E-mail a friendRep. Anh "Joseph" Cao
airdate November 11, 2009
Louisiana Rep. Anh "Joseph" Cao is the first Vietnam native to serve in Congress and the first Republican to serve in his district since 1890. As a child, he escaped to America, first arriving in New Orleans. He studied for the priesthood before earning a law degree from Loyola and becoming in-house counsel for Boat People S.O.S. At the time of his election to the House in '08, Cao was a member of the Orleans Parish Board of Election Supervisors. He was also elected to lead the Louisiana GOP both on the parish and state levels.
Louisiana congressman discusses reactions of fellow GOP House members and the conservative media to his voting for the healthcare reform bill. (1:51)
Full Interview (10:22)
Rep. Anh "Joseph" Cao
Tavis: Congressman Ahn "Joseph" Cao represents Louisiana's second district, which includes New Orleans. This week he found himself at the center of the healthcare debate in this country by being the only House Republican to support healthcare reform legislation. He joins us tonight from New Orleans. Congressman, nice to have you on the program, sir.
Congressman Ahn "Joseph" Cao: Thank you for having me on.
Tavis: Let me start with the obvious - what kind of response you've been getting, given your vote.
Cao: Mixed responses. We have received a lot of criticisms from many conservatives as well as a lot of positive remarks from many people in the district.
Tavis: You knew, of course, that when you decided to cast this vote it was going to cause some consternation for some, conversation with many others, so I'm curious as to how you came to this very difficult decision.
Cao: Well, my first priority as a U.S. representative is to represent the needs of my district, and if my decision does not go against some of my core moral values, like prohibiting federal funding of abortion, then I can support a healthcare reform bill that will address the needs of my constituents. So when the Stupak-Pitts amendment passed the House, that cleared the way for me to support healthcare reform to help the many poor people in my district who do not have medical insurance.
Tavis: The amendment you're talking about, of course, is the amendment that made it clear that there would not be federal funding for abortions.
Cao: That is correct.
Tavis: Okay. You mentioned your district now a couple of times, and I hear your point loud and clear that it is the role of any member of Congress to first and foremost represent the concerns of his or her district, so tell me more about your district, and why your district, you felt, needed this kind of healthcare reform package in the House to be supported by you.
Cao: Well, the New Orleans area was devastated by Hurricane Katrina four years ago. Our healthcare system is in a shamble, many of my constituents are poor. They do not have access to healthcare, they don't have medical insurance, and therefore if this healthcare reform passed it will provide people who cannot afford healthcare right now the federal subsidies to obtain healthcare insurance.
So I believe that the bill itself will help at least a fifth of my constituents here in the district to obtain medical insurance.
Tavis: I want to ask you about three different constituencies, because I know that you had to be in constant communication with all three. Let me ask in no particular order about your constituents. First, since we're talking about them, what kind of interaction did you have with your constituents over the summer leading you to vote the way you did?
Cao: I've had about 11 town hall meetings all over the district, from Westwego over to Kenner into uptown New Orleans, and obviously there were people who were very vocal against the reform package, while many others, they were supporting the bill, conveying that the district needs access to medical care.
So I really had a lot of mixed messages from my constituents, and there were more people in support of healthcare reform than those who opposed healthcare reform.
Tavis: In those 11 town hall meetings, were you subjected to the kind of screaming and yelling and threatening that we have seen make some of the news media rounds that other members of Congress were subjected to this summer?
Cao: Yes, there were a couple of - actually, several town halls in which people were quite vocal in conveying their displeasure with the healthcare reform bill, but I was able to explain to them many of the controversial provisions and to calm down and to clarify some of their concerns.
Tavis: So the second constituency I want to ask about, a second group, put another way, are your House colleagues, Republicans, to be specific. What kind of - tell me a bit about the conversations you were in. I know they were trying to hold all the Republicans in lock step to vote against this, so tell me the kind of lobbying that you were engaged in during the process of making your decision by Republicans in the House.
