[Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: WILLIAM J. CLINTON (2000-2001, Book III)]
[November 4, 2000]
[Pages 2497-2503]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office www.gpo.gov]



Interview With Jose Diaz-Balart of 
Telemundo in New York City
November 4, 2000

    Mr. Diaz-Balart. Mr. President, thank you very much for being with 
us on ``Esta Manana.'' It's a pleasure having you.
    The President. Glad to do it.

Hispanic Voters and the 2000 Election

    Mr. Diaz-Balart. Let's talk about the importance of November 7th, 
specifically towards the Latino population of the United States. Why 
should people who, many times, don't feel part of this country, and yet 
are citizens, why should they vote?
    The President. Because there are issues at stake that will directly 
affect themselves, their families, their communities, and our country. 
There are huge differences in the economic policies of the two 
candidates.
    Obviously, I favor the ones that Vice President Gore and my wife and others 
have articulated, but there's the question of whether you think it's 
better to pay down the debt, have a smaller tax cut focused on the 
middle class, and invest more in education, or whether it's better to 
have a bigger tax cut, partially privatized Social Security, and have 
spending that will take us back in debt but give some people more money 
right now. That will affect everybody. How do you build on the 
prosperity of the new--of the last 8 years?
    Then, there are differences of opinion on crime, on the environment, 
on health care, on education, and on fairness toward immigrants, which 
should be a big issue to the Latino population. I and virtually everyone 
in my party are fighting for the ``Fairness to Immigrants Act,'' and the 
leadership of the Republican Party is opposing us. And so we're--and we 
have a simple position, which is that it was right to let people from 
Cuba and Nicaragua come into this country if they were fleeing 
dictatorial or violent environments, but we owe the same thing to the 
people from El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Haiti, and other places. 
So I think that's a big issue.
    Then there are issues revolving around whether we should have hate 
crimes legislation.

[[Page 2498]]

Should we have stronger laws guaranteeing equal pay for women? All these 
things will drastically affect, one way or the other, what life is like 
for ordinary Americans.

Voter Apathy

    Mr. Diaz-Balart. Why do you think, sir, that the polls show that 
candidates really haven't gotten through to all of the voters, that 
there's some apathy, and there's some feeling that, ``You know what, I 
don't even want to get involved with this?''
    The President. I think the main--anybody that doesn't want to get 
involved, I think it's because the issues aren't as clear as they should 
be. But I also think, in a funny way, the general prosperity and sense 
of well-being of the country could be working against us a little bit. 
Because people may think, well, you know--younger voters, a lot of them 
can't even remember what it was like 8 years ago. And I think sometimes 
when times are good, you tend to be more casual about voting and about 
studying the differences. And then, maybe they--people, I think, do have 
a negative reaction sometimes to all this--the air wars, not just the 
Presidential race but all these ads where they're attacking each other 
and all that. That sometimes tends to depress turnout.
    But I would hope the American people would actually be in a very 
good humor. I mean, this has been an essentially positive election. The 
candidates have been sharply critical of each other on the issues, but 
there has been surprisingly little personal attack. Governor Bush has, I think, wrongly questioned Vice President 
Gore's character a couple of times, but by 
and large, both of them have run clean, positive campaigns in which they 
have strongly disagreed with each other on the issues. But that's what 
democracy is about. I would think--I think the American people ought to 
be happy. I mean, the economy is growing; all sectors of the society are 
benefiting. Crime is down. The environment is cleaner. There are fewer 
people without health insurance. The schools are getting better.
    I think that people should think, ``Wow, we've got a chance now to 
really dream big dreams about what we want America to look like over the 
next 10 years. What should America's role in the world be over the next 
10 years? What is exactly the right thing to do with our projected 
surplus? And how should we handle all this?'' This is, for a citizen who 
loves democracy, a dream election. We may never have another election 
like this in our lifetime, where we've got prosperity, social progress, 
and the absence of crisis at home and threat abroad.
    I would just say to the American people, you make a lot of mistakes 
in life. Sometimes when things are so good, you think it doesn't matter 
if you concentrate or act. It does matter.

