. >> plus, cautious but so far positive trading on wall street ahead of the health care vote.

where should you be putting your money to work in this market? >> first up, drama continues to play out on capitol hill. the house vote on health care is expected this afternoon. let's get to kayla tausche with the latest. >> just a few moments ago, carl, we did get an official schedule sent out by the office of the majority wip. you mentioned a few highlights but i want to share with you just so we can get specifics as far as planning your day and what to expect here on the hill. we will expect that first vote series of the day on the health care rule to come between 10:15 and 11:15. then hours of debate will take place with the final vote series, the full floor vote happening between 3:45 and 4:45. and there's an expectation that the floor will finish by 5:30 p.m. of course everything is fluid and this is still subject to change. and the wip's office might have sent out this schedule, but it really is the white house that's calling the shots on this issuing that ultimatum last night to republicans saying take it or leave it. and the person, the messenger delivering that directive, mick

mulvaney, the budget director, said this morning it was issued to all republicans, not a specific faction. >> the president wants a vote today. that's not targeting any moderate group, any conservative group. he wants a vote. he's tired of the drawnout negotiations. he's tired of folks always coming up with better ideas and nitpicking the bill as it is. this is not a politician. this is a businessman. he thinks the time has come for a vote. >> although there is still no official word on the wip count or how many votes the president believes he has won over, and current estimates from strategists don't have passage odds above 60%. with goldman having just lowered it own rate of passage before the april recess to 60% as well. of course as director mulvaney mentioned, the president's approaching this like a businessman which some here on the hill find refreshing and some people find it offputting. there are questions about whether he knows that there might be an unfavorable outcome or is hedging for the

possibility of an unfavorable outcome with this promise of tax reform saying that's really what he wants to do. on the nature of tax reform and this future pro growth agenda that the markets are prepping for there are two schools of thought. one is the freedom caucus, which is that conservative wing that has been the most vocal opponent to this health care bill. perhaps they're not learning how to govern quickly enough and perhaps they're going to put up continued fights and that could create a log jam for future policy. but then the other example from the president's and white house approach guys is perhaps if the president has shown his impatience and his desire to get to tax reform then he's willing to put his foot down on health care, he's willing to put his foot down even stronger to get to tax reform. but we'll see how this vote turns out today. we'll see what last-minute tweaks we get out of lawmakers who are in back room negotiations here on the hill currently. >> yeah, dow's up 35 points now, kayla, thank you. it's sure to be a fur nettic

day. let's get to our guests here at post nine. nick, you were saying one of the biggest surprises is how well the health care sector has done so far this year. >> that is really one of the biggest surprises. second best performing group up 7.7 versus the market's 4.8. only tech has done better. and it's really because the sector got to cheap having been beaten down so much last year that the top names at the very top of the cap table are trading 14.5, 15 times earnings. that's been enough to propel this group higher even with all the focus on regulations in the space as well as health care spending. >> so you would say that rally not necessarily what's going to happen today but because it became so unloved. people got scared and now they're getting back in? >> that's right. you have areas like biotech are going to benefit from deregulation and repeal of the medical products tax that's part of this repeal of obamacare.

>> meanwhile, krishna, you're saying it's not clear what is going to happen here, maybe investors should look international for opportunities. >> absolutely. we are getting caught up in the drama of the passage of this thing. at the end of the day the economic impact of health care passage is really minimal. what we're talking about is tax reform and there if it is going to be a fiscal consolidation, that is there's no widening of fiscal deficit, the likelihood that it ends up being reflati reflationary trade in my mind is pretty small. if we don't pass it today, may go down, if we pass it may have a brief rally but give it back over the next few months. sb better stunts are internationally. europe, better and emerging markets because they are so cheap relative to other markets. >> i guess we've proven out here with what health care's done even if you have a sense of what might happen, you don't know how the market is going to

metabolize that at any given time. so i wonder if we could be having a discussion in a few months saying, well, comprehensive tax reform might not get done but somehow the market's going to be okay because 2% growth and maybe okay we don't need the stimulus, nick, is there a chance something like that goes -- >> i think you have to go back to the day after the election and realize we're still up roughly 10% on the day after the election on the hope some of these things happening. if we were going to fast forward three to six months, we would have to rewind that rally because earnings expectations are still pretty high at 130, $132 a share, not going any higher, not coming down. and overall macro growth isn't that great. i think we'll be talking about a market 10% lower if that was going to be what happens. >> i would say that we probably don't have a substantial correction. but we don't get to the next level. growth is good enough for us to kind of sustain these levels for some time. >> on europe, pmis today are impressive once again. >> yes. >> how much are they poised for a tantrum of sorts as their bank tries to make a turn?

