[Christi Paul, Cnn Anchor:] Half past the hour on this early Saturday morning. I'm Christi Paul.
[Victor Blackwell, Cnn Anchor:] I'm Victor Blackwell. Good morning to you.
[Paul:] So, the GOP health care bill to repeal and replace Obamacare passed the House, now has to pass the Senate. And that's a task some say is already dead on arrival. Senate Republicans poised to make changes to the House's provisions have created the group you see here. This group that is starting to craft the Senate's version of the plan. Notice not a female in sight there.
[Blackwell:] Yes. This group's lack of diversity is catching heat from the left. Democrats are using that and the fallout behind the bill as a strategy to win back the House or to make some advantages in 2018. Virginia's gubernatorial candidate Tom Perriello put out this attack ad. Watch.
[Tom Perriello , Virginia Gubernatorial Candidate:] Republican leaders are trying to do this to affordable health care. I'm Tom Perriello, and in Congress, I voted for Obamacare because it was wrong that a million Virginians weren't covered while insurance companies held all the power. We'll make sure this never happens in Virginia.
[Blackwell:] The bill's fate is uncertain at this point, but the question remains will the Democrats' message resonate with voters and change the GOP's future? Let's continue the conversation, bringing back CNN Politics reporter Eugene Scott and political reporter for "The Washington Post" political blog, "The Fix", Amber Phillips. As we admire Mr. Perriello's ability to get that in one take because you have one ambulance, let's talk about the message here, Eugene. Democrats believe that this will be in part the ticket to taking some advantages at least in 2018 in Congress.
[Eugene Scott, Cnn Politics Reporter:] They do. I was reading the Cook Political Report, and 20 Republican lawmakers are currently in districts that they believe now could go to the Democrats in 2018. Democrats are on a high because of this vote and really believe that things look well in their favor in addition to the fact that Obamacare is now enjoying high favorability ratings. However, one thing that they would be wise to pay attention to is that people on both sides of the aisle have said that there are quite a few issues with the Affordable Care Act, and they could use this opportunity perhaps not to just coast on these approval ratings and the Republican lawmakers' vote, but actually to pay attention to some of these criticisms and try to make the bill better.
[Blackwell:] Let's turn now to the Senate. Amber, let me pull up a tweeted out statement from Senator Lamar Alexander who is going to be heading up this 13-member working group. We've shown the photographs here, but let's look at the tweet. He says, "The Senate will finish work on our bill, but" not and "but will take the time to get it right." Seems like a backhand at the House.
[Amber Phillips, Political Reporter, Washington Post's Political Blog, "the Fix":] Yes. The Senate wants absolutely nothing to do with this House bill. They think it is absolutely toxic. Listen, Paul Ryan and you can understand why when you look at the political dynamics with the House. To get this House bill through, Paul Ryan needed to shift it to the right. He needed this group of 30 or 40 conservative members of the House Freedom Caucus, who want government like completely out of people's health care, to get on board. Managed to do that. The Senate is an entirely different beast. You have more moderate Republicans who are in states that expanded Medicaid under Obamacare. Those states would be on the hook financially, hundreds of thousands. In some of the bigger states, millions of people could lose their health care. These senators cannot face voting for that kind of legislation whereas in a House district, it's much smaller. You have people who might cheer on, you know, this kind of conservative hands off my health care legislation. The Senate does not want to touch the House legislation, and clearly they're not going to.
[Blackwell:] I mean, there is no gerrymandered state, right? So these districts can be kind of fitted to suit someone with some of the more conservative rhetoric that we've seen from some House members. Eugene, back to you. And we've shown the 13-member working group tweet out from Democratic Senator Patty Murray where she says and points out there are no women on this panel. "It matters to have women at the table, and it matters when they aren't." I mean to have no women as part of this group, especially after that what could become iconic photo from the Rose Garden this week with members of the House celebrating passage of that bill would appear to be dozens of white men exclusively behind the president, the decision not to put a woman on this panel, this working group.
[Scott:] Indeed. This is also another move after, if you recall, some of the earliest discussions about this bill actually in the White House also featured a photo that had no women on the table during a specific meeting about how this bill could affect women. I think what we will have to see Senate Republicans try to do is make the case that they are listening to the voices of women and how they will be impacted by this legislation if it gets passed, and that they truly are concerned about making health care more affordable not just for people who look like them, but people who have different needs, different pre-existing conditions than themselves that are unique to women.
[Blackwell:] And hen you consider, Amber, that two of the voices or two of the votes they're likely going to need are from two of the more moderate members of the caucus, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, Susan Collins of Maine, two more moderate female senators who could have filled one of these seats that were occupied by two of the more moderate men. You've got Gartner of Colorado. You've got Portman of Ohio, Toomey of Pennsylvania. That could have been an easy fix important voices in this conversation.
[Phillips:] Yes, exactly. This comes across as tone deaf from Senate Republicans. I don't think they were trying to exclude women or anything, but there is an optics problem here, right? And then a politics problem as you get to exactly with the fact that the Senate can only lose two votes. This is assuming all Democrats oppose this bill, which is a very safe assumption. The Senate can only lose two votes to have some kind of legislation, whatever they come up with, pass. And right here you are excluding two moderates, two very important, powerful moderates who carry a lot of weight in the Senate from even crafting the legislation. And the fact that they happen to be women also gets to this optics problem Republicans have right now.
[Blackwell:] Eugene, we saw that the House bill went through without the CBO score being completed. We know that will come out over the next ten days to two weeks. Are we expecting that this Senate bill will go through regular rules, that there will be public hearings, that there will be some of these voices that were not included in the House legislation, some of the outside third-party advocacy groups will be consulted with?
[Scott:] Well, when they say they plan to take more time with the bill, that is the implication, I believe, to be true. But time will tell. It will certainly do Republican lawmakers a service to listen to some of the voices that believe they were not believe went unheard during the first steps when the House voted on the bill.
[Blackwell:] All right. Eugene Scott, Amber Phillips, thank you both.
[Phillips:] Thank you.
[Scott:] Thank you.
[Paul:] Well, new doubts this morning about the Trump administration's vetting process after the latest pick for army secretary suddenly withdraws his name.
[Blackwell:] Plus, North Korea accuses the U.S. of planning a detailed attack to assassinate its leader. Those accusations and the U.S. response are ahead.