♪ i'm dr. kelsey mcneely and some day you might be calling me an energy farmer. ♪ energy lives here. hi, everybody. great to have you with me. good morning. i'm thomas roberts here at msnbc world headquarters. it is 9:00 in the east, 6:00 a.m. out west. it is a high stakes election out west and one that will decide europe's future and you are looking live at the polling centers in paris and voters there are choosing a new president after a bitter campaign and a hacking attack similar to what we went through in 2016 here in the states. we've got the latest on that and a last-minute security scare at one of the country's landmarks and then testimony tomorrow from a former top justice department official about russian interference in the u.s.

election. what sally yates could reveal when she appears on capitol hill, and health care backlash, members of congress facing some pretty angry constituents when they go back home to hold these town halls about the votes and why one lawmaker's defense is gettg a lot of attention today. happening now in france, the polls are open in this historic presidential election and at the same time police in paris confirming to nbc an area at the louvre museum has been evacuated after a security alert there. here is a live look at polling centers there and the centrist president emmanuel macron has a celebration planned at this landmark later tonight. again, at the louvre. the election pits two radically different candidates together. matt bradley is in paris with more on this. the effect of the hacking attack, while there has been somewhat of a internet blackout for voters to hear about it. >> reporter: thanks, thomas, and good morning.

there were many fears that there would be mass abstentions because everybody thought voters here in france were so frustrated with both of the candidates who as you mentioned are coming from two dimeticry opposing views from europe and the world. the midday poll numbers just shows that there is actually going to be -- that actually, the turnout has been consist went years past, only slightly lower. now so far, these numbers are showing that there's quite a bit to worry about here as you mentioned. there was a security scare at the site of what would be emmanuel macron's victory party at the louvre museum. this is the most visited museum in the world. what msnbc has confirmed with police is there was a lone bag that was found at this party and this is hours before this party was set to begin. so police just took the extra precaution of evacuating the whole area and they've now actually announced that everything is fine, that there was no real security threat.

so this was a major risk and the reason why people are so concerned about this is because they're actually worried that there was a terrorist attack just days before the last round two weeks ago. so poll his that last round correct. they said marine le pen and emmanuel macron will run together and let's see if they get it right in five hours when the voting ends here in france, thomas? >> when we talk about voting ending, when do we expect to have any kind of official tally on whether or not it is le pen or macron? >> reporter: well, like i said, we are expecting macron to win by 20% and we will know very shortly after the polls close here about 8:00 paris time, about 2:00 your time, thomas. last time during the first round the results came out very quickly and i was actually surprised and it came out almost moments after the polls ended

and we're expecting that kind of fast reaction this time around. >> the prelim polls in france did have a better bellwether of what the people were feeling to accurately portray the results of that. we'll see how that happens today, matt. we'll touch back with you there in paris as we continue to watch this. matt bradley reporting for us. thank you. a bit of uncertainty in the white house after the healthcare bill heads to the senate and here is kellyanne conway last night. >> leader mcconnell and the president have a great relationship and they speak regularly and the senate started working on their bill before the house even passed their version. so everyone knows that this will take some time and we'll see what comes of it. meanwhile, republican congressman raul labrador is facing backlash at comments he made at a town hall and here's the clip and it's since gone viral.

>> people on medicaid accept dying. >> no one wants anybody to die. that line is so indefensible. nobody dies if -- >> president trump is wrapping up his weekend and is standing by his decision to stay at one of his personally branded golf resorts. >> the reason i'm stayinging i bedminister, new jersey, is that it is much more expensive and disruptive. meetings. kelly, let's talk about what's on the president this week and any type of preview information they're getting ahead of before sally yates' testimony. >> reporter: well, the white house is not talking about that, thomas. they've been trying to keep their distance from it. today the president is at his bedminister home and he's had readings and we have no doubt that he's had meetings for what

he describes as a working weekend. he did have a call with the peruvian president and we expect he'll go back to washington, d.c this evening and it allows him to spend more of the day here compared when he was in florida in weekends and he would leave mid-afternoon and he'll get a full day here and tomorrow there will be an opportunity for the public to hear for the very first time from an official who has been in two very important issues with respect to president trump. sally yates lost her job at the justice department because she would not enforce his controversial travel ban, but the reason that she will be in front of senators and a committee that's looking at the russia question is because when she was in the role of acting attorney general she went to the white house with a warning about rausch and about michael flynn, and so even as the white house says the investigations need to go forward, they're not getting involved and it would be hard for them to avoid the issue tomorrow. fired by president trump.

