for hanging out with this hour. do not miss tomorrow's all-day coverage leading up to the president's first address to congress. we will be here but start your day at 6 a.m. with "morning joe," also in washington all day long. thanks for watching this hour of msnbc live. i'm hallie jackson. right now more with chris jansing in washington. hey, chris. >> thank you, hallie and friends. right now the obamacare battle. president trump is meeting with health care insurance ceos right now. he's pushing congress to repeal and replace the affordable care act, what the ceos want and the big budget dilemma. and the president just announcing the huge increase in military spending but the big cuts elsewhere. >> this lab publwill be a publi

and national security budget. >> and the oscars take drama to a whole new level. what in the world happened to the envelope, please? >> this is not a joke. moonlight has won best picture. "moonlight" best picture. >> unbelievable. good morning, everyone. i'm chris jansing coming to you this morning from washington. we've already seen major new developments this morning at the white house. right now president trump is talking to health insurance executives about his promise to repeal and replace obamacare. before that the president talked about the new budget he'll soon send to congress. speaking here a meeting at the white house of the nation's governors. >> this budget will be a public safety and national security budget. very much based on those two with plenty of other things but very strong. and it will include an historic increase in defense spending to rebuild the depleted military of

the united states of america at a time we most need it. >> what we heard from the president just a very short time ago kind of sounding like a preview as he prepares to deliver his first address before a joint session of congress tomorrow night. peter alexander joins us live knew from the white house. what more have we been able to learn about the budget plan for the coming year? usually these are snooze fests. >> reporter: there's a new set of priorities that come with a new president. today according to several senior administration officials, the focus is going to be on, as you just played there, defense spending. among other things, a $54 billion increase in spending focused on homeland security and defense and other priorities. we'll put you up the graphic on our screen and give you a better understanding of exactly where these increases were going to be focused on. the items where these cuts will

be offset dollar for dollar in the word of one senior administration official are specifically other agencies that i'm told will include the state department and environmental protection agency. and also foreign aid, which is notable, because less than 1% of the federal budget is foreign aid. how you're able to raise spending from that large of a number and take it away from places like foreign aid remains to be seen how they propose doing that. finally senior officials here tell me that what will be untouched is social security, medicare and medicaid. those are the priorities as communicated by this administration within the last 30 minutes or so. and the number, the increase in spending will be $54 billion, specifically focused on defense spending. >> what do we know about what he's going to say tomorrow? this is not a state of the union just for people who may be confused about this. but it is a speech before a joint session of congress and it really is very much in the same

way a chance for him to make his case to the nation. >> you're exactly right. what we just talked about right there in terms of the budget will be among the priorities that the president lays out tomorrow as he communicated to the national governors, many of them who are in the room, in the state dining room as he visited with him. he said infrastructure, we're going to invest in infrastructure big, as he likes to describe it. he's going to give a better laying out of his plans with obamacare but insisting obamacare is failing under its own wait. he said repeal and replace remains on, though obviously there have been some frustrations expressed among some republicans that perhaps repairing is better than repealing arepeal repealing -- replacing. >> there's always so much going

on. peter alexander, thanks to you. i want to talk more about the budget plan the president talked about this morning. we've got a terrific panel here. howard dean, the former democratic governor of vermont and former dnc chair. ns msnbc business anchor ali velshi, hans nichonichol, per alexander. they're going to shrink the debt at the same time as doing all this. do the numbers add up? >> no. the increase in defense and homeland security spending, let's say conservatively it's $40 billion, we've seen some estimates that it might be $90 billion. in order to not raise the did have sit, you'd have to cut somewhere between 5, 6, 7, maybe up to 9% on average through other departments. they probably won't do an average cut but they might eliminate some departments

entirely. but the bottom line is republicans in congress won't go for that degree of cutting. some of them won't even go for that increase in defense spending. so we know that raising taxes is off the table because donald trump and the republicans have said so. they actually want to cut taxes. so generally speaking if you're going to spend that kind of money, your only options are increase the deficit or increase taxes. since we know taxes aren't going up, it means a deficit increase. the administration is counting on a lot more economic growth but there's no particular reason we should expect that to happen. so generally speaking this means an increase in the deficit. >> so, howard, and that's something he said he definitely wasn't going to do but howard, one of the things they are going to be telling msnbc news, get your full political gear ready for us. what do you see coming? >> this is just nuts. talk about fake news.