>> okay. so i think the first issue they're dealing with in europe is really the politics. french elections and things like that. if we get through that, we get a meaningful rally. >> get through it meaning she loses? >> she loses. le pen, that doesn't happen, bad things don't happen politically. then we deal with ecb. but that's really more of this back half of the year and 2018 business. >> by the way i'm looking here at what you're saying about bonds and it's really been interesting to watch interest rates. mike, this goes back to the point you were making about how the financials started outperforming in december. nick, if it's the case we're kind of running in place here on bond yeelgields, does that mean people can be fine hanging onto a lot of these positions, they don't need to worry they're going to get burned there? >> it does feel that way. feels like reflation trade has lost a ton of steam. we're calling the trump 1.0 trade is over, the trump 2.0 trade hasn't shipped yet. >> i like this. >> what is the 2.0 trade? >> exactly. >> the 2.0 trade is back to fundamentals on what's going on. that's why technologies number one group, why financials have

suffered. 1.0 trade was clean shot higher on a steeper yield curve with financials leading the way. the 2.0 trade is back to fundamentals, earnings growth, revenue growth and what happens in the back half of the year. >> actually, the 2.0 trade is 0.0 trade, going back to the original. >> it's like when dorothy says if i lost my heart it's always been back of my home, is that it? policy was always sort of a weird detour? that seems strange. >> it is a weird detour in that we focus too much on it. we really just got this one idea that we have a new president and new administration, everything's going to be different. you have to go back to the fundamentals and realize as we're seeing today waiting for government to do something is a really kind of lousy catalyst for equity markets if you're looking at trade today, tomorrow, the next day. >> i also wonder if it's a matter of how impatient we are. if everyone gets together and decides rates are going up and they go up a lot only to 2.6 on the ten-year and then come down a bit, everyone says it's over. maybe it's just a pause. >> well, i think the fed is telling you they're going to be

tightening. the question is what's going to happen in the long end of the market. i think it's clear that growth is not going to the next level. inflation is not going to the next level if fiscal deficit doesn't wide. so this is it. >> gentlemen, thank you. as we await to hear from the president after meeting with his national economic council, that could be coming down the pike. a lot of moving pieces today. thanks for being with us. >> speaking of moving pieces, the white house approving the keystone xl pipeline building permit this morning. we're expecting the president to make a statement shortly. eamon javers who's had his hands full all week long is at the white house with more. hey, eamon. >> yeah, good morning, carl. you know, this is following up on an executive order the president signed back on january 24th setting in motion the process to approve the keystone xl pipeline today will be the official go ahead from the white house. we're expecting a number of executives including those from transcanada which put out a statement this morning on this. here's what they have said and

we'll hear from their ceo we expect at the event here at the white house today. they say this is a significant milestone for keystone xl project. we greatly appreciate president trump's administration for reviewing and approving this important initiative. and we look forward to working with them as we continue to invest in and strengthen north america's energy infrastructure. now, take a look at some of the oil and gas executives who we expect will be in the room with the president for this event today. it's a long list of folks from quanta services, and other businesses all in the business in one way or another. this simply this white house guys enacting a campaign promise, they ran on it and doing it today, carl. >> all right. we'll keep our eye on that, eamon. obviously cramer's point earlier this morning, guys, was market kind of moved past all this during the white house years, found other ways to find -- >> i thought they already did this as well. i mean, wasn't -- we've had the

news about this being put into place. i know there's a lot of formalities here that really finalize it. >> jim's point is they don't need it, right? the market found other sources and better types of oil at lower production prices. >> you don't need it at all because under obama it became symbolic of another thing about energy and infrastructure and environmental policy. we already knew what the stance was going to be. >> is this the canadian sands oil as well? >> it includes that. >> there's been a lot of divestment from that because the permian is -- so a ton of companies sunk money into the oil sands had to walk away. so to your point how much of a boom this really is. >> we'll see if we get any additional wrinkles as the president speaks this morning. when we come back there's the other drama on the hill, that's the house getting ready to vote on health care flt we'll discuss that, tax reform and more with pulitzer prize winning "new york times" columnist jim stewart. dow's up 29. a lot more news to come. don't go away. ♪

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you've famously said we would have tax reform by congress' august recess. is that still the case? >> well, i'd like to think so. what i've said all along is this is optimistic, okay, this is a big challenge, but we're going to try to get it done in that period of time. if we don't, we'll get it done right afterwards. it's a big priority.

>> treasury secretary steven mnuchin earlier this morning as we keep our eye on the house floor preparing to vote on the first key piece of the trump agenda later on today. that is health care -- the trump team already preparing to move past that though perhaps to taxes. our next guest says last week's release of pages from the president's tax return makes a powerful case for tax reform. pulitzer prize winning "new york times" columnist jim stewart here. i don't know what you want to tackle first. >> i will just briefly say about taxes and tax reform which of course is looming, the big news on the 2005 reform is that he used up $813 million of his tax credit, his net operating loss. and that to me again just puts a spotlight on how grossly unfair the tax code is, especially when you get to big powerful real estate developers like him. i think that is the bottom line. a, he should release his taxes, but b, he ought to propose some reforms that close some of these outrageous loopholes.

