Move bypasses block by Senate

 BY ANDRES OPPENHEIMER

 President Bush, circumventing strong opposition by key Senate Democrats, Friday appointed Cuban-American Otto Reich as the State Department's top official in charge of Western Hemisphere affairs as the region faces major crises in Argentina and Colombia.

 Reich, a former U.S. ambassador to Venezuela, was given a recess appointment by the president to serve as assistant secretary of state for Western Hemisphere affairs -- allowing him to serve for at least one year without Senate confirmation.

 ``I'm obviously very happy,'' Reich told The Herald shortly after the announcement. ``I certainly hope to advance U.S. interests in the hemisphere. My guiding philosophy is to advance the cause of freedom, and that includes political and economic freedoms, and human rights.''

 In another recess appointment, Bush named Eugene Scalia as Labor Department solicitor, the agency's top lawyer. Scalia is a private practice labor lawyer and son of Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia.

 For nearly a year, the Democratic-controlled Senate Foreign Relations Committee had refused to give Reich a confirmation hearing, triggering a high-profile public dispute over the nomination.

 Western Hemisphere subcommittee chairman Sen. Christopher Dodd, D-Conn., a vocal critic of the U.S. trade embargo on Cuba, had accused Reich of ideological
 extremism and ethical lapses during his stint at the State Department's Office of Public Diplomacy for Latin America in the mid-1980s.

 His nomination had also drawn opposition among some Republicans, including Sen. Mike Enzi of Wyoming. Enzi joined Dodd in writing a letter to the president: ``To appoint an individual who does not have the support of the Senate for such an important post would seriously set back progress that has been made on hemisphere issues.''

 The Bush administration and Reich's backers said Reich had never been found guilty of any wrongdoing.

 ``This hemisphere is too important to allow one senator to attempt to sabotage the president's fine choice for assistant secretary of state,'' Rep. Lincoln Díaz-Balart, a Miami Republican, said Friday. ``Ambassador Reich is highly qualified, and I have confidence that he will do an excellent job.''

 SENATE CRITICIZED

 Reached in Israel, Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, also a Miami Republican and another strong supporter of the Reich nomination, criticized the Senate for not having given a green light to Reich's appointment at a time when Argentina, Colombia and several other countries in the region are going through major crises.

 ``South America is burning up, and we are looking the other way,'' Ros-Lehtinen said. ``Otto is going to be a great fire extinguisher.''

 Some Democrats say Sen. Dodd's stalling tactics were no different from what Republicans did when they controlled the Senate until last year. Former Senate Foreign Relations Committee chairman Jesse Helms, R-N.C., routinely held up ambassadorial nominations during the Clinton administration.

 In a statement late Friday, Dodd expressed ``regret'' at the administration's decision.

 ``The appointee becomes a lame duck as soon as he takes the position, and can only serve until the end of the Congress,'' Dodd said. ``There are many difficulties in the region, and it is unfortunate that U.S. foreign policy in the region is being sacrificed for a narrow domestic political agenda.''

 But some Latin America watchers in Washington say that, for the time being, Reich will have a hard time getting support from the Senate Democratic majority.

 ``This is not the best thing for a bipartisan Latin America policy,'' says Michael Shifter, an analyst with the moderate Democratic-leaning Inter-American Dialogue think tank in Washington. ``He is going to face resistance from the Senate, by virtue of the way in which he was appointed. This could make his job harder.''

 Other analysts countered that, because Reich is a political appointee with close ties to the president and Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, he will be uniquely positioned to advance Latin American initiatives through the White House bureaucracy. He will have much more clout than his most recent predecessors, who were career diplomats, Reich supporters say.

 FIRST, TO CANADA

 A U.S. official familiar with Reich's immediate plans say he is likely to make his first foreign trip to Canada, which is part of his office's responsibilities. The Canadian
 government was taken aback when President Bush chose Mexico for his first official visit abroad last year, Canadian diplomats said at the time.

 One of Reich's most immediate challenges will be helping solve the Argentine crisis, which exploded in late December when that country defaulted on its $132 billion
 foreign debt.

 ``Argentina has been one of our closest allies, and it deserves our support at this time of need,'' Reich said in a telephone interview Friday. ``But internal problems require internal solutions. The United States can help, and will help, but the Argentines have to find the solutions to their problems. The United States will be a supportive friend.''

 BACKING PASTRANA

 On Colombia, Reich said that ``we have been supporting President Andrés Pastrana, and will continue to support him and the democratic process in Colombia. We will continue to support Colombian democracy from attacks from violent extremes of right and left, and from narcotics traffickers.''

 On Cuba, Reich said that ``We will find ways to communicate with the people of Cuba, and to try to bring about a peaceful and rapid transition to democracy.'' He added that U.S. policy on Cuba ``will be consistent with our policy throughout the world: to advance the cause of freedom. And no one can say there is freedom in Cuba.''

                                    © 2002