White House Press Gaggle With Jay Carney

Aboard Air Force One

En Route El Paso, Texas

12:14 P.M. EDT

     MR. CARNEY:  Well, I assume I’ll have questions about what the President is doing in El Paso today.  Briefly, obviously, he’ll be giving a speech to talk about the need for comprehensive immigration reform, about the need to increase support, why it’s an economic imperative, in particular, to keep us competitive in the 21st century. 

And he’ll also — I think as you know, he’ll be touring the Bridge of the Americas commercial cargo facility in El Paso.  Of the four crossing that comprise the El Paso port of entry, the Bridge of the Americas is the largest, facilitating both passenger and commercial traffic.  On average, 1,200 to 1,600 trucks a day import commodities through this location.

     President Obama will be led on the tour by Ana Hinojosa, the director of field operations at the Bridge of the Americas, and he’ll be accompanied by the Department of Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano and U.S. Customs and Border Protection Commissioner Alan Bersin. 

During the tour the President will be shown a mobile truck X-ray and be given an overview of large-scale technology designed to protect and prevent radiological threats.  He will also view a demonstration of border patrol personnel searching commercial cargo.

And with that, I’ll take your questions.

Q    Boehner last night, line in the sand — helpful to the process, or no?

MR. CARNEY:  What I would say about that, Hans, is that the Speaker indicated that he supports significant deficit reduction.  The President supports significant deficit reduction.  All parties to these negotiations recognize the problem and share a similar idea about what the goal should be, which is roughly $4 trillion in deficit reduction over 10 to 12 years.  That in it and of itself is progress. 

Obviously we disagree with the House Republican budget plan, which we made clear.  The President believes that we need to achieve that $4 trillion in deficit reduction in a balanced way and not solely by cutting entitlements and eliminating, in the case of the House Republican plan, the Medicare guaranteed to our seniors.

     However, he believes that the negotiations, the talks being led by the Vice President, will continue to be productive as all sides seek common ground towards further deficit reduction.  We believe that will take place. 

And no less important is the urgent need to raise the debt ceiling.  We continue to maintain that the — it is folly to hold hostage the vote to raise the debt ceiling to prevent the United States of America from defaulting on its obligations to any other piece of legislation.  We will get a fiscal agreement, we believe.  We’re optimistic.  We believe we can get that.  But to hold one hostage to the other remains extremely unwise in our view. 

And I would simply note some of the things that Speaker Boehner has said in the past, if I have them here, about just that issue.  Back in the last day of January — or, no, January 30th, rather, he said — this is the Speaker of the House — to raise that — failing to raise the debt ceiling would mean, “financial disaster not only for our country but for the worldwide economy.  You can’t create jobs if you default on the federal debt.”  We couldn’t agree more.

Q    If I could fast-forward it to last night, did you hear Boehner as a hostage-taker or a deal-maker?

MR. CARNEY:  I believe that it is fine for all participants in this process to restate their starting positions.  That we understand.  But we believe that there is — that common ground can be found between Republicans and Democrats in these negotiations being overseen by the Vice President.  And we continue to be optimistic.

Q    So the idea that cuts will have to equal the amount that the debt ceiling is raised, that’s not new to you?  You haven’t heard — you’ve heard that from Boehner before?

MR. CARNEY:  No, but what I meant was that the position that eliminating the Medicare program as we know it remains on the table, but dealing with tax expenditures is off the table.  Maximalist positions do not produce compromise.

     Q    It’s not just Boehner that’s saying that on the tax expenditures, it’s Kyl too.

     MR. CARNEY:  No, I understand, Hans, and I’m not going to negotiate the particulars here, but what the purpose of the negotiations is, is for the — all sides to find common ground, and I think that common ground can be found.  The balance and the particulars are not something that I’m going to negotiate at 30,000 feet.

     Q    — his position not undermine the talks that are going on at Blair House with the Vice President?

     MR. CARNEY:  I don’t believe that it does, no.

     Q    The Texas governor is upset that there hasn’t been a disaster declaration covering the wildfires there.  Some Republicans have suggested that perhaps politics is playing a role in there, and one has even said it’s inappropriate for him to be raising funds in the state without such a declaration.  How do you answer that?

