>>> d.c. vindication is the order of the hour at the white house . the supreme court upholds the president's signature piece of legislation. and change is alive of 33 million americans in the process. for the young, the poor, the sick and even the well, the affordable care act is no longer a question, but indeed, quite possibly, the answer. it's thursday, june 28th , and t&is is "now."
>>> joining me today, msnbc political analyst david corn of " mother jones ," msnbc political analyst and former rnc chair, the notorious michael steele , former clinton white house chief of staff , john podesta , and jody cantor of "the new york times." we're expecting to hear from president obama in just a few moments on this momentous day for his administration and, of course, the country. in a 5-4 decision. the supreme court upheld the affordable care act . validating the president's most important domestic achievement. but republicans are not giving in on their vow to fight the law. house majority leader eric cantor 's office has scheduled a vote for a full repeal on july 11th . and just a short time ago, mitt romney spoke in washington.
>> i disagree with the supreme court 's decision, and i agree with the dissent. what the court did not do on its last day in session, i will do on my first day if elected president of the united states . and that is i will act to repeal obama care.
>> joining us now from new york, is nbc's chief legal correspondent, savannah guthrie , and out on the west coast , host of msnbc's "the last word," lawrence o'donnell. great to have both of you guys with us today. savannah, i want to go to you first in terms of what exactly is in this ruling. we know there are two sort of big pieces that measurably change the affordable care act . one is the mandate and the ? fact it is not being considered a penalty but of course a tax. tell us about that.
>> this is somewhat of a surprise i think. all of the oral arguments seem to center around whether or not the individual mandate, the requirement that every american purchase some minimum level of insurance, whether or not that was a valid exercise under the congress clausz. the government had a backup, this mandate, the policy attached to it operates as a tax. we don't call it a tax but it's in the tax code . it operates as a tax. it's on that that chief justice roberts , he was the ball game here, the whole ball game , determined, yes, it was a valid exercise of the government's power. the federal government 's power. if you looked at it under the tax clause. it's a fascinating read. it's a very fractured court. because while the chief justice did side with the liberals in the ultimate result, their reasoning to get there was different in almost every case. and frankly, i'm looking at it and still trying to figure out where each justice came down on it. the bottom line was they upheld the mandate. the second piece of it has to do with the medicaid expansion. this was one of the huge innovations inside the health care reform law. it's one of the reasons why coverage was expanded to so many in theory because medicaid was expanded and the states were going to have to pay for some of it. some of the states sued. what the court found today was, you know, if these states were forced to either accept this medicaid funding and start also helping to fund more patients, if they didn't do it, they would lose all ?hdir medicaid funding all together. chief justice roberts said if we went with that scheme, that would be unconstitutional, but he said as long as you give states the choice, this portion of the law can survive. i think the practical effect , alex, is that it may undercut quite a bit of what the health care reform law was trying to do with regard to medicaid , but it still has been upheld and not struck down as unconstitutional.
>> nbc's savannah guthrie , thank you, my friend, as always, for your time. we know you have a busy day today. we appreciate taking a little bit of time for us.
>> you got it. sorry for the long answer.
>> no, they were great answers. lawrence , we've talked a lot about the president and his selling of this law. it is one of the best things to come out of this whole process has been i think more transparency with regards to what is actually in the affordable care act . what is, in effect, now, of course, 3.1 million young adults have gained insurance because they can be on their parents' health insurance up until the age of 26. children with pre-existing conditions can't be denied coverage. the preventative care pieces. there are 12 million people in this country getting rebate checks from their insurance companies . we know the stuff that was slated to take place in 2014 will, in fact, take place in 2014 . the biggest piece of that, of course, is adults with pre-existing conditions cannot be denied coverage. that's going to affect 36 million to 112 million americans with pre-existing conditions. the president is going to speak in a few minutes, lawrence . what is his posture on this day?
>> well, there's no question that today is a political win for the president and everyone is reading it that way. it's definitely a political win when you see mitt romney is forced to go ? to a microphone and say, okay, here's what i would do about health care . once mitt romney starts talking about pre-existing conditions and all these things. he is in political trouble. however, on the policy side of what happened today, there are some very big losses for the president which people don't quite realize yet. in fact, in the bill, most, most, i'm going to repeat this three times, most of the increased coverage comes from the medicaid expansion. the medicaid expansion is now not enforceable on the states the way the president wanted it to be. the president's version of the medicaid expansion got only two votes on the supreme court . justice kagan voted against it. justice bryar voted against it. 26 states brought a suit saying we don't want this. it is now optional. by the way, blue states like california where i am right now are saying they cannot afford the medicaid expansion. this state is talking about cutting down the number of school days in order to fund what it has to do in its obligations. but on the tax piece, which is the big news of the day, a tenth of msnbc viewers are unsurprised, because literally for years i have been explaining to them that the individual mandate is, indeed, a tax. that is why all of this health care legislation is written in the tax committees. that is why the social security law was written in the tax committees. social security was justified on exactly the same basis. it is a tax. medicare is a tax first and a health care program second. that is how these things have always been justified constitutionally. so there really is no surprise there for ? people who understand the previous use of the power to tax, to justify social programs.
>> lawrence , if you were saying it, then i doubt it was only a tenth of the msnbc audience. aisle thinking it's more like nine-tenths. i want to open this up to my panel.
>> i'm surprisingly ignorable it turns out.
>> not true. we're going to prove that point out on air today.
>> go ahead.
>> john, when we talk about sort of the battle to get a national health care plan enacted, wyour experience as white house chief of staff in the clinton administration and stewardship of the center for american progress , it is, i think, many ways a victory for the idea of health insurance for ordinary average americans . to lawrence 's point, though, how much of the plan is in jeopardy? the medicaid piece, 17 million americans .
