done, under hhs, you recommend or the hhs recommends that for software development that they should you have an independent verification validation program, but it wasn't used in this case. can you share with us the time that's gone why we didn't use iv & v on something as crucial as this. >> i don't think that's accurate. at every point along the way, there is independent testing. >> independent. >> yes. >> you recommend independent testing and validation, not someone within your staff. >> pardon me. there is a level of company self-attested testing. there is a level of cns testing and then there is an independent test on each piece of the contracting. an independent not -- >> what she's done independently. >> gentleman's time -- >> it needs to be done independently. >> has expired. >> no, it isn't cms. i will get you the information. one of the three levels of testing is independent for every piece of this contracting, yes.

>> mrs. caster. >> good morning. when open enrollment began a few weeks ago, the people back home in florida helping hair neighbors sort through the new options for coverage, the navigators were taken aback by how grateful people are to have new pathways to the doctor's office and the care they need. affordable options. the -- they're no longer being discriminated against because they had cancer and diabetes or asthma. and they're very grateful. they said to me directly, it's like they found water in the desert. right now, surprisingly, they said it's taking time because people want to sort through all of these options. before they finally sign up at the end of the 26-week enrollment period. so we must fix the marketplace. we must to meet their

expectations and we have very high expectations for you and for the administration. but the i think it's important to point out the affordable care act is more than just a website. it, despite all the obstruction by republicans in my home state of florida, nationally, even going so far as to shut down the government, millions of americans are already benefiting. and there are benefits that are not tied to healthcare.gov. so madame secretary, let's clarify what's working. is it correct to say that many of the improvements to employer coverage and medicare where the vast majority of americans receive coverage are not dependent on healthcare.gov? >> that's correct. >> and so the delays and problems with healthcare.gov do not affect the millions of individuals thanks to the aca who the no longer have to worry about lifetime monetary caps on their coverage that previously sent them to bankruptcy. >> that's absolutely true. the quote that the president was

quoted recently saying if you have health care, you can -- you don't have to sign up for the new marketplace was referring to the large portion, the 95% of insured americans whose plans are solid stay in place and move forward. >> i understand the frustration with the website. what i don't understand is why people are not similarly outraged by the lack of medicaid coverage in many states. do you find that hypocritical? >> well, i think it's very troubling that millions of low income working americans will still have no affordable option if states don't take advantage of the expansion program, leaving states bearing the cost of uncompensated care, families bearing the cost of parents who can't take care of their kids, workers not able to go to work and people still accessing care through emergency room doors, the most expensive least effective kind of care they could get. >> mr. gardener.

>> thank you, mr. chairman. thank you secretary sa beious for being here. here's my letter. this is the letter that my family got canceling our insurance. we chose toe have our own private policy back in colorado so we could be in the same boat as every one of my constituents. yet, my insurance policy has been canceled. the white house website says if you like your health plan, you can keep it. dy hear it wrong. >> again, sir, i don't know how long you've had your policy. >> why aren't you losing your health insurance? >> because i'm part of the federal employees. >> why aren't you in the exchange? you're in charge of this law. why aren't you in the exchange? >> because i'm part of the federal employee health plan. >> why won't you go into the exchange? you're literally in charge of this law. should you be any different than all the other americans how the out there losing health insurance today? >> i'm part of the 95% with affordable available health coverage as are most of your colleagues in this room.

>> most americans it isn't available to them. >> i am not eligible for the exchange because i have coverage. >> you can decide to drop your coverage of your employer. you have the choice to decide not to the choose. >> that is not true, sir. >> i chose not to go. >> members of congress are now part of the exchange, thanks to an aext added by congress. i'm not eligible. if i have the affordable coverage in my workplace, i'm not eligible to go into the marketplace. >> with all due respect, madame secretary, i would encourage you to be just like the american people and enter the exchange and agree 0 find a way. >> it's illegal. >> i would like to show you an advertisement going on in colorado right now. this is an advertisement that a board member of the colorado exchange has put forward. do you agree with that kind of advertising for obama care? >> i can't see it. >> it's a college student doing a keg stand. >> if the colorado exchange did that, they are a --

>> do you approve of this kind of advertising >> i don't see it. i don't know what it is. and i did not approve it. this is a state-based marketplace. >> that's a pretty big picture of a keg. you can't see it. >> do i approve of it? i've never seen it. >> you have the opportunity to opt out by the way. >> i'm not eligible. >> i would like to submit a waiver for my district. >> gentleman's time has expired. >> does your policy cover -- never mind. >> plaintiff mathison. >> thank you, mr. chairman. and madame secretary, thanks for your time. i just want to ask on the issue of the fixes to healthcare.gov, we've had a lot of conversation about that today. and we've talked about confidence levels for being ready by a certain time. i think one question a lot of us have is, can you define what the magnitude of the problem is? is there a scale or metric by