the one thing i agree with republicans on often is money. the kato institute once ranked me as the fourth most conservative governor about money. you can't raise th defen and not attack medicaid i think it's great that the president promised not to attack medicaid because there's so many people that depend on that for their health care. you can't possibly do all these things. none of the investments are going to be made, none of the infrastructure is going to be built unless you double the daet. we're not in a good position to do that. i'm just shocked. i can't wait to see the actual budget because there's more funny money here than there is in the trump hotels. >> or the reaction from the republicans, who consider themselves to be fiscal conservatives. >> let me play a little more of what the president just had to say about his budget. >> we're going to do more with less and make the government lean and accountable to the people.

we can do so much more with the money we spend. with the $20 trillion in debt, can you imagine that, the government must learn to tighten its belt. something families all across the country have had to learn to do unfortunately. but they've had to learn to do it and they've done it well. my budget increase is spending and the increase in all spending for federal law enforcement also and activities having to do with law enforcement will be substantially increased and we will fight violent crime. >> all right, robert. help us understand a little bit here of the republicans' perspective. does this sound like a belt tightening to you, $40 to $90 billion on defense, increasing spending there. is this something you can see a republican congress getting on board with? >> i think so. here's why. republicans campaigned on this for the last 16 or 18 months. there's a couple things here as i understand it. one, i have not seen the actual budget numbers yet. i think we're all speculating so

i think we should stop hyperventilating for a moment and take a step back, see the numbers on paper over the next couple of days and then react. we have, as i understand it, w have -- we're dialing back on obously the wars, we're spending a little bit more on defense when it comes to these outdated resources if you will, we're also, as i understand it going to dial back on regulations that's going to save money and i think as governor dean mentioned a few moments ago or ali mentioned a few moments ago, we are anticipating unprecedented economic growth. those are rosie scenarios. whether or not they come out or not we shall see. republicans did campaign on a leaner government. and they did speak loud live back in november said let's give this a try. we'll see in a year from now whether or not it actually materializes or not. >> i just had a chance to sit down with some of the democratic governors who are in town. and their concern, it's not just the military but it's things like police departments. you don't want to be the one who

comes out and says i want less money for police departments but they're pointing out, folks, that crime is down. help us understand, hance nichols, is there a good sense of how this money is going to be spent if you're trying to make the case to the average american taxpayer this is why we need it and here's what it's going to go for, what's the answer? >> readiness. in one word that's the answer from the pentagon. they feel they have serious readiness problems, not enough combat brigades. they're actually functional, ready to go out and hit the ground. following up on robert's points on the numbers, they're talking about add 54 billion increase. we don't know what that's an increase from. if that's an increase from the sequester levels, the budget control act of 2011, i'm going to be a little wongy with the numbers here, that only gets you to $603 billion for the fiscal year of 2018. what they want, at least capitol hill does, congressional republicans, they want to get all the way to 640 billion.

this massive increasee're thinking we're talking about here and it does appear to be under the sequester, just the mb is talking about, they want to do it in some halls of pentagon, they want to bust the sequester and go all the way up to $640 billion, even claw back money around $18 billion that they thought they'd left on the table at the end of the year negotiations last year. so, yes, this looks like a big number increase but we don't know what that top line is and until it does, i'm with robert and we should maybe some hyperventilating. that's sometimes all we have at 11:00 in the morning. >> regardless of how you add those numbers, nobody can get below $29 billion. in my puny little world, i do hyperventilate even when we get to a billion. >> let me just go to howard really quickly. the democrats i've talked to are nervous about this. they're very nervous about it. when you talk to a governor of colorado or oregon about cuts in the epa, it makes them very

nervous. if you're in the democratic leadership and dnc got new leadership over the weekend, what's your strategy as this budget's about to roll out? >> well we shall do have to wait till we actually see the damage. i'm guessing we only have 11, 12 of them. i know what goes into budgets. you start talking about huge increases place and you got to cut something someplace else. we're going to hold medicaid harmless, social security harmless, add huge amounts of massive money for police and everything else and we're going to cut taxes. the average person watchin this, does this make sense to you? because it doesn't make sense to me. >> we're going toind out as the details come out and the president's got a very big speech tomorrow. gentlemen, good to see all of you, thank you so much. >> thank you, governor. >> up next, russia and the election, why a republican lawmaker is now calling for that