that brings me to, you know, can he do tax reform now? this health care thing today is historic. it's pivotal, not just for health care but for how the governing coalition is going to look in this administration for the next four years. i mean, i said on this show a while ago that there were basically two republican parties. it kind of breaks down on ideological lines, but more than that it's the people who are willing to compromise to get something done and the ones who will not compromise on anything. if they don't compromise on health care, trump will have to take the rest of the republican party, add some democrats to find a new coalition. and that changes the prescription for everything, particularly tax reform. because if he needs democrats to support it, you're going to get a very, very different tax reform bill than you would without that. >> you're referring specifically to the intransigence of the freedom caucus? or are you melding in other groups too? >> i think they're mostly in the

freedom caucus, but i think there are a few in the other camp too who say it's my way or the highway who won't get on board. i don't think it's a forgone conclusion this is going to fail. i'm intrigued -- you know, i kind of admire trump for making it kind of an all or nothing thing like this and saying, look, i'm not going to play this political game. we'll see how they line up on it. but if the -- can't ignore and let's be friends while we talk about health reform, i think they're going to be at war with him, he'll be at war with them, will force him to the middle. >> on the other hand i wonder if each individual member would be facing the same kind of political pressure from outside on corporate taxes in particular, right? i mean, you're not going to have people calling your office at a 300-to-1 ratio saying don't take my health care away or give a big tax cut to the same company.

doesn't seem to be the same kind of calculus. maybe it's hard to even play out how this goes. >> i think that's true. i think corporate tax reform is a bipartisan theme. frankly, earlier said on this show i don't know why didn't start with everything things can agree with like tax reform and infrastructure. >> but did hi e run on i'm goin to cut -- i mean, it works now, there's a lot of people who that sounds great to, especially the market. but i'm not sure his core constituents, it's repeal obamacare, it's a lot of things he's already done. >> first of all, you don't call it a corporate tax cut. you say it's an economic stimulus. said i ran on growth, i'm not content with 2% or whatever it is. >> it's a way to get more companies investing in this country, yeah. >> corporate tax reform is way down in that political speech. and, you know, the obamacare, yes, i do think some people were really fired up about it, but you can tell from all this that trump himself's heart is not really in obamacare.

i think he can still make progress on corporate tax reform. but, you know, the minute you start needing, you know, democratic support, you're changing the equation for your whole legislative agenda. and, yes, might come onboard for that but they're going to expect something in return whichever the freedom caucus can forget what their agenda is because it's not going to align with that. >> does it mean the times this morning has reported that the president has expressed regret to four people that he followed ryan's plan to tackle health care first. so does it mean that their partnership, however tenuous it was, is now not going to operate going forward? >> well, you know, look, i found that a very interesting piece too. it sounded plausible to me because he wants to get things done, he wants accomplishments, he wants wins. i don't know it's a breach with ryan. it's not ryan that is really the problem here. it's this group of people that ryan doesn't seem to be able to control. and i don't know, you know, who

could. again, i think they can -- look, he's got to work with ryan on some level. he's not going to throw him under the bus, no matter what happens here. so i think we're going to see them coming to some kind of terms. they're still struggling. >> i don't know, i've been drawing the connection to the fiscal cliff thing in 2012 and you had a speaker of the house tried to cut a deal with the president and didn't work out and he's home. >> that's true. that's true. >> basically what that membership is going to want -- >> when you talk about regrets, i wonder how many days paul ryan wakes up and thinks how did i get into this mess, this is not a prescription for future presidential run, unless he somehow pulls this off. >> and then you got sort of the vote today given the discussion, given the emphasis on things other than health care from spicer just tweeted out about tax reform, they're doing keystone this hour. what motivation is there for a fence sitter to vote for this thing knowing the chances of

failure are decent? >> well, look, if they know it's going to fail, maybe go ahead with it. but i still think, you know, when they really search their souls and say do we want this, you know, this failure, i mean, i'm on the fences i would probably go along with it. i just wouldn't want to predict. i don't think it's a forgone conclusion this is going to fail. >> we thought it was going to happen yesterday and we were wrong about that. >> the market seems to be taking it in stride. i thought there would be a bigger market pullback because a lot of this rally is based on hopes and, you know, prayers that the trump pro business is going to go through. if this thing fails, i'd say those bets are off. >> and that's market negative? >> i think it's market negative, yeah. >> we did see downturn yesterday hanging onto a 37-point gain here but there's a lot of time to go. >> right. >> look forward to learning more today, jim, good to have you back onset, thank you. jim stewart of "new york times." >> and when we come back, former oklahoma senator tom coburn, his take on the health care battle

and the approval of the keystone xl pipeline. look at stocks as we head to break, nasdaq up half a percent. "squawk on the street" will be right back after this. your path to retirement may not always be clear. but at t. rowe price, we can help guide your retirement savings. so wherever your retirement journey takes you, we can help you reach your goals. call us or your advisor t. rowe price. invest with confidence.