which we can understand how bad this is today and how we're going to get to where we go to have it fixeded? >> again, sir, i've been informed that the problems are in and the reports i've seen are really in two areas. they are in the performance area which is speed and reliability. it's too slow. it doesn't have reliable transfers and in functionality. there are parts of the system that don't make accurate transfers. so we have done an extensive assessment. they are prioritized as i indicated earlier. one of the priorities is the enrollment features which pass individual information to the companies where they want to enroll. that is not reliable at this point. companies are not getting accurate data. so it's an example of the kind of thing we know we need to iffism. >> is there a way -- have you set up metrics to figure out if we're making progress in terms of fixing those issues with speed and performance and

functionality? >> again, with the team and jeff zients at the head of it reporting to marilyn, there are definitely a comprehensive set of issues going forward that will be measured and accelerated. >> do you have target diets along the way if you want to neat the november 30th time? do you have you target or metrics along the way to make sure you're on that path? >> my understanding is yes, there are sort of groups of targets that fixes, as you know, can be loaded together. it isn't one at a time. they don't take days but they're trying to determine with a specific path that's one of the charges that qssi has. really looking at the umbrella of what needs to be fixed, prioritizing them, figuring out what destabilizes if something else is fixed. how they can be grouped together and that report will be in later

next week. >> gentleman's time has expired. mr. pompeo. >> i'd like to talk about kansas a little bit today. much like with some of my colleagues made references to the wizard of oz. i don't think anybody from kansas should be able to do those al goers. those folks worked hard to go down that yellow brick road. at the end of the day and pulled back the curtain they found out there was nothing that they didn't will are have. i think people are finding it's not exactly what they're going to have worked so hard to find their way too, as well. there's this commitment that said if you like your plan you can keep it. i have a letter from a mr. brito in kansas. py saw him the other night in benton. he got the following letter that says because your current does have offer the benefits specified you will be discontinued. then it says good news and then there's a group of folks, pizza hut you from the kansas

franchisees founded there. lots of those folks have now taken employees families working there and they've gone from having full-time jobs to part time jobs. they aren't able to keep the health plan they had either and the one they wanted. what do you tell -- yfr were the plans these folks had good enough when you were in the insurance commissioner kansas and when you were kansas's governor but those plans today aren't good enough for those hard-working kansas families. >> sir, i would tell you in the roles i had the honor of serving of in kansas, i worked every day to try and eliminate some of the discriminatory features of the insurance industry that finally with the affordable care act are gone. my successor an elected insurance republican commissioner sandy prayinger and i worked on a series of plans tops extend conch. i did work on these issues. we were not able to necessarily get them passed an. >> to use your words, i think

you said these were lousy plans. miss tavenner said not true insurance. do you think the plans you offered when you were commissioner were not true insurance. >> the insurance commissioner in kansas and virtually every place in the country does not have the regulatory authority over the plans. >> were they true insurance plans. >> a lot of them are not, no. >> i yield back. >> gentleman from vermont, mr. welch. >> thank you. i'm going to try to summarize quickly what i've been hearing. the website must be fixed. you're going to fix it. number two, i'm hearing a tone change. we've had a real battle will health care. we had a battle in this congress. it was passed. the president signed it. the supreme court affirmed it. a brutal battle. there was an election where the american people affirmed it. then the las gasp effort was the shutdown in the threat of debt default. what i'm hearing today is there are problems and people want to fix them because all of us

represent people who are going to win or lose depending how effectively this is rolled out. third, there's significant question about existing insurance policy what the president said and so on. let's acknowledge something. a lot of insurance companies were ripping off innocent american people by promising them insurance until they got sick. then it got canceled because they quote had a pre-existing condition that wasn't disclosed. that's got to end. the challenge for us going forward is to make health care affordable. so madame secretary, my question is, is there any indication that there's been a slowing of premium increases as a result of the affordable care acting? because unless we can keep those premium increases down, they can't rise faster than rate of inflation wages and profits, all of us are going to lose. >> id say the trends in the private market over the last three and a half years are that

cost increases have slowed down. our are rising at a lower rate than the decades before. in this individual market, the old individual market, the typical increase was 16% year in and year out rate increase and often that came with additional medical underwriting. so it gives you a sense of how the costs were. we note that medicare costs are down. we know that medicaid costs actually had a decreased per capita last year, not an increased per capita and underlying health care costs are down. these rates in the new marketplace have come in about 16% lower on average than was projected. not by us, but by the congressional budget office and we know that in many of these markets they're much more competitive. i believe in market competitiveness. that actually drives down rates. the states where the most companies are participating have the lowest rates. and new companies have come in