former top justice department official sale yates has a story to tell monday about ousted national security adviser michael flynn. the white house said in march it was okay for yates to go public. >> if they choose to move forward, great. we have no problem with her testifying. >> reporter: yates who was briefly acting attorney general -- >> i believe that we can work together. >> reporter: warned the trump white house in january that flynn had misled officials about his contacts with the russian ambassador. former obama director of national intelligence james clapper is also expected to testify tomorrow as part of a senate russia investigation. turning to the fallout over health care, saturday outside buffalo, new york -- >> vote him out! >> republican congressman tom reed faced angry constituents in a series of town hall meetings.

>> re-defended his vote for the gop health care plan. >> i totally understand it and empathize with the fear, the anxiety because we are talking about health care. it's a very personal situation. >> reporter: closer to home, the president's weekend home in bedminster, new jersey, an unusual drive-by protested saturday, a line of a few dozen cars passed outside president trump's golf resort where local police prevented them from stopping. demonstrators then met nearby. >> want the people of this community to know that we don't all agree with him. >> reporter: others defended the longtime working resident who is now president. >> he's a hard working guy that has a day off. >> reporter: the president is at his golf resort and he is more than a golf course. he and members of his family have homes on the property, and he has worked with the community of bedminster to get an

expansion of one of those homes it is notable when the president is tweeting about the beautiful community of bedminster and they're part of the story out here, as well. the president using twit tore talk about russia, but says the democrats' connections to russia should be examined by the media and he tweeted that this morning. clearly, he is aware of the criticisms of russia surrounding the white house and the trump team and saying the democrats should be looked at, as well, because it was in fact, dnc email that was hacked. the president trying to get us to look over there. >> kelly o'donnell reporting from new jersey. thank you very much. i want to bring in congresswoman debbie dingle, democrat of michigan. i hope you were able to hear your colleague raul labrador in his town hall saying that, quote, nobody dies because they don't have access to health care. is this more about semantics at

this point? the word access to health care as opposed to the phrase affordable health care? >> you know, quite frankly, i don't think any of this semantics. people are afraid of what will happen. it is a very bad bill that people who need health care the post are worried about what will happen to their costs. in some ways you talk about semantics and i say all of us have access to be able to buy, but how many of us can afford it? >> correct. >> and what happened in the house this week is going to increase costs most dramatically for those who need it the most, the sick and the vulnerable. i personally don't believe a senior is a person in their 50s, but when you get into the 50s they'll pay five times more. they're scared. what's going to happen to them? >> we dive deeper into this is that it really reveals a big tax cut for the wealthy and is that

the intended goal of this because it's really not much of repeal, replace or even a reform of obamacare. it's now trumpcare which is a big tax cut. >> it's a trillion dollar tax cut to all of his friends in the cabinet and the wealthiest in our communities and we've even got republican governors. i'm sitting here in michigan. our republican governor has said that this is a bad plan. healthy michigan reduce the uninsured in michigan by 50%. the governor is worried about what's going to happen to those people and that's happening in states across the country. we've got to make sure that if -- i'm sorry, i believe that if you live in this country you do have a right to quality, affordable health care and he can say nobody dies, and i have met person after person who doesn't go they're sick until they're about to die when they end up in the emergency room and quite frankly, some of them do. >> congresswoman, the vote was so close within only a few

points to give house gop members this win. could democrats have done something differently? >> i don't know what that means because people weren't talking to each other which is one of the problems. republicans wanted to get this bill through. i've said from the beginning affordable care is not perfect. we need to work to fix pieces of it and why not create a public option in many of the states and we need to do something about prescription drugs and republicans aren't interested in fixing this bill and they're interested in the trillion dollar tax cut you talked about and many, if i'm not saying all, there were some republicans that voted against the bill and the republicans that were uncomfortable about their vote. their arms and legs were really broken on this vote. >> what about the tuesday morning people and the freedom caucus folks of the gop? we know that this has been tried before. paul ryan wasn't even able to bring it to the floor for a vote. it was canceled and what was the