President's Role in 2000 Campaign

    Mr. Diaz-Balart. You know, what does surprise me, sir, is that a 
President with a huge popularity as you do, whose numbers continue to be 
record-setting as far as anybody is concerned, and yet we don't see you 
in the battleground States. I don't see you in Michigan. I haven't seen 
you in Florida. I haven't seen you in Tennessee and even in your home 
State that much. It surprises me as a journalist. Does it surprise you? 
Why aren't you there?
    The President. Not exactly. I think, first of all, there is a limit 
to what the President can do in another person's race. I have been out a 
lot this year. I couldn't go out--I think it would have been actually a 
negative factor if I had gone out before the Congress went home, because 
people would think, ``What's President Clinton doing trying to tell me 
how to vote for the next President when he's got a job to do back in 
Washington?''
    Now, when they did go home, I went to California. I spent the day in 
New York trying to help my wife and 
our candidates here. And I'm going to spend a day in Arkansas tomorrow, 
which is a State where I think we're a little bit behind but not too 
badly, and maybe I can have an impact there.
    But I also have done, over the course of this last year, I've been 
in all those battleground States. I've done 150-plus events for our 
Congressmen and Senators, every one of them also making the argument for 
the Vice President. And I cut a lot of 
radio spots and done some other communications, phone messages, and 
other things to try to reach swing voters and try to affect the turnout.
    But I'm not so sure, if I had been to more places, it would have 
made a difference in the vote, because I actually have experienced it 
from the other end. When President Reagan was wildly popular in 1984, he 
came to Arkansas and campaigned for my opponent. It had no effect on my 
vote, not at all.

[[Page 2499]]

    So I've done everything I could do to help the Vice President and Senator Lieberman. And I think that there was a decision made that the best I 
could do would be to try to articulate a national message, which I can 
do anywhere--yesterday my speech in California was played live on CNN, 
for example--and keep the schedule I had set, because I have a unique 
relationship with Arkansas, and then try to do direct voter contact.
    But I want the focus to be on Vice President Gore and Governor Bush. I think the 
people have to make that decision. All I can do is to help clarify what 
I think the choice is. You know, the American people have been very good 
to me, and I've tried to tell them in the last 2 weeks what I think the 
choice is, and I hope I've had a positive impact.

Perspective on the Presidency

    Mr. Diaz-Balart. What would you tell them about these last 8 years 
for you as a--less as President Clinton and more as Bill Clinton, the 
man whose dreams, in many ways, came true, and who has had ups and 
downs?
    The President. Well, first of all, I feel an enormous sense of 
gratitude to the American people. I mean, they gave me a chance to 
serve, and they sort of took a chance on me at first, because I was the 
Governor of a small State. I was quite young. I had never served an 
elected office in Washington. But I had some clear ideas about what I 
thought we should do. So I feel gratitude.
    Secondly, I feel gratitude because they've worked out pretty well. 
And one of the lessons that I have learned from all this is that it 
really matters--if you want to run for President, you should have 
reasons for running that are bigger than yourself, bigger than your 
desire to do it, because that will sustain you in the tough times. It 
gives you a game plan. It gives you a way of organizing a team and 
marshaling the energy of the country. And of course, the people stayed 
with me in the tough times, too.
    So when I leave office, I will leave grateful for the progress 
America has made, grateful for the generosity and support of the 
American people, but I'll also be more idealistic than I was the day I 
took the oath of office. In spite of all the battles I've been through, 
I'm more idealistic about the potential of America within our country 
and the potential of America to have a positive impact around the world 
than I was when I took office.

