i'm don lemon. the president beaming tonight over his health care victory in the house. but with an uphill climb in the senate, the celebration is a little premature. and in his hometown, let's say new yorkers are not exactly welcoming him with open arms tonight. i want to get straight to my guest, bill press, the host of the bill press show, david swerdlick. good evening to all of you. thank you for coming on. in pure, you know, trump fashion, the president had -- he did two events today. president trump taking his victory lap in the rose garden to celebrate his bill passing the house, and the president at a black tie event just a short time ago at the "uss intrepid" here in new york. is the president getting ahead of himself because this still has to go through the senate, and the outlook there is very different, bill. >> i think he is getting ahead of himself. i thought they spiked the football too soon. i don't blame them for doing it in the sense he wanted to crow a little bit that he got his first

big bill through. but i find it funny that they would consider this a big victory. i mean first of all, they control -- they got the votes. they have 50 more votes in the house than the democrats do. >> they need it so badly. they needed a win. >> yeah. so that they had to work so hard to get the votes in a republican house, it took them three times, and they only won by one vote. that's hardly a big, huge victory. and we know it's basically dead on arrival. >> is that john fredericks or david? i think it's probably john fredericks. >> no big victory. >> i'm sorry. i've got to laugh. ph bill is right. they can't get anything done. this is about the most inept group of republicans i've ever seen in history. i mean i said last night it was like the gang that couldn't shoot straight. but, look, donald trump finally took control of this and got it done. and here's the real thing that matters. obamacare was imploding. just this week, it was on life

support -- >> john, john, that's not true. >> if you live in iowa. >> i have to stop you. that's not true. >> you had no exchanges. aetna just pulled out of virginia. the thing was dying. they had to do something. >> let me get in here. that is a talking point. obamacare was not perfect. it could have been fixed if there was bipartisan consensus, if they had gotten together. but to say that obamacare is imploding is a talking point from the right. that is not correct. and if you're going to say things like that, you have to give it in context and give the whole thing. one is because they weren't letting the mandate happen. they weren't enforcing the mandate. and the other thing is that according to republicans and democrats, it's the way that this administration is talking about obamacare. it's causing uncertainty among insurers. so it's not imploding. it's not like it's sitting there and imploding. there's a force behind that. go ahead, john. >> well, aetna pulled out of virginia. iowa didn't have any exchanges

for any insurance companies to go in. all those people were left with coverage. so i guess, don, you've got alternative facts now. that's great. >> no. i'm giving context. i'm not saying what you're saying is not happening, but it's not collapsing under its own weight. >> it's because -- it's because somebody made a speech, insurance companies are pulling out. come on, don, that's not real. they're pulling out because the thing is failing. >> if you had the entire weight of the government and the president, a republican, saying this is the best we have. we need to make this work. you wouldn't have insurers being so uncertain about the future of obamacare. now you have republicans who are in the majority, and you have the person who's in the white house, saying those things about the affordable care act. of course people are going to be nervous about it. he's the most powerful person in the country, if not the world. >> what does that have to do with the insurers. all the insurance companies care about is making money. here's why the compromise is a good thing.

let me tell you why it's a good thing. all the lobbyists in washington, every health care lobbyist on k street is lined up in opposition to this compromise. when the lobbyists are mad, the people win. this is the swamp monsters coming out because there's no money for them to be made. this was a compromise that makes sense. and here's the thing, don. this is why the american people elected trump. they want the government to work. they want compromises, and the best compromise is when everybody is mad because they didn't get what they wanted. >> david -- >> this was imploding. it was dying. >> give us a reality check here. >> look, i think -- [ overlapping voices ] >> let me just say one thing. >> david, david, go ahead. >> what i hear coming from john is a little bit of an oversell on what this bill might do. back when democrats passed the affordable care act, they oversold what it could do for people. >> exactly.

