George H.W. Bush: “We will be meeting this afternoon. I've appointed the Chief of Staff, who is already engaged with the leadership. I…”

“We will be meeting this afternoon. I've appointed the Chief of Staff, who is already engaged with the leadership. I believe the meeting is going to be this afternoon with the leadership. I'm not familiar with what the Senate has done. There was one version of the bill that is unacceptable to us. But here's my view on what we ought to do: There are some things that we agree on with Congress, have nothing to do with how you pay for it, but there are some things that are well within the budget agreement that can be done and where both Congress and the executive branch has shown an interest. It is my view that we ought to focus on those. ``Weed and Seed'' is one; enterprise zones is another. My pitch to the leaders is, look, you've got your priorities over here, and we've got ours. But let's do something that will help the people not just in Los Angeles but people that need jobs in the inner cities. I'm still feeling that we have an opportunity to get it done that way. I can't comment on the Senate bill, except to say the one I saw yesterday, Kennedy-Hatch, is not acceptable to the administration, and we made that clear to the leaders. But let's get the common ground and try to do something to help people. Then we can have the debate and the votes and the countervotes as to whose plan, Senate plan, House plan, administration plan. I still think we can get it done that way.”