significantly below the old monopoli companies that often dominated this individual marketplace. so we're on a pathway. are we there? no, but you're right. affordable coverage for everybody is the goal. >> i yield back. thank you. >> madame secretary, i'm trying to make sure you're out of here by 12:30 before we start the second round of questions. plaintiff kissinger. >> that was a joke, right? >> i see the sheer panic. madame secretary, thank you for being here. you stated earlier to mr. harper that you give the president regular updates on the marketplace. the president stated he knew nothing about the status and functionality of the marketplace. how often and what were the subjects of those updates? >> well, i think there were a series of regular meetings with the president, with some of our federal partners, with offices of the white house from the omb to others on a monthly basis

giving reports on policy and where we were going. none of those i would say involve detailed operational discussions. that wasn't level. it was, are we coming together? do we have companies? do we have plans. >> i understand that. obviously, when it comes to the president of the united states, a certain level of details you have to see a 20,000 foot overview. in terms of the actual functionality whether it's the website or marketplace, he was legitimately caught off guard in. >> i assured him and that we were ready to go. everyone knew with a big plan that there were likely to be some problems. no one anticipate this had level of problems. >> and just a second quick question. where is hhs getting the money to pay for fixes? is it coming from other hhs accounts? have you used your transport authority to move money from non-aca programs to pay for the cost of implementing the president's health care program? and if so, from which programs

have you drawn money to help with the fix? that's not aca relateded. >> as you know, it's been two years since we've had a budget at hhs. we also have not had at the president's requested implementation budget authorized by the congress each of those years, we have used not only resources internally but i do have legal transfer authority that i've used, and a nonrecurring expense fund. we will get you all the details of that. >> so the answer is yes, there is some non-aca money being transferred and used? >> there is money specifically designed for either outreach and education so the health centers have hired education outreach people as part of their outreach for health personnel. i would say it's definitely related cause to get expanded health care pa thank you. >> mr. sarbanes. >> thank you, mr. chairman.

thank you, madame secretary for being here. my understanding is that a lot of the companies insurers that have been offering plans in the individual market, the ones sending out these notices, are actually repositioning themselves in the health insurance exchange to offer alternative plans. is that. >> that's true. >> correct? and in addition to those insurers who have been in the individual market, you now have a lot of other companies and insurers providing plans in health insurance market? >> that is true. >> so the way i look at this i went to buy oriole tickets and i got up to the ticket window and they closed the window. but i didn't have to go home because they opened another window a pugh feet away. so essentially what's happening is people are coming up on the renewal period and getting up to the window of the individual

market and being told that window is closed but if you go right down the line here, there's another window that's open. and by the way, when you get there, you'll get better he coverage, potentially at reduced premiums and if you go down to window three, there's some subsidies that may also be available to you. so this notion that people are being turned away from an affordable product that provides good quality care is preprosperous. in fact, they're being steered to a place where they can get good quality coverage in many instances much better than the coverage that they had before, at an affordable rate that is supported by the subsidies that can be available to many, many people. this is what's so promising about the affordable care act. and so i think it's important for people to understand that that window is not being shut. they're just being steered

someplace elsewhere they can get a good opportunity. >> and i think the first option for those companies is to say we'd like to keep you here and here are the plans we're offering, but to be fair, customers will now have an opportunity to look across a landscape which they couldn't before. they will have entry into those other windows which.of them didn't have before with a pre-existing condition and as you say, about 50% of this market lk have financial help in purchasing health insurance which none of them had before. >> mr. griffith. >> thank you, mr. chairman. early in your testimony here today, you said a couple times plans we enjoy but then as you noticed with mr. gardener's eloquent testimony that we're not going to be in the same plan that you're in after january 1. i was one of those who thought it was a good idea as a part of a proposal that was floating around the halls here in congress that the president and the cabinet secretaries ought to also be in the marketplace and not have a special federal plan

that you will have after january 1 but that we will not. the president while that was being discussed issued a vote toe threat. did you discuss the threat with the preds before he made it and have you discussed it with him since then? >> no, sir. >> and then i would have to ask you relating back to the contractors involved in this, cgi told us that the spanish website was ready 0 go. that they thought everything was ready just as they did with the regular site. obviously that didn't prove out. but they were told not to implement it. likewise the shop and browse seconds was ready to go. do you think that they were misleading this committee when they made those comments? >> i think what they believed is that that product independent of the entire operational site was ready and tested. what a determination was made, i was involved with the spanish website and the medicaid transfers to say let's minimize the risk for the whole site. let's load these later. >> that raises the next question

up. because one of the other contractors, qssi i believe it was, indicated to us that part of the problem was was that once you took away the ability 0 browse, everybody had to go through the business of setting up an account and you stopped one of the -- qmms stopped one of the browsing options, as well and that that actually contributed to the log jam and contributed to the problems. so isn't it -- is he correct on that that not allowing people to look without having to sign up, wouldn't that have made it easier for the american people. >> in hindsight, i think that probably would have been advantageous. the reason the decision was made going forward was to minimize risk. that didn't work so well but adding additional features that didn't involve people actually wanting to get to the what they would independently pay and what they would qualify for and what the plans were seemed to be things that could be added down the road. it was wrong. >> gentleman's time has expired.