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a government can't function can our president talking about high level leaks. >> reporter: how big is the rcle of individual who have access to those transcripts? >> well, this is out of -- i didn't really realize this but evidently the way i understand the process is the last administration had it set up to go down to the state department and the i.c. and perhaps any of other stake holders within the nsc and appropriate people in the white house. we don't know how those got out but how are foreign leaders going to be able to talk to our president if they don't think that this is going to be leaked to the press. >> reporter: just to follow up on this question, because you said no contacts with the russian government. there are many russian businessmen, oligarchs, who

report back to the kremlin as part of their circle of intelligence gathering. have you eliminated that possibility, that the people that trump advisers were speaking with have connections to the russian government, even if they're not officially working for the russian government? >> we haven't eliminated anything. the only thing that i want to make sure that we do is before we go after american citizens and subpoena them or bring them before the legislative branch of government, that it's not just because they appeared in a news story somewhere. >> but you're still investigating then communications between trump campaign advisers and russians known to u.s. intelligence perhaps without reporting back to -- >> i would say it's not -- i wouldn't limit it to trump only or trump officials. i would say that it would be also any contacts with any political candidates anywhere at any level including in the united states or in foreign -- or foreign countries. >> are you saying there were clinton advisers that were speaking to -- >> no, no, no, let's not --

>> reporter: i'm just asking -- >> there would be no evidence of that, nor is there any evidence i've been presented about trump advisers speaking to the russians. but we do know for a long time that the russians have been very interested in manipulating elections, manipulating the press, they're very good at propaganda. so that's what caused me a year ago to come out and criticize the intelligence agencies for the largest intelligence failure since 9/11 because of the lack of good intelligence that we were getting on putin's plans and intentions. so that's why i really appreciate the amount of press that showed up here today because we do need to have some scrutiny put on to the russian government and we do need to know if there are any americans that are talking to the russians and anybody connected to the russian government or russian agents. but at this time i want to be veryareful that we can't just

go on a witch hunt against americans because they appear in a news story. >> so congressman devin nunez obviously talking about pretty broad level of investigation if he says any contacts with any political candidates, pushing back on the suggestion that it might have been somebody in the clinton campaign talking to the russians. also we have other breaking news, the president sitting down just moments ago with ceos of major health care companies, talking about obamacare, let's listen in. >> that's very impressive. we just had a great meeting with the governors on the horrible effects obamacare has had and we're going to change it and straighten it out and we're going to be talking about it during the speech and we'll talk about it right now because i think we'll get you on and we're going to like what you here. again, thank you for being here.

i want to thank also secretary tom price who is with us and who is doing a phenomenal job on a very complex subject, subject of health care. he's an advocate for the patients. tom is all about the patience. that's what he wants. he wants to have a great health care system. obamacare has been a disaster and it's only getting worse. last year alone obamacare premiums increased by double digits. since it has gone into effect, premiums are up by almost 100% in many areas. and i think that this year it's going to be really the year that i've always been predicted, 17 is going to be a catastrophic year for obamacare, for payments and you just take a look at what's happening in various states like arizona, i believe it was up 11 of%, it's going to be worse this year. obamacare forced providers to limit the plan options they offered to patients and caused them to drive prices way up. now a third of united states

counties are down to one insurer and the insurers are fleeing. you people know that better than anody. sincobamacare went into effect, nearly half of the insurers are stopped and have stopped from participating in the obamacare exchanges. it has gotten so bad that nearly 20 million americans have chosen to pay the penalty or sooefd -- received an exemption rather than buy insurance. they're dooiing that rather tha buying insurance. we must work together to create more competition and bring down prices substantially. the chaos that obamacare has created requires swift action. i told the republicans that if we did nothing, just did nothing

