38 items found for your search. If no results were found please broaden your search.
(02/11/09 4:31pm)
____simple_html_dom__voku__html_wrapper____>WASHINGTON - All-Star shortstop Miguel Tejada has pleaded guilty to lying to Congress about the use of performance-enhancing drugs in professional baseball.Tejada was the American League's Most Valuable Player in 2002 while playing for Oakland. He now plays for the Houston Astros.The misdemeanor charge of making misrepresentations to Congress can lead to as much as a year in jail. But federal guidelines call for a lighter sentence.The case stems from Tejada's statements to House investigators in 2005 when he denied knowing anyone in baseball who used performance-enhancing drugs.Federal authorities also are investigating whether Roger Clemens lied to Congress when he denied using steroids or human growth hormone.
(01/31/08 5:08am)
NEW ORLEANS – Democrat John Edwards bowed out of the race for the Democratic presidential nomination on Wednesday, saying it was time to step aside “so that history can blaze its path” in a campaign now left to Hillary Rodham Clinton and Barack Obama.\n“With our convictions and a little backbone we will take back the White House in November,” said Edwards, ending his second campaign in a hurricane-ravaged section of New Orleans where he began it more than a year ago.\nEdwards said Clinton and Obama had both pledged that “they will make ending poverty central to their campaign for the presidency.”\n“This is the cause of my life and I now have their commitment to engage in this cause,” he said before a small group of supporters. He was joined by his wife Elizabeth and his three children, Cate, Emma Claire and Jack.\nIt was the second time Edwards sought the Democratic presidential nomination. Four years ago he was the vice presidential running mate on a ticket headed by John Kerry.\nFour years later, he waged a spirited, underfunded race on a populist note, pledging to represent the powerless against the corporate interests.\nHe finished second in the Iowa caucuses that led off the campaign, but he was quickly overshadowed – a white man in a race against the former first lady and a 46-year-old black man, each bent on making history.\nEdwards said that on his way to making his campaign-ending statement, he drove by a highway underpass where several homeless people live. He stopped to talk, he said, and as he was leaving, one of them asked him never to forget them and their plight.\n“Well I say to her and I say to all those who are struggling in this country, we will never forget you. We will fight for you. We will stand up for you,” he said, pledging to continue his campaign-long effort to end what he frequently said was “two Americas,” one for the powerful, the other for the rest.\nThe former North Carolina senator did not immediately endorse either Clinton, seeking to become the first female president, or Obama, the strongest black candidate in history.\nThe impact of Edwards’ decision will be felt in one week’s time, when Democrats hold primaries and caucuses across 22 states, with 1,681 delegates at stake.\nFour in 10 Edwards supporters said their second choice in the race is Clinton, while a quarter prefer Obama, according to an Associated Press-Yahoo poll conducted late this month.\nEdwards amassed 56 national convention delegates, most of whom will be free to support either Obama or Clinton.\nAs expected, Edwards said he was suspending his campaign rather than ending it, but aides said that was simply legal terminology so that he can continue to receive federal matching funds for his campaign donations.\nAn immediate impact of Edwards’ withdrawal will be six additional delegates for Obama, giving him a total of 187, and four more for Clinton, giving her 253. A total of 2,025 delegates are needed to secure the Democratic nomination.\nEdwards won 26 delegates in the Iowa, New Hampshire and South Carolina contests. Under party rules, 10 of those delegates will be automatically dispersed among Obama and Clinton, based on their vote totals in those respective contests. The remaining 16 remain pledged to Edwards, meaning his campaign will have a say in naming them.
(07/26/07 12:08am)
CHARLESTON, S.C. – The rival camps of Sens. Hillary Rodham Clinton and Barack Obama clashed Tuesday over the meaning of Obama’s claim in a Democratic presidential debate that he’d be willing to meet with leaders of rogue nations such as Cuba, North Korea and Iran.\nClinton supporters characterized it as a gaffe that underscored the freshman senator’s lack of foreign-policy savvy while Obama’s team claimed his response displayed judgment and a repudiation of President Bush’s diplomacy.\n“I would think that without having done the diplomatic spadework, it would not really prove anything,” former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright said in a conference call with reporters set up by the Clinton campaign.\nIn a memo from Obama spokesman Bill Burton, the campaign contended that Obama’s comments played well with focus groups that watched the debate and “showed his willingness to lead and ask tough questions on matters \nof war.”\nObama “offered a dramatic change from the Bush administration’s eight-year refusal to protect our security interests by using every tool of American power available, including diplomacy,” said \nthe memo.\nIn Tuesday’s two-hour debate from Charleston, S.C., Obama was asked if he would be willing to meet, without precondition, in the first year of his presidency with the leaders of Iran, Syria, Venezuela, Cuba and North Korea.\n“I would,” he responded.\nClinton said she would not.\n“I don’t want to be used for propaganda purposes,” she said. Her campaign quickly posted video of her answer online, trying to show she has a different understanding of foreign policy than her chief rival.\nObama adviser David Axelrod said on Tuesday that Obama would not just meet blindly with such leaders but only after diplomatic spadework had \nbeen accomplished.\nAmericans “are sick of the Bush diplomacy and aren’t interested in continuing it,” said Axelrod.\nThe Obama campaign was quick to point to an April 23 quote from Clinton in which she said, “I think it’s a terrible mistake for our president to say he won’t talk to \nbad people.” \nThat, Obama representatives said, showed Clinton had changed \nher position.\nBut Albright said, “I never would have gotten out of the debate last night that there was any change in position.”\nShe emphasized that Obama had said he would meet with such leaders in his first year without preconditions.\n“If you look back at real breakthroughs and diplomatic history, what you basically find is that in order to understand where the situation is, to clear the underbrush away, it is necessary to have lower level people make the initial contact,” Albright said.\nObama representatives also sought to emphasize anew Clinton’s initial support for the war, echoing comments by the candidate himself who asserted in the debate: “The time to ask how we’re going to get out of Iraq was before we got in.”\nRival John Edwards, who campaigned in South Carolina on Tuesday, echoed Clinton’s comments in the debate.\n“I would not commit myself on the front end openly to meet with (Iranian President Mahmoud) Ahmadinejad, (North Korean leader) Kim Jong Il, (Venezuelan President) Hugo Chavez,” Edwards told reporters in McClellanville, S.C.
