For Immediate Release
Office of the Press Secretary
April 17, 2001
Press Briefing by Ari Fleischer
The James S. Brady Briefing Room
Listen to the Briefing
- Personnel Announcements
- Nigerian President Obasanjo's Upcoming Visit
- Upcoming Commencement Speeches
- Administrator Whitman's Briefing/Environment
- The
Middle East
- China
- Tax Cut
- Upcoming
Summit of the Americas
2:32 P.M. EDT
MR. FLEISCHER: Good
afternoon. A series of announcements to begin
today. The President intends to nominate Michael J. Garcia
to be Assistant Secretary of Commerce for Export
Enforcement. The President intends to nominate Mary Sheila
Gall to be Chairman of the Consumer Product Safety Commission.
The President intends to nominate Anne Krueger
to be a member of the Council of Economic Advisors. The
President intends to nominate Jack Dyer Crouch II to be Assistant
Secretary of Defense for International Security Policy. The
President intends to nominate Russ Whitehurst to be Assistant Secretary
of Education for Educational Research and Improvement.
The President intends to nominate David Garman
to be Assistant Secretary of Energy for Energy Efficiency and Renewable
Energy. The President intends to nominate Neal McCaleb to be
Assistant Secretary of Interior for Indian Affairs. And the
final personnel announcement; the President intends to nominate Rosario
Marin to be Treasurer of the United States.
Q Ari, would you spell
Ms. Krueger's name so we can write about that immediately?
MR. FLEISCHER: Ms. Krueger's name
is spelled Anne -- O is her middle initial -- Krueger.
Q What's your count up
to now?
MR. FLEISCHER: Let me finish with
my announcements and then I'll take questions. I am also
announcing today that Nigerian President Obasanjo will come to
Washington for a working visit with President Bush on May 11th.
And then, finally, two longer-range scheduling
announcements for the President. We have two commencement
addresses to announce. The President will speak at Notre
Dame University graduation on Sunday, May 20th, and at the United
States Naval Academy graduation on Friday, May 25th.
With that, I'm happy to take questions.
Q Spell the name of the
Secretary of the U.S. Treasury, please.
MR. FLEISCHER: Which one?
Q The Treasurer of the
United States. Rosario Marin.
MR. FLEISCHER: The Treasurer is
spelled Rosario Marin.
Q I wonder why it is
that EPA Chief Whitman is coming here personally to brief us today on
this environmental decision. Is it in part because the
President feels stung by the criticism that he's hostile to the
environment and he's trying to reshape his image?
MR. FLEISCHER: No, it's the exact
same procedure that the President followed with members of his Cabinet
when they've come on previous occasions. If you remember,
Secretary Veneman came, updated the President on the status of the Foot
and Mouth Disease Program the United States has underway to prevent
Foot and Mouth from entering our country, and she went out to the
stakeout afterwards and spoke. So it's -- in the same vein,
members of the Cabinet are going to be coming to the White House on
regular occasions. And when they have news to make, they
will be pleased to stand before you and make it.
Q So we should expect
then that Ms. Whitman will come for every decision on whether or not to
roll back or continue Clinton executive orders related to the
environment?
MR. FLEISCHER: From time to time,
the Secretary will have announcements to make, or any secretary will
have announcements to make, and they will come here and make
them. If you recall, Secretary Mineta was going to come over
here to do a briefing on transportation issues, which we had to
reschedule. But it's all part of the same policy of when the
President meets with Cabinet members and they have something newsworthy
to announce, they're pleased to share it with you.
Q So the President
thinks his image on the environment is fine then, intact?
MR. FLEISCHER: The President is
not concerned about his image, the President is concerned about
results. And the President's results on the environment
represent a balanced approach to protecting America's environment, just
what he said he would do during the campaign. And the
President is very proud of that record.
As you can tell, in the early days of this
administration, the President has taken a number of actions, which
means that from day one in this administration there will be new
environmental policies, which I must say contrast with the previous
administration. Many of the regulations that this President
is reviewing now were left unaddressed for eight years of the previous
administration. They only went into effect in the last, in
some cases, 24, 48, 72 hours of the previous administration.
And the President has been reviewing, as he
announced he would, a number of those regulations, and many will remain
in place, others may be modified, and we will keep you
informed. But in addition to that, there are a series of
environmental initiatives the President has launched himself, such as
increasing the funding for the Land and Water Conservation Fund from
$500 million to $900 million.
