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Press Secretary Briefings, 12/20/74
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Press Secretary Briefings, 12/20/74
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This file contains materials relating to Dennison Kitchel.
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Ron Nessen Files (Ford Administration)
Ron Nessen's Press Briefing Transcripts
subjects
Vail (Colo.)
Nixon, Richard M. (Richard Milhous), 1913-1994
Federal budget
Jews
Legislation
Presidential appointments
Presidential trips
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State of the union messages
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1974-12-20
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12
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1974
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1974-12-20
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12
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1974
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Digitized from Box 4 of the Ron Nessen Files at the Gerald R. Ford Presidential Library
This Copy For
NEWS CONFERENCE
#107
AT THE WHITE HOUSE
WITH RON NESSEN
AT 12:20 P.M. EST
DECEMBER 20, 1974
FRIDAY
MR. NESSEN: The President met with Ken Cole
and others this morning for another of their discussions
on domestic issues for preparation of the State of the
Union Message.
At noon, the President met with a group of
leaders from the Jewish community.
At 2:00, the President met --
Q What was the purpose of it, Ron, or did
you tell us that yesterday?
MR. NESSEN: The Jewish leaders meeting?
Q Yes.
MR. NESSEN: He just wants to get acquainted
with them. He has been having a series of meetings
with leaders of different organizations.
Q Was it at his request?
Q There was a report they came down to
discuss the denunciation of the trade bill, can you
affirm or deny that?
MR. NESSEN: I do not have any indication of
that, Peter. I am told it is to get acquainted and to
hear their views. If they have some views on that, I
suppose they could give it to him.
Q
The paper pointed flat out that is why
they wanted to see him.
Q Can we get them out here to speak to us?
MR. NESSEN: It is all right with me if they
want to speak.
MORE
#107
- 2 -
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Q
Let us know when they are leaving.
Q
Will they bring a spokesman in here,
Ron, please?
MR. NESSEN: We don't have any plans for that.
Q
Ron, did the Vice-President come to the
White House this morning?
MR. NESSEN: No.
Q Will he tomorrow?
MR. NESSEN: It is possible he will be in here
tomorrow. Vice-President Rockefeller will not be in
today. I expect he will be in tomorrow for a meeting
with the President. I do not have the time yet. I'll
give it to you later. There will be a picture if you
care to take one of the meeting.
It appears from this that -- this is a group
that has met from time to time with Secretary Kissinger,
and they apparently asked for the meeting with the
President. We posted the participants, and they
probably do have some views to give to the President,
and the President will outline his policy toward the
Middle East.
Q
What is his policy toward the Middle East?
MR. NESSEN: I think what the President will
say is what he has been saying, which is that the
United States remains committed to maintaining the
momentum towards a Middle East peace settlement.
The President believes the most effective
way to do this is to have a period of quiet diplomacy,
which is what we are doing. By definition, he is not
going to go into a detailed discussion of the Middle East
because of the quiet diplomacy.
Q On Ambassador Scali of the UN, he said
a day or so ago that there was going to be some new
and somewhat dramatic developments in Middle East
policy. Can you tell us what that is?
MR. NESSEN: No, I did not read that speech,
and I did not know he said that.
MORE
#107
- 3 -
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Anyhow, let me just interrupt my announcements
here for a moment to make this announcement. The
President is going to be leaving the White House after
his meeting with Jewish leaders to attend a surprise
party for Senator Sparkman.
The travel pool will be the AP, UPI; AP and
UPI Photos; the Newsweek correspondent, the ABC camera
crew with radio technician, and the ABC correspondent.
You should assemble in about 25 minutes over
here, and Bill Roberts will take you to the motorcade.
Q
Where is this?
MR. NESSEN: Up on the Hill somewhere.
Q
You don't know specifically?
MR. NESSEN: I don't.
At 2:00 the President will meet with Roy Ash
and the other officials of the Office of Management
and Budget to make the last of his budget decisions
for 1976.
Q
Who else is going to be there?
MR. NESSEN: Roy brings about three or four
assistants, and they change depending on what area
of the budget is being discussed each day.
Q
They don't bring James Lynn?
