the alaska native heritage center and will look at preparing seafood for market from alaska glacier seafood incorporated. at 4:30 pm on reel america, watch four documentaries on alaska. the 1936 film, alaska silver millions. the 1949 film, eskimo hunters in northwestern alaska. the 1967 film, alaska centennial. and the 1944 film, alaska highway. watch alaska weekend saturday and sunday july 21 and 22nd. on the c-span networks. at c-span.org or listen with the free c-span radio app. >> in the coming weeks, the house will take up several bills making changes to the 2010 healthcare law peter sullivan of the hill, you been writing there are real political considerations to the debate. why do republican leaders in the house want to take up these bills? >> that's right. i think republicans are right

to push back on some of these democratic attacks. over rising obamacare premiums, the script has flipped this year. in the past it was republicans over these premiums and now democrats think this is an advantage they can blame republicans for the premium hikes had of the election this year. and so, with the votes next week republicans can try to push back on that and say, look, we are putting forward our own ideas about how to lower premiums and democrats are opposing this. this is kind of our way to push back and change the narrative. >> one of those measures would repeal the medical device tax. who does that tax hit and what are proponents saying they want to repeal it? >> that is part of obamacare. 2.3 percent tax on sales of medical devices. obviously, the medical device companies who make things like you know, knee replacements or that kind of thing.

they hate it.they been pushing to repeal it for a long time. you know, it's also been something that members of both parties have criticized as kind of hurting innovation, hurting jobs. so even some democrats have been a favorite repealing this. >> one of the political considerations you wrote about this in early july with the headline. at the hill.com. july 1 repeal medical device tax may -- the lawmaker is the author of the measure. how does this help or hurt his campaign? >> yeah, as you said, he is a sponsor. he is a republican in minnesota. it could help them because his district is home to a lot of medical companies, home to a lot of employees of these companies. who could benefit from this and

so calmly i think he is helping if this passes the house he can say look, this is an accomplishment for me. he can bring that back home to his district. >> you also had an article, gop looks to blunt democrats attempts on premium to what would these measures do specifically? >> yeah, there are a series of measures coming up next week in the house. one would expand what is called health savings accounts. which are basically tax-free ways for people to save for their healthcare costs. so expanding that, republicans can argue is helping people for their healthcare. and then a couple other, besides a medical device tax there is also delaying different obamacare tax called health insurance tax. that some critics say drives up premiums because health insurers have to pay the tax and in fact it is premiums. these are relatively minor bills but taken together, republicans are going to try and argue this is doing

something to help people with premiums. >> how do these bills tied to the overall republican effort? particularly house republican efforts to repeal, replace or remodel the 2010 healthcare law? >> these are definitely much smaller. it is not certainly, not close to full repeal or even being billed that way. i think republicans kind of realize that we are not successful last year. in the repeal efforts. a smaller scare effort that republicans i think would say this is something we would do in the meantime. while we wait for the senate to get enough republican votes to be able to do it more kind of full scale repeals. and you tweeted about senator collins that she calls the health and human services announcement possible importation of drugs to address the price spikes encouraging a step in the right direction. focusing on the trumpet missed ration plan for lowering healthcare cost.

are there any house or senate committee efforts on drug pricing that you are seeing that might come up this year? what might they be? >> this is been a big area for the administration. president trump has been doing a lot on this. i think probably kind of the executive action angle of it is going to be more prevalent. i think congress, people don't really expect there to be chances of a lot of action. they are in an election year is very controversial issue that i think a lot of lawmakers would really want to touch but the administration has been acting on its own and i think it's really stepping up its efforts on drug prices this year. >> peter sullivan with the hill. you can read his reporting@thehill.com. also on twitter peter sullivan four. >> thank you for having me. >> supreme court nominee brett

kavanaugh continues to meet on the hill. follow c-span leading up to the confirmation hearings and the vote. watch live on c-span. watch anytime on c-span.org. listen with the free c-span radio app. this weekend on american history tv. on c-span3. saturday at 6 pm eastern, on the civil war. william marble author of the book, lincolns mercenaries, explains economic factors that drove many poor northerners to volunteer. and at 8:00 on lectures in history, san diego state university professor, pierre -- on the vietnam war. from the u.s. military escalation in 1965. to the fall of saigon 10 years later. sunday at 11:00 a.m. , military historian patrick o'donnell in his book, the unknown. the untold story of the americas unknown soldier. and world war was most decorated heroes who brought it home. then at 4:30 pm eastern on reel america.

part of the alaska weekend, four films about alaska. the 1936 film, alaska's silver millions per the 1949 film, eskimo hunters in northwestern alaska. the 1967 film, alaska centennial. and the 1944 film, alaska highway. watch american history t.v. this weekend on c-span3. >> earlier today, secretary of state, mike pompeo and u.s. ambassador to the un, nikki haley. spoke to reporters after the meeting on north korea with the un security council. this is 10 minutes. >> good afternoon, everyone. first i want to commend my good friend, ambassador haley and her team here at the united nations.

her leadership in advancing american interest on north korea and many other issues has been evident here this morning. she's got a great team behind helping. so thank you. the main reason i came in today was to meet with members of the u.s. security council. -- un security council to south korea, japan as well to converc details and progress that was made. i also had an opportunity to meet with the un secretary general to discuss the topics and other topics as well. countries of the security council are united. on the need for final fully verified denuclearization of north korea. as agreed to by chairman kim. strict enforcement of sanctions is critical. to achieving this goal. members of the un security council and by extension, all un member states, have unanimously agreed to fully enforce sanctions on north korea. we expect them to honor the commitment.