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big day on capitol hill as the house votes on health care reform bill. also approving the keystone xl pipeline. we're joined by tom coburn, a former two-term u.s. senator from oklahoma, and tom vilsack, state senator and governor of iowa and former u.s. agriculture secretary. gentlemen, great to have you. thank you so much for joining us. senator coburn, just broad thoughts today about what this vote means if it goes down and any lessons the white house should be learning from it. >> well, you know, when i was watching this occur yesterday and this morning, i was thinking about when they shut the government down, the same group, and the effect that it didn't have they wanted it to have and we're told that was the case. i don't like a lot of this bill but i would vote for it to move

the process along. but i'd make a couple of points about it, one is this isn't going to lower the first premium for anybody. because there's no price discovery mandated in this bill, which could pass under reconciliation. so there's no price discovery. even if you muf people into high deductible medical savings account, if they can't find out the prices and outcomes are, you're not going to get the lowering of costs. and you're not going to markedly increase competition. so there are problems with the bill, but what we're seeing is legislative sausage making open wide. and we'll see what happens. i like the fact that trump says we're going to vote it. and you guys can tell your people you decided your way or the highway and we're not going to fix obamacare because i couldn't get everything i wanted. >> yeah. governor, i mean, people are trying to argue, look, it doesn't poll necessarily well. the cbo didn't help. there was minimal language. there were not good talking

points to take home to your district. and it's tough to start a new administration by arguably taking something away. are those things fair? >> well, i tell you, my concern about this whole process is its impact on rural america. when you talk about 24 million uninsured americans, you're talking about many of them living in small communities. it's going to have a profound impact on health care in those rural areas, which is going to make it more difficult for those rural areas to attract economic opportunity. so i think folks need to fully understand and appreciate exactly what we're doing here. and i think there's a concern in terms of access. i think we're going to see a denial of access to many, many americans. i think they're going to be quite surprised when they find out what's actually in this bill. >> senator coburn, our bertha coombs raised an interesting point yesterday which is if we're now going to have to get used to a democratic president pushing forward on something closer to a public option for health care and a republican president trying to pull that back and then this continues now with every successive

administration, what is going to happen to this country's health care system? >> well, the reason it costs more is because we don't have markets, we don't have transparency to outcome. and we have government controlled things. i disagree with former secretary vilsack. i don't think rural's going to be in trouble. most of the people are going to lose insurance are some of the fraudulent members on medicaid today. look at what pennsylvania did when they cross checked the applications on medicaid versus auto loans and they found 600,000 people lied on their applications on medicaid. so it's not -- you know, the people that are on the vast majority of obamacare recipients were medicaid. so what you're going to see is the decline in the fraud and those who truly needed this bill still takes care of those people. what's going to happen is if until you get markets in health care, we're never going to have a system. if we ping-pong back and forth and this idea that you need to get rid of the filibuster in the

senate, the filibuster was designed to force compromise. and if you're going to change health care policies every time you change president, our country's going to collapse because we can't do that. so what we need is we need quality care with great safety nets, with real competition and real transparency so people can see price and quality. and where that happens today in the small number of places it happens, the costs are about 40% to 60% less, bertha -- dell kel i'm sorry. >> just to get to issues what we mean when we say costs are going up or we want costs of premiums to go down, we're talking really often about the amount of health care consumed has gone up or gone down or the ability to basically pay for less or more with a thin plate or heavier plan. so is there any way that this process leads us to more clarity on what it's going to mean for everyone out there?

>> well, i think it's really difficult. health care is about access, affordability and quality. and frankly you can have any plan that you talk about you're going to get two out of the three, it's very, very difficult if not impossible to get all three. i think we're seeing that in this debate. we're limiting access in order to make things more affordable in theory and hopefully have quality. that's an issue. and with due respect to the senator, the state of iowa is estimating -- the hospital association is estimating 250,000 iowans, most living in small towns, are going to lose access to health care. this is not about fraud or medicaid, this is about real people going to get hurt. and it's going to really impact small communities. and these are the people that voted for the trump administration. >> that's also the same people, the hospitals who don't want their prices known, don't want quality known, they don't want competition. they don't -- they want the status quo. so they'll say whatever they need to to not have transparency.

they're the biggest lobby in washington for the status quo of not having a price discovery mechanism. >> it's great to talk about competition, but you don't have competition in rural communities. you know that in oklahoma. certainly true in iowa, you're lucky if you have a hospital, lucky if you have a doctor. it's going to be extremely difficult without a functioning health care system for these small communities to survive. >> senator coburn, i was just going to ask you because it sounded to me like you said you don't want the senate to get rid of the filibuster. would that mean that neil gorsuch can't be confirmed to the supreme court? >> well, i'm not talking about the filibuster, this is relatively new on supreme court nominees. it wasn't until the '60s that even supreme court nominees came before the senate. and we used to have a 51 vote back in the '60s on supreme court nominees. so i'm not talking about the filibuster for nominees. i'm talking about the filibuster for moving bills through the senate. >> understood. going back to the debate that's playing out today then, you know, i guess the question becomes if this bill does pass