MR. NESSEN: I have not seen Lynn in there, no.
Q
Does this mean they might be wrapping up
this afternoon?
MR. NESSEN: This is the last in a series of
budget decision meetings.
The budget people now have to take the
President's decisions and put the budget into final
form.and get it to the printer and send it up to
Congress.
When I say this is the last of the budget
decisions, I think the President will have to go back
and review some of the things and make final decisions
in some areas, but this is the last of the broad
subject area meetings that they have been holding.
MORE
107
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Q
The question, Ron, is, is there still a chance
for appeal after this afternoon's meeting?
MR. NESSEN: I think so, Peter.
Q
Are you telling us he made the bulk of the
decisions on the forthcoming budget?
MR. NESSEN: Yes.
The meeting starts, as we said, at 2:00 o'clock,
and Secretary Brennan will be in there for 15 minutes to
do some of this process that you are talking about. Secretary
Lynn will be there at 2:15 p.m. in his capacity as HUD Secretary,
and at 2:30 p.m. Administrator Train and Frank Zarb and at
2:45 -p.m. Administrator Fletcher and Frank Zarb.
Q Are these appeals?
MR. NESSEN: The areas of the budget that they will
be wrapping up today are labor and housing and urban
development and EPA and NASA, and if those officials disagree
with -- well, to answer your question, yes.
Q
Ron, does the President plan to meet his goal
of a balanced budget in 1976?
MR. NESSEN: That is still his goal, Helen, but
based on what has happened to the economy, it is going to
be a difficult goal to achieve.
Q
Is it true the budget deficit could be as
high as $25 billion to $30 billion in 1976 and as high as
$20 billion in 1975?
MR. NESSEN: I have not seen the figures and don't
know what decisions have been made on the 1976 budget. The
1975 budget -- what was the figure you used for 1975?
Q
$20 billion.
MR. NESSEN: I have not heard one that high.
Q
What is the highest you have heard?
MR. NESSEN: You can do the arithmetic yourselves.
He came with 302.2, and Congress did not go along with most
of the 4.6, so you have to add most of that back again,
I
some of it back again anyhow. I think you know what
revenues are, don't you, 290 something?
Q
And falling.
MORE
#107
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Q
You also have the surtax revenue, and you are
not going to get that.
MR. NESSEN: It certainly looks that way.
Q
Isn't the current figure on the deficit at
least $15 billion?
MR. NESSEN: I don't see how you could get
$15 billion, Jim. I don't have the figures, so let's not
speculate on it. You can call up Roy Ash's office and get
it.
MORE
#107
- 6 -
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Q
Can we carry this to say the President has
given up his hopes for a balanced budget?
MR. NESSEN: He certainly has not given up his
goal of a balanced budget.
Q
How about his hopes?
MR. NESSEN: It is going to be difficult.
Q
For 1975 or 1976?
MR. NESSEN: Both.
Q
Since it has been pointed out that
Denison Kitchel has never devoted any legal service
to the poor, and he does not deny this, why does the
President nominate him so soon after asking the poor
to pay more for food stamps and Medicare?
MR. NESSEN: The President has not nominated
Denison Kitchel for anything.
Q
I am sorry, I thought there was a page one
story.
MR. NESSEN: Did you read the top of it
carefully?
Q
Maybe I did not.
MR. NESSEN: I don't think you did.
At 3:30 this afternoon there will be a
diplomatic credentials ceremony for the new Ambassadors
from the German Democratic Republic, the Yemen Arab
Republic, and the Kingdom of Morocco.
Tomorrow, as we said, the President will
likely have a meeting with Vice-President Rockefeller,
and I do not have the time, but we will get it for you
when we have it.
The Economic Policy Board is having an
important meeting today which will last all day long.
This is taking place in the Executive Office Building.
It is expected to go on most of the day, including
right through the lunch hour. I am told they are going
to have lunch right in the conference room to continue
their meeting. The attendees are Secretary Simon,
Bill Seidman, Roy Ash, Alan Greenspan, and Ambassador
Eberle, and members of their staffs.
MORE
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This is to put into a final form a whole
series of very wide-ranging options and recommendatios
for the President on the economy.
