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Clinton campaigns for Clinton and Gore

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November 2, 2000 

NEW YORK (AP) - Pumping out speeches, feuding with Congress and striving to add energy to the presidential and New York Senate campaigns, President Bill Clinton says voters should think twice before they abandon his record of economic and social progress.

But he's heeding Al Gore's request to leave the center-ring fight to him.

Clinton campaigned Tuesday for a former welfare mother running for a House seat in Kentucky and flew to New York to appeal in the city's Harlem section for the large black turnout Democrats believe they need to hold on to the White House.

The president also stumped for first lady Hillary Rodham Clinton and took an indirect shot at her Republican opponent, Rep. Rick Lazio.

"Don't let all this last-minute mudslinging deter you," the president said about attacks on his wife's campaign.

A week before Election Day, Clinton is staying away from direct intervention in closely contested states in the down-to-the-wire race between Gore and Texas Gov. George W. Bush. While the president still has favorable poll ratings, Gore's staff fears that Clinton's presence in closely contested states could alienate swing voters, particularly women whose support is vital for the vice president.

Gore's explanation is that he is campaigning on his own, without Clinton at his side, to prove he is his own man with his own plans. Clinton said he was leaving his campaign travels up to others who are involved in day-to-day operations and have access to polls.

But the president was not hesitant in taking on Congress, accusing the House Republican leadership of torpedoing a compromise spending bill to fund federal labor, health and education programs. In Louisville, where he endorsed the congressional bid of state Rep. Eleanor Jordan, he assailed Rep. Tom DeLay, the House Republican whip, by name.

"Mr. DeLay, their leader, says no, no, no, we can't do this, our lobbyists are hysterical, never mind the school kids and what they get out of this, our lobbyists don't like this and we will not do it."

In Washington, DeLay responded: "The president is a very difficult person to work with. ... I don't care what he said today. His credibility is not very good anyway."

In Harlem, at the Kelly Temple Church of God in Christ, the president said voters faced a simple choice: "Do you want to abandon the present economic policy or go back to the failed policy that was there before?"

"The American people should think about it before they leave the Congress and the White House in the hands of the other party," he said.

In dealing with Congress for eight years, he said, "I've stopped a lot of bad things from happening."

At the black church in Harlem and at a fund-raising dinner of Irish-Americans backing his wife's campaign, Clinton said he is the first to admit he is not objective observer of the 2000 campaign.

"The most important person in the world to me is running for the Senate and my partner for eight years is running for president," Clinton said. "So I'm biased."

The dlrs 1,000-a-person event was expected to raise dlrs 100,000. Afterward, the president was driven to his home in Chappaqua, New York, for the night. He planned to return to Washington on Wednesday.

In the campaign homestretch, Clinton plans to spend Thursday and Friday in California. After that, he will go to New York to campaign over the weekend for the first lady. The president may make an excursion Sunday to Arkansas and Michigan, aides said, although Gore's staff has been leery of Clinton campaigning in Michigan.