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American Morning

Senate and Bush Return to Work

Aired September 03, 2002 - 08:31   ET

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

PAULA ZAHN, CNN ANCHOR: Members of the Senate returned to work today. President Bush is back at the White House after a month-long trip to the ranch. From homeland security to Iraq, his plate is very full. What is at the top of the president's agenda? Let's turn to Kelly Wallace, who's standing by at the White House. She's been on the road a long time, too.
How are you, Kelly? Do you even recognize that place anymore?

KELLY WALLACE, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: It takes a little getting used to, Paula, after being in Crawford, Texas for a while. But definitely a lot going on here at the White House. The president feels that there's a lot he wants to get done, but there just isn't a lot of time. So he's going to do some arm twisting, meeting with Senate Republicans here at the White House later today.

Number one on his agenda, trying to get the Senate to finish work and pass a cabinet-level agency, a new Department of Homeland Security. In fact, the president used much of the August recess and his Labor Day appearance yesterday to step up pressure on lawmakers over this issue.

The sticking point is not the makeup of the agency but the personnel issues. The president wants the agency to be able to hire, fire and move employees around, but Senate Democrats object. They say that would mean the workers in this agency would not have the same union and civil service rights as other federal workers. But the president is kind of drawing a line in the sand saying the Senate -- quote -- "better get it right."

Other priorities, getting passage of the longest increase in spending for the Defense Department since the Reagan administration, passage of an energy bill, and also completion of terrorism insurance. On top of all that, the lawmakers have some spending bills to finish up work on. You have more debate on the issue of Iraq and you have lots of campaigning for the November elections. A lot of goals, but not a lot of time -- Paula.

ZAHN: Let's talk a little bit about how some of those goals might be affected if the Senate goes through these Congressional hearings, that, for example, Senator Jon Warner has called for in relationship to Iraq. Is there a feeling among administration members that that definitely is going to happen?

WALLACE: Definitely. The sense is, you heard Vice President Cheney in fact a couple of weeks back saying that the president, in fact, had told his advisers to cooperate with Congress as hearings get under way. The sense in the administration is that Congress will have hearings about what to do in Iraq, that administration officials will testify. Clearly, U.S. officials do not want congressional lawmakers to get distracted and spend a lot of time on Iraq and not time on these other issues. So the goal is hopefully finding a balance, working on those issues, as well as these domestic priorities.

ZAHN: Yes, but as you and I both know, finding that balance is going to be tricky, because there are just so many days between now and the mid-term elections, right?

WALLACE: So many days. I mean, lawmakers are supposed to leave in five weeks. No one truly expects that to happen. The president then will be on the road, lawmakers on the road, so not a lot of time and of course control of Congress is up for grabs.

So both sides want to have as many priorities that they say they can take to the voters in November.

ZAHN: Thanks, Kelly.

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