Really, today's meeting is a kind of culmination
of everything that has gone on in terms of the economy
since shortly after President Ford took office. And
that goes all the way back to the planning of the summit
conference and the preparation for the economic speech
and so forth.
He has been meeting with his economic advisers
on a regular basis, but as he said in the Business Council
speech, he had directed the Economic Policy Board to draw
up a final set of options and recommendations, and have
it done today.
And tomorrow, probably about 2:00, they are
going to meet with the President to go through a full-
scale review of the economy and of the options that
they are pulling together today.
That will be at 2:00, here at the White House
tomorrow, and I think we could have some pictures of
that.
Q
If any decisions are made will they be
announced tomorrow?
MR. NESSEN: No, he is not expected to make
any decisions tomorrow. The meeting is likely to go
on for quite a while. I think it is comparable in the
economic area to that long Saturday meeting on energy.
That was last Saturday.
Just to project ahead a little bit, the President,
once he has the recommendations and the options, will
spend the next two or three weeks going through them.
And his procedure in the past has been on these kinds
of things to ask for additional information and so
forth. And he will spend a fair amount of his time
at Vail going through these economic recommendations.
Then he will make his decisions, and I would think that
they would be announced sometime about the middle of
January.
MORE
#170
- 8 -
#107-12/20
Q
Before the State of the Union Speech, or would
that be the speech?
MR. NESSEN: The precise timetable is not really
set, you know, in what form or format he is going to
announce it.
Q
Ron, on that same subject, there was a published
report that Representative Conable of New York and some other
Republican Congressmen, when told that the State of the Union
Message would be pretty much a regular State of the Union
Message with lots of different remedies and programs in it,
said to the White House Congressional liaison people, "
We don't want a laundry list; we want a State of the Union
Message that concentrates on the economy. Don't give us a
lot of other stuff. Give us a State of the Union Message that
deals with economy and the energy crisis."
Does the President plan to do that, essentially, in
the State of the Union Message, concentrate on these two
major issues?
MR. NESSEN: Jim, for one thing, the President
has invited a number of people to give their views on the
State of the Union Speech. In fact, a letter has gone up to
Speaker Albert and to Senator Mansfield formally inviting
them to send in ideas, and I think the word will get around
the Hill that other people -- he would be happy to hear their
ideas, too.
As for precisely what he is going to say in the
State of the Union Speech, he simply has not decided yet
whether it is going to be a broad, philosophical speech,
or a shopping list speech, or a combination of the two; it
has not been decided.
Q
Is there a possibility that he might follow
the precedent that President Johnson set, to have two State
of the Union Messages, one on foreign policy and one on
domestic?
MR. NESSEN: That is possible.
Q Ron, could you explain to me the difference
here? I read the head on here. It said, "The President wants
Denison Kitchel." Could you explain why the President wants
him?
MR. NESSEN: The President has decided he wants
Denison Kitchel.
MORE
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- 9 -
#107-12/20
Q
Is there any reason why he would want Kitchel
to head this, when Kitchell has never given a minute of
legal work to the poor? And this is not a nomination,
it is just a desire, is that it?
MR. NESSEN: I say, if you read the heading yesterday
you will understand.
Q
I read the heading here.
Now, you said he wants him, and why does he want
him when he has never helped the poor in all of his career?
Is there any explanation for that, Ron?
MR. NESSEN: You should read the press release, Les,
but in answer to your question, he has indicated his interest
in"having Mr. Kitchel have that job.
The procedure is that these nominations are sent to
Congress for them to review and either confirm or reject.
Q
Then it is a nomination?
MR. NESSEN: It will be, if he decides to go ahead
with it.
Q
The nomination has not been made yet?
MR. NESSEN: That was the point I was trying to
make earlier.
Q
Ron, is the President concerned with the
objection that has been raised, that Mr. Kitchel does not
have this experience in dealing with the poor?
MR. NESSEN: I think, Mr. Kitchel, the President
feels, is a qualified lawyer and that whatever lack of
experience he may have in the specific area is not a disability
to doing a good job if he nominates him for this job.
