Republicans Celebrate Tax Bill Victory; U.N. Showdown Over Jerusalem; Virginia House Balance of Power in Limbo
DAVE BRIGGS, CNN ANCHOR: This is what victory looks like. Republicans celebrate passage of an historic tax overhaul, but the party will be short if the GOP can't approve a spending plan to keep the government open by tomorrow night.</s>DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Well, we're watching those votes. Let them vote against us. We'll save a lot. We don't care.</s>CHRISTINE ROMANS, CNN ANCHOR: President Trump with a veiled threat to world leaders as the U.N. prepares for a showdown vote over Jerusalem.</s>BRIGGS: And how do you pick a winner in a tied election? Wait until you hear how Virginia will determine balance of power in the bellwether state. It is a fascinating process. Welcome back to EARLY START. I'm Dave Briggs.</s>ROMANS: And I'm Christine Romans. It's Thursday morning. It's 31 minutes past the hour. A major victory for the Republicans, delivering on tax cuts, killing the Obamacare individual mandate, opening up ANWR for drilling, all in one move. The GOP tax bill now just awaits the president's signature, but in touting the bill as a huge tax cut, the president reveals a hidden agenda all along.</s>TRUMP: The individual mandate is being repealed. So in this bill, not only do we have massive tax cuts and tax reform, we have essentially repealed Obamacare. We didn't want to bring it up. I told people specifically, be quiet with the fake news media because I don't want them talking too much about it, because I didn't know how people would -- but now that it's approved, I can say, the individual mandate has been repealed.</s>BRIGGS: Important to note, Obamacare has not been repealed. Those GOP efforts failed miraculously this year. It's true, the tax bill may destabilize Obamacare by reducing the incentive for young, healthy people to buy insurance. The Congressional Budget Office has said repealing just the individual mandate will likely raise the premiums to help cover older, sicker people, but it will also save the government money as people drop out of the subsidized Obamacare marketplaces.</s>ROMANS: Yes, that individual mandate really the glue that keeps Obamacare together.</s>BRIGGS: Also the most unpopular part of Obamacare.</s>ROMANS: Right, right, right. Republicans say it's a tax. Now, by admitting the tax bill was a vehicle for hurting Obamacare, the president handed Democrats a powerful talking point for 2018. None of that got in the way of the Republicans' big celebration yesterday. Even with funding for the government set to run out tomorrow. For the very latest, let's bring in CNN's Abby Philip at the White House.</s>ABBY PHILLIP, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Well, Christine and Dave, the president and Republicans were jubilant at the White House with the passage of the first major legislative victory of his administration. The president talked a lot about the corporate tax rate going down and the money that will be coming back home from overseas. But Republicans had nothing but praise for him and his leadership, getting them over the finish line on this bill. Take a listen.</s>REP. PAUL RYAN (R-WI), SPEAKER OF THE HOUSE: Something this profound could not have been done without exquisite presidential leadership.</s>SEN. MITCH MCCONNELL (R-KY), MAJORITY LEADER: This has been a year of extraordinary accomplishment for the Trump administration.</s>SEN. ORRIN HATCH (R), UTAH: And we're going to make this the greatest presidency that we've seen not only in generation generations, but maybe ever.</s>MIKE PENCE, VICE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: President Donald Trump delivered a great victory for the American people.</s>TRUMP: All friends, I mean, I look at these people, it's like we're warriors together.</s>PHILLIP: But the battle for Republicans may still be ahead with just a third of Americans supporting the tax bill that they just passed, and about 66 percent of Americans say that the middle class will not benefit as much as the wealthy. The White House is fully aware that they have a little bit more work to do to sell this bill, Christine and Dave. That's going to be next on the agenda for President Trump.</s>ROMANS: All right. Abby, thank you for that. Less than 48 hours to go before funding runs dry and the federal government shuts down, and there's no deal right now. House Republicans frustrated after a closed-door meeting last night. Members giving widely differing accounts of a proposal that's being cobbled together to keep the government running past midnight Friday. One thorny issue, whether to add to a stopgap bill a three-week extension of the mass surveillance program that collects intelligence on non-U.S. citizens. Looming on the Senate side, the GOP's failure to deliver for Susan Collins. The Maine Republican received assurances from majority leader Mitch McConnell that she would get a vote on two Obamacare stabilization bills in exchange for her yes vote on the tax bill, which repealed the individual mandate, but Congress will leave town for the holidays without voting on Obamacare funding. She was not at that signing ceremony yesterday. For the Republicans, the afterglow of tax reform victory could wear off if they don't pass a spending plan. A new CNN poll shows voters prefer Democrats by an 18-point margin, as we get closer to the 2018 midterms. A blunt warning to president Trump from the top Democrat on the Senate Intelligence Committee -- don't fire Bob Mueller. Mark Warner of Virginia launching a preemptive strike. He's calling on Congress to respond with significant consequences if the president does try to neutralize the special counsel.