Bush pushes homeland security as he raises money for GOP

Friday, September 27th 2002, 12:00 am

By: News On 6

CRAWFORD, Texas (AP) _ Raising the cash the GOP needs to stamp the party's brand on Congress for the next two years, President Bush is maintaining pressure on the Senate to adopt his homeland security plan without ``a lot of rules and regulations.''

Using his Texas ranch as home base, Bush was headlining money raising efforts Friday for GOP candidates in Colorado and Arizona, following a $1 million effort in Houston on Thursday afternoon.

After a night at the ranch, the president was moving on to Denver on to campaign and raise money for House candidate Bob Beauprez.

A second round of political events awaited in Arizona, with appearances in both Flagstaff and Phoenix. There, the president was rallying GOP donors and voters in support of Matt Salmon, the party's choice for governor, and Rick Renzi, a GOP congressional contender.

Republican officials said the party and Salmon likely would take in more than $1 million.

White House Press Secretary Ari Fleischer said that in both Colorado and Arizona the president would underscore his efforts to improve the lagging economy and to create a new Department of Homeland Security to coordinate efforts to fight terrorism at home.

In Houston, where he raised $1 million for Texas Republicans and the Senate campaign of GOP candidate John Cornyn, Bush continued to criticize the Democratic-controlled Senate for insisting that the legislation creating the new department also protect the rights of the 170,000 federal workers expected to run its agencies and programs.

``Thy want there to be a lot of rules and regulations and I'm not going to accept that,'' Bush said. ``The enemy doesn't care about these rules.''

The fund-raiser was held not far from the Houston headquarters of Enron Corp., a symbol of the recent corporate scandals. At the dinner, Bush told business executives they should operate their companies with honesty and integrity.

``If you're running a corporation in America, you're responsible to tell the truth to your shareholders and employees,'' the president said.

The Cornyn reception was the fourth of six campaign appearances this week for the president. It brought to at least $127 million the total that Bush has raised on behalf of Republican candidates this year.

The elections will decide control of Congress for the remainder of Bush's term as well as many state houses and could help his own cause as he positions himself for an re-election campaign in 2004.

Bush is taking Saturday and Sunday off and staying close to the ranch. That keeps him out of the capital at a time when thousands of demonstrators are expected to protest the weekend meetings of the World Bank and International Monetary Fund just blocks from the White House.