CNN "Newsroom" - Transcript

Interview

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SANCHEZ: Senator, good to see you again, sir. Welcome back.

SEN. JOHN BARRASSO (R), WYOMING: Great to be with you, Rick.

SANCHEZ: There is a -- thanks, Senator.

There's a suggestion that Republicans may actually make Democrats read the entire bill. Is that really necessary? Are you for that?

BARRASSO: Well, I think everybody that votes on the bill ought to read the bill. I think the American people ought to read the bill.

But I don't see that...

(CROSSTALK)

SANCHEZ: No, no, no. No, no, no. I'm sorry. I mean read it out loud.

BARRASSO: No, I don't think that's going to happen, Rick, but I think everybody wants to know what's in the bill, which is what happens when you're looking at a 2,000-page bill that fundamentally is going to affect every person in this country, because health care is such a personal thing.

It's going to affect one-sixth of our economy. And it is going to cut Medicare. And it is going to raise taxes. And it is going to make premiums go up for people that already have insurance. So, it's a good idea for people to know what's in there before they vote on it.

SANCHEZ: We agree. I everybody agrees on that. And it's too many times in the past, bills like this have gone by without people reading them, too often because the guys who do what you do, not in your case, of course, but the guys who do what you do are often out doing other things, like trying to make sure they can get campaign money, for example, rather than doing the judicious work of looking through the bills -- both parties, by the way.

But here's what Dick Durbin says about the suggestion that somebody should stand up on the floor and read the entire bill. Here's what he said.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. RICHARD DURBIN (D), ILLINOIS: The Republicans have come to the floor for weeks now decrying the fact that the bill that we're presenting is long, too many pages, they say, too much for them to absorb.

Well, I will tell you that the bill is long because we're tackling one-sixth of the American economy. We're preparing a bill which will be challenged by the health insurance companies, who hate this, as one old senator used to say, like the devil hates holy water.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SANCHEZ: Let's move into another area. I just heard you mention Medicare a moment ago. And I heard Mitch McConnell, Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, mention the same thing.

Let me just be -- ask you a real frank question, since you and I do this all the time. I think that's the best way of getting to the real nitty-gritty of this stuff. Your party, the Republican Party, has opposed Medicare every step of the way, including back when it was created.

Now you're arguing for it. At what precise point did the Republican Party become the defenders of Medicare?

BARRASSO: Well, you know, I practiced medicine for the last 25 years in Wyoming, taking care of Wyoming seniors who are on Medicare. And I know what it's like to fight with the federal government for Medicare reimbursements.

Medicare is the number-one denier of care. They do a terrible job in terms of coordinating care, in terms of working with preventive care. But when you're talking about cutting $500 billion from our seniors who depend on Medicare, and you have more and more seniors every day who are going to be dependent upon Medicare, I don't think that the way to solve this is to cut $500 billion from our seniors, because we know that program is going broke. We know it's going to be broke by the year 2017.

If you're going to do these sorts of things, you should do it so save Medicare, not to start a whole new government program, Rick.

SANCHEZ: OK. But it just seems curious, because I have heard Medicare referred to by many Republicans as the first step in socialized medicine. And now suddenly Republicans I see are embracing Medicare, like they need to protect it.

Let's move on to something else. We hear Senator McConnell talking about several other things. For example, he suggested that this is going to be a tax increase, which I think even Obama admits it probably will be, but a tax increase for whom?

BARRASSO: Well, there's going to be tax increases across the board when they raise taxes on companies that make the implants, the artificial hips that I used to put in and medications and other things. That stuff's all going to get passed on to people who are paying their own health care. And that's why they say that premiums were going -- are going to go up.

The other is that they're going to -- at least in the Senate bill, there's an excise tax on people who have these -- you know, Rick, these Cadillac plan health insurance plans. But for an individual who buys their own insurance, that's about an $8,500-a-year plan. Well, with inflation -- and we know that this bill is going to make the costs go up -- a lot of these what are now Chevy plans are going to become Cadillac plans in just a couple of years.

So, people with what today you and I might think are just pretty standard health insurance plans, they're going to be paying 40 percent excise tax on the cost of that insurance.

SANCHEZ: OK. And just for the record, I checked before doing this interview, and I think what the plan calls for is your taxes will go up for health care reform if you're an individual that makes over $200,000 a year, or if you're a couple that makes over $250,000 a year.

So, it's not like it's affecting the average American, not that anybody's saying it's good to have...

(CROSSTALK)

BARRASSO: Those are two separate things.

SANCHEZ: What do you mean?

BARRASSO: What you just talked about is an additional tax.

But it's why the unions are opposed to this excise tax, because we're talking about union workers who have very good health insurance programs, expensive plans, but they're not making over $250,000 a year, but they have excellent health insurance coverage, covers first- dollar care, and they're the ones that are going to get hit with this excise tax.

SANCHEZ: Another quick, tough question, because you know we like to always do this when we -- when you and I talk. BARRASSO: You're good at this.

SANCHEZ: You're good. No, and you're good. And I respect you as much as I respect anybody up there.

You're for health care reform, right?

BARRASSO: I'm -- there are a number of things we can do today and we need to do.

SANCHEZ: Not this plan, but...

BARRASSO: Yes. Yes, I am.

SANCHEZ: Here's the question. Republicans have had the power to enact health care reform going back to the '80s, during the Republican ascendancy under Reagan, under George Bush II. You had the House, you had the Senate, and you had the presidency. And at no time was there a measure to do this.

And now you're allowing the Democrats to have their version, but you're criticizing it. Is there something a little disingenuous? At what point do you say to yourself, why didn't we do this, rather than just criticize it now?

BARRASSO: Well, I asked that question. And I started talking about it the day I got here to the Senate. I have only been here two years, as you know, Rick, but from the day I got here, because this is what I did in Wyoming, as a practicing physician, and as doing -- running the Wyoming health fairs, to help people get health information to keep down the cost of their care.

I have been talking about these sorts of things from the day one, you let people buy insurance across state lines, let people take the same tax breaks as the big companies when they buy their own insurance, give incentives to individuals to get their cost of care and their health under control by -- you know, we know half of all the money we spend in this country on health care is on just 5 percent of the people.

And those are people that eat too much, exercise too little, and smoke. We need to give those folks specific personal incentives, money in their own pockets, by staying healthy, getting their cholesterol under control, their blood pressure under control, and quitting smoking.

Those are the things that move the system in the right direction. I don't think we need a 2,000-page bill. What we need is step by step in the right direction.

SANCHEZ: Now you sound like my doctor. Thanks a lot, like I needed that from you.

(LAUGHTER)

SANCHEZ: John Barrasso, you know what? Always a pleasure, Doctor, talking to you.

BARRASSO: Thank you. Appreciate it.

SANCHEZ: Thanks for coming on again, sir. Appreciate it.

BARRASSO: Thanks for having me.

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