     MR. CARNEY:  I would love to answer that.  I think it’s important for everyone to know that this administration has been extremely responsive to the state of Texas’ requests for wildfire management assisting grants — 25 of them at last count.  All that have been requested had been, as far as I know it, have been provided.  And that — in each case, because wildfires are different from other natural disasters — they are ongoing.  And in each case the federal government, the federal taxpayer, is paying 75 percent of the costs of fighting these fires of Texas — 75 percent.  So there is plenty, considerable federal assistance flowing to Texas to deal with these serious wildfires.  We take this very seriously.

     And the fact is, is that because wildfires are the kind of natural disaster that they are and fighting them is a major cost here, the federal government is picking up a substantial portion of that cost.

Q    Why is the President —

MR. CARNEY:  And I would say — can I just point out that the suggestion that you are raising that some I guess some Republicans think that this is political, I would just point to the disaster declarations that the President has designated from across the country, and I think there was no discrimination here between red and blue states.

     Q    Why is the President not meeting with Governor Perry?

     MR. CARNEY:  Governor Perry turned down our invitation to meet the President at the airport.

     Q    He wanted a more substantial meeting and didn’t want to have to go 800 miles all the way to El Paso to discuss the wildfires and border security and all that.

     MR. CARNEY:  Again, we invited him to meet with the President and he declined the invitation.  We have also in the past offered him a National Security Council briefing on immigration; he declined that as well.

     Q    Is his request for a thousand more National Guardsmen under any kind of consideration at all?

     MR. CARNEY:  We have substantially increased the number of border patrol agents twice — more than 20,000 now — twice the number that there were in 2004.  We have tripled the number of intelligence agents — analysts who are working on border patrol.  We have — let me just get out my trusty fact sheet here — we’ve deployed unmanned aerial vehicles that now patrol the border from Texas to California.  For the first time, we are screening 100 percent of southbound rail shipments to seize guns and money going south, even as we go after the drugs that are heading north.  We’ve forged a partnership with Mexico to fight the transnational criminal organizations that have affected both of our countries.  And I would add that in terms of the presence of the National Guard there, we intend to maintain that presence and to work with Congress to get the funding necessary to maintain the border — the National Guard presence. 

     Q    On the immigration reform that the President is going to discuss today, will he be discussing specifics — for instance, hurdles that illegal immigrants would face in order to get on the path to citizenship?

     MR. CARNEY:  I don’t want to steal the President’s thunder.  I encourage you to listen to the speech.  But he will talk about all the issues that encompass comprehensive immigration reform, from the need for border security, the need to deal with this underground economy that depresses wages, that allows bad actors in business to compete unfairly with those who follow the rules and obey the law, and the need to reform our legal immigration laws so that we’re making sure that we essentially take advantage of the enormous talent that we find in our universities and not train the competition, but have those immigrants who are here studying at the best universities in the world start companies here in the United States instead of taking them overseas to our competitors.

     Q    Does the White House intend to submit its own legislation on immigration reform, or are you going to leave the work to Congress?

     MR. CARNEY:  I’m not going to preview our legislative strategy from here, but we’re — the approach we’re taking is we are trying to — recognizing the hurdles that we have faced legislatively, we are trying to build awareness and support for the need for comprehensive immigration reform, to fix this broken system.  And I’d just remind you that the stakeholders that we have talked with represent Republicans and Democrats, businesses, a variety of interest groups.  This is — the need for this, as in so many cases, the train is leaving the station and Washington is still trying to find the train station.

     I mean it’s — this is something that we’re hoping that we can push from the outside in here to get Congress to address the fact that this is a broken system that needs to be fixed, and that used to have bipartisan support.  And one of the reasons why we’re told — we’ve been told, all of us in the United States have been told, that those who used to support comprehensive immigration reform in the Republican Party backed away from that support because they wanted borders first.

     So, again, everything that was demanded has been provided in terms of increased border patrol, increased efforts to secure our borders, and so we look forward to some of those supporters returning to the table to try to figure out this problem and fix the broken system.

     Q    So if it’s so urgent, why aren’t you providing a timetable then?

     MR. CARNEY:  Because, as you know, Hans, there are a lot of ways to skin a cat in Washington when you’re talking about getting things done.  And we have a strategy here to try to get another hard thing done, and we’re following that strategy because we believe it gives us the best chance of success.

     Q    Can I ask, if it’s so urgent, why did the President wait almost two and a half years since he took office to visit the border?

