 [4] AEN_NEWS (1:375/48)  AEN_NEWS 
 Msg  : #1645 [75]                                                              
 From : Al Thompson                         1:231/110       Fri 12 Aug 94 13:06 
 To   : All                                                                     
 Subj : Crime Bill news pt1                                                     

AP 08/12

   WASHINGTON (AP) -- President Clinton Friday vowed to "fight and
fight and fight" to resurrect his $33.2 billion crime bill, and
senior lawmakers discussed changing a controversial assault-weapons
ban to help squeeze the measure through the House.

   Clinton set out this morning to Minnesota to address a police
group as part of the White House's campaign to salvage the measure
that was shelved Thursday by a coalition of Republicans, anti-gun
control Democrats and blacks upset over an expanded death penalty.

   In the House, Speaker Thomas Foley said lawmakers would return to
the Capitol to vote anew on a crime bill, the number one issue in
polls this summer. "We are going to put this bill over the top," he
said.

   At a breakfast meeting with reporters, Majority Leader Richard
Gephardt was asked if the crime bill could be passed with the
assault-weapons ban that sparked a furious campaign by the National
Rifle Association.

   "I think so, but probably not the same one," he replied.

   Some Democrats also spoke of trimming some of the provisions that
Republicans ridiculed as "pork" before sending the measure back to
the floor. But they said they didn't expect to open bipartisan talks
with Republicans on the measure.

   One of the items of "pork" criticized by Republicans was an
authorization of $10 million to establish a criminal justice
research and education center at Lamar University in Beaumont,
Texas, represented by House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jack
Brooks. Key Democrats involved in crafting the crime bill said they
were unaware it was in there.

   It came to light in a July 29 news release from the university
touting it, and House GOP leaders cited it in an Aug. 5 memo as one
of seven reasons for Republican members to oppose the rule. "Who
knows what lurks deep in the fine print?" the memo asked.

   Clinton's trip had a bipartisan aura, as mayors of both parties
made the journey aboard Air Force One.

   He criticized the lawmakers who had voted to keep the crime bill
from reaching the floor. Those opposed "decided that their political
security was more important than the personal security of the
American people."

   "This crime bill cannot die," Clinton said outside the White
House, "Congress has an obligation to the American people that goes
way beyond politics and way beyond party."

   Poll after poll, he said, showed crime the top worry of the
American people and "if we can't meet this concern there is
something badly wrong in Washington."

   Republican Mayor Rudolph Giuliani of New York and Democratic
Mayors Edward Rendell of Philadelphia and William Campbell of
Atlanta were with Clinton at the White House.

   Giuliani and Rendell were accompanying him to Minneapolis to
appear before a convention of the 200,000-member National
Association of Police Organizations, which strongly supported the
bill.

   "We are going to fight and fight and fight until we win this
battle for the American people," Clinton said.

   Democrats emerged from a closed-door caucus that originally had
been called to discuss health care but turned instead to crime.

   Sources, speaking on condition of anonymity, said one lawmaker
had warned his colleagues that they risked losing majority control
if they couldn't pass the crime measure, one of the centerpieces of
the Democrats' election-year agenda. His remarks were met with
applause.

   But lawmakers expressed different views on how to proceed, some
saying the assault-weapons ban should be stripped from the bill and
voted on separately, and others saying the leadership should
repackage the measure in a way that can allow enough Democrats to
change their votes and reverse the outcome.

--- GEcho 1.00
 * Origin: Gun Control=Criminals & Gestapo vs. the Unarmed. (1:231/110)

