[Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents Volume 31, Number 20 (Monday, May 22, 1995)]
[Pages 850-851]
[Online from the Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]

<R04>
Remarks Prior to a Meeting With Congressional Leaders and an Exchange 
With Reporters

May 18, 1995

Budget Proposals

    The President. I want to say something about the discussions now 
going on about the rescission bill. First of all, for me, this is not a 
partisan issue at all. This is about pork. And in this pork battle, 
Democrats aren't blameless either. This is about pork over people.
    Now, let's look at what happened. I worked hard with the Senate to 
get a big deficit reduction bill that would protect people and education 
and our efforts to raise the incomes of the American people as much as 
possible. Then they went into conference behind closed doors and took 
out a lot of the people programs that will raise incomes and increase 
security to put in pork.
    There's one congressional district with nine road projects in it; 
one courthouse cost over $100 million. And those two things alone will 
take over $200 million away from our efforts to make sure our children 
go to safe schools, to make sure that we can fund our national service 
program to let young people do community service work and earn money to 
go to college. There is even a project in there that gives a million 
dollars to a city street. Now, what's the Federal Government got to do 
in that?
    You know, if we're going to bring this budget into balance, we're 
going to have to make a lot of tough decisions. We're going to have to 
have a lot of serious cuts. And we have to change the way we do things 
here, and we have to be very careful about how we spend the money we do 
spend. We've got to spend it on things that matter like education and 
training and building up the American people.
    So, that's my position. If they'll get rid of the pork, we can have 
a bill.
    Q. Mr. President, your administration isn't blameless, either, 
though, is it? These aren't programs that were just put in. These are 
programs that were put in the budget that you signed off on and 
Democrats approved. If it's pork, wasn't it pork then? Why did you 
approve it?
    The President. Because we're going to cut $16 billion out. Because a 
$100 million courthouse is not as important to raising incomes as the 
School-to-Work program to give young people who don't go to 4-year 
universities a chance to get good training or as a program for women and 
infants to make sure they're properly nourished or as a program to let 
our young people work in their communities and earn money to go to 
college. It just doesn't compute.
    There's nowhere near--you know, special interest road projects, nine 
in one congressional district, are not as important as giving our 
teachers the training they need to make sure our students reach world-
class standards in education. The judgments are wrong. If we're going to 
get serious about continuing the spending cuts and continuing the cuts 
in the deficit, moving this thing to balance, we cannot afford to choose 
pork over people.
    It is a very simple choice, and it has nothing to do with partisan 
politics. And if they will fix it, we can have a bill.
    Q. If they will put the AmeriCorps program back in and fully fund 
that, would that be enough for you? Would you then let the rescission 
bill go through?
    The President. For one thing, on AmeriCorps, I didn't ask for 
AmeriCorps to be fully funded at the level that we funded it in our 
budget. I only asked that it be funded at the level that the Senate--the 
United States Senate passed a rescission bill with a bipartisan vote. 
And all I asked the conference to do was to leave the people programs, 
the education programs in at the Senate level. I asked the conference 
also to take

[[Page 851]]

out some very harmful language on the environment dealing with the 
forests in the Pacific Northwest which will cause us all kinds of legal 
problems and headaches. I hope that can be modified as well.
    But I accepted some cuts in every--I think we're going to have to 
look at everything for cuts, but what I asked was that we not cut below 
what the Senate did. And what happened was, they cut below what the 
Senate did to stick in a bunch of pork projects. And that wasn't right.
    And I want to say this: To the people of Oklahoma and California and 
Louisiana and the other States who need the emergency aid, they can get 
that aid today; they can get that aid tomorrow with more deficit 
reduction than is in this bill that came out of the conference if the 
Congress will just take out the pork and put back the people.

Secretary of Commerce Ron Brown

    Q. Can I ask you one question on Secretary Brown? Are you concerned, 
sir, that the investigation of Secretary Brown and other Cabinet 
officials is giving at least a perception they haven't lived up to----
    The President. Read what the Attorney General's referral said, and I 
think you will see why I asked him to stay on.

Note: The President spoke at 2:22 p.m. in the Oval Office at the White 
House. A tape was not available for verification of the content of these 
remarks.