and, you know, you've said you think you would vote for it, that the president's really pushed everybody in that direction, what do you think the immediate impact then is going to be as it works its way now to the senate? >> well, i think you'll get something different out of the senate. and then you'll conference. that all has to happen before -- i think the drop dead date is april 28th. so, you know, time is the great compromiser when you have bills that have to pass by drop date. >> yes, senator -- >> i think what you'd do is get compromise. >> senator, let me interrupt and go to the intel committee chairman. >> -- to request that the fbi brief the full committee on information regarding the ongoing counterintelligence investigation that had been previously limited to mr. schiff and myself. so that was an agreement that we reached yesterday. secondly, the committee will ask director comey and admiral rogers to appear in closed session and postpone the previously scheduled march 28th

hearing in order to make time available for director comey and admiral rogers. the committee seeks additional information from monday's hearing that can only be addressed in closed session. thirdly, i know a lot of you are wondering about the documents that we're supposed to receive today. i will say that the nsa has kept us completely informed the entire time. they are fully cooperating. it is possible that we would receive documents today from the nsa as we've requested, original deadline was on march 15th. but i want to caution that i don't expect the entirety of everything that we need today. so i would hope that by early next week we'll have a better accounting of what the nsa is able to provide us. so i'm telling you that just so you know that you're not going to -- you know, you don't need to hang out down here because we're not going to have anymore information on those today. lastly and fourthly, yesterday

the council for paul manafort contacted the committee yesterday to offer the committee the opportunity to interview his client. we thank mr. manafort for volunteering and encourage others with knowledge of these issues to voluntarily interview with the committee. and so those are the four things i wanted to alert you of this morning. and so stay tuned for more. yes? >> congressman, does paul manafort's name appear in the new files that you have received? >> no. the documents that i viewed this week? no. >> are you recalling director comey because you think he was not forthcoming in his earlier testimony based on the new documents? >> it has nothing to do with the documents that i've seen. i will say that i think there are just questions that we have for director comey and admiral

rogers probably that they just couldn't answer in a public setting. but it's necessary to get both of them back down here before we can move onto other interviews. hold on. >> wait, i want to be clear on this. so you are recalling them not on the basis of the new documents? >> that is correct. not on the basis of the documents that i have seen and that i'm hoping to get today or over the weekend or first part of next week from nsa and other agencies. [ inaudible question ] we don't know that, but he voluntarily offered to come to the committee. we will work it out our lawyers, republicans and democrats will work with his lawyers to see what exactly he wants to do. if he wants to come out in public and have a public hearing, he's more welcome to do that. if he wants to do in a closed session that's fine with me. >> last night on sean hannity's show you said one reason why you briefed the president is because he'd been taking a lot of heat

in the news media. what did you mean by that? >> i'm stating the obvious. maybe you can follow me around and ask me more questions today. yes, sir? >> in documents you reviewed, how many names were unmasked? >> i don't know that yet, so i'm aware of just so i can be perfectly clear, so there was additional unmasking that was done in the documents that i read the other day. i don't know who asked for them to be unmasked. i just know that there are more. now, just so you know, i was aware of the unmasking before i read the documents. >> but schiff has suggested it might just be one or that the unmasking might have been done for appropriate reasons. >> everybody's -- look, i think i'm the only one that's seen the documents as far as i know. and i can tell you that we have -- i knew about the unmasking before i read the documents. i'll leave it at that.

[ inaudible question ] i did. yes. >> chairman, as far as the sources, was it whistleblower in the nsa? >> as you know, and i've said this several times, we don't talk about sources at this committee. we want more people to come forward. the good thing is that we have continued to have people come forward voluntarily to this committee. and we want to continue that. and i will tell you that will not happen if we tell you who our sources are and people come to the committee. >> but i mean like just as far as the situation in terms of a whistleblower, or is it someone who wants to be hidden -- >> i'm not going to get into that. we want people to come forward. and we will protect the identity of those people at all cost. >> are you going to brief us -- >> i'm sorry. >> are you going to brief adam shift schiff on what you've seen? >> yeah, i was hoping to get the

documents today, doesn't sound like we'll get a full accounting of those but hopefully they come in today -- >> the ones from the letter? >> the ones from the letter mr. schiff and i sent due on march 15th? [ inaudible question ] >> we won't -- the letter should cover -- we should get the letter should encompass everything i've seen. >> was president trump surveilled directly? and do you believe what you have uncovered is validation of the tweets he released a couple weeks ago? >> no, i've been very clear there was no -- as a matter of fact i've been clear on this for many, many weeks now. there was no wiretapping of trump tower. that didn't happen. yes. >> was he surveilled? was he indirectly surveilled? >> members of congress have suggested on the record that your wednesday press conference might have been orchestrated by the white house. can you say categorically you can deny? >> yes, i can. it was exactly as i told you. were you here on wednesday? >> i was. >> okay. so i came out here and i told