Q
Ron, does the President intend to hold a press
conference before he leaves for Vail on Sunday?
MR. NESSEN: Not that I am aware of, Ralph.
Q
Ron, can you specifically deny the rumors
that are spreading in our own incestuous little group and
elsewhere that the President plans to hold a press conference
at 11:00 o'clock tomorrow.
MORE
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- 10 -
#107-12/20
MR. NESSEN: The status of Mr. Kitchel is that the
President has made a preliminary selection pending all the
clearances, and of course, these names do go to --
Q
Who suggested this? Was it the same fellow
that suggested Gibson, the fellow with the $88,000 a year
from the oil company, as I recall?
Q
Can I ask you whether or not, specifically,
the President is going to hold a press conference as rumored
at 11:00 o'clock tomorrow morning?
MR. NESSEN: He is not.
Q
Or at any other time tomorrow?
MR. NESSEN: He is not.
Q
Before he leaves for Vail?
MR. NESSEN: He is not. He is not going to hold
a news conference before he goes to Vail.
MORE
3107
- 11 -
#107-12/20
Q
Are you going to hold a briefing tomorrow?
MR. NESSEN: I did not intend to.
Let me give you several more announcements.
The President today announced his decision to
appoint a new Chairman of The Civil Aeronautics Board.
Q
Ron, on that, what happens to Mr. Timm?
Is he now out, or does he continue as a member of the
Board but not Chairman?
MR. NESSEN: That is correct. He continues as
a member of the Board, but he is not Chairman.
Q
Who?
MR. NESSEN: Mr. Timm.
One other word on Vail. We don't really have
all that much more to give you on Vail. We have not
heard from Eric yet.
Let me make a small correction to something I
said the other day about Vail. The rent that the
President is paying to Mr. Bass is $75 a day, rather
than $100 a day, and the way this was computed is that
Mr. Bass normally rents his house for $250 a day,
and the President normally rents his condominium for
$175 a day, and the difference is $75. So the President
will pay $75 a day rent to Mr. Bass, plus letting Bass
use his condominium.
Q
I would like to ask a question on Vail.
The other day you said the President would do as little
as possible to disrupt the normal course of tourism
and vacations there. Does that mean in view of the
fact I talked to a fellow from Vail this morning, and
he said the lift lines are 20 minutes long on weekends --
is the President of the United States going to wait in
a lift line, and will the pool wait in a lift line at
Vail?
MR. NESSEN: I am supposed to talk to Dick
Keiser at 2:00 this afternoon to get precise arrange-
ments for stuff like that, but I am told one of the
things they do at Vail is that if you are skiing with
an instructor you go to the head of the line. I think
that is the normal procedure -- some of you have been
to Vail -- and the President will be skiing with
an instructor.
MORE
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Q
What is his name?
MR. NESSEN: I will get it for you.
Q
Ron, the Defense Department and other
Executive agencies have opposed the Cargo Preference
Bill which passed the Senate earlier this week.
MR. NESSEN: Right.
Q
And there are stories out a deal was
worked out with Senator Long in which he would clear.
the Trade Bill in exchange for the President's
signature on this legislation. Is that true?
MR. NESSEN: What is the deal that you are
describing?
Q
That Senator Long would clear the
Trade Bill which, of course, the President wanted,
and in return for that, the President would sign the
Cargo Preference Bill.
MR. NESSEN: No, there was no such deal.
Q
Sign what?
MR. NESSEN: The Cargo Preference Bill.
Senator Long did talk to the President
about this, and the President indicated that he
would not do anything to prevent the Cargo Preference
Bill from coming to a vote, but there was never
anything about whether he would sign it or veto
it, and the fact of the matter is he has not decided
whether to sign it or veto it, but that is incorrect.
Q
What about the Strip Mining Bill? Has
the President decided what and when he is going to
do something?
MR. NESSEN: No, but let me say something
about all the legislation that is up here if I could.
In the last 72 hours there have been something like
60 bills up here, and as I mentioned to you yesterday,
some of them are complicated. The Trade Bill has 180
pages to it, for instance, and I think it is going to
take a lot of the President's time to go through this
legislation to make his decision. He plans to do a
lot of that in his first days at Vail.