>> it did cover more people. it didn't lower costs. they could never get around if you like your doctor, you can keep it. now i think republicans are in danger of overselling the benefits of this compromise when if this does get through the senate and does become law, they're going to own it. and, you know, their rationale has gone from socialism to the individual mandate to covering more people to now say we're going to bring down premiums. if this does not bring down premiums, if this does not bring down deductibles, ultimately they're going to own it just like democrats did. i think, john, no one cares what lobbyists do or don't do. they want good coverage, and they want coverage that's broader and more effective and possibly less expensive, not a win for president trump. >> can i just add something else? you know, this congressional budget -- by the way, this bill, i think it's worth pointing out, was passed before nobody had read it and with no score from the cbo. so we're all kind of talking through our hat. we don't really know what's in the bill.

we don't really know what the impact will be. i just think we all ought to be honest about that. >> john? >> and, further, the first score, the first bill, the cbo said 24 million people would lose their health insurance. this bill is a lot worse. so a lot more people are going to be impacted, and that's going to hit in 2018. and the biggest lie about this bill, john, is that it helps people with pre-existing conditions. it does just the opposite. >> let him rerespospond. john, are you concerned no one knows what's in it? >> i agree with david. the republicans own this now. the president owns it. i don't know what the final version will be. but premiums have got to come down. deductibles have got to come down, and you have to be able to cover people with pre-existing conditions. >> it doesn't. >> and to bill's point, bill, i don't know if $8 billion is the number or if it's $80 billion. but whatever that number is, let me just tell you this now. it's got to get funded through the reconciliation. we don't know what that number

is, but if you have a pre-existing condition -- and here's the thing -- and you're getting health care, not coverage. forget coverage. that doesn't matter. you're getting care where you didn't have it. you can't take that away because you can't kick people to the curb and say, well, just go to the emergency room. >> the point is -- >> let's have a fact. this bill that passed today, that they celebrated today, it allows states to opt out of offering pre-existing conditions, number one. then, two, it sets up this fig leaf of an $8 billion fund over five years, which turns out to be -- do the math -- about $1.5 billion a year to cover up to 50 million, maybe more americans that have pre-existing conditions. >> 130 million. >> i've heard 130 million. >> go ahead, david. >> bill and john are both right. until we have a cbo score, we just don't know whether it is or isn't going to deliver on

bringing premiums down. but i agree with bill. this $8 billion is a fig leaf. if the whole key to this was just a measly $8 billion, which in the context of the federal budget is like the change underneath the sofa cushions, if all it took was $8 billion, then they could have solved this weeks ago. >> i've got a question for john. john, you could say it could be $8 billion or $80 billion. nobody knows, right? they don't know? >> it's not going to be 80. >> that's what he says. >> they put the mechanism -- here's the thing, though. they put the mechanism in place in order to fund this through taxpayer dollars and subsidies for pre-existing conditions. let me put this in perspective and just cut through the nonsense here. we spent $6 trillion on middle eastern wars over a 12-year period. you know what we got out of it? body bags and our young men and women coming home without arms and legs. we spent $6 trillion, got nothing out of it.

so if you have to put in $8 billion or $80 billion, you put it in. that's what this president and this congress is going to have to do. >> what does that have to do -- >> look, let's not fool people out there. the president and billy long -- the president and fred upton. let me finish a sentence please. i was at the congress yet when fred updton and billy long came back with the white house, and they said the deal they made with the president is $8 billion. i don't know where this $80 billion came from. don't throw that out there. you're just confusing people. your misleading people. it's at most, at most $8 billion. if you really want to put the money in health care, then why don't they continue to pay the subsidies so people who have never been able to afford health care and now are able to do it under obamacare won't lose their coverage? instead, they're taking the subsidies and giving that $600 million to the wealthiest of americans. >> my original question i was