you all i was going to the white house. i had talked to the white house, my staff had talked to the white house earlier that day to request a meeting with the president. and i had not talked to the president before that. yes. >> can you verify trump or his associates were monitored or just mentioned? >> we won't know that until we actually receive all of the documentation. it's hard to know where the information came from until you get the reports and have time to go through them and see all the sourcing of the documents. i'm not going to speculate until we get them all. it was dozens of reports. >> since this does not -- the information you saw does not involve russia, are you going to start a separate investigation? are you going to break this away from the russia investigation? >> i don't know about that yet. i mean, it's all in the scope of what we're looking at in terms of unmasking of names, leaks. it's all in that same body. if we have to section it off and

look at it a different way, we will. but we haven't gotten to that point. yes, sir. >> are there legitimate reasons for intelligence agencies to unmask the names of trump transition officials? for example incidental collection could refer to chatter between fisa targets, presumably windows intelligence agencies want to know if it was being discussed, are there legit 3459 reasons to unmask some of these names? are you suggesting illegitimate -- >> so there are reasons to unmask names, i can tell you without question at least some of what i seen. i don't know what that reason would be. maybe someone has a good reason for it, but not from what i've been able to read. couple more questions i know are going to have votes on. >> was it baffling that you did not brief him. >> yeah. >> also said it's baffling you could not rule out that the white house was your source behind the documents.

can you categorically say -- >> so you've asked this question many, many times and i will continue to say the same thing. you can ask me every single name that exists on the planet. and i'm still not going to tell you who our sources are. >> is there recent suspicion that perhaps there was reverse surveillance going on in terms of looking to -- >> all right. that is devin nunes chairman of the house intelligence committee postponing the march 28th meeting where we were expecting to hear from james clapper and john brennan asking the fbi to brief the full committee, asking comey and rogers to come in for a closed session, answer some questions perhaps they couldn't in the open session. but most importantly saying that paul manafort, former campaign manager for the president, has volunteered through his attorney to testify in front of the committee. we don't know if that would be public or closed, but that's going to be news. we turn back to our guest tom coburn and tom vilsack. gentlemen, thanks for your patience here. i don't want to belabor this

particular news point, but some had argued, senator, that the comey hearing had emboldened some lawmakers to oppose the president on health care where they might not have otherwise. do you believe that? >> no. and i don't think anybody with common sense believes that. you have an investigation, but you don't have much fact. and you all actually this is very important newsworthy stuff, but it's probably been overemphasized in the news, let it come to its conclusion, let the facts be out there and then let's find out. but, you know, it certainly isn't as important as the amount of time it takes on the news every day. >> governor, how much of it -- they call it a gray cloud for a reason. how important is it? >> well, i think it goes to the essence of our democracy whether or not there was an effort to try to persuade american voters that was funded or directed by russian influences. i think it's an incredibly important thing. frankly, i think it's probably the house is going to have to make a decision about whether or

not this committee is the committee to do this given the nature of comments recently or whether there needs to be a select committee. i think americans deserve to know if the 2016 election was in some sense hijacked by the russians. >> and i'm going to guess as we say good-bye you gentlemen might not agree on whether or not congress has credibility on this issue, senator? >> oh, i think they can. i don't think you need a select committee. i think the chairman made a mistake not talking to his vice chairman before he went to the white house, just as courtesy. but again, the president said the election was not influenced. president obama said they had no evidence of that. so, you know, let it come to its natural conclusion. everybody's innocent until they're proven guilty. and quite frankly doesn't seem to be much to this story. but it's a great tactic, political tactic, to keep us

from talking about the real issues in front of america. >> governor, senator, appreciate your guidance on health care, on nunes and a lot more today. we'll see you next time. >> all right, take care. >> thanks so much. dow hasn't moved a whether or not he will lot, guys. still up 41 points. >> drifted up a couple. >> as we watch keystone and await some of this movement in the house. we'll take a break and talk more about it after a short break. ( ♪ ) i moved upstate because i was interested in building a career. i came to ibm to manage global clients and big data. but i found so much more. ( ♪ ) it's really a melting pot of activities and people. (applause, cheering) new york state is filled with bright minds like victoria's. to find the companies and talent of tomorrow, search for our page, jobsinnewyorkstate on linkedin.

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stock strategist sam stoval may be a long term bull, but he still sees a rocky road ahead in the near-term. find out why and why he's worried at cnbc.tradingnation.com. more "squawk on the street" coming up.

minimum movement in the markets over the past hour or so as we await some procedural votes in the house regarding health care.

