Contrasting his position on gun control with that of GOP rival Bob Dole, President Clinton said Wednesday he would veto any bill repealing a ban on assault weapons.
"We are prepared to stand by the ban on 19 deadly assault weapons. It is the right thing to do," Clinton told the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People.Dole on Tuesday backed away from his previous commitment to the National Rifle Association to make repeal of the assault weapons ban a top priority. He suggested that a majority of the banned weapons are now back on the market, in another form, anyway.
Clinton said Wednesday, "I will veto any attempt to repeal the assault weapons ban. You can't tell me it doesn't make a difference."
With Hurricane Bertha bearing down on the Eastern Seaboard, the president scrapped a planned overnight visit to Florida. Clinton felt it was not appropriate to make the trip while people in Florida were under the threat of the storm, officials said. With time on his hands, Clinton opted to play golf in North Carolina before returning to Washington.
Earlier at the White House and again in his speech to the NAACP, Clinton praised bipartisan legislation to fight church burnings in a dozen states.
He also said his administration has taken action to stem church arson, calling the fires the result of "a flaw in the human spirit that all of us have to fight. We have got to find a way to stamp out intolerance and bigotry."
And he urged Congress to complete action on a 90-cent-per-hour increase in the minimum wage.
"Get it up here so I can sign it immediately and give people a raise," Clinton said, adding that as many as 10 million people will benefit.
At the White House church-fires ceremony, Clinton told about 200 people in the Rose Garden, "When these attacks are motivated by hate, they're BT-c3ffront to our basic commitment to religious liberty and racial tolerance."
"And in so doing, they pose a challenge, not just to those whose houses of worship are desecrated or burned, but to the entire nation and to our future as a common community," Clinton added.