After 61 Days, Gore Speaks
On the 61st day, Al Gore ended the news conference drought.
In his first question-and-answer forum with reporters in two months, the vice president took a few campaign shots at presidential rival George W. Bush Friday and insisted - in the backyard of big-labor China opponents - that he was making good on his own promise to push for permanent full trade relations with the Chinese.
Gore also condemned as "bad business" a planned meeting organized by Michigan Gov. John Engler, an active Bush booster that will bring together state regulators and industry groups who believe federal air-quality standards are too cumbersome.
Asked if Democratic state officials should stay away from next Thursday's gathering, Gore replied, "I would if the stated purpose of the meeting is to conspire with the regulated industries on how to weaken the environmental laws."
Hours after he privately lunched with Teamsters president James Hoffa, Gore was pressed to prove that he was indeed lobbying members of Congress for the Clinton-Gore administration's plan to give China permanent normal trade status.
"Yes. Yes I am," Gore said, not offering details.
Hoffa, who continues to withhold a Teamsters endorsement in the presidential race, hotly opposes the trade measure, and Gore said he spoke to the labor leader about the matter.
"I'm not going to go into my private conversations, but yes I did and we disagree on it, also," Gore told reporters.
The vice president, who was on a part-official, part-campaign trip to Michigan, spent 20 minutes taking about 20 questions in the lobby of the Wyndham Garden Hotel, while hotel guests loudly rolled luggage across the floor nearby.
The Republican National Committee had been keeping a daily tally of time elapsed since Feb. 19 when Gore last formally entertained questions from the crew of reporters who travel with him.
For Friday's occasion, the Gore campaign handed reporters buttons that said: "I was at Al Gore's first general-election press conference."
Gore himself laughed off a question about when his next might be. "Oh my. It could be any moment."
He proved himself adept at sticking to his script.
For example, when asked if he had any doubt that Elian Gonzalez's father genuinely loves his 6-year-old son and wants him home in Cuba, Gore responded with his usual answer: "I still think the standard should be what is in the best interests of the child."
Gore spent the bulk of his seven-hour visit to Michigan on the chilly loading floor of the Alvan Motor Freight company, where he beamed pre-Earth Day environmental pitches via satellite to nearly a dozen TV news stations all of them in Midwest swing states.
In those interviews, and in his news conference, he broke little new ground, though he did say he has done nothing during the recent days' developments on the Gonzalez case to press is own views within the administration.
"I have not been in touch with the attorney general directly on this at all. I have talked to the president in days past on this and have expressed my views," Gore said.
Attorney General Janet Reno is waiting for law enforcement officials to determine the best time and method to remove the Cuban boy from the home of his Miami relatives and reunite him with his father.
"I would recommend a different course to resolve it within the family," Gore said.
On the presidential campaign, he brushed aside Republican allegations that he cannot be trusted to tell the truth. "They like to repeat that," Gore said.
Since his only other formal remarks of the day were delivered at an officially nonpartisan appearance on behalf of the White House, Gore used an opening statement at the news conference to indict Bush's environmental record.
"You know, Governor Bush seems to have the smug assumption that he can get away with calling himself an environmentalist in spite of the record," Gore said.
Political endorsement was not on the day's menu in Romulus, about 30 miles outside of Detroit, Hoffa told a reporter before sitting down with Gore.
"It's going to be a tough race for everyone. We're not making any announcement about who we're going to endorse and not endorse," Hoffa said. "Everything in time."