guys, ten-year around 2.41 all morning long. >> no real reaction to that durable goods number by the bond market. >> which was pretty good. >> it was pretty good. so some of the hard data may be starting to follow that survey, david. >> here's the president. >> okay, i'm sure -- pete is a fantastic guy, done a great job, but i'll call him today. thank you all very much. appreciate it. thank you. [ overlapping speakers ] >> we'll have to see. see what happens. >> did you rush it? >> we'll see what happens. no. >> okay, this tape i'm told is going to rerack. we're going to get a listen at some other material in a moment. but that is the president flanked by gary cohn, rick

perry, wilbur ross, jared kushner in there. eamon javers, apparently he was just asked whether or not the speaker should remain speaker if the health care bill fails. he says yes. >> yeah, exactly, carl. it's amazing that we're at that point where the president's facing that question today. but here's the transcript from the pool reporters who were in the room with the president just a few moments ago. they asked him what will you do if health care fails and he said we'll see what happens. they sdasked him did you rush this, he said no. and as you point out he was asked should paul ryan stay as speaker if it fails and the president saying, yes, he should stay on as speaker. so clearly this white house bracing for a failure today even though they said yesterday they thought the vote count was coming their way over time. we also saw today, carl, mike pence, the vice president, has canceled a planned weekend trip to arkansas and to memphis. the pool reporters were at the joint base andrews getting ready for that trip when suddenly got word that trip was canceled.

a lot of moving parts here in the trump administration today. we're gearing up for the vote later on today this afternoon in the house of representatives. >> eamon javers, thank you, appreciate it. let's bring in bob hormatz just to talk about, bob, thanks for being here, what all this means, this suspenseful vote on health care and all this controversy about whether in fact it should have been the first legislative priority. what do you think it might mean for the overall economic agenda of the trump white house? >> well, i think it certainly slowed it down a lot. the president went with health care. there are a lot of technical reasons why he had to do that first. in addition of course he made it a very big priority in his campaign to change, get rid of, change -- >> bob, let me take you back to the president. >> transcanada will finally be allowed to complete this long overdue project with efficiency and with speed. we're working out the final details as we speak.

it's going to be an incredible pipeline. greatest technology known to man. or woman. and frankly we're very proud it. russ gerling, president of trans-canada, is right behind me and i'm going to have to say a few words. i know you have been waiting for a long, long time and i hope you don't pay your consultants anything because they don't have anything to do with it. in fact, you ought to ask for your money because they didn't do a damn thing except give it a no vote, right? it's a great day for american jobs and a historic moment for north america and energy independence. this announcement is part of a new year of american energy policy that will lower costs for american families and very significantly, reduce our dependence on foreign oil and create thousands of jobs right here in america. and i also would like to add, i think it's a lot safer to have

pipelines than to use other forms of transportation for your product. when completed, the keystone xl pipeline will span 900 miles, wow, and have the capacity to deliver more than 800,000 barrels of oil per day to the gulf coast refineries. that's some big pipeline. the fact is that this $8 billion investment in american energy was delayed for so long, it demonstrates how our government has too often failed its citizens and companies over the past long period of time. today we begin to make things right and to do things right. today we take one more step in putting the jobs, wages, and economic security of american citizens first. put america first. as the keystone xl pipeline now moves forward, this is just the first of many energy and infrastructure projects that my administration will approve, and

we've already approved a couple of other big ones, very, very big ones, which we'll be announcing soon, in order to help put americans back to work, grow our economy, and rebuild our nation. and with that, i'd like to invite russ to say a few words. russ is a very highly respected man in the energy world. he's president of trans-canada. and i know you're going to do a fantastic job, russ, and get it up and hire plenty of american people. thank you. >> thank you, mr. president, and this is a very, very important day for us, for our company. so, on behalf of thousands of people that have worked very hard to get here, as you pointed out, a very long time to get here, but we're very relieved and very much just want to get to work. some of those folks i have with me today. i have the building trades, shawn garby, and some of our construction contractors, quanta, our pipe suppliers from wells fund. there's thousands of people that

are just ready and itching to get to work. we've got a lot of work to do in the field, but as you pointed out, this is the safest, the most reliable way to move our products to market. we're going to use the best technology, and it will create thousands of jobs, and important tax revenues in local communities. that's something often overlooked in projects like this is local communities benefit greatly from these projects. it gives them tax revenues with which they can invest in schools, hospitals, roads, teachers, nurses, all of those things build the fabric of communities and make the places better for those folks who live there. so, again, thank you very much for this opportunity, and we're not going to let you down, sir. >> thank you, russ. and i know the voters appreciate this. some of them expressed it very, very strongly. the workers definitely appreciate it. the building trades' heads didn't, but now maybe they're going to start to. where are my building trades? i think they're going to start to, because other people were not going to be signing this

bill. that i can tell you. and if it ever did get done, it would be years, but i don't think it would have ever gotten done. so, we've put a lot of people to work, a lot of great workers to work, and they did appreciate it, and they appreciated it, russ, very much at the polls, as you probably noticed. and so, we're very happy about it. so, the bottom line, keystone finished. they're going to start construction when? >> we've got some work to do and nebraska permits to get. >> nebraska. i'll call nebraska. you know why, nebraska's a great governor. they have a great governor. >> we've been working there for some time, and i do believe we'll get through that process, but obviously have to engage with local land owners throughout the communities. so, we'll be reaching out to those over the coming months to get the other necessary permits that we need, and then we look forward to starting construction. >> okay. i'm sure nebraska will be good. a fantastic governor who's done a great job. i'll call him today. thank you all very much. appreciate it. thank you. >> what will you do if the