for a two-year period, let obamacare totally implode, which it's doing anyway that, would be from a political standpoint the best thing we can do, just let it implode, then the democrats will come begging to do something to help them out of the jam. once we start doing herit the p ours, but it's the right thing to do for the american people. i think allowing the disaster to go on is a mistake. i'm asking secretary price to work with you, stabilize the insurance markets and to ensure a smooth transition to the new plan. and the new plan will be a great plan for the patients, for the people and hopefully for the companies. it's going to be a very competitive plan. and costs will come down and i think the health care will go up very, very substantially. i think people are going to like it a lot. we've taken the best of everything we can take. it's our hope that democrats will stop the obstruction and resistance and that's what they have.

they have a sign sist, resist. they want to resist everything, including cabinet members. they have many cabinet members that haven't been approved yet. people that are extraordinary, all of whom are going to be approved but they just take forever. it's called obstruct and resist. i hope i didn't give them a new phrase because their rephrase is resist. i think i just gave them another word. i shouldn't have done that. i'm going to brand it. you're going to see them now come out and "obstruct and resist" and they work with us. and we are going to hopefully work with the democrats because ultimately we're all people that love this country and we want to do the right thing, including reforms like expanded health care, savings accounts, state flexibility and the ability to purchase across state lines. the state lines are so important for competition. everybody's wanting to do it for years. what's not to do? so that's going to be very important. i want to thank you all for being here, i want to know and i want you to know that it's an

honor to do business with you, it's a great honor to have you in the white house and we look forward to providing health care that is extraordinary. better than any other country anywhere in the world and we can do that. we have the talent, we have the capacity and we have the people. so we'll work on that together. and maybe before the press leaves, we can just introduce yourself and your company and the public will get to see what you're about and then if things aren't working out, i'm blaming you anyway, you know that. so we'll start with brad. >> thank you, mr. president. i'm brad wilson, ceo of blue cross and blue shield of north carolina. pleased to represent our 3.9 million customers here today. >> great job. >> matt isles, i represent america's health insurance plans, we represent all plans

including plans to cover manningamanninaged care. >> i'm steve helmsley from united health group. we're a diversified health care company, we have about 230,000 employees, we serve about 120 americans and weep are contributing in terms of jobs, jobs, 35,000 in the last five years, over 10,000 in the coming year. and we're a mission-driven enterprise, help people have healthier lives, make the system work for everyone. >> from significacigna corporat. >> we represent 108 million. >> that's a pretty big group, right? >> yes, it is. >> i'm joe swedish with anthem. we're in 14 states representing 40% of the american public. we have 40 million members and

we've been involved in individuals for probably seven decades and deeply embedded in the affordable care act situation that has evolved over the last three years. i don't want to miss you the opportunity to thank you for the swift and decisive action regarding some adjustments that have occurred around special enrollments. >> it was going to be an implosion. i had to step in. >> i'm from kaiser permanent. we are an integrated delivery system so we both provide the coverage and the care. we have a medical group that contracts exclusively with kaiser foundation health flplan and we're proud to care for 11.7 million people. >> i'm based in philadelphia, independence blue cross, independence health group, we're in 32 states and the district of

colombia. and we're the only player on exchange in the five-county philadelphia area. again, i'd like to echo joe's point. we were thrilled with the initial steps to stabilize the market. we look forward to working with you, vice president pence, secretary price in making sure that we have a sustainable program for years to come. so thank you. >> thank you very much, dan. and the market, as you know, when we talk about stabilizing the market, the market is disastrous. it's going to absolutely implode. it's why we're meeting today and people are going to come up with something where not only will the market be great but the people are going to be taken care of. so we will work that out. i think quite easily actually. thank you very much. thank you, everybody. >> mr. president, do you support a special prosecutor on russia? >> thank you, friends. thank you. take care. bye-bye. >> president trump, who has learned the art of ignoring the

