[Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents Volume 35, Number 45 (Monday, November 15, 1999)]
[Pages 2283-2286]
[Online from the Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]

<R04>
Remarks on Departure for Georgetown University and an Exchange With 
Reporters

November 8, 1999

Budget Negotiations

    The President. Good afternoon. Over the weekend, we made some 
progress toward creating a budget that reflects the values of the 
American people, respects the need for our Government to live within its 
means, and looks to our future. I believe we can finish our work by 
Wednesday if we put partisanship aside and focus instead on achieving 
goals that the vast majority of the American people want us to achieve: 
a better education for our children, safer streets, a clean environment, 
more Americans brought into the circle of our growing prosperity.
    Improving education is perhaps the greatest domestic challenge our 
Nation faces. Education is at the heart of this budget debate. Last fall 
we took an important step to improve learning in the classroom. We 
reached an agreement with Congress to help States and school districts 
begin hiring 100,000 new, highly trained teachers to reduce class size 
in the early grades.
    The need was obvious. School enrollments are exploding. Record 
numbers of teachers are or will soon be at retirement. And the research 
is clear that students do learn more in smaller classes with quality 
teachers.
    Last week we learned from a new survey of the Nation's largest 
school districts that our class size reduction initiative so far has 
done precisely what it was intended to do. It has put more teachers in 
the classroom and increased training for those already there with a 
minimum of redtape and bureaucracy. Now we have even more new evidence 
that our class size reduction is working.

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    Today I am releasing a new report from the Department of Education. 
It's called ``Local Success Stories: Reducing Class Size.'' It shows 
that in just one year, schools across America have actually hired over 
29,000 new, highly trained teachers, thanks to our class size reduction 
initiative. The report also shows that in the early grades in those 
schools, class size has been reduced by an average of five students per 
class. Over 1.7 million students are now directly benefiting from this 
class size initiative.
    It shows we are headed in the right direction, and that's the good 
news. But we must remember, only a fraction of America's students have 
been reached. So we must continue down that path, not abandon it. I am 
committed to providing more teachers and better teachers for all our 
schools. I want to make sure every young student in America receives the 
benefits of more individual attention and a more disciplined learning 
environment in a smaller class size setting.
    Now, last fall congressional Republicans agreed to support this 
initiative. Indeed, it was election season, and they even went home and 
campaigned on it. It was a good idea then, and it's still a good idea. 
But suddenly the Republican majority has mysteriously changed its mind. 
Instead of keeping their commitment to hire more teachers and reduce 
class size--again I say, something they bragged on and ran on last 
year--now they want an open-ended block grant which could even be used 
for vouchers for private schools. I think that is wrong.
    Nine out of 10 students in our country attend public schools. The 
percentage of the funding coming from the Federal Government is already 
too meager, in my judgment. Therefore, our taxpayer money should go for 
more teachers and smaller classes in our public schools, not for 
vouchers for private schools.
    I am absolutely committed to keeping the promise that I made, and 
the promise that Congress made, to reduce class size with more quality 
teachers in the early grades. We need to work together to find a way to 
keep that promise.
    We also must demand more accountability for results, so I call on 
Congress to pass our plan to help States and schools districts turn 
around failing schools or shut them down. Working together we can find a 
way to deliver a budget that meets our values.
    We also value the safety of our families, so we must extent our 
successful COPS program, which has given us already the lowest crime 
rate in 30 years, and now put up to 50,000 new community police officers 
in our neighborhoods with the modern equipment they need to keep the 
crime rate coming down.
    We must support our lands legacy initiative because we value the 
environment, to set aside precious natural areas for future generations 
and reject special interest riders that would endanger our environment.
    Because we value one America with justice for all, we must pass 
strong hate crimes legislation. And I would like to say that I want to 
express my personal appreciation to the parents of Matthew Shepard and 
to the police officers who have come with them here today and have gone 
to Capitol Hill to lobby for the hate crimes legislation.
    We value our national security and our leadership in the world. 
Therefore, we have to pay our dues to the United Nations. We value equal 
opportunity. And so before Congress leaves we should tackle one more 
urgent priority: We ought to raise the minimum wage so that more people 
will participate in our prosperity. And we ought to raise the minimum 
wage without holding it hostage to special interest tax cuts that are 
not paid for and don't address national needs.
    We can do all this, and we can do it and pay for it, not spend the 
Social Security Trust Fund and continue to pay down the debt so that in 
15 years we'll be debt-free for the first time since 1835. I urge 
Congress to continue to work with me in a bipartisan fashion to finish 
the job the American people sent us here to do.
    Thank you.