</s>SEN. MARK WARNER (D), VIRGINIA: Any attempt by this president to remove special counsel Mueller from his position or shut down the investigation would be a gross abuse of power and a flagrant violation of executive branch's responsibilities and authorities.</s>ROMANS: White House counsel Ty Cobb responding to Warner's warning, telling CNN no consideration is being given to firing Mueller. He adds: If the media is going to continue to ask for responses to every absurd and baseless rumor, attention-seeking partisans will continue to spread them. Mueller is facing a growing number of Republicans who claim there is an anti-Trump bias in his Russia investigation.</s>BRIGGS: This morning, the U.N. General Assembly votes on a resolution rejecting president Trump's decision to recognize Jerusalem as the capital of Israel. The administration says it will remember which countries oppose the U.S. position. America's U.N. ambassador, Nikki Haley, writing her fellow ambassadors to say she and the president will be carefully monitoring their votes and taking them personally.</s>ROMANS: That follows this tweet from Haley on Tuesday: When we make a decision at the will of the American people about where to locate our embassy, we don't expect those we've helped to target us. The U.S. will be taking names. President Trump pushing it a step further, warning financial assistance to nations could be cut off if they vote against the U.S. position.</s>TRUMP: Well, we're watching those votes. Let them vote against us. We'll save a lot. We don't care. But this isn't like it used to be where they could vote against you and then you pay them hundreds of millions of dollars and nobody knows what they're doing, and we're not going to be taken advantage of any longer.</s>ROMANS: Let's go live to Jerusalem and bring in CNN's Oren Liebermann. And, Oren, we know that that kind of stance from this president is something his supporters really adored on the campaign trail, but it plays very differently on the world stage.</s>OREN LIEBERMANN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: And this vote will show in just a few hours. It's very much expected that the U.S. stands alone or nearly alone with its foreign policy, and that's because President Donald Trump's threat isn't really expected to change any votes at the 183-member U.N. General Assembly. And if you want an idea of how this vote could go, take a look at a vote from a couple of days ago on Palestinian self-determination. That passed 176 for and only 7 against or abstaining. Israel and the U.S. in that against and abstaining category. And tonight's vote, which is in emergency meeting of the general assembly, could have much the same result, a vast majority of countries voting to attempt to nullify President Trump's recognition of Jerusalem as the capital of Israel. Now, it is a nonbinding vote, which means that they can't actually change President Trump's position or have any sort of facts on the ground effect on what happens. But it is a stinging rebuke of U.S. foreign policy and serves to highlight how much the U.S. stands alone there as Trump makes this threat to cut off foreign aid. Does he carry through on that threat? We'll see what comes after here. It's worth pointing out a couple things, Christine, that first, Israel is the biggest receiver of U.S. foreign aid, at least military aid, more than $3 billion a year. Second, a lot of that aid, or some aid, goes to the United Nations budget, so that could be a threat against the U.N. as well. But again, at the end of the day here, this isn't expected to change any votes at the U.N. an overwhelming vote trying to or attempting to nullify President Trump's recognition of Jerusalem as the capital of Israel.</s>ROMANS: All right. Oren Liebermann, we will be watching. Thank you, sir.</s>BRIGGS: Another twist in the Virginia House race leaving the balance of power in limbo. Now it basically comes down to the luck of the draw. A recount had given Democrat Shelly Simonds the victory by one vote over Republican David Yancey, but a three-judge panel has now declared one more valid vote for Yancey, so now the final tally with 11,608 votes each.</s>ROMANS: Virginia law says in the event of a tie, the election board will determine the winner by lot. The board of elections process involves printing the candidates' names on to equal-size sheets of paper, then putting them in a container. The first name drawn would be declared the winner and the loser could then petition for another recount. A victory for the Democrat would split the control of House of Delegates. A win for the Republican would mean the GOP maintains the majority. All right. Breaking overnight, more than a dozen people hurt in Australia, where a car plowed into pedestrians outside Melbourne's iconic Flinders Street Railway Station. Two adults and a young child with a head injury have been taken to the hospital in serious condition. Police do have the driver and another person under arrest. Police say the action was deliberate, but they are not specifically calling it terrorism. We will have more information as it becomes available.</s>BRIGGS: All right, ahead, shots fired at the DMZ. South Korea opens fire after soldiers from the North pursue a defector. We're live in Seoul ahead on EARLY START.