Click here to see the video.

Find more video, photos, and information on the events featured in this episode below:

Monday, July 26, 2010

Tuesday, July 27, 2010

Wednesday, July 28, 2010

Thursday, July 29, 2010

Arun Chaudhary is the official White House videographer

H.R. 4899, the “Supplemental Appropriations Act, 2010,” which provides FY 2010 supplemental appropriations for ongoing military, diplomatic, and intelligence operations; support for individuals and communities responding to major disasters; maintenance of ongoing humanitarian work following the earthquake in Haiti; enabling the response to the recent oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico;

H.R. 5610, the “Independent Living Centers Technical Adjustment Act,” which requires an adjustment in how funds for independent living centers under the Rehabilitation Act are allocated in certain States.
 

MR. GIBBS:  Good afternoon.  Before we do our regularly scheduled programming, we have with us today to give a little report and to take some questions from you, given the President’s upcoming trips to both Detroit and Chicago to visit Chrysler, GM and Ford plants, today we have with us Ron Bloom, Senior Advisor to the Treasury Secretary for Automobiles; and celebrating his second to last day -- tomorrow is his last day -- and we will sorely miss him -- Ed Montgomery, who is head of the White House Council on Automotive Communities and Workers -- to talk a little bit about what the President will do tomorrow.

I'll just briefly outline -- as I said, the President will make two stops tomorrow in Detroit and Hamtramck, and then the following week in Chicago, to talk about the tough decisions that the President made well over a year ago as it related to our auto industry -- a decision that has since resulted in a restructured and turned around auto industry, one that is adding rather than shedding jobs, and a decision in and of itself that likely saved a million jobs and communities -- certainly saved communities from economic devastation.

So, with that, let me turn it first over to Ron.

MR. BLOOM:  Thank you.  So tomorrow’s visit, the President will begin at the Jefferson North plant of Chrysler, where they’re making the Jeep Grand Cherokee.  The company employs roughly 2,800 people.  It just added a second shift that increased its employment by about 1,100 jobs, to bring it to that 2,800.  The Jeep Grand Cherokee is being very well received in the marketplace.

The President will then travel to Hamtramck.  Around 1,100 people work there and that's the plant where General Motors will be making the Volt. 

So that's what tomorrow is.  And then early next week he'll be traveling to Ford’s Chicago plant, where they have agreed -- where they will be adding another shift, another 1,200 workers, importantly because of a Department of Energy loan.

It’s also worth remarking that today we're releasing a little report that does a bit of an update on the situation in the automobile industry.  I think it’s now available.  Just a couple of highlights from the report:  In the year before these bankruptcies, these companies lost almost 340,000 jobs.  In the year since then, 55,000 jobs have been added to these companies. As Robert pointed out, if we hadn’t stepped in when we did, most observers believe at least a million jobs would have been lost.

While there is still a long way to go, the report points out that the companies are also showing positive signs of financial performance.  In the first quarter, all of them made operating profits.  That's the first time that's happened since 2004.

Ford just reported its second quarter, $2.6 billion in profits.  General Motors announced that in their summer -- normal summer shutdown period, nine of their 11 factories needed to continue working to meet customer demand.  So we think there’s a lot of signs that, while slow, the industry is truly coming back.

We also would note in that regard that at the time of the -- when things began, the automobile supply industry, which, in fact, employs a lot more people than the Big Three themselves, was losing jobs at a great rate.  They were 54 supplier bankruptcies over the course of last year.  The supply base has now stabilized.  There are less than 10 percent of the companies who are in default of their covenants, so we think the supply base is also looking much more stable.

And then, finally, we point out the investments that the President made in the auto industry of the future -- in battery plants, in other high-mileage vehicles.  So we think we’re positioning the United States automobile industry to lead the world in the future.

MR. MONTGOMERY:  A little over a year ago, the President recognized that not only were the companies in trouble, but the communities who relied on this industry were going through distress, as well.  And so he created the Council on Auto Communities and Workers.  And we spent the past year both going out and listening to these communities and then trying to make sure that the resources of the federal government were deployed to help them.

They identified a couple of areas which were priority needs for them -- first, help the workforce.  And so the Department of Labor and the government has made some $50 million in national emergency grants available to help workers in Michigan, Ohio, California, Delaware and Missouri, in the auto sector.  On top of that another $75 million was made available particularly for auto community workers to help them transition to new jobs in the green economy as well as in medical and other high growth sectors.

The second area that they focused on was helping suppliers.  Obviously, Ron talked about some of the assistance we did to keep the supply base in place, but also to help suppliers think about how to diversify, how to get into new lines of business away from automobiles. 

We’ve worked with the Manufacturing Distinction Program and programs like the Ohio Economic Development to reach some 170 different suppliers in the auto sector, specifically in that state alone, to help them with diversification efforts. 

On top of that, investments like the Department of Energy’s 48c Advance Manufacturing Program allowed over $7 billion in capital to be made available to get people out of and into the new sectors of wind and solar and other advance manufacturing to allow these communities to have new opportunities going forward
-- some 180 projects have been funded through that.

And third, these people talked about the fact that these plants, these facilities that were in these communities, which had been a source of strength for them, were now going to be abandoned, many of them going to be abandoned.  And so, working with the Treasury, the Department of Justice, the Environmental Protection Agency, the administration has put forward a plan that will make some $800 million in investments available to clean up these sites, as well as to engage in economic development kinds of activities.

An example of a kind of a site that will benefit from this fund is Buick City.  That was a huge facility in Flint, Michigan. It closed in 1999.  Nothing done on that site for almost a decade.  With the kinds of work that we've been able to do -- we've got the Environmental Protection Agency already worked out a plan to clean up the site, to put in place -- which they can put in place as soon as the money becomes available at the end of the year, and there’s hope that there’s actually going to be a new investor coming in, take over that site and create some jobs in that area. 

And so those kinds of investments were the kinds of things we've been doing over the course of the year, making sure that workers, suppliers, and the community benefit.

MR. GIBBS:  Any questions?

Q    Yes, Mr. Bloom, could you tell me, does the government see any hurdles to GM being able to go public?  And also, do you expect the government, in the IPO, that it will reduce its stake in GM to under 50 percent?

MR. BLOOM:  We stated previously that we are hopeful that General Motors will be able to go public this year.  We continue to be hopeful in that regard.  A public offering of this nature, or any public offering is very tightly regulated by the Securities and Exchange Commission, and so until the company files what’s called a registration statement, we're really not in a position to give any further information about what the offering might or might not look like.

If at some point in the future the company does file a registration statement, which as I said before, we're hopeful it will, then we'll be in a position to give some more information.

Q    Mr. Bloom and Mr. Montgomery, The Washington Post had a story this Sunday that talked about the unequal wage scale or disparate wage scale now as a result of the federal intervention -- some assembly line workers make $14 an hour, some make $28.  is that the new normal?  And is that something that, as this restructured and turned-around auto industry looks at the future a lower wage scale, one that does bring some concerns to those who are on the line now and are anticipating or trying to plan for their future -- is that the new normal in the American auto industry?

MR. BLOOM:  We're not -- I can't say what the new normal is.  The company and their union in the context of this very difficult situation worked out a new labor agreement, which reduced the company’s costs.  We did not intervene and tell the company and the union we would rather they do it one way or the other.  There were very difficult sacrifices made by all stakeholders which allowed these companies to restructure.  And we're confident that over time the companies and their unions will work out a fair and equitable situation.

Q    Mr. Montgomery, any comment on that?

MR. MONTGOMERY:  I would just say it’s not new.  It didn’t start with the notion of a two-tier -- different salaries for the newer workers versus older workers didn’t originate under the restructuring going on here.  But as Ron has just said, obviously this is something that the UAW is negotiating.  They thought that this was necessary for the survival of the company.

MR. GIBBS:  Major, let me just add this.  When the President made these tough decisions he did so asking for that conditions be placed on this money and that tough sacrifices, as these gentlemen have said, be made by all.  I think if you look back at that article, I think everyone was struck that despite what their wage per hour was, those workers were happy to have jobs, happy to be -- the communities are happy that the plants that have been there are there and are thriving.  And as we've said, we have an auto industry that, instead of shedding hundreds of thousands of jobs, is adding jobs.

I think -- and I'm sure Ed can talk to this -- my guess is that when the President walks into any of these plants over the next -- in the next three stops, my guess is that the first 10 or 15 people that he sees and meets and talks to aren’t going to be the first of their generation working in that plant.  They’ll be fathers that worked there before they did, grandfathers that worked before they did, as well.  And these facilities build strong communities and build strong economies, and as a result of the tough investments that we made and the tough sacrifices made by all, we have an industry that looks fundamentally different in its progress than we did just a year and a half ago.

Q    Real quick, Robert, (inaudible) that Ford, though not receiving bailout dollars, benefited nevertheless because suppliers remain alive.  Would you address that and talk to us a little bit about your understanding of how though Ford did not seek, nor did it receive, it still was either an indirect or direct beneficiary of this intervention?

MR. BLOOM:  Yes, I think the entire industry was an indirect beneficiary.  The transplant companies were an indirect beneficiary, too.  This is an incredibly interdependent industry. And if GM had failed, a very large number of suppliers would have immediately failed, who would have been so significant within -- their GM business would have meant that they couldn’t succeed. And that would have had a cascading effect through the balance of the OE industry, Ford included and potentially others, as well.

So I think there’s no question that the President’s intervention helped the entire industry.  I think that's a good thing.  The American automobile industry directly employs today 1.7 million people.  And so that is one of the reasons why it was so important to look at General Motors and say, this company really matters, and if its stakeholders are prepared to do the tough stuff, then it is a good investment to try to help them.

So, yes, I think there were many other companies that benefited and I think that's a very good thing.

MR. GIBBS:  And then, Major, as the CEO of Ford said back in December of 2008, they weren’t looking for direct money, but went to support the efforts of Chrysler and GM because, as he said then and as Ron said, without that supplier base, Ford would not have been making cars within -- not within weeks, but within days, they would have been forced to make some changes, which is certainly significant.

Q    What do you say, Robert, or any of you, to the folks who, at the beginning, a year and a half ago, were deriding this effort, calling it socialism, calling it government takeover?  You had Rush Limbaugh today -- there yesterday talking “Obama Motors” again.  Is essentially the message here a sort of, we told you so?

MR. GIBBS:  No, because -- I’ll say this.  Look, Rush Limbaugh and others wanted to walk away.  Rush Limbaugh and others saw a million people that worked at these factories, that worked at these parts suppliers, that supported communities, and thought we should all just walk away.  The President didn't think that walking away from a million jobs in these communities made a lot of economic sense.

Let’s go back now and look at where we are.  The President and the team expect, after these tough decisions, and after the conditions that were put on the restructuring that enabled them to change the trajectory of where we’re heading -- as Ron said, we’ve got auto companies that for the first time since 2004 all showed an operating profit in the first quarter of this year.

It’s adding jobs.  And the money that this administration invested, about $60 billion, we believe we’re on the path to recouping all of that.  That's a significant story.  And it’s not, as I told a few of you guys yesterday, it’s not a zero-sum game.  A million people leaving their job would have had a multiplying economic effect.  That's a million more people that would have been on unemployment benefits.

And certainly as Ed knows, when you walk into these communities, it’s not as if these communities have a lot of other businesses -- because they're built around these plants.  So you’re walking away from a million workers, you’re walking away from the communities where these plants have been built; and quite frankly, you’re walking away from a future that -- when the President walks into that factory that's building the Chevy Volt, two or three years ago, if you go back, we didn't even -- there was a lot of talk about whether or not you could even develop the technology necessary to put a battery, an electric battery in a car and have it go 40 or 100 miles without kicking into a gas engine or charging it every 10 miles.  That was unsure.

There was also a lot of doubt about whether any type of car like this would ever be built in this country or driven in this country.  And if they were driven in this country, they would likely have been shipped over here and imported.  Now these cars will say made in America, by American workers and bought by Americans.  And that is -- that's significant.

I’ll let those that sat in the cheap seats a year and a half ago and wanted to walk away from a million explain to every one of those workers why they made that decision.  And I think, better yet, ask them if they had to do that decision to do all over again -- knowing that that $60 billion were on track to get paid back, knowing that there’s a million people that are still employed, knowing that we’re adding 55,000 jobs, that plants are working through what’s normally a planned summer shutdown, and that we’re creating the jobs of the future -- whether they thought the decision they made 16 or 18 months ago, different than that of the President of the United States -- whether they still stand by it. 

And then you should ask Mr. Limbaugh -- I don't know what kind of car he drives, but I bet it’s not an F-150.

Q    Can I just follow up real quick?

MR. GIBBS:  Yes.

Q    Even the President has said all along he doesn’t -- he didn't want to be in the position of running a car company and that this kind of a government -- use whatever word -- takeover, intervention, whatever -- isn’t ideal.  Are there things that you got -- even in the success that you’re touting now, are there regrets or things that you are trying to be careful about in terms of not having this become a sort of precedent-setting thing for other industries?

MR. BLOOM:  The President has, in fact, been extremely clear that he did not run for office to be taking over car companies.  And I think, in fact, if you look at our behavior since the bankruptcy ended, he’s been exceptionally true to that word.  The administration -- nobody in the administration is directing General Motors on what to do on a day-to-day basis.  We are not running these companies.

And many people did assume that if we became the owner of the company, the next thing we would do is to direct the affairs of the company.  And that's exactly what we haven’t done.  We were very involved in the bankruptcy.  We did insist on major change in management and the board of directors, and then we have very consciously stepped back, we have not intervened in these companies. 

And while we're very proud of their success and changing the culture the way they have, et cetera, and while we think that the President’s support was essential to giving them that second chance, the fact is they are now grabbing that second chance with their hands and they’re doing it.  So we were actually concerned about those things, and I think we've acted in a way consistent with those concerns.

MR. GIBBS:  There was a process and a structure put in place to ensure that, despite the level of ownership, we were not involved in voting decisions.

Q    But if this thing has worked so well, I mean, in theory, somebody might say, why not do it for other things.  I mean --

MR. GIBBS:  Well, again, that's not what the President was here to do.  The President made a decision based on what we all believed were economic ramifications that were too big to walk away from.

Q    Mr. Bloom, I'd like to ask you how confident you are the U.S. government is going to be repaid in full, given the improved performance in the auto industry you’ve described.  And also, if I can try you again on the GM IPO.  We've reported that the filing is going to be in the week of August 16th.  Could you at least talk about the timing of the filing?

MR. BLOOM:  You can try me as many times as you want on the IPO, you're not going to get a different answer.  And I think Robert spoke about the investment situation.  The Obama administration has invested $60 billion into the automobile industry.  The latest valuation from the Office of Financial Stability has the value of that investment in the aggregate at $60 billion.

So that's where we are.  And we haven’t realized on that yet.  There’s still has to be a process of selling the shares.  Right now the trajectory is positive. 

MR. GIBBS:  I'd just say, in terms of the -- as Ron said, once you get to a point in an IPA, there are some good rules that the SEC has employed that we're all trying to make sure don't get us called by that agency.

Q    Robert, you can't keep jobs if you can't sell cars.  I wonder how confident you are in the strength of these auto companies and if the administration thinks it’s appropriate to do another round of cash for clunkers or something similar to sort of stimulate this sector.

MR. GIBBS:  Well, I don't have the exact figures with me.  Look, when we talked about the decisions that were made around a structured bankruptcy, we were dealing in an economy I think where the yearly car sales were certainly less than 10 million.  And this is off of a high of probably around 17 million.  We're in a better environment now.  I think right now it’s about 11 million. 

MR. BLOOM:  About a 11 and a half [million].

MR. GIBBS:  And so because of consumer demand -- obviously, as these guys mentioned, working through that planned retooling and some are shut down in order to meet an increased amount of customer demand I think demonstrates, one, that the economy as a whole is getting stronger, and that pushed demand for more automobiles; and secondly, these guys are making a profit.

So at this point, we don't see or have plans for redoing the cash for clunkers program.  But I would say the investment that was made on that, not only did that spur an enormous demand, but it took cars off the road that were, by definition, older and more polluting, and put newer, cleaner models on in their place.

I will say it is hard to talk about the success of the decisions that were made in the auto industry without mentioning again the efforts of many, including all of the auto industry and certainly efforts like -- people like Carol Browner on the President’s staff -- to provide certainty in emissions and fuel economy.  The rules that were created working with the industry added certainty for cars and now we've added work trucks to that rule as well.  That, again, provided some certainty in emissions that cars -- the emission targets that cars have, as well as took the mandate that Congress passed on fuel economy and moved it up several years.

It had been somewhere between 20 and 30 years since we had a substantial improvement in fuel economy.  The Senate finally broke that impasse in I think either 2007 or 2008.  Given the certainty of this rule, we were able to push the 2020 target to 2016, in a way that, again, helps our goals in reducing our dependence on foreign oil, and gives auto manufacturers the certainty that they have always wanted on the manufacturing side.

Q    I wanted to ask you about Charlie Rangel and whether the White House --

MR. GIBBS:  Let’s do autos first, and then I'll do the regular -- yes, ma’am.

Q    How important is this IPO in recouping the taxpayers (inaudible) -- can you give us some sense of that and some sense of the timeline on Chrysler and GM paying back -- 

MR. BLOOM:  The IPO is important because almost all of our investment in General Motors today is common stock.  We have $2.1 billion of preferred stock, but the vast majority of the investment is in common stock.  So the absolute expected way one receives value on that investment is for the company to offer its shares to the public and then for there to be a public float, and then for us to be able to sell in both -- as part of the IPO and subsequently into that public float.] So it is very important.  And as I said before, we are hopeful that it can be accomplished this year.  After that, it will remain to be determined on what schedule we can sell the rest of the shares. 

In the Chrysler case, most of our investment is in the form of debt.  There’s a small investment in common stock.  We are hopeful that at some point Chrysler will also be able to offer shares to the public.  We don't have any visibility to that at the moment.  But the debt has a maturity date of half at seven and half at eight years from when we made the loan, so in the current trajectory, we would expect Chrysler to pay back their loan when its due.

Q    Robert, you have said several times here that the $60 billion will be paid back, the Obama administration’s portion of it.  Why is there a distinction being made between the full amount that's been paid out of the TARP and what the Obama administration is going to be paid back, that portion that the Obama administration --

MR. GIBBS:  Well, Mike, we’re not -- I was not, as you probably know, not here when the Bush administration made that --

Q    When it comes to the sum total of everything that's been paid out of the TARP, will there be a net benefit?  Or will --

MR. GIBBS:  You’re right the total liability is $85 [billion].  Again, our goal, as you’ve heard the President enunciate, is that the taxpayers won’t be on the hook for one dime of money.  That's why you heard the President talk about a financial crisis responsibility fee in order to ensure that taxpayers are fully paid up.

I highlight the difference largely also because the criticism at the end of 2008 was that you are -- you're giving monetary help but not asking that the companies do anything differently.  And, look, we had -- you watched companies go through, in some cases, substantial cash reserves until they were -- they got to this point.  The President recognized part of the reason that we were at that point were some bad management decisions.  And the President required and conditioned that investment on everybody making a sacrifice.  So that's the reason why I said --

Q    Okay.  And I guess this goes to Mr. Bloom.  The Volt is said to be going to be priced around $41,000.  That seems kind of high.  It’s a heavily subsidized, through various tax credits for the batteries and what have you, price to begin with.  Is it marketable at $41,000?  Is that a concern to the administration?

MR. BLOOM:  Well, a couple things.  I think it is worth noting that the company will also be offering a lease at $350 a month.  It’s also worth noting that this is a new technology and most times when new technologies come out, they are more expensive.  And because of the President’s investments in the battery industry, we absolutely expect battery prices to come down over time.  And finally, we do not tell General Motors what to charge for its cars.  We don't tell them what to charge for the Volt.  We’re not going to tell them what to charge for the Cruise.

General Motors has an extremely competent management, supervised closely by a board of directors.  We are confident that they are carefully thinking through what the price of the Volt ought to be, as much as they are with the price of the Cruise or the Cadillac CTS would be.  And exactly that sort of decision -- back to the earlier question -- is exactly what we have resisted the temptation to do.

Q    Right, but the government owns 61 percent of the company.  And so is there a concern that it will succeed or not succeed?

MR. BLOOM:  GM makes decisions every day about cars that they're going to sell -- at least in the next couple years -- a lot more of than the Volt.  And we -- our confidence rests in the management and the board of directors, that they will carefully weigh all those facts.  And we believe General Motors is broadly on a good track.

MR. GIBBS:  Mike, I’ll get you the graph that we -- before the President went to Western Michigan to do the batteries, we had a graph of -- and I’ll get it for you -- that showed as you have more and more of these made, as you streamline that process, the investment that we’ve made -- that will greatly increase the number of those facilities in this country will, by definition, drive down the price for each.

Q    Question for Mr. Montgomery.  You mentioned a $50 million program, a $75 million program.  I wonder if you could talk specifically about Detroit and what your office has been able to provide that community, and then if you could put it in some perspective in terms of the city, which are enormous -- I mean are these programs that are really having an impact on how well a community like Detroit is doing?  Or is this just really working around the edges?

MR. MONTGOMERY:  Well, obviously, clearly Detroit was a distressed community and it has been a distressed community for a considerable period of time.  Its unemployment rate is close to 20 percent and remains there.

The programs that we’ve talked about -- the national emergency grants, there was a regional grant that went to Southeast Michigan, I think around $9 million, which was dedicated to programs in the Detroit region -- they were part of the $75 million.  Detroit won several of those grants.  The Detroit region won several of those grants to help those workers train.

As we’ve said all along, we’ve got a long way to go.  We can’t be happy with the unemployment rate in the state of Michigan at over 13 percent, or in Detroit in the 20 percent.  But these are providing some needed resources to help autoworkers and others in the community begin the process of finding jobs.

Q    So what more needs to be done?  What more can the federal government do going forward?  Do you have recommendations for the President?

MR. MONTGOMERY:  Well, obviously, we want to continue what we have been doing.  How do we create new jobs?  How do we support small businesses?  How do we create -- who are the source of growth, and how do we encourage them to hire additional workers?  I think those are absolutely critical in cities like Detroit and around the Midwest.

MR. GIBBS:  And I’d say I don't think anybody believes that the auto industry alone is going to, as Ed said, bring that unemployment rate, in and of itself, or only, bring that thing down.  But it is also hard to imagine both the city and the state making the kind of progress that we all want it to make without an industry that is making the progress that we’ve seen.

Q    I want to go back, Mr. Bloom, to Mike’s question about the sticker shock on the Volt.  The problem is that the Nissan Leaf is out at the same time for $33,000.  So isn’t it asking a lot of an American to pay an extra $8,000 just to drive the American electric car versus the Japanese electric car? 

MR. BLOOM:  It works out that the lease is the same price, so you can lease the car for --

Q    How?

MR. BLOOM:  If you read General Motors’ press release, they're prepared to lease the car at the same price.  But --

Q    Right, leasing, but not -- not to purchase.

MR. BLOOM:  But I’m not going to get into a debate about whether General Motors on this particular matter has the correct business strategy.  There are dozens and dozens of business decisions they make every day.  They believe that people will buy this car in a sufficient number that they're manufacturing it.

I think they believe that some number will lease it.  And they believe some other number will buy it and use the tax credit that's available.  Over time, we are confident that the prices of these sorts of cars will come down.  Different companies have different strategies.  In the next two years, there will be 20 different either electric or hybrid or gas -- or plug-in hybrid cars hitting the road. These are the first two.

This is going to be a very big open competition.  I think that's terrific.  And I think what’s going to result in it is more and more Americans will eventually be able to buy electric-powered cars.

Q    Just to follow, as owners of this company, or at least 61 percent, wouldn’t it make sense to somehow influence the cost of the Volt to make it more competitive? 

MR. BLOOM:  The problem with that --

Q    Subsidize it --

MR. BLOOM:  The problem with that slippery slope is it never ends -- because I could equally make the argument that General Motors ought to also charge 2.6 percent less for the Cadillac or 3.1 percent less for the Cruise.  Every management decision can be second-guessed.  And we made a very firm decision up front that either we were going to run the company day to day, or we would find the finest management and the most independent, hard-nosed board of directors we could and asked them to take on that responsibility.   We made the latter decision.  And if we violate it on one thing that seems important to us, then we will violate it on everything.  And then I think we’re -- then it is Government Motors.  And the history of the last year is it absolutely has not been, and we intend to keep to that.

Q    Thanks, Robert.  This is for Mr. Bloom.  You and others have mentioned the figure a million jobs saved several times throughout the briefing.  It’s up on the monitor behind you in a graphic, and I see in the graph that you rely for the figure on the Center for Automotive Research, which is a think tank in Michigan, which is funded by the auto industry.  Do you think this is an objective source to come up with this particular number?

MR. BLOOM:  The number is actually from the Bush administration.  The Center for Automotive Resource --

Q    Is that a good source?  (Laughter.)

MR. BLOOM:  I would have thought you wouldn’t accuse them of being too aggressive.  The Center for Automotive Research, who I’d be delighted to have you talk to, has a number that's much, much higher.  We’re actually using the low end of a number of numbers that have been put out.

Q    Thanks.  On the same lines as earlier Volt questions, but maybe -- how many years -- (laughter.)

MR. GIBBS:  Wow.