(04/05/07 4:00am)
DAVENPORT, Iowa – Democrat Barack Obama raked in $25 million for his presidential bid in the first three months of 2007, placing him on a par with front-runner Hillary Rodham Clinton and dashing her image as the party’s inevitable nominee.\n“We’ve exceeded all of our hopes and expectations,” Obama said in an e-mail to supporters Wednesday. “You’ve sent an unmistakable message to the political establishment in Washington about the power and seriousness of our challenge.”\nThe donations came from an eye-popping 100,000 donors, the campaign said.\nThe figures were the latest evidence that Obama, a political newcomer who has served just two years in the Senate, has emerged as the most powerful new force in presidential politics this year. It also reinforced his status as a significant threat to Clinton, who’d hoped her own $26 million first-quarter fundraising total would begin to squeeze her rivals out of contention.
(04/04/07 4:00am)
CEDAR RAPIDS, Iowa – Elizabeth Edwards said Tuesday that she got some good news: She has a type of cancer that is more likely to be controlled by anti-estrogen drugs.\nMrs. Edwards, wife of Democratic presidential candidate John Edwards, expressed frustration with reports that she’s likely to die within five years. She said doctors can’t give her a reliable life expectancy and even if they could, the information would be of no comfort to her.\n“I don’t care,” she said in an interview with The Associated Press as she campaigned with her husband. “I’m going to fight exactly as hard if they tell me that I’ve got 15 years or if I’ve got 30 years. I’m still going to fight to get rid of this – if they tell me I’ve got 15 minutes I’m still going to fight. It doesn’t matter what the prognosis is. So it’s not an important piece of information to me.”\nThe Edwardses announced nearly two weeks ago that her breast cancer had returned and spread to her bone. They said they had no intention of ending his bid because doctors told her that although she’s likely to die from the disease eventually, the campaign wouldn’t interfere with her treatment.\nMrs. Edwards had her first post-diagnosis doctor’s visit Friday and emerged encouraged. She said her doctor expected she had the most aggressive “triple-negative” cancer, but testing found that she had two of the three key hormonal receptors – estrogen and progesterone. She said her original diagnosis was “slightly estrogen heavy,” but this time it’s a strong marker and she also has the second progesterone marker.\n“I consider that a good sign,” Mrs. Edwards said in an interview in an art classroom before appearing with her husband at the Prairie High School gymnasium. “It means there are more medications which I can expect to be responsive.”\nMrs. Edwards, pointing out a large bruise on the back of her hand and another on her forearm from her IV, said she got an initial course of a bone-building drug. She’s also taking Femara, an aromatase inhibitor, but is not undergoing chemotherapy treatments.
(01/17/07 2:05am)
WASHINGTON -- On Tuesday, Democratic Sen. Barack Obama took the initial step in a bid that could make him the nation's first black president.\nObama filed papers creating a presidential exploratory committee, a move he announced on his Web site, www.barackobama.com. He said he would announce more about his plans in his home state of Illinois on Feb. 10.\n"I certainly didn't expect to find myself in this position a year ago," Obama said in a video posting. "I've been struck by how hungry we all are for a different kind of politics. So I've spent some time thinking about how I could best advance the cause of change and progress that we so desperately need."\nObama, a 45-year-old with little more than two years into his Senate term, is the most inexperienced candidate considering a run for the Democratic nomination. He quickly rose to national prominence, beginning with his keynote speech at the 2004 Democratic National Convention and his election to the Senate that year, but still is an unknown quantity to many voters.\nTwo best-selling autobiographies -- "The Audacity of Hope: Thoughts on Reclaiming the American Dream" and "Dreams from My Father: A Story of Race and Inheritance" -- have helped fill in the gaps but have still only touched a fraction of the public.\nNonetheless, he ranks as a top contender. His appeal on the stump, his unique background, his opposition to the Iraq war and the fact that he is a fresh face set him apart in a competitive race that also is expected to include front-runner Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York.\nOther Democrats who have announced a campaign or exploratory committee are 2004 vice presidential nominee John Edwards, former Iowa Gov. Tom Vilsack, Connecticut Sen. Chris Dodd and Ohio Rep. Dennis Kucinich.\nObama's announcement was comparatively low-key, banking on the hype building up to his decision to drive the buzz rather than a speech or high-profile media appearance. He was in Washington on Tuesday but did not plan any public appearances.\nObama tried to turn his biggest weakness -- his lack of experience in national politics -- into an asset by criticizing the work of those who have been in power.\n"The decisions that have been made in Washington these past six years, and the problems that have been ignored, have put our country in a precarious place," he said.\n"America's faced big problems before," he said. "But today, our leaders in Washington seem incapable of working together in a practical, commonsense way. Politics has become so bitter and partisan, so gummed up by money and influence, that we can't tackle the big problems that demand solutions."\nHe said Americans are struggling financially, dependence on foreign oil threatens the environment and national security and "we're still mired in a tragic and costly war that should have never been waged."\nObama insisted during the 2004 campaign and through his first year in the Senate that he had no intention of running for president, but by late 2006 his public statements had begun to leave open that possibility.