going to ask you, john, is if you don't know -- your words, 8 or 80 -- why would you vote on it? >> they wanted to vote on it because health insurance companies are pulling out of the market and people in iowa have no insurance. and the same thing has happened in my state of virginia. >> can i play this, please? can we play this? paul ryan, 2009, please. >> you're giving me all the liberal, left-wing talk. >> stand by, john. >> i don't think we should pass bills that we haven't read that we don't know what they cost. if you rush this thing through before anybody know what's this thing is, that's not good democracy. that's not doing our work for our constituents. we shouldn't rush this thing through just to rush it through for some artificial deadline. let's get this thing done right. >> john? >> you know what, i'm out of the business of paying any attention to what paul ryan says ever. paul ryan didn't lead this. trump had to come in and bail his tail out. the guy fails at everything he does. he's a complete disaster. but here's what nobody

recognizes. >> quickly. >> how about all the millions and millions of americans whose deductibles have gone to $10,000, $15,000, whose premiums have gone up? these are the forgotten people. we're focused on -- >> john, are we sure in this case that paul ryan didn't bail president trump out? are we sure in this case that the speaker didn't partially bail donald trump out? >> are you kidding me? >> thank you, guys. >> trump had to bail him out just like he's going to have to continue to do. >> thanks guys. when we come back, president trump is back in his hometown of new york tonight, but the city can't exactly giving him a warm welcome. [ krocrowd chanting ] try zyrtec® it's starts working hard at hour one and works twice as hard when you take it again the next day. stick with zyrtec® and muddle no more®.

president trump returning home to new york city tonight for the first time since taking office. he and the first lady, melania trump, attending a black tie dinner aboard the "uss intrepid," a retired aircraft carrier docked on manhattan's west side. the president's only here for a few hours, so it's unclear if he saw any of the protests or protesters, i should say, who hit the streets to send him a message. >> he's not a fellow new yorker. i feel new york stands for equality. they stand for, you know, immigrants. they respect everyone, and i don't think that he does that.

>> he only represents a tiny 0.001% of new york. >> reporter: it may not be the warmest welcome. >> no more trump! >> reporter: but president trump is back in new york city after a 107-day absence. friends say it's the longest stretch trump has spent outside of new york since he was born in queens in 1946. protesters lined the streets in midtown manhattan with some tough talk for their fellow new yorker. >> i say resign. i say stop trying to hurt the american people. >> reporter: even the staten island ferry carries a message. protesters plastering a sign to the side, #notrumpnyc. usually at each other's throats, this time around, new york city mayor bill de blasio defending the president's right to be here. >> now, would you prefer that trump never came to new york city? >> i hope he doesn't just drive

by the people in the neighborhoods that used to be a part of his life but actually takes an opportunity to listen to people. but, no, no one should tell him he can't come home. i don't think that's fair. >> reporter: de blasio in a new york state of mind after congress included $61 million in its latest budget to cover the cost of protecting the president and his family while living in manhattan. first lady, melania trump, and youngest son barron still live at trump tower. >> we fought long and hard to get reimbursement for the protection of trump tower. in the final analysis, what the congress is doing is going to make us substantially whole. >> reporter: the police commissioner says the city spending nearly $140,000 a day to keep trump's wife and son safe. the cost more than doubles to over $300,000 when president trump is in town. like today, as melania's motorcade left trump tower to meet her husband, protesters stood their ground. >> in a city where he was born and raised, and he can't even

face his own people. >> reporter: the protesters say they'll keep coming out. they're going to keep the pressure on. they want to make sure their concerns are heard and their issues are addressed. they say this is the resistance. cnn, new york. >> deborah, thank you so much. i want to bring in now timothy th natale. it's unusual for a president to be so disliked in his hometown, don't you think? >> yet again something else that's unusual about the trump presidency. jimmy carter a few weeks after becoming president went back to plains, which is a big deal for him, and he writes in his diary how much it mattered to him and the first lady. he went for a walk on the main street in plains. it took him two hours. he stopped. he said hello to shopkeepers. i think the secret service were a little nervous, but he did it for two hours. very positive experience. think about it. choose any major boulevard in new york city and have donald trump walk down. not going to be pretty.