Q    How many years, realistically, do you think it will be before the majority of American-made cars that are available for consumers are either electric or hybrid or some combination, and before they are affordable, by whatever standard -- $25,000 or whatever that is at the time?

MR. BLOOM:  I think that is -- that's a question that really doesn’t have an answer today.  I think what the President did is he made a series of investments in the key technologies that drive this industry forward, which is the batteries.  And as Ed mentioned, the battery prices, I think most experts now believe are going to come down at a very rapid rate.  Exactly when that hits the crossover point so that most Americans want to buy an electric car, I don't think it’s knowable.  I think the issue for the government is can we do things that can set the conditions for that.

And I think the President by his leadership has done that.  But honestly, it’s going to be private actors in the marketplace competing for market share that are going to determine that answer.  So I don't think we can sit here today and make a prognostication on that.  Obviously, we’re committed to trying to help it happen, but it’s going to happen, importantly, because private sector individuals choose to put their money at risk and make these cars.

MR. GIBBS:  And, look, Margaret, the -- I bought a 2005 -- I bought a new Ford Escape hybrid, which, in 2005, was basically as a gas-electric hybrid that, if you go more than about 25 or 30 miles an hour, kicks into the sole use of the gas engine. 

In 2005, that was basically the cutting edge of domestically offered technology.  Look, in five years, you're at a point where, with the Volt, with the Focus coming online, and other models, that the technology -- the plug-in technology is rapidly advancing.  And as Ron says, the more we make, the less each individual unit will cost, and therefore, the less each automobile will cost.

Q    I mean, if you look at everything combined that's available -- the Ford Fusion hybrid and Honda and all of this, it’s still just a fraction of what’s sold.  Do you think -- I know you don't want to pinpoint an exact date, but is it fair to say it’s at least five years off?  I mean, you're asking Americans to buy in right now to something that will be many years before most people will --

MR. GIBBS:  Well, I don't think anybody would disagree with that, except if you go back just a couple of summers -- gas hit above $4 a gallon.  My guess is you saw a lot more -- people can recall seeing a lot more Hummer H2s on the road, say, three years ago than sort of post-late summer 2008.  In fact, by and large, it’s a brand that has been sold.  Look, as the technology changes, I think more and more people will take advantage of it.

MR. BLOOM:  One other thing.  I mean, look, for a lot of years, and Robert pointed this out, these companies were criticized for not having long-term strategic thinking.  We now have these companies thinking long term.  They understand this is not a next year, year after issue.  This is a long-term bet that they’re making on the direction of the industry.  That bet is going to take a while to pay off, but I think we should be applauding their willingness to try to look ahead, because for a lot of years people said the companies wouldn't look ahead, they always tried to fight the future.  Now we have companies trying to shape the future. 

So I'd rather be -- I'd rather criticize them for thinking less far ahead than criticizing them for thinking too far ahead. I think that's a welcome change.

MR. GIBBS:  I mean, the gas prices resulted in the industry itself changing its viewpoint on increasing fuel economy standards, again, something that took decades to happen but was moved along by gas prices.

Q    Mr. Bloom, do you think it’s a good idea for the federal government to buy or lease a substantial number of these Volts at this $41,000 a year price point?

MR. BLOOM:  We have no particular plan to buy or lease the Volt or the Leaf.  There are ongoing discussions about whether there might be an opportunity to have some amount of it, but I don't think that's going to be a principal way this car is going to get introduced.

Q    To follow up on what Mr. Bloom was saying, and then you joined in -- what assurance do you have, does the country have, that they will continue to be so forward-thinking, particularly since gas prices have come down in most parts of the country a long way from a couple summers ago?

MR. BLOOM:  There are no guarantees.  As Robert said, the President made a decision to give this company a second chance.  We insisted on very substantial change in their cost structure, in their operating footprint and in their management and board of directors.  But we are not going to retain operational control to assure ourselves that everything they do meets our satisfaction because we don't believe that’s the proper role for the government.

So is it possible that someday in the future General Motors will lose its way again?  I think the fact that that's possible is a good thing, because that's what American companies are supposed to do -- they’re supposed to compete in the private marketplace.  This was an intervention in an extraordinary moment in our nation’s history.  It was done to prevent, as Robert said, the loss of a million jobs.  We are determined to exit that investment as soon as is practicable and this company’s future will be in the hands of its management, of its board of directors, of its employees, and of all the stakeholders who sacrificed.  We want to get as much of the taxpayers’ money back as we can, but that's not going to cause us to intervene in running the company.

Q    Realistically, when can the administration completely exit its investment in the auto companies -- 2012, beyond?

MR. BLOOM:  I think that's not something that's knowable today.  I think we're -- again, the guidance we put out, which we're sticking to, is as soon as practicable.  And that means exactly what it says.  We don't like having this investment, but we're not going to sell it at a fire sale.  So we're on an orderly course.  We believe General Motors can achieve an IPO this year.  We remain hopeful of that.  We are hopeful Chrysler will be able to achieve one at some point thereafter.  We're going to take this slowly and carefully, and we're not going to be irresponsible.   

We recognize people don't want us to own the company.  We don't want to own the company.  But to do it at a fire sale I think is irresponsible to the taxpayers.  So it’s a careful walk and we're going to walk it carefully.

MR. GIBBS:  Look, I think if you travel back to the decision that the President made in the Roosevelt Room, there was no guarantee at the time in which the President made that decision that one or both of these companies would survive.  You’ll recall very distinct conversations about whether or not it was slightly better than 50-50.  What we've seen since then -- and I think this is a fair characterization -- that where these companies are now exceeds where we believe they’d likely be at this point, and that their situation has only gotten better, quarter by quarter, than, again, where we thought it would be.

So they made some tough decisions.  The President made some tough decisions.  And when we look back at both where we are and where we were, we see real, sustained progress.

Q    Given that success story that you're describing here today, why hasn’t the administration gotten more credit for stepping in and writing these companies --

MR. GIBBS:  Obviously, Elizabeth, I don't think the story that the President is going to embark on telling is well known.  I doubt many people in this room -- and you guys are largely the reporters of said stories -- would -- or have pointed out that for the first time since 2004, each of the three companies, in the first quarter of this year, represented -- had an operating profit, or that since GM emerged from bankruptcy, 55,000 jobs have been added.

Q    Could the administration have done a better job in -- as this turnaround slowly came about -- step by step communicating that better to the public?

MR. GIBBS:  I think we have.  And I'll say this is -- the report that we're putting out on the auto industry isn’t the first one, it’s the second one that we've done.  I look forward to reading in your newspaper tomorrow -- attention, assignment editors -- (laughter) -- the arc of the decision that the President made and where this industry is.

The President will be here and he will tell that story, and will tell it to the workers who work on those lines today because of the sacrifices that they made and the tough decisions that were made here.  We're going to do an awful lot over the next week to 10 days, and I think, in all honesty, if people get a sense of what went into these decisions, what resulted in the structured bankruptcies, and then what has resulted in the success of the companies up to this point, I do think given all that information, I do think people will look at the decision that was made at the end of March of 2009 differently.

Yes, sir.  And I want to let these guys go.

Q    This is the first I've heard of a Department of Energy loan to Ford Motor.  Could you give us some details for the loan? Why the Department of Energy, as opposed to a bank?  And how much money and --

MR. BLOOM:  This is under a program called the ATVM program, also known as Section 136.  This loan was made, I believe, in excess of a year ago.  It was $5.9 billion.  It’s been fairly well discussed and disclosed that this was a program that the Congress had put in place to provide funds for these companies to invest in new technologies to get more fuel efficient.  And that was the purpose of the program and the program is ongoing.  Other companies have applied for it.  There was a loan to Tesla.  There was a loan to Fisker.  There was a loan to Nissan, which was part of the reason they’re building the plant to make the Leaf here in the U.S.  And there was a $5.9 billion loan to Ford.

MR. GIBBS:  And it will allow the -- you saw probably earlier this week Ford unveiled the new model Explorer, which is constructed on a -- not on a truck frame but on a car frame, which not only allows, as Ron said, fuel efficiency here in this country, but attractiveness in selling that car overseas. 

Thank you both. 

Yes, ma’am. 

Q    Can I go back --

MR. GIBBS:  No, I was listening.  But I realize that you were not talking about a new model car and was --

Q    To the Rangel -- 

Q    Is the White House disappointed that there wasn’t a deal reached before the session started today?  Do you think that’s damaging to the party and to candidates? 

MR. GIBBS:  Look, some of this has happened while we’ve been up here and I want to get some more information on where the situation is.  There is a bipartisan panel that’s looking into this and into these serious charges.  We think that is important to do.  And I don’t want to prejudge that outcome.  I will get some information at the end of this and see if I need to update that.

Q    Well, the session ended before we came in here, so -- and a deal was agreed.  So that’s not still an open question.

MR. GIBBS:  Yes, again, I will wait and get a full picture before we have anything additional to say.

Q    All right.  And then let me ask you about the judge’s ruling on the Arizona immigration law -- Republicans already starting to use it in fundraising.  It looks pretty clear it will be an issue of some magnitude in the elections this fall.  Is that something you all are worried about?  And is that something that the political folks here have kind of a plan to deal with?

MR. GIBBS:  Well, look, I would echo what the Justice Department said yesterday about the judge’s decision.  I think the judge ruled that what -- and reaffirmed that the responsibility for immigration reform and for immigration law is -- rests with the federal government.  We all understand the frustration of Arizona and border states at this problem, but believe that instead of a patchwork of 50 state laws, that Congress has in the past and should act now to enact comprehensive immigration reform.

Look, Jennifer, in terms of the politics, the President has made decisions since coming into office -- autos being one of them -- that he didn’t make based on polling.  I think if that were the case, we’d be looking for a new pollster.

The President and the Justice Department believed that what we filed was the right thing to do and that the right thing to do now based on that ruling is what will be harder, and that is comprehensive immigration reform.  It’s been done before and it can be done again if those that are involved in this are willing to be part of the solution.  And I think that’s the next step.

Q    Well, I understand that’s your policy position and politics -- good policy is good politics and all that sort of thing at the end of the day.  But you’re not going to get comprehensive immigration reform before the November elections happen.  So you’ve got this sort of political status quo that you’re going to have to deal with in some form or fashion over the next several weeks before that voting happens.  So how do you -- is there messaging?  Does the President get involved in terms of talking about this?  How do you deal with the political --

MR. GIBBS:  Well, look, I think we will talk about the need for everyone involved to step up and solve that problem.  I hope that everybody that’s running for office at a federal level this fall will talk about after the judge has ruled that this is the purview of the federal government -- I hope each of these candidates will discuss what they think -- what the federal government must do to deal with it.

And it is -- there are a lot of different components, but only enacting those components comprehensively, from border security on through, are we going to be able to solve this problem.  And I think that’s what the President will spend time talking about.

Yes, sir.

Q    Thanks, Robert.  Since you had the monthly AfPak meeting, I want to ask about that.

MR. GIBBS:  Sure.

Q    Does the President think that the WikiLeak leak of documents has put Afghan informers at risk?

MR. GIBBS:  I would say from General Jones’ statement last Sunday, from the President’s statement -- and I know while we were out here, the Pentagon has -- Secretary Gates and Admiral Mullen are briefing on both that situation and on the meeting today itself -- and I said, we believe that this has the potential to put people -- our troops, those that cooperate with our efforts -- into harm’s way.

Q    Has it identified any points in the documents where people have been named?

MR. GIBBS:  I don’t want to get into -- I don’t want to get into that level of that detail.  I will say this, and I know this is -- I just want to be clear.  We did not see any of these documents prior to their being put online.  We worked with The New York Times on some questions that they had.  They were able to see some of the documents beforehand.  And, as I said earlier, I think they handled this story in a responsible way.  But I reiterate that we have not -- did not -- and did not see those documents, nor were we contacted about seeing those documents beforehand. 

Let me give you just a little bit of a broad read-through on what was discussed this afternoon -- or this morning.  This was the seventh regular meeting of the group on Afghanistan and Pakistan.  The meeting began with an update on the situation in Afghanistan where they discussed the success of the recent Kabul Conference, including the absence of significant security disruptions, and the steps that were announced to move forward on strengthening governance and pursuing reintegration.    

General Petraeus gave a security update reviewing the progress that has been made across the country.  On Pakistan, the group reviewed the recent strategic dialogue that Secretary Clinton held in Pakistan, while also discussing our continued efforts to support the Pakistani military’s actions against violent extremists within its -- within its borders.

Q    But just to come back to the WikiLeaks, was the sense in the meeting that there’s going to be an operational impact?

MR. GIBBS:  Well, I would say that that was the --

Q    Due to the leaks, I mean.

MR. GIBBS:  I will say this.  WikiLeaks was not something that took up any real measurable amount of time in today’s meeting.  I think each of the principals, including the President, has commented on the operational security risks that 90,000-plus secret documents, classified documents being put on the Internet poses to our troops, poses to those that are cooperating in efforts to make Afghanistan and Pakistan more secure.  And we’ll go from there.

Yes, sir.

Q    Thanks, Robert.  I just wanted to follow up on immigration.  You seemed to be saying that you acknowledge it’s highly unlikely there will be a congressional deal before the elections.  But I wanted to talk about after the elections.  Republican Darrell Issa yesterday -- I want to acknowledge in the premise of my question that he is not the most friendly Republican to the White House -- but he said on CNN and other places yesterday that he thinks there is an appetite on Capitol Hill, and he included himself and said that he and other Republicans -- if the President guaranteed that comprehensive reform would not have amnesty, he thinks there would be some Republicans who would come on board with a guest worker program. I just wonder how you react to that, and whether you think that’s sincere, that there are Republicans -- because on other issues, as you’ve noted, they haven’t worked with you.  Do you think that there’s a sincere chance here?

MR. GIBBS:  I do, if -- look, and I said this to Jennifer, this is -- it’s not unthinkable that progress can be made on this issue because it has been made on this issue in the past.  Now, was that a time in which Republicans worked a little bit more closely with Democrats?  The answer to that, obviously, is yes. 

I have not seen what Congressman Issa supported in the past. I would suggest, Ed, we cannot deal with immigration reform comprehensively without dealing with those that are here.  I don’t know what his plans are for that.  I know the President has outlined comprehensively -- and, again, Republicans in the past have worked on that.  It is the President’s sincere hope that out of this decision and out of the understandable frustration of those that are dealing with this problem locally each and every day that we can make real progress on dealing with this tough issue. 

And, look, we have all watched this issue play out over the past five years.  This was not just -- I remember going through Iowa and having caucus-goers asking the President tough questions about immigration.  But I think if we all work together and work together honestly, I think progress can indeed be made. 

Q    Two other quick things.  Shirley Sherrod -- the President mentioned her today.  And since her firing and then the apology, some Republicans including Congressman Steve King of Iowa have raised these allegations that Shirley Sherrod got a government payout as part of a previous settlement with Black Farmers.  And they seem to think there is some sort of a connection between that and her getting a political appointment to the USDA last year.  Do you know any details of that?  And do you think that there --

MR. GIBBS:  There is no connection that I’m aware of, certainly, no.

Q    And then on -- finally, on the President’s unemployment event a couple of days back, a local TV station in Charlottesville is now saying that one of the people that the President held up as an example is Leslie Macko.  And he said that she is something who -- we need to extend unemployment compensation benefits for people like Leslie.  And the station is reporting that she was convicted of prescription drug fraud in March of 2009, about a month before she lost her job.  And I wonder, was the White House aware of this before they brought her out to use her as an example?  And do you do any sort of background on check?

MR. GIBBS:  I don't know the circumstances around this particular event.  I certainly -- I saw a couple of news reports before I came out here.  Without knowing a lot, I would certainly say that had that type of information been known, I doubt seriously that -- she would not have participated in the event here.

I hope that doesn’t take away from -- and I don't think it should take away from the message the President had that day, that as in the midst of the greatest economic calamity that we’ve seen since the Great Depression, that we ought not take steps together to extend unemployment insurance to those that are out of work.

Q    But are you examining your policies?  Is there a background check that's done?

MR. GIBBS:  I don't know the specifics.  Again, it’s safe to say that had we known it, she wouldn't have been.

Yes, ma’am.

Q    Robert, the President talked extensively at the Urban League and also on “The View” about this whole -- about Shirley Sherrod, about talking about race.  Now Ms. Sherrod says she’s going to sue Andrew Breitbart.  I wonder, does the White House think that that suit is justified?  And also how does that --

MR. GIBBS:  I will excuse myself from that based on the fact that I have -- I’m not a lawyer.  Even if I was, I wouldn’t -- I don't know why I would get into answering questions about one citizen’s decision to sue another.

Q    But how does that play into the whole narrative, to the whole teachable moment?  I mean if you have an incident like this and it turns into a lawsuit, surely that doesn’t play into what the White House hopes come out of an event like this.

MR. GIBBS:  Well, look, I’m not going to speak for the actions of the individual that put up a video that clearly was heavily edited to the point of not showing the end of the story. But I’m not going to get into the legal back-and-forth of this.

Q    But if this --

MR. GIBBS:  No, no, but let’s understand this, regardless of the lawsuit or who wins or who files it or where it’s heard, that's not -- I don't know how that detracts from the fact that, as the President has said since that and reiterated in the past couple days, that it is important to listen to all of what people have to say, to hear their entire story before making a judgment.

I don't think that is changed at all by legal decisions that are made around that.  That is still -- that's still the lesson that someone should take from all this.  And I don't know why you wouldn’t take that lesson based on the fact that somebody made a legal decision.

Q    But because this was an administration employee by the fact that this person actually worked for the USDA, so that -- the President stepped in with Henry Louis Gates and held “the beer summit” in something that he was much less involved in.  Is it appropriate then, so this does not descend into a lawsuit, for him to hold some kind of a conversation on race, or to do something to mitigate this so that we’re not talking about this forever?

MR. GIBBS:  We’re not talking about what forever, the lawsuit?

Q    We’re not having this back-and-forth between Sherrod and Breitbart.

MR. GIBBS:  The President got close to 60 million votes not to be somebody’s chief legal advisor, but to be the Commander-in-Chief and to run the affairs of the United States of America.  Individuals can and should make their own legal decisions regardless of who their employer is.

Q    Robert, that's not what she’s saying.  You were brought -- this administration was brought into it, in the weeds of this because of your reaction and --

MR. GIBBS:  April, I would not get involved in -- if a federal employee had been dismissed from federal service, got into a car and --

Q    Forced to resign.

MR. GIBBS:  Or however -- and got into a car accident that they believe they should sue about, why would the President or the administration get involved in that?

Q    But this administration --

MR. GIBBS:  No, no, but why would --

Q    --  is a casualty of this Breitbart --

MR. GIBBS:  Hold on, April, why would the President --

Q    -- a highly -- heavily edited videotape --

MR. GIBBS:  Why would the President or the administration get involved in that lawsuit?

Q    Because you are -- this administration is part of the  --

MR. GIBBS:  We would get involved in that lawsuit?

Q    No, this is -- no, what I’m saying is you’ve been brought into --

MR. GIBBS:  I appreciate it -- I’m happy to talk about what the President talked about.  The President, I just want to be clear, doesn’t work for the Legal Services Administration, okay? He doesn’t provide legal advice to employees of the administration.  I wouldn’t ask the President legal advice on something that I was doing.  I --

Q    Would you consider yourself a casualty of this Breitbart tape, what happened here?

MR. GIBBS:  I think as I said in the days past it, I thought the administration acted rashly.  I think the media in moving this story quickly acted rashly.  I think people probably, based on the video, came to conclusions about what or wasn’t said rashly.  I said that all a week ago.

Q    But if the conversation on race was worth having for Henry Louis Gates, why is not worth having and being a leader on that now?

MR. GIBBS:  Yunji, I don't think the President has to be the teacher at every teachable moment.  I hope you can look at what happened and discern the lessons that one should take away from it without having to have the President tell you what to take away from it.

Q    They're still fighting.

MR. GIBBS:  Who’s still fighting?

Q    Shirley Sherrod and Breitbart.

MR. GIBBS:  And I assume that that's going to happen -- I don't understand how that's part of what you take away from -- that now is what you take away from this whole moment?

Q    What I take away from it is irrelevant.  I just wonder if --

MR. GIBBS:  No, no, no, you’ve posed the question.  Let’s delve into what -- you’ve said that the teachable moment is now erased based on the fact that one person has decided to take legal action.  Does that erase the teachable moment that you took away from this individual circumstance?

Q    Absolutely not.  But I wonder if the President --

MR. GIBBS:  I don't think it’s takes away from most people’s teachable moment. 

Q    - can be more of a mediator or a leader in this circumstance.

MR. GIBBS:  Again, I think the President has spoken about what he takes away from it.  I hope you take away something from it without necessarily having to speak to the President about it. I think we can all come to our own reasonable conclusions about it.

Chip.

Q    I take it the President is not planning on a major speech on race as a -- (laughter.)

MR. GIBBS:  If he does, he’ll hire Yunji as a lawyer -- (laughter.)

Q    I just wanted to confirm that.  Is the President -- first of all, do you have anything on the Arlington Cemetery situation, the Claire McCaskill investigation now finding that it&rsq


]]> Thu, 29 Jul 2010 18:16:00 CDT NOTICE

CONTINUATION OF THE NATIONAL EMERGENCY WITH RESPECT TO THE ACTIONS OF CERTAIN PERSONS TO UNDERMINE THE SOVEREIGNTY OF LEBANON OR ITS DEMOCRATIC PROCESSES AND INSTITUTIONS

On August 1, 2007, by Executive Order 13441, the President declared a national emergency and ordered related measures blocking the property of certain persons undermining the sovereignty of Lebanon or its democratic processes or institutions and certain other persons, pursuant to the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (50 U.S.C. 1701-1706).  The President determined that the actions of certain persons to undermine Lebanon's legitimate and democratically elected government or democratic institutions; to contribute to the deliberate breakdown in the rule of law in Lebanon, including through politically motivated violence and intimidation; to reassert Syrian control or contribute to Syrian interference in Lebanon; or to infringe upon or undermine Lebanese sovereignty contribute to political and economic instability in that country and the region and constitute an unusual and extraordinary threat to the national security and foreign policy of the United States.

While there have been some recent positive developments in the Syrian-Lebanese relationship, continuing arms transfers to Hizballah that include increasingly sophisticated weapons systems serve to undermine Lebanese sovereignty, contribute to political and economic instability in Lebanon, and continue to pose an unusual and extraordinary threat to the national security and foreign policy of the United States.  Therefore, the national emergency declared on August 1, 2007, and the measures adopted on that date to deal with that emergency, must continue in effect beyond August 1, 2010.  In accordance with section 202(d) of the National Emergencies Act (50 U.S.C. 1622(d)), I am continuing for 1 year the national emergency declared in Executive Order 13441.

This notice shall be published in the Federal Register and transmitted to the Congress.

BARACK OBAMA

THE WHITE HOUSE,
    July 29, 2010.

Section 202(d) of the National Emergencies Act (50 U.S.C. 1622(d)) provides for the automatic termination of a national emergency unless, prior to the anniversary date of its declaration, the President publishes in the Federal Register and transmits to the Congress a notice stating that the emergency is to continue in effect beyond the anniversary date.  In accordance with this provision, I have sent to the Federal Register for publication the enclosed notice stating that the national emergency declared with respect to the actions of certain persons to undermine the sovereignty of Lebanon or its democratic processes and institutions is to continue in effect beyond August 1, 2010.

While there have been some recent positive developments in the Syrian-Lebanese relationship, continuing arms transfers to Hizballah that include increasingly sophisticated weapons systems serve to undermine Lebanese sovereignty, contribute to political and economic instability in the region, and continue to pose an unusual and extraordinary threat to the national security and foreign policy of the United States.  For these reasons, I have determined that it is necessary to continue the national emergency declared on August 1, 2007, to deal with that threat and the related measures adopted on that date to respond to the emergency.

BARACK OBAMA

THE WHITE HOUSE,
    July 29, 2010.

     THE PRESIDENT:  Thank you, everybody.  Please have a seat.

     I want to start, obviously, by thanking Lisa for her introduction and having the courage to share her story with all of us today.  It’s for every survivor like Lisa who has never gotten their day in court, and for every family that feels like justice is beyond reach, and for every tribal community struggling to keep its people safe, that I’ll be signing the Tribal Law and Order Act into law today. 

     And in doing so, I intend to send a clear message that all of our people -- whether they live in our biggest cities or our most remote reservations -- have the right to feel safe in their own communities, and to raise their children in peace, and enjoy the fullest protection of our laws. 

     As many of you know, I campaigned on this issue.  And during our last -- during our tribal conference last year, I pledged my administration’s fullest support for this bill.  And I told Senator Dorgan last week that I intended to sign it in a ceremony here at the White House with all of you.  So today, I am proud to make good on my word. 

     Now, I’m told there’s a Seneca proverb that says “He who would do great things should not attempt them all alone.”  (Laughter.)  And that’s particularly true of this legislation, which is the product of tireless efforts by countless individuals across this country.  Congressional leaders like Senator Dorgan, Representative Herseth Sandlin, and others who are here today, and tribal leaders like Chairman Marcus Levings, President Theresa Two Bulls, President Diane Enos, Chief Chad Smith, Vice Chairman Jonathan Windy Boy -- we are grateful to all of them for their extraordinary support.  And then we’ve got leaders in our administration like Attorney General Holder and Secretary Salazar, Kimberly Teehee, Jodi Gillette here at the White House who work tirelessly on this legislation. 