President's Future Plans

    Mr. Diaz-Balart. How do you plan to channel that optimism and 
continue trying to make a difference?
    The President. I hope that what I can do is to try to trade my job 
in, which now has an enormous amount of power and authority, but 
requires me to be involved in literally hundreds of things, and identify 
four or five big areas that I care passionately about and concentrate my 
energies there, so that whatever influence I have as a former President, 
being able to concentrate in fewer areas, I'll still have a positive 
impact.
    I'm still working on the details of how to do that, but I really 
hope I can do that. I think that I have an obligation to my country and 
to the people who have been my friends and allies around the world to 
try to use whatever time and energy I have left in this astonishing, 
unique experience I've had to make the world a better place, and I'll 
keep trying.
    Mr. Diaz-Balart. Give me an idea, something that may or may not work 
out, but something that we could be seeing you at.
    The President. Well, I'm very interested in the economic empowerment 
of poor people. That's something I've worked on here at home with our 
empowerment zone programs, with our community development institutions, 
making loans to people who couldn't get them otherwise, and something 
that my wife and I have worked on around the world. Last year, through 
our AID programs, we made 2 million small microenterprise loans in Latin 
America and Africa and in poorer countries in Asia.
    I think one of the problems with democracy is, it's hard for it to 
take root if people don't feel any tangible benefits. In Latin America 
today, we have some countries where democracy is more fragile partly 
because they haven't felt the benefits. One of the problems we have in 
the Middle East today, with all the tension in the West Bank and Gaza, 
is that many Palestinians are not better off today economically than 
they were when we signed the peace agreement way back in 1993. And we 
have to do a better job in the world of merging politics and economics. 
So that's one area that I'm very interested in.

[[Page 2500]]

Middle East Peace Process

    Mr. Diaz-Balart. We'll talk about the Middle East real quick before 
we go to Latin America, which is a subject dear to our viewers' hearts. 
Some critics have said that the United States, your administration, has 
been so keen on pushing for some kind of concessions on both sides, that 
maybe it's become an American agenda in the Middle East, versus the 
Americans acting as brokers and as objective people who can help the 
system.
    The President. I don't think that's a fair criticism. Here's why. 
We, all along, have basically facilitated what the parties wanted to do. 
Now, when we met at Camp David, we met knowing that there might not be 
an agreement. But we did it because both parties were afraid that they 
were coming up on the September deadline for the declaration of a 
Palestinian state without an agreement, and that without further 
progress on these tough issues, we might have a real mess there, even 
worse than what we've been through.
    So what I tried to do was to explore--when they reach an impasse, I 
did what President Carter did, way back at Camp David I, between Israel 
and Egypt. If they reach an impasse, then you can offer an idea to see 
if both sides will take it. But it can never be America's agenda. All we 
can ever do is try to be an honest and fair broker, because we don't 
have to live with the consequences. The people that have to live with 
the consequences are the Israelis and the Palestinians. So for us to try 
to force something on them is a grave mistake.
    On the other hand, the consequences of not making peace have been 
evident these last 3 or 4 weeks over there, and they are just horrible. 
So we should nudge them when we can, and as long as both sides trust us, 
we can nudge them without them thinking it's our agenda, because they 
know when they have to get off--they know when they can't do something.

Cuba

    Mr. Diaz-Balart. This January will mark the 42d anniversary of 
Castro in power, the longest lasting dictator. Why haven't you helped 
the internal dissident movement in Cuba like, let's say, Reagan did for 
Poland?
    The President. Well, I don't know what else we could have done. I 
believe I could have done a lot more if the Cuban Democracy Act had been 
left intact. And the Cuban community in Florida, for example, and in New 
Jersey, strongly supported the Cuban Democracy Act. I think we could 
have done a lot more for the dissident movement in Cuba, because we 
would have been in a position to have carrots and sticks in return for 
openness and change, and we could have supported them.
    But when Castro's air force murdered those 
Brothers to the Rescue people in the two airplanes, shot them down 
completely illegally, we had to have some sort of response. The Congress 
passed the Helms-Burton bill. I signed it, but it tied the hands of the 
executives so much that it's hard for us to use the full panoply of 
pressures we had.
    For example, let's just take Kosovo--I mean Serbia. We just had an 
election in Serbia, Mr. Kostunica. We 
could put a lot of money into a democratic election there, but we also 
had something to offer them if they won. I had the power to immediately 
suspend the embargo, to do other things. We had an embargo on them that 
was very tough, but I always had the flexibility to use carrots and 
sticks.
    I think it's a great mistake, and I hope the next Congress will 
correct it to put the President in a position where he can promote 
positive change in Cuba. Because the Congress believes the only way it 
can show it's anti-Castro is to make sure that 
the President has no leverage. The Congress just adopted another bill 
that I think was a mistake. They put it in the Agriculture bill, and I 
had no choice but to sign it. The bill purported to sell--allow more 
food sales to Cuba, but because it doesn't have any financing mechanism, 
there won't be any food sales. The real purpose of the bill was to 
further restrict the ability of Americans to travel to Cuba and have 
person-to-person contact. I think that's a mistake, because I think it 
again--we have no plans to invade Cuba. If there's not going to be a 
military invasion of Cuba, then what you need is a balance of carrots 
and sticks.
    I am disappointed that Castro is still in 
power. I am disappointed that democracy has not been restored to Cuba. I 
am glad that we have had a very tough line these last 8 years. I wish we 
could have done better. But I think that it is a mistake--I think the 
Cuban Democracy Act was right. That was the right concept: more sticks 
and more carrots, more flexibility. Get in there and find the people in 
Cuba that are promoting democracy, that are promoting free