MORE
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So what I am saying is on these two specifics
he has not made a decision yet, and I would think that
it is just very difficult to predict when he is going to
make a decision on these bills. It is going to take
him a couple of days to get through them.
Q
On the Strip Mining Bill. I think
yesterday you said the White House was actively working
on another bill. What progress has been made, and what
is the outlook for that?
MR. NESSEN: You have to check on the Hill on
that one. I have not heard of much progress.
Q
The corrections you talked about on the
bill, has that actually gone to the Hill?
MR. NESSEN: In conversations with Van Ness in
Jackson's office, he is aware of what the corrections
would have to be to get a signature on the Strip Mining
Bill.
Q
What is the President's position on the
Strip Mining Bill? Is it still that he intends to oppose
it?
MR. NESSEN: That has never changed since last
Saturday. He will veto it unless a bill is passed in
this session which he can sign at the same time.
Q
Ron, is there any announced purpose for
the meeting tomorrow with Vice-President Rockefeller?
How long is it going to take? Can you give us a little
detail of what is planned in that meeting?
MR. NESSEN: I really can't. I think some of
you have asked about what the President's plans are
for Vice-President Rockefeller, and I would think that
would be a topic of discussion.
Q
Will there be any announcements here after
that, Ron?
MR. NESSEN: It is hard to predict, Bill.
Q
What are the plans?
MR. NESSEN: The plans are for them to meet
sometime tomorrow.
MORE
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Q
I mean, what are the plans for Rockefeller?
MR. NESSEN: Helen, they have not talked about
it yet. I said yesterday it seemed to be improper to talk
about plans prior to his confirmation, because you presume
confirmation. Well, he has been confirmed and sworn in, and
that is what they are going to do tomorrow, among other
things.
Q You indicated we might not even find out
tomorrow, and it seems to me, the American people ought to
know.
MR. NESSEN: I said I did not know. I told you I
did not know what the plans are for tomorrow.
Q
Do you have a time for that meeting tomorrow?
MR. NESSEN: Not yet.
Q What time will you know when it will be?
MR. NESSEN: We will set a time for me to set a
time for knowing what time it is.
Q There is no meeting between the two men today?
MR. NESSEN: That is right.
Q
You indicated there would be a decision this
week on food aid. What is the status on that?
MR. NESSEN: I mentioned yesterday, it is taking a
little longer than expected because he asked for some
additional material.
Q
Has U. S. Steel sent in its justification
papers yet?
MR. NESSEN: They are due today. Several officers
of U. S. Steel will be coming in at 3:00 o'clock, I am told,
to meet with Albert Rees, the Director of the Council on
Wage and Price Stability and members of his staff, and it
would be at 3:00 o'clock, at room 3235 of the new EOB. That
is the one on 17th Street.
Q Do you know their names?
MR. NESSEN: Yes, I do know their names. They are
Edgar Speer, who is the Chairman of the Board, and David
Roderick, Chairman of the Finance Committee, and William
Whyte - he is Washington Vice-President.
MORE
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Q
Is the President going to see them?
MR. NESSEN: No. This has nothing to do with the
White House.
Q
Who will see them?
MR. NESSEN: They will be seen by Mr. Rees and by
his Deputy, James Blum, and by the Assistant Director for Price
Monitoring, whose name is Arnold Collery, and I do not know
whether there will be anything said after that meeting.
If there is, it will not come from the White House.
The press queries should go to Morrie Feibusch,
who I think most of you know. He is the Information Officer
for the Wage and Price Council. His phone number is
456-6757.
Q
Will Rees meet with the President after the
meeting with the steel people?
MR. NESSEN: I do not have any plans for that. I
think it might take them some time to analyze the information.
Q
They are delivering the justification papers
at that time?
MR. NESSEN: That is my understanding.
Q
Has the President issued any instructions to
Mr. Rees and the others on how to deal with U. S. Steel?
MR. NESSEN: Only his initial request for
justification, and you know, he remains -- whatever it was
we said.
