want to bring back cnn plit cal analyst david drucker and john avlon. avid sanger with a great piece today in "the new york times." one of the big guess is why is russia doing this now, david? why is vladimir putin kicking out these u.s. personnel now and not last winter when barack obama, then president of the united states, first issue some of these types of sanctions? >> it's a fascinating question. you'll remember last winter he was urged by some in the incoming trump administration not to overreact. instead of throwing out diplomats, he invited the children of diplomats to come to a kremlin christmas party. so what's changed? the main thing that's changed is putin's calculus. i think he now recognizes that he is not going to get out of president trump the kind of change that mr. trump talked about during the campaign, a better relationship, not because mr. trump doesn't want it, but because congress has now taken control of this with a mix of democrats who are angry about russia's interference in the 2016 election and republicans who i think worry t

. >> david drucker, let me bring you in and talk about the politics of this. that moment when john mccain gave the thumbs down, and you see mitch mcconnell standing there at the corner of the desk. and he literally thumbs down, turns his back, turns his back on his colleague, gasps in the room. after the vote, here's what mitch mcconnell said. >> i regret that we're here. i want to say the vote i made is consistent with what we told the american people we'd try to accomplish. in four straight elections, if they gave us a chance. >> for those of us who know mitch mcconnell, you can tell he is seething there as he is sayi saying those words, "what we tried to accomplish in four straight elections." i would say, four straight elections? you should have had a plan. >> i think the problem was there were too many plans and they couldn't get to a consensus. i think the focus and clip you pulled is the perfect clip. the reason republicans were trying so hard to pass a bill, multiple bills that polling has shown are very unpopular with policies that people don't quite

let's get to it this morning with david drucker from the washington examiner. said. rather than repeating the same failed partisan process yet again, republican shoes start from scratch and work with democrats on a bill that lowers premiums, provides long term stability to the markets and improves our health care system. and john mccain from the hospital issuing a statement of saying we must not repeat the original mistakes that led to obamacare's failure. the congress must return to regular order, hold hearings, receive unpit ainput and producl that will finally provide americans access to affordable health care. they are back to square one. >> square one, yeah. >> let's see what happens over the next ten days to six, seven weeks. the house bill was dead and was dead for six weeks. and quietly republicans were working behind the scenes amongst themselves to craft a compromise which they were eventually able to pass. it's possible that going home for august recess and getting an earful from their constituents and time away from washington could help them find a

>> thanks, suzanne. >> errol louis, karoun demirjian and david drucker with us.ch mcconnell can't lose one more. one more in this thing is essentially sunk. one of the unwithes against is rand paul who has been pretty consistent. listen to what he said. >> i just came from the republican caucus. many other members behind closed doors are willing to admit it's not a repeal bill. this needs to be the discussion. our promise to the american people we would repeal obamacare. now it looks, if this bill goes through, we're voting to keep obamacare. >> the thing is, david drucker, there's no way to give rand paul what he wants or to give ted cruz or mike lee more of what they want without taking away from the susan collinses of the world. >> the republicans find themselves in a pickle here. so much of this, john, is because republicans, many of them have changed the position on the medicaid expansion. seven, eight years ago when we were covering the obamacare debate, the bill that eventually became the affordable care act, i couldn't find a republican that supported exp

back with us, john avlon, abby phillip, david drucker. abby, first of all, we're all hopeful that john mccain will recover quickly. i think every republican and democrat on capitol hill feels the same way. it is the remarkable that the absence of just one senator means this thing would have no hope of advancing any further. it shows the predicament that mitch mcconnell is in. >> yeah. they have absolutely no room for error here and working with people who are just kind of watching the way the wind is blowing here on this bill. i actually think rand paul is not quite identifying the problem here. i think everybody knows this bill is not full repeal. i think conservatives are fully aware of that. the question is how bad is it and how much are they willing to tolerate. i don't think anybody is under the delusions that this is going to be exactly what they promised, but they don't want to sign on to something that's going to rhee ate a lot of unintended consequences, higher premiums and prices next year. i get the sense when i talk to people

let's bring back david gregory, errol louis and david drucker.he urgency, how do you see this, in terms of balancing that urgency of getting something done with getting the right thing done? >> the political imperative is so big from conservative republicans, grass roots republicans that are reminding members of congress and their senators, this is why we sent you to washington, to get rid of obama care. what you have been talking about in the senate is more of obamacare light. not having that supported means they are in the position of trying to hang the repeal sign on anything they do. david and i were talking before we came on this morning, in in quiet period you don't want to count anything out from being accomplished. it seems a very difficult road. i think what is additionally difficult, i should say, is their fallback position is if they work with democrats to get something, i don't think democrats are going to participate as long as it is under the guys of any kind of repeal as opposed to just fixing. there are so many different intereste

