    [Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: William J. Clinton (1993, Book I)]
    [June 16, 1993]
    [Page 863]
    [From the U.S. Government Publishing Office www.gpo.gov]

    Exchange With Reporters on Campaign Finance Reform
    June 16, 1993

        Q. Mr. President, those Senate Republicans, sir, who are now
    blocking campaign finance reform even though they voted for it before,
    what do you say to them? I mean, this thing could go down today and be
    dead.
        The President. The real question is what can they say to the
    American people. What possible reasons can they give other than pure
    politics for filibustering a bill which they voted for last year? And as
    I said, this isn't the first time it's happened. It happened on motor
    voter, but we were able to work that out.
        But these are good people, and I think they must be searching their
    hearts about it and about wondering if they can even begin to defend it
    on anything other than raw politics. And I'm hoping that there will be
    some change and some breakthrough. I got some information this morning
    that it's at least somewhat encouraging, and we'll just keep working on
    it and hope we can prevail.
        Q. Would you agree to give up any public funding? Would that be one
    way?
        The President. Well, the only problem with that is, if you give it
    all up you have no control on the amount of money being spent. And the
    argument for the public funding is simply that the Supreme Court has--
    that unless you give candidates something, you can't condition how much
    they spend. So if the object is to control the cost of campaigns, as
    well as to limit the influence of PAC's, and to open the airwaves, it is
    difficult to meet all those objectives if you don't have some public
    funding. They're talking about the various compromises. I don't know
    whether they can reach one, but that's why I hope that Republicans who
    voted for the bill last year will think about it. It is essential to
    limit the overall costs of campaigns, and somehow there's got to be a
    public funding element to it. Thank you.

    Note: The exchange began at 10:15 a.m. at the North Portico of the White
    House. A tape was not available for verification of the content of this
    exchange.