shouted question. nbc's kristen welker is at the white house. she was in that room with the president. and chief business correspondent ali velshi is in new york. thank you, kristen, for rushing to the camera, after hearing the president say things like we need to save americans from obamacare, he talks about it imploding. is it clear within the white house that there's a unified view about how to make that happen? >> it's not clear, chris. it's one of the thorny topics here, how to proceed. of course this comes on the heels of last week we got our first glimpse at the top republican proposal for repealing and replacing obamacare and it would call for getting rid o the individual ndate, capping the medicaid expansion among other major changes. now i've been talking to top republicans on capitol hill. they say, look, their goal is to put some of the power back in the hands of the states, to regulate this. but of course a lot of questions

about whether or not those with preexisting conditions will continue to get the same coverage that they have right now under obamacare. so you heard the president -- i just thought it was striking talk about the fact that politically speaking the wiser thing might be to allow obamacare, in his words, to implode. he acknowledges republicans are going to own this now. however, you heard him make the point he thinks it's the right thing to do. but, chris, there's a lot of pressure and a lot of buzz on both sides of pennsylvania avenue that this is a lot tougher than anyone anticipated because they need to not only replace it but make sure that the 20 million people who now have health care coverage, who didn't before obamacare, continue to have that type of protection in place, chris. >> that really was striking, kristen. ali, when you look at this and you talk to democrats, the confidence that they have about the future of obamacare is tied to the fact that they don't believe for a second that republicans in those individual districts where there have been town halls, with people

shouting, that they're going to allow this to go ay. but many of them, include being the governors, will acknowledge the fact that there needs to be a stabilizing of the market, there need to be more people who get into the system. is it clear what a plan could look like that would help to do that? >> no. and that's why i thought the last sentence that donald trump used, which is one that he's used a lot during the campaign is that it's going to be easy. i remind you that hillary clinton when she was first lady tried to do something with health care. it wasn't easy. president obama came in and said he didn't want a mandate. he didn't want to force everybody to pay in. after he looked at the mathematics, the actuarial studies and economics, they realized it's like people who live in florida and have to have a wind pool for hurricane insurance, it's just not easy. this is a good and useful conversation he's having and i hope those insurers are frank with him. they make plans based on five and ten-year projections and

it's going to be very difficult. the leaked responses about what the new health care plan to replace obamacare is going to look like is indicating that many millions of people will be dropped off of the plan. so this is politically very difficult but more important it's mathematic, it's economics and it's actuarial. that health insurance to help the president understand if he's going to repeal obamacare and what that replacements needs to look like. >> joining me now is raja. if the numbers that i looked up are accurate, there are 3 million people in your state who depend just on medicaid for their health care, 50% of the children. when you hear the things that president trump just said,

what's your reaction? >> well, i'm very concerned. i had a town hall meeting on friday night. we had an overflow crowd of 300 people and thousands of people apparently were watching on facebook live. the overwhelming sentiment from this group of people, including independents and others was don't repeal obamacare. >> but when you say and others, others, were there republicans there or -- >> yeah, yes, yes. >> the criticirom the republics is that the democrats are organizing bus loads of people, bringing them particularly to the republican town hall meetings. >> these are constituents. i'm hearing from people all across the spectrum, mend it but doesn't end it. you can tweak and fix what needs to be fixed -- >> is a tweak enough?

maybe overhaul is too big a word for most democrats? but does it need to be big are than a tweak? >> i think it needs to be repaired. one of the things we have to do is get some of those young invincibles to join the plan to broaden the risk pool and lower the costs. i don't think we have the necessarily the best ideas on repairing but repealing this would be an economic catastrophe, not to mention the fact that it would rob 20 million people of their health coverage and rob the people on employer-sponsored plan on those important consumer protections, such as an end to discrimination for people with preexisting conditions, as well as allowing children to stay on parents' plans until the age of 26 and no lifetime caps. these are things that a lot of

people rely on, including my guest who is coming tomorrow, deborah youngblood, who whout this bar against preexisting conditions under obamacare would not have health insurance. this is very serious. we're talking about real people's lives. >> congressman, let me ask you about the last shouted question, they asked about the possibility of a special prosecutor, would they support that. a lot of people were surprised when darrell issa said you cannot have somebody, a friend of mine, jeff sessions, who is on the campaign and who is an appointee looking into this, you need to use a special prosecutor. you want your committee to do an in-depth deep drive on this. are you convinced that somehow, some way americans are going to learn the truth about what happened here? >> it interesting. after the oscar controversy last night, it looks like price waterhouse cooper will investigate that controversy before we figure out what exactly are the ties between the

