BLITZER: The House speaker Nancy Pelosi says 96 percent of all Americans will have health insurance if the plan Democrats presented today passes. But how many House Democrats will actually vote for the plan? Will any Republican support it?

Joining us now the man whose job it is to whip up the votes, the number three Democrat in the House, the majority whip, James Clyburn of South Carolina. He's here in THE SITUATION ROOM. Gloria Borger, our senior political analyst is here joining me in the questioning.

Congressman, thanks very much for coming in.

CLYBURN: Thank you for having me.

BLITZER: Right now do you have the 218 votes you need to get this -- this 2,000 page piece of legislation passed?

CLYBURN: Wolf, you know, my standard answer to that is we're getting there.

BLITZER: You don't have it yet?

CLYBURN: Well, I have not taken a whip count. We rolled it out today and we have not really done a whip count yet. I will start doing that on Monday morning.

BLITZER: When will the vote take place?

CLYBURN: I don't expect a vote before Thursday of next week and I expect for us to stay in until it gets done.

BLITZER: So you'll have one week now -- between now and next week to get 218 votes. CLYBURN: Yes, as we promised it went up on the Internet today for 72 hours so that everybody can take a look at it. As I understand it, we've have already had eight million hits on this and we'll do a managers amendment probably on Monday or Tuesday and that then will stay up for 72 hours and then we'll vote.

BORGER: So what's the cost of this, the House version?

CLYBURN: The House version is $896 billion.

BORGER: And the question everyone has is how are you going to pay for it? And your bill includes a tax increase on a so-called millionaire's tax. The Senate bill does not have that kind of a tax increase. So what do you do? Are you willing to give it up?

CLYBURN: Well, the Senate has got another tax increase and that tax increase is on insurance plans.

BORGER: On insurance plans.

CLYBURN: And whether you got a Cadillac plan or a Ford Taurus plan, it doesn't matter. I do not believe that we ought to be taxing that kind of benefit because that would in fact be a tax against...

BORGER: So where's the middle ground?

CLYBURN: ... the middle income American.

BORGER: Where's the middle ground on how you pay for it between the Democrats and the House and the Senate?

CLYBURN: I don't know there's a middle ground, I think the way we're doing it, it's the best way to do. And that is a tax if you make over $1 million a couple.

BLITZER: As a married couple.

BORGER: That's nonnegotiable?

CLYBURN: Married couple over $1 million.

BLITZER: Half a billion if you're single.

CLYBURN: Yes.

BORGER: That's nonnegotiable to you point of view?

CLYBURN: No, everything is negotiable. It's just my position going into the...

BLITZER: But you're going in with a tough stance from the House side. The Senate will pass, if they pass something, they'll pass yours. Then you guys have to come together in on a conference and try to work out the details.

Do you believe there will be any Republican support in the House, even one Republican voting for your plan?

CLYBURN: Well, I don't think so. We are...

BLITZER: So you're just assuming the Democrats will have to carry...

CLYBURN: I'm assuming...

BLITZER: Now you have a large majority in -- so you shouldn't have any problem, except the fact -- for the fact you have some Democrats who are moderate, the so-called blue dogs who are very nervous about the public option, even the compromised public option if you have. And you have other Democrats who are very liberal on the left who don't think you're going far enough and they may be reluctant to support.

CLYBURN: No. But the interesting thing about the so-called public option is that the plan that was most preferred by the progressives, that is the so-called Medicare-plus-five reimbursement rate, and the plan that was most preferred by the blue dogs, the negotiated rates, want the public option with the 15 -- or the Medicare-plus-five saved the most amount of money.

$120 billion as opposed only $25 billion with the other. So I do believe if you look at this, it's very hard to say what's the liberal plan and what's the conservative plan.

BLITZER: So you give some of those blue dogs, those moderate and conservative Democratic members, a pass and say, you know what? We know you're in a tough conservative district. You've got a reelection coming up in a year. You don't have to vote for it.

CLYBURN: Well, a lot of people will not be able to vote for this for various reasons. I think that we've been focusing so much on the so-called public option that we have not looked at other things. And there are a lot of other things in this bill that we've got to get reconciled and that's why we will be doing a managers amendment.

Not to worry about how to pay for it. Not to worry about the exchange, but to look at other things in this, immigration, abortion, all these things.

BORGER: Well...

CLYBURN: Other things that we are -- are going to be working with.

BORGER: And let me ask you about abortion, because that's a great deal of concern to some members of Congress that no federal money go to fund abortions.

CLYBURN: That's correct.

BORGER: Let's listen to Congressman Stupak and what he says about that.

BLITZER: He's a Democrat.

BORGER: He is a Democrat.

CLYBURN: And a very good friend.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. BART STUPAK (D), MICHIGAN: We feel we have enough votes, 218, to block the rule, to block the bill from coming to the floor. We should not use public funds to pay for abortion. If you want that service, you should pay for it out of your own money and not ask the government to pay for it.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BORGER: So are you going to listen to him?

CLYBURN: Absolutely. That's current law. That is current law.

BORGER: Are you going to specify it though?

BLITZER: The Catholic Church, you know, the Catholic bishops wrote you a letter saying they're not happy with the way this -- any one of these bills, the five bills, the two in the Senate, the three in the House, phrase the language that would make it absolutely positively clear that not a penny of any of this money would go to fund abortions?

BORGER: And can you restate it then in the legislation?

CLYBURN: Wolf, this is the thing you have to be careful of. You could very well say that anybody who participates in this exchange, if they have an insurance company, even outside of the exchange, where the insurance company may pay or reimburse for abortions, then that insurance company participating in the exchange may not be allowed to participate in the exchange for offering these kind of policies outside of the exchange.

That's what we're being very careful about here. We cannot superimpose these things on the private sector in such a way that it may be interpreted as for bidding them from participating.

BLITZER: Is Congressman Stupak satisfied with the language in there right now?

CLYBURN: Well, I don't think he's quite satisfied with the language.

BLITZER: Are you ready to change it so he will be satisfied?

CLYBURN: I'm ready to work with Bart who's one of my best friends. I spent more (INAUDIBLE) with him than with anybody else I suspect up here. And I believe that we're going to get there.

BORGER: Now Congressman Grayson, also a Democrat who's been quite outspoken during this health care debate. BLITZER: The Democratic congressman from Florida.

BORGER: Florida. And he apologized, he called a member of the Federal Reserve, and this is a quote, "a K Street whore."

BLITZER: He apologized.

BORGER: He also -- yes, he did, but he also accused Republicans of wanting people to die. Have you as a member of the leadership spoken with him about his incendiary rhetoric and asked him to tone it down?

CLYBURN: Yes, I have spoken and of course before I ever spoke to him, he came to me and talked to me about his language. And Allan is a good buddy, he's from Orlando, Florida. I campaigned with him and he is remorseful for the language.

BORGER: But he's raising a lot of money off of it, you know that?

CLYBURN: Well, I have a colleague that's -- a few congressmen that's raising a lot of money, too.

BLITZER: That would the Republican congressman Wilson from South Carolina who uttered those words, "You lie" to the president.

CLYBURN: Absolutely.

BLITZER: All right, Congressman. Thanks very much for coming in. And please come back and visit.

CLYBURN: Well, thank you so much for having me. It's good to be back.

BLITZER: Thank you.