david drucker, you are a reporter, you meet with politicians, campaign officials. donald trump jr. says he didn't know this person's name beforehand. is it believable that somebody could schedule a meeting, get into trump tower and meet with the campaign manager, paul manafort was there, remember, without giving their name? >> so, it would be highly unusual and especially at that point, you would have secret service protection for the presumed nominee, and that started well before then. and usually you have a lot more, a lot greater security checks than you would have had if donald trump was just a candidate starting out. but on top of that, paul manafort is pretty well versed in the russian government and in that part of the world. so this is something he would have understood, at least once the meeting got under way. look, having said all of that, the reason this continues to be a problem for the trump campaign, at least politically, at least potentially with republicans on the hill who have put together a tougher sanctions bill on russia that is caught up in the house right now,

i want to bring back our panel, david drucker, jeffrey toobin, and david sanger.question we're hearing from inside the white house, jeff zeleny is reporting, look, if the president will do this to jeff sessions, will he do it anyway? >> well, anyone other than his close family members. i think here what is very interesting and important is that when you do this so publicly to a member of your administration, a cabinet official, and usually this is done third hand. so i guess you've got to give the president credit here for not outsourcing this, is that you've completely undercut jeff sessions' power and influence. because the way politics works, especially in the west wing, but even on capitol hill, is it's all about how much juice you have with the principle. and now, in a tug-of-war over policy, if jeff sessions gets into one, his adversary can say, you know, i don't think the president has that much confidence in your leadership. he was pretty public about that. so i don't really care what you think. and it creates a situation where, especially if jeff sessions

we have cnn political director david challan, david drucker, julia pace. david, you watched it unfold along with us in realtime. what do you make of what anthony scaramucci is focused on and talking about? >> well, there were so many things there to unpack. i do think at its core when you heard anthony scaramucci tell you, chris, that he believes there are people in senior positions in the west wing who see it as their duty to save america from trump, what that is -- he said what they should really be doing is injecting trump into america. what that's saying is he thinks there's a ramping disloyalty among the most senior people inside the west wing. and he believes that by coming in now and on day five saying he is going to carry the flag for the thing donald trump has been talking about for months and stamp out these leakers and get rid, purge anybody inside the operation who has questions about the way donald trump is conducting himself, this becomes a very dangerous thing. i don't know how you go to work in the west wing today with any kind of confidence

. >>> let's bring in analyst and correspondent for the "washington examiner," david drucker. there's going to be a vote, a vote on keeping going on health care. we don't know what -- what is it? what are you voting to keep moving? >> i can understand why people are a little confused here. the senate is a very odd place. you're going to have a vote, number one on, what we call a motion to proceed. for short, we like to call it a key procedural vote that will let us know if health care is moving forward. what that means is they're going to vote on whether or not to debate all sorts of health care proposals. and then once they get the votes for the motion to proceed which i think they're going to get and they need -- if mccain is back, they'll need 51 votes for that. >> right. >> then they will open on all sorts of amendments. they will open debate on the house health care bill. then they'll have a debate on the straight repeal bill. so they could end up voting on straight repeal from 2015. they could also end up voting on the latest version of the better care reconciliation act

. >>> bringing in a cnn analyst and others joining us from fort worth, texas, david drucker. begin with you. you have had a long career as a diplomat in the state department. been in meetings like this. 2 hours, 16 minutes to be exact. you've heard a lot of topics discussed. if it goes longer, sign of a good meeting? >> could be. i doubt if this is a transformation transformational movement. if a.p. reports are true, a cease-fire announced for southwestern syria sunday, in the works for quite some time. they didn't agree to this at this meeting. this has been developing for months, but it's still a success and interesting to see whether or not tillerson refers to this agreement, or whether they allow others to announce the israelis and jordanians are informally a part of this, because it bumps up against important real estate near the golan heights. it demonstrates, jim, i think that there is a basis for cooperation. one last point. we're treating this as if it were the seventh game of the world series in which there was going to be somehow a clear winner and a clear loser. m

and nia-malika henderson, and political analyst, david drucker. hello.he latest on this skinny repeal effort. >> yeah, well for the first time, don, we actually have a look at exactly what this bill is. the senate gop committee releasing the details of the bill about 20 minutes ago and this is still the skinny repeal they were talking about but there are aspects of this that are not all that skinny. it does completely repeal the individual mandate that forces americans to buy insurance, that's a central tenet of obamacare. it also has in place that 1332 amendment which i understand is legislati legislativese, but this is a controversial amendment designed with conservative legislators in mind and would essentially give more flexibility to the states as to how they implement provisions of health care reform and that would include, perhaps, not forcing insurance companies to provide coverage for pre-existing conditions. and another big aspect of this, it is a repeal of planned parenthood funding but that funding would be shifted over to community health ce