mr. bill rackes. >> madame secretary, over the weekend "the new york times" wrote the following project managers at the department of health and human services assured the white house that any remaining problems could be worked out once the website went live. where other senior officials predict serious trouble and advised delaying the roll out. can you confirm if this is true. did any senior official predict serious problems and did any advise delaying the roll out of the exchanges or parts of the exchanges on october 1st? >> i can tell you that no senior official reporting to see ever advised me we should delay. you heard from the contractors on the 24th that none of them advised a delay. we have testing that did not advise a delay. not to my knowledge. >> there were serious problems? >> they indicated to me we would always have risk because the

system is brand new and no one has operated a system like this before to any degree. so we always through knew there there would be the possibility that thing would go wrong. no one indicated this could possibly go this wrong. >> name some of the officials that gave you the advice that there were certificates problems. >> again, we had a series of meetings with teams from cms. i was always advised that there is always a rick with a new product and a new site. but never suggested that we delay the launch of october 1st, nor did our contracting partners ever suggest that to us. >> thank you, madame secretary. thank you, mr. chairman. i yield backing >> mr. johnson. >> madame secretary, thank you for being here with us today. cms was the integrator of the website leading up to the october 1st roll out, correct? >> that's correct. >> you've testified you've now hired an outside company.

who is that company. >> qssi who built the hub, yes, sir. >> this is the same company that told our committee last week they were not only the develop he ever of the hub and the pipeline but also an independent tester of the system. >> yeah. >> you've acknowledged in your testimony today that ip accurate testing played a significant role in this failed launch. aren't you concerned that qssi has lost its ability to be an objective independent arbitrator in addressing the problems that plague the system now? bass they're part of the tester, part of the developer, part of the problem? >> no, i haven't lost my confidence in them. i think the testing that they did is validating the pieces of the equipment what we've said since the launch is that we did not do adequate end to end testing. that was not the qssi responsibility. >> in this new role as integrator, are you going to be paying qss i more than they were to be paid under their original contract i would expect they're going to get paid more, right.

>> that discussion is underway in terms of what the outlines are, yes, sir. >> hard-working american taxpayers have already paid for this implementation once. do you think it's fair to ask taxpayers to pay more so that qssi can now attempt to do something that administrator tavenner and her cms team were unable to do right the first time? >> i think the american taxpayers expect us to get the site up and running. >> i'm certain they did. they expected it the first time. >> i understand. so did i. we have not expended the funds that have been encumbered for the contracts. and we will monitor every dime we spend from here on in and reaudit things that are going forward. >> with that, mr. chairman, i yield back. >> yielding back. mr. long. >> thank you, mr. chairman. thank you, secretary for being here today and giving your testimony. earlier today, you said that i'm

responsible for the implementation of the affordable care act. i've heard you referred to and maybe yourself as the point person for the roll outout, the architect of implementing the affordable care act. you are kind of the president's point person for this roll out? >> yes, sir. >> i earlier, you were asked, and there's a lot of things striking about the roll out of this and about the affordable care act all together, but the thing that's most striking to me is when we have the point person for the rollout here, and you're not going into the exchange, now i've heard you say that and you got some advice from the folks behind you. but i'm asking you today, can you tell the american public if your advisors behind you if they happen to have given you wrong information, if it is possible for you to go into the exchange like all these millions of americans that are going to go into the exchanges, will you commit to forego your government

insurance plan you're on now and join us in the pool? come on in. the water's fine. all the congress men, all staff have to go into the exchanges. we have to go into the dc exchanges. i tried to get on the website. i was successful during the hearing earlier and i got to the dc exchange where i have to buy from. i got partway through and when i got to the point to enter my social security number, i could not bring myself to do that from what i've heard from folks about the security. will you tell, if your advisors are wrong and it is possible for you, i'm not saying it is, if it's possible for you to forego your government program you have now, will you tell the american public that yes, i will go into the exchanges next year like everyone else. >> sir, the way the law is written. >> it's a yes or no. let's say you're wrong on that. yes or no. >> i don't want to give misinformation to the american public who may be. >> you what. >> i don't want to give misinformation. >> go home and research it. if you're wrong. >> if you have affordable. >> will you go into the

exchanges, if you can, will you? >> that's a yes or no. if you can, will you. >> i will take a look at it. i don't have any da. >> that's not a yes or no. >> gentleman's time has expired. >> you're the architect tech of the program and you won't go into it. >> i did not say that sir. >> if it's legal, will you go in. >> affordable coverage. >> come on in, the water's fine. >> gentleman's time has expired. >> i have a unanimous consent request. i'd like -- madame secretary. >> doesn't do this to me. >> i'd like you to answer for the record if you were able to do what the gentleman just suggested or follow the recommendation of cory gardener, our colleague from colorado and went into the bought to bite individual policy, would you be able to find one that would protect you from cheap shots or do you think had i it has to be mandated for coverage? i leave it the record open for your response.

