[Jimmy Kimmel, Host, Jimmy Kimmel Live:] A little over a week ago on Friday, April 21, my wife, Molly, gave birth to a boy. His name is William. We call him Billy. It was an easy delivery. Six pushes and he was out. He appeared to be a healthy baby until three hours he was born and we were out of the delivery room and moved to the recovery room. Our whole family was there and introduced him to his 2 12- year-old sister. She was cute with him. We were happy. My wife was in bed relaxing and when a very attentive nurse at Cedar Sinai Hospital checked him out and heard a murmur in his heart but also noticed he was a bit purple well, which is not common. She asked me to come with her and my wife and I assumed it would be nothing. Our daughter had a heart murmur too and we didn't notice he wasn't the color that he was supposed to be. So now more doctors and nurses and equipment come in and it's terrifying thing. My wife is back in the recovery room. She has no idea what's going on. They did an echo cardiogram and found that Billy was born with a heart disease, something called tetralogy of fallot with pulmonary atresia. He has a hole in the wall between the left and right sides of his heart and they brought my wife in and they wheeled her in and the doctor told her what was going on and what our options were. We decided to take him to children's hospital where there's a world renowned cardiac surgeon. He's a genius. We put the baby in an ambulance to children's Hospital Los Angeles and on Monday morning, the doctor opened his chest and fixed one of the two defects of his heart. He went in there with a scalpel and did magic that I can't even begin to explain. He opened the valve and the operation was a success. It was the longs guest three hours of my life. We were brought up to believe that we live in the greatest country in the world. But until a few years ago, millions of Americans had no access to health insurance at all. If you were born with congenital heart disease like my son was, there is a good chance you'd never be able to get health insurance because you had a pre-existing condition. If you were born with a pre-existing condition and if your parents did not have life insurance, you may not live long enough to even get denied because of a pre-existing condition. If your baby is going to die and it doesn't have to, it shouldn't matter how much money you make. I think that's something whether you're a Republican or a Democrat or something else, we all agree on that, right? I mean, we do whatever your party is, whatever you believe or support, we need to make sure that the people who are supposed to represent us and people meeting about this right now in Washington understand that very clearly. Let's stop with the nonsense. This isn't football. There are no teams. We are the team. It's the United States. Don't let their partisan squabbles divide us on something that every decent person wants. We need to take care of each other. I saw a lot of families there and no parent should ever have to decide if they can afford to save their child's life. It just shouldn't happen. Not here.
[Pamela Brown, Cnn Anchor:] All right. I'm going to bring in Brad Carson and Beverly Halberg. Thank you both for being here. First up, your reaction, Brad, to what we just heard from that very emotional plea from Jimmy Kimmel.
[Brad Carson, Former Under Secretary Of Defense:] I think he speaks for tens of millions of Americans who find themselves with health conditions and find it difficult to access insurance, perhaps not even possible to get insurance and I think it's a fundamental debate rather than all of the intricacies of health insurance. Do people have the right to have health insurance or not? And should it be based on your income level or not? That's why Republicans are finding it so hard to repeal Obamacare.
[Brown:] Rebecca, you don't necessarily agree with the point that he made about pre-existing conditions, is that right?
[Beverly Halberg, Conservative Strategist:] When I watched that, I teared up the first time I saw it.
[Brown:] It's hard not to.
[Halberg:] I'm an aunt of a little boy who had open heart surgery because of a heart defect. When I heard this story, I teared up. I think it's great that he was that transparent and open. I would agree with him that we as Americans, whether Republican or Democrat, any child going through this should get the care that he or she needs. What I disagree about is that the answer to these problems is Obamacare. So, when it comes to pre-existing conditions, Republicans are talking about having a health care that does have pre-existing conditions as an element of that. But the issue is, one of the reasons why health care is so unaffordable to begin with is because of so many of these policies of Obamacare. My premiums have tripled since Obamacare. We need to get to the heart of the issue which is cost and quality of care.
[Brown:] Let me ask you this, Brad. We heard the President say that the GOP bill will guarantee coverage for those with pre-existing conditions but the reality is, states can opt out. I mean, this is sort of the big sticking point between conservatives and moderate conservatives.
[Carson:] The freedom caucus and perhaps the people on the far right of the house GOP conference don't believe in covering pre-existing conditions. The waiver will no doubt be exercised by 30 or more states effectively ending the requirement that pre-existing conditions be ignored in the issue wants o issuance of insurance.
[Brown:] Beverly, our reporting is that Republicans are one "no" vote away from this crashing and burning again. What do you think is going to happen? Do you think they are going to get it?
[Halberg:] I would hope that the Republicans make sure that they have all of the votes. It's a PR disaster the first time and will be this time. One of the reasons they are working so hard, because let's not forget that President Trump said he was going to move on to tax reform, the reason they are pushing this forward is because this is what Americans want. This is one of the reasons why many of them got re-elected, that people are struggling under the weight of rising health care costs and they are saying that you have to do something about it. And so, I think you're going to see Republicans continue to battle this out. I would be surprised if they put anything on the house floor for a vote that they weren't sure they had all of the votes on. It would be disastrous if that happened.
[Carson:] Paul Ryan won't bring it to the floor unless he knows he has the votes.
[Brown:] Beverly, Brad, thank you. Appreciate it. In South Carolina, a police officer pled guilty for killing an unarmed man after shooting him in the back. Details on the deal he's getting and how long he could spend in prison.