     MR. CARNEY:  Well, come on — I mean, there have been quite a few things going on in the last two and a half years — the worst recession since the Great Depression, two wars, the hunt for Osama bin Laden that ended successfully a few days ago, among many, many other issues.

     What is notable — the irony of your question, if I may, is that I was getting the opposite questions:  Why are you bothering when you know it’s so politically difficult to achieve this.  Are you really serious? 

     And just like people said the same thing about whether or not the President was serious about fiscal reform, the answer is yes.  Is he serious about comprehensive immigration reform?  The answer is yes.  He feels that he was hired to try to do some hard things, and he’s going to try to do them.

     Q    Could we do one on Pakistan?  The offer to let the wives be interviewed, is that sufficient or will the U.S. be calling for more?

     MR. CARNEY:  Look, we have an important and complicated relationship with Pakistan.  We are working avidly with our Pakistani counterparts to continue the cooperation that we’ve had in the past.  And we’re optimistic that that cooperation will continue with regards to the issues that you’ve raised, access to the — to Mr. bin Laden’s wives and also to the materials that were collected by the Pakistanis after the U.S. commandos left, and of course on all the other issues that we need cooperation on with the Pakistanis.

     Q    The Navy chaplaincy has approved the — officiating of same-sex marriages at Navy chapels, pending a full certification of the repeal of “don’t ask, don’t tell.”  There have been some members that have been complaining that that brings the administration’s pledge to uphold — or to, I should say, follow DOMA, if not defend it.  Does the administration feel that that’s still legal under DOMA?

     MR. CARNEY:  I haven’t seen that, and so I suggest you ask the Department of Defense since I haven’t seen that story.

     Q    Jay, to get back to Pakistan, what kind of communications and interactions is the administration having with the Pakistani government now?

     MR. CARNEY:  Well, we maintain our contacts at a variety of levels of — senior levels of the government, as we did prior to the mission against bin Laden.

     Q    Has the President spoken again or will he be speaking again with President Zardari?

     MR. CARNEY:  Well, I’m sure he will speak again with President Zardari.  I’m not aware that’s he has had another conversation with him since the evening of May 1st.

     Q    And just a quick issue here.  Some of the folks in the cabin were startled to see a plane fly underneath Air Force One, about the time we were just south of Dulles, I believe.  Are you aware that there was anything too close or —

     MR. CARNEY:  No, I was not aware that happened, and I’m sure I would have been told if there were an issue.

     Q    Can I ask about the political dimensions of the visit to Texas?  He’s raising money in Austin.  How confident is the President about carrying the state of Texas in the 2012 election?

     MR. CARNEY:  Well, he obviously did not carry it in 2008, but the President believes strongly that he doesn’t give up on any state.  And I’m just citing something he said recently about that.  And the fact is I’ve heard him talk on other occasions about how much he enjoys coming to Texas.  He’s glad to be here.  He knows he has a lot of supporters here; it’s a big state.  And I’m sure he’ll be back.

     Q    If I could go back to deficit and debt, are you — in an answer to Darlene, you said that you didn’t think Boehner’s talk — speech last night undermined the process.  And then earlier you said that you didn’t think it was helpful to restate starting positions.

     MR. CARNEY:  I didn’t say that.  I said it’s fine to restate starting positions.  I didn’t say it was unhelpful.  I’m just saying that it doesn’t —

     Q    So it’s fine —

     MR. CARNEY:  We understand that there are starting positions.  We also understand that compromise involves acknowledging that you have to move off of your starting position.  That’s kind of the nature of compromise.

     Q    Anything on — the President take a look at the window at the swelling Mississippi?

     MR. CARNEY:  I haven’t seen him do that but I haven’t been with him for the full flight so far.  I remember when we were flying out of Fort Campbell on Friday there was a lot of flooding in Kentucky.  It’s obviously quite devastating what we’re seeing now on television.

     Q    Are there any plans for the President to take a closer look at the impact of the flooding?

     MR. CARNEY:  I don’t have any scheduling updates.

     Anybody else?

     Q    Thank you, Jay.

END           12:31 P.M. EDT



White House Press Gaggle

By White House Press Secretary Jay Carney
Aboard Air Force One
En Route Joint Base Andrews
 
1:39 P.M. EDT
 
MR. CARNEY:  Good afternoon, everyone.  I don’t have any opening announcements or statements, so I will take your questions.
 