That will mark a real increase in protection
of many of the green areas of the United States. Eliminating
the backlog at our national parks, which has been a vexing problem for
millions of Americans who use our national parks. There is
insufficient upkeep at the parks. The President has, for the
first time, proposed a budget that, unlike the previous administration
which didn't propose it, the President proposed a budget that will
fully eliminate the backlog of maintenance requests at our national
parks.
The American people are about to get on the
road this spring and summer and hit the parks. Thanks to
this initiative by President Bush, the parks they're going to hit will
soon have cleaner facilities, better facilities, less
traffic. And I think the public is going to receive that
very well.
So the President's approach to the environment
is going to continue to reflect the best science; it will reflect
balance. There will be a series of new initiatives the
President is launching, as well as a review of all those last-minute
regulations of President Clinton. And the Secretary will be
here today to share with you an announcement on one of them.
Q May I suggest that
your long list of the President's environmental concerns suggests that
even if he is concerned only about results and not about image, that
perhaps some of his staff are concerned about presenting his
environmental record in the best possible light, leading up to, say,
Earth Day.
MR. FLEISCHER: So if you're
accusing me of remembering the President's successes on the
environment, I remember them. But I could go through a list
of tax accomplishments; I could go through a list of educational
accomplishments that the President has achieved on Capitol
Hill. This is one of a series of accomplishments that the
President has been able to put forward, and I think the President is
proud of that record.
Q I was really
questioning the timing more than anything else.
MR. FLEISCHER: In many cases, the
timing was set for us, a course that the previous administration had
the effective date of many of their regulations go into effect, say,
January 17th, January 18th, January 19th. And as you know, the Chief
of Staff, Andy Card, issued a memorandum to all agencies asking them to
carefully review each of these last-minute regulations set by the
previous administration.
So much of the timing had nothing to do with
the actions of this administration. The timing was
determined by the previous one. But it is
notable. Many of these actions will go into effect for the
entire tenure of President Bush's time in office. The
previous administration did not take action on many of these measures
until the very end.
Similarly, with the President's
multi-pollutant strategy. The President has proposed a
strategy to seek mandatory reductions in several
pollutants. Again, that's a step above and beyond what the
previous administration sought or did. And there has been
some talk about the President's actions on CO2. Of course,
the previous administration did not make any effort to have mandatory
reductions in CO2.
Q Was that the case
with this regulation? Were you up against a deadline today
on lead?
MR. FLEISCHER: On lead?
Q That you had to
meet?
MR. FLEISCHER: Yes, I believe
that's right. I think that one was up on January 17th or
18th, if I recall.
Q This is one of those
rare areas where you're actually willing to look backward, so it's
worth pursuing. Do you believe that President Clinton, and
that his administration, specifically set up President Bush to look bad
on the environment?
MR. FLEISCHER: No, I'm not making
any such accusation, but it is notable, that for eight years of the
previous administration, none of these regulations were sought, went
into effect. Some of them, of course, took years to study,
and that study period happened to end on January 17th, 18th, 19th, et
cetera.
It's just a reality of the regulatory scheme
that was left behind by the previous administration. The
President has received that inheritance, and he's dealt with it
forthrightly. In some cases, the appropriate cabinet officials have
reviewed the regulations and made determinations that these regulations
should proceed.
They are in the nation's best
interest. They're based on science. They're good for the
environment, they're good for the country. Other cases, the
President's administrators have looked at these and come to other
conclusions. It's part of a balanced approach to the
environment that the President will continue to pursue, and proudly
so.
Q Ari, what is the
President's take on the escalation of the past 24 hours in the Middle
East, and does he have any plans to personally pick up the telephone to
urge leaders in the region to exercise the maximum restraint you spoke
of yesterday from the podium?
MR. FLEISCHER: John, as you know,
the President of Lebanon will be here a week from today, and the
President is going to be meeting personally with the President of
Lebanon to discuss the situation in the Middle East. He, of course,
met with King Abdullah last week and he has met with President Mubarak
of Egypt.
He will continue to reach out and talk
directly with the parties involved. And as you know, the
United States, under the President's direction, has been party to
several of the negotiations and the meetings that have taken place
between the Palestinian Authority and Israel. And that was
in good part because of the United States' constructive role.
In regard to what's happening in the Middle
East right now, I think we heard Secretary Powell address that earlier
this morning. He issued a statement, and let me share a
portion of that with you -- he said that the situation is threatening
to escalate further, posing the risk of a broader
conflict. And the United States calls on all sides to
exercise maximum restraint to reduce the tensions and to take steps to
end the violence immediately.
