[Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: William J. Clinton (1997, Book II)]
[November 10, 1997]
[Pages 1530-1532]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office www.gpo.gov]



Remarks on Fast-Track Trade Legislation and an Exchange With Reporters
November 10, 1997

    The President. Good morning. Ladies and gentlemen, as you know, we 
have postponed the vote in the House of Representatives on renewing 
fast-track authority to strengthen our ability to expand exports through 
new agreements. I'm disappointed, of course, that this step was 
necessary because we worked very hard, and we're very close to having 
the requisite number of votes. But early this morning it became clear to 
me that if the matter were taken to a vote, there was a substantial 
chance that we would not get the votes necessary to pass the bill.
    Let me begin by saying a profound word of thanks to Speaker Gingrich 
and to the leadership team in the House who worked with us on this, and 
on the Democratic side, to Representatives Fazio and Matsui and the 
others who were helping them. This was a partnership for the national 
interests, and I am very grateful for what they are doing.
    I think most of you know what happened. We have been having a big 
debate in our party for several years on the question of trade and its 
role in our economic future. Even though we clearly have a majority of 
the Democratic mayors and Governors, and we had a majority in the 
Senate, we don't have a majority in the House who agree with the 
position that I have taken. We worked hard to overcome their objections, 
and we didn't succeed. And because we didn't have more Democratic votes, 
we then had to get a bigger share of the Republican vote. That brought 
into play the controversy over international family planning and the so-
called Mexico City language.
    Had we been able to resolve that, I think we could have gotten 
enough votes on the Republican side to go with the Democrats' votes we 
had to pass the bill. Clearly, I think we could have. But we simply were 
not able to do that. And I say that without undue criticism of anyone. 
The people who took the position that they could not give their votes to 
the fast-track legislation believe very deeply in principle that we 
should change our family planning funding. I, on the other hand, believe 
that it would have been wrong for me to mix the two issues and to 
compromise what I believe in principle. And in the end, this matter 
could not go forward because of that disagreement.
    But what we're going to do now is to regroup a little bit and find a 
way to succeed, and I think we'll be able to do that. I also know, from 
my extensive work now in the House, that there are a large number of 
House Members who are interested in trying to find some constructive 
resolution of this matter, and I think we may well be able to do that. I 
expect that we will successfully press forward with this issue in this 
Congress and at the appropriate time. So I'm not particularly concerned 
about the long run; I think we'll be able to prevail.
    Today, let me say again, I think it's important that all of us do 
more to make the case. This country is in good shape. We have 13\1/2\ 
million more jobs; we have a 4.7 percent unemployment rate; we know that 
a third of that growth has come from trade. We know that the countries 
that are willing to enter into agreements with us in the kinds of areas 
of agreement that we need to push on a regional and a worldwide

[[Page 1531]]

basis will lower barriers more in other countries than they will in our 
country.
    But we also know that the benefits of trade are often not seen as 
directly tied to trade. When a plant expands or a new contract is 
signed, and whenever a plant closes down, generally it's easy to tie it 
to trade whether trade had anything to do with it or not. So we have 
some more work to do.
    But on balance, based on where we are now, I'm quite optimistic that 
we will ultimately prevail in this Congress. And I'm very pleased again 
with the good partnership that we had with Speaker Gingrich and the 
House leadership team and with the Democrats who helped us. And so we're 
just going to go forward. I think it's clear to everybody that America's 
leadership in the world depends upon America's continuing economic 
leadership, and this, therefore, has to be only a temporary obstacle 
because, in the end, we always find out a way to do what's right for 
America, to maintain our leadership, and maintain our economic growth.

Situation in Iraq

    Q. What did you think--[inaudible]--to make a move on Iraq? And how 
do you assess the situation now?
    The President. Well, first of all, as you know, the United Nations 
U-2 plane was not fired upon in its flight. But--and that's a good 
thing, but it does not change the larger issue which is that the U.N. 
inspections have been stopped by Saddam Hussein. So the next step is to 
get a very strong resolution from the United Nations manifesting the 
determination of the international community to resume those 
inspections. And that should happen shortly, as the report is made from 
the people who went to Iraq. And then we will have to go about 
manifesting that, demonstrating our determination to start those 
inspections again.
    Q.  Do you have any fear for the safety of those Americans who are 
in Baghdad? And what kind of unambiguous action did you signal yesterday 
that you expected out of the Security Council?
    The President. Well, of course, I'm concerned about the Americans. 
I'm concerned about the other United Nations personnel who are there. 
I'm concerned about all of them. But again, I am trying to work with Mr. 
Butler and with the United Nations on a daily basis to do what seems 
right and best. And it was the judgment of the United Nations people and 
Mr. Butler that they ought to stay as long as they had a chance to 
resume their work and that they wanted to do that. But I assure you, I'm 
quite concerned with the safety of all the people that are there on 
behalf of Americans and on behalf of the world community trying to keep 
this weapons of mass destruction program from being restarted.
    I believe we are considering every aspect of this issue. We spent 
all weekend working exhaustively on it, and we're going to watch it very 
carefully in the days ahead.