     Q    The President said in an interview today that the debt ceiling won’t be raised without spending cuts.  Can you explain what he means by that?  Are these two separate issues like you have been saying, or one and the same?
 
     MR. CARNEY:  I think what the President made clear and has made clear in the past is that we — there are two urgent tasks that need to be addressed.  One, Congress has to vote to raise the ceiling on our debt.  That’s an imperative that shouldn’t be linked or held hostage to any other action because the consequences of not raising the debt ceiling — those consequences would be catastrophic to the American economy, to the global economy and to America’s creditworthiness internationally.
 
     We are also moving with a great sense of urgency towards — taking steps towards greater deficit reduction, through the speech the President gave the other day, and the process that he has asked the Vice President to oversee and leaders of Congress to appoint members to participate in where they can come together and begin to negotiate areas where we can agree to bring about further deficit reduction in a balanced way that can achieve the kind of results that we think are what America needs economically and for our future.
 
     These are both urgent, but they’re not linked.  How this will play out remains to be seen, but both need to be done.  And with regards to the debt ceiling, it cannot be linked or held hostage to something that wouldn’t pass — couldn’t reach consensus.  It has to be done.  All the leaders of Congress of both parties have said that, and we obviously share that sentiment.
 
     Q    So the one isn’t contingent on the other?  It seemed in the interview like he was saying that he recognizes the relationship —
 
     MR. CARNEY:  I think what the President was saying is that he recognizes that the — that Republicans want more deficit reduction.  He wants more deficit reduction.  He wants it in a balanced way.  He also said that as in any compromise and any negotiation, he recognizes he’s not going to get 100 percent of what he wants or that it’s not going to be his way only, and Republicans need to recognize that, which is how we ended up with an agreement last week on the funding for the 2011 budget.
 
So I think that’s the process that he — a similar kind of process that he hopes that we’ll see as we go forward with — on the deficit-reduction track for the larger-picture issues that we’re looking at.
 
Q    But if his condition now is that the deficit ceiling won’t be raised without an agreement to cuts —
 
MR. CARNEY:  That’s not his position at all.  His position is that the deficit ceiling must be raised — absolutely.  And that’s the position of the Speaker of the House, the Senate Minority Leader, the Senate Majority Leader, the House Minority Leader, et cetera, et cetera — all the major players in Congress — which is fortunate because as we’ve all said and as I know you know, if you talk to economists or businessmen or women, that there’s simply too much at stake here to be playing around with the full faith and credit of the United States government.
 
     What he is saying is that he recognizes that there is a great focus, as there should be, on the need for deficit reduction and building on the significant achievement of last week which was — and voted on and passed into law yesterday the — for the fiscal year 2011, the largest domestic non-defense discretionary spending cuts in history.
 
     Q    Does the President believe Paul Ryan is a sincere person?  I mean, his comments in the public were very different than the comments when the reporters left the room, were very pointed in saying does he think — you know, implying that Ryan was not serious about the deficit, he voted for two wars, that kind of thing.  Is there a difference between what he said in public and what he said when we thought he was not in public?
 
     MR. CARNEY:  Actually I think what he said in that session you’re talking about and the things he’s said in more public forums have been entirely consistent.  And you can’t in one breath criticize him for being pointed in his comments about the House Republican budget plan in public and then say, my gosh, he was pointed and so different in private, because he is making clear that the visions are quite different.
 
He does believe that Chairman Ryan is absolutely sincere and that he believes that this is the right — that that’s the right path, the one he put forward is the right path for America.
 
The President simply disagrees because he doesn’t think that it’s balanced.  He doesn’t think that we need to — that the price of deficit reduction needs to be ending the guarantee, the health benefits that Medicare has provided our seniors, cutting energy — clean energy investment by 70 percent, cutting education by 25 percent, cutting infrastructure by 30 percent — and all so that we can not just reduce the deficit but so that we can extend tax cuts for the wealthiest of Americans and give new tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans.  That’s just not — that’s just — it’s a different vision.
 
And then — and I think the point he’s making is that there is more here than a goal of deficit reduction.  It’s a vision of government and what — and the way our system should work and what America should look like.
 
And when he talked about those votes under the previous administration, he was making the point that that’s evidence that this is more than — this is not just about deficit reduction.  If it were just about deficit reduction, you wouldn’t vote for —
 
Q    Wars.
 