Q Is the President,
himself, doing anything today about this? Is he making
calls? Is he getting briefings, or is he hands-off entirely
on it?
MR. FLEISCHER: The President is,
depending on any day of the week, is involved, when you're saying is
the President doing anything today. Repeatedly, the President has
called on all parties to exercise restraint. The President has had a
series of phone calls with leaders around the world and meetings with
leaders around the world about this subject.
Q And to follow up on
John's question, I mean, is he, himself, making any phone calls today
on this matter?
MR. FLEISCHER: I'll have to check
his phone log and keep you advised.
Q Ari, does he want
Israel to withdraw from Gaza?
MR. FLEISCHER: As the statement
continues, it goes on to say that we call on both sides to respect the
agreements they've signed for the Palestinians. This
includes implementing their commitment to renounce terrorism and
violence, to exercise control over all elements of the PLO, and the
Palestinian Authority, and to discipline violators. For the
Israelis, this includes respecting their commitment to withdraw from
Gaza according to the terms of the agreement signed by Israel and the
Palestinians. There can be no military solution to this
conflict.
Q Ari, just to follow
up, for almost 50 years, though, the U.S. has been calling for maximum
restraint, and parties haven't done anything. I mean, is
there going to be any teeth to this, anything specific that the U.S.
can do?
MR. FLEISCHER: Well, as the
President has made clear and has said repeatedly, that the key to peace
in the Middle East depends on the actions taken by the parties
involved. As you point out, Connie, the United States
governments have said something like that for quite a long period of
time. And that means that it is not dependent from one administration
to the next, as much as it is dependent on the actions taken by the
parties involved in the Middle East. And the President has
sent a very clear message that the United States will continue to play
a helpful and constructive role.
But the key to securing lasting peace in the
Middle East depends on the actions taken by Israel, the Palestinian
Authorities and others in the region.
Q Does the President
believe that Israel has gone too far in its recent actions?
MR. FLEISCHER: In the context of
what I just said, the hostilities in Gaza were precipitated by
provocative Palestinian mortar attacks on Israel, and then the Israeli
response -- the statement issued by the Secretary, which the
President concurs with. The Israeli response was excessive
and disproportionate.
Q In the campaign, the
President said that he supported the legislation that would allow
wholesalers to re-import American drugs from Canada. And
that was something that the Clinton administration decided not to
enforce, at the very end. Is this one of those Clinton
things that's under review?
MR. FLEISCHER: I'd have to check on
that. Failure to enforce is not the same as promulgation of
a new regulation. So let me take a look at that and get back
to you on that.
Q On the Middle East,
Ari, you're asking for withdrawal. Now some Israeli
officials are talking about withdrawal in months, maybe years
today. Do you -- are you happy with such a statement, or are
you asking for immediate withdrawal from Gaza?
MR. FLEISCHER: The statement speaks
for itself.
Q It doesn't say
immediate.
MR. FLEISCHER: The statement speaks
for itself.
Q Ari, you can assure
us that the President will not send any unarmed, unescorted $80-million
surveillance plane with crew into the South China Sea, as long as the
Chinese claim that this is all their territory, and refuse to return
our plane, can't you, Ari?
MR. FLEISCHER: Les, I'm not going
to talk about the manner of which the United States will conduct its
missions. Suffice it to say, the President has made it clear
on many occasions that the United States reserves, at all times, the
right to fly reconnaissance aircraft in international airspace.
Q With fighter planes?
MR. FLEISCHER: I'm not going to
discuss any of the terms of any pending missions and any missions.
Q All right, the
Washington Post reports that Ted Koppel and other members of ABC News
dared to challenge Michael Eisner, asking how he can possibly lay off
4,000 people, when he was paid $11 million last year. And my
question is, doesn't the President think that was a good question that
ought to be asked of many multi-millionaire owners who lay off but
don't take pay cuts, because the President would surely take a pay cut
rather than lay off you and Scott, wouldn't he? (Laughter.)
MR. FLEISCHER: You're half
right. (Laughter.)
Q Doesn't the President
think that's a good idea? I thought it was great for Ted
Koppel to do this. I mean, he should have asked that guy.
MR. FLEISCHER: The President thinks
all questions that Ted Koppel asks are good
ones. (Laughter.)
