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| Sunday, 10 November 2002 |
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Bush presses for U.S. homeland security bill soon WASHINGTON, Nov 8 (Reuters) - President George W. Bush on Friday persuaded incoming Senate Republican leader Trent Lott to change his mind and consider passage of a Homeland Security Department in the lame-duck session of Congress next week. "My misgivings were only always from a standpoint of how much resistance would there be and how long would it take and could we get it worked out," Lott told reporters after he had lunch with Bush at the White House. "But the president of the United States is the leader of our country and he feels very strongly about this, he feels it is very important that the Congress works to see if we can get this done and I agree and I'm prepared to do whatever I can," he said. Bush summoned Lott, the Mississippi Republican who will become Senate majority leader in January, and House Speaker Dennis Hastert, an Illinois Republican, to the White House to press for quick action on a homeland security bill to better protect Americans from attacks like those on Sept. 11, 2001. "The president was very clear yesterday that the number one piece of unfinished business that we need to get done is passing a bill creating a Department of Homeland Security ... and that will definitely be a topic of discussion in their meeting," White House spokesman Scott McClellan said. At a news conference on Thursday, Bush stressed his most important priority was to complete the homeland security bill that sets up a Cabinet agency with 170,000 employees and a budget of about $40 billion. "They've got a few days to get some big things done, and the most important thing to get done, I want to emphasize, is to get a Department of Homeland Security finished," Bush said. "It doesn't matter how long it takes, they need to get it done." HELD UP IN SENATE The bill has been held up in the Democratic-led Senate over Bush's demand for broad power to hire, fire and transfer workers in the department in order to obtain an efficient anti-terror operation. Democrats contend the president is seeking an unwarranted rollback on labor rights. Lott, who said he was "not an advocate of lame-duck sessions," had suggested it be limited to a few days to pass bills that could be agreed to quickly, including efforts to help U.S. insurers deal with potential costs of future terrorist attacks, and boost security at U.S. ports. The White House is eager to show it can govern in a bipartisan way after historic Republican gains in Tuesday's midterm congressional elections, and Lott seemed to get the message. "Homeland security is important," he said after his meeting with Bush. "If we leave now not having achieved that, it would be four or five months then before that could be done ... We are talking about the security of the American people here at home and so we have to find a way to do it." |
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