MR. CARNEY:  — an entitlement, a brand new entitlement without paying for it.  You wouldn’t vote for two massive tax cuts without paying for them, or for the funding of two wars without paying for them, which is what happened in the first decade of this year.
 
     Q    How did it happen last night that those remarks were piped back into the press room?
   
     MR. CARNEY:  It was a miscommunication, nothing more than that.  But we’ve — it’s not a problem, not an issue.
 
     Q    Is the President embarrassed about anything that he said —
 
     MR. CARNEY:  Not at all.
 
     Q    — or regret —
 
     MR. CARNEY:  Not at all.  There’s nothing —
 
     Q    — might have clarified them differently if he had known they were for public distribution?
 
     MR. CARNEY:  He obviously — that was meant to be a closed-press event.  He was taking questions from supporters.  But there’s nothing — nothing he said that contradicts anything he said in public.
 
     Q    In an interview yesterday, the Senate Majority Leader had raised some doubts as to whether the President’s Afghanistan policy is going to be ultimately successful.  Did the Commander-in-Chief hear those remarks, and did he have any thought on them?
 
     MR. CARNEY:  I’m not aware that he heard those remarks, so I don’t have a response for you.
 
     Q    I’ve only read the top line from the AP interview, but it looks as if the President, speaking about Libya, said that they are at a stalemate and — but that he still believes Qaddafi will go.
 
     MR. CARNEY:  Right, what his point was that the — what he said, rather, was that the — obviously the military conflict remains contentious and unresolved because what the NATO mission is — NATO is fulfilling its mission which is to enforce the no-fly zone, enforce an arms embargo and provide civilian protection; it is not to win the war or decapitate the regime.
 
But all the other measures that the United States and its partners are taking are tightening the noose around Qaddafi, putting more pressure on Qaddafi, with the end goal of having him accept the fact that he can no longer rule legitimately in Libya, and that the Libyan people need to decide their future for themselves.
 
     Q    How does he think, though, that Qaddafi is going to come to that realization or leave by force in some other way?
   
     MR. CARNEY:  Well, I think that it becomes increasingly clear when your assets are frozen, your capacities have become increasingly diminished, that you are — your days are numbered in terms of your — what exactly are you ruling over.  And that what we have seen, because the sanctions are targeted not just at Colonel Qaddafi and his family but members of his inner circle who are being identified in greater numbers every week, that there — pressure is put on them to make an existential decision about who they want to be, whose side do they want to be on, the Libyan people’s side or Colonel Qaddafi’s side, a man who has lost all legitimacy in the eyes of the world and his people.
 
     So that kind of pressure has led to defections already.  We hope and anticipate that it will lead to more defections, put more pressure on Colonel Qaddafi, and eventually lead to his stepping down from power.
 
     Q    In the Q&A last night the President said that he anticipates that Republicans will seek to kind of put policy issue riders on future budget-type bills.  So would he veto a deficit-reduction package that had unrelated social policy or environmental riders?  Because he did, in the end, have to accept some, as you know.
 
     MR. CARNEY:  Well, I’m not going to speculate about what might be on a bill that hasn’t been written or anything like that.  What I will say is that his position on these issues was made pretty clear in the negotiations over the 2011 continuing resolution and — because he doesn’t believe that highly contentious social issues or ideological issues belong in budget bills.  But I’m not going to pre-negotiate something that doesn’t even exist at this point.
 
     Q    What time is he going to sign the 2011 budget bill — today?
 
     MR. CARNEY:  I don’t know, actually — we can find out.
 
     Q    Will that be open, closed, photo —
 
     MR. CARNEY:  We’ll have to find out.  I don’t know.
 
     Q    Do you guys have any reaction to the CBO report that shows that the budget deal reduced government spending by $20-$25 billion, not the $38 billion number?  Have you seen that?
 
     MR. CARNEY:  I have read reports of that.  My only reaction is that we worked together with members of Congress on a package that, by the numbers, Republicans and Democrats measured together in the negotiations, reduced spending by roughly $38.5 billion.  And there are obviously different ways to measure this and there are different kinds of spending, but those are real cuts with real impact on the government and on Americans.
   
     Q    Is there a week ahead?
 
     MR. CARNEY:  You know what, I don’t but I’ll — my understanding is that they are providing something back at home in Washington out of the press/comms office.  But if — I’ll double-check to see if there’s anything additional on top of that.
 
     Q    Great.
 
     MR. CARNEY:  All right?
 