outreach to those concerned congress people of the republican party to talk about this and maybe not be at this position where we are now? >> i wasn't in those meetings. i don't want to speculate about meetings that i wasn't in. freedom caucus clearly had very different issues while i was grateful that they kept the vote from happening a month ago i'm not going to agree with them and we have a philosophical difference. i know that many republicans that are pat of the tuesday group are deeply bothered by what this bill would do and are praying that the senate is going to fix it in some way or that the bill that passed in the house would never be seen. you know what makes meed saddest about that? this isn't a game of words between two political parties. i was at two health care events yesterday. a breast cancer summit at the university of michigan and the heart walk, there are real people that are scared to death about what this means for them. >> it really is when we think

about the drilling down choices being used by republicans in their houn halls when they talk about this and if they're describing this to fool people into thinking that they will have insurance because they have access to it is wrong, and so it really is a game of being, you know, cautious about the word choices and being honest while we talk about this, and if we do that the senate has the big option right now and most of the colleagues on the senate side have said they're going to go back to the majority and there are 13 men on the senate side reviewing this. what's your reaction to that and why isn't there a woman involved over on the senate side at all? >> look, it deeply disturbed me. i watched in shock the picture in the rose garden after what happened in the house. i really wanted to cry, and when i say it's not a game and they're treating it like a game and for the people i represent

and for the people across the country it's not a game. you see the picture in the rose garden you realize who it is that is celebrating this and then hear that it's the 13 white boys, sorry to say it that way, that are going to be doing this in the senate. i am very concerned. we lost the essential services package in the house so that pregnancy is not -- delivering a baby, having maternal ben if is is no longer an essential benefit. mental health, substance abuse. these are real issues in everyday lives and these guys don't live these kinds of issues every day. one of the reasons that i feel like i'm able and we need to have more women. we're the caregivers and we are the ones dealing with these issues every day in real life. didn't ask for it, but it's our reality and we're meeting people, we're talking to people, we understand and we need people in a room that understand what it really means to everyday people. >> congresswoman debbie dingell

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the president showed patience and vigilance, and he worked the phones. he and the vice president, they worked the phones and held personal meetings and he asked people what will get you to yes? is there a way for us because he's always very open to other people's ideas and inputs. >> there we have kellyanne conway, counselor to president trump in an interview on his and vice president pence's efforts to get the house health care bill to pass. the president himself tweeting just a few minutes ago

republican senators will not let the people down. obamacare premiums and deductibles are a lie and it is dead. also nile stanich, white house columnist at the hill. nile, josh, great to have you both here. let's start with here. it was a lie and it's dead. josh, it's not really dead. >> no, it's not dead. there are significant problems in many states obamacare markets and it depends on the decisions made at the state level. iowa, for example, is possibly going to be in a situation with no insurers participating in the exchange in post counties and you have other states when the market is much more robust in cases like minnesota and alaska because lawmakers have taken steps to shore up their program. it's not dead, but it's certainly true there are problems. the main concern people have is what happens ends up being looking like the house bill you're going to have a lot of people who simply can't afford to buy insurance anymore because the subsidies that they received to purchase insurance will be a

lot less generous than they are under obamacare that could worsen the situation of these markets and make the programs more dead in a lot of states. >> nile, we know this was razor thin for the house gop members and now it goes over to the senate and we have 13 male senators working on this and many of them have said they want to come up to square one. how involved is the white house going to be in this and what is the relationship that president trump and vice president pence have with these senators? >> it's an interesting question because clearly the white house is trying to put pressure on and we see that in the tweet that you just read out there, thomas, but i think that one of the interesting things about this is that lawmakers on capitol hill behind the scenes have pretty mixed feelings about the white house trying to railroad them into certain aks and thas caused a level of tension on capitol hill. vice president pence, whom you mentioned, is very much involved in this. he has existing relationships out there, but someone close to

