Bill Clinton: “Well, first of all, I never selected her to be Attorney General. There was a press report that she was, and I regret--I…”

“Well, first of all, I never selected her to be Attorney General. There was a press report that she was, and I regret--I think she was treated quite unfairly in this whole thing. I have high regard for her, but she was one of three or four people I was considering. Secondly, the facts of her case was that she did not violate the law, because in 1986 the law was changed to say if you knowingly hire an illegal alien, you're violating the law, but if you did it before the law became into effect, you're not violating the law. So a few months before the law was passed, she knowingly hired an illegal alien. Now, I think--and she did not do anything illegal. She knew the person providing child care was doing something illegal, but she didn't. But the question there that you can ask or answer, that I would have had to answer had I decided to put her up for Attorney General, is whether the Attorney General, who runs the Immigration and Naturalization Service, has a special standard to meet in this area that other Cabinet members might not have to meet. And that's a question that I would have had to resolve, had I decided to nominate her. One of the things that I think has been very good in this whole business is that we've now taken a lot of these issues out. They're now the subject of public debate, and I hope that we will be able to resolve some of them, including--you would be amazed how many people who come to my attention as potential candidates for various positions in Government honestly did not know that they had to take out withholding on anybody who worked for them if they spent more than $50 on them every 3 months. They just didn't know. And that's something that I think has really been raised on the public agenda. I think people are so much more aware of that than they were. You know, some people don't think that ought to be the law, but that's what the law is. Health Care Reform Mr. Bonds. Mr. President, a lot of people wonder if when your wife speaks on health care reform she is speaking directly for you and if that is the message that you're sending to the American people. Here's a young woman by the name of Marcie Hoffmaster; she's 17. She's going to be graduating soon. And you've got a tough future in front of you.”