Also, I suppose most of you know the President also
requested the Council to seek justification from the Colorado
Fuel and Iron Company, which is a smaller steel company,
but also raised its prices, and so, the President asked that
they be required to submit a justification -- Colorado Fuel
and Iron Company. And they have promised also a prompt reply.
Q
Ron, what happened yesterday to the Consumer
Price Index by way of reaction?
MR. NESSEN: Well, it looks to me as if there is
no significant improvement in the cost of living.
Q
I think it was a .9 percent increase, wasn't it?
MR. NESSEN: I think, from what I have read, this
appears to be mostly the rapid increase in food prices. Some
areas of the index look a little better.
MORE
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The commodities, excluding food -- there has been
a slow down over the past two months in the rate of increase,
but it shows that inflation has not let up and it shows
that there is a continuing need to fight inflation, as
the President has said often, and not to make this kind of
180 degree turn that he spoke of in his Business Council
speech.
Q
Ron, what happened at yesterday's meeting with
his energy advisers, and what was the result of the meeting?
MR. NESSEN: It was a long meeting. It broke up
about a quarter of seven, I think, twenty of seven, something
like that. So, it was over three hours. The participants
at the Camp David meeting took turns going through various
sections of this report with him. They had some proposed
goals for the energy policy, and they had some proposed
solutions.
The solutions were broken down into short-term solutions
which would be to deal with the problems between now and
1977; and the medium term solutions, which would deal with
the problem from 1977 to 1985; and long-term solutions, which
would deal with the problem from 1985 until the end of the
century. As we said the day that they had their first
meeting here that Saturday, it is complex, and it has to do
with increasing supplies and it has to do with prices and
it has to do with the effects on both the domestic and
international economy. There were no decisions made.
The President asked for additional information on
some of the proposals. It is going to take them a few days
to take what the President told them and put it into the kind
of form that he asked for.
As for the specific ideas that were discussed, I
just do not feel that we can talk about them. It is the
President's desire that they not be.
Q
Ron, you said the gasoline tax was not
discussed at this meeting?
MR. NESSEN: I am just not going to say what was
discussed and what was not discussed. The President made it
clear that he felt he wanted to make these decisions and
announcements and not have a daily public discussion of
what is under consideration, and I am going to stick to that.
Q
Ron, you described short range as 1977?
MR. NESSEN: Right.
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Q
His previous goal was to cut oil imports by
one million barrels a day, by the end of 1975. Has that goal
been changed?
MR. NESSEN: No, there were no decisions made along
that line, or any other line.
Q
Ron, will the same rule apply to the economic
policy recommendations the President is being given tomorrow?
MR. NESSEN: Yes. I think what the President said,
in the Business Council speech is going to govern discussions
of all these major issues, which is, he makes the decisions
and don't believe anything until you hear him announce them.
Q
That is what Lyndon Johnson used to say.
MR. NESSEN: I thought he used to say "All of those
helicopters are mine, boy."
Q
Ron, when do you expect a decision to be made
in the energy area?
MR. NESSEN: Still aiming for mid-January.
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Q
Ron, what is the difference between a
nomination and preliminary selection? I mean how
long will it be preliminary before it becomes a
nomination, and is it possible the President, if
there is enough static on the Hill about Kitchel
that he might withdraw it?
MR. NESSEN: The reason it was done in this
manner is that some of the names were leaking out on
the Hill, and the answer is, as it says here on the
paper, that these are preliminary selections pending
full clearances.
Phil?
Q
May I discuss a housekeeping problem?
MR. NESSEN: I know what the housekeeping
problem is, and I will explain to you what happened.
The Azalea Queen, named Pam Penington, of
Alabama, will be brought in to see the President at
2:00 this afternoon. She is from Mobile. It will be
very brief. She is being brought in by Congressman
Jack Edwards of Alabama. We did not plan any photo
unless there is a great demand for it.
I think Phil wants to talk about the announce-
ment of the Nixon Tapes Bill since last night. Let me
just tell you quickly what happened.