the trump white house i spoke to earlier this week only put the chances of passage in the senate at about 50-50. so that shows i think how deep the doubts are behind the scenes. >> josh, are there moderate republicans that they have, you know, as nighal points out that want to see this go through, who are they? >> the problem of getting this through the senate is not just that you have moderate republicans in the senate. you have different republicans with different bills of what this bill ought to do. you've had senators write about how the concern cuts medicaid and there are constituents that rae lie on that because the state would have to end up to pick up slack for what the government wouldn't do anymore. senator lisa murr you can skows alaska and people have to buy insurance in the private markets and their states have rural areas with very high of tcosts e

lower subsidies would have a problem and it would be hard to drop a bill that satisfies people and also satisfies people like ted cruz and mike leigh who have a much more conservative vision for what the bill ought to do and the next question is if you can get something to pass the senate. if you go back to the house it's likely to be something far to the left than the house bill and you have the people in the house freedom caucus who rejected the first version of the bill as not being conservative enough? are they going to roll over and potentially more insurance regulation than the house bill that they blocked in march. so it's a very open question whether it gets through the senate and whether you can get the bill that can get through both houses. >> you have tom contin on the house side, and he's influential and vocal about what this means going forward? how seriously do you think senators are going to take him? >> i think they will take him seriously, and i think this goes

to the point where we focus naturally enough on the battle in the senate, but the battle really here is for public opinion. the first iteration of this bill was very unpopular according to opinion polls, with 17% approval and that's what republican lawmakers on both sides of capitol hill are concerned about, the idea that if they support this it is going to stick to them and they're going to own that decision. if this ends up being a disaster then something like that photo-op we saw in the white house rose garden, a celebratory occasion will become a real political liability and it will be the health care equivalent of the george w. bush mission accomplished when it turned out the mission was not at all accomplished and it became a problem for him. >> house gop members know this as trumpcare and we'll see what happens in the midterms on this, but i want to the switch topics because it is a big week for

folks in d.c. tomorrow with sally yates deciding on the senate panel on russian interference in the election and what they knew about mike flynn and what they told the trump team in respect to having him fired by the president because of not being forthright in his contact with sergei kislyak. the russian ambassador to the u.s. and the discussion on the sanctions. how much do you think we'll get out of yates' testimony and also about flynn? >> it's definitely clear that democrats have been eager to have sally yats on the record on this and that yates looks pretty eager to testify and then you saw the president trying to pre-butt this with his usual line with what about the democrats and why not let the fbi into their servers and this is not something the white house is eager for. i would note on the other hand, i think the most hazardous issue for this white house right now is the health care bill as you've watched the president's poll numbers bounce around and the worst episode for him has

been trying to move that bill through the house in march when you had had the 17% polling. while this issue is embarrassing for the white house donald trump would like people not to talk about it, and i also wonder whether this is preferable political ground compared to the substantively very unpopular thing they want to do. >> guys, i want to get you on the record for this, because we got a statement for jared kushner's attorney and i want to take you back a peg to the story that ran in the post about the kushner family and the pitch to chinese investors. they went to china the real estate investors asking them to pour hundreds of dollars into a real estate exchange for a new jersey project they have going on and in doing so they get an investor visa. jared kushner's attorney has told "the washington post" that kushner himself has divested from the family business when the family put up the slide show

in china they had a slide of the president in there saying that he makes big decisions about the eb-5 visas known as this investor visa described as a key decisionmaker. kushner, his attorney has said that kushner has no involvement in the company and divested his interest by selling into a family trust that he and his children, wife and children are not beneficiaries are. the office of unpublic ethics saying he will recuse himself that the eb-5 visa program, but not only think about this and the fact that there is a slide of the president and we know that he is a senior adviser to the president and the kushner family also had reporters thrown out of this event. so that they couldn't talk about it when kushner's sister was approached there was an angry man that said leave us alone. what does this do for the ethics, issues and impropriety

optics if kushner? >> it is not very helpful for him. clearly, there is always going to be an issue when someone has very complicated business interests, and i note what his lawyer has said there, but in a situation like that, you have to be rauultra careful about the optics, as we say and the optics in this instance seem pretty awful, quite frankly and there is the slide as you mentioned suggesting that donald trump would be in a position to somehow rule on the eb-5 visas, and that visa program is controversial in the first place and a lot of emphasis was put on the kushner family and people will think that's an attempt to get people to read between the leans and see a pretty clear message. >> it seems that some people have described this as a blatant cash grab before you get corrected for it. josh barrel, niles stanich, great to have you both on and lots to talk about in the weeks to come. >> we have a hacking attack on