     And that’s nothing to say of all the dedicated judges and prosecutors and tribal and BIA law enforcement officers -- some of whom are here today -- who’ve supported these efforts.  And the determined survivors most of all, like Lisa, who even when it’s too late to undo what happened to them, still speak out to seek justice for others. 

     All of you come at this from different angles, but you’re united in support of this bill because you believe, like I do, that it is unconscionable that crime rates in Indian Country are more than twice the national average and up to 20 times the national average on some reservations.  And all of you believe, like I do, that when one in three Native American women will be raped in their lifetimes, that is an assault on our national conscience; it is an affront to our shared humanity; it is something that we cannot allow to continue. 

     So ultimately, it’s not just the federal government’s relationship with tribal governments that compels us to act, it’s not just our obligations under treaty and under law, but it’s also our values as a nation that are at stake.  And that’s why earlier this year, after extensive consultations with tribal leaders, Attorney General Holder announced significant reforms to increase prosecutions of crimes committed in Indian Country.  He hired more Assistant U.S. Attorneys and more victim-witness specialists.  And he even created a position for a National Indian Country Training Coordinator who will work with prosecutors and law enforcement officers throughout Indian Country.   

And under Secretary Salazar’s leadership, we’re launching new community policing pilot programs.  We’ve overhauled the recruitment process for BIA officers, resulting in a 500 percent jump in applications and the largest hiring increase in history.  And we’re working to deploy those officers to the field as quickly as possible.

     The bill I’m signing into law today will build on these efforts, because it requires the Justice Department to disclose data on cases in Indian Country that it declines to prosecute and it gives tribes greater authority to prosecute and punish criminals themselves.  It expands recruitment and retention and training for BIA and Tribal officers and gives them better access to criminal databases.  It includes new provisions to prevent counterfeiting of Indian-produced crafts and new guidelines and training for domestic violence and sex crimes.  And it strengthens tribal courts and police departments and enhances programs to combat drug and alcohol abuse and help at-risk youth. 

     So these are significant measures that will empower tribal nations and make a real difference in people’s lives.  Because as I said during our tribal conference, I have no interest in just paying lip service to the problems we face.  I know that too often, this community has heard grand promises from Washington that turned out to be little more than empty words.  And I pledged to you then that if you gave me a chance, this time it would be different.  I told you I was committed to moving forward and forging a new and better future together in every aspect of our government-to-government relationship.

     And slowly but surely, that is exactly what we are doing.  At this moment, agencies across our government are implementing detailed plans to increase coordination and consultation with tribal governments -- and I intend to hold them accountable for following through. 

     We’ve also included a permanent reauthorization of the Indian Health Care Improvement Act in the health care reform legislation we passed this spring.  We’re strengthening Tribal education.  We’re working to spur economic development throughout Indian Country.  And in consultation with Indian tribes, we’re now formally reviewing the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.  And after 14 long years, we’ve finally settled the Cobell case and we’re working with Congress to get the settlement approved as quickly as possible.

     So we’re moving forward, and we’re making progress.  And as we celebrate today, I’m reminded of a visit I made a couple of years ago to the Crow Nation out in Montana.  While I was there, I was adopted into the Nation by a wonderful couple -- Hartford and Mary Black Eagle -- so I’m Barack Black Eagle.  (Laughter.)  But I was also -- I was also given a Crow name that means “One Who Helps People Throughout the Land.”  And it’s a name that I view not as an honor that I deserve, but as a responsibility that I must work to fulfill.

     And looking back, I can’t help but think that only in America could a guy like me named Barack Obama -- adoptive son of the Crow Nation -- go on to become President.  (Laughter and applause.)  That was improbable when it happened two years ago -- (laughter) -- but it would have been inconceivable a generation or two before that.  And I think the same could be said of this legislation.

And that should ultimately give us all hope.  It should remind us that our union has a way of -- over time -- becoming more, and not less, perfect -- more inclusive, more fair, more free.  And that’s because of people like you -- leaders and public servants and everyday folks who understand that we’re more than just heirs to a difficult past.  Here in America, we have a chance to choose a different future, and to heed those better angels of our nature and cast our lot with something bigger than ourselves. 

     So it’s in that spirit that I hope we define the relationship between our nations in the years ahead, and it is the goal of this legislation that I am proud to sign into law today.

     Thank you very much, everybody.  God bless you.  God bless the United States of America.  (Applause.)

     (The bill is signed.)

END           5:09 P.M. EDT
 

Click here to see the video.

The President just signed the Tribal Law and Order Act -- an important step to help the Federal Government better address the unique public safety challenges that confront tribal communities.

According to a Department of Justice report, Native American women suffer from violent crime at a rate three and a half times greater than the national average. Astoundingly, one in three Native American women will be raped in their lifetimes. At the White House Tribal Nations Conference in November 2009, President Obama stated that this shocking figure "is an assault on our national conscience that we can no longer ignore."

Last week, Congress took another important step to improve the lives of Native American women by passing the Tribal Law and Order Act of 2010. The Act includes a strong emphasis on decreasing violence against women in Native communities, and is one of many steps this Administration strongly supports to address the challenges faced by Native women.

read more

According to a Department of Justice report, Native American women suffer from violent crime at a rate three and a half times greater than the national average. Astoundingly, one in three Native American women will be raped in their lifetimes. At the White House Tribal Nations Conference in November 2009, President Obama stated that this shocking figure "is an assault on our national conscience that we can no longer ignore."

Last week, Congress took another important step to improve the lives of Native American women by passing the Tribal Law and Order Act of 2010. The Act includes a strong emphasis on decreasing violence against women in Native communities, and is one of many steps this Administration strongly supports to address the challenges faced by Native women.

The stipulations in the Act that will benefit Native women reflect several Administration priorities. The Act will strengthen tribal law enforcement and the ability to prosecute and fight crime more effectively. The Indian Health Care Improvement Act will require that a standardized set of practices be put in place for victims of sexual assault in health facilities. Now, more women will get the care they need, both for healing and to aid in the prosecution of their perpetrators.

Victims of domestic violence and sexual assault will now more often encounter authorities who have been trained to handle such cases. The Act expands training of tribal enforcement officers on the best ways to interview victims of domestic and sexual violence and the importance of collecting evidence to improve rates of conviction. The Director of Indian Health Services will coordinate with the Department of Justice, Tribes, Tribal organizations and urban Indian organizations to develop standardized sexual assault policies and protocols.

Special Assistant US Attorneys will be deputized under the Act to prosecute reservation crimes in Federal courts, and tribes will be given greater authority to hold perpetrators accountable. These provisions help to increase communication between tribal law enforcement, Federal authorities and the court system. As numbers of convictions grow, more women may be willing to report the abuses against them so that their abusers may be prosecuted.

However, the Act focuses not only on prosecution but also on prevention. It reauthorizes and improves programs to prevent and treat alcohol and substance abuse, as well as programs that improve opportunities for at-risk Indian youth. Getting men and boys involved in stopping the violence against women and girls is an important step to ending it everywhere, giving youth a chance to change their own futures.

This Act, combined with the great work that Attorney General Eric Holder and the Department of Justice are doing to combat violence in American Indian/Alaska Native communities, is an important step towards our Administration’s priority of ending violence against women and girls, and making Native communities safer and more secure. One in three is a statistic that is intolerable, and the Tribal Law and Order Act of 2010 will help to change that.

Lynn Rosenthal is the White House Advisor on Violence Against Women

Federal funding is available to State and eligible local governments and certain private nonprofit organizations on a cost-sharing basis for emergency work and the repair or replacement of facilities damaged by the severe storms, tornadoes, and flooding in Dewey, Perkins, and Ziebach Counties, and the Cheyenne River Indian Reservation.

Federal funding is also available on a cost-sharing basis for hazard mitigation measures for all counties and Tribes within the State.

W. Craig Fugate, Administrator, Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), Department of Homeland Security, named Michael L. Parker as the Federal Coordinating Officer for Federal recovery operations in the affected area. 

FEMA said additional designations may be made at a later date if requested by the State and warranted by the results of further damage assessments.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT:  FEMA (202) 646-3272.

Federal funding is available to State and eligible local governments and certain private nonprofit organizations on a cost-sharing basis for emergency work and the repair or replacement of facilities damaged by the severe storms, flooding, and tornadoes in the counties of Adams, Appanoose, Audubon, Buena Vista, Butler, Cherokee, Clay, Davis, Decatur, Franklin, Howard, Humboldt, Iowa, Lee, Lyon, Madison, Marion, Mills, Monroe, Montgomery, O’Brien, Osceola, Palo Alto, Ringgold, Shelby, Union, Van Buren, Wapello, Warren, Wayne, Webster, and Wright.

Federal funding is also available on a cost-sharing basis for hazard mitigation measures statewide.

W. Craig Fugate, Administrator, Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), Department of Homeland Security, named Thomas A. Hall as the Federal Coordinating Officer for Federal recovery operations in the affected area. 

FEMA said additional designations may be made at a later date if requested by the State and warranted by the results of further damage assessments.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT:  FEMA (202) 646-3272.

President Barack Obama delivers remarks to the National Urban League Centennial Conference at the Washington Convention Center in Washington, D.C.,

Today, President Obama delivered an address on education at the Urban League’s 100th Anniversary Convention highlighting the steps his Administration has taken over the past eighteen months to improve the education system in America.  The President stated that education reform is a top priority for his Administration because the “status quo is morally inexcusable, it’s economically indefensible, and all of us are going to have to roll up our sleeves to change it.”

The President began his remarks by discussing the importance of education for the success of our economy and our nation:

I know some argue that as we emerge from a recession, my administration should focus solely on economic issues.  They said that during health care as if health care had nothing to do with economics; said it during financial reform as if financial reform had nothing to do with economics; and now they're saying it as we work on education issues.  But education is an economic issue -- if not “the” economic issue of our time. 

It’s an economic issue when the unemployment rate for folks who’ve never gone to college is almost double what it is for those who have gone to college.  It’s an economic issue when eight in 10 new jobs will require workforce training or a higher education by the end of this decade.  It’s an economic issue when countries that out-educate us today are going to out-compete us tomorrow.

read more

The President began his remarks by discussing the importance of education for the success of our economy and our nation:

I know some argue that as we emerge from a recession, my administration should focus solely on economic issues.  They said that during health care as if health care had nothing to do with economics; said it during financial reform as if financial reform had nothing to do with economics; and now they're saying it as we work on education issues.  But education is an economic issue -- if not “the” economic issue of our time. 

It’s an economic issue when the unemployment rate for folks who’ve never gone to college is almost double what it is for those who have gone to college.  It’s an economic issue when eight in 10 new jobs will require workforce training or a higher education by the end of this decade.  It’s an economic issue when countries that out-educate us today are going to out-compete us tomorrow.

read more

A little more than one year ago, the entire industry was on the edge of failure.  Plants were being closed, jobs were being lost, and America’s future role as a leading producer of vehicles in the global marketplace was in question. We’re now starting to see real signs of recovery.  While there is still a long way to go, the progress to date is far beyond what most observers thought possible a year ago. The industry is creating jobs and American auto companies are addressing past failures, restoring financial discipline and returning to profitability.  Today, the White House released a new report cataloguing some of these early signs of success. 

In addition to stabilizing the industry and addressing the hardship faced by communities that lost auto plants and the jobs they provided, the Administration has been focused on making long-term investments across the country that will make the U.S. a home base for the design and production of the next generation of innovative vehicle technologies.  This new interactive map shows where these key investments have been made and the types of projects that will ensure the vehicles of the future are made in America.  

Ron Bloom is Senior Advisor to Treasury Secretary Geithner and Senior Counselor for Manufacturing Policy
Ed Montgomery is Executive Director of the White House Council on Auto Communities and Workers

10:09 A.M. EDT

THE PRESIDENT:  Thank you.  Everybody, please have a seat.  Have a seat.  Take a load off.  (Applause.)  Thank you. 

Good morning, Urban Leaguers. 

AUDIENCE:  Good morning.

THE PRESIDENT:  Yes.  It is wonderful to be here with all of you.  It is wonderful to be here.  And let me begin by congratulating Marc Morial for his outstanding leadership, his great friendship.  (Applause.)  I want to thank the entire National Urban League on your centennial.  From your founding, amid the great migration, to the struggles of the civil rights movement, to the battles of today, the Urban League has been on the ground, in our communities, working quietly -– day in, day out -– without fanfare; opening up opportunity, rolling back inequality, making our union just a little more perfect.  America is a better place because of the Urban League.  And I'm grateful to all of you for the outstanding contributions that you’ve made. (Applause.)  

The last time I spoke with you was during your Orlando conference in August -- (applause) -- got Orlando in the house.  (laughter) -- Orlando conference back in August of 2008.  I didn’t have any gray hair back then.  (Laughter.)  Say that's all right?  (Laughter and applause.)  But I want to remind you what things were like in August of 2008.  Our economy was in freefall. We had just seen seven straight months of job loss.  Foreclosures were sweeping the nation.  And we were on the verge of a financial crisis that threatened to plunge our economy into a second Great Depression.

So, from the moment I took office, we had to act immediately to prevent an even greater catastrophe.  And I knew that not everything we did would be popular.  Sometimes when we do things, the scribes, the pundits here in Washington, they act surprised. They say, why would you do such a thing, it doesn’t poll well.  And I have to explain to them I’ve got my own pollsters.  (Laughter and applause.)  But I wasn’t elected just to do what’s popular; I was elected do what was right.  That's what you supported me for.  (Applause.)

And because of what we did, America, as a whole, is in a different place today.  Our economy is growing, instead of shrinking.  Our private sector has been adding jobs for six straight months, instead of losing them.  (Applause.)

Yesterday a report was put out by two prominent economists  -- one of them John McCain’s old economist -- that said if we hadn’t taken the actions that we took, we would have had an additional 8 million people lose their jobs. 

Now, that doesn’t mean we’re out of the woods yet.  Every sector of our economy was shaking by the crisis; every demographic group felt its impact.  And as has been true in the wake of other recent recessions, this one had an especially brutal impact on minority communities -- communities that were already struggling long before the financial crisis hit.

The African American unemployment rate was already much higher, the incomes and wealth of African American families already lower.  There was less of a cushion.  Many minority communities -- whether in big cities or rural towns -- had seen businesses and opportunities vanish for years, stores boarded up, young people hanging out on the street corners without prospects for the future.

So when we came in to office, we focused not just on rescuing our economy in the short run, but rebuilding our economy for the long run -- creating an economy that lifts up all Americans.  (Applause.)   Not just some, but all.

That’s why we passed health insurance reform that will give every American -- (applause) -- more choices, more control over their health care; will narrow the cruel disparities between Americans of different backgrounds.  That’s why we passed Wall Street reform -- not only to make sure that taxpayers aren’t paying for somebody else’s foolishness, but also to protect consumers from predatory credit cards and lending practices, regulating everything from mortgages to payday loans; making sure that we’re protecting our economy from the recklessness and irresponsibility of a few.  (Applause.)
 
Across agencies, we’re taking on the structural inequalities that have held so many of our fellow citizens back, whether it’s making more housing available and more affordable, making sure civil rights and anti-discrimination laws are enforced, making sure our crime policy is not only tough, but also smart.  So yesterday, we took an important step forward when Congress passed a fair sentencing bill that I look forward to signing into law -- (applause) -- a bipartisan bill to help right a longstanding wrong by narrowing sentencing disparities between those convicted of crack cocaine and powder cocaine.  It’s the right thing to do. (Applause.)  We’ve gotten that done.

So we’ve made progress.  And yet, for all of our progress -– progress that’s come through the efforts of groups like the Urban League; progress that makes it possible for me to stand here as President -- we were reminded this past week that we still got work to do when it comes to promoting the values of fairness and equality and mutual understanding that must bind us together as a nation. 

Now, last week, I had the chance to talk to Shirley Sherrod -– an exemplary woman whose experiences mark both the challenges we have faced and the progress that we’ve made.  She deserves better than what happened last week -- (applause) -- when a bogus controversy based on selective and deceiving excerpts of a speech led her -- led to her forced resignation. 

Now, many are to blame for the reaction and overreaction that followed these comments -– including my own administration. And what I said to Shirley was that the full story she was trying to tell –- a story about overcoming our own biases and recognizing ourselves in folks who, on the surface, seem different -– is exactly the kind of story we need to hear in America.  (Applause.) 

It’s exactly what we need to hear because we’ve all got our biases.  And rather than jump to conclusions and point fingers, and play some of the games that are played on cable TV, we should all look inward and try to examine what’s in our own hearts.  (Applause.)  We should all make more of an effort to discuss with one another, in a truthful and mature and responsible way, the divides that still exist -- the discrimination that's still out there, the prejudices that still hold us back -- a discussion that needs to take place not on cable TV, not just through a bunch of academic symposia or fancy commissions or panels, not through political posturing, but around kitchen tables, and water coolers, and church basements, and in our schools, and with our kids all across the country.  (Applause.)

If we can have that conversation in our own lives, if we can take an opportunity to learn from our imperfections and our mistakes, to grow as individuals and as a country, and if we engage in the hard work of translating words into deeds -- because words are easy and deeds are hard -- then I’m confident that we can move forward together and make this country a little more perfect than it was before.  (Applause.)

Now, since we’re on the topic of speaking honestly with one another, I want to devote the balance of my time, the balance of my remarks, to an issue that I believe will largely determine not only African American success, but the success of our nation in the 21st century -- and that is whether we are offering our children the very best education possible.  (Applause.)

I know some argue that as we emerge from a recession, my administration should focus solely on economic issues.  They said that during health care as if health care had nothing to do with economics; said it during financial reform as if financial reform had nothing to do with economics; and now they're saying it as we work on education issues.  But education is an economic issue -- if not “the” economic issue of our time.  (Applause.)

It’s an economic issue when the unemployment rate for folks who’ve never gone to college is almost double what it is for those who have gone to college.  (Applause.)  It’s an economic issue when eight in 10 new jobs will require workforce training or a higher education by the end of this decade.  It’s an economic issue when countries that out-educate us today are going to out-compete us tomorrow.

Now, for years, we’ve recognized that education is a prerequisite for prosperity.  And yet, we’ve tolerated a status quo where America lags behind other nations.  Just last week, we learned that in a single generation, America went from number one to 12th in college completion rates for young adults.  Used to be number one, now we’re number 12. 

At the same time, our 8th graders trail about eight -- 10 other nations -- 10 other nations in science and math.  Meanwhile, when it comes to black students, African American students trail not only almost every other developed nation abroad, but they badly trail their white classmates here at home -- an achievement gap that is widening the income gap between black and white, between rich and poor. 

We’ve talked about it, we know about it, but we haven’t done enough about it.  And this status quo is morally inexcusable, it s economically indefensible, and all of us are going to have to roll up our sleeves to change it.  (Applause.)

And that's why -- that is why, from day one of this administration, we’ve made excellence in American education -- excellence for all our students -- a top priority.  And no one has shown more leadership on this issue than my Secretary of Education, Arne Duncan, who is here today.  (Applause.)

I chose Arne not only because he’s a great ballplayer --  (laughter) -- Arne and I play a little bit on the weekends -- I choose Arne because I knew that for him, closing the achievement gap, unlocking the potential of every child, isn’t just a job, it’s been the cause of his life.

Now, because a higher education has never been more important –- or more expensive -– it’s absolutely essential that we put a college degree within reach for anyone who wants it.  And that’s why we’re making higher education more affordable, so we can meet the goals I’ve set of producing a higher share of college graduates than any other nation by 2020.  I want us to be back at number one instead of number 12.  (Applause.) 

And in pursuit of that goal, we eliminated taxpayer subsidies to big banks.  We saved tens of billions of dollars, and we used those savings to open the door to additional financial aid -- to open the door for college to millions more students.  This is something that a lot of you may not be aware of, but we have added tens of billions of dollars that were going to bank middlemen, so that that money is now going to students -- millions more students who are getting scholarships to go to college.  (Applause.)  That’s already been done.

We’re making loan repayment more manageable, so young people don’t graduate -- like Michelle and me -- with such big loan payments every month.

AUDIENCE MEMBER:  Thank you!

THE PRESIDENT:  You’re welcome.  Right there.  (Laughter.)  You can relate.  (Laughter.) 

And we’re reinvesting in our Historically Black Colleges and Universities.  (Applause.)  Our HBCUs, we are reinvesting in them, while at the same time reforming and strengthening our community college, which are great, undervalued assets -- (applause) -- great assets that are a lifeline to so many working families in every community across America.

But here’s the thing.  Even if we do all this good stuff for higher education, too many of our children see college as nothing but a distant dream -– because their education went off the rails long before they turned 18.  These are young people who’ve been relegated to failing schools in struggling communities, where there are too many obstacles, too few role models -– communities that I represented as a state senator; communities that I fought to lift up as a community organizer.

I remember going to a school back in my organizing days and seeing children -- young children, maybe five or six -- eyes were brimming with hope, had such big dreams for the future.  You’d ask them, what do you want to be when you grow up?  They’d want to be a doctor; they’d want to be a lawyer.  And then I remember the principal telling me that soon, all that would change.  The hope would start fading from their eyes as they started to realize that maybe their dreams wouldn’t come to pass -- not because they weren’t smart enough, not because they weren’t talented enough, but because through a turn of fate they happened to be born in the wrong neighborhood.  They became victim of low expectations, a community that was not supporting educational excellence.

And it was heartbreaking.  It is heartbreaking.  And it reinforced in me a fundamental belief that we’ve got an obligation to lift up every child in every school in this country, especially those who are starting out furthest behind.  (Applause.) 

That’s why I want to challenge our states to offer better early learning options to make sure our children aren’t wasting their most formative years -- (applause) -- so that they can enter into kindergarten already ready to learn -- knowing their colors, knowing their numbers, knowing their shapes, knowing how to sit still.  (Laughter.)  Right?  That’s no joke.  You got to learn that, especially when you’re a boy.  (Laughter.)  That’s why we placed such heavy emphasis on the education our children are getting from kindergarten through 12th grade.

Now, over the past 18 months, the single most important thing we’ve done -- and we’ve done a lot.  I mean, the Recovery Act put a lot of money into schools, saved a lot of teacher jobs, made sure that schools didn’t have to cut back even more drastically in every community across this country.  But I think the single most important thing we’ve done is to launch an initiative called Race to the Top.  (Applause.)  We said to states, if you are committed to outstanding teaching, to successful schools, to higher standards, to better assessments -– if you’re committed to excellence for all children -– you will be eligible for a grant to help you attain that goal.

And so far, the results have been promising and they have been powerful.  In an effort to compete for this extra money, 32 states reformed their education laws before we even spent a dime. The competition leveraged change at the state level.  And because the standards we set were high, only a couple of states actually won the grant in the first round, which meant that the states that didn’t get the money, they’ve now strengthened their applications, made additional reforms.  Now 36 have applied in the second round, and 18 states plus the District of Columbia are in the running to get a second grant.  (Applause.) 

So understand what’s happened.  In each successive round, we’ve leveraged change across the country.  And even students in those districts that haven’t gotten a grant, they’ve still benefited from the reforms that were initiated.  And this process has sown the seeds of achievement.  It’s forced teachers and principals and officials and parents to forge agreements on tough, and often uncomfortable issues -- to raise their sights and embrace education.

For the most part, states, educators, reformers, they’ve responded with great enthusiasm around this promise of excellence.  But I know there’s also been some controversy about Race to the Top.  Part of it, I believe, reflects a general resistance to change.  We get comfortable with the status quo even when the status quo isn’t good.  We make excuses for why things have to be the way they are.  And when you try to shake things up, some people aren’t happy. 

There have been criticisms from some folks in the civil rights community about particular elements of Race to the Top.  So I want to address some of those today.  I told you we’re going to have an honest conversation.

First, I know there’s a concern that Race to the Top doesn’t do enough for minority kids, because the argument is, well, if there’s a competition, then somehow some states or some school districts will get more help than others.  Let me tell you, what’s not working for black kids and Hispanic kids and Native American kids across this country is the status quo.  That's what’s not working.  (Applause.)  What’s not working is what we’ve been doing for decades now.

So the charge that Race to the Top isn’t targeted at those young people most in need is absolutely false because lifting up quality for all our children -- black, white, Hispanic -- that is the central premise of Race to the Top.  And you can’t win one of these grants unless you’ve got a plan to deal with those schools that are failing and those young people who aren’t doing well.  Every state and every school district is directly incentivized to deal with schools that have been forgotten, been given up on. 

I also want to directly speak to the issue of teachers.  We may have some teachers here in the house.  (Applause.)  I know Urban League has got some teachers.  Nothing is more important than teachers.  (Applause.)  My sister is a teacher.  I’m here because of great teachers.  The whole premise of Race to the Top is that teachers are the single most important factor in a child’s education from the moment they step into the classroom.  And I know firsthand that the vast majority of teachers are working tirelessly, are passionate about their students, are often digging into their own pockets for basic supplies, are going above and beyond the call of duty. 

So I want teachers to have higher salaries.  I want them to have more support.  I want them to be trained like the professionals they are –- with rigorous residencies like the ones that doctors go through.   (Applause.)  I want to give them a career ladder so they’ve opportunities to advance, and earn real financial security.  I don't want talented young people to say I’d love to teach but I can’t afford it.  (Applause.) 

