[Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: William J. Clinton (1993, Book II)]
[November 16, 1993]
[Pages 2001-2005]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office www.gpo.gov]



Remarks on Governors' Endorsements of NAFTA and an Exchange With 
Reporters
November 16, 1993

    The President. Thank you very much. Thank you, Mr. Vice President, 
and thank you to all the Governors who are here and to the many 
Governors who are not here who have helped

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us in this battle to pass NAFTA.
    I think I should say by way of sort of a parenthesis at the outset 
of my remarks, in reaction to Governor Thompson's eloquent comments 
about the Rose Bowl, that in view of the wisdom of the voters in 
Michigan, Ohio, and Wisconsin in the last election, this administration 
has no position on that football game. [Laughter]
    You know, I looked at the Governors who are here with me, and I had 
to think--I actually counted. We are about equally divided back here 
between Democrats and Republicans. And I think it is an interesting 
statement that these who have come here and those who are not here who 
have also endorsed this agreement are more or less equally divided in 
about the ratio the parties hold of gubernatorial offices. And the 
reason for that is that if you're a Governor today, a big part of your 
job is keeping the job base you have, trying to find more jobs, and when 
you lose jobs, trying to replace them as quickly as possible.
    It's not unusual to see a Governor who actually knows huge numbers 
of employers by name, who's been in, in my case, literally hundreds of 
manufacturing facilities and different small businesses and who 
understands how businesses rise and fall and how they fit within the 
economy of the State, the Nation, and the globe. The job of Governors is 
to create jobs, to keep jobs, to enhance the economic base and the 
economic security of our people.
    Any of these Governors will tell you that it is difficult to hold 
onto this job if your voters don't believe you have a clear economic 
program and that your State is moving in the right direction against all 
the odds. Many of us have served in very difficult economic times, with 
high unemployment rates caused by all kinds of factors. But we always 
found that the people of our State wanted us to have a theory about how 
the economy works and how we were going to get more jobs. That is what 
these folks do for a living.
    So I am especially honored to have these Governors here and to have 
their support because they understand on a bipartisan basis that a big 
part of America's national security involves the ability to create 
economic security for our people. They further understand that the only 
way to have economic security is to compete and win in the global 
economy.
    As I have said many times and I want to say here on the eve of this 
great vote, every wealthy country in the world today is having trouble 
creating new jobs. Productivity increases, which are necessary to 
compete in the global economy, in the short run sometimes cause 
difficulty in creating jobs because a more productive worker means fewer 
people can produce more products and services. Therefore, if you want 
more jobs at higher wages in this world, you have to have more 
customers. There is no way around that.
    No one has seriously advanced the proposition that the United States 
can grow jobs and raise incomes, our most urgent economic priority, 
without having more customers for our products and services. The 
Governors understand that. That is why they do not seek to run away from 
change or to shield their people from change but instead to embrace it, 
to compete and win. That is the great message that must be carried to 
the Congress over the next 24 hours as the Members prepare for this 
vote.
    This really is a vote about whether we're going to try to hold onto 
yesterday's economy or embrace tomorrow's economy. It's about the past 
and the future. You know, if I could wave a magic wand and return every 
American to absolute job security with no competition at all, I might do 
that although I'm not sure our country would be better off. At least 
more and more people think that that is a possibility as you hear this 
NAFTA vote. And I'm telling you folks, these Governors understand that 
is not a possibility.
    Governors have stood at the doors of plants when they closed. I have 
stood by plants and shaken hands with workers, hundreds of them, when 
they walked off the job for the last time. If I thought that this was 
going to cost the American people jobs, I would not be for this 
agreement and neither would these Governors. Our work is putting 
Americans to work.
    Now, in the last 10 months, with the deficit down, with inflation 
down, with interest rates down, this economy has produced more jobs in 
the private sector than in the previous 4 years. And every American can 
tell you that's very fine, but it's nowhere near enough. We cannot get 
more jobs in this economy until we have more customers for our products 
and our services.
    Tomorrow the Congress has simply got to vote for hope over fear, for 
the future over the past, they've got to vote for confidence in

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the ability of the American people to compete and win. These Governors 
are closer to their workers than any other public officials in the 
country. They know we can compete and win. So do I. And tomorrow I think 
the House of Representatives will say the same thing.
    Thank you very much.