Fast-Track Trade Authority

    Q.  Mr. President, on fast track, you said that the people who 
decided to vote no on this because they believed in principle about 
family planning are sincere. Do you think the Democrats who decided to 
vote no on fast track are sincere, or as you suggested in the past, 
that, in fact, they're knuckling under to political pressure from labor?
    The President. Well, I think some of them are generally opposed to 
it. I think some of them really do believe that we would have gotten all 
the jobs we've gotten and we would be raising incomes and lowering 
unemployment and growing the economy if we had a more protectionist 
trade policy, and that we wouldn't have lost any jobs that have gone 
away in the economy. I think some of them really believe that. I don't 
believe that. And I think the evidence is on my side on that argument.
    And then I think some of them were, in effect, voting their 
district, voting their concerns. They're afraid, or concerned at least, 
that the trade issue is much misunderstood and easily subject to 
misunderstanding. Was there some politics in it? Of course, there is. 
But there's politics in every tough vote that has been held in the 
Congress and any legislative body in my lifetime. I did not question 
their integrity. I questioned the judgment, and I do believe that there 
were some who felt that it was a politically impossible vote but that 
the right thing to do was for me to have the authority and go forward, 
based on my conversations.
    What I think we have to do is try to let the temperature go down 
here and unpack this and go back to what is actually at stake. The 
Democratic Party, insofar as it is saying that we ought to inject labor 
issues and environmental issues into our international negotiations

[[Page 1532]]

as part of our strategy to expand trade and economic partnerships, that 
is a positive thing. We can disagree about how we should do that, but I 
think that's a positive contribution of our party.
    Insofar as we're saying that we should do more and do it more 
quickly to help people who do lose their jobs, whether it's from trade 
or technological changes or whatever, to start new lives and to resume 
successful careers, I think that is a positive thing. And what we need 
to do is sort of unpack the politics and the emotions and the substance 
and try to go back and put this together in a way that allows us to have 
a big bipartisan majority in the House for a constructive fast-track 
authority that enables us to move forward on all these fronts. And I 
think we'll be able to do it.
    Q. A lot of people are going to say this is the second most serious 
defeat you've suffered, after health care. Do you feel----
    The President. No, there's a big difference.
    Q. Do you feel you could have handled it better? Do you think you 
could have started earlier, or is this just a nut you couldn't crack 
unless you caved in on Mexico City?
    The President. Well, I think in the end--let me say again, I think 
in the end we could have passed the bill if the Mexico City thing had 
been resolved. But I simply couldn't do that. I mean, I just couldn't do 
it. To me, first of all, I think it's wrong to mix these things. And 
secondly, I feel as strongly in principle on one side of the issue as 
the people in the House who otherwise might have voted for fast track do 
on the other. The prior problem was that we have, as I said, we have--
look at the Senate vote--we have a majority of Senate Democrats for fast 
track, a huge majority of the mayors and Governors who are Democrats. We 
don't have a majority in the House. And I don't know whether--what we 
could have done differently.
    Let me just say this. I think the bill that's there before them now, 
had we been able to persuade everybody involved that that bill should 
have been there months ago, maybe that would have made a difference. But 
it's easy to second-guess these things. The main thing is--the 
difference between this and health care was that health care was all 
caught up in politics and partisanship in even a more profound way, and 
there were big vested interests that had a stake in basically performing 
reverse plastic surgery on the proposal we made, and when it was dead, 
it was dead.
    This is not dead. I will be very surprised if we are not successful 
in developing a bipartisan, constructive, successful approach to fast 
track before this Congress is over. This is a big difference here. I 
feel that this is entirely different. And keep in mind, it's also 
occurring in a different context. It's occurring in the context of the 
country doing well, the economy being strong, and the Congress 
continuing to do productive things.
    So I'm going to sign a bill, an appropriations bill that has the 
biggest increase in education in decades, that funds the America Reads 
program, our program to put computers in schools, increased scholarships 
for people going to college, and that makes a huge step toward 
establishing national academic standards and national testing, something 
that everyone thought was dead just about 10 days ago and we worked out.
    So I'm basically very upbeat, as we move toward the break for 
Thanksgiving and Christmas, about the capacity of the Congress to work 
together and to work with me and to get this done. I wish we'd been able 
to pass it right now, but I expect it to pass.
    Q. What about this week? You said this session, but do you mean this 
year?
    Q. When? In the spring?
    The President. I'm sorry, what did you say?
    Q. You said you expect it to pass this session, but what about this 
year? Any hope this week?
    The President. First of all, we've been up for a couple of days 
working on fast track and dealing with Iraq, and you will, I hope, 
understand why we can't make a judgment about that. We will bring it 
back up at the appropriate time and when we think we can pass it. But 
we're very close now, under the most burdensome of circumstances. So all 
we need is a few breaks to have more than enough votes to pass it. And 
what I would like to do is to bring it back up at a time when we can 
pass it with a big vote and a much stronger vote from both parties. And 
I think there's every change that we will be able to do that. And I look 
forward to it, and I expect it to happen.
    Thank you.

Note: The President spoke at 11:30 a.m. on the South Lawn at the White 
House. In his remarks, he referred to President Saddam Hussein of Iraq; 
and Richard Butler, Executive Chairman of the United Nations Special 
Commission.