>> maybe the rest of the country doesn't know that, how people actually feel about him, how new yorkers feel about donald trump. so what do new yorkers know about donald trump that the rest of the country doesn't? >> i haven't lived here in a lorng ti long time but -- >> be honest. >> i hope i'm honest. here's the deal. they've been watching this guy. they've watched his career. they've watched him go -- not him personally, but his operations go bankrupt. they've seen the fact that he has trouble at times actually raising money in his own city, that he has to go to foreign bankers. the reason i think is that new yorkers know him too well. >> yeah. >> and they've seen all sides of him whereas for much of the country, he was quite unknown despite the fact that he was a reality tv star. >> it's like they say, you don't know someone until you live with him. new yorkers have been living with donald trump for a long time, right? when people say, you don't know such and such, you don't have to live with him, i think that's sort of the same thing. do you think these protests do

anything to chip away at the president's base because it's happening in new york city. people think new york is -- >> it's not doing anything. >> yeah. >> but i think it's important to do because you want to express your first amendment rights lest they be taken away from you. in fact, he can use that to bolster his support among his base. look at the speech he gave in pennsylvania the other day. it was all about how the elites don't like me, and that's a good thing because i prefer you. so, no, in fact these images are helpful to him politically. >> here's the interesting thing. if you look at donald trump, donald trump is a very wealthy man, and the people he hung out with in new york city were very wealthy people. listen, new york is not just elitis elitist. there are people from all walks of life. it's one of the most diverse cities, if not the most diverse city in the country or the world. i say that because when he says the elites of the country, look at this picture, right if th? this happened today. these are people who are making

decisions about health care and life and death situations for the country. look at this. at least you can say new york city is diverse, which is surprising because donald trump comes from the most diverse city. what is happening here? >> well, don, this is in many ways a very troubling day. >> does that represent america, that picture? >> no, of course it doesn't represent america. our country, if you -- you know, we're not perfect. but if you look at linear progression, we grant and recognize more and more rights with each generation. african-americans, it takes 100 years for the second reconstruction, but it happens. in the '70s, a republican administration grants more rights to native-americans. native-americans in alaska finally get their due. the george herbert walker bush administration recognizes with the disabilities act, helping those that are physically challenged. we are now seeing a moment where president obama ran and won or

barack obama ran and won, promising that access to affordable health care was a right. >> yeah. >> and today one of the houses of congress, of the richest most powerful country in the world, is applauding the fact that they sl clawed that back. >> you said we're regressing. it's not a representation of america. >> it's a representation of the people who will not be hurt by what they just did. >> yeah, because congress is actually exempt from this. >> exactly. >> which is very telling. thank you, timothy. i appreciate it. when we come right back, the man who is calling the president tragically unfit for office. (male #1) it's a little something

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that's over 6 times faster than slow internet from the phone company. say hello to internet speeds up to 250 mbps. and add phone and tv for only $34.90 more a month. call today. comcast business. built for business. a big victory for house republicans and president trump. the house passing a health care bill that repeals and replaces obamacare. let's talk about this now and a lot more with john mcwirter, professor of linguistics at columbia university. let's talk about the big event today and that was the passage at least in the house of this health care bill to replace obamacare, the affordable care act. celebratory, you know, sentiment

happening in washington. here's the rose garden earlier. >> premiums will be coming down. yes, deductibles will be coming down. but very importantly, it's a great plan, and ultimately that's what it's all about. we knew that wasn't going to work. i predicted it a long time ago. i said it's failing. now it's obvious that it's failing. it's dead. it's essentially dead. if we don't pay lots of ransom money over to the insurance companies, it would die immediately. so what we have is something very, very incredibly well crafted. tell you what, there is a lot of talent standing behind me, an unbelievable amount of talent. that i can tell you. [ applause ] i mean it. and, you know, coming from a different world and only being a politician for a short period of time -- how am i doing? am i doing okay? i'm president. hey, i'm president. can you believe it, right? >> what do you think of the president's tone? i'm president. he says it like he can't believe