(10/30/06 3:41am)
WASHINGTON -- On Sunday, the No. 2 leader in the House said Secretary of Defense Donald H. Rumsfeld is "the best thing that's happened to the Pentagon in 25 years," sparking a debate with Democrats who said the comments show why the GOP should be voted out of power.\nRumsfeld's leadership of the bloody mission in Iraq has become a divisive issue in the Nov. 7 elections. Many Democrats and a few Republicans are calling for his resignation, but President George W. Bush repeatedly has defended him. So did House Majority Leader John Boehner, R-Ohio, during an appearance Sunday on ABC's "This Week."\n"I think Donald Rumsfeld is the best thing that's happened to the Pentagon in 25 years," Boehner said. "This Pentagon and our military needs a transformation. And I think Donald Rumsfeld's the only man in America who knows where the bodies are buried at the Pentagon, has enough experience to help transform that institution."\nRep. Charles Rangel, D-N.Y., said voters will have their chance to show if they agree with Boehner on Election Day.\n"It's true President Bush may not be on the ballot, but people like Boehner and people who support Rumsfeld and Cheney and Bush, they're on the ballot," Rangel said on CNN's "Late Edition."\n"And that's why we only get two years. You don't have to wait to get the president. This is a referendum on the war and the incompetency of the Bush administration."\nIllinois Rep. Rahm Emanuel, head of the Democratic effort to win control of the House, quickly e-mailed a statement to reporters objecting to Boehner's comments and including quotes from seven military leaders criticizing the defense secretary.\n"Congressman Boehner's defense of Donald Rumsfeld makes it crystal clear that we need change in Washington from the rubber stamp Republican Congress and their blind adherence to President Bush and Secretary Rumsfeld's stay the course policy in Iraq," Emanuel's e-mail said.\nRepublican Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen of Florida, appearing with Rangel on CNN, said she has confidence in Rumsfeld.\n"I think it's a shame to take this complex issue of winning the international war on terror and putting it at the level of whether you like or not like Donald Rumsfeld, and whether you like or don't like President Bush's personalities and the statements that he's made," she said.\nAnother Republican, Maryland Senate candidate Michael Steele, declined to back the Pentagon chief.\n"He wouldn't be my secretary of defense," Steele said on NBC's "Meet the Press." "And ultimately, that's going to be a decision that the president of the United States makes"
(10/18/06 2:25am)
By Nedra Pickler \nThe Associated Press\n Bush's plan for treatment of the terror suspects, called the Military Commissions Act, became law just six weeks after he acknowledged that the CIA had been secretly interrogating suspected terrorists overseas and pressed Congress to quickly give authority to try them in military commissions.\n"With the bill I'm about to sign, the men our intelligence officials believe orchestrated the murder of nearly 3,000 innocent people will face justice," Bush said.\nA coalition of religious groups staged a protest against the bill outside the White House, shouting, "Bush is the terrorist" and "Torture is a crime." About 15 of the protesters, standing in a light rain, refused orders to move. Police arrested them one by one.\nAmong those the United States hopes to try are Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the accused mastermind of the Sept. 11 attacks, as well as Ramzi Binalshibh, an alleged would-be 9/11 hijacker, and Abu Zubaydah, who was believed to be a link between Osama bin Laden and many al-Qaida cells.\n"It is a rare occasion when a president can sign a bill that he knows will save American lives," Bush said. "I have that privilege this morning."\nBush signed the bill in the White House East Room, at a table with a sign positioned on the front that said "Protecting America." He said he signed the bill in memory of the victims of the Sept. 11 attacks.\n"We will answer brutal murder with patient justice," Bush said. "Those who kill the innocent will be held to account."\nAmong those in the audience were military officers, lawmakers who helped pass the bill and members of Bush's Cabinet.\nHe singled out for praise, among others, Secretary of Defense Donald H. Rumsfeld, who has come under sharp criticism in recent months as violence has soared in Iraq.\nThe law protects detainees from blatant abuses during questioning but does not require that any of them be granted legal counsel. Also, it specifically bars detainees from filing habeas corpus petitions challenging their detentions in federal courts. Bush said the process is "fair, lawful and necessary."\n"The bill I sign today helps secure this country and it sends a clear message: This nation is patient and decent and fair, and we will never back down from threats to our freedom," Bush said. "We are as determined today as we were on the morning of September 12, 2001."\nMany Democrats opposed the legislation because they said it eliminated rights of defendants considered fundamental to American values, such as a person's ability to go to court to protest their detention and the use of coerced testimony as evidence. Bush acknowledged that the law came amid dispute.\n"Over the past few months, the debate over this bill has been heated and the questions raised can seem complex," he said. "Yet, with the distance of history, the questions will be narrowed and few. Did this generation of Americans take the threat seriously? And did we do what it takes to defeat that threat?"\nThe American Civil Liberties Union said the new law is "one of the worst civil liberties measures ever enacted in American history."\n"The president can now, with the approval of Congress, indefinitely hold people without charge, take away protections against horrific abuse, put people on trial based on hearsay evidence, authorize trials that can sentence people to death based on testimony literally beaten out of witnesses, and slam shut the courthouse door for habeas petitions," said ACLU Executive Director Anthony D. Romero.
(10/16/06 2:43am)
WASHINGTON - Two leading Republican senators called Sunday for a new strategy in Iraq, saying the situation is getting worse and leaving the United States with few options.\nSens. Chuck Hagel of Nebraska and John Warner of Virginia are part of the growing list of Republicans speaking out against President Bush's current plan for Iraq as U.S. casualties rise.\n"The American people are not going to continue to support, sustain a policy that puts American troops in the middle of a civil war," Hagel said on CNN's "Late Edition."\nHagel said he agreed with Warner, chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, who said after a recent visit to Iraq that Iraq was "drifting sideways." Warner has urged consideration of a change of course if the Iraq government fails to restore order over the next two or three months.\nWarner said Sunday he stands by that assessment, and even in the week since his trip to Iraq there has been an "exponential increase in the killings and the savagery that's going on over there."\n"You can see some movement forward, but a lot of movement back," Warner said on "Face the Nation" on CBS. "We have to rethink all the options, except any option which says we precipitously pull out, which would let that country fall into a certain civil war at that time, and all of the neighboring countries would be destabilized."\nBush told reporters last week he invites a change in strategy if the plan isn't working. He also said the United States will not leave until the job is done.\nHagel said it is time to change course, but "our options are limited."\n"We need to find a new strategy, a way out of Iraq, because the entire Middle East is more combustible than it's been probably since 1948, and more dangerous," Hagel said. "And we're in the middle of it."\nDemocrats long have urged a change in Iraq policy. Sen. Carl Levin of Michigan, the leading Democrat on the Senate Armed Services Committee, said there is "no military solution to this conflict" and the United States must pressure Iraqis to take over their country.\n"If they're going to have a civil war, they're going to have to do it without us," Levin said on CNN. "This is long overdue. We've got to focus Iraqi leadership attention on this by telling them we need to begin a phased redeployment of American troops from Iraq within the next few months"
(09/25/06 2:52am)
