    [Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: William J. Clinton (1993, Book I)]
    [March 2, 1993]
    [Pages 230-231]
    [From the U.S. Government Publishing Office www.gpo.gov]

    Exchange With Reporters Prior to Discussions With Secretary General
    Manfred Woerner of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization
    March 2, 1993

    Branch Davidian Religious Sect Standoff

        Q. Mr. President, the incident in Waco appears to be ending. Do you
    have any misgivings at all about how that was executed?
        The President.  I don't think now is the time to discuss that. I'm
    pleased that it's ending. I think it's ending in a way that's very
    consistent with a similar incident that occurred in my State, very
    similar, when I was Governor there many years ago.
        Q. Are you satisfied that the appropriate action was taken in the
    first place?
        The President.  I don't think this is the time for me to comment on
    that. It's not appropriate at this time for me to comment on it.

    Haiti

        Q. Are you having any second thoughts about your criticism of George
    Bush's Haiti policy during the campaign, given that today you went to
    court to essentially support his position?
        The President.  But our position is different. Our position now is
    that there's a difference if there are extreme circumstances, and I
    think there are. You know, maybe I was too harsh in my criticism of him,
    but I still think there's a big difference between what we're doing in
    Haiti and what they were doing in Haiti. And there's a big difference
    between the kinds of problems that are created by the Haitian
    circumstance. I mean, something that was never brought up before but is
    now painfully apparent is that if we did what the plaintiffs in the
    court case want, we would be consigning a very large number of Haitians,
    in all probability, to some sort of death warrant. I mean, if you look
    at how many people have been lost at sea, look at the number of people
    who died not even trying to come to the United States in a much shorter
    trip recently, given the means they had to get here, the kinds of boats
    they have and all of that.
        We have now cut from 2 months down to 1 week the amount of time it
    takes to process

    [[Page 231]]

    people who want to be considered to be refugees in Haiti. When we bring
    people back, we meet them there now. We don't just let them get
    dispersed into the country. We're going out into the country and doing
    the refugee handling. So it's a very different set of circumstances than
    it was.

    Note:  The exchange began at 4:25 p.m. in the Oval Office at the White
    House. A tape was not available for verification of the content of this
    exchange.