NAFTA

    Q. Mr. President, you have stressed bipartisanship here. But Lane 
Kirkland says that you have really abdicated the leadership of the 
Democratic Party with your all-out campaign.
    The President. My job is to try to lead the United States and to try 
to help this country move forward and to do what I think is right to get 
that done. I do not believe we can grow this economy without expanding 
our trade. I'm doing the job that the people elected me to do, to try to 
expand the economy.
    Q. Can you explain about the political cover, as it's been 
described, that you're offering Members of Congress, Republicans and 
Democrats, in terms of NAFTA not being a legitimate political issue in 
the 1994 campaign?
    The President. I have told all Members of Congress who vote for this 
that I will do everything I can to defend this vote and to say that a 
vote for this agreement should not be the basis for defeating any Member 
of Congress without regard to party. And I believe that.
    Q. Mr. President, Ross Perot has accused you of giving away billions 
of dollars in taxpayers' monies to buy votes in favor of NAFTA. And he 
says that what you're doing makes the scandal in New Jersey look like 
peanuts. What do you say about that?
    The President. I say that the Vice President, first of all, disposed 
of most of Mr. Perot's arguments pretty well the other night. The 
Members of Congress who come to me and ask me for things have asked me 
to help their people. The people that I've talked to in Congress have 
been nobly motivated. Most of them have taken great risks and, as you 
heard, were threatened on national television with their very political 
life by Mr. Perot the other night to vote for this. When they come to 
see me, they want to know things like: Is this job training package 
going to be really adequate? How do I know the members of my district 
are going to have access to job training programs? What are you going to 
do to ensure that the environmental standards will be kept? And how 
quickly will we see investments in cleaning up the environment along the 
border?
    Those are the kinds of substantive questions that we've been asked 
to hammer out and work through and give assurances on. I think that is 
the job of a Member of Congress. I don't feel badly about that at all.
    Q. Mr. President----
    Q. Mr. President--sorry.
    The President. Go ahead. Both of you. [Laughter]
    Q. Isn't there a danger, Mr. President, these kind of side deals 
you've had to make on sugar, citrus, wheat can end up undermining the 
very thing you tried to do with the trade agreement?
    The President. No.
    Q. Why not?
    The President. Well, the side agreements we made on agriculture were 
just like the side agreements we made on the environment and on the 
labor standards. They don't undermine the fundamental things in the 
agreement. The Mexican tariffs come down. The barriers to trade go down. 
The Mexicans have access to nationwide investment in their country. We 
win; they win. The big things in the agreement are still wholly intact, 
and as a matter of fact, I think it's a much better deal than it was a 
year ago.
    Q. How do you feel about this bipartisan coalition? There was an 
extraordinary joint whips committee meeting yesterday. When all the 
votes are being counted in the middle of the rollcall, do you really 
trust Newt Gingrich with what may be the future of your Presidency?
    The President. First of all, I wouldn't even characterize it that 
way. I believe that Newt Gingrich believes in NAFTA just like I do. And 
I believe he wants it to pass. And do I trust him to do everything he 
can to deliver every vote he can? You bet I do.
    And let me say that, you know, we can't win for losing around here. 
I mean, when we were voting on the budget, you were asking me wasn't it 
terrible we didn't have any Republicans voting with us. I like the idea 
of people in the two parties working together when they agree. I do not 
like the idea that any party's, either party's discipline would prevent 
people who agree with one another from working together toward the 
national good. I think that's what the American people want us to do. I 
think they want us to disagree when we disagree, to agree when we agree, 
but not to let our labels keep us