     Q    Thank you very much, Jay.
 
     MR. CARNEY:  Thanks for flying with us.
 

Obama Says Goodbye To Gibbs

By Anna Cameron

President Obama appeared in the White House briefing room Friday to recognize press secretary Robert Gibbs’ last day on the job.

Though Obama stated confidently that Jay Carney will do an “outstanding job filling [Gibbs’] shoes,” he emphasized the value of his friendship with his departing aid.

“Robert has not only been an extraordinary press secretary, but he has been a great friend, and you could not ask for someone better in the foxhole with you,” said the President.

Gibbs, who has supported Obama since the 2004 Senate campaign, expressed deep gratitude and appreciation for the opportunity to serve as White House press secretary.

“I don’t intend on telling anyone goodbye. I don’t intend to go anywhere,” said Gibbs, who will again support Obama on the 2012 reelection campaign.

As a commemorative gift of his service in the White House, Gibbs was presented with a tie that he had loaned Obama at the DNC prior to his keynote speech.

“I thought I should finally give you your tie back. It and you helped me get started,” said the note accompanying Obama’s gift to Gibbs.

Obama Spending Plan Fuels Debate

Congress likely will not take substantive action in the short run on President Barack Obama’s request for $50 billion to be used on infrastructure projects.

Both the House and Senate resume session next week, but for how long remains to be seen. Members are expcted to spend most of their time between now and November campaigning for re-election.

Already, the President is receiving blowback from his speech Monday in which he announced his new plan to create jobs by funding a series of transportation measures.

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) said the plan “should be met with justifiable skepticism.”

“We don’t need more government ‘stimulus’ spending,” added House Minority Leader John Boehner (R-Ohio). “We need to end Washington Democrats’ out-of-control spending spree, stop their tax hikes, and create jobs by eliminating the job-killing uncertainty that is hampering our small businesses.”

Democrats have successfully overcome a series of Republican hurdles this year to pass legislation, but given mounting voter discontent over deficit growth it is uncertain how much of an appetite they still possess to attach their names to more spending.

In a conference call with reporters on Monday, one senior White House official said the plan is not an added stimulus, but rather a long-term initiative that would also create jobs quickly, perhaps as early as 2011. However, critics point out that the aim of last year’s monumental stimulus package was also to bring down unemployment in the short-term, a goal that went unmet.

White House Gaggle

By Deputy White House Press Secretary Bill Burton
Aboard Air Force One
En Route Seattle, Washington
 
9:17 A.M. PDT
 
     MR. BURTON:  Okay.  Welcome onboard Air Force One.  You all saw Secretary Locke is joining us today.  At his remarks at a small business in Seattle, the President will discuss the fact that the Senate is going to take on the small business bill when they come back into session and the importance of Republicans stopping their obstruction so that small business owners can get the assistance that they need as soon as humanly possible to create an environment where small businesses can be creating jobs and the economy can continue to grow.
 
With that, I’m happy to take any questions you might have.
 
Q    Hey, Bill, with all the campaigning the President is doing, how far is he willing to go in saying that he’s confident the House and Senate will stay Democratic?  Is he willing to guarantee it?  How confident is he?
 
MR. BURTON:  How far is he willing to go?  Interestingly put.  The President thinks that this election is a choice between the policies that move our country forward or the policies that got us to the crisis that we’re in right now.  But he’s confident that given that choice in the voting booths in November that Democrats will be successful and he does think that we will hold on to both the House and the Senate.
 
Q    So you think — so the White House’s feeling is that things are trending well right now; with all of these campaign stops it’s making a difference?
 
MR. BURTON:  Well, I’m not going to get into the punditry of it, but the President thinks that this is fundamentally a choice and it’s a choice where the Americans will choose to continue making progress.
 
Q    Is the President having fun on the campaign trail right now, considering every day the polls are beating him down, every day he’s getting a lot of backseat-driving advice?  Is this fun for him?
 
MR. BURTON:  The President has gotten a lot of advice from all corners ever since he started out on the campaign trail February 10, 2007.   But he appreciates the opportunity to go out there and make the case to the American people about what his policies have done to help make our economy stronger, what he’s done to make our country safer, and the choice that people have in this election between continuing on our economic policies, like the small business bill that he’ll be talking about today, that get more loans to small businesses; that cut — that end capital gains for their investments.  So he does enjoy making that case to the American people.
 
