Josh Gottheimer Shares Concerns with American Health Care Act

U.S. Representative Josh Gottheimer (D) - NJ, shares why he voted against the American Health Care Act, describes the disastrous impact the bill would have on New Jersey residents and the importance of creating bipartisan healthcare reform.

7/1/17 #112

Excerpt:

"State of affairs is honored to have United States congressman Josh Gottheimer who is from the 5th congressional district. Good to see you congressman. Good to see you. Thanks for having me Anything happening in Washington? Nothing to see. By the way, tell folks real quick about your background. United States Congress Most recently I was at Microsoft. I spent time at Ford Motor Company and early in my career, I was a speech writer for president Bill Clinton. So, in and out of the private sector. Let's talk about speech writing. Tone, tenor. We're doing this in the summer, moving towards July Yeah It'll be seen very soon. The reaction to the horrific, excuse my voice, the reaction to the horrific events in Virginia involving members of congress playing baseball, staff, and one of your colleagues who was seriously injured. What's been the reaction? That was a tough week last week. In the last...I think overall, this just brought to bear what a lot of us know. Just the polarization in politics overall How polarized are we Josh? I think if you read social media or watch the news or you listen to how people speak about each other, I think it's way to polarized. But what's interesting, and I've seen this in Washington now. I've just been down there since January, so I'm new, but what you realize is that most of us across the aisle, and I spend a lot of time speaking to democrats and republicans, because I think that's very important. Most of us get along really well and people treat each other nicely What happens is the cable shows and social media and the institution isn't built right now to encourage people to work together, right? You're disincentive to so those of us who are spending a lot of time working across the aisle, and I cochair something called the problem solvers caucus right so I'm very focused on let's sit down and actually talk to each other. I believe the best way to settle things down and work and lessen this polarization is to actually talk to each other. And, you know this If you've done business with people, it starts with relationships and those relationships are really important. However, on policy, a big part of our country is disagreeing. Doing it vehemently but respectfully. We have serious questions and we're doing this program as we said toward the last week of June. We don't know exactly what's going to happen with the United States Senate and the deliberations around repealing the affordable care act and replacing it. What are your thoughts? Talking about bipartisan engagement, unfortunately on this healthcare bill, this was not..."