I want them to have a fulfilling and supportive workplace environment.  I want them to have the resources -- from basic supplies to reasonable class sizes -- that help them succeed.   And instead of a culture where we’re always idolizing sports stars or celebrities, I want us to build a culture where we idolize the people who are shaping our children’s future.  (Applause.)  I want some teachers on the covers of some of those magazines.  (Applause.)  Some teachers on MTV, featured.  (Applause.)

I was on the “The View” yesterday, and somebody asked me who Snooki was.  I said, I don't know who Snooki is.  (Laughter.)  But I know some really good teachers that you guys should be talking about.  (Laughter and applause.)  I didn't say the teacher part, but I just -- (laughter.)  The question is, who are we lifting up?  Who are we promoting?  Who are we saying is important? 

So I am 110 percent behind our teachers.  (Applause.)  But all I’m asking in return -- as a President, as a parent, and as a citizen -- is some measure of accountability.  (Applause.)  So even as we applaud teachers for their hard work, we’ve got to make sure we’re seeing results in the classroom.  If we’re not seeing results in the classroom, then let’s work with teachers to help them become more effective.  If that doesn’t work, let’s find the right teacher for that classroom.  (Applause.)

Arne makes the point very simply:  Our children get only one chance at an education, so we need to get it right.

I want to commend some of the teachers unions across this country who are working with us to improve teaching -- like the Delaware Education Association, which is working with state leaders as part of their Race to the Top efforts, not only to set aside 90 minutes of collaboration time a week to improve instruction, but to strengthen teacher development and evaluation.  That's the right way to go.

So, for anyone who wants to use Race to the Top to blame or punish teachers -- you’re missing the point.  Our goal isn’t to fire or admonish teachers; our goal is accountability.  It’s to provide teachers with the support they need to be as effective as they can be, and to create a better environment for teachers and students alike. 

Now, there’s also the question of how hard our teachers should push students in the classroom.  Nations in Asia and Europe have answered this question, in part by creating standards to make sure their teachers and students are performing at the same high levels throughout their nation.  That’s one of the reasons that their children are doing better than ours.  But here at home, there’s often a controversy about national standards, common standards -- that violates the principle of local control. Now, there’s a history to local control that we need to think about, but that -- that’s the argument.

So here’s what Race to the Top says:  Instead of Washington imposing standards from the top down, let’s challenge states to adopt common standards voluntarily, from the bottom up.  That doesn’t mean more standards; it means higher standards, better standards, standards that clarify what our teachers are expected to teach and what our children are expected to learn -– so high school graduates are actually prepared for college and a career. I do not want to see young people get a diploma but they can’t read that diploma.  (Applause.) 

Now, so far, about 30 states have come together to embrace and develop common standards, high standards.  More states are expected to do so in the coming weeks.  And by the way, this is different from No Child Left Behind, because what that did was it gave the states the wrong incentives.  A bunch of states watered down their standards so that school districts wouldn’t be penalized when their students fell short.  And what’s happened now is, at least two states -– Illinois and Oklahoma –- that lowered standards in response to No Child Behind -- No Child Left Behind -- are now raising those standards back up, partly in response to Race to the Top.

And part of making sure our young people meet these high standards is designing tests that accurately measure whether they are learning.  Now, here, too, there’s been some controversy.  When we talk about testing, parents worry that it means more teaching to the test.  Some worry that tests are culturally biased. Teachers worry that they’ll be evaluated solely on the basis of a single standardized test.  Everybody thinks that’s unfair.  It is unfair. 

But that’s not what Race to the Top is about.  What Race to the Top says is, there’s nothing wrong with testing -– we just need better tests applied in a way that helps teachers and students, instead of stifling what teachers and students do in the classroom.  Tests that don’t dictate what’s taught, but tell us what has been learned.  Tests that measure how well our children are mastering essential skills and answering complex questions.  And tests that track how well our students are growing academically, so we can catch when they’re falling behind and help them before they just get passed along.  (Applause.) 

Because of Race to the Top, states are also finding innovative ways to move beyond having just a snapshot of where students are, and towards a real-time picture that shows how far they’ve come and how far they have to go.  And armed with this information, teachers can get what amounts to a game tape that they can study to enhance their teaching and their focus on areas where students need help the most.

Now, sometimes a school’s problems run so deep that you can do the better assessments and the higher standards and a more challenging curriculum, and that’s not enough.  If a school isn’t producing graduates with even the most basic skills –- year after year after year after year -– something needs to be done differently.  You know, the definition, somebody once said, of madness is you do the same thing over and over again and keep expecting a different result.  If we want success for our country, we can’t accept failure in our schools decade after decade.

And that’s why we’re challenging states to turn around our 5,000 lowest performing schools.  And I don’t think it’s any secret that most of those are serving African American or Hispanic kids.  We’re investing over $4 billion to help them do that, to transform those schools -– $4 billion, which even in Washington is real money.  (Applause.)  This isn’t about -- unlike No Child Left Behind, this isn’t about labeling a troubled school a failure and then just throwing up your hands and saying, well, we’re giving up on you.  It’s about investing in that school’s future, and recruiting the whole community to help turn it around, and identifying viable options for how to move forward.

Now, in some cases, that’s going to mean restarting the school under different management as a charter school -– as an independent public school formed by parents, teachers, and civic leaders who’ve got broad leeway to innovate.  And some people don’t like charter schools.  They say, well, that’s going to take away money from other public schools that also need support.  Charter schools aren’t a magic bullet, but I want to give states and school districts the chance to try new things.  If a charter school works, then let’s apply those lessons elsewhere.  And if a charter school doesn’t work, we’ll hold it accountable; we’ll shut it down.

So, no, I don’t support all charter schools, but I do support good charter schools.  I’ll give you an example.  There’s a charter school called Mastery in Philadelphia.  And in just two years, three of the schools that Mastery has taken over have seen reading and math levels nearly double –- in some cases, triple.  Chaka Fattah is here, so he knows what I’m talking about.  One school called Pickett went from just 14 percent of students being proficient in math to almost 70 percent.  (Applause.)  Now -- and here’s the kicker -- at the same time academic performance improved, violence dropped by 80 percent -– 80 percent.  And that’s no coincidence.  (Applause.)

Now, if a school like Mastery can do it, if Pickett can do it, every troubled school can do it.  But that means we’re going to have to shake some things up.  Setting high standards, common standards, empowering students to meet them; partnering with our teachers to achieve excellence in the classroom; educating our children -- all of them -- to graduate ready for college, ready for a career, ready to make most of their lives -- none of this should be controversial.  There should be a fuss if we weren’t doing these things.  There should be a fuss if Arne Duncan wasn’t trying to shake things up.  (Applause.)

So Race to the Top, isn’t simply the name of an initiative. It sums up what’s happening in our schools.  It’s the single most ambitious, meaningful education reform effort we’ve attempted in this country in generations.

And I know there are a number of other steps we need to take to lift up our education system -- like saving teachers’ jobs across this country from layoffs -- and I’ll continue fighting to take those steps and save those jobs.  But I’ll also continue to fight for Race to the Top with everything I’ve got, including using a veto to prevent some folks from watering it down.  (Applause.)

Now, let me wrap up by saying this.  I know there are some who say that Race to the Top won’t work.  There are cynics and naysayers who argue that the problems in our education system are too entrenched, that think that we’ll just fall back into the same old arguments and divides that have held us back for so long.  And it is true, as I’ve said since I ran for President, and that everybody here knows firsthand, change is hard.  I don't know if you’ve noticed.  That's why I’ve got all this gray hair. (Laughter.) 

Fixing what was broken in our health care system is not easy.  Fixing what was broken on Wall Street is not easy.  Fixing what’s broken in our education system is not easy.  We won’t see results overnight.  It may take a decade for these changes to pay off.  But that’s not a reason not to make them.  It’s a reason to start making them right now, to feel a sense of urgency -- the fierce urgency of now.  (Applause.)

We also know that as significant as these reforms are, there’s going to be one more ingredient to really make a difference:  parents are going to have to get more involved in their children’s education.  (Applause.)  Now, in the past, even that statement has sparked controversy.  Folks say, well, why are you talking about parents?  Parents need help, too.  I know that. Parents need jobs.  They need housing.  They need -- in some cases -- social services.  They may have substance abuse problems.  We’re working on all those fronts. 

Then some people say, well, why are you always talking about parental responsibility in front of black folks?  (Laughter and applause.)  And I say, I talk about parent responsibility wherever I talk about education. 

Michelle and I happen to be black parents, so -- (laughter and applause) -- I may -- I may add a little umph to it when I’m talking to black parents.  (Laughter.)  

But to paraphrase Dr. King, education isn’t an either/or proposition.  It’s a both/and proposition.  It will take both more focus from our parents, and better schooling.  It will take both more money, and more reform.  It will take both a collective commitment, and a personal commitment.

So, yes, our federal government has responsibilities that it has to meet, and I will keep on making sure the federal government meets those responsibilities.  Our governors, our superintendants, our states, our school districts have responsibilities to meet.  And parents have responsibilities that they have to meet.  And our children have responsibilities that they have to meet.  (Applause.)

It’s not just parents.  It’s the children, too.  Our kids need to understand nobody is going to hand them a future.  (Applause.)  An education is not something you just tip your head and they pour it in your ear.  (Laughter.)   You’ve got to want it.  You’ve got to reach out and claim that future for yourself. And you can’t make excuses.  (Applause.)

I know life is tough for a lot of young people in this country.  The places where Urban League is working to make a difference, you see it every day.  I’m coming from the Southside of Chicago.  (Applause.)  So I know -- I see what young people are going through there.  And at certain points in our lives, young black men and women may feel the sting of discrimination.  Too many of them may feel trapped in a community where drugs and violence and unemployment are pervasive, and they are forced to wrestle with things that no child should have to face. 

There are all kinds of reasons for our children to say, “No, I can’t.”  But our job is to say to them, “Yes, you can.”  (Applause.)  Yes, you can overcome.  Yes, you can persevere.  Yes, you can make what you will out of your lives.  (Applause.) 

I know they can, because I know the character of America’s young people.  I saw them volunteer on my campaign.  They asked me questions in town hall meetings.  They write me letters about their trials and aspirations.

I got a letter recently postmarked Covington, Kentucky.  It was from Na’Dreya Lattimore, 10 years old -- about the same age as Sasha.  And she told me about how her school had closed, so she had enrolled in another.  Then she had bumped up against other barriers to what she felt was her potential.  So Na’Dreya was explaining to me how we need to improve our education system. She closed by saying this:

“One more thing,” she said.  (Laughter.)  It was a long letter.  (Laughter.)  “You need to look at us differently.  We are not black, we’re not white, biracial, Hispanic, Asian, or any other nationality.”  No, she wrote -– “We are the future.”  (Applause.) 

Na’Dreya, you are right.  And that’s why I will keep fighting to lead us out of this storm.  But I’m also going to keep fighting alongside the Urban League to make America more perfect, so that young people like Na’Dreya -- people of every race, in every region -- are going to be able to reach for that American Dream.  They’re going to know that there are brighter days ahead; that their future is full of boundless possibilities. I believe that, and I know the Urban League does, too.

Thank you very much, everybody.  God bless you.  God bless the United States of America.  (Applause.) 

END
10:53 A.M. EDT

Yesterday, after years of extensive research, consultation and negotiation with industry experts, OSHA announced the publication of a new rule covering the use of cranes and derricks in construction. This long overdue rule addresses the key hazards related to cranes and derricks on construction worksites, including the four main causes of worker death and injury.  

read more

Today was a great day to be in Colorado. First, I toured a Federal Railroad Administration facility--the work the FRA crew is doing there really deserves its own blog post, so stay tuned for that one next week.

Then, I learned about an exciting new municipal bike-sharing program in Denver with 43 bike stations and more than 400 bikes spread around the city. Mayor Hickenlooper and I even had a chance to test the system by checking out a pair of bicycles and riding them to another station.

But what really drew me to Denver was the Biennial of the Americas, a month-long celebration of the Western Hemisphere. I was there for the Americas Roundtable on Energy and Climate Change: Designing Answers for Today's Challenges and to discuss how DOT is working to manage those challenges.

read more

Starting September 23, the new law makes it illegal for insurance companies to discriminate against children under 19 with preexisting conditions. In 2014, discriminating against anyone with a pre-existing condition will be illegal, but we know Americans need relief now. That’s why the new law created the Pre-Existing Condition Insurance Plan. This plan offers coverage to uninsured Americans who have been uninsured for at least six months and unable to obtain health coverage because of a pre-existing health condition like cancer, diabetes or lupus.

Coverage will be available at the same rate as it is for an average person who does not have such a condition and the program is entirely funded by the federal government.  The program is temporary and will last until 2014 when discriminating against anyone with a pre-existing condition will be illegal. If you’re interested in joining the program, you can click here to learn more about the program in your state.

Today, HHS issued an interim final regulation laying out the rules for the PCIP program.  The regulation describes the options for determining who has a pre-existing condition, how to verify citizenship, and how an individual can appeal a PCIP decision.  It also details how Federal funding will be allocated, ways to prevent “dumping” of already-insured people into the program, and strategies for preventing fraud.

The regulation also lists the benefits that can and can’t be covered under this temporary federal program.  Covered benefits include hospitalization, outpatient care, maternity care, and, hospice, and home health care. 

The list of services not covered parallels that of the Federal Employees Health Benefit Plan (FEHBP), which serves government workers and their families, including Members of Congress. And like this program, PCIP prohibits the use of federal funds for abortion services, except in cases of rape or incest, or where the life of the woman would be endangered.  This policy meets the President’s commitment throughout the health reform debate to neither expand nor scale back current restrictions on federal funding for abortion and ensures that no federal funds will be used to cover abortion services other than the exceptions mentioned above

Much has been made of this policy by both sides of the debate.  But, in reality, no new ground has been broken.  The program’s restriction on abortion coverage is not a precedent for other programs or policies given the unique, temporary nature of the program and the population it serves.  It does not restrict private insurance choices and the implementation of the Affordable Care Act will continue to be guided by the law and the President’s Executive Order.

What is new is the benefits from this program detailed in the regulation.  Studies have estimated that 200,000 to 400,000 uninsured people with pre-existing conditions could be helped, doubling the number of Americans insured through existing high risk pools.  And this new coverage will help all of us by reducing medical debt, improving health and worker productivity and reducing the amount of uncompensated care provided to the uninsured, potentially by billions of dollars. 

Every day, the Affordable Care Act is making it easier for Americans to take control of their health care by giving them easier access to better health coverage choices.  The Pre-Existing Condition Insurance Plan helps meet that goal.
 

The recession has meant that folks are spending less. It means that small businesses have had a tougher time getting credit and getting loans. And that’s why when I took office, we put in place an economic plan specifically to help small businesses. And we were guided by a simple idea: Government can’t guarantee success, but it can knock down barriers that keep entrepreneurs from opening or expanding.

President Barack Obama talks with small business owners, from left, Brian Bovio, Dave Thornton, and Catherine Horsburgh at the Tastee Sub Shop in Edison, N.J. The President is visiting Edison to discuss the economy and urge Congress to pass support for small businesses.

read more

The recession has meant that folks are spending less. It means that small businesses have had a tougher time getting credit and getting loans. And that’s why when I took office, we put in place an economic plan specifically to help small businesses. And we were guided by a simple idea: Government can’t guarantee success, but it can knock down barriers that keep entrepreneurs from opening or expanding.

President Barack Obama talks with small business owners, from left, Brian Bovio, Dave Thornton, and Catherine Horsburgh at the Tastee Sub Shop in Edison, N.J. The President is visiting Edison to discuss the economy and urge Congress to pass support for small businesses.

read more

Beverly Joyce Harvard, of Georgia, to be United States Marshal for the Northern District of Georgia for the term of four years, vice Richard Vaughn Mecum, term expired.

Marina Garcia Marmolejo, of Texas, to be United States District Judge for the Southern District of Texas, vice Samuel B. Kent, resigned.

Maria Elizabeth Raffinan, of the District of Columbia, to be an Associate Judge of the Superior Court of the District of Columbia for the term of fifteen years, vice Odessa F. Vincent, retired.

Ripley Rand, of North Carolina, to be United States Attorney for the Middle District of North Carolina for the term of four years, vice Anna Mills S. Wagoner, term expired.

David Mark Singer, of California, to be United States Marshal for the Central District of California for the term of four years, vice Adam Noel Torres, term expired.

Few things say summer like a state fair. And, as a graduate from the nearby University of Dayton, I was thrilled to take part in today's opening of the 157th Ohio State Fair with Governor Ted Strickland.

A proud Buckeye tradition, the Ohio State Fair has delighted locals and visitors since 1850. Last year alone, over 800,000 people turned out to take part in the livestock competitions, concerts, rides, and butter sculptures that make up a true state fair experience.

Deputy Transportation Secretary John Porcari speaks at the opening of the 157th Ohio State Fair.

read more

“Throughout her career Maribeth Raffinan has shown a commitment to justice and public service,” said President Obama. “I am proud to nominate her to serve on the Superior Court of the District of Columbia,”

Maria Elizabeth (Maribeth) Raffinan:  Nominee for the Superior Court of the District of Columbia
Maribeth Raffinan is a supervising attorney in the Trial Division of the Public Defender Service for the District of Columbia where she has represented indigent defendants charged with criminal offenses since 1999.  Prior to joining the Public Defender Service, Ms. Raffinan worked in the Office of the Federal Public Defender for the District of Columbia.  Ms. Raffinan co-chaired the 2007 Deborah T. Creek Criminal Practice Institute, an annual training program for criminal defense practitioners in the District of Columbia, and she has served as a member of the Superior Court’s Drug Court Committee.  She has also served as an adjunct professor at the Columbus School of Law at The Catholic University of America.  Ms. Raffinan has a bachelor’s degree in political science and philosophy from Boston College and earned her law degree from Catholic University of America’s Columbus School of Law.

“These dedicated law enforcement professionals have spent their careers protecting their fellow Americans,” said President Obama.  “I am honored to nominate them to serve the American people as U.S. Marshals.”

Beverly Harvard:  Nominee for U.S. Marshal for the Northern District of Georgia
Beverly Harvard is currently employed by the United States Transportation Security Administration as the Director of Transportation Security Coordination.  Ms. Harvard began her career at TSA in 2002 as the Deputy Federal Security Director.  Prior to Ms. Harvard’s employment with TSA, she worked for the City of Atlanta Police Department from 1973-2002.  Ms. Harvard worked her way through the ranks to the position of Chief of Police from 1994-2002. Ms. Harvard earned her Bachelor of Arts Degree from Morris Brown College in 1972 and went on to receive her Master of Science Degree in 1980 from Georgia State University.

David Mark Singer, Nominee for U.S. Marshal for the Central District of California
David Singer serves as Chief of Police for Whittier, California, a position he has held since 2001.  Previously, he served for four years in the United States Air Force and then began his law enforcement career in 1979 at the Signal Hill, California Police Department, where he served for 21 years, including five as Chief of Police.  Mr. Singer is the chair of LA IMPACT, the Los Angeles countywide drug task force, and he is past president of the Los Angeles County Police Chiefs’ Association.  Mr. Singer graduated received his bachelors degree in criminal justice and his masters degree in public administration from California State University, Long Beach, where he has served as an adjunct professor.  He is also a graduate of the FBI National Academy.

“I am proud to nominate Marina Marmolejo to serve on the United States District Court, said President Obama.  “I am confident she will serve on the federal bench with distinction.” 

Marina Garcia Marmolejo:  Nominee for the United States District Court for the Southern District of Texas
Marina Garcia Marmolejo is a partner in the firm of Reid Davis, which she joined in 2009.  She previously helped open the San Antonio Office of Thompson & Knight, where she was Of Counsel from 2007 to 2009.  Prior to entering private practice, Ms. Marmolejo was an Assistant United States Attorney in the Southern District of Texas, a position she held from 1999 until 2007. She began her legal career as an Assistant Federal Public Defender, in the Western District of Texas from 1996 to 1998, and then in the Southern District of Texas from 1998 to 1999.  Ms. Marmolejo received her J.D. in 1996 from St. Mary’s University School of Law, her M.A. in 1996 from St. Mary’s University Graduate School, and her B.A. in 1992 from the University of the Incarnate Word.

“I am proud to nominate these outstanding individuals to serve as United States Attorneys,” said President Obama.  “They will be unwavering in their pursuit of justice and I am confident they will serve the people of North Carolina and Michigan with distinction.” 

Ripley Eagles Rand, Nominee for United States Attorney, Middle District of North Carolina
Ripley Rand is a Superior Court Judge for the State of North Carolina, a position he has held since 2002.  Prior to that, Mr. Rand worked as an Assistant District Attorney in the Tenth Prosecutorial District of North Carolina from 1997 to 2002 and in the Twelfth Prosecutorial District in 1997.  From 1996 to 1997, Mr. Rand was a judicial clerk for the Honorable James A. Beaty, Jr., United States District Judge for the Middle District of North Carolina.  Following law school, he was a research assistant for the Honorable Burley B. Mitchell, Jr., Chief Justice of the North Carolina Supreme Court, from 1995 to 1996.  Mr. Rand graduated from the University of North Carolina in 1990 and the University of North Carolina School of Law in 1995.

M. Scott Bowen:  Nominee for United States Attorney, Western District of Michigan
Scott Bowen has been the Commissioner of the Michigan State Lottery Bureau since 2008.  From 2007 to 2008, he was the Director the Michigan Office of the State Employer.  Prior to that, Mr. Bowen served as District Judge for the Michigan State District Court for Wyoming, Michigan, from 2003 to 2005.  From 1997 to 2003, he was a City Commissioner for the 3rd Ward of Grand Rapids, Michigan, and from 2001 to 2003, he worked concurrently for the law firm McInerny & Bowen.  Following law school, he worked as an Associate Attorney at Clary, Nantz, Wood, Hoffus, Rankin & Cooper from 1990 to 1994, and as a founding partner of Bowen, Distel & Hayes, P.C., from 1994 to 2001.  Mr. Bowen graduated from Michigan State University in 1987 and the University of Detroit Mercy Law School in 1990.

With the hard-fought passage of Wall Street Reform last week, the President ensured that Wall Street will be held accountable, and that the American taxpayer will never again be on the hook for their actions.  As the President had said repeatedly, he was just as angry with having to take steps to shore up our financial system as all Americans were.  But when the President came into office, the economy was falling off a cliff, and this report demonstrates just how deep and disastrous the valley below truly was had he not done everything possible to pull it back.  The report particularly emphasizes the effectiveness of financial stability measures including the bank stress tests, the actions of the Fed and the TARP program and it highlights the potential cost to the taxpayers had policy makers not acted at all.

read more

2:42 P.M. EDT

THE PRESIDENT:  Well, I just had a terrific meeting with these small business owners here at Tastee Sub Shop.  And I want to thank Dave and Carl for hosting us here today.  And I highly recommend everybody buy a sandwich while you’re here, although as I said before, I can’t eat a 12-inch these days, now that I’m 49 -- well, I will be in a week.

We talked about some of the difficulties that people have had making payroll and turning a profit during this recession.  And we talked about what we can do to make it easier for small businesses to grow. 

All of these folks here know why that’s important.  Small businesses create two out of every three jobs in this country.  So our recovery depends on them.  And if we want to keep America moving forward, we need to keep investing in our small businesses. 

This is, by the way, more than -- is more important than just our economy.  It’s also about who we are as a people.  Because America has always been a place where if you’ve had a good idea and you’re willing to really work hard for it, you can see it through and you can succeed.  That’s what gives the worker the courage to leave her job to become her own boss.  It’s what propels people to risk their savings on an idea that they believe might just change the world.  I was hearing from Tom here about how he was having trouble finding work 30, 40 years ago, and decided that he would take over a business that only had two employees.  And now he’s an employer for a whole bunch of folks and he’s going to be passing on his business to his family.  And that’s the American story.

This town, Edison, is named after somebody who was not only one of history’s greatest inventors but also a pretty savvy small business owner.  And the small business people who are here with me today exemplify that same entrepreneurial spirit.  And all of these companies have seen their share of challenges.  All of these small business owners have had to improvise and adapt over the years, especially in tough times, and that includes over the last couple years.

So Tom and Catherine Horsburgh were telling me that they got through the downturn.  In order to do so, they had to market their products to types of businesses that they hadn’t sold to before.  Brian Bovio’s company had to let some people go when the recession hit.  But in the two years since, he’s transformed his business, and now he’s making people’s homes more energy efficient to save money on their utility bills -- and he’s been able to start hiring again.  He is very interested in making sure that the HOMESTAR proposal that we’ve put into Congress actually passes, because not only will that help to expand his business but it’s also going to help Americans save energy not only in this part of the country but all across the country.

Now, all of this hasn’t been easy.  The recession has meant that folks are spending less.  It means that small businesses have had a tougher time getting credit and getting loans.  And that’s why when I took office, we put in place an economic plan specifically to help small businesses.  And we were guided by a simple idea:  Government can’t guarantee success, but it can knock down barriers that keep entrepreneurs from opening or expanding.  For example, the lack of affordable credit -- that’s something the government can do something about.  Government can’t replace the millions of jobs that we lost in the recession, but it can create the conditions for small businesses to hire more people through steps like tax breaks. 