Q    Enjoying the campaign trail this week?
 
MR. BURTON:  He enjoys making the case.  He obviously would enjoy it more if he could spend more time with his family.  But I think that as one of the hats that he wears as the leader of the Democratic Party, as President of the United States, he does like going out and talking to the American people, hearing what’s on their minds and explaining how he sees the choice in this election.
 
Q    Can you talk about Senator Reid’s disagreeing with the President on the mosque issue?  Has the President spoken to him? Did Reid’s people give you guys a heads-up about that?  What was his reaction?
 
MR. BURTON:  We did have a sense that that’s what they were going to do.  But if you look at what the President said on Friday night, he respects the right of anybody — Democrat, Republican, independent — to disagree with his opinion on this. That’s one of the other fundamental rights written into the DNA  of our Constitution.
 
Senator Reid is a fiercely independent individual; it’s one of his strengths as a leader of the Democratic Party.  So the President feels completely fine that he might disagree.
 
Q    — you view Senator Reid and the President disagree on this issue?
 
MR. BURTON:  Well, the statements are different.  What the President said was that he thinks that there’s a fundamental right for individuals and groups to be treated equally.  But the President, like he said on Saturday, didn’t comment specifically on whether or not he was pushing for the site to actually to be put in that spot.  Senator Reid’s comment was he thinks that it shouldn’t be.
 
Q    So it is a different statement.  It’s a different statement — do they agree?  Do they disagree?
 
MR. BURTON:  I’ll leave it to the smart guys like you, Chuck, to decide whether or not that means disagreement or different statement or what’s up and what’s down.  But it’s a different take on this issue.
 
Q    — decide not to speak to the insurance commissioners today?
 
MR. BURTON:  Just postponed it for a month.
 
Q    Sorry, didn’t hear you.  What —
 
MR. BURTON:  Just postponed it for a month.
 
Q    Why?
 
MR. BURTON:  I just think that the President thought it was important to talk about small businesses and the importance of getting moving on that right when the Senate gets back.
 
Q    Can you comment on reports today that the President may announce loosening travel restrictions for groups to Cuba?
 
MR. BURTON:  Sure.  I’ve seen those reports and I don’t have anything new to announce.  But the President is going to continue to do things that are in the best interest of the United States and that help to create a more democratic environment and expand freedoms for the Cuban people.
 
Q    Some members of Congress are saying they did not get a heads-up about the mosque comments, even though the President spoke to Mayor Bloomberg.  Why not discuss this with the senators, or even Representative Gillibrand?
 
MR. BURTON:  I don’t know that the President spoke to Mayor Bloomberg — I don’t think that that’s accurate — about this beforehand.  We have very close relationships with our partners on Capitol Hill, and sometimes — we talk to them every day at different levels of the West Wing, but we take each issue on a case-by-case basis.  This wasn’t something that the President viewed through a political lens.  This is something that he saw as his obligation to address.  So there you go.
 
Q    Was the President briefed on the Iraq bombing this morning?
 
MR. BURTON:  Yes, made aware.  And the President condemns those attacks.  There are obviously still people who want to derail the advances that the Iraqi people have made towards democracy, but they are firmly on track and we’re confident that we’re moving towards the end of our combat mission there.
 
Q    — the work of al Qaeda in Iraq?
 
MR. BURTON:  I don’t know.  I would point you to the DOD for that.
 
Q    Given that attack and how bad it was and the fact that there’s still no government in Iraq, how can you — how can the United States go ahead, continue with its plans for the drawdown?
 
MR. BURTON:  The fact that, as the Vice President said, politics has broken out in Iraq is a good thing.  It means that democracy is thriving there already.  There’s a transitional government in place that’s functioning in a stable fashion, and we’re confident that they will be able to put together a government.  But that fact that there’s a lot of competition for who is going to be leading that country is a good thing.  It’s a political process at work.
 
     Q    So it’s not going to affect the schedule?  This kind of attack is not going to affect the U.S. schedule?
 
     MR. BURTON:  No.  We’re obviously helping the Iraqi forces to keep that country secure.  Our combat mission ends at the end of the month, but we will still have troops there who are helping to support them as necessary.
 
     Q    — preview tomorrow?
 
     MR. BURTON:  Tomorrow in Columbus, the President is going to be visiting with a middle-class family, where he’ll talk — I think it’s right at their kitchen table — about some of the concerns that they have about what — things are going on in the economy.  And then afterwards, he’ll go outside and have a conversation with some neighbors and folks from the community about questions and concerns that they have.
 