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welcome back, everybody. good morning. i'm thomas roberts here at msnbc world headquarters in new york and at the half hour this is what we're watching. a wildfire in georgia has now burned more than 185 square miles in a wild life refuge forcing an evacuation of at least 75 home. dry and gusty winds fanned the lightning and sparked a fire to more than 1,000 acres and right now it's only 12% contained. now we'll take you back to politics if my voice comes back. the trump administration pushing back on criticisms of republicans and the health care bill as it heads to the senate. here's what tom price told my colleague andrea mitchell on the issue of $1 trillion in medicaid cuts that will happen coming up.

>> so what we're trying to do is to improve the medicaid system, make it more responsive to patients so there are more resources to be able to be utilized for the disabled and the aged. that makes a whole lot of sense. >> i think a lot of people will wonder how taking more than $800 billion out of something will put more resources in it. also new this morning, white house chief of staff reince priebus says the health care bill is far from the political suicide from republicans who voted in favor from it. >> there are some times in life that you have to do what's right and by the time that people see that the premiums are lower and the better service and there are more options and more choices. they're going to reward the republicans that stood up and said we're not going to see the obamacare system which is failing and collapsing and continuing any longer. we're going to do something better and we're going to do our

job as legislators to get this thing done. i think the republican party will be rewarded. >> everybody out on a limb with predictions about this as we go overseas and happening right now in france, the voting for the presidential election is under way. the centrist candidate emmanuel macron facing off against his far right national opponent marine le pen and joining us from paris, msnbc and nbc world news reporter. explain to everybody what's at stake here not just for france, but for how we understand the cohabitation of western europe? >> oh, and it's not just western europe. let's be really blunt here. the election of marine le pen would be the end of europe as we know it, and probably in some senses, the end of the world as we know it because what she's talking about doing is taking a central part of the european union, an absolutely founding member central part, france and taking it out of the european union, taking it out of the euro

and creating a situation where europe starts to break up once again. it's not just great britain floating off into the atlantic. it's the whole core of the european union falling apart. with all that that implies for nato and the alliance. so we would be looking at something we haven't seen since europe was put back together after world war ii and it would be a very dangerous proposition. >> christopher, what's the tone of frexit as it's been called since le pen has been described as the french trump and he has rolled back on his conversations when it comes to nato and unifying as an international, governing world body together? >> yeah, you know, trump, his famous remark, nato is obsolete and then the next thing you hear nato is not obsolete. there might be something of that from le pen, but i doubt it and

frankly, her little bit of waffling going into this election has absolutely confused people and made people who might have voted for her lose faith. i was talking to a taxi driver today who had every reason not to vote for mack ron since one of the things macron did was allow uber into france, and he was enthusiastically voting for macron. he said he thinkses a lot of good people are around him and the issue he brought up was marine le pen on europe. he said what does she think she's going to do? how is anything going to work if france pulls out of europe so he will vote this afternoon for macron, he said. >> a lot of parallels what's happening in france to what we had happen in the u.s. exit except that polling has been more on point for those in france. christopher dickey, we will talk to you later today. i know as we ramp up to the polls closing there in france. thank you, sir. so who was to blame for obamacare's replacement bill?

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welcome back, everybody. we have breaking news that north korea has detained another american citizen. a.p. and reuters are citing north korean state media saying the american workers at pyongyang university were detained yesterday. this makes the fourth american, if true, detained amid ongoing tensions between the u.s. and the communist state. a third american was detained last month. of course, we will keep you updated on this, and nbc news has not independently confirmed this story and . >> a nightmare ends for 80 nigeria know school girls and the mystery surrounding the kidnapping. coming up on "a.m. joy," president trump and the power of the bully pulpit.