That’s why we’ve cut taxes for America’s small businesses eight times.  Eight times have we cut taxes for small businesses all across the country.  Because of a bill I signed into law a few months ago, businesses are now eligible for tax cuts when they hire unemployed workers -- something that could benefit every business represented behind me.  Companies are also able to write off more of their investments in new equipment, which Tom and Catherine have taken advantage of.  As part of the health reform package, 4 million small business owners recently received a postcard in their mailbox telling them that this year they could be eligible for a health care tax credit that’s worth perhaps tens of thousands of dollars. 

And I was just talking to Dave, who does the right thing by his employees and is providing health insurance -- they actually are not paying a significant share for that health insurance.  Dave and Carl are doing the right thing by those workers.  He’s now going to be eligible to potentially get up to 35 percent tax relief on those -- premium that he’s paying, and that could make, obviously, an enormous difference in terms of his bottom line and may mean that he can hire some additional workers.

Our economic plan has also supported nearly 70,000 new loans to small businesses.  One of these loans made it possible for Tom and Catherine to purchase new equipment.  We’ve waived fees on new SBA loans to save folks money on payments.  And that reduced Theo’s costs when he opened his new restaurant.  His family had a business, a family restaurant.  He opened his own and it saved him more than $20,000 in waived fees -- money that’s now gone into that new restaurant and its 60 new employees. 

So all told, these and other steps are making a difference.  But when you listen to the struggles that small business owners are still facing, it’s clear that we need to do more.  And that’s why I’m urging the Senate to approve a jobs bill that will do two big things for small businesses:  cut taxes and make more loans available.  That’s what Dave and Carl and Theo and Brian and Tom and Catherine tell me they can use.  And that’s what I’ve heard from small businesses all across America.

     If this bill becomes law, small businesses and start-ups will see the positive benefits right away.  It eliminates capital gains taxes for key investments in small firms.  It will increase the deductions that small businesses can take for new equipment and other expenses.  I know Tom and Catherine are looking at expanding to a larger facility; this could help them do that.

This bill will also make more credit available.  Everywhere I go, I hear from small business owners who simply cannot get the credit they need to hire and expand.  And we’ve been hearing from smaller community banks that they want to lend to these folks but need more capital to do it.  So the initiatives in this bill will help them meet those challenges.  And it will increase -- allow them to increase loan sizes, and make sure that we continue to waive fees for SBA loans that have helped a number of the people standing behind me.

Now, let me just make one last point.  I know it’s no secret that we’ve confronted a lot of partisan politics over the past year and a half.  We’ve seen a fair amount of obstruction that’s had more to do with gaining political advantage than helping the country.  But surely, Democrats and Republicans ought to be able to agree on this bill.  When I had a conversation with Mitch McConnell and John Boehner yesterday, I told them that the provisions of this bill are things that the Republican Party has said it’s supported for years:  helping small businesses, cutting taxes, making credit available.  This is as American as apple pie.  Small businesses are the backbone of our economy.  They are central to our identity as a nation.  They are going to lead this recovery.  The folks standing beside me are going to lead this recovery.

So as I said yesterday in a meeting with congressional leaders at the White House, I expect us to get this done before they go on vacation, for the folks standing behind me and for small businesses and their employees all across the country.

All right?  Thank you very much, everybody.  Thank you, guys.

                        END           2:50 P.M. EDT

On Monday, I joined Vice President Biden at Yellowstone National Park as he continued his Recovery Summer tour.  Under overcast skies, we walked up a new gravel road to see the construction of the new Madison wastewater treatment plant, a $4.6 million project that will service the campground in this beautiful part of the park. This project replaces the weary wastewater plant, constructed in 1959, which was not built to meet today’s wastewater treatment needs or function throughout the year. The new design will be less visible from the main road and with its new treatment technology (better bugs as the project manager told us) no longer waft offensive odors over the campers. The work at Madison is being done by Dick Anderson Construction – a contractor based out of Bozeman, Montana. Ed Venetz, VP for the company spoke about how the ARRA funds have really helped keep his workers employed and how much he likes projects like this one in the National Parks. Ed later introduced the Vice President to a back drop of the Madison Valley and National Park Peak, the site of the legendary campfire where the idea of National Parks was born.  

Vice President Joe Biden meets Director of the National Parks Jon Jarvis before touring a recovery act project in Yellowstone National Park, Wyoming, July 26, 2010. (Official White House Photo by David Lienemann)

read more

The Honorable General James L. Jones, USMC (Ret), National Security Advisor to the President, will be the head of the delegation.

Members of the Presidential Delegation:

The Honorable William R. Brownfield, United States Ambassador to the Republic of Colombia

First, extending the high-income tax cuts would provide very little job creation in 2011. There is widespread agreement that the short-run economic benefits of high-income tax cuts are small.  The Congressional Budget Office lists a tax cut for high-income earners as a particularly ineffective job creation measure.  Private sector forecasters haver reached the same judgment.1 The vast majority of economic research shows that higher-income earners spend less of a tax cut and so tax cuts to those earners create fewer jobs throughout the economy.2

That doesn’t mean that all tax cuts are ineffective in creating growth.  In fact, tax cuts designed in the right way can be highly effective.  That is why the President supported numerous tax cuts in the Recovery Act and why continuing the middle-class tax cuts from 2001 and 2003 is so important.  The view that tax cuts focused on the middle class can be important to the recovery is consistent with a wide range of research, including a paper that I wrote with David Romer before coming to government and that was recently published.  This paper showed that tax changes in the postwar United States had larger short-run impacts on output growth than previously believed.  Since most postwar tax changes have been broad-based, our evidence indicates that broad-based tax cuts have large effects.  But it’s important to note that our study did not distinguish among tax cuts for different groups and did not focus on high-income earners.  Thus, it provides no basis for doubting the compelling evidence that tax cuts for high-income earners are less effective than broad-based tax cuts focused on the middle class.

If lawmakers are truly concerned about job creation, as they should be given the painfully high rate of unemployment, many approaches would be more cost effective than extending the Bush tax cuts for high-income earners.  For example, a private sector study recently concluded that a third year of the Making Work Pay tax credit would be far more stimulative.1  Likewise, estimates by the Council of Economic Advisers suggest that that spending $10 billion to prevent the layoffs of teachers, firefighters, and police would lead to nearly twice as many jobs as the estimated $30 billion of high-income tax cuts—that’s twice as many jobs for one-third the cost.  The small business jobs bill currently before the Senate, which contains both targeted tax cuts for small businesses and measures to improve their access to credit, would also be a far more powerful and cost-effective way to stimulate economic growth and job creation.
 
It is ironic that many who are now arguing that the high-income tax cuts must be extended on stimulus grounds opposed the Making Work Pay tax credit in the Recovery Act.  That tax cut, which totaled $110 billion (spread over tax years 2009 and 2010), went to 95% of working families and by all accounts has made an important difference to the trajectory of the economy.  In its third quarterly report to Congress on the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, the Council of Economic Advisers estimated that the tax cuts and other income support provisions in the Recovery Act saved or created more than a million jobs just through the first quarter of 2010.  The evidence from my work with David Romer implies that the Making Work Pay tax credit may have been even more effective than conventional estimates indicate. 

Finally, near-term stimulus measures must be taken in the context of developing a credible plan to address our Nation’s long-run fiscal challenges.  A benefit of all three of the alternatives mentioned above is that they are clearly temporary measures aimed at jumpstarting job creation.  In contrast, extending the high-income tax cuts would increase pressure to make them permanent.  While the Office of Management and Budget estimates the high-income tax cuts would cost about $30 billion in 2011, the yearly cost is expected to grow as the economy recovers.  Extending them permanently would add about $700 billion to the ten-year deficit.  That is a cost that we simply cannot afford, particularly for something that does so little to aid our recovery.

Christina Romer is the Chair of the Council of Economic Advisers

1 See Goldman Sachs Global ECS US Research, “US Daily:  Extending the Expiring Tax Cuts:  What, How, When and Why (Phillips),” July 26, 2010.

2 Economic studies in the 1940s and 1950s provided the first statistical evidence for the widely-believed proposition that lower-income households tend to spend more out of an additional dollar of income than do richer households, and subsequent research has repeatedly confirmed the proposition.  For an excellent summary of this literature, see Thomas Mayer, Permanent Income, Wealth, and Consumption (University of California Press, 1972).  These differences across groups emerge in a host of ways in more recent studies.  For example, Parker, Souleles, Johnson, and McClelland studied households’ spending responses to the 2008 Economic Stimulus Payments and found substantially larger spending responses among low-income than among high-income households. See Jonathan A. Parker, Nicholas S. Souleles, David S. Johnson, and Robert McClelland, “Consumer Spending and the Economic Stimulus Payments of 2008,” Manuscript, Kellogg School of Business, Northwestern University, February 2010. 

1:01 P.M. EDT

MR. BURTON:  Before we start, I just want to encourage you guys, once you get Internet access when we’re on the ground, to take a look at a new video on our website -- it was on WebMD this morning.  It’s the President showing folks how to use healthcare.gov.  So you can find that at whitehouse.gov.

With that, I’m happy to take some questions.

Q    Bill, what can you tell us about the BP investigation?  Has the focus widened on it?  And has the President been briefed?

MR. BURTON:  Well, I am not going to comment on an ongoing investigation.  As you know, the administration is doing everything it can to look into the cause of the tragedy that took those lives and created one of the biggest natural environmental catastrophes in the history of our country.  And we’re looking forward to hearing the results of that investigation.

Q    Is there anything you can tell us about the nature of the investigation?

MR. BURTON:  Not at this point.

Q    Bill, just on the 100th day of the spill, how does the President assess the situation where we are now, and does he have anything to say to the people in the Gulf at this point?

MR. BURTON:  Well, if you’ve seen some of the reports out today, we’ve obviously been able to make a lot of progress on cleaning up some of the oil that’s spilled out into the Gulf and stopping the oil from coming out of the well.  But the President’s view is that we’re not going to rest until we ensure that we’ve cleaned up all the oil, restored the damage that’s happened to the Gulf, and make sure that the people of that region are whole again.

We’re continuing to work to find any oil that might not be visible from the surface, any effects that might have happened at the sea bottom or anywhere in the area, and we’re going to keep that work up.

Q    Two closed fundraisers tonight -- we’re not going to get in to see him?  Is he not making remarks?

MR. BURTON:  That’s right, no remarks.  So one is at a private home; the other one is an event where he won’t be making any formal remarks.

Q    Meeting with Senator Kerry today -- did they talk about Lockerbie?

MR. BURTON:  I don’t know if that specifically came up.  But it was -- they spoke about a wide variety of issues.  But I’m not sure if Lockerbie in particular came up.

Q    Did the White House ask Senator Kerry to delay the Lockerbie hearings?

MR. BURTON:  I don’t know if Lockerbie came up.  So I’ll have to get back to you on that.

Q    I mean before that, though.  Senate Foreign Relations Committee has delayed the hearings.  Did the White House reach out and ask them to do that?

MR. BURTON:  Oh.  Not that I’m aware of.

Q    Did they discuss the WikiLeaks documents?

MR. BURTON:  I don’t know all the issues that they discussed.  So I can’t be more helpful for you.

Q    What did they discuss?

Q    What was on the agenda?

MR. BURTON:  This is one of those meetings where the President likes to touch base with members of Congress.  And he came in to have a conversation about a wide variety of issues, both foreign and domestic, so --

Q    Could you name some?

MR. BURTON:  -- I don’t have any in particular that they discussed.

Q    When will the President sign this war supplemental?

MR. BURTON:  As soon as possible.  If I get more clear guidance on -- when we get it, I will let you know.

Q    We’ve got these two events today that are kind of night and day.  You’ve got the sub shop, and then we’ve already got so many “Devil Wears Prada” jokes about the fundraiser at Anna Wintour’s house.  Is that how you say it?  Wintar?

MR. BURTON:  Wintour, I think.

Q    How do you reconcile the objects of going to these lavish fundraisers when the economy is what it is?

MR. BURTON:  Well, as you know, the President is doing everything he can to get this economy moving in the right direction.  If you take a look at where we started and where we are now, we’ve obviously been able to make a lot of progress.  The President isn’t satisfied. 

Since you asked about the event today, I do want to point out something that I read in The New York Times today.  It’s a study by two economists, Blinder and Zandi, in which they take a comprehensive look at the American Recovery Act and some of the different things that we’ve done to take on -- to get the economy moving.

In their report, they find that -- these are two separate quotes from the report.  First, “While the effectiveness of any individual element certainly can be debated, there is little doubt that in total, the policy response was highly effective.”  And then secondly, “When all is said and done, the financial and fiscal policies will have cost taxpayers a substantial sum, but not nearly as much as most had feared and not nearly as much as if policy makers had not acted at all.”

And they say specifically that the nation’s gross domestic product would be about 6.5 percent lower this year, and there would be about 8.5 million fewer jobs.

I’m going to get around to the end of your question, but I do want to point out the reason that we’re going to New Jersey is to talk about some of the things that the President has done on the economy and some of the things that he thinks we need to continue on to create an environment where small businesses can create more jobs.  That means increasing lending and making it easier for -- and cutting their taxes.

So obviously we’ve focused on the economy today.  This evening, the President is doing what the President traditionally does, which is helping to raise money for the campaign season as things approach.  I think that, in the same sense, the President has a wide variety of things that he has on his schedule every single day.  Today is one of those days and he’s wearing a couple different hats.

Q    The last thing I had was, does he have any canned jokes for “The View” we should know about?

MR. BURTON:  Maybe.  (Laughter.) 

Q    It’s embargoed till tomorrow.  You can’t give us something we can use today?

MR. BURTON:  Wouldn’t that be weird if I was previewing the jokes?  Then you’ve got Elizabeth Hasselbeck not laughing because she already knows the punch line.  I’m not doing that.

Q    Do you expect her and the President to get along anyway?

MR. BURTON:  I mean, if you look at their last -- the President’s last appearance in March of 2008, I think they had a pretty good discussion.  I suspect that they will again.

Q    March 2008?

MR. BURTON:  March 2008, yes.

Q    The Arizona law goes into effect tomorrow.  I’m assuming the administration is watching that, for anything with the judge coming out.  Do you have anything on Arizona?

MR. BURTON:  I mean, not in particular.  I don’t think that changes how ICE functions or how the Department of Homeland Security sees its role there.

Q    Thank you.

MR. BURTON:  All right, thanks.

END
1:08 P.M. EDT

As President Obama noted before the vote, Republicans had blocked unemployment benefits, small business tax credits—and now legislation to ensure regular people’s voices aren’t drowned out by special interests trying to influence elections. “On issue after issue, we are trying to move America forward,” the President said. “They keep on trying to take us back.”

The Boston Globe reported on yesterday’s Republican obstruction on one of the President’s top priorities:

Senate Republicans defeated legislation yesterday to require more disclosure in campaign spending, ending Democrats’ quest for stronger rules after a Supreme Court ruling this year allowed corporations and unions to spend unlimited sums to influence elections.

The bill had been a high priority for President Obama, who denounced the Supreme Court ruling during his State of the Union address in January, as justices sat silently in the House chamber.

On a party-line, 57-to-41 vote after a heated debate, an effort by Democrats to fight off a Republican filibuster fell short of the 60 votes required. All 40 Republicans in attendance, including Senator Scott Brown of Massachusetts, voted against it....

The legislation was the congressional response to a 5-to-4 Supreme Court ruling in January that struck down limits on corporate and union spending in elections. In the legal case — Citizens United v. the Federal Election Commission — the court ruled that corporations and unions must be treated the same as individuals in campaign spending, recognizing a right to bankroll election activities as an exercise of the First Amendment.

The Supreme Court simultaneously upheld spending disclosure requirements, which Democrats tried to expand with the legislation. The House of Representatives passed a version of the bill last month.

The law would have required corporations and unions to reveal how much they spent on broadcast advertising in federal elections. And corporate CEOs or union heads would have to appear in their ads to take responsibility for the message.

Click here to see the video.

Making useful, easy-to-use information available online is a priority for this Administration.  And putting power back into the hands of Americans is a primary focus for the President.  HealthCare.gov accomplishes both.  So, take a moment and check it out.

And don’t forget to leave your feedback in the yellow boxes throughout the site.  The team at HHS is reviewing them on a regular basis and it’s a great way to help make HealthCare.gov a better resource for all of us.
 

Our thoughts and prayers go out to all of those touched by this horrible accident.  The American people stand with the people of Pakistan in this moment of tragedy.

Yesterday, I joined D.C. Mayor Adrian Fenty, officials from the D.C. office of Housing and Community Development, representatives of Vida Senior Residences – and even some of the building’s future residents – to break ground on an affordable housing development made possible with more than $6.8 million in Recovery Act funding.  When it’s complete, The Vida Senior Residences at Brightwood in Washington, DC will provide 36 affordable apartments for low-income seniors.  And while it’s under construction, this project will create an estimated 55 full-time construction jobs.

As part of the Administration’s Recovery Summer outreach, Treasurer of the United States Rosie Rios joined DC Mayor Adrian Fenty to break ground on the Vida Senior Residences at Brightwood 36-unit affordable apartment building for low-income seniors in D.C. financed with more than $6.8 million in Recovery Act funds. Photo Credit: Sandra Salstrom, Treasury Department.

read more

Today, I joined D.C. Mayor Adrian Fenty, officials from the D.C. office of Housing and Community Development, representatives of Vida Senior Residences – and even some of the building’s future residents – to break ground on an affordable housing development made possible with more than $6.8 million in Recovery Act funding.  When it’s complete, The Vida Senior Residences at Brightwood in Washington, DC will provide 36 affordable apartments for low-income seniors.  And while it’s under construction, this project will create an estimated 55 full-time construction jobs.

As part of the Administration’s Recovery Summer outreach, Treasurer of the United States Rosie Rios joined DC Mayor Adrian Fenty to break ground on the Vida Senior Residences at Brightwood 36-unit affordable apartment building for low-income seniors in D.C. financed with more than $6.8 million in Recovery Act funds. Photo Credit: Sandra Salstrom, Treasury Department.

read more

The LA Times highlighted one of the personal interactions between an OFA volunteer and a first time ‘08 voter—the type of conversation that will happen time and time again leading up to this fall’s elections:

Jordan Love, 22, was standing outside his home with his pit bull Duke when he was approached the other day by a Democratic volunteer canvassing his Carson neighborhood. Love had voted for the first time in 2008, inspired by Barack Obama's campaign, and that has made him a target in 2010.

Lori Noflin, the volunteer, urged him to cast a ballot again this fall and would only walk away after Love signed a card pledging to vote in November.

Voters like Love — first-time and sometimes voters — are a vital voting bloc for Democratic gubernatorial nominee Jerry Brown and incumbent Sen. Barbara Boxer in their election bids, according to political observers in both parties. Both candidates are in dead-heat races, and their fates could rest on these voters, a mercurial bunch whose turnout potential is unpredictable....

Organizing For America, the Democrats' national get-out-the-vote apparatus, has made the president the centerpiece of its message to voters. On a recent Saturday, organizers told volunteers to make Obama and his agenda central to their pitch as they reached out to 2008's first-time voters in their homes and on the phone. More than 330 volunteers sought out 6,000 first-time voters in California that day, and talked to 900 of them.

"We are obviously focusing on first-time 2008 voters… making sure these people are as fired up and ready to go, and get to the polls in 2010," Phil Gaskin, a regional field director, told a handful of volunteers gathered at Lori Noflin's airy Carson home, preparing to canvas neighborhoods and make calls from a phone bank. "It's a whole campaign to keep the president linked to these voters, even though he's not running this year. It's a very, very cool strategy."

Check out the whole article.

Yesterday, we hosted a lively forum at the White House, which brought more than 130 stakeholders– civilian and uniformed officials from the Department of Defense (DOD) and our armed services, policy makers from the Department of Energy (DOE), think tanks, and business entrepreneurs – together for a discussion on the importance of clean energy for our national security.

Secretary of the Navy Ray Mabus, delivered the keynote address, and highlighted not just the great progress happening at the Department of the Navy in terms of greening its fleet, powering its jets with biofuels, and testing new, experimental technology in efficiency and alternative energy, but also underscored just how much further we have to go to ensure our energy independence.  Deputy Secretary Dan Poneman of the Department of Energy echoed these sentiments, and challenged the audience to think about ways in which our challenges might instead be viewed as opportunities for both improved mission capability, and an enhanced energy security.

read more

Secretary of the Navy Ray Mabus, delivered the keynote address, and highlighted not just the great progress happening at the Department of the Navy in terms of greening its fleet, powering its jets with biofuels, and testing new, experimental technology in efficiency and alternative energy, but also underscored just how much further we have to go to ensure our energy independence.  Deputy Secretary Dan Poneman of the Department of Energy echoed these sentiments, and challenged the audience to think about ways in which our challenges might instead be viewed as opportunities for both improved mission capability, and an enhanced energy security.

read more

One important change in the new law is a provision that prevents insurance companies from discriminating against children with pre-existing conditions. This new provision takes effect on September 23 and will bring welcome relief to parents of children with medical conditions who often were denied access to health insurance.

Since this policy was announced, we have had helpful discussions on how to ensure children with pre-existing conditions have access to care, while not disrupting the insurance marketplace.   Some state insurance commissioners expressed concern that, without an open enrollment period that was widely communicated, people might wait until their children got sick to enroll them in coverage, causing plans’ costs to increase. And we were concerned when last week, some indicated that insurance companies would choose to stop offering policies for children rather than cover kids with pre-existing conditions.

Today, the Administration is releasing new guidance to health insurance plans to help ensure children get the high-quality care they need. The new FAQ document notes that insurance companies may establish an open enrollment period for children with pre-existing conditions and makes clear that the Administration will not hesitate to issue regulations if insurance companies unfairly limit access to insurance for children who need it most.   The document also signals that kids with pre-existing conditions should not be shifted from the Children’s’ Health Insurance Program to the individual market in an attempt to reduce State health care spending and that these policies will apply to health plans that start on or after September 23.

Insurance companies have pledged to conduct a significant consumer education campaign to ensure more Americans and their children know about the coverage options that are available to them. And some of the companies that reportedly planned to stop offering policies for children have reversed course and committed to continuing to provide coverage for the youngest Americans.

The Blue Cross Blue Shield Association said the “policy will ensure that children get the comprehensive coverage they need,” and pledged to “work with our Blue Cross and Blue Shield companies on outreach efforts to educate consumers about this new provision.” Blue Cross Blue Shield of Florida said they were “pleased to announce that it will establish a process to resume the sale of Child Only policies.”  

For too long, parents have been forced to worry about what they would do if their child developed a serious medical condition. Others have found that children born with illnesses were forever ineligible for insurance. Thanks the Affordable Care Act, kids will get the care they need and parents will have one less thing to worry about.

To learn more, read the FAQ document.

Nancy-Ann DeParle is Director of the White House Office of Health Reform

A fact sheet on President Obama’s small business jobs proposals is attached.

The small business provisions that the President has put forward will help small businesses like the ones the President will meet with by:

• Providing small banks on Main Street with capital and incentives to lend to small businesses on Main Street, so that these businesses can renew a credit line, purchase new equipment or open a new location.

• Supporting state initiatives like loan guarantee programs that make it easier for creditworthy small businesses to borrow from private sector lenders.

• Creating tax incentives for new investments made by small businesses seeking to expand and grow – allowing, for example, a small business to more quickly receive a deduction on their taxes after purchasing new machinery or equipment.

• Eliminating capital gains taxes on key investments in small businesses, encouraging and rewarding those who invest their capital in smaller firms.

• Continuing successful provisions from the Recovery Act that have helped increase the availability of SBA loans and reduce the fees small businesses pay, while doubling the size of SBA loans small businesses can receive so that they can expand and create new jobs.

The names of the small business owners at the event in New Jersey tomorrow and their stories are below:

• Dave Thornton is a co-owner of the Tastee Sub Shop in Edison, New Jersey.  He and his business partner, Carl Padavano, met in school and have worked at the Edison shop since they were teenagers.  Based on the success of the Edison store, they opened a second Tastee Sub Shop together in South Brunswick, and three years ago Dave opened a third shop in Lawrenceville with his two sons.  Business has remained steady at all three locations despite the recent economic downturn and Dave is optimistic that business will continue to improve. 

• Theo Mastorakos is the owner of a family-run Italian restaurant, Mama Roxy’s, which opened last month in Rochelle Park, New Jersey. Mama Roxy’s received a 504 SBA loan to purchase the land and construct the restaurant. Under the Recovery Act, the 1.5 percent fee of the loan was waived, saving Theo and his family over $20,000 in fees.  The loan enabled the family to open their third restaurant and create 60 new jobs. 

• Tom and Catherine Horsburgh have owned Ridgid Paper Tube Corporation in Wayne, New Jersey, a manufacturer of paper tubes and custom packaging, for almost 30 years.  Ridgid Paper Tube has received a total of four SBA 7(a) loans, two of which were received in 2010 with provisions utilized under the Recovery Act that amounted to fee elimination savings of over $5,000.  The loans allowed Tom and Catherine to purchase the new equipment and materials necessary to expand the sale of their product. Business has grown as a result and they are currently looking to move to a larger facility and plan to hire approximately ten additional employees by the end of the year, almost doubling the size of their current workforce of over 25 employees.  They plan to keep the business in the family and are currently in the process of transitioning management to their son. 