>> we'll wait for that response to come back. >> gladly join the exchange if i didn't have affordable coverage in my workplace. i would gladly join it. the d.c. market is an independent state-based market even though d.c. is not a state. we do not run the d.c. market in the federal marketplace. >> gentle lady from north carolina, miss elmers. >> i have a couple of requests. thank you for being with us today, madame secretary. idaho like to go to the issue raised by my colleagues on the left here where accurate information. number one, i've heard the issue of medicare part d brought up many, many times although my colleagues although, now they're extolling the issues of medicare part d. is part d a mandate or is it voluntary? >> it is voluntary. >> it is a voluntary program. >> yes. >> that's the first piece of accurate information i would like to get.

we're asking or we're actually forcing millions of americans to go to find a health care premium in some way whether it's to go to the exchange or whether they are to be insured. many of my constituents are being -- are reaching out to me those with individual policies and they are saying to me that my rates are going up 400%. my rates are going up 127%. these are my constituents. now, you know, we're talking about open enrollment, but it's forcing the issue -- is it not? that if an american does not have health care coverage, they are essentially break the law. is that not correct? >> if someone can afford coverage and has that option and chooses mot to buy coverage, they will pay a fee on their -- >> and that is a law, so therefore they are breaking the law. you also brought up the issue when you were in kansas that you

fought against discriminatory issues. now, you know, as far as the essential het benefits, correct me if i'm wrong, do men not have to buy maternity coverage? >> policies will cover maternity coverage for the young and healthy. >> including men. >> 130-year-olds will have a choice also of a cat tas frof otrophic plan which has no maternity coverage scenario. >> but the men are required to purchase maternity. >> an insurance policy has a series of benefits whether you use them or not. one of the benefits will be maternity coverage, mental health coverage, domestic violence. >> forcing them to buy things they will never need? thank you, madame chairman. >> the individual id policies cover families. men often do need maternity coverage for their spouses and for their families, yes. >> single male aged 32 does not need maternity coverage to the best of your knowledge.

>> he may not need hospital coverage. >> has a man ever delivered a baby. >> gentle lady's time has expired. >> gentle lady cath mcmorris rogers. >> madame secretary, although we were told repeatedly that if you liked your health insurance plan you'd be able to keep it, we're now being told by the government that they have determined many existing plans to be lousy sub par. in reality, this law is becoming quickly less about helping americans purchase affordable coverage and more about compelling millions of americans into a struggling medicaid program. in my home state of washington, 90% of enrollees will be in medicaid. 16,000 of them coming into a program that they were already eligible for. colorado 89%, kentucky two-thirds, maryland 97%. these are states already

struggling with their budgets wondering how they're going to cover medicaid which is as we all know for the most vulnerable populations. so isn't it true that in states like washington, they're going to have new unexpected costs associated with a dramatic influx into medicaid? >> well, congress woman, the medicaid expansion provision under the affordable care act is -- are states going to face new costs? >> federal government pays 100% of the newly insured for the first three years and gradually reduces. >> these are people already eligible. 2003 know two out of three doctors don't accept new medicaid patients. we know that current provider rates will drop at the end of 2014. so isn't it true that existing medicaid enrollees are going to further compete for scarce resources in these states? >> if the citizens of washington hog are signing up were eligible

for medicaid, they certainly will be entitled to enroll in medicaid now. the newly insured will be fully paid for and doctors have -- >> i understand the most vulnerable in this country are going to lack access to the care they think they're going to receive. i know time is short. >> that's absolutely true. in states choosing not to expand medicaid, it's particularly dire. >> it's existing medicaid. finally i just wanted to inform the secretary you told us several hours ago when the hearing started that the website was down. if you look at the screen, several hours later, healthcare.gov is still down. you promise this system would be ready on october 1st. you're clearly wrong. so before i leave you today, i would just impress upon you, this is more than a broken website. this is a broken law. millions of americans are getting notices their plans are being canceled. >> gentle lady's time has

expired. if i would do a couple things here. first i'm going to ask unanimous consent that the written opening statements for any member on the committee be introduced into the record and without objection, the documents will be there. i also would ask unanimous consent to put the document binder and other documents presented to the secretary during questioning into the record without objection. so ordered. let me just say in conclusion, we do look forward to having you back in december to get an update on where we are. and we'll work with your schedule to find a right time and date early that week. i want you to know we're going to want real numbers. you'll have them by then, is that right, in terms of the signup? >> that's correct, sir. we'll have them by mid-november. >> we look forward to getting those done. we appreciate, we really do appreciate your time this morning to take questions.