Q Ari, back on the
environment, if I may, yesterday the Administrator of the EPA issued a
decision on wetlands, another area in which one of those decisions that
environmentalists embraced and were happy about. At that
point, the White House issued a statement, more or less --
MR. FLEISCHER: Applauding the
action.
Q Applauding the
action. That was sort of an unusual gesture. Why
did the White House feel it necessary to do that?
MR. FLEISCHER: This is not
unusual. There have been often statements from the White
House in regard to actions taken by Cabinet officers. Not
uncommon at all. And I think you can anticipate that on a
continued basis. It's natural; people at Cabinet agencies take certain
actions. These briefings are proof perfect.
I was asked right here just moments ago about
the White House reaction to what the Secretary of State said, vis-a-vis
Israel and the Palestinians. So it's questions that you all ask that
we're pleased to answer. Sometimes we put them out in
writing for your information; other times I take them right here at the
podium. But that's why, and you can anticipate that will
continue.
Q Some of your
supporters have suggested that you had failed to get out your side of
the argument on various environmental questions. Are the
actions of yesterday and today at least an effort to give a little
higher profile to your explanations and the actions the administration
has taken?
MR. FLEISCHER: Well, I would just
say that as these regulations come up, and they are now subject to
their final reviews, because of the necessities of the clock you will
continue to hear from the Bush administration what it will do with
these last-minute regulations.
So, again, the calendar to a significant
degree was provided to us. It was not of our own
making. But the President is proud to bring a balanced
approach to the environment. The President is proud to
involve stakeholders in decisions that will be made about the
environment -- for example, the national monument designation that the
President and the administration have left in place.
It's also important to talk to the
stakeholders who are involved with those decisions, which is exactly
what the President said he was going to do in the course of the
campaign. So the President is moving forward to honor his
campaign commitments, to create a balanced environmental approach, and
that's what he's doing. And you're hearing the manifestation
of that as each of these regulations comes up for review.
But again, I want to remind you of the
initiatives that the President has launched on his own. The
Land and Water Conservation Fund increase and the elimination of the
backlog at the national parks are major developments in helping the
American people enjoy our natural resources in this country. Those are
no small efforts.
When you think about the interaction most
Americans have with the environment, very often it is their visits to
our national parks. And one of the biggest frustrations the
American people have said is they visit the parks and they can't park,
they're too crowded, that there is a backup, that the facilities are
not adequately maintained. That is one of the most important
ways the American people interact with nature. And the
President is very pleased to be able to be the first President to take
that step, which he announced in the campaign, which was part of his
budget. And he will continue to push for that in the
negotiations with Congress on the budget.
Q Ari, since you're
painting the White House so green ahead of Earth Day here, where is the
President going with the roadless areas rule?
MR. FLEISCHER: I don't have any
information on that today, John. It will come out of the
agencies whenever their review is complete.
Q Aren't we hitting the
90-day -- I mean, 90 days from January 20th -- we're just about out of
time, then.
MR. FLEISCHER: Some regs were 60,
some were 90, some could be an additional period of time. It
all depends on the effective date set in the regulations.
Q Do you have any more
information on this meeting with Powell and Rice and Rumsfeld this
afternoon? Is the President going to join them?
MR. FLEISCHER: No, no,
no. That's a regular meeting that takes place among the
principals. The President is never in attendance at that
meeting, and it's a regular occurrence.
Q It will be on China
and the Middle East, though, won't it?
MR. FLEISCHER: It will be on a host
of topics around the world. I think you can anticipate those
two will be included.
Q There's some
rumblings from China that the Chinese may not consider return of the
plane as on the agenda for the meeting tomorrow. What would that
constitute if that were the case?
MR. FLEISCHER: Well, I'm not going
to prejudge what the Chinese actions will be at this
meeting. I think it's important to allow that meeting to
take place, and review what the Chinese say. Certainly that
will be an item on the American agenda. The agenda includes
discussion of the return of the airplane; an explanations from the
United States on how we view the accident -- the cause of the accident;
how to avoid future accidents in the future; and the United States
delegation will also ask, as I indicated previously, tough questions
about the manner in which the Chinese have been intercepting our
reconnaissance aircraft.
Q You're saying the
Chinese don't set the agenda, that each side comes with its own?
MR. FLEISCHER: Clearly.
Q Ari, last -- final
question. Last one, I promise.
Q Ever?
Q No, just
today. Yale is having its 300th anniversary next weekend,
reports the New Yorker, and one of Yale's class of 1968 is refusing to
attend, even though his father will be there, and his daughter is a
Yale undergraduate. Could you explain why this Yale graduate
has refused reportedly repeated invitations from his alma mater, for
God, for country and for Yale, and is it possible that he now prefers
Harvard, where he earned an MBA?