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82 school girls are being reunited with their families after being kidnapped from boko haram three years ago. they were taken by the extremist group in 2014. 21 were released last year. kelly cobiella joins us more from london. explain this background on how this release was triggered. >> tom a good morning. this was a deal, we understand, that was months in the making. the international red cross along with the swiss government both helped to negotiate with the boko haram and the nigerian government. 82 girls freeded in return for an unknown number for boko haram extremists held by the nigerian government and we are seeing the first pictures of those girls tweeted out by the international red cross. a picture of them boarding a helicopter on their way to the capital today. they were wearing red cross shirts, treated by the international red cross along with the tweet, a happy sight

for families of missing loved ones and there you see that tweet right there, and it's difficult to identify any of the girls and as of early this morning, even though family members didn't know who was being freed. boko haram kidnapped 276 girls from their school back in 2014. the extremist group with ties to isis and the kidnapping sparked global outrage, as you remember and the social media campaign, as well, to free them. back in october, 21 girls were freed. we saw a little bit of that video earlier, and today the united nations special envoy for global education and former prime minister gordon brown said what is unknown at the moment is how many of the girls are still enslaved, but we must now urge authorities and negotiators not to give up until every one of them has been safely returned. thomas, we understand as many as 113 girls could still be unaccounted for. those girls who were freed today will meet with the nigerian president in the next hour or so

and be reunited with their families so obviously, some very ppy reunions today, thomas, and disappointment for the families of those girls who are still being held. >> bittersweet knowing that 82 were released, but there are still more than that in captivity or worse. kelly cobiella, thank you very much, kelly. winning the yes vote. how much politicking did president trump do to get the house to approve the gop health care. tonight on msnbc. former president obama will be presented by the john f. kennedy profile in courage award. chris matthews will host this for america's pioneering president. see things a bit differently thanks to pampers easy ups while they see their first underwear you see an easy way to potty train pampers easy ups our first and only training underwear with an all-around stretchy waistband and pampers' superior protection

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of the billboard music awards just by using your voice. the billboard music awards. sunday, may 21st eight seven central only on abc. the republican party now is working together. you have the white house, the house, the senate, the governors and the state legislatures. the democratic party as far as i can see is this collection of ad hoc protesters and there's no

cohesive message and no true leader. >> there we have the counselor to the president kellyanne conway explaining last night how the president was able to push his healthcare bill through the house. i want to bring in the robert traynham and krystal ball, senior fellow at the new leaders council. krystal, let me begin with you. are the democrats disorganized, there really is no leader? >> you know, in a sense i think she's right, actually. democrats have really been galvanized to resist trump and to oppose his agenda and his attempts to undermine some of our democratic norms and institutions. but you know, thomas, and this is what i write about in my book, we've really got to coalesce around a bold and fairly radical economic vision that's going to deal with the problems facing the country and that are roiling the world. we're in a place of transition and that's not a bad thing.

>> robert, let me talk to you about this. because of the celebration we saw with gop members of the house and other folks within the rose garden, this really isn't a repeal and replace of obamacare to a trumpcare situation. is this a president bush mission accomplished sign moment? >> well, i'm not sure about that. there's a version 2.0 of this as you know and that is what the senate will do. if i was a communications person in the house of representatives right now, i would have mentioned to the leadership that i thought this would be a bad idea. i do think this may come back and haunt them for two reasons. number one, i think the senate will have a radically different interpretation of this bill, but also number two to your question, thomas, this really is not about a repeal and replace, this is about stop and freeze if you will. but there still is a declarative -- there still isn't a declarative alternative to obamacare. so, look, i understand why the house of representatives did this. it's almost like they wanted to rally the troops and send some red meat to the base, but i'm