WASHINGTON -- Democrats on Sunday seized on an intelligence assessment that said the Iraq war has increased the terrorist threat, saying it was further evidence that Americans should choose new leadership in the November elections.\nThe Democrats hoped the report would undermine the GOP's image as the party more capable of handling terrorism as the campaign enters its final six-week stretch.\nTheir criticisms came in a collection of statements sent to reporters Sunday amid the disclosure of a National Intelligence Estimate that concluded the war has helped create a new generation of Islamic radicalism and that the overall terrorist threat has grown since the Sept. 11 attacks.\nThe report was completed in April and represented a consensus view of the 16 disparate spy services inside government, according to an intelligence official. The official, confirming accounts first published in Sunday's New York Times and Washington Post, spoke on condition of anonymity on Sunday because the report is classified.\n"Unfortunately this report is just confirmation that the Bush administration's stay-the-course approach to the Iraq war has not just made the war more difficult and more deadly for our troops, but has also made the war on terror more dangerous for every American," said Rep. Rahm Emanuel, head of the Democratic effort to take control of the House.\n"It's time for a new direction in this country," Emanuel, D-Ill., said in the statement.\n"Press reports say our nation's intelligence services have confirmed that President (George W.) Bush's repeated missteps in
(09/20/06 2:41am)
UNITED NATIONS -- President Bush on Tuesday appealed directly to Muslims to assure them that the United States is not waging war with Islam as he laid out a vision for peace in the Middle East before skeptical world leaders at the United Nations.\nOn the sidelines, Bush pressed Iran to return at once to international talks on its nuclear program and threatened consequences if it does not.\nBut his speech to the United Nations General Assembly was less confrontational and aimed at building bridges with people in the Middle East angry with the United States.\n"My country desires peace," Bush told world leaders in the cavernous main hall at the U.N. "Extremists in your midst spread propaganda claiming that the West is engaged in a war against Islam. This propaganda is false, and its purpose is to confuse you and justify acts of terror. We respect Islam."\nAddressing Iraqis specifically, Bush said, "We will not abandon you in your struggle to build a free nation."\nBush said Iran "must abandon its nuclear weapons ambitions." Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was scheduled to speak to the body later Tuesday, but he was not at the country's table in the hall when Bush spoke.\nSpeaking to Iranians, Bush said their country's future has been clouded because "your rulers have chosen to deny you liberty and to use your nation's resources to fund terrorism and fuel extremism and pursue nuclear weapons."\nOn the crisis in Sudan's violence-wracked region of Darfur, Bush delivered strong warnings to both the United Nations and the Sudanese government, saying that both must act now to avert further humanitarian crisis.\nBush said that if the Sudanese government does not withdraw its rejection of a U.N. peacekeeping force for Darfur, the world body should act despite the government's objections. The U.N. Security Council last month passed a resolution that would give the U.N. control over the peacekeeping mission in Darfur, now run mostly ineffectively by the African Union. But Sudan has refused to give its consent.\n"The regime in Khartoum is stopping the deployment of this force," Bush said. "If the Sudanese government does not approve this peacekeeping force quickly, the United Nations must act."\nWith more than 200,000 people already killed in three years of fighting in Darfur and the violence threatening to increase again, Bush said the "credibility of the United Nations is at stake."\nIran's defiant pursuit of a nuclear program was at the top of the agenda when Bush met earlier with French President Jacques Chirac at the Waldorf Astoria hotel where the U.S. delegation was staying. The French leader is balking at the U.S. drive to sanction Iran for defying Security Council demands that it freeze uranium enrichment.\n"Should they continue to stall," Bush said of Iranian leaders, "we will then discuss the consequences of their stalling." The president, speaking after his meeting with Chirac, said those consequences would include the possibility of sanctions.\nChirac proposed on Monday that the international community compromise by suspending the threat of sanctions if Tehran agrees to halt its uranium enrichment program and return to negotiations. The U.S. and other countries fear Iran is trying to build nuclear weapons, while Tehran insists its uranium enrichment program is to make fuel for nuclear power plants.\nBush said Iran must first suspend uranium enrichment, "in which case the U.S. will come to the table."\nBut he also stressed that he and Chirac "share the same objective, and we're going to continue to strategize together."\n"Time is of the essence," Bush said. "Now is the time for the Iranians to come to the table"
(09/07/06 2:39am)
WASHINGTON -- President Bush on Wednesday acknowledged the existence of previously secret CIA prisons around the world and said 14 high-value terrorism suspects -- including the mastermind of the Sept. 11 attacks -- have been transferred from the system to Guantanamo Bay for trials.\nHe said the "small number" of detainees that have been kept in CIA custody include people responsible for the bombing of the USS Cole in 2000 in Yemen and the 1998 attacks on U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania, in addition to the 2001 attacks.\n"The most important source of information on where the terrorists are hiding and what they are planning is the terrorists themselves," Bush said in a White House speech with families of those killed in the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks making up part of the audience. "It has been necessary to move these individuals to an environment where they can be held in secret, questioned by experts and, when appropriate, prosecuted for terrorist acts."\nThe announcement from Bush is the first time the administration has acknowledged the existence of CIA prisons, which have been a source of friction between Washington and some allies in Europe. The administration has come under criticism for its treatment of terrorism detainees. European Union lawmakers said the CIA was conducting clandestine flights in Europe to take terror suspects to countries where they could face torture.\nBush said the CIA program has involved such suspected terrorists as Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, believed to be the No. 3 al-Qaida leader before he was captured in Pakistan in 2003; Ramzi Binalshibh, an alleged would-be Sept. 11, 2001, hijacker; Abu Zubaydah, who was believed to be a link between Osama bin Laden and many al-Qaida cells before he was also captured in Pakistan in March 2002.\nThe list also includes Riduan Isamuddin, known additionally as Hambali, who was suspected of being Jemaah Islamiyah's main link to al-Qaida and the mastermind of a string of deadly bomb attacks in Indonesia until his 2003 arrest in Thailand.\nDefending the program, the president said the questioning of these detainees has provided critical intelligence information about terrorist activities that have enabled officials to prevent attacks not only in the United States, but Europe and other countries. He said the program has been reviewed by administration lawyers and been the subject of strict oversight from within the CIA.\nBush would not detail the type of interrogation techniques that are used through the program, saying they are tough but do not constitute torture.\n"This program has helped us to take potential mass murderers off the streets before they have a chance to kill," the president said. "It is invaluable to America and our allies."\nThe president's announcement, which the White House touted beforehand and asked to be televised live on the networks, comes as Bush has sought with a series of speeches to sharpen the focus on national security two months before high-stakes congressional elections.\nThe president successfully emphasized the war on terror in his re-election campaign in 2004 and is trying to make it a winning issue again for Republicans this year.\nThe president said the 14 key terrorist leaders, including Mohammed, Binalshibh, and Zubaydah, that have been transferred to the U.S. military-run prison at Guantanamo Bay would be afforded some legal protections consistent with the Geneva conventions.\n"They will continue to be treated with the humanity that they denied others," Bush said.\nBush also laid out his proposal for how trials of such key suspected terrorists -- those transferred to Guantanamo and already there -- should be conducted, which must be approved by Congress. Bush's original plan for the type of military trials used in the aftermath of World War II was struck down in June by the Supreme Court, which said the tribunals would violate U.S. and international law.\nAides said the legislation being introduced on Bush's behalf later Wednesday on Capitol Hill insists on provisions covering military tribunals that would permit evidence to be withheld from a defendant if necessary to protect classified information.