• Brian Bovio is the Operations Manager of his third generation family business, Bovio Advanced Comfort & Energy Solutions in Sicklerville, New Jersey.  As a result of the downturn in the economy, the company began to look for new ways to grow and became involved in the New Jersey Home Performance with ENERGY STAR program which allowed Brian to add an insulation division and transform Bovio Advanced Comfort & Energy Solutions from a traditional heating and air conditioning company to a business focused on providing services to maximize homeowner energy savings.  Since making the transformation, business has been steadily growing and in 2009 Brian hired eight workers and has added an additional four more workers so far this year, bringing the company to 18 employees currently.

BY THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

A PROCLAMATION
 

Today we celebrate the signing of the Military Armistice Agreement at Panmunjom and we honor our servicemembers who fought and died for freedom and democracy in the Korean War.  This year marks the 60th anniversary of the start of the Korean War and the birth of an enduring friendship between the United States and the Republic of Korea that is stronger today than ever before.  Our alliance is rooted in shared sacrifice, common values, mutual interest, and respect, and this partnership is vital to peace and stability in Asia and the world.

Since our Nation's founding, the United States has relied on our Armed Forces to ensure our safety and security at home, and to protect lives and liberties around the globe.  When Communist armies poured across the 38th parallel, threatening the very survival of South Korea, American troops braved unforgiving conditions and rallied to the young republic's defense.  Tens of thousands of our Nation's servicemembers lost their lives, and many more were wounded, declared missing in action, or taken as prisoners of war.  The courageous service and ultimate sacrifices of these patriots and our allied combatants safeguarded a free government and vibrant economy in South Korea, forging a bond between our people that stands strong today.

As we commemorate the 60th anniversary of the outbreak of the Korean War and the eventual conclusion of hostilities at Panmunjom, let us raise our flags high to honor the service and valor of our veterans, to reflect on the principles for which they fought, and to reaffirm the unshakeable bond between South Korea and our Nation.

NOW, THEREFORE, I, BARACK OBAMA, President of the United States of America, by virtue of the authority vested in me by the Constitution and the laws of the United States, do hereby proclaim July 27, 2010, as National Korean War Veterans Armistice Day.  I call upon all Americans to observe this day with appropriate ceremonies and activities that honor our distinguished Korean War veterans.

IN WITNESS WHEREOF, I have hereunto set my hand this twenty-sixth day of July, in the year of our Lord two thousand ten, and of the Independence of the United States of America the two hundred and thirty-fifth.

                                                                                           BARACK OBAMA

President Obama, as only he can, delivered an eloquent, passionate and memorable speech that summed up this historic anniversary. Read the complete remarks here.

Click here to see the video.

President Obama announced the signing of an Executive Order that will make the government a model employer for people with disabilities. He also announced the release of two new rules on the ADA that had not been updated since 1991, explaining that the rules will cover “more than 80,000 state and local government entities, and 7 million private businesses.” The President’s message about this law and our movement resonated with the audience, closing by stating, “[T]hat’s what we did with the ADA. That is what we do today. And that’s what we’re going to do tomorrow -- together.”

Notably, however, other observance activities were taking place elsewhere. The Department of Justice released the new regulations on its website. FEMA Administrator Fugate wrote a wonderful op-ed for CNN on the importance of emergency preparedness for people with disabilities. Education Secretary Duncan joined so many others throughout the administration by releasing a statement noting that this anniversary is a “cause for celebration and rededication to equal education opportunity for students with disabilities.” On a personal level, I discussed the impact of the Americans with Disabilities Act on Yahoo! Accessibility.

Also on Monday, the Ad Council launched a Public Service Announcement featuring a message from the President. The President also released a proclamation in commemoration of the 20th anniversary.

All and all, it was a truly historic day, once again illustrating it’s a new day for people with disabilities and the President is leading the way forward. I urge all to take time to remember those like Senator Kennedy, Justin Dart and so many more who made the ADA possible. Then reflect on the numerous steps forward we’ve taken and get ready for the work ahead because more remains to be done.

President Barack Obama delivers remarks before he signs an Executive Order increasing federal employment of individuals with disabilities, during an event commemorating the 20th anniversary of the Americans with Disabilities Act on the South Lawn of the White House.

President Barack Obama signs Executive Order increasing federal employment of individuals with disabilities, during an event commemorating the 20th anniversary of the Americans with Disabilities Act on the South Lawn of the White House.

Kareem Dale is Special Assistant to the President for Disability Policy

H.J.Res. 83, which renews the import restrictions contained in the Burmese Freedom and Democracy Act.

H.R. 689, the “Shasta-Trinity National Forest Administrative Jurisdiction Transfer Act,” which transfers the administrative jurisdiction of certain Federal lands located in northern California, between the Department of Agriculture’s Forest Service and the Department of the Interiors’s Bureau of Land Management.

H.R. 3360, the “Cruise Vessel Security and Safety Act of 2010,” which establishes security and safety requirements for passenger cruise vessels.

H.R. 4840, which designates the facility of the United States Postal Service located in Columbus, Ohio, as the Clarence D. Lumpkin Post Office.

H.R. 5502, which allows issuers of gift certificates, store gift cards, and general-use prepaid cards to issue certificates or cards produced prior to April 1, 2010, that do not meet disclosure requirements scheduled to be effective on August 22, 2010, until January 31, 2011, subject to specified conditions.

This past Friday OFA volunteers and staff participated in the Netroots Nation conference by holding a voter registration canvass with Netroots attendees. OFA volunteers and staff met at the Rio Hotel and quickly, and efficiently, gave a brief overview of how to register voters and then drove to a nearby neighborhood and went to work in 110+ degree weather. Local OFA volunteers were joined by Netroots participants and speakers from coast-to-coast including a community organizer, Janice C., from New York. OFA staff from Washington D.C. participating and presenting on panels at the conference. Joining us from D.C. were; Natalie Foster, DNC New Media Director, and Greg Greene, DNC Online Outreach Manager, helping out to register voters.

Sporting newly produced union t-shirts, from PDQ Printing, with OFA-NV social media sites emblazoned in blue, teams dispersed into several apartment complexes near the hotel and went door-to-door asking people if they were registered to vote and for their commitment to vote in the 2010 election through our commitment cards.

Although it was the early afternoon and the temperature had already reached the triple digits mark, volunteers came out and walked up and down the stairs at apartment complexes and canvassed a local Latino neighborhood.

A volunteer from Berkley, California said she was inspired to see the local volunteers so passionate about canvassing, despite the intense heat and vowed to do more when she returned home.

Through all the hard work and effort, the team was able to register 9 new Democratic voters and gather 24 Vote 2010 commitment cards.  In order to win in November there will need to be many more doors knocked and voter contacted.  We can’t do it alone.  OFA needs your help now more than ever.  To get involved now please email us at OFANevada@dnc.org.

Find an Event Near You: CLICK HERE          

Follow Organizing for America Nevada on Twitter: CLICK HERE   

Become a Supporter of Organizing for America Nevada on Facebook: CLICK HERE

This past Friday OFA volunteers and staff participated in the Netroots Nation conference by holding a voter registration canvass with Netroots attendees. OFA volunteers and staff met at the Rio Hotel and quickly, and efficiently, gave a brief overview of how to register voters and then drove to a nearby neighborhood and went to work in 110+ degree weather. Local OFA volunteers were joined by Netroots participants and speakers from coast-to-coast including a community organizer, Janice C., from New York. Also joining in the effort were OFA staff from Washington D.C. participating, and presenting, on panels at the conference. D.C. staff included; Natalie Foster, DNC New Media Director, and Greg Greene, DNC Online Outreach Manager.

Sporting newly produced union t-shirts, from PDQ Printing, with OFA-NV social media sites emblazoned in blue, teams dispersed into several apartment complexes near the hotel and went door-to-door asking people if they were registered to vote and for their commitment to vote in the 2010 election through our commitment cards.

Although it was the early afternoon and the temperature had already reached the triple digits mark, volunteers came out and walked up and down the stairs at apartment complexes and canvassed the Latino neighborhood.

A volunteer from Berkley, California said she was inspired to see the local volunteers so passionate about canvassing, despite the intense heat and vowed to do more when she returned home.

Through all the hard work and effort, the team was able to register 9 new Democratic voters and gather 24 Vote 2010 commitment cards.  In order to win in November there will need to be many more doors knocked and voter contacted.  We can’t do it alone.  OFA needs your help now more than ever.  To get involved now please email us at OFANevada@dnc.org.

Find an Event Near You: CLICK HERE     

Follow Organizing for America Nevada on Twitter: CLICK HERE   

Become a Supporter of Organizing for America Nevada on Facebook: CLICK HERE

Anthony Bryk, of California, to be a Member of the Board of Directors of the National Board for Education Sciences for a term expiring November 28, 2015. (Reappointment)

Julie A. Reiskin, of Colorado, to be a Member of the Board of Directors of the Legal Services Corporation for a term expiring July 13, 2013. (Reappointment)

     MR. GIBBS:  Take us away.

     Q    Got nothing else in mind?  You didn’t give me -- you didn’t buy me the time there.

     MR. GIBBS:  No opening statements.

     Q    I wanted to ask you about the President’s statement that he wants to keep pushing for a broad climate bill, energy bill.  Is that something that came up in the meeting?  Was there any sort of new way forward?  And why is he stressing this now?  I mean, the bill was essentially dead for the year.

     MR. GIBBS:  Well, I wouldn’t say that the -- I don’t think the bill is essentially dead for the year.  The House passed a very strong and very comprehensive energy bill last year.  The Senate is going to take up a version that is more scaled down but still has some important aspects, particularly dealing with how we deal with oil spills in the future.

     But I don’t think that closes the door -- once a bill passes, each House doesn’t close the door to having some sort of conference.

     Q    Well, let me phrase it a different way then.  What does he plan to do now to push for it, as he said he wanted to do, that he didn’t do up to now?

     MR. GIBBS:  Well, first and foremost, I mean, they talked about making sure that before the Senate leaves we get -- we do get some energy bill through the Senate.  Again, there’s --

     Q    You can’t really call that a broad energy bill; it’s pretty narrow.

     MR. GIBBS:  I’m not suggesting that.  I don’t think anybody in the meeting did.  I think what -- again, what I’m suggesting is what -- if you need to sneeze, go ahead.  (Laughter.)     Q    Do it the right way.

     MR. GIBBS:  I don’t want to be responsible for not letting you sneeze, for goodness’ sakes.  (Laughter.)  Sorry.  Yes, I was going to say.  No, but, again, you’ve got one bill that passes the House; you’ll have a different bill that passes the Senate.  And then there will be an opportunity to reconcile those two differing bills.

     Q    So is there some hope that a conference committee would produce something broad?

     MR. GIBBS:  I certainly wouldn’t rule it out.  Anything else?

     Q    I’m good.  (Laughter.)

     MR. GIBBS:  Okay.  Ease back into it, right?     Q    Robert, BP has said it’s going to offset the cost of the oil spill against its taxes.  Does the White House have an opinion on that?  This is legal, but is it right?      MR. GIBBS:  Well, look, first and foremost, American taxpayers will not be responsible for any costs related to the spill.  The administration will ensure that any action that BP takes is -- respects the law as it is.  And I think more than anything, Jeff, what we’ve seen over the discussion over the past sort of 24 hours as BP has changed leadership is the role that BP has to -- in the administration’s eye and I think in the eyes of those on the Gulf -- has to continue to play in capping the well, and then after the well is capped, for responding to the damage that’s been caused and to adequately compensate those who have been harmed.

     And I think more than anything, that’s what the American people are looking for and I think that’s what the people of the Gulf are looking for, is a continued commitment by BP that even after the well is closed -- obviously right now the sealing cap remains on and by all estimations, sometime this weekend -- later in the weekend, early next week -- the next effort will be made to pump mud through the choke and kill lines and, once and for all, kill the well.

     Q    This offset will cost U.S. taxpayers about $10 billion.  Is that something you would prefer that they not do?  If they --

     MR. GIBBS:  Jeff, I don’t think anybody would prefer that they do that.  There are tax laws in this country that have been written for quite some time.

     Q    But can you -- I mean, you could say to the company, we would prefer that you not do this.  Will do you that?

     MR. GIBBS:  Again, I don’t think anybody -- Jeff, if I could wave the magic wand, we would never have had a big oil spill in the Gulf.

     Q    Robert, two questions.  Staying on BP for a second, now that Mr. Dudley will take over, does the President have any plans to reach out to him, to have any one-on-one meetings with him?  Has the White House made any effort in that regard?

     MR. GIBBS:  Well, the President had an opportunity to -- Mr. Dudley was part of the negotiations that took place here a few weeks ago.  The President had an opportunity to talk to the chairman of the board yesterday about their change in leadership.  And, again, our concern is not who heads BP.  Mr. Hayward is leaving.  The key is that BP can’t leave, and should not leave, the Gulf.  That is our viewpoint.  I think that’s the viewpoint of everyone that’s involved, that they have obligations and responsibilities as the responsible party in this instance that have to be met regardless of who the CEO is or who the chair of the company is.

     Q    Surely the President, though, has an opinion on Mr. Dudley, especially if they’ve met in person.  Does the White House think this is a good choice or a bad choice?

     MR. GIBBS:  I’m not going to get into -- and the White House isn’t going to get into -- picking who the CEO of this company is.  Our opinion of the CEO is immaterial to the notion that we’re going to hold that CEO, whomever it is, and the chair and the entire board responsible for the damage that’s been caused, the obligations that they have to fulfill, the money that they will owe the federal government in penalties; the $20 billion in escrow that they will have to continue to pay into; the $100 million that they’ve put up for rig workers as part of the oil moratorium; and also, the natural resource damage assessments, which will come a little bit later in that process.     Q    Moving on to war funding, we heard the President publicly push for this today.  Is he doing anything behind the scenes to try to get more Democrats to vote for this bill?  A significant number it seems will not vote for this.  Why does the White House think the party is so divided on this?

     MR. GIBBS:  Well, I don’t think that’s a new thing.  I think if you look back at war funding that goes back to six or eight years, there have been splits in the Democratic Party.  I don’t -- Chairman Obey announced he was going to vote against war funding today.  It’s an announcement, quite frankly, that he made quite some time ago.     So I think the President believes that -- and talked extensively in the campaign -- about the fact that we did not have a winning strategy in Afghanistan.  Coming into office, we spent a large chunk of time reviewing and creating a strategy that we believed had an opportunity to be successful.  Those troops are on their way in and by the end of August will all be in place.  And as he said in his statement, that’s the strategy he believes Congress should in the supplemental and will approve funding for this evening.

     Q    That opposition might not be new, but the strategy is new.  Should the President be doing something else to convey the message to people in his own party as to why they should support this?

     MR. GIBBS:  I don’t -- I will say this, I don’t know how many of the Democrats that -- there are Democrats that have been opposed to involvement in Afghanistan a lot longer than we’ve been here.

     Yes, sir.

     Q    Robert, can I ask on BP, when the President spoke to the chairman of the board, did he express any concern or outrage about the golden parachute that Tony Hayward is getting?

     MR. GIBBS:  I don’t have a readout from the call.  I know the call took place, but I don’t have a readout.

     Q    Do you have any sense of outrage?  Is there going to be any pressure on BP?  When people in the Gulf are suffering --

     MR. GIBBS:  I don’t want to -- I don’t want to talk about a call I don’t --

     Q    -- he’s walking away with $18 million.

     MR. GIBBS:  I don’t want to talk about a call I don’t have some direct knowledge of.

     Q    No, but what about your sense of -- do you have any sense of outrage?

     MR. GIBBS:  Well, I would have to see if it was brought up on the call.     Q    I wonder, in the Rose Garden, a couple quick things.  The President was talking about how he focused on getting small business -- the small business bill through, that it’s an urgent priority.  But when Senator Reid decided to put the small business bill aside to move on to the DISCLOSE Act, the campaign finance reform bill, isn’t that delaying getting the small business bill passed when as you’ve acknowledged --

     MR. GIBBS:  Well, I think they’ll take that --

     Q    -- there’s a small window of passage?

     MR. GIBBS:  I think they’ll take that up if -- I think the DISCLOSE Act is likely not to get cloture largely because Senator McConnell has made sure that the bill is not going to get cloture.  I think the Democratic leader will likely take that bill up pretty quickly --

     Q    They’re saying he’s spending valuable time on a bill that’s not going to pass when the President is saying he’s got an urgent priority to get the small business bill passed.

     MR. GIBBS:  Well, and let’s be clear, Ed, we’ve been working on this bill for quite some time.  Remember, if you had a nickel for every time you heard the Republicans talk about helping small business, you’d be in the upper -- you probably are, but you’d certainly be in the uppermost tax income bracket, right?  Why then on Earth would it take a cloture vote to get additional lending to go to community banks in order to get it to small businesses to create jobs?  I mean, there’s -- look, there’s a lot going on on Capitol Hill.  I think the notion that somehow Harry Reid has set up procedural hurdles that don’t allow something like this to finish is -- doesn’t adequately capture sort of reality.

     Q    Also in the Rose Garden, finally, the President was talking about the WikiLeaks story and was saying that one of the things that he’s brought is greater accountability to both Afghanistan and Pakistan.  You said yesterday the President has also talked about no blank check for Pakistan.  And yet the President a few months ago signed the Kerry-Lugar bill into law that’s providing I think $7.5 billion of U.S. taxpayer aid to Pakistan when these documents that are leaked out are suggesting Pakistan and their intelligence service has these deep ties to the Taliban, maybe plotting attacks against U.S. soldiers, as well as Afghan leaders --

     MR. GIBBS:  I think we covered this yesterday, Ed.

     Q    -- which we talked about yesterday, right?

     MR. GIBBS:  Yes.

     Q    Isn’t -- doesn’t that sound like a blank check, though, when you’re still providing $7.5 billion to Pakistan when this is still going on?

     MR. GIBBS:  Let’s get Ed some -- we can get you a copy of the legislation in which -- Ed, I don’t know if you remember when we -- when this bill was happening, there was quite a bit of consternation in both of those countries about what had to be done in order to get that.  We’ll get you a copy of the bill so you can become more familiar --

     Q    Why are they still talking to the Taliban if there’s such a great check on Pakistan right now?  Why is their intelligence service still allegedly meeting --

     MR. GIBBS:  Ed, Ed, again, I thought we covered this fairly adequately yesterday, but --

     Q    You talked about it, but if this still -- do you think the ties are over between the Taliban and Pakistan so it’s a done deal?

     MR. GIBBS:  No, again -- and I answered that -- can we also get Ed a transcript from yesterday?  Ed, I said yesterday that -- and I think your network has likely covered the historical connection between the two.  I think your network has probably also covered the fact that we’ve made progress in this relationship.  But as I said yesterday -- and again, we’ll get you that transcript, Ed -- nobody is here to say that all of our problems dealing with Afghanistan and Pakistan are finished.     I don’t -- that’s not this administration.  We haven’t told you that everything is all fine and hunky-dory.  That’s quite the opposite of what we’ve said.  We came into office understanding that for seven years, as the President said today, a strategy had been under-resourced and under-funded, right?  A commanding general sat in Afghanistan and said he needed more troops, despite the fact that no troops came, right?  We’ve tripled the number of troops and resources in Afghanistan.  We’ve created a new strategy that includes how to deal with Pakistan.

     So I’m not here to tell you, as I told you yesterday, that all our problems are solved, but we’re making progress.

     Q    Can I follow, Robert, please?

     Q    In the Rose Garden the President mentioned that he talked to Senate Minority Leader McConnell about the lethargic pace of judicial confirmations.     MR. GIBBS:  Yes.

     Q    Did he mention the possibility of making recess appointments?

     MR. GIBBS:  In fact, Mitch McConnell brought that up.

     Q    And what was said?

     MR. GIBBS:  They just discussed -- right now there are 12 judges that have passed the Judiciary Committee unanimously that await Senate confirmation.  And the President asked Senator McConnell why those 12 judges couldn’t be approved before the Senate left in a little more than a week, given the fact that the Judiciary Committee, which examines closely the qualifications of those nominated for judgeships -- why nobody found any objection to any of those 12.     There was some discussion -- the President was I think somewhat pointed in discussing with the Minority Leader the notion that the confirmation process is -- has broken down to a point that I think we really haven’t seen in Congress dealing with the Executive Branch ever.  And that was discussed.

     Q    But the aspects of the specific idea of having recess appointments?

     MR. GIBBS:  They did not get into the specifics of what that might be, but the President said his decisions on recess appointments would be made based on the decisions that the Senate minority made in clearing the nominees that this government needs in order to conduct everyday business for men and women in America.

     Q    So it’s an open tool that he has at his disposal?

     MR. GIBBS:  No, it is up to the Minority Leader in the Senate to determine the degree to which action is undertaken on important nominees.  Again, I’ve used this example before -- I don’t have the exact timeline in front of me -- but when the head of the GSA has to get cloture, and then a vote is delayed for months and months and months, only to be approved unanimously, one has to ask, why the delay?  Is there any delay -- is there any reason other than partisan politics?

     Q    I’d like to broaden that out a little bit, because you’ve mentioned cloture votes a couple times already.  This past weekend, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid brought up the idea for the second time in favor of filibuster reform, and that was seconded by various Senate candidates who are running for office, as well as senators themselves.  I’m wondering if that came up in the conversation and/or what your thoughts are on the growing support for that in the Congress?

     MR. GIBBS:  I have not seen what -- I have not seen any of the specific proposals or I haven’t looked closely at them.  It was not something that came up in the meeting.

     Q    And then finally, the consumer protection agency board, I know we’ve talked a lot about Elizabeth Warren, but when exactly should we expect the President to make an appointment?

     MR. GIBBS:  I don’t have an exact timeline.  I don’t  -- as I said here yesterday, I don’t expect that an appointment is imminent.

     Q    Thank you.

     Q    Robert, when the President has talked about Afghanistan in recent months it’s been when kind of his hand was forced -- during the McChrystal situation, handover to Petreaus, and this situation --

     MR. GIBBS:  I don’t think --

     Q    -- it’s when there’s news that he’s responding to.

     MR. GIBBS:  I don’t think that’s true, Chip.  I mean, at the end of March, the President traveled to Afghanistan.  That was not something we were forced to do; that was something that the President wanted to do.  And then in May of this year, President Karzai visited the White House upon the President’s invitation.  That was hardly something that was foisted upon the President.

     Q    Is that enough?  I mean, why isn’t he out there talking about this every week on something that is so important to this nation and to him personally and politically?

     MR. GIBBS:  You know, Chip, I think the President has --

     Q    And with polls showing public support declining on a pretty steady basis.

     MR. GIBBS:  We don’t make decisions on what we talk about based on polling.

     Q    But you need the support of the American people to wage a war.  And you don’t have it and you’re losing it.

     MR. GIBBS:  Well, Chip, we have dedicated an awful lot of time to this.  I will point out, Chip, that last -- was it last week? -- the leaders of the two largest coalition members in Afghanistan, the two largest coalition partners that make up our international force there, were standing in front of you guys, took four questions, and not one of them was on Afghanistan.  Much, I will say, to the surprise of both myself and to my British counterpart, who, I think we both had in our segments discussions about Afghanistan.

I appreciate, Chip, that the intricacies of this war have not necessarily been followed.Q    We would love to have had more than two questions per side.  That would have been a wonderful thing.

MR. GIBBS:  Well, I like that the --

Q    Guarantee you you would have gotten an Afghan question.

MR. GIBBS:  I like that the fifth most important topic that you had on your mind that day was the 100,000 --

Q    I don’t remember you calling on me.

MR. GIBBS:  I’m generalizing and lumping you guys all together --

Q    I don’t think you can do that.

     Q    Really?  You’re generalizing the media?  You’ve never done that before.

     Q    I’m shocked that you would do that, accuse us all --

     Q    Shocked, shocked.

     Q    -- of one person’s sins.

     MR. GIBBS:  That’s good, good.  Jonathan.

     Q    I can’t believe that you would do that.

     MR. GIBBS:  No, I don’t want to -- I’m lumping your questions in with Chip.

     Jonathan.

     (Laughter.)     Q    Wow.

     Q    Now, that’s -- come on -- now, that’s --

     MR. GIBBS:  What do you mean?  I just -- I generalized.  You TV guys all look shiny together.

     Q    That’s just a silly -- that’s a silly diss, come on.

     MR. GIBBS:  No, I -- go ahead, Jonathan.

     Q    Chuck, I think it’s your turn.

     Q    Chuck, I am deferring to you.  (Laughter.)

     Q    Thank you, Jonathan.

     MR. GIBBS:  I’ll go to Mark next.  Jonathan.  I’m just teasing, guys.  Grow some skin that’s a little thicker than -- look past --

     Q    It’s a two-way street on the thick skin.

     MR. GIBBS:  Yes, I -- (laughter) -- I see how you were pouting just only moments ago.  Please get Chuck -- (laughter.)  Please, please --

     Q    I don’t think I was.  Everybody else seemed to be.  Anyway.  Actually, let me just follow on something that Chip said.  Does public opinion matter in waging a war?  How much does it matter in waging a war?

     MR. GIBBS:  I think that -- I think you have to -- I think obviously public opinion matters quite a bit when you have forces in harm’s way.  I will say this, Chuck, at the same time you can’t just make popular decisions.  You can’t just decide that if it’s too hard to do something because public opinion is against it, I don’t think you’d make a lot of decisions certainly when you have to deal with crises.  I don’t -- so, look, obviously, while important, I don’t think it’s the only determinative factor.