MR. FLEISCHER: What weekend is this
event?
Q Next weekend?
MR. FLEISCHER: Next weekend the --
Q Three Hundredth
anniversary, Ari.
MR. FLEISCHER: The President was
faced with a difficult choice between his alma mater and the White
House Correspondents Association, and I'll leave it to you all to
decide what the right answer is. (Laughter.)
Q Ari, on the Free
Trade Area of the Americas, has the President been encouraged with the
Minority Leader of the Democrats, of the House, about the trade
promotion authority in the last few days, and there is also an
accusation by the President of AFL-CIO saying since the President took
the office, he has been calling him, and the President never called him
back. And he says, if the President is ready to discuss
labor issues of the Free Trade Area of the Americas, why he isn't
taking care of the labor organizations and --
MR. FLEISCHER: I noted, I believe
this is the same President who must not have been as informed, at the
moment, who said that the AFL-CIO has had no contact with the
administration on the same day that representatives of the AFL-CIO were
in the White House meeting with officials to discuss transportation
labor disputes. So I think that he understands that there's
been regular contact with this administration, and of course with the
Secretary of Labor, who's also met with the President of the
AFL-CIO. So I'm sure it's just a question of information
updating.
The Congress, of course, is in recess, and the
President looks forward to continuing discussions. He
indicated today in his remarks about the importance of trade promotion
authority, securing that authority from the United States
Congress. And upon his return from the summit in Quebec,
where he will again discuss the importance of trade promotion
authority, he looks forward to developing an aggressive strategy with
the Congress, so we can pass it.
It's always a difficult fight. It
will be difficult this year as well. But the President is
determined to make the case and to succeed, because he thinks that free
trade is in the interest of economic growth for developing nations, for
the United States and around the world.
Q Do you have any sense
of when the President's going to submit Fast Track?
MR. FLEISCHER: No, there's no hard
and fast date for it yet. The President's indicated that
following the summit, he will come back, and we're going to be working
with members of Congress on the best strategy to get it
done. As I indicated, it's been a tough vote in the Congress
in the last many years.
Q President Clinton
couldn't get it, and he had a -- and there was a Democrat in the White
House. Do you think the fight is tougher now than it was a
couple of years ago?
MR. FLEISCHER: Tom, I think it's
too soon to say. I think this has always been one of those
-- trade has been an issue that has split both parties. The
split is deeper in the Democratic Party, but there, too, is a split in
the Republican Party. And I just think it's too soon to say
exactly how it's going to come out. I can simply tell you
that the President is committed to getting it done. He
believes it's important.
If you recall, he took on his own party to
make the case for free trade, and he will do so again. He
will work, of course, closely with as many cooperative Democrats as
possible. You recall, he hosted a meeting here at the White
House about three weeks ago -- Congressman Bob Matsui, a Democrat from
California, and other leaders of the Democrat effort and Republican
effort on free trade and trade promotion authority joined the President
at that meeting. So the President has this on his mind,
clearly. He's already begun a series of meetings with the Democrats
who are likely to support it.
I would point out that in the previous
Congresses, that split did mean the Democrat leadership was on side,
Congressman Matsui and other Democrats who were historically for free
trade were on another. The President will, of course, begin
work with those who are closest to his position on the issue and then
try to broaden support from there.
Q Can he move forward
with any of these negotiations without fast track?
MR. FLEISCHER: Fast track is the
most productive and helpful way to get it done. But you can,
of course, have multilateral agreements, you can have bilateral
agreements, and you can have fast track or trade promotion authority in
place. They all are avenues to free trade. But
the easiest avenue to free trade flows from a straight up or down vote
in the Congress, which is what trade promotion authority is.
Q What about the deal
with Chile --
MR. FLEISCHER: The major
difference, Tom, is that any agreement you submit to the Congress
outside of trade promotion authority is amendable. Anything that is
done under trade promotion authority is subject to an up or down vote,
and you then conduct your negotiations with nations in close
cooperation with the Congress.
Q What about the one
with Chile? Is that stuck until he gets fast track, or can
you move on that one --
MR. FLEISCHER: I would not say
that. It's not stuck. That was a topic of their
discussion yesterday. You can proceed on both tracks, and
the United States will proceed on both tracks.