(05/22/06 1:08am)
WASHINGTON -- The inauguration of Iraq's new government marks a new era in relations with the country that the United States has occupied for more than three years, President Bush said Sunday.\n"The formation of a unity government in Iraq is a new day for the millions of Iraqis who want to live in peace," Bush said. "And the formation of the unity government in Iraq begins a new chapter in our relationship with Iraq."\nBush briefly spoke to reporters from the White House with his wife, Laura, at his side, to highlight the political development without mentioning the violence that still rages in Iraq.\nThe president did not speak of the spree of bombing, mortar rounds and a drive-by shooting that killed at least 18 Iraqis and wounded dozens -- most of them hit by a suicide bomber who targeted a Baghdad restaurant during Sunday's lunch hour.\nBush said he called President Jalal Talabani, Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki and parliament speaker Mahmoud al-Mashhadani to congratulate them on working together.\n"I assured them that the United States will continue to assist Iraqis in the formation of a new country because I fully understand that a free Iraq will be an important ally in the war on terror, will serve as a devastating defeat for the terrorists and al-Qaida and will serve as example for others in the region who desire to be free."\nSecretary of State Condoleezza Rice said Iraq has made "extraordinary progress politically" by inaugurating the government even though sectarian infighting has stalled the selection of Cabinet posts for overseeing the army, police forces and national security.\n"They want to make sure that they have it right," Rice said on "Fox News Sunday." "I think it's quite obvious that when you take this kind of time, it shows the kind of determination and maturity."\nRice said U.S. Embassy officials in Baghdad told her that 90 percent of the Iraqi parliament will support the new government.\nThe United States hopes the new government will help clear the way for the withdrawal of American troops. Rice said it is too early to talk about precisely when that will happen, but that U.S. officials will sit down with Iraqi leaders to come up with a plan.\n"Clearly larger number of Iraqis are being trained, clearly they are taking on more security responsibility, and it has always been the plan that as they take these responsibilities, we will have less to do," Rice said on NBC's "Meet the Press." "But there are still some difficult places to deal with, and we want to make sure we have the forces there that are needed."\nAbout 132,000 U.S. troops are now in Iraq, with U.S. military commanders sending several hundred more to bolster security as the government in Baghdad takes shape.
(05/08/06 1:20am)
By WASHINGTON -- A leading Republican came out against the front-runner for CIA director, Gen. Michael Hayden, saying Sunday the spy agency should not have military leadership during a turbulent time among intelligence agencies.\nMembers of the Senate committee that would consider President Bush's nominee also expressed reservations, saying the CIA is a civilian agency and putting Hayden atop it would concentrate too much power in the military for intelligence matters.\nBush was expected to nominate a new director as early as Monday to replace Porter Goss, who abruptly resigned on Friday.\nBut opposition to Hayden because of his military background is mounting on Capitol Hill, where he would face tough hearings in the Senate Intelligence Committee.\nDespite a distinguished career at the Defense Department, Hayden would be "the wrong person, the wrong place at the wrong time," said the chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, Rep. Peter Hoekstra, R-Mich.\n"There is ongoing tensions between this premier civilian intelligence agency and DOD as we speak," Hoekstra said. "And I think putting a general in charge -- regardless of how good Mike is -- ... is going to send the wrong signal through the agency here in Washington but also to our agents in the field around the world," he told "Fox News Sunday."\nIf Hayden were to get the nomination, military officers would run the major spy agencies in the United States, from the ultra-secret National Security Agency to the Defense Intelligence Agency.\nThe Pentagon already controls more than 80 percent of the intelligence budget.\n"You can't have the military control most of the major aspects of intelligence," said Democratic Sen. Dianne Feinstein of California, who is on the Senate Intelligence Committee. The CIA "is a civilian agency and is meant to be a civilian agency," she said on ABC's "This Week."\nA second committee member, GOP Sen. Saxby Chambliss of Georgia, added, "I think the fact that he is a part of the military today would be the major problem."\nSen. Joe Biden, D-Del., mentioned fears the CIA would "just be gobbled up by the Defense Department" if Hayden were to take over.\nThe chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee said he would view a Hayden nomination as a way to get information from the Bush administration about its secretive domestic surveillance program, undertaken by the NSA when Hayden led that agency.\nThe warrantless monitoring covered electronic communications between people in the United States and other parties overseas with suspected terrorist links.
