GOP Wary About Clinton’s Plan for Social Security

Leading Republicans reacted warily Sunday to President Clinton’s scaled-down proposal for Social Security reform, with one criticizing it as a gimmick and another making no promise of early action.

“This is the Godzilla of all gimmicks,” Sen. Pete V. Domenici, (R-N.M.), said on CNN’s “Late Edition.”

Domenici, head of the Senate Budget Committee, was criticizing Clinton’s plan to use projected surpluses in the Social Security retirement system to pay down the national debt, then funnel interest savings on the debt back into the system to prolong its solvency.

Clinton announced his plan Saturday and was expected to submit it to Congress this week.

White House officials said the plan would cut the government’s annual interest bill by $107 billion by 2011, and that channeling these savings into the Social Security trust fund from that year until 2044 would keep the system solvent until 2050--an extra 16 years beyond current projections.

House Speaker J. Dennis Hastert (R-Ill.) welcomed Clinton’s decision not to include his earlier proposal that the government invest a portion of Social Security funds in the stock market.

But Hastert said there is still interest in allowing individual private investment of Social Security money.

“I don’t think most Americans want to see their Social Security trust funds invested by the federal government. I think some folks would like to be able to invest some of their own Social Security funds, and that will have to be part of the debate,” Hastert said on Fox television’s “Fox News Sunday.”

White House spokesman Nanda Chitre said Sunday that Clinton had not completely abandoned his investment idea. “I wouldn’t say that the proposal is dead, but for now we are trying to send up something that is bipartisan in nature,” she said.

Hastert said the House would consider Clinton’s proposal, but he made no pledge of early action.

“I don’t think the American people want us to hastily just throw a solution at Social Security. We want to make sure it is the right thing to do, and we’ll take some time and take a look at it,” Hastert said. “We’ll be happy to look at it, have hearings on it and move with it.”