it himself. >> frankly, he knows nothing about the subject. he knows about as much about health care as i know about flying a plane. he's being a standard bearer for his party. but let's face it. this is -- >> you can tell that from the language, the way he's speaking? >> he's talking like a standard bearer, like a towel snapper, like a toastmaster. he's trying to create a certain kind of atmosphere. i don't think he knows anything about the details. but even if he did, what he's trying to do is create a mood. that's what he does. he skirts on the surface. >> democrats are now calling this trumpcare. you think it could come back to haunt them? >> frankly i think that it will because this is a bill that is inhuman or unfeeling in many ways. i think that largely it's a matter of gesture over action. the idea being that you absolutely must undo obamacare because obama did it, and that's what being a republican means. but they've lost the sense of

what it means to govern, to do what's good for their own people, even their own constituents and people who voted for trump are realizing there's something wrong with this idea of politics as gesture rather than action. it's an infection in our whole nation at this point, forgetting what action really means. >> the first time it appeared he really didn't get involved in those who were supporting the bill, the replacement wanted him to get more involved. is this an example of his kind of deal-making skills that supporters thought he would put into action? >> they thought as this deal maker, he would actually engage in the details of the matter the way we presume he did to an extent with the financial deals that he's famous for. but frankly this stuff is harder, and he simply lacks the interest in these matters of complexity. let's face it. to most people, health care issues, unless they happen to be threatening you, seem at a distance rather dull. it's not unusual, but he's one of those people. the problem is that he's running the country. >> yeah. let's talk about the wall now.

i don't know if you've seen what's been happening, especially in the white house. >> oh, mexico? >> in the briefing room. there was a disconnect in terms of language and logic when the administration talked about the wall. the president was angry about not getting any funding for the wall in this budget they just passed. democrats were crowing. over the past couple days, republicans like the press secretary sean spicer, mick mulvaney, have been spinning. listen to this. >> we are building this now. there is money in this deal to build several hundreds of millions of dollars of this to replace this. that's what we got in this deal, and that's what the democrats don't want you to know. >> are those photos of fences or walls? >> that is called a bollard wall. that is called a levee wall. >> that's the wall that -- >> no, no. there are various types of walls that can be built under the legislation that was just passed, it allows us to do that. as we've mentioned -- that is called a levee wall on the left. that is called a bollard wall.

huh? >> so that's not a wall. it's a levee wall. >> that's what it's actually called. that's the name of it. it is called -- >> it's fencing, not a wall. >> so the problem is it's not true. and if you actually do the research, it's actually called a levee fence and a bollard fence. the money to fix this actually came from george w. bush and from the obama administration and had nothing to do with the trump administration. the fence they mentioned there was part of a construction site and had nothing to do with the actual border wall. what's your reaction to this tortured language? it seems it is torture. >> the lack of preparation is astounding. i mean if what you were going to do was paper that over and make it sound like some sort of victory, it seems to me you could sit down for about 20 minutes and prepare. i remember i was on the debate team for about ten seconds when i was in middle school. and i didn't care about the cigarette smoking or trout fishing in quebec, but what you do is you prepare. you sit down and you learn some stuff.

the lack of focus in this administration, the lack of interest in the basic arts of persuasion is stunning, which means that essentially we're looking at a bunch of juveniles. >> how can they expect people to believe that, though? i mean it's not even -- all you have to do is a minimal amount of research to -- and even from their tone, can't you tell? >> no. they assume that most people don't care about the details. and, don, the sad thing is that most human beings don't care about the details of governance. that's why we have representatives to take care of it for us. i get the feeling they suppose that melissa mccarthy can make fun of these little episodes and we'll all laugh. but really trump will make certain sorts of speeches and say punchy sorts of things, and a certain kind of person will figure, well, he's for us. although i get the feeling that how clearly he isn't for the uses over the next year is going to start to become so clear that a certain segment of these people are going to realize that