not sure it was smart politics long term. >> no, they look a little thirsty, you know? >> they were dancing on the grave before the body was formally dead yet. >> as we look at the next steps on this, krystal, make some predictions because we know this goes to the senate. they're going to make a lot of alterations to this and might not look like anything that came through the house. how much of a hot potato has this become? >> i honestly think mitch mcconnell is going to push this off as long as he possibly can because he's smart enough to know what just passed the house is absolutely political suicide. and it makes no sense either, because the first bill that they tried to pass and failed to, they actually took back and made worse and crueller and worked to kick more people off of health care and that somehow passed the house. so i think you're going to see a long process unfold here. i'm highly doubtful that they're actually able to come together and pass anything, because it's just a disaster for them

politically. >> robert, senate majority leader mitch mcconnell said he wants to wait for the cbo score before moving forward at all on this. did house members really walk the plank on this by voting without having that bipartisan effort and research to vote with? >> yes, absolutely. what the house did was look out for their own best interests. they wanted to actually do this so they can put a notch on the tree. they really don't care what the senate thinks about this. i think what's going to happen is they're probably over the next couple of months, will blame the senate, saying it's too slow too deliberative, too arcane. saying, look, we are the people's house, we did what the people wanted us to do and they're going to blame the senate, which of course is going to make mitch mcconnell's blood pressure rise very, very quickly. but, look, the reality is 2018 there are a lot of senate democrats that are up for re-election. so the company becomquestion be they do. a lot of those democrats are in

states president trump won pretty handily. so the question is whether or not mitch mcconnell can flex his muscle to come out with a more moderate bill that president trump would sign into law, we don't know. >> also forecasting what's going to happen in 2018, we have steve israel, the former chair of the dccc speaking to politico and talk about republicans saying this was a mirror image of the 2010 midterm election, moderate democrats in tough districts voted for an unpopular bill and 63 didn't come back. we owned the unintended consequences of obamacare and house republicans will own the unintended consequences of trumpcare. krystal, do you agree with this? >> absolutely. i ran in 2010, as you know, for congress and it was an ugly scene. and obamacare was more popular, much more so than this bill which was polling somewhere around 20% in the lastversion. when that cbo sco does come out and people realize what these folks just voted for, it's unbelievable. this is not a health care reform

panel, it is a tax cut for the wealthy at the expense primarily of the working poor, the sick and the elderly. i don't think that's what folks were voting for when they voted this supposed man of the people into the presidency. >> obamacare is more popular right now than president trump and the reviews that he has gotten just past that 100-day mark. now this is a first legislative win for them. robert, what do you think the pitfalls and also the pros are? because you have to look at this as this does put some giddy-up into president trump and what he is trying to do within that oval office. this is, you know, perception is reality in his point of view, a win. >> yeah, the reality is two things. one, 2018 is light years away so anything can change between now and 2018. in his defense, president trump did campaign on this and so this is a promise that he has kept. also the reality is also this, we've never -- to my knowledge, we've never, ever rescinded an

entitlement program, when it comes to medicare, social security, so it's really hard to take something away from people now that they have a tangible thing that they can point to, so i think republicans are going to be really -- have to be really careful about how they message this. yes, they voted to repeal this, but what are you for? what are you fighting for and what are you going to replace it with? i think that's the missing link here that republicans will have to answer to the american people for. >> krystal, you tweeted earlier about your pre-existing condition. how is your pre-existing condition? >> my little baby pre-existing condition is great. she is sleeping so she's actually here in the studio. we're doing very well. >> the newest intern. >> so we have to whisper. >> the newest summer intern is already on the scene. great to see you both. thank you very much. that's going to wrap up this hour of "msnbc live." coming up next on "a.m. joy" did president trump last week really fulfill that promise to the religious faithful? i'm thomas roberts. i'll see you again coming up

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for too long the federal government has used the power of the state as a weapon against people of faith. bullying and even punishing americans for following their religious beliefs. good morning and welcome to "a.m. joy." if you are spending this morning in a certain kind of christian conservative church rather than watching this show, you might have heard a version of that triumphant message. why? because donald trump handed the religious right that talking point this week when he signed an executive order on thursday. trump said his new order, which he's been promising since his campaign, protects pastors from the irs if they preach politics. something they are legally barred from doing if they want to keep their tax-exempt status under what's known as the johnson amendment. but