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American Morning

Interview With Senate Minority Leader Trent Lott

Aired June 07, 2002 - 09:22   ET

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

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
PAULA ZAHN, CNN ANCHOR: Calling it a "titanic struggle against terror," the president is asking Congress to help him take homeland security to a new level.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

PRESIDENT BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Tonight I propose a permanent cabinet-level Department of Homeland Security to unite essential agencies that must work more closely together. Among them the Coast Guard, the border control, the customs service immigration officials, the Transportation Security Administration, and the Federal Emergency Management Agency. Employees of this new agency will come to work every morning knowing their most important job is to protect their fellow citizens.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ZAHN: Now comes the hard part: Selling a plan that would dramatically reshape the government to lawmakers on both sides of the aisle. Joining us now with his reaction, Senate Minority Leader Trent Lott. Great to see you in person.

SEN. TRENT LOTT (R-MS), SENATE MINORITY LEADER: Glad to be here.

ZAHN: I'm looking at this configuration of some of the agencies involved in this new Department of Homeland Security: 88 different congressional committees and subcommittees will be affected by the restructuring of the government. Why is this approach any less bureaucratic than what already exists?

LOTT: First of all, this will be a major effort. This is a major reorganization. It's not creating a new bureaucracy, I hope. It's consolidating the 100 agencies and bureaus throughout the government that are in different departments, unrelated, bringing them together in a coordinated way that will hopefully lead to more efficiencies and more effective homeland security. It will be a problem in Congress. We have to decide what committees will have jurisdiction. We may have to look at restructuring some committees. My answer is to that is, so what? This is an important issue. I think it will have wide bipartisan support. I must confess early on, six months ago, I would say no, I don't think so.

ZAHN: A bunch of Republicans said that. LOTT: Of course. We do listen to the president. He wanted time to work through this. I think if you look back on it, they've done in the right way. He brought in a good man. Tom Ridge, put him in charge of Homeland Security trying to bring the disparate agencies and bureaus together. It's obvious there are too many of them. I expect Tom Ridge is the biggest advocate of doing this. He learned how tough the job is. I hope the president will continue to have an adviser of Homeland Security sitting next to him. I think it will still be a huge effort.

ZAHN: You brought up Tom Ridge. Is he a shoo-in?

LOTT: If he wants it...

ZAHN: If for the cabinet...

LOTT: If he wants it. I know the president and Congress respect him. He's an effective congressman and governor and worked hard in a very tough job. Ridge will have to make a decision if he wants to continue that. The president will have to decide if he doesn't want it, who else might be the right person. I think it's premature. I think it will take three-four months to get this done; a new cabinet secretary couldn't be in place until January.

ZAHN: Is that realistic?

LOTT: That's going to be a major achievement. I think it is. I think Congress will get going on this. Some of the committee chairmen, even dissenting people like Joe Lieberman, have been honestly advocating this and are trying to move a bill. I think they will take the what the president proposes, merge it with what they've done and hopefully move it quickly. It may overwhelm a lot of other things that we might like to do, but what is more important than homeland security? This is a new threat we have; we have to deal with it in a better way. We've seen that it hasn't been working too well. You have competition. Duplication. On the border, you've got the INS, the customs, the DEA. Probably ten agencies quite often are trying to do the same thing and get the same information. They's competitiveness. You have to find a way to cut through that.

ZAHN: There's been a lot of talk about this plan being budget neutral. Now we know that some $37 billion had been earmarked for homeland security. Can you assure the American public today that, that is all they will spend on homeland security?

LOTT: No. No. I think that we will still have to see. This is going to be an evolving thing. It may take even more money. The president has asked for significant increases for homeland security. Congress has give him that much and more. And we may learn that it even takes more. But I think for what is now being done within the agencies that will go in this department, they can do with efficiencies.

I asked Governor Ridge and the vice president a couple days ago to analyze this and see if we can't find with these 170, 000 people that maybe they can do this job with 5,000 fewer. I don't think this should be about the growing of bureaucracy. It's about efficiency and effectiveness and getting the job done. Now, I think that homeland security is still going to cost more. I think we will have to do more for port security, transportation security. I just think we will learn as we go along where our vulnerabilities are and some will absolutely cost money.

ZAHN: How do you pay for it?

LOTT: There's two way. First of all you decide on priorities. There may be places where now we're spending more than that we can justify under the new circumstances. Hopefully, while we're working on national security, homeland security, we'll also pay attention to economic security. If we have a growing economy, hopefully we will have more revenue coming in. And I still believe when you cut taxes for people who work and create jobs, it actually creates more revenue.

ZAHN: I knew you would slip that in there.

LOTT: I had to get that in. We have to make choices; it won't be easy. Congress will find innovative ways to spend less money, if you know what I mean. The president will have to be strong. We have to use good judgment. Right now I feel good about the way Congress reacts.

ZAHN: Were you ticked off you weren't part of the process? Four people have been involved since April designing a plan for the government. You weren't let in the loop until a picnic the other night.

LOTT: I've been talking with the White House for a long time. Not about the way this would be lined up, but the concerns in Congress, the demands that Governor Ridge have a confirmation hearing and testify. So there's been a lot of discussion in terms of the package they came up. They did it very quietly.

ZAHN: His feelings are not hurt, audience.

LOTT: I have faith in this president and this administration. I won't always agree with them. But they give me my chance to be heard. Congress now will be intimately involved.

ZAHN: Thanks very much. I appreciate your time.

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