i apologize to all the members who we had to shorten the time, but those things happen when we have this much interest. we look forward to continuing to get an update and look for your continued work. >> mr. chairman, from our side of the aisle, we want to work with you. i would hope on the other side of the aisle they would take that same approach. let's do something constructive, not just negative attacks against a bill that i think is going to be a godsend for millions of americans. thank you for being here. >> thank you. hearing is adjourned. >> all right. so there you have it. three and a half hours of testimony, kathleen sebelius clearly in the hot seat today testifying before the house energy and commerce committee. fred upton the chairman, henry waxman the ranking democrat. two very, very different approaches to the health care reform law, the affordable care october or obama act.

the democrats almost to a person supported it. the republicans almost to a person opposed it. tough questions for kathleen sebelius. they made important news in the course of these 31/2 hours. she made it clear, yes, there may be some security problems. mike rogers the chairman of the house intelligence committee who is a member of this committee, as well raised all sorts of issues. joe johns is here. we're going to talk about that in a moment. she repeatedly insisted the system has not yet formally crashed even though the system is down right now, it's been down now for many hours, here are some of the highlights what we heard over the past three and a half hours. >> i am as frustrated and angry as anyone with the flawed launch of healthcare.gov. so let me say directly to these americans, you deserve better. i apologize. >> all right. so that's just for starters.

it's been going on as i said for three and a half hours. an extraordinary amount of testimony. she answered all of the questions. she was pretty blunt. she was pretty direct. a lot of it got very, very testy. kathleen sebelius clearly in the hot seat. some of those republicans very angry at her for what unfolded. in fact, there were some blistering questions as far as the affordable care act is concerned. listen top a bit more of the highlights. >> this is what is happening right now with this website. it is down. it is not working. what is your cost estimate? >> so far, congress woman, we have spent about $11 million on the website itself. and. $56 million has been expended on other i.t. to support the web. >> who is responsible for overseeing this project? is it you or your designee? >> let me be clear.

i'm not pointing fingers at verizon. i'm trying to explain the way the site operates. we own the site. the site has had serious problems. >> at that team, who is the individual. >> michelle snyder. >> michelle snyder is the one responsible for their debacle. >> hold me accountable. i'm responsible. >> there is a famous mean called "the wizard of oz." and there's a great line dorothy at some point in the movie turneds to her little dog toto and says toto, we're not in kansas anymore. madame secretary, what i you're from kansas, we're not in kansas anymore. >> i will remind you some people like to drive a ford, not a ferrari and some people like to drink out of a red solo cup not a stem. you're taking away their choice. >> can you provide a list of insurers in the federal exchange who do not offer as part of

their package abortion coverage? >> i will get that information to you. the website has never crashed. it is functional but at a very slow is speed and low reliability. >> you accepted a risk on behalf of every user that put their personal financial information at risk because you did not have the most basic end to end test on security of the system. amazon would never do this. pro flowers would never do this. kayak would never do this. >> i understand that you'veaid approximately 700,000 people have applied for coverage via the healthcare.gov and the state exchanges. >> they've completed an application. >> right, which is different from enrollment. >> that's correct. >> so my question is, are you expecting, i know you don't have exact numbers yet but are you expecting a large number or i an small number of enrotments during the first month? what is your thoughts on that? >> well, our projections prior to launch were you always that

there would be a very small number. >> that was news. she was projecting that there would be a very small number of people in the initial enrollment phase. i was surprised to hear that. the -- she said aid, but then she repeatedly said something that also raised some eyebrows. let me play this clip. >> the website has never crashed. it is functional but at a very slow speed and very low reliability and has continued to function. >> all right. so those words raised om eyebrows. let's bring in laurie segall from cnn money. what do you make of this? because even as we speak right now, it certainly looks like the website has crashed. you go there and it says it's not operable. >> i've got a computer in front of me. i just went in, technically, it it is crashed right now. it was a have i interesting statement. after hearing it, i e-mailed a tech guy, an entrepreneur friend

and said, are we wrong? has this crashed? he said absolutely it's 100% crashing. as a matter of fact, it's crashing right now. the definition of a crash, he told me, is having the services unavailable due to significant bad programming issues or other related issues. what you're looking at right now is essentially a website crashing. so that statement, part of what she said is true which is that there have been slow services. the part about her saying it hasn't crashed talking to tech folks i know just doesn't necessarily line up. >> maybe she's dealing with a nuance that it's crashed because verizon, their responsibility has forced it to crash, not necessarily directly the government. >> sure, i mean, what you -- first of all, regardless, the website it seems has crashed. but what you do hear her saying and what we kept hearing during this hearing is no one seemed to understand about responsibility.

she kept saying i'm accountable. but a lot of folks were saying well, who's accountable for this and that. what we really see from a tech standpoint, there were so many cooks in the kitchen. when something happens and the website crashes or goes very slow as she said, you don't really know where to point the finger because every single person, everyone's building a different type of technology. you put it together and without the end to end testing which is what she essentially said, they didn't really have much end to end testing, you see it's going to crash quite often. when you put together the part, they didn't necessarily fit as expected, wolf. >> and one other thing, laurie, congressman michael burgess of texas referred to an article that was posted on cnn.com in recent days saying it was for people it was relatively easy to hack in and get someone's name and get some sensitive information. in fact, let me play the clip from congressman burgess.