(04/26/06 3:47am)
WASHINGTON -- President George W. Bush ordered a temporary suspension of environmental rules for gasoline Tuesday, making it easier for refiners to meet demand and possibly curb prices at the pump. He also halted for the summer the purchase of crude oil for the government's emergency reserve.\nThe moves came as political pressure intensified on Bush to do something about gasoline prices that are expected to stay high throughout the summer.\nBush said the nation's strategic petroleum reserve had enough fuel to guard against any major supply disruption over the next few months.\n"So, by deferring deposits until the fall, we'll leave a little more oil on the market. Every little bit helps," he said.\nWholesale gasoline future prices for June delivery dropped 8 cents a gallon to $2.10 on the New York Mercantile Exchange immediately upon Bush's remarks.\nEasing the environmental rules will allow refiners greater flexibility in providing oil supplies since they will not have to use certain additives such as ethanol to meet clean air standards. The suspension of oil purchases for the federal emergency oil reserve is likely to have only modest impact since relative little extra oil will be involved.\nThe high cost at the pump has turned into a major political issue, with Democrats and Republicans blaming each other for a problem that is largely out of Congress' control. Republicans are worried that voters paying more than $3 per gallon would punish the party in power. Democrats want to make that happen.\nDemocrats sought to turn gas prices -- like Hurricane Katrina and the Iraq war -- into an issue that hurts Bush's standing with voters. "What happen to Iraq oil, Mr. President? You said Iraqi oil would pay for the war. Ain't seen no money. Ain't seen no oil," Sen. Barbara Mikulski of Maryland said.\n"Families are gripped by the fear of rising gas prices," she added.\nAt the same news conference, New Jersey Sen. Bob Menendez proposed a 60-day suspension of the gasoline tax, saying the money could be recovered by repealing tax breaks for energy companies. He scoffed at Bush's call to curb tax breaks for the oil companies.\n"What we're left wondering today is why it took five years" for Bush to support tax increases on the energy industry, Menendez said.\nBush, in his speech, urged Congress to revoke about $2 billion in tax breaks over 10 years that Congress approved and he signed into law to encourage exploration. "Taxpayers don't need to be paying for certain of these expenses on behalf of the energy companies," Bush said.\nHe also urged lawmakers to expand tax breaks for the purchase of fuel-efficient hybrid automobiles.\nThe president said Democrats in the past have urged higher taxes on fuel and price caps to control fuel expenses, but he said neither approach works. Instead, he called for increased conservation, an expansion of domestic production and increased use of alternative fuels like ethanol.\nBush said high energy prices are disturbing.\n"Our addiction to oil is a matter of national security concerns," the president said in a speech to the Renewable Fuels Association, which advocates alternate energy sources. "After all, today we get about 60 percent of our oil from foreign countries. That's up from 20 years ago, where about 25 percent of our oil came from foreign countries."\nBush said gasoline prices are expected to remain high throughout the summer and "that's going to be a continued strain on the American people."\nBush said the Federal Trade Commission, the Justice Department and the Energy Department were investigating whether the price of gasoline has been unfairly manipulated. The administration also contacted all 50 state attorneys general to offer technical assistance to urge them to investigate possible illegal price manipulation within their jurisdictions.\nDuring the last few days, Bush asked his Energy and Justice departments to open inquiries into whether the price of gasoline has been illegally manipulated.\nIt's unclear what impact, if any, Bush's investigation would have on prices that are near or at $3 a gallon or more. Asked if Bush had any reason to suspect market manipulation, White House press secretary Scott McClellan responded, "Well, gas prices are high right now, and that's why you want to make sure there's not."\nThe administration sent letters Tuesday to state attorneys general urging them to vigorously enforce state law "against any anticompetitive, anticonsumer conduct in the petroleum industry."\n"Consumers around the nation have expressed concerns about what they have perceived as anticompetitive or otherwise unfair conduct by the world's major oil companies," said Attorney General Alberto Gonzales and Federal Trade Commission Chairman Deborah Platt Majoras. Their letter said federal agencies had substantially increased efforts to monitor, detect and prevent any violations of the law.\nHouse Speaker Dennis Hastert, R-Ill., and Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, R-Tenn., urged Bush in a letter Monday to order a federal investigation into any gasoline price gouging or market speculation.\n"There is no silver bullet," Frist said Tuesday on ABC's "Good Morning America," but "we need to make sure that any efforts at price-gouging be addressed and addressed aggressively." Meanwhile, Frist said, consumers should take steps to conserve gasoline -- drive at slower speeds, tune up car engines for maximum efficiency and carpool.\nSenate Democratic Leader Harry Reid of Nevada dispatched his own letter, calling for a multi-pronged approach to restrain gas prices.
(04/20/06 4:07am)
WASHINGTON -- White House Deputy Chief of Staff Karl Rove gave up some of his responsibilities, and White House press secretary Scott McClellan announced his resignation Wednesday, continuing a shake-up in President Bush's administration that has already yielded a new chief of staff.\nRove is giving up oversight of policy development to focus more on politics with the approach of the fall midterm elections.\nA little more than a year ago, Rove was promoted to deputy chief of staff in charge of most White House policy coordination. That new portfolio came on top of his title as senior adviser and role of chief policy aide to Bush.\nNow, the job of deputy chief of staff for policy is being given to Joel Kaplan, the deputy budget director.\nThe move signals a broad effort to rearrange and reinvigorate Bush's staff by new chief of staff Joshua Bolten, who moved into his position last week; Kaplan was his No. 2 person at the Office of Management and Budget.\n"Joel Kaplan is a man of great talent, intellect and experience who possesses a deep knowledge of policy and budget processes," Bush said in a written statement.\nAt least for the time being, the promotion of Kaplan would leave Bush with three deputy chiefs of staff: Rove, Kaplan and Joe Hagin, who oversees administrative matters, intelligence and other national security issues.\nMcClellan, talking to reporters later aboard Air Force One, said that Kaplan's role will focus more on the day-to-day aspects of policy.\nAsked whether the change in Rove's role was akin to what he used to do as political director, McClellan responded "I wouldn't look at it that way. ... Karl is someone who has always been intimately involved in the strategic planning and addressing these bigger strategic issues, and this will free him up to do more of that."\nAppearing with Bush on the South Lawn, McClellan, who has parried especially fiercely with reporters on Iraq and on intelligence issues, told Bush: "I have given it my all sir and I have given you my all sir, and I will continue to do so as we transition to a new press secretary."\nBush said McClellan had "a challenging assignment."\n"I thought he handled his assignment with class, integrity," the president said. "It's going to be hard to replace Scott, but nevertheless he made the decision, and I accepted it. One of these days, he and I are going to be rocking in chairs in Texas and talking about the good old days."\nMcClellan is expected to remain in his job until a successor is named. Among those under consideration are Tony Snow, a former White House speechwriter under the first President Bush, former Pentagon spokeswoman Victoria Clarke and Dan Senor, a former coalition spokesman after the invasion of Iraq, according to Republican officials.\nMcClellan was named press secretary in June 2003, not long after the United States invaded Iraq and had first been a deputy to Ari Fleischer in the job -- a White House position with daily public visibility rivaling virtually everyone there except the president.\nAfter the announcement, Bush and McClellan walked across the lawn together and boarded Marine One, but a problem with the helicopter's radio kept it grounded. The president and his staff were forced to take a motorcade to Andrews Air Force Base, Md., where Bush boarded Air Force One for a flight to Alabama. McClellan and Rove rode in the president's limousine to the military base.\nMcClellan came back on the plane to the press cabin and shook hands all around. Someone said it was a sad moment, and McClellan replied, "It is sad on some level." He said he would accompany Bush on a trip to California this weekend and remain on the job for a couple more weeks.\nHe said he had been thinking seriously about leaving in the past few weeks since Andrew Card announced he was leaving.\n"With a new chief of staff coming on board," McClellan said, "it was a good time to make this decision. And three years would have been an awfully long time in this position.\n"I've been at this for a long time, and I didn't need much encouragement to make this decision, even though you all kept tempting me"