we have a member of congress, jane harmond, david drucker.ongresswoman, i want to start with you, the g-7 was awkward, the meetings with nato, awkward. how awkward will these meetings be? >> it occurs to me that the stop in poland is also a do over. that will be president trump's opportunity to say he does support article 5 after he personally left it out of his speech a few weeks ago in europe, which stunned his own advisors and everyone else. so, check, that will help, i think. but it's going to be awkward. a lot of the countries and there's a new leader in france, feel that our country, sadly, is out of step with where they want to go and i think one of the things, if trump could do it over, he might consider doing over was dropping out of the climate accord because that's creating dissent around the world and leaving it open for china to take the lead. >> we don't see any signs of him pulling out article 5. but david, in terms of repairing these relationships, who do you think needs to go further at this point? do you think the president

and joining us, david drucker, senior congressional correspondent for the "washington examiner." eric columbus as well, former obama justice department official. we have our cnn politics editor wanna summers and chief political analyst gloria borger. anthony scaramucci said it would have been a felony to leak that confidential information from his financial disclosure, but that information after 30 days does become public. >> it's publicly available and even scaramucci said this morning, seems to be shooting, just talking, blabbering, in a way, and he can't do. he can't do that, when you have that kind of a podium and that kind of a megaphone. by threatening to fire people and accusing people, there is such a elf will of dysfunction at this white house that you can't even keep it private. it just is spilling out into the open for everyone to see. you know? his interview with chris cuomo this morning was quite remarkable, and i think that -- that if he's going to be the communications director, maybe he ought to be a little more considerate about what he says. because it seems to

joining me now to talk more about this, the health care bill, cnn political analyst david drucker, senior congressional correspondent for -- and "time" contributor, jane newton small. david, you first. senate bill faces a crucial test in the week ahead. can majority leader mitch mcconnell get the 50 votes he needs to move the bill forward? >> well, that's still to be determined. i've thought all along that he eventually was going to get there one way or the other, whether it's this coming week, last week, a month from now, because republicans are facing a couple of problems here. one, their base, and not just the trump base but the broader republican base expects them to repeal and replace obamacare. they've been promising this for seven years. not doing it is a very big problem for them in the 2018 midterms because when you control all aspects of gvernment, you can't deliver on something as basic as this. >> but that's the only consensus that they all want to do something but the problem is how to do it and what to agree upon. >> right. and the other -- so the other thing there, fred, th

cnn politics reporter brit, david drucker and author of "nuclear showdown: north korea takes on the world," gordon chang. gordon, the president choosing to tweet about this situation going on. with we have the tweet or not, this time the president saying, well, china, north korea, trade grew by almost 40% first quarter, so much for china working with us, but we had to give it a try. we had republican congressman lee zeldin on the show. i said is it as simple as this? he said no. is it a problem doing diplomacy by tweet? this is a bit of a hole the president put himself in. >> this particular tweet not so bad but with ton just after the missile launch was terrible. it was lighthearted saying kim jong-un doesn't have anything better to do. we have to remember on the first of this year kim jong-un said he would test an icbm. on january 2nd, trump said it suspect going to happen. so it was really wrong for trump on sunday to say this doesn't matter because it does. it also undercuts some very good diplomacy trump ep gauged in last week. he just undercut him with tweets. >> i don't understand.

cnn political analyst david drucker and a.b. stoddard. david, i don't know where to begin. what did you hear you would like to talk about? >> all of it. let's hone in on a couple of things here. i don't know that they even go together. as a matter of u.s. foreign policy, kellyanne conway did comment on how this white house views russia and its ability to work with vladimir putin. it's confusing because the president's national security team, general mattis, general mcmaster, nikki haley seemed to recognize president putin for what he is, a u.s. add variesry that you cannot trust. they've recognized putin for what he is and work to counter his influence in europe and the middle east. the president and his leadership here, his rhetoric is so important. we saw that reflected in how kellyanne conway talked about the president's meeting with vladimir putin does not seem to recognize that he's an adversary that cannot be trusted and it appears, possibly, that the president is about to try his own russian reset and brought up that ridiculous staples button that hillary clinton use

. >> david drucker, thank you for your contribution to -- >> conjunction junction what's your function>> thank you for that. >> thanks, guys. >> he helped, i think, dispel confusion. >> yes, that was good. strangers coming together to rescue a family caught in the rip tide. the good stuff next. as moms, we send our kids out into the world, full of hope. and we don't want something like meningitis b getting in their way. meningococcal group b disease, or meningitis b, is real. bexsero is a vaccine to help prevent meningitis b in 10 to 25 year olds. even if meningitis b is uncommon, that's not a chance we're willing to take. meningitis b is different from the meningitis most teens were probably vaccinated against when younger. we're getting the word out against meningitis b. our teens are getting bexsero. bexsero should not be given if you had a severe allergic reaction after a previous dose. most common side effects are pain, redness or hardness at the injection site; muscle pain; fatigue; headache; nausea; and joint pain. bexsero may not protect all individuals. tell your healthcare pr