Editors note: Only the part of the conference as it relates to NEP, which
late in the conference, is provided below.

Q Mr. President, General Barry McCaffrey is in the midst of controversy
over the needle exchange program, as well as a personality conflict. Mr.
President, what are your words to General McCaffrey's detractors,
especially those in your Cabinet, your administration, and those Democrats
in the CBC [congressional black caucus] that are joining Newt Gingrich to
get McCaffrey out of the Drug Czar's Office?

THE PRESIDENT: Well, first of all, I think we ought to look at his record.
I think he's got quite a commendable record. We have more than double --
we've had a strategy that was as follows with the drug issue: One, to try
to help parents teach their children that drugs are wrong and illegal and
can kill you. Two, to try to support local law enforcement efforts and
local community efforts at not only punishment, but prevention. Three, to
try to increase our capacity to stop drugs from coming in at the border.

We more than doubled border guards, for example, from 3,000 to 6,000.
We've got another 1,000 coming in this budget. We've got a fund set aside
in the highway bill to increase the technological capacity of the
government to stop drugs coming in at the border.

And General McCaffrey has been behind a lot of that. He's also done
enormous work with the supply countries and Latin America, trying to get
them to work with us. And he's made some real headway. He's one of the
reasons we've got this alliance against drugs at the last Summit of the
Americas. He supported huge increases in funding for treatment and for
testing and treatment for inmates not only in federal, but in state and
local penitentiaries. So I think he's got a good record.

Now, he believes that the benefits of needle exchange are uncertain and
that the message you send out is not good, that somehow the government is
empowering drug use. There are people all over the country who agree with
that. Now, the weight of medical research and the American Medical
Association has a different view. Their view is that it may help to lower
the transmission of HIV, and there is no evidence that it increases drug use.

I think -- if I might, I mean, that's the next logical question, why did we
make the decision we did -- because the weight of scientific evidence was
what I just said. But if you look at it, it's clear -- if you go all
across the American cities or go to Vancouver, Canada, anyplace where
they've had a needle exchange program where there has been serious testing,
the only place it really works to reduce HIV transmission and to reduce
drug use is when the people who come in to exchange needles get pulled into
treatment programs.

So the real issue is, will there be more funds for treatment. And that's,
obviously -- I'm getting as much money out there as I can, but that's why I
think it should remain a local decision and why I made the decision I did,
and why I'd like to see this controversy put behind us, because I think in
a way, in terms of impact on people, it has been -- there has been more
heat than light on it.