Reduction of Class Size

    Q. Mr. President, on the issue of funding for teachers, sir, you 
resent it when Congress tells you to spend money in ways in which you do 
not deem appropriate. Why should a State Governor, who would like to 
spend that money differently, feel any differently?

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    The President. Well, because it's not their money. If they don't 
want the money, they don't have to take it. If they're offended by it, 
they can give it to other States and other school districts.
    Look, we have--the difference is, we are acting on evidence, based 
on what the local school districts tell us and what we know. We have a 
record number of schoolchildren; we have a record number of teachers 
starting to retire. We have mountain upon mountain of evidence that 
smaller classes in the early grades lead to permanent learning gains if 
the teachers are well-qualified.
    And Congress agreed with that last year. I'd like to see them answer 
instead why they're ready so--excuse me, so willing to abandon something 
they campaigned on and asked people to vote for them for doing just a 
year ago.
    This is the right thing to do. It's good educational policy. And let 
me remind you that the teachers have supported this; the educators have 
supported this; and the evidence supports this. That's why I'm for it.
    Q. Mr. President, do you expect China to get into the----
    Q. The Department of Labor----
    The President. One at a time, sorry.

Unemployment Insurance

    Q. The Department of Labor, at your direction, is drafting 
regulations to change the use of unemployment insurance so that it could 
be used for family leave purposes. Opponents of this idea say you don't 
have the authority to do this, that any such change should be done by 
Federal legislation. How do you respond to that?
    The President. Well, I was informed that we did have the authority 
to do it in the narrow way that we're doing it. And I think if you want 
more information on what the arguments are, you will have to talk to 
either the Labor Department Counsel or the appropriate people at the 
White House. But I obviously would not have done it if I hadn't been 
told that we had the authority to do it.
    Helen [Helen Thomas, United Press International].

China and the World Trade Organization

    Q. Mr. President, do you expect China to get into the World Trade 
Organization this time around?
    The President. I don't know, but I hope so. Ambassador Barshefsky 
and Mr. Sperling have gone over there to work on it, and we're doing our 
best.
    Q. Are things looking better?
    The President. Well, I don't know yet. Let's not characterize the 
in-between until we see whether we can produce the product.

Budget Negotiations

    Q. Mr. President,--[inaudible]--real sticking point----
    The President. Obviously, we have a big difference of opinion on 
education, and I feel very strongly about it. The education community 
and the country feel strongly about it. And the Democrats in Congress 
feel strongly about it. And the Republicans felt strongly about it when 
they were facing an election, and I think it's wrong for them to abandon 
a commitment the next year that they were proud of in an election year. 
So I hope we can work that out.
    But the other issues I mentioned are all important to me, as well. 
Can we do it all by Wednesday? In a heartbeat, if we decide to get 
together. We resolved very quickly many of our differences over the 
foreign operations bill, and we can do that on these other bills if we 
really work at it.

Mexican Presidential Primary

    Q. Mr. President, Mexico has held its first Presidential primary. 
The PRI has governed Mexico for over 70 years. What do you think about 
it, the primary yesterday?
    The President. I think it's a good thing that they held a primary, 
and I think the more democracy they embrace, the better. So I would 
applaud them and congratulate them for having done so. And particularly, 
I would like to congratulate President Zedillo, who took the initiative 
to promote this primary and to open up the political process in his 
country.

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Situation in Pakistan

    Q. Mr. President, how would you characterize the situation in 
Pakistan differently than George W. Bush did this last week?
    The President. Oh, I--look. I don't want to get into that. You all 
can handle the Presidential campaign without me. You know that I'm very 
concerned about the interruption of civilian leadership in Pakistan. We 
would like to see a stronger democratic system there, not the 
abandonment of the system that they did have. And we are--we have 
communicated that to General Musharraf and to the others, and we will 
continue to work with them and hope that we can achieve some progress 
there.
    And I also want to encourage them to continue to work to diminish 
tensions with India and to resolve matters in Kashmir, not to continue 
to use that, as has been done in times past, to inflame tension on both 
sides of the line of control, and in both countries. Those countries 
need to be working on their long-term challenges and their common 
interests. And so I will continue to push for that as well.
    Thank you.

Note: The President spoke at 2:30 p.m. on the South Grounds at the White 
House. In his remarks, he referred to murder victim Matthew Shepard's 
parents, Dennis and Judy; President Ernesto Zedillo of Mexico; and Gen. 
Pervaiz Musharraf, head of the Pakistani Armed Forces, who led a 
military coup d'etat in Pakistan on October 14.