(04/11/06 5:45am)
WASHINGTON -- President Bush said Monday that force is not necessarily required to stop Iran from having a nuclear weapon, and he dismissed reports of plans for a military attack against Tehran as "wild speculation."\nBush said his goal is to keep the Iranians from having the capability or the knowledge to have a nuclear weapon.\n"I know we're here in Washington (where) prevention means force," Bush said during an appearance at the Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies at Johns Hopkins University. "It doesn't mean force necessarily. In this case it means diplomacy."\nBush and other administration officials have said repeatedly that the military option is on the table, and White House officials acknowledge "normal" military planning is under way. Several reports published during the weekend said the administration was studying options for military strikes, and an account in The New Yorker magazine raised the possibility of using nuclear bombs against Iran's underground nuclear sites.\nBush did not directly respond to that report but said, "What you're reading is just wild speculation."\nBut Bush said he was correct to include Iran in the "axis of evil" with Iraq and North Korea and that he's glad to see other countries taking the threat from Iran seriously, too.\n"I got out a little early on the issue by saying 'axis of evil,'" Bush said. "But I meant it. I saw it as a problem. And now many others have come to the conclusion that the Iranians should not have a nuclear weapon."\nThe White House sought Monday to minimize new speculation about a possible military strike against Iran while acknowledging that the Pentagon is developing contingency plans to deal with Tehran's nuclear ambitions. The Pentagon has refused to describe its planning further.\nWhite House press secretary Scott McClellan refused to confirm or deny The New Yorker report. "Those who are seeking to draw broad conclusions based on normal military contingency planning are misinformed or not knowledgeable about the administration's thinking," he said.\nBritish Foreign Secretary Jack Straw, in an interview Sunday with the British Broadcasting Corp., called the idea of a nuclear strike "completely nuts."\nStraw said Britain would not launch a pre-emptive strike on Iran, and he was as "certain as he could be" that neither would the United States. He said he has a high suspicion that Iran is developing a civil nuclear capability that, in turn, could be used for nuclear weapons, but he said there is "no smoking gun" to prove it and rationalize abandoning the plodding diplomatic process.\n"The reason why we're opposed to military action is because it's an infinitely worse option and there's no justification for it," Straw said.\nDefense experts say a military strike on Iran would be risky and complicated. U.S. forces already are preoccupied with Iraq and Afghanistan, and an attack against Iran could inflame U.S. problems in the Muslim world.\nThe U.N. Security Council has demanded Iran suspend its uranium enrichment program. But Iran has so far refused to halt its nuclear activity, saying the small-scale enrichment project was strictly for research and not for development of nuclear weapons.\nBush has said Iran might pose the greatest challenge to the United States of any other country in the world. And while he has stressed that diplomacy is always preferable, he has defended his administration's strike-first policy against terrorists and other enemies.\n"The threat from Iran is, of course, their stated objective to destroy our strong ally Israel," the president said last month in Cleveland. "That's a threat, a serious threat. It's a threat to world peace; it's a threat, in essence, to a strong alliance. I made it clear, I'll make it clear again, that we will use military might to protect our ally"
(04/10/06 4:47am)
WASHINGTON -- President Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney should speak publicly about their involvement in the CIA leak case so people can understand what happened, a leading Republican senator said Sunday.\n"We ought to get to the bottom of it so it can be evaluated, again, by the American people," said Sen. Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania, chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee.\nIn a federal court filing last week, the prosecutor in the case said Cheney's former chief of staff, I. Lewis Libby, testified before a grand jury that he was authorized by Bush, through Cheney, to leak information from a classified document that detailed intelligence agencies' conclusions about weapons of mass destruction in Iraq.\nA lawyer knowledgeable about the case said Saturday that Bush declassified sensitive intelligence in 2003 and authorized its public disclosure to rebut Iraq war critics, but he did not specifically direct that Libby be the one to disseminate the information.\n"I think that it is necessary for the president and vice president to tell the American people exactly what happened," Specter told "Fox News Sunday."\n"I do say that there's been enough of a showing here with what's been filed of record in court that the president of the United States owes a specific explanation to the American people ... about exactly what he did," Specter said.\nLibby faces trial, likely in January, on charges of perjury and obstruction of justice for allegedly lying to the grand jury and investigators about what he told reporters about CIA officer Valerie Plame.\nSpecial Counsel Patrick Fitzgerald did not say in the filing that Cheney authorized Libby to leak Plame's identity, and Bush is not accused of doing anything illegal.\n"The president may be entirely in the clear, and it may turn out that he had the authority to make the disclosures which were made," Specter said. But, he added, "it was not the right way to go about it because we ought not to have leaks in \ngovernment."\nThe investigation is looking into whether Plame's identify was disclosed to discredit her husband, former Ambassador Joseph Wilson, who criticized the Iraq war. Wilson had accused the administration of twisting prewar intelligence to exaggerate the threat from Iraq's \nweapons of mass destruction.\nSen. John Kerry, said it was wrong for Bush to declassify information selectively "in order to buttress phony arguments to go to war."\n"This was not a declassification in order to really educate America. This was a declassification in order to mislead America," Kerry said on NBC's "Meet the Press". \nWilson said Sunday that Bush and Cheney should release transcripts of their interviews with Fitzgerald.\n"It seems to me that first and foremost, the White House needs to come clean on this matter," Wilson said on ABC's "This Week." "My own view of this is that the White House owes the American people and particularly our service people who have been sent into war, an apology for having misrepresented the facts."\nThe lawyer knowledgeable about the case said Bush instructed Cheney to "get it out" and left the details about disseminating the intelligence to him. The lawyer, who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the case for the White House, said Cheney chose Libby and communicated the president's wishes to his then-top aide.\n"I don't think there's any evidence that the president told the vice president to go leak information to the press," said Sen. John Kyl, R-Ariz.\nKyl said on CNN's "Late Edition" that a better way for the administration to have tried to counter Wilson's claims in a New York Times op-ed would have been to "have all of the press be given" the declassified intelligence material.\nIt is not known when the conversation between Bush and Cheney took place. The White House has declined to provide the date when the president used his authority to declassify the portions of the October 2002 National Intelligence Estimate.\n"There has to be a detailed explanation as to precisely what Vice President Cheney did, what the president said to him and an explanation by the president as to what he said," Specter said.