Q Ari, after having
passed two tax cut packages, Congress is coming back to start to digest
the concomitant spending --
MR. FLEISCHER: Concomitant.
Q Yes. I
can't say that in my TV work, but -- (laughter) -- but concomitant
spending reductions that will be necessary to make it all work. But
it's a long way between now and October 1st. I'm curious how
the President plans to keep a handle on this situation before the
spending, I guess, gets out of hand.
MR. FLEISCHER: There are no
spending reductions required to make it work. The only thing
that's required is to have spending increase at a reasonable rate of
growth, as opposed to an extravagant rate of growth. And the manner in
which the Congress, or at least the Senate has proceeded so far, if
they actually increase spending by the amount the Senate passed, which
is closer to 10 percent, if you take out -- there's a little asterisk
in the Senate budget resolution of unnamed future budget cuts --
without that, spending is actually 10 percent. If you give
them credit for this magic asterisk, it's 8 percent increase.
That alone, an 8-percent rate of growth, would
subtract $3 trillion from the projected surplus. It would
risk tapping the Social Security surplus. It would risk
putting the nation back on the course to a permanently bigger
government that could hurt economic vitality. And the
surplus, handled properly, is of the size that you can have the tax cut
the President's talked about, reasonable growth in spending for vital
programs such as education, Medicare, Social Security and record
amounts of debt relief.
Q How does he plan on
keeping, I guess, a grip on this situation before it gets out of
hand? How does he knock heads or whatever --
MR. FLEISCHER: Well, I think it
will be a very interesting conference between the House and the
Senate. I think that there are many people who, now that
they have been able to review what was written in the Senate, have
additional concerns.
I don't think it was immediately clear the
night that it passed in the Senate how much additional spending had
been agreed to by the Senators. And I think there are a number of
Senators who are concerned about that. So there will be a conference
between the House and the Senate that could begin as soon as next
week. The President will be involved in that conference
through our officials on the Hill, of course. And the
President will continue to make his case that the greatest risk to the
surplus and to economic vitality comes from blowing the budget through
bigger spending.
Q Are you sure that
they're going to have a conference on this? Because apparently, the
Senate can't agree on how many people to send to a conference, and so
they haven't conferenced anything.
MR. FLEISCHER: Well, without a
conference, there is no budget. So clearly there will be a
conference. But they still have some areas they need to
agree to. And that's an internal Senate question, about who
the conferees will be.
Q But you expect it to
occur by next week?
MR. FLEISCHER: There is some talk
on the Hill that the conference could begin next week. Now,
things always slip on the Hill. But no, that was the
original goal. And the question of who conferees will be is
a Senate matter. So you'd have to take that up with them.
Q Was the White House
consulted about the case of the Ukrainian official whistle-blower who
was granted political asylum in the United States?
MR. FLEISCHER: I'm advised we were
not.
Q Why
not? It's a matter that has created a lot of backlash -- I
mean --
MR. FLEISCHER: Let me suggest you
take that up with Mary Ellen following this briefing.
Q Ari, with the visit
of the Lebanese President, most major players have visited or come to
visit Washington, except for one, who holds the record for the visit in
the last eight years. Do you have any plan of inviting
Chairman Arafat, or are you shunning him until the reduction of the
violence?
MR. FLEISCHER: Again, every day I
come to the podium and share with you the announcements of the meetings
the President will have, and nothing is announceable until I indicate
it. So there's nothing to report at this time.
Q Ari, talking about
the alma mater, I have one more question regarding that.
MR. FLEISCHER: Are you recommending
the President go to Yale and not show up next
Saturday? (Laughter.) It's a very funny speech.
Q Former President Lee
Teng-hui of the Republican of China on Taiwan, is visiting the United
States from April 30th to May 4th -- that's one week -- to his alma
mater at Cornell University. He's a retired politician; he's
a civilian. I just wonder whether you care to comment
whether the President thinks that he will be able to travel freely as a
civilian in the United States.
MR. FLEISCHER: I do not have any
information on that. You may want to take that up with
people who handle visits, and that would be the State Department.
Q One question on the
Summit of the Americas. Has there been any discussion about
the bilateral meeting of President Bush and the President of Venezuela
-- anything?
MR. FLEISCHER: Bilateral between
them?
Q Yes.
MR. FLEISCHER: I would anticipate
that they will all be present at the Summit of the Americas in
Quebec. And you can anticipate that.
THE PRESS: Thank you.
MR. FLEISCHER: Thank you.
END 3:02
P.M. EDT
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