it was all bluster. these people have basic human intelligence like all of us do. >> the president did a series of interviews and raised some eyebrows with his comments on the civil war and on andrew jackson. listen to this. >> i mean had andrew jackson been a little bit later, you wouldn't have had the civil war. he was -- he was a very tough person, but he had a big heart. and he was really angry that -- he saw what was happening with regard to the civil war. he said, there's no reason for this. people don't realize, you know, the civil war, if you think about it, why? people don't ask that question, but why was there the civil war? why could that one not have been worked out? >> what's wrong? >> this is the president. >> i've heard it all week. i know. it's -- does it make any sense to you as a linguistics professor, someone who studies

and teaches language, does that make any sense to you? >> well, frankly it's not about language at this point. i mean why does he like andrew jackson? it's because you can imagine that at some point he was on some shag-rugged floor in queens in a coonskin cap and he liked d davy crockett. as far as the civil war, the idea that people aren't quite sure how it went, does he know nothing about the fact that there's a whole wing of scholarship arguing over why there was a civil war and that certain conclusions have been come to? i mean really, that kind of scholarship isn't covered in elementary or middle or even high school. but his idea that the civil war is uncharted territory, like some mystery about the moon landing, it means he didn't pay attention in school. he couldn't even pay attention in school, and now he's running the united states of america. >> and you said this is not about language because you're right. trump's perspective of the civil war reveals more than trump's

lack of book smarts or interest in the african-americans. rather, trump's ignorance about something as fundamental to our nation's history as the civil war marks a profound disconnection from anything but his mundane self. it is this that reveals him as tragically unfit for his office. i mean you think he's the least knowledgeable president we've had in modern times? >> no. i mean andrew johnson didn't know much about some things. george w. was not somebody who was much into focusing, but he pretended. he read the abridged policy papers that were written for him whereas with trump, he simply can't pay attention at all and doesn't even know that he's supposed to pretend to. that's what worries me. you have to at least pretend. ronald reagan wasn't reading dense policy papers, but he listened to people who summarized them for him. trump doesn't know anything more about what's going on in this country than frankly some of my

pre-adolescent cousins. and that frightens me because things could get more serious than what we've seen thus far. if you don't understand the very basics of the civil war, you simply weren't capable of paying attention in school. that was every second student. but now one of them became the president of the united states. >> you know, he didn't come to the office on background with a great background on policy, especially foreign policy. do you think that he's learning and absorbing as he goes along here? >> it would seem that he's learning nothing after these 100 days, and that's what scary. so let's say he comes in and he knows next to nothing. fine. most people know next to nothing about these things. but the idea is you're supposed to come in and think, well, i'd better bone up. and you don't sense that he does when he says, sure, i'll meet with the leader of north korea with no sense of the background and the diplomacy and what the implications of that would be, and all of that is surely written in some of the papers he's not reading in favor of tweeting. he has no idea about

geopolitics. it's all a macrocosm. he doesn't understand that the united states and life are more complicated than he happens to be. and it doesn't look like there's any learning curve. and that's what's so disturbing. >> people watch this and say you're being really hard on the president. are you this hard on your students? >> i am being very hard on the president. i'm not this hard on my students because they're young and their in formation. he's 70. i am this hard on myself. so, yes, i'm being hard on the president. and if i'm seeming smug it's because in relation to him, yes, i'm feeling quite smug, and i think i'm justified in it as is anybody who is watching this man pretending to run the country. >> thank you, john. i appreciate it. when we come back, president trump is a pretty unlikely champion for the religion right, but i'm going to talk to one social conservative who is definitely in the president's corner.

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welcome back, everyone. i need to clarify something i said earlier in the show about congress being exempt from the health care law the house passed today. in an earlier version they were,

but they passed a separate amendment eliminating that exemption. now on to this. there was a time when donald trump might have seemed like a pretty unlikely champion of the religious right, but not anymore. my next guest helped him make his case with evangelical voters. joining me now, ralph reed, chairman of the faith and freedom coalition. thank you so much for joining us, ralph. >> you bet, don. good to be with you. >> thank you. first of all, what's your reaction to passing this bill to replace obamacare? >> well, we're obviously thrilled. this is not only one of the most central and explicit promises that donald trump made as a candidate, but frankly, don, it was arguably the centerpiece of most of the campaigns over the last eight years. and i think to have failed to fulfill that campaign promise would have broken trust with the american people. but beyond that, i think on a public policy level, look, this is the deepest tax cut since 2001.

