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Morning News

The Bush Presidency: Congressional Leaders Meet at the White House; More Cabinet Confirmations on Capitol Hill

Aired January 24, 2001 - 11:06 a.m. ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

DARYN KAGAN, CNN ANCHOR: Now to Washington, D.C. It's President Bush's fourth working day in office. He met this morning with Democratic congressional leaders at the White House. It's also a day of more Cabinet confirmation hearings on Capitol Hill.

We have CNN's John King at the White House and Bob Franken on Capitol Hill.

John, that was an interesting visit that the president had this morning, not just Democrats, but Republican leader as well.

JOHN KING, CNN SR. WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: That's right. The new president inviting into the White House the people he needs to pass his agenda through the Congress, both the Republican and the Democratic leadership here. The discussion, we are told, ranged from the president's number-one priority, education, to tax cuts, to scheduling on the budget, even to the California power crisis.

First and foremost, this week, though, the new president wants to focus on education. He submitted his proposal yesterday. There is a great deal of agreement, but there is disagreement on two big issues, one is vouchers, the use of government taxpayer money to allow parents to take their children out of public schools and perhaps put them in private schools; the other is annual testing, the new president wants annual testing in reading and math in grades three through eight. Many teachers unions, and they are powerful in the Democratic Party, they object to that.

But the new president said he is very eager to make his case.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I'm going to make the case here, and I will continue to make the case to anybody who will listen that, in order to make sure every child is educated, I mean every child, we must measure, we must understand whether or not children are learning. Because the likelihood of poor children being shuffled through the system is increased, if we don't measure. And I hope we can find people, I hope people will listen because I feel passionately on the subject.

(END VIDEO CLIP) KING: Among those in the meeting listening, the House Democratic leader, Dick Gephardt. Remember, Republicans have just a very narrow majority in the House, it is tied in the Senate, so the new president will need some help from Democrats. In an interview with CNN after that meeting, Mr. Gephardt said, yes, there are some very significance differences, but he believes, in the end, there will be a major new education reform bill.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. DICK GEPHARDT (D-MO), MINORITY LEADER: I think there's great agreement on accountability. We will have some differences on some of the details, but I think everybody sees a way that we can get real accountability. We will have some fights over the tests, how many tests, how often they are given. But you got to know that every child is being advanced in the right way. And I think we can get agreement on that.

Vouchers going to be a lot tougher. A lot of us believe that vouchers bleed money out of the public school system. We want to deal with failing schools, but we don't think vouchers is the best way to do that. I think we can get an agreement on that.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KING: Two other footnotes from this meeting. No firm commitments, but from the discussion with the congressional leaders afterwards, it seemed clear that even though this new president wants to push ahead with a $1.3 trillion tax cut, the congressional leaders believe it will be months down the road before Congress is ready to deal with that. And remember, there are significance differences between the Democrats and Republicans, but both leaders in both parties said they believed it would be months before the Congress could get to any big tax bill.

And, in that meeting, the president said, he issued a two-week extension yesterday, ordering power suppliers to sell power to California during the power crisis. But, the president said, he was not inclined to issue another federal directive after this next two weeks. He said, California will be on its own -- Daryn.

KAGAN: John, the president let cameras in right before he has that bipartisan meeting. But the place I would really like to have the camera and the think I would really like to see is later today, when Senator John McCain stops by the White House, to see these two men interact. What are they set to take about?

KING: They are set to talk about, of course, campaign finance reform, Senator McCain's top priority in the Congress. President Bush has some disagreements with the details in that bill. He also thinks Senator McCain should wait awhile. The new president wants his agenda to be focus in the early weeks and months here in Washington. Senator McCain says, he wants his bill pushed through the Senate by no later than March. So there's disagreement over the details, also disagreements over the timing. Remember, though, new president has the ear of the leadership in the Congress. Senator McCain may have the votes, but most believe here that, while the new president must have this meeting with Senator McCain, that once he actually introduces his bill, and it starts going through the debate in the Senate, it will be months before it becomes an issue for the new president. One question, of course, would be: Would he veto it, if it had -- if it did not include the provisions he wants. His spokesman today saying, it is way too early for the president to think about that.

KAGAN: All right, John King, at the White House, thank you very much -- Leon.

LEON HARRIS, CNN ANCHOR: All right, next, let's go over to Capitol Hill and more Cabinet confirmation hearings underway there.

Our national correspondent Bob Franken joins us. He has got that -- Bob.

BOB FRANKEN, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Can you say the words Interior Secretary Gale Norton, Leon? Those are words that are usually accompanied when the environmental groups are testifying, by the words oh, no. But the Senate committee that was handling this voted oh, yes today, 18-2. An explosive debate over her ascension to be the interior secretary really kind of fizzled, even though there was quite a bit of controversy over her Western land views, where the state should have more say over environmental policies and corporations should too.

Now, she is going to just slip by. She is going to get by the Senate. It looks like that is going to be an easy confirmation. And the controversy over that is just really never going to be a factor. She will become the interior secretary.

That's not the case with John Ashcroft. The Senate Judiciary Committee, newly re-taken by the Republicans and Chairman Orrin Hatch, held their meeting today. Hatch had hoped that the vote on Ashcroft could occur in the committee with some indications that he would squeak by, with some indications that he will be confirmed, in spite of all the controversy surrounding his views. But the Democrats have decided, they want to stir the pot a little bit more. So they have used procedures that require the committee to wait one more week.

So Ashcroft is going to have a fight. There are going to be the continued efforts by the groups that oppose him to try and cause some sort of outrage in the country, something they've been very unsuccessful with so far. But his is not the easy one.

But it is Norton certainly going to be the interior secretary; Ashcroft looks like, after all of this is done unless something really big changes, he will finally be confirmed as the attorney general -- Leon.

HARRIS: Bob, aren't the Democrats there, at least somewhat concerned at all about looking as if they rolled over on the Norton nomination here and possibly having hell to pay with their constituents and some of those who have best most vocal in their opposition?

FRANKEN: Well, they were able to make their point. They were able to, in fact, stand up for the groups who do provide an important part of their backing, many of the environmental groups. But, at the same time, they have to worry about being obstructionists. There is a honeymoon going on. The arguments that were successful were that the president does have the right to appoint his own Cabinet. Norton was able to finesse the hearing. She smiled an awful lot, was not able to be painted as somebody who was some sort of demon out there who was going to destroy the environment. So it looks like Republicans won the PR game.

HARRIS: All right, well, then enjoy the honeymoon. Thanks much, Bob Franken from Capitol Hill this morning.

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