white house and the kremlin. right now i would favor any type of investigation, whether it's by a special prosecutor or by our committee. this is going on beyond party. congressman isice issa is favor investigation. senate records like lindsay and mccain are doing the same. we have to find out to learn essentially how to protect our national security. >> thank you for taking the time. >> thank you so much, chris. >> this morning i did talk with three democratic governors, all the governors in town. they were at dinner with trump, they met with him this morning, they talked a lot about this health care reform. we're going to hear from them next. >> why would you pull the rug out from underneath these struggling families? why would you rip out their health care from them? (becky) i've seen such a change

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>> he did sanction contractors that participated in the hacking. i guess the question is if general flynn telegraphed to the russian ambassador, that those sanctions, whether or not you think this were serious enough or strong enough, would be eased or lifted, would that not be concerning -- >> so let me be very clear. i think that just when i apply common sense to this, those were not sanctions, those were petty, they're not taken seriously by anybody who knows this. when everything conversation i ever had about russia sanctions with any allies, it's always been about the russia sanctions dealing with the invasion of ukraine. >> you realize there were sanctions imposed -- >> you guys can call them that if you want. but i wouldn't call them that. >> that's what they were called by the white house. but the question is did general flynn in any way suggest to the russian ambassador that he didn't have to worry that vladimir -- that vladimir putin

didn't have to worry about these sanctions because president trump would either ease or lift them? >> i think that if the discussions incurred around ensuring that there was no overreaction by the russian government so that the new administration could do like all the other previous administrations who think that they can work with putin, which all three have been wrong, that they cannot work with putin, if that was what general flynn did was just to try to keep the lines of communication open and to make sure the russians didn't jo overreact and maybe have some reciprocal attacks on our diplomats or other ebmbassies around the world, that did us a big favor and we should be thanking him and now -- >> it didn't sound like doesn't worry about what the president just announced, we're goingo do something different when we get -- >> i don't know if that was

said. if it was said, i don't know if that's the problem. that's what he should be -- so you want to investigate the logan act in you're a logan act guy? that's ridiculous. the logan act. you guys all know that's ridiculous. >> and so are you going to subpoena trump's tax returns? >> no, we're not going to do that. >> this question about -- you said if i understood correctly, i don't know why he should because he didn't know of any investigation going on. >> i don't think there's any evidence to go after anyone at this point is my point. at that point, it would be up to the attorney general and others. >> reporter: is the fbi not investigating -- >> the fbi should always be investigating leaks. i would hope that they're taking the leaks that have occurred over the course of the last couple months very seriously and i would hope they're investigating but they're not going to comment on those nor should they. >> reporter: one other thing, if

you are looking into leaks, is that rolled into the rest of the vags sp. >> it will all be rolled into the investigation. >> your democratic colleagues are not here today -- >> some tough questions for devin nunes there. including from our own kasie hunt. i'm joined by mark murray. we're both struck by the tone of what we're hearing. what did russia do, who talked to them and who knew about it? they're not going away. >> and they're not going to go away. darrell issa said we need a special prosecutor. and one ofhe reasons why there are some republicans who might find themselves in a very tough 2018 battle for reelection is they don't want to answer these types of question, what are you doing about russia? sometimes the easiest thing for a member of congress to do is let's push this off on a special

prosecutor i don't have to answer this anymore. >> one does not preempt the other necessarily. >> no, not at all. chairman nunnes was a vociferous advocate for donald trump. on the other hand the dynamic we're seeing on the senate intelligence committee with some people like susan collins who ended up saying over the weekend that she wants full public report on whatever they end up finding, there's a little bit of a contrast there. >> and the question that we just heard, will you consider subpoenaing the tax returns because that's what the democrats have been saying. we need to know exactly trump's dealings were with russians. so where is this all going? >> we still talk about it. and you have people like congressman nunnes who said there's no sign of wrong doing yet, there th is too early to say. >> is getting over their skis. ornd you have senators like john

mccain and lindsay graey graham telling people this is a very serious story. when a party is split on one thing to do, that's never good news because it shows their flank is potentially exposed on this. >> mark murray, always good to see you. >> we'll be right back with my interview with three democratic governors. they just met with the presidt. we'll be right back. will your business be ready when growth presents itself? american express open cards can help you take on a new job, or fill a big order or expand your office and take on whatever comes next. find out how american express cards and services can help prepare you for growth at open.com.