     Q    Was it -- did it come up -- did the whole WikiLeaks thing and the issue of sort of the effect it could have on public opinion on the war, and therefore on members of Congress, did that come up in this meeting today?

     MR. GIBBS:  No.

     Q    No discussion?

     MR. GIBBS:  No.

     Q    And one more thing --

     MR. GIBBS:  I think largely, Chuck -- if I can, I think that’s largely because, again, the content of what was in the WikiLeaks has been addressed on the record by a lot of members of this administration prior to the documents being put online.

     Q    We’ve seen two sort of pieces of response on WikiLeaks from the administration.  One is nothing new in there.  And the second thing is that the release of this potentially put some operations in harm’s way.  When you guys are looking through this, do you think that some of the level of secrecy was maybe too much, that some of this stuff that was marked top secret --

     MR. GIBBS:  Well, again --

     Q    -- maybe shouldn’t have been?

     MR. GIBBS:  Chuck, I got this question yesterday.  And I’m not an expert on classification.  I don’t -- and I’m certainly not in danger of becoming one.  I would just say this, that -- look, there’s -- when somebody marks something top secret or classified, it’s not an option, right?     I mean, certainly some people I guess could go back in the annals of history and look through the classification process, but once -- look, to handle any kind of information like that within the administration requires -- you have to -- there’s a training process that goes along with handling it.  There is -- I think you’ve probably seen in my office and other offices, there are safes for keeping this kind of information in an office that is traveled by people other than those in the administration.

     So, look, I don’t -- I’m not here to discuss what role classification is.  There’s a fairly strict law.  And those that have access to classified information can either comply with that law or live with the consequences of not.

     Q    Something I wanted to follow up on Jennifer’s question.  Are we to interpret the President’s remarks today on energy -- so he specifically used the phrase “energy reform,” sort of saying he will accept something out of the Senate that doesn’t have climate in it, which is a little bit of a change from where you guys were six months ago -- is that fair?

     MR. GIBBS:  Well, Chuck, I think that if you -- I think that’s an acknowledgement that you got to have 60 votes to get something through the Senate.  You got to have --

     Q    So you take what you can get, is what you’re saying.  On energy you’re going to --

     MR. GIBBS:  You got to have 60 votes to get your GSA nominee through the Senate, let alone a comprehensive immigration reform, so I think it’s largely an acknowledgement that -- certainly given 41 Republican senators, there are not 60 votes for that bill.

     Q    So basically you’ll take an energy reform bill now and then go and try to do a climate bill later?

     MR. GIBBS:  Well, again, there’s -- well, no, I think the process is you get an energy bill through the Senate, then you can you conference that legislation with the House.

     Q    During lame duck?

     MR. GIBBS:  No, we could do it in September.

     Jonathan.

     Q    Speaking of during September, last week, Vice President Biden was at a fundraiser in North Carolina and he said the heavy legislative lifting was over and now was the time to sell what you have passed.  Today, the President urged members of Congress not to be overwhelmed by the political season, even though he’s actually doing a number of political events and fundraisers this week and next week.  Is it realistic -- and is it even wise -- to expect Congress during a very heated political season to come back in September and do some of these big things?  How realistic do you think that is?

     MR. GIBBS:  Look, there -- I don’t know what -- how many weeks they’ll come back, but I assume they’re coming back to do legislative business.  I assume we’re going to have debates on policy issues, some of which won’t get finished until -- won’t get finished in time for an election, and they’ll be the basis for some of the discussion in that election.  But I think there are -- there’s certainly work left to be done.  If we don’t get a small business bill through by the time the House and the Senate leave, the President would certainly expect that we get that done soon.

     Q    Is the small business -- besides the small business bill, are there any actual “must passes” on the President’s list that he absolutely wants to get done in September and early October?

     MR. GIBBS:  Well, look, again, I think that well before an oil spill you would have said getting energy legislation done is important.  I think Speaker Pelosi made the point today that regardless of whether you have an oil spill or not, it doesn’t change the fact that you’re sending a billion dollars overseas in foreign oil, which is -- Senator Reid’s legislation addresses natural gas, addresses electric cars, and obviously that’s the basis for moving energy forward.

     Q    And does the President still believe that a lame duck session should take up the recommendations of the deficit commission and pass what could be very monumental legislation?

     MR. GIBBS:  Well, I think that once we have those recommendations, they will be considered.  I don’t know what the schedule of Congress will be.  Look, I’d point that Senator Cornyn just a week or so ago leaned in on the fiscal commission as a part of the solution for the deficit.  So it doesn’t appear to be simply one party that is waiting for the recommendations of a fiscal commission.

     Mark.

     Q    Robert, did the Kagan nomination come up in the leaders’ meeting?

     MR. GIBBS:  It did not.

     Q    Does the President expect it next week, the confirmation?

     MR. GIBBS:  The confirmation that the vote will happen and that we’ll have a new Supreme Court justice, yes.

     Q    And tonight, the President is doing a DNC event and two tomorrow in New York City, and yet they’re all closed to press coverage.  Why is that?

     MR. GIBBS:  We make open the events in which the President is going to speak.  I think he’s speaking at one tomorrow; I will double-check on that one.  That is open for pool coverage.

     Q    Tomorrow, on the speech on the economy, obviously he’s going to be talking about small business.  But is he going to address the economy in a larger sense, such as the deficit numbers and the growth projections that came up in the budget review last week?  Are we going to hear anything new on the economy?

     MR. GIBBS:  I don’t know that the President gets into the mid-session review, not that I’m aware of.  I think the President will continue to push that Congress take up and finish the small business bill.  That, I think, will be the thrust of his remarks, the thrust of his remarks on that tomorrow.

     Q    Nothing beyond, really, on the economy in general?

     MR. GIBBS:  Well, I think creating jobs and small businesses would fall into that category.

     Wendell.

     Q    Congress is considering another emergency funding bill for Afghanistan.  The President wanted to put those things on the budget in the campaign.  Why hasn’t he been able to?

     MR. GIBBS:  Well, we have -- we would certainly like to, and it would be good if Congress could do that.  It hasn’t always been that way.  And, Wendell, this is a newer strategy.  This is -- the President has dedicated an increased number of troops and an increased number of resources that was outside the normal budget bill.

     Q    So you’re saying that the -- the plus, the addition, the tripling the number of troops in Afghanistan --

     MR. GIBBS:  I’d say that as a result of the fact that the President has created a strategy that finally allows us to have the resources necessary to have success in Afghanistan.     Q    You realize that suggests the same explanation former President Bush gave, which was --

     MR. GIBBS:  No, I don’t think President Bush ever gave the suggestion that there were enough troops -- if they gave the suggestion that there were enough troops in Afghanistan to do the job --

     Q    For Iraq.  Allow me to be clear, for not putting the costs of Iraq on the budget.  It was ongoing, we’re increasing the troops, you can’t anticipate, we have to do it -- we’ll do it in emergency spending.  That’s the same argument.

     MR. GIBBS:  No, because we’re -- at the end of next month, we won’t have combat troops in Iraq, so it’s decidedly different.

     Q    So you won’t be asking for another supplemental emergency spending bill for Afghanistan?

     MR. GIBBS:  Look, I’m dealing with what we’re dealing with now in Capitol Hill.  I can’t project what the next one is.

     Q    On Afghanistan, follow?

     Q    Robert, in the meeting with the congressional leaders, did tax cuts, the extension of the Bush tax cuts, come up?

     MR. GIBBS:  Yes.  Yes.     Q    Could you talk a little about that?  Who brought it up and --

     MR. GIBBS:  I can’t remember who brought it up, but I think you would not be surprised at -- along the lines of where that discussion was.  The President said that, as he had committed to in the campaign, he would not allow the tax cuts for the middle class to expire.  I’ll let Congressman Boehner unwind his eloquent argument for preserving the tax cuts for those that are quite wealthy.  I don’t think the President believes -- I don’t think there’s an economist that believes there’s a stimulative effect to -- or a good reason in terms of economic growth to extend those tax cuts, particularly given the choice that one has to make about the budget deficit.

     Q    How much discussion was there and what was the sort of tone of it, the give and take?

     MR. GIBBS:  Look, I mean, it was very much -- look, I don’t think the argument, quite frankly, is different than the one we had in -- for most of 2008, and that is the choices that one has to make on where you put your thumb -- do you put it on the side of the middle class or do you put it on the side of those that are decidedly above the middle class?

     Q    May I follow up?

     MR. GIBBS:  Sure.

     Q    About a week and a half ago, the co-chairman of the fiscal commission came out at a jobs summit and they said basically it’s a slim to none chance that you’re going to get 14 out of 18 votes to approve these recommendations.  And given that --

     MR. GIBBS:  To approve which recommendations?

     Q    The fiscal commission recommendations in December.  And given that, and given the concern over the deficit, what possibly could you pass in terms of tax cuts after the election other than middle class or a temporary extension to everything?

     MR. GIBBS:  Well, look, the President and his team have not argued for extending the high-end Bush tax cuts.  That’s not an argument that people have made in this building, and it’s not an argument that’s -- not an argument that’s going to be made.  I think the Secretary of Treasury spoke pretty clearly to this on Sunday on both shows.  And the President made a commitment not to raise taxes on the middle class and believes that those middle-class tax cuts should be preserved.     But I’ll let the Republicans, again, lay out their case for extending high-earner income tax cuts and how they’d like to square their statements on the budget deficit as that goes.

     Q    But if you have a cloud over long-term fiscal certainty in December after the election, and the big issue right now is even to decide to what extent to do tax cuts prior to the election, doesn’t that, frankly, work in your favor, not to have recommendations by the fiscal commission?

     MR. GIBBS:  Well, look, I’m not going to prejudge where the fiscal commission could end up.  Regardless of whether you have a fiscal commission or not, understand that, as I think you all do, that the 10-year Bush tax cuts were structured so that December -- at midnight December 31, 2010, they all expire.  So regardless of the fiscal commission and its existence or not, and regardless of the ability with which its 18 votes can be structured to pass a recommendation, this is something that is going to have to be dealt with regardless of that.

     Did you have --

     Q    Yes, just to wrap it up -- you said Boehner made his case.  Did the President make a case for letting them lapse for the richest taxpayers beyond what you said about him reminding them that he had campaigned on this?  Did he bring it into the present, make an economic argument --

     MR. GIBBS:  Absolutely.  The President believes that, as, again, as you heard the Secretary of Treasury this weekend say quite clearly, that there are tax cuts that, based on our fiscal situation, simply can’t be afforded.  And we are not in favor of extending the high-earner Bush tax cuts.  Those will -- we believe those should lapse.

     Q    Did he challenge them to address how it is that they are now arguing for stimulus when they’ve opposed his ideas for stimulus in the past --

     MR. GIBBS:  Yes, there was a little discussion about -- I mean, again, I think -- again, don’t take our word for it; I think if you look at -- I think if you were to ask any economist what the economic impact of those high-earner tax cuts are versus, for instance, the President’s concept of Make Work Pay, which is, for 95 percent of working families, a tax cut, the stimulative effects are quite different.

     Q    Robert, John and Mark made reference to the fundraisers tonight, tomorrow, and I guess we’ve got more on Friday.  Is this kind of the beginning of the President’s campaign in terms of the fall elections and --

     MR. GIBBS:  No, I think he’s been doing this for quite some time.

     Q    Oh, I realize he has been doing some, but --

     MR. GIBBS:  You asked me if it was the beginning.

     Q    This is a lot -- this is a lot all of a sudden.  There’s more coming up on the schedule.

     MR. GIBBS:  Yes.  I mean, I don’t think it’s news to say we’re getting closer to the election.  I don’t think it’s also news -- as I said a minute ago, I don’t think it’s news that -- this is not the first or certainly the last that he’ll do.     Q    Going on “The View” to talk about Afghanistan?

     MR. GIBBS:  Going on “The View” to talk about whatever the hosts on “The View” ask the President of the United States.  I don’t doubt that -- I’m not a regular watcher, but I am of the opinion that they’re -- I’m of the opinion that they have strong views and I’m sure they’ll ask the President.

     Look, I think it is another opportunity for the President to talk to people where they are.  We made a decision to put the President on Jay Leno, David Letterman, “The View,” because that’s where -- people have busy lives and it’s best to go where they are.  And I think that’s what the President will do tomorrow.

     Q    Local reporters are talking about that in -- apparently, the event in New Jersey is in a sandwich shop, a sub shop, a famous sub shop.  Is that also trying to get close to people -- grassroots?

     MR. GIBBS:  No, I think that’s an opportunity to talk about moving a small business -- small business legislation forward so that -- look, for the better part of the last year and a half, the biggest problem that we’ve had particularly with small business is ensuring that they have access to the type of capital and credit that’s necessary not just to simply meet a payroll, but to take advantage of the beginnings of economic growth and changes in consumer demand by expanding.  And having access to that credit is tremendously important.

     The community bankers believe -- are certainly supportive of money to community banks that can be lent directly to small businesses.Yes, sir.

     Q    Robert, you said a minute ago that the President doesn’t believe we can afford to extend the tax cuts for the high-income.  Does he think the country can afford to extend the tax cuts for everybody else?

     MR. GIBBS:  I believe the President believes that raising taxes on the middle class during this economic time would not make a lot of economic sense.  And I think if you go back to the campaign, the President made that pledge not simply to make that pledge, but to make that pledge because for years and years and years we’d watched jobs being shed, wages either flat or declining, and that now is neither the time nor the place to raise taxes on them.

     Q    But he thinks, given the fiscal situation, the country can afford to extend those tax cuts?

     MR. GIBBS:  Yes, and -- as at the same time, we begin to look at our medium- and long-term fiscal threats.     Yes.

     Q    Robert, can you comment on the report by the Inspector General for the reconstruction of Iraq that billions of dollars have been missing and there’s a very poor system of oversight and liability?  And also, can you tell us what does it mean for you, since you’re shifting from the military focus to reconstruction and building Iraq?

     MR. GIBBS:  Well, again, and I would -- this is a report that covers the time period of 2003 to -- as I understand it, 2003 to 2004.  I’d point you over to some in the Department of Defense that have worked on that.

     I will say this.  This is why the President has pledged greater accountability.  This is why the President has undertaken contract reform and why we can’t have -- why we can’t have, as he said, in Afghanistan and Pakistan, blank checks.

     Yes, ma’am.     Q    Robert, you touched earlier on polling as it relates to Afghanistan.  But broadening that a bit, the President’s numbers have slid recently among several key groups from Hispanics, to whites, to men, independents.  Does that matter?  Does that make it tougher to get his agenda through Congress?

     MR. GIBBS:  Look, I was asked specifically about the impact of public opinion on the war.  Look, the President has made a series of decisions -- whether they were politically popular or not, the President believed they were the right decisions to make.

     Take for instance, the President will make two stops on Friday, in Detroit and Hamtramck, Michigan, to visit the Chrysler and G.M. plants in each of those -- in those two places.  Ensuring that the auto industry -- Chrysler and G.M., in particular -- did not go bankrupt, the President asked them to make a series of tough decisions about restructuring in order to qualify for aid to get them through that bankruptcy period.  Not an altogether popular decision, but understanding that the ramifications of not doing that would have been probably a million jobs lost, a supply chain that disappeared, and if you look at where the auto industry is today, 55,000 more people are employed by the auto industry today than when the President took office.

     It was a tough decision to make.  The President asked for sacrifices by those companies in making some hard decisions that for years they had put off in terms of restructuring in order to build a better future for its workers and the communities that those plants were in.  I think it’s in many ways a metaphor for the decisions that the President has made on the economy.

     I also -- I go back to the notion that we are in a time of two wars and 9.5 percent unemployment and it’s understandable that people are frustrated.

     Yes, ma’am.

     Q    Can you pursue any legal action against WikiLeaks?

     MR. GIBBS:  There is an ongoing investigation that is looking into the leaking of classified information.  As I’ve said here before, my transmitting one of those documents to you would constitute a violation of federal law, and certainly, as I said earlier, handling that type of information comes with certain responsibilities.  And if you don’t meet those responsibilities, you’re held liable.

     George.

     Q    Who were the members who met with the President at lunch today?  And what was the topic?

     MR. GIBBS:  I’ll get you a list.  There was no specific topic.  It was a series of -- like the President has had, a series of lunches with both senators and members of the House.  But I’ll -- right as soon as I’m done here, I’ll get you a list.

     Q    We never got that list last week, though.  I guess it’s twice in a week the President is meeting with members -- we don’t know who they are.

     MR. GIBBS:  We put the list out.  But I will -- I’ll get both lists to you.

     Glenn.

     Q    Robert, you’ve talked from time to time about the potential risks faced by U.S. service members because of this disclosure.  Do you think that this is bad enough to warrant -- whomever passes information along, presumably, you will find out who it is -- I’m not saying that it’s anyone who is currently in custody -- do you think this warrants a jail sentence for the person --

     MR. GIBBS:  Well, I don’t -- besides not being a classification expert, I’m not a sentencing -- I’m not a judge familiar with sentencing guidelines or an attorney.  I presume that if this person or persons is identified, that they will prosecuted and, as I said earlier, you make a commitment when handling this type of information to live up to the responsibilities invested in federal law in how one handles this information.  And if you’re not willing to live up to those responsibilities, then you face those consequences.

     Tom.

     Q    Thanks, Robert.  I have two quick questions.  First, Tony Hayward, in his exit interview with the British press, he was asked if his ouster was fair, he said life’s not fair, and he said that he was forced to leave because he’d been demonized by the American press.  And he also said that he wasn’t -- he thought he might be too busy to attend future hearings about the oil spill.  Do you have any reaction to those comments?

     MR. GIBBS:  Well, look, I’ll say this, what’s not fair is what’s happened on the Gulf.  What’s not fair is that the actions of some have caused the greatest environmental disaster that our country has ever seen.  What’s also not living up to your obligations is -- and your responsibilities are -- if Congress seeks to talk to him about the actions that he and his company undertook as part of the -- what led up to, what caused, or the response to that spill, our belief is that Mr. Hayward should make himself available for that.     I will say this.  I don’t think that a lot of people in any country are feeling overly sorry for the former CEO of BP.  I think the decision -- I’m not going to speak to the decision that the board made.  I can only speak to the damage that’s been caused and the lives that have been altered because of it.

     Q    My second question -- do you have any reaction to the news that Andrew Breitbart will be appearing at a fundraiser with RNC Chairman Michael Steele?

     MR. GIBBS:  I don’t have a reaction and I’m altogether not surprised.

     Q    Third, I wanted to just clarify something from the Lockerbie letter.  There’s a part in there where it says that -- well, obviously you explained that the first preference was that he remain locked up, but if they were going to let him go that it be to house arrest in Scotland.  And in the letter it references that this would be the best thing for the families.  And I just wanted to see if you could clarify, was that done after conferring with the families?  Was that a --

     MR. GIBBS:  Well, I don’t know that the comment -- I don’t know what had been undertaken with the families prior to that.  Let me make sure that we’re clear on the point.  As is stated I think at least twice in the letter, the preference, strongly, as communicated both in the letter, by the President and by members of this administration to the government was that this individual continue to serve the sentence -- his sentence where he was.  If they made the unfortunate decision to do something differently, we did not want -- we wanted at all costs to avoid the pain that would obviously be caused by a celebration or some sort of welcome befitting a hero, not a terrorist and a murderer, in Libya.     None of that was listened to.  And I think the pictures -- the disgusting pictures that we saw in many ways speak for themselves.

     Q    Was that done in conference with the families?  Or you don’t know --

     MR. GIBBS:  I don’t know the answer to that, but I will check.

     Yes, sir.

     Q    Robert, the President is going to New Jersey tomorrow, I believe, and probably will be seeing Senator Menendez.  It seems that a number of individuals from not only Great Britain but from Scotland as well have refused to testify or meet with his committee on Thursday.  Are there any thoughts here about that?  And would the President --

     MR. GIBBS:  Well, again, I think -- I don’t know who has been called and who’s decided not to come.  I know that Prime Minister Cameron, when he was here, talked about the cooperation that they would lend into looking into the developments around the Lockerbie release.

     Q    It was a number of high-levels, including the First Minister, I believe.

     MR. GIBBS:  Again, I think it’s been pretty clear where we were on this, the notion that somebody like this should be -- continue to be locked up and serving their jail time, and believe that it’s important that anybody cooperate with the investigation.

     Thanks, guys.

                         END              2:58 P.M. EDT                     

Click here to see the video.

read more

Click here to see the video.

In his latest meeting with Congressional leaders of both parties – a new tradition promised by the President in his State of the Union Address – the conversation was focused primarily on two topics.  The first was help for small businesses, one of the most straightforward things government can do to spur job creation; the second was the need for energy reform. 

In remarks afterwards, the President touched briefly on the need to pass funding for our troops in Afghanistan, saying that documents recently leaked “don’t reveal any issues that haven’t already informed our public debate on Afghanistan,” and that they were precisely the issues that led to the review at the beginning of his presidency along with the new way forward that came out of it.  He also relayed the frustration he expressed to the Republican Leader in the Senate about the gratuitous delays of judicial nominations despite broad bipartisan support , which has left many courts nationwide short-handed.

On small business as the engine of our economy:

read more

Click here to see the video.

In his latest meeting with Congressional leaders of both parties – a new tradition promised by the President in his State of the Union Address – the conversation was focused primarily on two topics.  The first was help for small businesses, one of the most straightforward things government can do to spur job creation; the second was the need for energy reform. 

In remarks afterwards, the President touched briefly on the need to pass funding for our troops in Afghanistan, saying that documents recently leaked “don’t reveal any issues that haven’t already informed our public debate on Afghanistan,” and that they were precisely the issues that led to the review at the beginning of his presidency along with the new way forward that came out of it.  He also relayed the frustration he expressed to the Republican Leader in the Senate about the gratuitous delays of judicial nominations despite broad bipartisan support , which has left many courts nationwide short-handed.

On small business as the engine of our economy:

read more

Take a look at our first edition of the Daily Snapshot below, then sign up to get updates.  You can also sign up to get periodic updates from President Obama and other senior Administration officials as well as our weekly newsletters - the Energy and Climate Agenda and the Economy and Jobs Agenda.  

read more

     THE PRESIDENT:  Good afternoon, everybody.  I just concluded a productive discussion with the leaders of both parties in Congress. 

This was one of a series of regular meetings that I called for in the State of the Union because I think it’s important for us to come together and speak frankly about the challenges we face and to work through areas where we don’t agree; hopefully find some areas where we do.

Our conversation today focused on an issue that’s being discussed every day at kitchen tables across this country -- and that’s how do we create jobs that people need to support their families. 

I believe that starts with doing everything we can to support small businesses.  These are the stores, the restaurants, the start-ups and other companies that create two out of every three new jobs in this country -- and that grow into the big businesses that transform industries, here in America and around the world. 

But we know that many of these businesses still can’t get the loans and the capital they need to keep their doors open and hire new workers. 

That’s why we’ve proposed steps to get them that help -- eliminating capital gains taxes on investments, making it easier for small lenders to support small businesses, expanding successful SBA programs to help these businesses access the capital that they need. 

This is how we create jobs -- by investing in the innovators and entrepreneurs that have always driven our prosperity. 

These are the kind of common-sense steps that folks from both parties have supported in the past -- steps to cut taxes and spur private sector growth and investment.  And I hope that in the coming days, we’ll once again find common ground and get this legislation passed.  We shouldn’t let America’s small businesses be held hostage to partisan politics -- and certainly not at this critical time.

We also talked about the need to move forward on energy reform.  The Senate is now poised to act before the August recess, advancing legislation to respond to the BP oil spill and create new clean energy jobs. 

That legislation is an important step in the right direction.  But I want to emphasize it’s only the first step.  And I intend to keep pushing for broader reform, including climate legislation, because if we’ve learned anything from the tragedy in the Gulf, it’s that our current energy policy is unsustainable. 

And we can’t afford to stand by as our dependence on foreign oil deepens, as we keep on pumping out the deadly pollutants that threaten our air and our water and the lives and livelihoods of our people.  And we can’t stand by as we let China race ahead to create the clean energy jobs and industries of the future.  We should be developing those renewable energy sources, and creating those high-wage, high-skill jobs right here in the United States of America. 

That’s what comprehensive energy and climate reform would do.  And that’s why I intend to keep pushing this issue forward.

I also urged the House leaders to pass the necessary funding to support our efforts in Afghanistan and Pakistan.  I know much has been written about this in recent days as a result of the substantial leak of documents from Afghanistan covering a period from 2004 to 2009.

While I’m concerned about the disclosure of sensitive information from the battlefield that could potentially jeopardize individuals or operations, the fact is these documents don’t reveal any issues that haven’t already informed our public debate on Afghanistan; indeed, they point to the same challenges that led me to conduct an extensive review of our policy last fall.

So let me underscore what I’ve said many times:  For seven years, we failed to implement a strategy adequate to the challenge in this region, the region from which the 9/11 attacks were waged and other attacks against the United States and our friends and allies have been planned. 

That’s why we’ve substantially increased our commitment there, insisted upon greater accountability from our partners in Afghanistan and Pakistan, developed a new strategy that can work, and put in place a team, including one of our finest generals, to execute that plan.  Now we have to see that strategy through.
 