     Q    — a town hall?
 
     MR. BURTON:  But smaller.  More like a —
 
     Q    Will he take questions?
 
     MR. BURTON:  He will be taking questions, yes.
 
     Q    From — that will be folks in the community?
 
     MR. BURTON:  Yes.
 
     Q    How was the family chosen?
 
     MR. BURTON:  I think that our folks at the White House talked to local community leaders about finding an appropriate venue where such a conversation could take place.
 
     Q    Whose house is — who is hosting the fundraiser in Seattle today, the one at the private residence?
 
     MR. BURTON:  I don’t know.  I would check in with the Murray campaign on that.
 
     Q    The questions that he’ll have, it’s like a town hall we’ll be seeing?  Or he’ll just sit alone with them?
   
     MR. BURTON:  Yes, it will be town hall-style, but it will be pretty small — it will be like 40 people.
 
     Q    Okay, but we’ll be in there?
 
     MR. BURTON:  Yes.
 
     Q    Hey, Bill, I knock on wood as I ask this last one, but after this, the President goes off to Martha’s Vineyard.  Is his expectation that that is a genuine vacation?
 
     MR. BURTON:  The President is definitely going to spend a little time recharging his batteries.  I would, as the spokesman who’s going to go on that trip, encourage anybody else who’s going in the media to think that this is going to be the hardest that they will have ever have worked in their entire lives.  You’ll probably be working every day, early till late, maybe really early in the morning till really late at night, and over the weekend as well.  And you’ll probably never see outside of your bed and breakfast where you’ll be staying.
 
     Q    Don’t laugh.  Those of us in print — that was the schedule, actually.
 
     Q    And it was your fault.
 
     Q    And it was all your fault.
 
     Q    — your reverse psychology.
 
     MR. BURTON:  I’m just trying to set expectations appropriately.  I know what I said before the last time we went to Martha’s Vineyard and it turned out a little bit differently.
Just one last thing on this.  So a couple folks have asked me who all is going on the trip.  Valerie Jarrett will be out there, as well as Pete Rouse —
 
     Q    To Martha’s Vineyard?
 
     MR. BURTON:  Yes.  John Brennan will be on the trip.  I’ll be there doing spokesman duties.  And I think Denis McDonough is going to show up at some point to help out as well.
 
     Q    Do you have any other details about where they’re staying, what they’re doing, or who’s going with them for vacation purposes?
 
     MR. BURTON:  Not other than that, really.  I mean, as far as what they’re doing, I think it will be a lot like last year.  There will be some hiking, some time at the beach, some time at the ice cream store — all the sort of things you do when you’re at Martha’s Vineyard.  You enjoy the people and the good food.
 
     Q    Will he be playing golf?
 
     MR. BURTON:  Say that again?
 
     Q    Golf?
 
     MR. BURTON:  I don’t know.  You’ll just have to wait to see how it all shakes out.
 
     Q    They’re staying at the same house?
 
     MR. BURTON:  I’ll keep you posted on where they’re staying.
 
     Q    Any plans for a Thursday morning press conference before he leaves and he’s down for 10 days?
 
     MR. BURTON:  None that I know of.  (Laughter.)
 
Anything else?
 
     Q    What does the President think of the reaction to his comments on the mosque?  Has he been sort of — does he have his — he’s very critical sometimes of the news media.  Is he as critical on this one?
 
     MR. BURTON:  The President thinks that this is an issue that people are going to come to with strongly held opinions, and he respects the fact that they’re going to express them.  He doesn’t — he’s not surprised necessarily that a lot of people are coming out and talking about this forcefully.  So I would say that he’s happy that our thriving democracy is continuing to produce vigorous debate.
 
     Q    He’s not critical — this isn’t one of those moments where he thinks the media is doing something it shouldn’t do?
 
     MR. BURTON:  I don’t want to miss an opportunity to just criticize the media, but — (laughter.)  This is debate that’s just happening in the country.
 
     Q    Does he have any regrets about coming out and saying anything, given that it’s stoked the flames in this way?
 
     MR. BURTON:  No.  He felt it was his obligation to address this matter.
 
     Q    Thanks, Bill.
 
     MR. BURTON:  Thanks.
 
                                          END             9:29 A.M. PDT