it's a trillion-dollar tax cut. it will lower premiums by creating high-risk pools and giving states flexibility and offering more diverse packages of insurance to consumers. it's the most important pro-life piece of legislation that we've seen probably since the partial birth abortion ban because it defunds planned parenthood and ends direct and indirect abortion subsidies, makes hite amendment permanent and enhances religion liberty by pulling off some of the mandates on people of faith. >> i want to talk to you about the religious part of it that you just talked about. can we talk about the tax cut real quick? >> sure. >> the criticism and the pushback from democrats is that republicans only wanted this because they needed it for a tax cut and that they're using this and americans' health, you know, as a tool to get a tax cut. >> well, i don't speak for the republican party, but i can tell

you on behalf of my organization, faith and freedom coalition, that had absolutely nothing to do with our support for the legislation. it is good to cut taxes and lift the burden of regulation and taxes on small business, which this does. it is good to lower premiums, and by restoring some of the high-risk pools in many of these states, don, that were done away with by obamacare, we can take those patients who are sick or who are likely to get sick because they have previous conditions, and put them in a risk pool where we backstop the liability of insurers and in some states like maine, that's lowered premiums 20% to 40%. that's good, sound public policy. >> i don't want to get bogged down in the repealing and replacing of obamacare because i really want to talk to but this religious freedom -- >> okay. >> let's move on now. i want to talk about this vote now. the president signed -- not the vote. but the president signed an

executive order on religious freedom. here it is. >> freedom is not a gift from government. freedom is a gift from god. [ applause ] it was thomas jefferson who said the god who gave us life gave us liberty. our founding fathers believed that religious liberty was so fundamental that they enshrined it in the very first amendment of our great and beloved constitution. yet for too long the federal government has used the power of the state as a weapon against people of faith. >> ralph, how has the government been a weapon against people of faith exactly? >> well, because of the fact that making even one political statement or, say, having one line in a church newsletter that mentioned a candidate brought the death penalty for tax-exempt

organizations, including churches and ministries. so you could have a $50 million budget as a ministry, and if the head of that ministry made one statement about a candidate, they could lose their tax-exempt status and destroy the ministry. it had a chilling effect on the first amendment right to political speech, which we think is sacred and inviolable. >> isn't that part of the separation of church and state, ralph? >> absolutely not. in fact, it's the very opposite. allowing the church or the faith community -- remember, this doesn't just affect churches, don. it affects all tax-exempt organizations including a lot of ministries that are doing a lot of good out there. by giving them a more vibrant, robust voice in our public policy debates, i think we ensure that church and state remain separate but that the church, or more accurately the faith community, can speak truth to power. and, don, no matter where you come down politically, whether it's the role of the

african-american church in the civil rights struggle, which was essential, or whether it's in the more modern sense, more conservative and center-right organizations in the pro-life movement, these are social reform movements that simply do not exist without the faith community. >> so then, ralph, i can hear people saying -- >> and attempting to restrict their right to speak out, i think is not only a violation of their first amendment rights, i think it removes a bright thread from the fabric of our -- >> where do you draw the line, then, ralph, when it comes to this separation of church and state? because as you know within the rules, you're not supposed to talk politics from the pulpit. you're not supposed to -- a church for pastor is supposed to show support for any candidate running for any office. it's not supposed to be that way, or otherwise you're operating outside the bounds of your tax exemption. >> well, my position would be -- our position would be that we should apply the same standard to statements about candidates or about campaigns that we apply