And as I told the leaders, I hope the House will act today to join the Senate, which voted unanimously in favor of this funding, to ensure that our troops have the resources they need and that we’re able to do what’s necessary for our national security.

Finally, during our meeting today, I urged Senator McConnell and others in the Senate to work with us to fill the vacancies that continue to plague our judiciary.  Right now, we’ve got nominees who’ve been waiting up to eight months to be confirmed as judges.  Most of these folks were voted out of committee unanimously, or nearly unanimously, by both Democrats and Republicans.  Both Democrats and Republicans agreed that they were qualified to serve.  Nevertheless, some in the minority have used parliamentary procedures time and again to deny them a vote in the full Senate. 

     If we want our judicial system to work -- if we want to deliver justice in our courts -- then we need judges on our benches.  And I hope that in the coming months, we’ll be able to work together to ensure a timelier process in the Senate. 

     Now, we don’t have many days left before Congress is out for the year.  And everyone understands that we’re less than 100 days from an election.  It’s during this time that the noise and the chatter about who’s up in the polls and which party is ahead threatens to drown out just about everything else. 

     But the folks we serve -- who sent us here to serve, they sent us here for a reason.  They sent us here to listen to their voices.  They sent us here to represent their interests -- not our own.  They sent us here to lead.  And I hope that in the coming months, we’ll do everything in our power to live up to that responsibility.  Thanks very much.

                        END                12:37 P.M. EDT
 

Every year, our family tries to come up with a fun way to wish Barack a happy birthday.

And this August 4th, when he turns 49, I have something new in mind.

This has been a big -- and hectic -- year for him. After signing the Affordable Care Act and Wall Street reform into law -- and completing his first year as president -- I think it's safe to say we will remember it for a long time.

And I know full well how much he credits this movement, and the work of supporters like you, for the change that we've accomplished.

So I'm putting together a birthday card that I would like you to sign. Together with other Organizing for America supporters -- and me, Malia, Sasha, and Bo -- we'll wish him a happy birthday and let him know that we're ready to take on the year ahead alongside him.

Will you wish Barack a happy birthday with me?

This year also brought a lot of surprises -- some good and some bad.

Supporters like you have helped him make the best of it -- by contacting Congress to help push stalled legislation forward, by re-engaging supporters in the political process, by giving back with service projects across the country, and so much more.

And while we can't know what the coming year will bring, all of us, working together, will continue pushing forward for change.

Will you help make this a memorable birthday for Barack and wish him a happy 49th?

http://my.barackobama.com/birthday

Thanks so much,

Michelle Obama

Two-thirds of Recovery Act funds are in tax cuts and relief payments. These funds were designed to be spent over time, generally over a two year period. Recovery Act tax cuts show up in each paycheck, people on extended unemployment get their benefits weekly, and so on. In reports and on Recovery.gov, the tax cuts and relief funds not yet paid out appear to be “unspent,” creating some confusion. But these tax cuts and relief checks are moving out as planned, on time, and on track. They aren’t “unspent” – people are expecting to get their tax cuts or their unemployment checks – they just haven’t been paid out yet.

The other one-third is the $265 billion for projects. When people talk about “unspent” Recovery Act funds, this is usually where they focus. But here too, the critics are missing the point. 

read more

Federal funding is available to State and eligible local governments and certain private nonprofit organizations on a cost-sharing basis for emergency work and the repair or replacement of facilities damaged by the severe storms and flooding in the counties of Des Moines and Lee.

Federal funding is also available on a cost-sharing basis for hazard mitigation measures statewide.

W. Craig Fugate, Administrator, Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), Department of Homeland Security, named Thomas A. Hall as the Federal Coordinating Officer for Federal recovery operations in the affected area. 

FEMA said additional designations may be made at a later date if requested by the State and warranted by the results of further damage assessments.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT:  FEMA (202) 646-3272.

WASHINGTON, DC – This week, Vice President Biden and Administration officials are continuing to hold “Recovery Summer” events and visit Recovery Act project sites as part of a focus on the surge in Recovery Act projects underway across the country this summer.  The Recovery Act has already funded tens of thousands of projects and put about 3 million Americans to work, but this summer is the most active Recovery Act season yet, with thousands of new projects breaking ground that are helping to create more jobs for American workers and economic growth for businesses large and small. 

Week Ahead:

Tuesday, July 27
Vice President Biden
Vice President Biden will meet workers and deliver remarks at Grand Canyon National Park in Arizona. Grand Canyon and Yellowstone – where the Vice President traveled on Monday – received $25 million in Recovery Act funding that is creating jobs and jump-starting previously-deferred construction and maintenance projects. Overall, there are 800 Recovery Act projects underway at National Parks across the country this summer – eight times as many as there were last summer.

Department of the Treasury
Treasurer of the United States Rosie Rios will attend a groundbreaking for the Vida Senior Residences at Brightwood, a 36-unit affordable housing development for low-income senior citizens in Washington, DC.  The project received $6.8 million in Recovery Act Funds which were leveraged to attract other investments and help the project move forward. An estimated 55 construction workers will complete the job.

Small Business Administration
SBA Administrator Karen Mills will visit A. Harold and Associates where owner Andy Harold received two Recovery loans and has created 10 new jobs in Jacksonville, Florida. Harold is a service disabled veteran and current reservist who runs a technology, education, engineering, training and management service for both public and private sectors.  Thanks to the fee eliminations provided for in the Recovery Act, Harold saved over $33,000 in waived loan fees. Under Recovery Act loan enhancements, SBA has supported nearly 70,000 recovery loans, providing more than $30 billion in much needed capital to help small businesses drive economic growth and create jobs.

Wednesday, July 28
Department of Housing and Urban Development
HUD Secretary Shaun Donovan will participate in the groundbreaking of Gibson Plaza Apartments in Washington, DC.  Gibson Plaza was awarded a $2.1 million Recovery Act Green Retrofit Program grant to do substantial “green” rehabilitation. The rehabilitation will create dozens of quality jobs in the DC area, while transforming Gibson Plaza from an aging 1970s inefficient structure into a LEED certified building with, among other improvements, a new handicapped accessible elevator, Energy Star roof and windows, and an energy efficient HVAC system.  The Secretary will be joined by DC Mayor Adrian Fenty, Congresswoman Holmes Norton, and other local elected officials.

Department of Agriculture
Rural Business Service Administrator Judith Canales will host a Recovery Summer event with the Delaware YWCA in Harrington, DE. The Delaware YWCA received $41,000 in Recovery Act funds from the Rural Business Enterprise Grant Program. The funds are being used to provide technical assistance for the Women’s Entrepreneurship Center’s Business Plan Development series.  The event will take place at Ocean Fresh Seafood, where one of the program participants works as a seafood broker, connecting retail stores and restaurants with local products.

Thursday, July 29
Department of Transportation
DOT Secretary LaHood will join Governor Jim Doyle in Watertown, WI, for a visit to the site of the future high-speed rail corridor that will connect Milwaukee and Madison.  The corridor, which will operate at speeds of up to 110 mph, will eventually extend from Milwaukee to Minneapolis.  Wisconsin is slated to receive more than $800 million from the Recovery Act for the development of high-speed rail.

Department of Housing and Urban Development
HUD Deputy Secretary Ron Sims will travel to Pueblo, CO to visit a Pueblo Housing Authority project that is using $1.7 million in Recovery Public Housing Capital Funds to make much needed improvements and bring the project to ADA compliance.  Deputy Secretary Sims will be joined by Pueblo Housing Authority Executive Director Frank D. Pacheco and other local elected officials. They will tour the project, meet with workers and discuss how this transformative project is creating jobs and stimulating the local economy.

Highlights of Recent Events:

Vice President Biden
Vice President Biden visited Yellowstone National Park, Wyoming, where Recovery Act projects are creating jobs, generating economic activity, and preserving the life of the park. The Vice President met workers at the Recovery Act-funded construction site of the Madison Wastewater treatment facility, then delivered remarks outside the Madison Junior Ranger Station, joined by Director of the National Park Service Jonathan Jarvis. Overall, there are 800 Recovery Act projects underway at National Parks across the country this summer – eight times as many as there were last summer.

“Biden began a two-day tour highlighting Recovery Act projects in Yellowstone and Grand Canyon national parks by speaking to about 100 park workers, contractors and their families in the scenic Madison Valley, where the famous Madison River is formed in the shadow of 7,500-foot National Park Mountain. He said some $750 million in stimulus money has gone to about 800 national park projects, which have created jobs in tough times. But, he added, the projects would have been necessary even if the economy was good to protect the parks and reduce man's footprint there. ‘For too long our nation's crown jewels have been neglected,’ Biden said. ‘Everything we're doing in this park is worthwhile and needed to be done anyway, whether times were good or bad.’" [AP, 7/26/10]

Federal funding is available to State and eligible local governments and certain private nonprofit organizations on a cost-sharing basis for emergency work and the repair or replacement of facilities damaged by the severe storms and flooding in the counties of Adams, Gem, Idaho, Lewis, Payette, Valley, and Washington.

Federal funding is also available on a cost-sharing basis for hazard mitigation measures statewide. 

W. Craig Fugate, Administrator, Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), Department of Homeland Security, named Willie G. Nunn as the Federal Coordinating Officer for Federal recovery operations in the affected area. 

FEMA said additional designations may be made at a later date if requested by the State and warranted by the results of further damage assessments.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT:  FEMA (202) 646-3272.
 

With an important vote expected today on the DISCLOSE Act, President Obama urged the Senate to pass the bill that would require corporate political advertisers to reveal who’s funding their election-related activities.

The DISCLOSE Act undoes some of the damage from the Citizens United Supreme Court case, which ruled that big corporations can spend unlimited amounts of money influencing our elections, without having to reveal that they’re doing so.

Unfortunately, as they have done on unemployment benefits and tax credits, Republicans in the Senate are doing everything they can to block this bill from moving forward.

President Obama:

Now, you’d think that making these reforms would be a matter of common sense, particularly since they primarily involve just making sure that folks who are financing these ads are disclosed so that the American people can make up their own minds.  Nobody is saying you can’t run the ads -- just make sure that people know who in fact is behind financing these ads.  And you’d think that reducing corporate and even foreign influence over our elections would not be a partisan issue.  But of course, this is Washington in 2010.  And the Republican leadership in the Senate is once again using every tactic and every maneuver they can to prevent the DISCLOSE Act from even coming up for an up or down vote.  Just like they did with unemployment insurance for Americans who’d lost their jobs in this recession.  Just like they’re doing by blocking tax credits and lending assistance for small business owners.  On issue after issue, we are trying to move America forward, and they keep on trying to take us back.

At a time of such challenge for America, we can’t afford these political games.  Millions of Americans are struggling to get by, and their voices shouldn’t be drowned out by millions of dollars in secret, special interest advertising.  The American people’s voices should be heard.

That is why the Obama Administration is strongly committed to responsibly reforming our nation’s broken system of housing finance, including Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. And that is why it is so important that we get the reforms right.

Work on this issue is well under way, as the Obama Administration continues to develop a comprehensive reform proposal for delivery to Congress by January 2011. Earlier this year, Secretaries Geithner and Donovan testified before Congress, outlining the principles that will guide the Administration’s housing finance reform efforts. In April, the Treasury Department and the Department of Housing and Urban Development issued related questions for public comment, which have received over 300 responses from a broad cross-section of stakeholders. (To view these responses, please visit: here and here.)   

That commitment to public engagement will continue. Today, the Administration is announcing that it will hold on August 17 a Conference on the Future of Housing Finance at the U.S. Treasury Department in Washington, D.C.  This event will bring together leading academic experts, consumer and community organizations, industry groups, market participants, and other stakeholders for an open discussion about housing finance reform.

read more

With OFA’s Vote 2010 strategy underway all across the country, Obama campaign manager David Plouffe stopped by two of Organizing for America’s California offices to fire up volunteers and lay out OFA’s plan for this year’s elections.

Plouffe told volunteers that they are the most effective messengers in making the case to friends and neighbors about the importance of November’s elections. OFA California shared more from Plouffe’s visits to OFA in Oakland and Los Angeles:

"The most important thing in 2010 is you talking to these voters, human being to human being, and getting them to say, ‘Alright, I’ll vote,’" Plouffe told volunteers in the Northern and Southern California OFA offices.

Plouffe explained that the President needs you to reach out to first-time ‘08 voters and tell them in your own words why this election matters.

Plouffe’s honest and candid speech to the Oakland office on the magnitude of the 2010 midterm election spoke volumes about his belief in OFA volunteers’ ability to affect lasting positive change. Plouffe made it clear to those in the room in Los Angeles and Oakland that by turning out the same first-time voters who carried President Obama to a historic 2008 victory, and turning out new first-time voters for 2010, OFA can once again make history in the upcoming midterm elections.

"It was those 15 million first-time voters that allowed us to win in 2008. We have to go out there and tell them that this election matters," Plouffe passionately implored the Oakland group to a round of applause. "We have to go out there and make sure that all those first-time voters go to the polls in 2010."

Plouffe was excited about the growth that OFA has seen ever since the 2008 elections. He pointed our that the organization's ability to affect policy in the last two years is remarkable, and is breaking new ground in citizens’ ability to access their government....

Plouffe pointed out that although no one has ever tried to rely so heavily on volunteers and grassroots organizing for a midterm election before, no one else has the level of grassroots support and dedication that OFA does. After letting those words sink and pausing to survey the crowd of volunteers hanging on his every word, Plouffe said frankly, "This year, my money is on you guys."

Section 1.  Policy.  Approximately 54 million Americans are living with a disability.  The Federal Government has an important interest in reducing discrimination against Americans living with a disability, in eliminating the stigma associated with disability, and in encouraging Americans with disabilities to seek employment in the Federal workforce.  Yet Americans with disabilities have an employment rate far lower than that of Americans without disabilities, and they are underrepresented in the Federal workforce.  Individuals with disabilities currently represent just over 5 percent of the nearly 2.5 million people in the Federal workforce, and individuals with targeted disabilities (as defined below) currently represent less than 1 percent of that workforce.

On July 26, 2000, in the final year of his administration, President Clinton signed Executive Order 13163, calling for an additional 100,000 individuals with disabilities to be employed by the Federal Government over 5 years.  Yet few steps were taken to implement that Executive Order in subsequent years.

As the Nation's largest employer, the Federal Government must become a model for the employment of individuals with disabilities.  Executive departments and agencies (agencies) must improve their efforts to employ workers with disabilities through increased recruitment, hiring, and retention of these individuals.  My Administration is committed to increasing the number of individuals with disabilities in the Federal workforce through compliance with Executive Order 13163 and achievement of the goals set forth therein over 5 years, including specific goals for hiring individuals with targeted disabilities.

Sec. 2.  Recruitment and Hiring of Individuals with Disabilities.  (a)  Within 60 days of the date of this order, the Director of the Office of Personnel Management, in consultation with the Secretary of Labor, the Chair of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, and the Director of the Office of Management and Budget, shall design model recruitment and hiring strategies for agencies seeking to increase their employment of people with disabilities and develop mandatory training programs for both human resources personnel and hiring managers on the employment of individuals with disabilities.

(b)  Within 120 days of the date the Office of Personnel Management sets forth strategies and programs required under subsection (a), each agency shall develop an agency specific plan for promoting employment opportunities for individuals with disabilities.  The plan shall be developed in consultation with and, as appropriate, subject to approval by the Director of the Office of Personnel Management and the Director of the Office of Management and Budget, and shall, consistent with law, include performance targets and numerical goals for employment of individuals with disabilities and sub goals for employment of individuals with targeted disabilities.

(c)  Each agency shall designate a senior-level agency official to be accountable for enhancing employment opportunities for individuals with disabilities and individuals with targeted disabilities within the agency, consistent with law, and for meeting the goals of this order.  This official, among other things, shall be accountable for developing and implementing the agency's plan under subsection (b), creating recruitment and training programs for employment of individuals with disabilities and targeted disabilities, and coordinating employment counseling to help match the career aspirations of individuals with disabilities to the needs of the agency.

(d)  In implementing their plans, agencies, to the extent permitted by law, shall increase utilization of the Federal Government's Schedule A excepted service hiring authority for persons with disabilities and increase participation of individuals with disabilities in internships, fellowships, and training and mentoring programs.

(e)  The Office of Personnel Management shall assist agencies with the implementation of their plans.  The Director of the Office of Personnel Management, in consultation with the Director of the Office of Management and Budget, shall implement a system for reporting regularly to the President, the heads of agencies, and the public on agencies' progress in implementing their plans and the objectives of this order.  The Office of Personnel Management, to the extent permitted by law, shall compile and post on its website Government wide statistics on the hiring of individuals with disabilities.

Sec. 3.  Increasing Agencies' Retention and Return to Work of Individuals with Disabilities.  (a)  The Director of the Office of Personnel Management, in consultation with the Secretary of Labor and the Chair of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, shall identify and assist agencies in implementing strategies for retaining Federal workers with disabilities in Federal employment including, but not limited to, training, the use of centralized funds to provide reasonable accommodations, increasing access to appropriate accessible technologies, and ensuring the accessibility of physical and virtual workspaces.

(b)  Agencies shall make special efforts, to the extent permitted by law, to ensure the retention of those who are injured on the job.  Agencies shall work to improve, expand, and increase successful return to work outcomes for those of their employees who sustain work-related injuries and illnesses, as defined under the Federal Employees' Compensation Act (FECA), by increasing the availability of job accommodations and light or limited duty jobs, removing disincentives for FECA claimants to return to work, and taking other appropriate measures.  The Secretary of Labor, in consultation with the Director of the Office of Personnel Management, shall pursue innovative re employment strategies and develop policies, procedures, and structures that foster improved return to work outcomes, including by pursuing overall reform of the FECA system.  The Secretary of Labor shall also propose specific outcome measures and targets by which each agency's progress in carrying out return to work and FECA claims processing efforts can be assessed.

Sec. 4.  Definitions.  (a)  "Disability" shall be defined as set forth in the ADA Amendments Act of 2008.

(b)  "Targeted disability" shall be defined as set forth on the form for self identification of disability, Standard Form 256 (SF 256), issued by the Office of Personnel Management, or any replacements, updates, or revisions thereto.

(c)  Not less than 1 year after the date of this order and in consultation with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, the Department of Labor, and the Office of Management and Budget, the Office of Personnel Management shall review the effectiveness of the definition of targeted disability set forth in SF 256 and replace, update, or revise it as appropriate.

Sec. 5.  General Provisions.  (a)  Nothing in this order shall be construed to impair or otherwise affect:

(i)   authority granted by law to a department or agency, or the head thereof; or

(ii)  functions of the Director of the Office of Management and Budget relating to budgetary, administrative, or legislative proposals.

(b)  This order shall be implemented consistent with applicable law and subject to the availability of appropriations, and shall not be construed to require any Federal employee to disclose disability status involuntarily.

(c)  This order is not intended to, and does not, create any right or benefit, substantive or procedural, enforceable at law or in equity by any party against the United States, its departments, agencies, or entities, its officers, employees, or agents, or any other person.

                                                                                 BARACK OBAMA

THE WHITE HOUSE,
July 26, 2010.
 

BY THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

A PROCLAMATION

When the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) was signed into law in 1990, a founding truth of our Nation was realized for persons living with disabilities -- that all our citizens are entitled to the same privileges, pursuits, and civil rights.  As we mark the 20th anniversary of this historic legislation, we renew our commitment to ensuring that everyone with disabilities can live free from the weight of discrimination and pursue the American dream.

Across our country, Americans with disabilities have enriched and strengthened our Nation.  Each day, individuals living with disabilities contribute immeasurably to every aspect of our country's national life and economy, from art to law, science to business, education to technology.  Through steadfast determination, they have worked to make our communities more accessible, while empowering others to exercise independence and self-determination in all aspects of their lives.  They have also brightened futures for countless young people.  Today, children and youth with disabilities have a place in our classrooms alongside their peers, and are graduating with the knowledge and skills needed for postsecondary education and beyond.

Yet, despite the progress made in removing barriers and eliminating discrimination based on disability, on this 20th anniversary of the ADA, we must renew our commitment to achieving equal opportunity for, and the full inclusion of, all people with disabilities.  My Administration has taken important steps towards achieving this goal.  We have expanded funding for the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act so that all of America's children have access to the tools to succeed.  Under the health care reforms enacted in the Affordable Care Act, unfair practices like discrimination based on health status or pre-existing conditions will be eliminated.  This landmark legislation also creates the Community Living Assistance Services and Supports Program to assist Americans with disabilities to live independently.  Additionally, the Affordable Care Act provides States with more tools and financial incentives, such as the Community First Choice Option, which will support individuals with disabilities living in the communities of their choosing.  These and other initiatives build on the "Year of Community Living," which I launched in 2009 to support independent living.

The Federal Government is committed to leading by example in hiring people with disabilities, with focused efforts to recruit, retain, and support these public servants.  In partnership with the many Federal agencies and departments with ADA responsibilities, my Administration will uphold strong and meaningful enforcement of the ADA to eliminate discrimination in employment, housing, public services, and community accommodations.  I urge all Americans to visit Disability.gov for comprehensive disability-related information and resources.

I am also proud that the United States has in the past year joined the international community in signing the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities.  In so doing, we affirm that these rights are not simply principles to safeguard at home, but also universal rights to be respected and advanced around the world.

In honor of and in solidarity with all Americans with disabilities and their loved ones, we celebrate the 20th anniversary of the ADA, and recommit to build a more just world, free of unnecessary barriers and full of deeper understanding.

NOW, THEREFORE, I, BARACK OBAMA, President of the United States of America, by virtue of the authority vested in me by the Constitution and the laws of the United States do hereby proclaim Monday, July 26, 2010, the Anniversary of the Americans with Disabilities Act.  I encourage Americans across our Nation to celebrate the 20th anniversary of this civil rights law and the many contributions of individuals with disabilities.

IN WITNESS WHEREOF, I have hereunto set my hand this twenty-sixth day of July, in the year of our Lord two thousand ten, and of the Independence of the United States of America the two hundred and thirty-fifth.

BARACK OBAMA

President Barack Obama greets crew members from the Space Shuttle Atlantis and the International Space Station in the Oval Office, July 26, 2010. (Official White House Photo by Pete Souza)

[View Full Size]

President Obama said, “I am confident that these accomplished individuals will serve our nation well in these important roles. I look forward to working with them in the months and years ahead.”
 
President Obama appointed the following individual to a key administration post:
 
Daphne Kwok, Appointee for Chair, President's Advisory Commission on Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders
Daphne Kwok is currently the Executive Director of Asians and Pacific Islanders with Disabilities of California.  She was also the Executive Director of the Angel Island Immigration Station Foundation from 2005 to 2007, the Asian Pacific American Institute for Congressional Studies from 2001 to 2005, and at the Organization of Chinese Americans (OCA) from 1990 to 2001.  During her term at OCA, Ms. Kwok was elected the first Chair of the National Council of Asian Pacific Americans.  Ms. Kwok’s work with federal agencies has included being appointed to the Secretary of Energy’s Advisory Board (2000-2005); testifying before the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights; and being a grant reviewer for the Department of Health and Human Services’ Substance Abuse & Mental Health Services Administration.  She also currently serves on the board of trustees at Wesleyan University, where she earned her B.A.
 
President Obama announced his intent to appoint the following individuals to key administration posts:
 
David Grubb, Appointee for Member, Board of Directors of the Presidio Trust
David Grubb is the former chairman and chief executive officer of Swinerton Incorporated, a San Francisco-based general contractor. At Swinerton for four decades, he worked successively as project manager, branch manager, vice president, executive vice president, and president and chairman. Mr. Grubb currently serves on the board of directors for Immaculate Conception Academy and the San Francisco Zoological Society.  In addition to having served as chair of the Presidio Trust, Mr. Grubb has served on the board of trustees for the Golden Gate National Parks Conservancy. While at the Conservancy, he chaired the projects committee which oversaw the restoration of Crissy Field, a national historical landmark that was once part of the Presidio Army Base.
 
William R. Hambrecht, Appointee for Member, Board of Directors of the Presidio Trust
William R. Hambrecht is the Founder and Chairman of WR Hambrecht + Co, an investment bank that uses the internet and auctions for raising capital.  Prior to WR Hambrecht + Co, he co-founded Hambrecht & Quist, a firm that specialized in investing in and taking Silicon Valley companies public.  Mr. Hambrecht currently serves on the Board of Directors for Motorola, Inc., AOL Inc., and Decision Economics, Inc., and he is on the Board of Trustees for The American University in Beirut and serves on the Advisory Council to The J. David Gladstone Institute.  In October 2006, he was inducted into the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.
 
Charlene Harvey, Appointee for Member, Board of Directors of the Presidio Trust
Charlene Harvey, a longtime resident of San Francisco, worked for 16 years with the Management Center of San Francisco as a staff consultant to nonprofit organizations. She currently serves a board member of the Golden Gate National Parks Conservancy and the San Francisco Foundation, and is involved in the environmental field with Conservation International. She is a past chair of KQED, past chair of the Advisory Committee to Grants for the Arts, and past president of the Junior League of San Francisco. She has served on the boards of the Rosenberg Foundation, the Mental Health Association of San Francisco, and the California Pacific Medical Center, among others. She was awarded the SPUR Award in 1997 and the Outstanding Volunteer Fund Raiser Award in 1996 by the National Society of Fund Raising Executives.