Q & A with Press Secretary Jay Carney
Texas Insider Report: Aboard Air Force One En Route EL PASAO Texas Question: The Texas governor is upset that there hasnt been a disaster declaration covering the wildfires there. Some Republicans have suggested that perhaps politics is playing a role and one has even said its 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 its 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 didnt 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 20000 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 -- weve 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. Weve 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 dont want to steal the Presidents 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 were 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: Im not going to preview our legislative strategy from here but were -- the approach were 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 Id 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 its -- this is something that were 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 were told -- weve 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 its so urgent why arent 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 youre talking about getting things done. And we have a strategy here to try to get another hard thing done and were following that strategy because we believe it gives us the best chance of success.
Q Can I ask if its 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 its 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 hes going to try to do them.
Q & A with Press Secretary Jay Carney
Texas Insider Report: Aboard Air Force One En Route EL PASAO Texas Question: The Texas governor is upset that there hasnt been a disaster declaration covering the wildfires there. Some Republicans have suggested that perhaps politics is playing a role and one has even said its 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 its 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 didnt 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 20000 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 -- weve 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. Weve 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 dont want to steal the Presidents 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 were 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: Im not going to preview our legislative strategy from here but were -- the approach were 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 Id 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 its -- this is something that were 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 were told -- weve 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 its so urgent why arent 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 youre talking about getting things done. And we have a strategy here to try to get another hard thing done and were following that strategy because we believe it gives us the best chance of success.
Q Can I ask if its 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 its 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 hes going to try to do them.