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breaking news where republican and democratic governors have just met with the president. this is the republican governor of kentucky, matt bennett. >> to the american people that we can no longer afford. >> you want to say something? >> i think it's important for the american people to know that the governors around our nation are highly engaged in talking to the president and the vice-president. we know that americans want to have access tocare, but when your care is unaffordable, when your insuranceremiums are going up so high, in fact, i heard one story of a man making $80,000 a year to support his family but his insurance premiums were $2500 a month with a big deductible. that's not access to care. that's not affordable. so the affordable care act is no longer affordable and doesn't create access because if you got a card and it says you have insurance but you can't afford the deductible and the premiums, then how are you going to get access to care? so we want to talk about that we

as governors understand that healthcare and your health itself is one of the most important things that a family has to consider. we got to have a healthy work force, we got to have sustainable system that works for our nation that doesn't cause us to go into debt, which we already are. we already have a $22 trillion debt. and for us as governors, we have rising costs of medicaid and private businesses have rising costs of health insurance itself. so we have to have a system that works for all the people, but we want the american people to know that as governors we're going to do everything we can to make sure that we have compassion and that we help develop a system transformative system that will create flexibility for our states so that we can provide solutions within our own states and we, frankly, think that we can provide those solutions and we have a president and a vice-president that's willing to listen to us. i know just since i've been here the last couple of days i've had four meetings with the vice-president. that's remarkable.

i've had two meetings with the president. i met with the secretary of health and human services two or three times now, as well as my fellow governors here. so i think the american people need to know we understand that the affordable care act is a big concern but we also understand they need to have health insurance coverage. we understand the costs are a problem. we also understand it's a problem for our states and our states' budgets. we're all collaborating, talking and working hard to stop this issue. >> i would put it in a little bit different perspective. everyone talks about repeal and replace, but if you step back from it -- >> so this has really been a series of reports from various governors. obviously they all say they want coverage for the people in their state. the problem is how do you get there. you heard what mary fallin had to say. a lot of republicans who basically want to blow up obamacare but no specific plan ahead. i sat down with three democratic governors from colorado, from

oregon, and connecticut. they were talking about this report that republican governor john kasich met with president trump late last week and trump was really reconsidering how he felt about obamacare. then the next day these three governors say they talked to top people in his administration and was like, that conversation never happened. here's part of my conversation with three democratic governors. >> we met with secretary price the day after kasich met with the president, and clearly there had been month change in the secretary's talking points overnight. and in fact, in a group of democrat and republican governors, kind of talked about how we were working on a plan that would take medicaid away from a lot of people. there's no democrat working on a plan that would take medicaid away from people. there's no one who would shutter hospitals away or take away the millions of jobs in our country that that would do. >> we now have created 20,000 to

40,000 jobs as a result of those federal investments in healthcare. those are jobs that we're going to lose in urban oregon and rural oregon. that's devastating to our communities that are still struggling to recover from this recession over the last couple of years. >> within the governors, we hear all the stories about the republican governors are involved in this discussion, that discussion. no democrats are involved. it's almost like it's like a back-room deal that's kind of setting up. then you're going to have to take it or leave it. >> senator murkly had 3,000 people show up at his town hall. they're very concerned. they don't want oregonians to lose their healthcare. >> and i've watched people get up in those things and talk about their home, their city, their community, and the effects that taking away healthcare will have on them. i've watched women stand up and say that they would be dead of breast cancer but for the ability to have obtained treatment. i've watched disabled people talk about how they rely on the government to help them get through the day.