health care bill fails? mr. president, what will you do if the health care bill fails? >> thank you! thank you. >> we'll have to see. >> all right, so, that's going to take us to the piece of the tape that we were watching a few moments ago. that was russ girling of transcanada, 23-year veteran of that company, ceo since 2010. eamon javers, a lot of emphasis on keystone today. does that signal any emphasis or lack of emphasis on health care as we await these votes? >> reporter: well, i do think this white house views this very much as a big win for them. they view it as a campaign promise that they've checked off the list, also something that's important for the economy. and yeah, i do think there is a sense here in this white house that there are some folks who are ready to move on from health care, including possibly the president himself. sean spicer, the white house press secretary, about an hour ago retweeted a cnbc.com article about the treasury secretary. spicer saying, "treasury secretary mnuchin says we'll try to get comprehensive tax reform done by congress' august recess. so, on a day when they're

pushing health care legislation up on capitol hill, the press secretary is tweeting about tax reform. the press secretary a good navy man, maybe has his eyes looking over the horizon here and trying to focus on what comes next. so, you do get the sense of between keystone and tax reform, this white house does want to talk about other subjects today other than the health care vote later this afternoon. >> that said, eamon, if i may, there were a couple of tweets that might be significant. the president earlier calling out perhaps the freedom party, by saying, you know, if you don't pass this, it leaves funding for planned parenthood in place, perhaps trying to apply some pressure that their constituents can refer to if they flip from a no to a yes. and just now, the president saying "thank you, more conservative groups are endorsing the ahca" with #passthebill. >> reporter: right. and you can imagine the frustration at the white house when conservatives and republicans up on capitol hill have been voting to repeal obamacare for years.

this white house feels that they've given them the opportunity to go ahead and do that in a real way. as spicer said, with a live ball this time, without president obama standing there in the white house ready to veto anything they send over. this time, it really counts, they're saying, and they're frustrated that the conservatives are not going to take that opportunity. we'll see what the vote count is today. usually, you know, a white house can get five or six congressmen to flip. they just have enormous amount of pressure that they can put on these congressmen on various issues and a lot of goodies that they can dole out, including things like rides on air force one and all kinds of things. in this case, though, the trenches are dug pretty deep going into this vote this afternoon, so we'll see whether the white house can get what it wants on that vote. but when you see the keystone event today, when you see the press secretary tweeting about tax reform, you do get the sense that they're ready to move on here at this white house. >> eamon, thank you. let's bring in john kilduff now, capital's founding partner. john, to react to keystone.

by the way, the significance of this potential hurdle in nebraska right now. you know, how much of a road block might that be? >> it won't be one. it's really administrative. look, if they can get the dakota access pipeline done and the sensitive lands and interests there, you can be assured that the nebraska flight plan will take off. >> so, if that happens, then we should expect oil's going to start flowing from this. but the point made earlier is how much is going to flow from the canadian oil sands now that the permian's become so hot? >> well, it's going to be a lot. it's 800,000 barrels, as a matter of fact. and that's what's made this a contentious question and difficult one, because it's a meaningful amount of oil. whether you think about it being a little dirtier than normal is one thing, but it's a difference-maker. and a lot of this oil, though, will be heading overseas, because the gulf coast, as you just indicated, is already swamped with oil from u.s. producers, and even overseas,

key suppliers like saudi arabia who want this market. so, the battleground is going to be in asia for these barrels, where a lot of this is going to be heading. so, if this oil is going to come across the u.s., but it's not going to stay here. >> it sounds like it's going to accelerate or feed the ongoing narrative, john, of the united states being the biggest new marginal producer, right? >> no doubt. this puts an exclamation mark, if you ask me, on the trump administration's forward-leaning stance on encouraging more and more exploration and production, more pipelines, more drilling, and also encouraging more exports. we've already had days recently where we've exported over a million barrels. we've fallen back in the past couple of weeks, but i would look for that number to ramp up and see these companies really take it to opec and other non-opec producers. >> quickly, john what about the oil price? it's hanging in there today. >> it is hanging in there. there was downward pressure initially from this announcement

and i think you could see back pressure on the curve when we can figure out when the pipeline will go into operation. but we're dealing with still more and more oil, and i would look for prices to i think break down at the end of the day. and i still see us heading down to $42 a barrel. >> all right, from just under $48 where we sit this morning. john, thank you. john kilduff. >> what a morning. if you're just joining us, welcome to "squawk alley." jon fortt's here with us along with kelly evans on this friday morning at post 9. dow is slowly adding to its gains, up 58 points right now. as you might know, the house delaying that key vote to repeal and replace obamacare until later today, debating the issue on the floor at this hour. of course, we're watching lawmakers as we keep a camera shot on the house floor. we're going to be talking about that. we've got keystone going on. the president, of course, delivering his own ultimatum. the cover of the "new york post," guys, is "my way or the highway," as he announces -- >> couldn't resist using that. >> as he announces that to house leadership.