>> i think he really overstates it. i'll tell you why. because i think when states look at that, in the early period, 100% of the costs are going to be covered by the federal government . 80% of the costs are going to be covered by the federal government . right now, lawrence notes in california, particularly because of the recession, but also i think because of somewhat dysfunctional government out there, they're struggling with their -- with their budgets. but i think when states look at what they can provide to their people, and particularly working poor people in this country, which is where that big expansion comes from, people who don't -- they're working hard, but they're not being afforded coverage through their jobs. i think governors are going to have to say, we have to do this for our state. and i think most states will accept that ?money, accept the expansion and the supreme court will allow them to do that.
>> we heard from mitt romney . we haven't unpacked his comments yet. republicans are doubling down on the repeal obama care. the branding is still in place. we know eric cantor scheduled a full repeal in the house on july 11th . it has always been an awkward issue for mitt romney , an awkward candidate. but he seems to want to carry it through november. this is -- i will repeal obama care on day one continues to be a main plank of his platform.
>> yeah, it is. i think, you know, he's going to ride that horse very hard because he has to. he's got a base that was excited going back in 2009 , and certainly 2010 , around this idea. against nationalized health care of some form or any form. it's in contradiction, obviously, to the position he had as governor where basically implemented formula that he's going to have to figure out how to make that argument to independent voters. while the numbers are with him in a sense that this is still only 30%, 37% of the american people really like the idea of obama care, that is going to change now. i think the president is going to reframe the argument. onlying out with his speech in a little bit. i think lawrence makes a very interesting point, lawrence , you are right about the --
>> he's impossible to ignore.
>> he's impossible to ignore. he's right about the tax portion of this. remember, obama didn't argue this is a tax and avoided like the dickens the point this is a tax. lawrence is exactly right, this was in the tax committee. took the supreme court to come back and say, now, this is, in fact -- how the president ? makes that argument and fashions that argument, in an environment where anything related to taxes is problematic.
>> how far can you -- the tax argument, how much does that carry water, when the counter to that is what you're getting for it.
>> the obviously counter also, is if this is a tax, it was a tax in massachusetts.
>> right.
>> you can't have tax in one place and not the other. you know, mitt romney 's going to have a hard time , you know -- if the debate is framed over components of health care . people like the public opinion against it is in the abstract. the overall package. break it down. as i was walking up the building to come here today, after the decision had been announced, someone stopped me on the street. he said, tears are in my eyes. i have two kids. 22 and 24. one has a pre-existing condition. i didn't know what i was going to do if this was struck down. you know, emphasize that again and again. it puts mitt romney in a difficult place because when it comes to these issues that are very popular, he doesn't have anything to say about them.
>> judy, magnificent book "the obamas" which i'm three quarters of the way almost done with. you talk about the struggle internally in the white house around pushing forward on health care . and that, you know, the former chief of staff, rahm emanuel , said don't do it. it was really a personal issue for the president. tell us a little bit about the vindication that he must be feeling at this moment and sort of what it means in terms of his broader legacy.
>> well, you know how people in washington say all the time, what does president obama really believe in? i want to know what he really believes in. what he really believes in is giving as many americans as possible health insurance . and reforming what everybody agrees is a ? pretty dysfunctional system. he made a very difficult choice. he stuck with this legislation. many times even though it looked tough. he paid an enormous political price that he's still paying in many ways. and today he avoided a disaster. i mean, if the alternative had happened, if the court had struck the mandate down, that would have sent a message to swing voters saying the president did something bad, something unconstitutional. et cetera , et cetera . you know, we're going to see him get on tv. i agree with david. i think he's going to talk about real people . it's always been what this is about. i spoke to vicki kennedy a week or two about this and spoke about the president's and ted kennedy 's commitment to everyday people struggling enormously with the system.
>> i don't believe mitt romney has that type of commitment. he showed it a bit with individual mandates. he gets up there and talks about these things in the abstract. he doesn't connect. he doesn't identify with the struggles. he doesn't come up with a solution.
>> what is the plan? i mean, it's not going to be a --
>> the house republicans have, too, repeal, repeal, repeal. nothing there.
>> there is something there. i mean, you act like for the last two years the house republicans just sat there and did nothing. there were -- and committee after committee, pieces of legislation that touched on, you know, affordability and other issues that they put on individual pieces. not this mammoth 2,700 page document. so i think that the republicans can make a very good argument about how health care can look in the future, without all of this massive government intrusion. and buildup with the panels that are going to be formed and the cost down the road.
>> what is already in law.
>> in place.
>> the 3 million young people who are already getting coverage of their parents' policies. the fact that seniors are in medicare drug benefit are getting $600 back from the passage of this bill. you know, you go down each and every one. kids with pre-existing conditions can't be discriminated against. the votes now to repeal are going to be about these real things , not some abstract version of socialism.
>> exactly.
>> i think it's going to be very tough.
>> the honest part of the conversation still has to center around the cost. not necessarily right now, but down the road. the taxes that start to come into play, beginning next year, $210 billion in --
>> look at the cbo numbers.
>> the evidence, we're raising --
>> i want to bring you in really quickly. we haven't asked about the dynamics on the supreme court . the president is going to approach the podium any minute. if we can get a question in here, i think we can. we can, because that's not the president in front of the camera. lawrence , one of the things that really surprised me was the fact it was justice roberts who wrote this, who sided with the sort of liberal wing of the court and not at all tony kennedy.
>> well, he makes the point that it is the court's obligation --
>> okay.
>> we're done.
>> we are done. president obama 's approaching the podium at the white house . responding to the supreme court 's ruling. let's take a listen.