we have to start telling the truth in washington. people are hurting. there's a proposal that's going to take away their healthcare. how would you feel? >> there are a number of republican governors who expanded medicaid under the affordable care act, took the commitment that the federal government made on face value and said, okay, based on this commitment we're going to go forward and do this. and i think they are standing side by side with democratic governors and say they don't want to cut back on who gets coverage. >> we particularly don't want to cut back on who gets coverage to give a tax break to millionaires. >> all weekend i spent as much time with republicans if not more, i spent more time with republican governors than democratic governors. you're trying to steal each other's best ideas, make them a little better and then hope that they steal them back from us, right? >> this is going to continue to be a big breaking news story today because, again, president trump right now meeting with healthcare ceos. so we're going to continue to follow that. we have another big breaking news story this hour. let's go to nbc capitol hill

correspondent kasie hunt who's been live on capitol hill, was there for what seemed, from what we watched, to be a sometimes contentious exchange between members of the press and nunez. tell us a little about what's going on there. >> reporter: really fascinating development, here, chris, in the saga of these investigations into russian meddling in the u.s. election and of course whether there were contacts between the trump campaign and russian officials at any point. this of course all centers on that "new york times" story that came out mentioning thr people in the trump campaign orbit, that that story said we talking to russian officials. we should note that nbc's reporting slightly different from what was reported in that story, saying that there were russians, not necessarily russian intelligence officials. that's the question that has really been at main issue here. but nunez, the chairman of the intelligence committee on the house side, was pressed repeatedly about what evidence he has or hasn't seen related to

these potential contacts, to michael flynn's calls to the russian ambassador and other issues. take a look at a little bit of what just played out. >> not that i'm aware of. we still have not seen any evidence of anyone from the trump campaign or any other campaign for that matter that's communicated with the russian government. there's been major crimes that have been committed and what i'm concerned about is no one is focusing on major leaks that have occurred here. >> reporter: so, mr. nunez also said that the president himself had had no contacts with russians that he was aware of. he said he was briefed on michael flynn's phone calls with the ambassador to russia but that he had not seen the transcript of those phone calls. he seemed very concerned about the idea that crimes had been committed around these leaks. he said that they should be able to trace inside the u.s.

government who knew about these conversations that flynn was having with the russian ambassador as well as where those potential calls and logs of calls between any russians or russian officials and trump campaign officials came from and that they want to try to hunt that down. he seemed very focused on the leak aspect of this investigation. he also said -- and i pushed him on this point. he's saying and has been pushing back against these reports that there were contacts with russians. he talked about mccarthyism. he said i'm not going to drag three americans with no evidence before my committee to make them testify here. but is essentially relying on the word of the intelligence officials that he's been talking to and he wouldn't name who they were or specific the agency but he did acknowledge that his committee's investigation is still in the relatively preliminary stages. they have defined the scope of their investigation so they've essentially put together a document that says, okay, we're going to go to the intelligence agencies and ask them for these

pieces of information, but they haven't actually received that information yet. so he's essentially going on the word of these intelligence community officials. chris. >> kasie from capitol hill, thank you for that. thanks to all of you for watching this hour of msnbc live. i'm chris jansing. right now, andrea mitchell reports. >> thank you, chris, right across the table from me. develops over diplomacy, a day before president trump makes his first address to the first session of congress. a big boost for defense and homeland security, drastic cuts in environmental protection, diplomacy and foreign aid. >> this budget will be a public safety and national security budget very much based on those two with plenty of other things but very strong. and it will include an historic increase in defense spending to rebuild the depleted military of the united states of america at

a time we most need it. [ applause ] >> the russian connection, a leading house republican says an independent prosecutor needs to take over the investigation into russia's role in the campaign. even if the white house takes extraordinary steps to track down leaks on its own staff. >> you're going to need to use the special prosecutor's statute and office to take not just to recuse. you can't just give it to your deputy. that's another political appointee. >> i think we all need answers. whether or not the special prosecutor is the right way to go or not, you're talking to the wrong guy. i'm not sure the right avenue to take. i am sure though that that question needs to be answered. >> we'll have more on that exclusive oday" show interview. moments ago, the chair of the house intelligence committee, david nunez, rejected the idea of a special prosecutor. and trump's war against the pr