>> mr. chairman, it just came to my attention that on cnn, cnn's website that the site was hacked just last week. >> okay. >> and i will be happy to make had available to you. i don't think. >> the cnn website? >> the cnn ran a story that the healthcare.gov website was hacked last week. again, i will get this to you and would appreciate your response to that. >> that wasn't exactly precise. tell our viewers what we posted on our website. >> yeah, let moo he clear it up. at cnn money we put an article out that essentially said theoretically with a string of vulnerabilities available on the website, someone could theoretically get in and reset your password. let me get into the nitty gritty here. essentially if you would try to sign up and put in a user name, it would tell you if that was correct or not. if it was correct, there was code available on the website and since down. initially that would enable you

to put in the code and say reset password. you you would then get a string of security questions. if you couldn't answer them, it would give you an e-mail so for anyone kind of hacking if they have your e-mail, they can plug it into the internet and social mediaen an find out sensitive information about you that would enable them to likely be able to answer those security questions. so it's a lot of theoreticals but i will tell you this, talk to folks in the hacker community this kind of thing is very easy for people to do and they don't have to be that tech savvy. i'll say this. i spoke to one of the guys who found some of the vulnerabilities. he said he's been looking at the coden an it's riddled with vulnerabilities. the conversation we're having now is the site is not working. the conversation i guarantee we will be having is the security flaws in the system. >> laurie segall, thanks very much. joe johns is watching what's going on. joe, that brings us to the next series of questions about the security of the entire system.

you heard -- you heard several republicans complain that there were serious security cyber security problems, the system wasn't completely tested. you're looking into all of this as well. what are you hearing? >> absolutely, wolf. this issue has been running in the background on the obama care website for a long time. all the way back in august, the office of the inspector general for health and human services raised questions about whether the site could be hacked. and now we have this memo dated september 27th of this year. it was sent to marilyn tavenner, the administrator of the centers for medicare and medicaid services, signed by her in fact, essentially says that aspects of the system had not been tested as of that date, which was just a few days buff going live. it said that it exposed a level of up certainty that was high risk. said there were parts of the system that had not been fully tested.

now we don't know the which security concerns they were they were specifically addressing in this memo. however, we do know in fact, that a number of questions had been sort of raised along the way. and the system again, the big question has been whether it was vulnerable to hackers. we actually have a sound bite. i think we can play it for you now where they talked a bit more about that in today's hearing >> when did you know the exchanges were going down? a month, a day, a quarter? and did you tell the president what you knew? >> sir, i was informed that we were ready to launch on october 1st. the contractors who we had as our private partners told us and told this committee that they had never suggested a delay and that is accurate. our cms team felt we were ready to go. i told the president that we

were ready to go. clearly i was wrong. we were wrong. we knew that in any big new complicated system, there would be problems. no one ever imagined the volume of issues and problems that we've had. and we must fix it. >> a big picture sound bite there the from the secretary of health and human services on the overall readiness and the functionality of the system which has been a question throughout, wolf. >> joe johnson, thanks very much. gloria borg ser here, elizabeth cohen is here. gloria, how did she do? >> i think she was a little more forthcoming than we've heard in the past. i don't know if you all agree with me, but she took full responsibility for this. she said the buck stops here. she was very clear that she told the president we were ready to go as she put it, she was wrong.

and this is something i found very interesting that no senior official ever advised her to delay the launch, which i found kind of shocking actually after looking at the timeline that she actually agave us, which is you know in june, hhs sent a memo to another government agency, gao saying we're ready to go mid-august, problems were identified. and they were only ready to go, she said, the third week in september. now we learn about this into late september about security problems. and nobody ever suggested a potential tension delay? >> and i want you to listen to this clip, elizabeth, from the hearing today. listen to this. >> the assessment that we have made is that it will take until the end of november for an optimally functioning website. i know that the only way i can restore confidence that we get it right is to get it right.

so i have confidence. but i know that it isn't fair to ask the american lick public to take our word for it. i've got to fix -- people will only have two weeks. >> not a whole lot of time. >> by i was talking to a woman in arizona, she has breast cancer. her insurance runs out december 31st of this year. she's spends hours and hours a day on the site and can't get in. she is truly frantic whether or not she's going to be able to get insurance by the end of the year. >> don't go away. we've got a lot more to dissect. story up on capitol hill, we're speaking to a couple of lawmakers who were inside with very different perspectives as

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>> i am as frustrated and angry as anyone with the flawed launch of healthcare.gov. so let me say directly to these americans, you deserve better. i apologize. i'm accountable to you for fixing these problems. and i'm committed to earning your confidence back by fixing the site.