to legislation, which is an insubstantial amount of their activity. so, for example, if a church let's say has a million dollar a year budget, and they're spending 40% of that on political activity, of course they shouldn't have tax-exempt status. but if they're spending that million dollars a year sharing the gospel, mending families, feeding the homeless, fighting human trafficking, and doing lots of good things, and then they spend a dollar on one line in a newsletter, they shouldn't lose their tax-exempt status. i want to make one other really important point, don. this is critical. i want to make it clear i am not advocating that pastors endorse candidates from the pulpit. i have never advocated that. i believe pastors -- >> do you think they should speak politics from the pulpit? >> no. i believe what they should do from the pulpit is preach the gospel and lift up the name of jesus christ and cause people to come to him as their lord and

savior. that's what they ought to do. >> ralph reed, thank you. i appreciate you answering the question. >> thank you, don. good to be with you. >> thank you. when we come back, the mystery that has become a worldwide obsession. the disappearance of 3-year-old madeline mccann. randi kaye has the latest on the case.

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breakthrough allergies with allegra®. this week marks ten years since little madeleine mccann vanished while on a family vacation in portugal. despite the decade long search and millions of dollars spent looking for her, madeleine's parents are still waiting for answers. cnn's randi kaye covered the story when it first broke and is now back on the case with a new special report, missing madeleine mccann. it airs tomorrow night at 10:00 eastern. here's a preview. >> back home in england, a decade after their nightmare began, the mccanns faced another somber milestone. ten years come and gone without any sign of their daughter. >> inevitably on anniversaries and on her birthday, they are by

far the hardest days, by far. >> i think it's important, though, because despite how difficult these days are, just keeping in mind how much progress we have made, and while there is no evidence to give us any negative news, that hope is still there. >> we have made such an emphasis of the point that time is the enemy. we've done too good a job of doing that because now the public thinks if you don't recover a child in the first days or weeks or months, that there's no hope. and there are a growing number of cases that demonstrate that there is hope. >> we get lucky. we get kids back alive. but the not knowing is what kills you. the not knowing. >> randi kaye joins me now. it's hard to believe it's been ten years. >> yeah, it's been a really long time, certainly for the mccann family. but they hope their daughter is one of the ones that does come

home alive. given the ten-year anniversary now, kate mccann came out recently just this week saying that she still buys christmas gifts for madeleine mccann, hoping, you know, that she will come home. it's a real indication that there's still hope. >> you think after ten years, could she still be alive? >> well, scotland yard, who is still investigating this case, says there is zero evidence that she's dead. there isn't the evidence to prove that she is dead. the experts say that a younger child is when they're taken, the less likely it is that they're actually killed. all of the indications are that she was either taken and sold into some sort of adoption ring for a couple that wants a child or sold into some type of sex ring. obviously not ideal and certainly not what her parents would have wanted for her but that days say she could be alive. >> when this happens, they look at everyone, including the people who were closest. the parents were investigated, right? >> they were heavily investigated but never charged. nobody was ever charged. over these between years, 9,000 reported sights of madeleine

mccann. 600 people were interviewed. still nothing. and there just isn't any indication. but the parents were under such a cloud of suspicion because they brought in these cadaver dogs who found dna and spots of blood in the apartment that they were staying in on vacation in portugal and in the parents' rental car, but later it was discovered that dna was not necessarily connected to madeleine mccann. so the mystery continues as to what happened to her. >> fascinating. can't wait to watch. thank you, randi. our special report, missing kwk madeleine mccann airs tomorrow night at 10:00 eastern right here on cnn. make sure you tune in. that's it for us tonight. thanks for watching. it delivers a whole mouth clean with a less intense taste. zero alcohol™. so it has the bad breath germ-killing power of this... [rock music]

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we're going to get this passed through the senate. i feel so confident. >> on to the senate. the republican bill to repeal and replace obamacare faces a steep climb. we'll look at what's in the bill, what's not, and whether it can ultimately pass the senate. good morning. welcome to "early start." i'm christine romans. >> i'm dave briggs. great to have you back! >> thank you. >> you battled through the flu in one day. >> did anything happen yesterday? did i miss anything? >> nothing. >> i missed nothing. >> nothing at all. it is friday, may 5th, cinco de mayo, 4:00 a.m. in the east and you didn't miss much. this morning it's just the battle to repeal and replace obamacare. it begins anew, now in