Cao: Well, the members in the house, the members of the Republican Party, they all understand where my duty lies because they themselves, they have to represent their constituents. So they fully understand that the first priority of a U.S. representative is to represent the needs of their constituents.
Then if the vote happens to correspond to the Republican Party, it's fine. If not, then that's okay, too. So I did not receive a lot of, I guess, opposition from the Republican members because we all understand that at one point or another each one of us will have to make a hard choice.
Tavis: I don't know - I hear your point loud and clear and I accept that. I don't know how much media you're paying attention to, but there are a lot of conservatives, a lot of Republicans, a lot of right-wingers in the media who are not being as kind to you, apparently, as your House colleagues were. You're aware of that, sir?
Cao: No, even though I've been informed by my staff that some of the criticism has been quite brutal, but it goes with the job and my constituents chose me to represent their needs, and that's what I'm trying to do the best that I can.
Tavis: So the push-back you're getting from the conservative media doesn't make you at all rethink the vote that you made?
Cao: Oh, no. If I have to do it again, I would do the same thing.
Tavis: Fair enough. The last group I want to ask you about, the last group is really an individual. What kind of conversations, if any, did you have with the White House, the Obama White House, about your pending vote?
Cao: When I spoke with the president around noontime on Saturday, I told him specifically that I'm open to supporting the healthcare reform bill as long as the Stupak-Pitts amendment were to pass the House, and obviously we were working very hard to make sure that the amendment would pass.
In speaking to the president we have always had a very friendly relationship, and I conveyed to him some of the needs of the district, some of the concerns that I have, some of the concerns that many of my constituents were conveying, that we need to have addressed.
For example, community disaster loans, our FMAT problem, the issue with Charity and Methodist Hospital, so I convey those concerns to the president and I basically encourage him to continue working with us to help this area rebuild. He has done - he and his administration, they have done a tremendous job in working with us to address many of our needs down here.
Tavis: Since we're talking about the president and New Orleans and your being the representative of that area, what did you have to say, what were your thoughts then, if you had them - I assume you did - about the controversy the president found himself in some weeks ago going to New Orleans, touching down for a few hours, and leaving again, and taking nine or 10 months to get to New Orleans in the first place. Did you have thoughts about that controversy then?
Cao: Well, for me - my constituents, many of them, they were disappointed that the president did not spend a long enough time down here in New York and in the surrounding areas, but for me, it's not so important of the length of time that the president spent down here, it's how well we have been working with the administration to address all the needs that we have.
As I've said already, in the past eight or nine months we have worked extremely well together. Secretary Napolitano and I, we have worked very hard to push out over $1 billion in recovery money through FEMA to help municipalities, organizations to rebuild infrastructure, to improve healthcare, to rebuild schools.
So it's not the length of time that the president spent down here that was important to me, but how well we have worked together in the last several months.
Tavis: Finally, where do you think this healthcare debate is headed? We all know the Senate has to do its thing now. We know that the Senate is going to be a tougher fight than the House, we're told. We know there's a conference committee that's going to come eventually, whatever the Senate finally passes. Where do you think this is going to go, and do you think in the end that your vote and the criticism that you've taken for casting it will have been worth it where healthcare is concerned?
Cao: I really don't know what will happen in the Senate. I don't know the - I'm not familiar with the dynamics and the different forces that are working in the Senate. I hope that whatever reform bill that comes out of the Senate will be a responsible bill, will have strong language prohibiting federal funding of abortion.
So I am very hopeful that a reform bill will get out of the Senate, but I also hope that it will be a responsible bill, a bill that will address the needs of the country, that will address the different issues that we have to tackle in reforming this healthcare system, because it is a very complex question, but it's a question that we have to answer, that we have to tackle, and I hope that we will do it responsibly.
Tavis: Congressman Joseph Cao out of Louisiana, specifically the New Orleans area. The only Republican member in the House to vote for the healthcare bill that passed here just days ago. Congressman Cao, nice to have you on the program. Thanks for sharing your insights with us, sir.
Cao: Thank you very much.
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