[[Page 2501]]

markets, that are promoting freedom of speech, that are politically 
opposed to the communist regime, and find ways to support them. And find 
ways to give power to just ordinary people doing all kinds of things 
that are inconsistent with a total communist dictatorship.
    And I hope that we'll--he can't last 
forever. Nobody lives forever, for one thing. And I don't think that the 
system is sustainable without him, but I would like to see change before 
then. I know even in Miami and in New Jersey, I hear more and more 
discussion among my friends in the Cuban communities about what else we 
could do. I wish we could have done better. I do think the next 
President should be given more tools. If we want to try to move toward 
freedom quicker, we've got to give the President more tools to deal 
with.

Mexico

    Mr. Diaz-Balart. One of the good stories coming out of Latin America 
is this election in Mexico with Vicente Fox winning the PRI after 70-
something years.
    The President. Great story.
    Mr. Diaz-Balart. Tell me how that's--the influence you think or the 
impact of that story on--not only on the United States-Mexico relations 
but also on Latin America in general.
    The President. Well, first of all, I think it's a great credit to 
the people of Mexico that they had an honest election, that it was 
carried off in a forthright way.
    It is secondly a great credit to Ernesto Zedillo, because he, first of all, opened his own party's 
Presidential nomination up to a broader popular choice, and secondly, he 
basically assured an honest election to make politics competitive in 
Mexico. So I think President Zedillo will go 
down in history for many things in a positive way. He had a very good 
economic policy, but he also had the courage to give up his own party's 
monopoly of power. And he knew what he was doing when he opened the 
system.
    Then thirdly, I think it's a tribute to Mr. Fox. He's a very engaging, compelling man. He's an 
interesting man. He's a----
    Mr. Diaz-Balart. Charismatic.
    The President. Very charismatic. He lives on 
a ranch. He showed me the boots he was wearing he said were made in a 
boot factory on his own ranch. His children still, by and large, live on 
the ranch; I think one of them lives in Mexico City now. He's a very 
impressive man.
    And what I hope will happen is that when he 
takes office, I hope that the PRI will try to cooperate with him, will 
try to work with him, will give him a chance to succeed. Because one of 
the problems that a new President faces, if your party has never been in 
power or if your party has been out of power a very long time--that even 
happens here sometimes; we faced some of those challenges when I came 
in--is, you have to put together a team that not only is smart and 
knowledgeable on policy but also can figure out how to work through the 
political culture of a country, in this case Mexico's political culture, 
which has never before had a President of another party.
    So I would hope that since Mexico has one-term Presidencies, the PRI 
has nothing to lose by helping Mr. Fox succeed 
and giving him a chance to do good for Mexico. If he makes a mistake, 
he'll have to live with the consequences, like we all do. But I think 
that America has a big interest in the success of Mexico, and I think 
the PRI will rise in the esteem of the public if they are seen to be a 
constructive force there. So this will be an interesting test for them 
because they've never been like this before, either.
    I like Mexico's chances for the future. I think their--I personally 
believe their biggest problem is the same thing Colombia is facing, but 
on a smaller scale. The narcotraffickers have so much loose money to 
throw around in countries that are poor, and have so much power to throw 
around in communities and areas where the power structure is weak, that 
that's a real test for Mexico and its democracy. But it's basically, I 
think, Mexico is moving in the right direction and deserves a lot of the 
world's applause for what's happened there.

Immigration

    Mr. Diaz-Balart. In interviews with ``Esta Manana,'' both Governor 
Bush and Vice President Gore have said that a lot needs to be done as 
far as how INS handles the Mexicans who try to reach this country for a 
better life for themselves and for their family. They both have said 
that they failed to--there's not enough, maybe, human respect towards 
families that are divided, people who are sent back without any kind of 
sensitivity towards their cases. Would you agree with that?