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from working together.
    So this has been an immensely rewarding thing for me to work with 
the Republicans who agree with us on this issue. Mr. Bonior has worked 
very hard with the Republicans who agree with him on the issue, and I 
would like to see more of it in America. I think that our country would 
work better if we could work out agreements and work together in a 
constructive way, particularly on issues that affect our national 
security.
    When I was a boy, looking at Washington from afar, growing up, the 
normal thing was for the Republicans and Democrats to work together on 
foreign policy because everyone understood that was our national 
security. Well frankly, folks, a lot of these economic issues are our 
national security today. And I hope we'll see a lot more of this 
bipartisanship.
    Q. Do you have the votes?
    The President. We're getting there. I never say that until they're 
counted, you know, but I feel good today. We're getting there.
    Q. Mr. President, a lot of people have characterized this as a test 
of your Presidency. And the stakes seem to have been ratcheted up, 
particularly in the last few days, to the point where one Senator was 
quoted as saying your political future is at stake and, at the very 
least, the future of any political programs you want to enact. Do you 
think that is an exaggeration, or are the stakes really that high?
    The President. I think the stakes for our country are high. What 
happens to me is not nearly as important as what happens to the country. 
Thursday morning I'll wake up, and I'll get on that plane and go to the 
APEC meeting and do the best I can for America. A month from now people 
may be concerned about something else. But what I want to emphasize is 
the importance of this to our country.
    I want to make, in closing, since this is my last shot, one argument 
that none of us have made yet again this morning. And that is that NAFTA 
is the gateway to all of Latin America, to 700 million people. It is an 
insurance policy against protectionism in the rest of the world. And it 
is an enormous lever for us to convince our friends in the Pacific 
region and our friends in Europe to complete the worldwide trade 
agreement, the GATT round, by the end of the year so we can continue to 
expand the global economy.
    Yes, sir.
    Q. Mr. President, your opponents on this issue, Mr. Gephardt, for 
instance, say that if NAFTA fails they will immediately offer to 
renegotiate it with you, to revive it. If NAFTA does not pass tomorrow 
night, is it dead, or are you going to immediately try to work with them 
to renegotiate it?
    The President. They're missing the point. They can renegotiate with 
me all they want. They can't renegotiate it with the Mexicans. I think 
the Government of Mexico has made it quite clear that this trade 
agreement includes environmental concessions and labor concessions on 
their part, which I think are good for them, by the way, but never 
before put into a trade agreement by any nation ever. I think it is 
clear what they will do is to look to other nations to make other deals. 
You see, even the Canadians said today that if we voted it down, they'd 
try to make a separate agreement with Mexico. I feel quite sure that 
other nations will as well.
    Q. Mr. President, what are you learning from this intensive 
campaign? Are there a lot of disappointments? And do you have any 
unusual surprises?
    The President. There haven't been any disappointments. Actually, 
what I'm learning from this campaign is that an awful lot of people 
really love this country and many Members of Congress are literally 
willing to put their political careers on the line tomorrow night to do 
what they think is right, even though they're not quite sure their 
voters agree with them yet. Every Member we get who's in a difficult 
district, who's voting for this is doing it because he or she believes 
that it's in the interest of their constituents even if they haven't 
quite persuaded them yet. And it's been a deeply moving thing for me.
    I also would tell you all that we've had a lot of close votes up 
here, but we're moving the ball forward in this country. It is hard to 
do hard things. And sometimes hard things win by narrow margins. But 
America is going through a period of real change and ferment at a time 
of great difficulty for millions of our citizens. So the fact that this 
is tough, it should be exhilarating to all of us who are carrying 
forward. It's just our responsibility to take the tough fight and go 
forward.

North Korea

    Q. Mr. President, on one other topic, are you willing to give up 
military exercises in South

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Korea in exchange for nuclear inspections in North Korea?
    The President. I'm not at liberty even to comment on that now. The 
negotiations are going on, and I don't think I should comment. I'll have 
more to say about that, I hope, in the next few days.
    One last question. Go ahead.

Canadian Agricultural Subsidies

    Q. Have you decided to ask Canada to change its grain pricing 
policies? And are you prepared to seek tariffs or quotas, if they don't, 
on durum wheat?
    The President. First of all, I don't think I should prefigure my 
conversation with the Prime Minister of Canada. I'm going to have my 
first meeting with him in just a couple of days, and we're going to 
discuss some of the issues outstanding between us, including the 
differences both of us have with each other's definition of what 
constitutes fair trade in agriculture. The Prime Minister has made an 
interesting suggestion, which is that we ought to try to reach agreement 
on what does or doesn't constitute a subsidy, something which was not 
done before our agreement with Canada was developed. And that is what 
led to a lot of this misunderstanding because they have things that our 
farmers consider to be significant subsidies that are indirect. So we're 
going to meet and visit about that when we get out to the Pacific. Right 
now, we've got to pass NAFTA.
    Thank you very much.

Note: The President spoke at 11:05 a.m. at the North Portico to the West 
Wing at the White House. In his remarks, he referred to Gov. Tommy G. 
Thompson of Wisconsin.