(04/04/06 6:07am)
CINCINNATI -- Perhaps it was the pitching practice he got over the weekend or inspiration from the new baseball bat that outfielder Ken Griffey Jr. gave him. President George W. Bush had lots of oomph in his arm to throw out a strong first pitch for the Cincinnati Reds' home opener.\nBush became the first sitting president to throw a ceremonial pitch in Cincinnati as the Reds took on the Chicago Cubs. The ball to catcher Jason LaRue was high and off the plate, but Bush called it "my best pitch, which was kind of a slow ball."\n"Give me some tips," the president asked Reds pitcher David Weathers during a pregame visit to the clubhouse.\nBush received a loud standing ovation when he took the mound in this Republican-leaning city. Two injured soldiers and a father who lost his son in Afghanistan accompanied him.\nLittle American flags were distributed to the crowd of 42,000 before the game. Fans waved them excitedly as Bush was introduced and drowned out the few scattered protesters, like the family sitting a few rows behind home plate wearing matching red-and-white T-shirts that said "11-04-08" -- the date of the next presidential \nelection.\nBush, the former Texas Rangers owner, told Fox Sports Network in a gametime interview that he has been a baseball fan since birth.\n"I was born when my dad was in college, and he was the first baseman for the Yale Bulldogs, and Mother used to take me to the games," Bush said. "So it was like immersion from a young age.\n"I've got the dish at home at the White House, and so, when I'm doing my work, I keep a game on. And there's nothing better than opening day," the president said.\nBut he balked when asked if he would return to baseball after leaving the White House.\n"I don't know," Bush said skeptically. "You know, I've got too much to do right now. ... But you know, I think I'll just always be a fan."\nBush shook hands with players from both teams before they took the field. In the Reds' clubhouse, Griffey gave him a black bat, and pitcher Ken Mercker showed he was a loyal Bush supporter.\n"I wanted to wear another hat but it didn't match," Mercker said, holding up a blue Bush-Cheney hat from his locker that said "Delivered" on the back.\nIn the Cubs' clubhouse, Bush walked in and announced, "This is the year." He went straight to manager Dusty Baker, grabbed his hand, and turned him to the cameras. "Smile," Bush said, shaking Baker's hand with a broad grin. Baker did as instructed, saying, "I'll do what I got to do"
(03/27/06 7:06am)
WASHINGTON -- Founded by immigrants and praised as a haven for the oppressed, the United States now is struggling to decide the fate of as many as 12 million people living in the country illegally.\nThe Senate takes up the emotional debate on the heels of weekend rallies that drew hundreds of thousands of people protesting attempts to toughen laws against immigrants. \nAmong the ideas that President Bush and members of Congress are considering include erecting a fence on the Mexico border to deter illegal immigration and treating people who sneak across the border as felons to be deported.\nOther possible ideas for legislation are allowing foreigners to stay in the country legally as custodians, dish washers, construction workers and other low-paid employees and allowing those working in the U.S. a path to citizenship.\nOn Monday, the Senate Judiciary Committee takes up the issue as Bush headlines a naturalization ceremony for 30 new citizens at Constitution Hall. Demonstrations are planned near the Capitol, including a prayer service with immigration advocates and clergy who plan to wear handcuffs to demonstrate the criminalization of immigration violations.\nBush is going to Mexico this week for a meeting with the leaders of Mexico and Canada. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said Sunday it's important that Mexico "recognize the importance of defense of the borders and of American laws."\nProtests raged across the country over the weekend, led by more than 500,000 people who marched through downtown Los Angeles on Saturday in one of the largest demonstrations for any cause in recent U.S. history. Marchers also took to the streets in Phoenix, Milwaukee, Dallas and Columbus, Ohio.\nThe president, working hand-in-hand with the business community that relies on cheap labor, is pressuring Congress to allow immigrants to stay in the country legally if they take a job that Americans are unwilling to do.\nJudiciary Chairman Arlen Specter, R-Pa., also supports the idea and has vowed that his committee will advance a bill to the full Senate on Monday, even if they have to work "very, very late into the night."\n"If they're prepared to work to become American citizens in the long line traditionally of immigrants who have helped make this country, we can have both a nation of laws and a welcoming nation of workers who do some very, very important jobs for our economy," Specter said Sunday on ABC's "This Week."\nSenate Majority Leader Bill Frist, R-Tenn., has said that whether or not a bill gets out of the Judiciary Committee, he is opening two weeks of debate on the issue Tuesday. \nHe has offered a plan that would tighten borders, add Border Patrol agents and punish employers who hire illegal immigrants because he says the most important concern is improving national security in an age of terrorism. His bill sidesteps the question of temporary work permits, but he has said he's open to the idea.\nDemocrats have said they will do everything they can to block Frist's bill. Sen. Edward Kennedy, D-Mass., said Sunday that legislation creating tougher enforcement does not do enough.\n"We have spent $20 billion on chains and fences and border guards and dogs in the southern border over the last 10 years," Kennedy said on "Face the Nation" on CBS. "And it doesn't work. What we need is a comprehensive approach. I think President Bush understands it."\nWhere Kennedy and Bush differ is on the question of what to do with foreigners who are already living and working in the United States. Kennedy and Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., have a bill that would allow those immigrants to apply for citizenship once they pay taxes and a fine and learn English.\nCritics like Rep. Tom Tancredo, R-Colo., say that would give amnesty to people who have broken the law by entering the country without permission.\n"It's a slap in the face to every single person who has done it the right way, and to everybody who's waiting out there to do it the right way," Tancredo said. "It's bad policy. And it's also, I think, for the Republican Party especially, bad policy."\nBush wants to give foreign workers a guest permit to stay for a specific amount of time to do a job, without a path to citizenship. Sens. John Cornyn, R-Texas, and Jon Kyl, R-Ariz., propose to let employed illegal immigrants stay for five years but then leave, pay fines and apply to re-enter the country.\nIf the Senate can agree on the bill, the work won't be over to get legislation to Bush's desk to become a law. The House passed a bill last year that increases penalties for illegal immigration activities, requires employers to verify the legal status of their employees and provides $2.2 billion for a seven-mile wall across the border. But it did not address the guest worker issue.