>> kathleen sebelius, the secretary of health and human services not mincing any words apologizing for the disastrous rollout of this obama care website. let's discuss what happened today during the course of these three and a half hours of this testimony. joining us two members of the committee that just finished questioning of kathleen sebelius, republican literary of nebraska, democrat peter welch of vermont. congressman terry, first to you, are you satisfied with what you heard? >> not really because we didn't get a lot of answers. there's been almost $600 million spent on a website that doesn't work. >> hold on a second. let me interrupt. she said it was under $200 million. the specific number she gave today. how much they've spent so far. >> but she only gave one of the contractors' numbers and she didn't finish the rest of the answer nor was the other questions asked. the contractors were in front of our committee a week ago said that it totaled up to about $600

million. >> let me ask congressman welch, do you accept that bigger in you be? >> i don't know what the number is, but i thought it was fair questions about the accountability. we blew it when it came to the roll out of the healthcare.gov. that jeopardizes the effect of the health care bill. there was something quite significantly different in tone. the republicans who askeded legitimate questions about the rollout had as a premise that this law has to be implemented. up till this hearing it's all been about repeal. that tug of war is over. it is fair and square and mutual concern to make sure that it works. >> do you accept that, congressman terry? >> what i accept is that we have this website that was rolled out knowing there was a lot of flaws. frankly, most of the flaws weren't discovered till afterwards. then now we have a president in the "washington post" that has been given four pinocchios for saying if you like your

insurance you can keep it. there's a trust issue here. the people that hhs in charge of developing that website rolled it out with all of the flaws in it. these are the same people that are going to really manage health care going forward and how can we trust them? >> how do you answer that, congressman welch? into there's a difference between a defective website. we had that when george bush passed medicare part d. there was a lot of problems there. the republicans were defending it then. there's a huge interest in making this thing work. some people may have to be held accountable it didn't work. there's a lot of elements of health care changing including there's minimum standards so when people buy insurance, they're actually getting coverage. there's been an enormous amount of ripoff of american people by insurance companies that sell them policies that are good till you get sick. they then have a pre-existing coverage, they don't have coverage for the surgery room,

just the hospital visit. so this minimum standard is creating consternation is something long overdue. >> and wolf, i would answer in respect to that is that we could have dealt with the those folks that really needed that access that he had pre-existing without reshoveling all of the chairs on the deck. what they're causing now, some will be insured but now there's a lot of my constituents back home that sent me their cancellation letters saying that your policy is now canceled because of the president's health care law. they now have to go out into the exchanges or find something else. they're finding it's a lot more expensive with less coverage. higher deduct deductibles and more copays. >> that's going to be the test of the coverage. a lot of those folks had policies that didn't provide much coverage and they would get ripped off once had he got sick. the question is when had get a new policy with the premium support, is that going to be better coverage, better

protection and affordable? the other point is that the secretary acknowledged something that i think is really important. we've got to bring down the cost of health care. that's got to be a mutual effort no matter how you pay for it. whether it's private pay, tax pair pay, if the cost of health care is going up faster than wages and profits we can't sustain it. system reform is essential. >> i would agree with you, peter. that's one of the big missed opportunities with the president's health care is dealing with the cost of the health care supposed to focusing on who's going to provide it, government or private sector. >> congressman welch, given all the problems of the website including it remains down right now, these are critical days, obviously, in trying to encourage people to sign up, is it time to consider delaying some of the penalties for people who don't have the affordable care act provisions by the required dates? >> i think common sense fairness is that you have to align the penalties with the access to the web site. you can't impose a penalty on

somebody who didn't get the coverage because the website was broken. i think we've got to be paying real close attention so that people have a fair amount of time in order to get on the website. and so i think a common sense approach is let's ewhen this is working and make certain we're not shortchanging people and penalizing them for government failure. >> congressman terry, you hear a lot of democrats got this line fix it, don'tnism it. do you want to fix this affordable care act, or do you want toni nisx it? >> i still have real opposition and thoughts about it. the president's health care bill just like what i mentioned with constituents that are getting their cancellation letters. you're all of a sudden creating this new group of uninsured. it's going to be a lot more expensive for less. we have to deal with those type of issues now. >> congressman literary of nebraska and peter welch of

vermont, thanks to you, as well. this three and a half hour hearing was historic, very important. we're going to continue our analysis of what happened. thanks very much. and to our viewers, i'm wolf blitzer in washington. we're covering these historic hearings that took place today up on capitol hill. kathleen sebelius clearly in the hot seat today. answering questions from members of congress, democrats and republicans, some very, very testy questions, all of our reporter and analysts are standing by. dana bash is up on capitol hill. gloria borger is here with me. so is elizabeth cohen. we've got our white house team in place. we're going to have full analysis right now. let's go to dana bash up on capitol hill. you watched these three and a half hours, dana. give us your thought how this went down because as i say, i this i a lot of people were watching. >> well, certainly people who are genuinely interested i