It was signed very late in the afternoon, or
early in the evening. I had already gone over to the
reception when I heard it had been signed. I said
first, "Let's hold it for morning since we have given
a lid, and most of the people are over here at the
reception." Then a few minutes later somebody from
my staff came back and said somebody was putting it out
on the Hill. So I said, in that case we have to
protect our own White House Press Corps, so we will do
a call-out to the wire services, which we did, and we
said that we would have an announcement of a bill signing
in ten minutes, And that is the way we handled it,
which I thought was the best way.
Q
Ron, why is it that this was asked about
repeatedly, and you said, "We have no information on
this"? Why was it it was not until the last minute?
Was this orders from the President that you were not
to discuss this bill until he signed it or what?
MR. NESSEN: I am not sure that is exactly
the way it went, Les.
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Q
I remember I asked about it once, I believe,
and then there was someone else on other days, about
what is the President going to do about this Tapes Bill,
and you said you had no information.
MR. NESSEN: That is right.
Q
You could have made the announcement at the
party, Ron.
MR. NESSEN: It did not seem proper to me,
Helen, to make the announcement at the party.
Let me add one other factor to it, which is
after doing the call-out to the wire services-- which
is the normal procedure when we have an announcement
after a lid has been put on -- I took two copies over
myself and gave it to Cormier and to Dick Lerner
to make sure it got in the hands of the wire services.
Q
Am I wrong, when there is a lid not only
the wire services are to be called but other people
are to be notified also?
MR. NESSEN: Given the time and the fact that
everybody was over there at a party, this seemed to
me to be the simplest way to solve it because the
networks and the others who are on our normal call-out
list subscribe to the wire services and got the word.
Q
Will you make it three copies next time?
MR. NESSEN: I am sorry, Ralph.
Q
Putting it another way, Ron, for the
future -- since of course this has already happened --
could we all agree, including yourself, that news
takes precedence?
MR. NESSEN: Over a party?
Q
Over a party.
MR. NESSEN: I do think, and did think last
night, it was improper to make a public announcement
of it.
Q
Why? It was a press party.
MR. NESSEN: I think it is wrong now, and I
did last night. We did what I thought would get the
word around fastest to everyone ,which is the wire
service.
Under other circumstances, as you know, when
news comes up after a lid we do a full call-out, as
we did on Mrs. Ford's illness, and on a couple of other
things that have come up. This was peculiar in that
everybody was over there.
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Q
A reporter was in the house.
Q
We all got phone calls asking us, "What
about this? What are you talking about?" So we don't
know. If we are going to trust this operation, when
there is a lid, when you announce at 8:00, "With
the exception of the travel pool there is a lid", we
have to go with that, or at least we all get notified.
MR. NESSEN: There was a lid. There was no
question about the lid, and he did sign it unexpectedly.
My first inclination was to. hold it out to
everyone at the same time this morning. What messed
that plan up is somebody on the Hill was spreading
the word, and at that point I decided to do it this
way.
Q
How did they know?
Q
Secretary Brinegar was spreading the word
himself that he resigned the other day, and I tried for
almost two hours to get confirmation from this place
and could not get it. This is not consistent.
MR. NESSEN: The point on that was Brinegar
asked the President whether he could announce his own
resignation, and the President said yes.
Q
After he had done it couldn't there have
been some confirmation? The policy doesn't seem
consistent, and it leaves us a little uneasy. That is
my point.
MR. NESSEN: Don't be uneasy.
Q
Is Lynn going to announce his own
appointment?
Q
The Press Secretary or not the Press
Secretary, Ron, you ought to announce the news when
you got it.
MR. NESSEN: We try, Jim.
Q
Ron, when was the first time you ever
heard about this signing of the Tapes Bill? When was
the first news you had of it?
MR. NESSEN: It wasn't until after I got there
at 7:30.
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Q
That was the first time you knew the
President could have signed this bill?
MR. NESSEN: That is right.
Q
Ron, I have a question on the CAB
announcement. Does the present Chairman serve until
December 31, or is he being summarily dismissed in
effect?
MR. NESSEN: No, he serves until December 31.
Q
That is Mr. Timm you are talking about?
MR. NESSEN: That is correct.
Q
He remains on the Board how long?
MR. NESSEN: He remains a member, but not
Chairman, until December 31.
THE PRESS: Thank you, Ron.
END
(AT 1:05 P.M. EST)