[[Page 2502]]

    The President. Oh, yes. I think there are several problems with the 
INS. But I think, first, there's the whole issue of how we deal with 
controlling our borders and immigrants that come here without legal 
sanction. And then there's the question of how we handle those who are 
eligible for naturalization and how long they have to wait and how 
they're treated while they're waiting.
    The Vice President headed up a task 
force for us back in '96 to try to dramatically speed the naturalization 
process, and we did--you remember we did a project in Miami and in 
several other cities. We got an enormous amount of criticism from the 
Congress, I think, because they thought that immigrants would be more 
likely to be Democratic voters. Although one of the reasons we did it in 
Miami was because, as you know, Cuban-American voters normally tend to 
vote for Republicans for President, and we wanted to demonstrate that we 
weren't trying to be partisan. What we wanted to do was to make the INS 
work better for people who were eligible for naturalization.
    Now, for people who are trying to get in the country, it's a genuine 
dilemma, because every nation has to have some control over its borders 
and some limits on immigration. And if you ignore those entirely, with 
regard to Mexico, because of our long history and the culture of the Rio 
Grande Valley and all of that you know very well, then you're sort of 
really hurting those people that wait their turn in line.
    So I think what we need is a little better treatment. We need to 
review the quota. We need to make sure that people are treated right, 
and then we need to examine whether or not we need to do more on the 
family unification front. As you know, that's one of things we're 
fighting for in the Latino immigrant fairness legislation before 
Congress now, is trying to do a little more on family reunification, 
because it seems to me that America ought to be a pro-family country. We 
ought to let people be together. And that's another reason I'm fighting 
for the Liberians, too. You may be familiar with that case and the 
Liberian immigrants.
    I will say this: I think, on balance, the Government works a lot 
better than it did when I got here, but I am disappointed that I have 
not made more improvements in the Immigration and Naturalization 
Service. So both Governor Bush and the Vice 
President are right, and I'm glad that they 
have both committed to focus on it.

President's Future Plans

    Mr. Diaz-Balart. My last question is, here's a kid who goes to the 
White House and meets President Kennedy, then later as a grown man is 
saying hello to kids on that same lawn. Here's a political animal who 
has studied all his life politics, history. I see you out there on the 
line, and you seem to be the last guy who wants to be there. The people 
who have shook your hand leave before you do, because you want to say 
hello and touch everybody out there. How in the heck are you going to 
do--what are you going to do after this? Here's a guy who--you're a 
young guy, and all your life you've done this, and I see you out there. 
Now what? What happens?
    The President. I do love politics, and I also love public service. I 
will miss the job of being President even more than the political 
events, even more than living in the White House, which has been a 
profound honor. But you know, it is our system, and it's probably a 
pretty good system, that a person just gets to be President for 8 years, 
if you're lucky. So I have to do what I've done before at several points 
in my life. I have to start a new life and figure out how to use the 
life I've lived to good effect in building a new life.
    And I won't have to stop being a citizen of America or a citizen of 
the world; I just won't be the candidate any more. I hope I'll be a 
member of the Senate spouses club after Tuesday. I told Vice President 
Gore that if he got elected, I would do 
whatever he wanted me to do, anything from coming in to talk or going to 
funerals. I'd do whatever I was asked to do.
    I've done this. I'm grateful. I'm not going to stop being an 
interested citizen, but I have to make a new life. I just hope it will 
be one that will be of some use to my country.
    Mr. Diaz-Balart. Mr. President, thank you very much. I appreciate 
you being with us on ``Esta Manana.''
    The President. Thank you.

Note: The interview was taped at 5:10 p.m. at the African Square Plaza 
in Harlem for later broadcast. The transcript was released by the Office 
of the Press Secretary on November 9. In his remarks, the President 
referred to Republican Presidential candidate Gov. George W. Bush of

[[Page 2503]]

Texas; President Fidel Castro of Cuba; President Vojislav Kostunica of 
the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (Serbia and Montenegro); and 
President Vicente Fox and former President Ernesto Zedillo of Mexico. A 
tape was not available for verification of the content of this 
interview.