Bush accuses Kerry of changing stance on nuclear waste repository

Washington Bureau --Aug. 14--LAS VEGAS

President Bush on Thursday defended his decision to send the nation's nuclear waste to a repository at Yucca Mountain and accused Sen. John Kerry of flip-flopping on the issue.

Kerry, the Democratic presidential nominee who says he'll stop the dump, was in Nevada the day before, where he accused Bush of breaking an election-year promise four years ago not to allow it. In fact, Bush's position in 2000 wasn't that simple.

The Yucca Mountain issue is radioactive politically in Nevada. Democrats hope Kerry's stand will help them win the state, which is closely divided and went to Bush by 4 percentage points in 2000.

But Bush said Kerry's opposition to Yucca Mountain is less ironclad than it might appear because he cast several votes favoring it in the past.

"Now, my opponent's trying to turn Yucca Mountain into a political poker chip," Bush said to a hand-picked audience at a union hall of the United Brotherhood of Carpenters. "He says he's strongly against Yucca here in Nevada, but he voted for it several times. And so did his running mate."

The Kerry campaign said any such votes were procedural, but could be interpreted as support for the site. In fact, on the key Senate procedural vote to move toward approval of Bush's Feb. 15, 2002, decision to make Yucca Mountain the nation's permanent nuclear-waste repository, Kerry voted no, according to Congressional Quarterly.

John Edwards, a senator from North Carolina, voted for the dump and changed his view only after he was chosen as Kerry's running mate.

"My point to you is that, if they're going to change one day, they may change again," Bush said. "I think you need straight talk on this issue. I think you need somebody who's going to do what he says he's going to do."

Bush promised in 2000 that he wouldn't let the dump be built until scientists had deemed it safe. In September of that year he emphasized in a letter to Nevada's governor that he would veto any legislation that would store the waste at Yucca temporarily.

Once he became president, he let the project go forward and, upon the recommendation of his energy secretary, Spencer Abraham, approved it as a permanent repository, although its safety was still being debated.

Nevada Republicans, including the governor, a U.S. senator and the state's attorney general, have distanced themselves from Bush on the issue. Bush said Thursday that he understood that.

A federal court dealt the project a setback this summer, saying the government didn't have adequate standards to protect against leaks for more than 10,000 years.

Without mentioning the ruling, Bush said he would allow court appeals and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission decide the issue.

Without responding directly to Bush about Yucca Mountain, Kerry -- campaigning in Carson, Calif. -- blasted Bush for suggesting recently that his administration would consider a national sales tax. The president later backed off that remark, but it gave Kerry ammunition in his argument that Bush has been insensitive to the middle class.

"This is from an administration that has offered almost no new ideas for our economy -- and the few they have proposed have only hurt middle-class families," Kerry said.

Kerry also responded to Vice President Dick Cheney's attacks on him for wavering on the Iraq war and promising to wage a more "sensitive" war on terrorism. "It's sad that they can only be negative. They have nothing to say about the future vision of America," Kerry said.

While many unions have endorsed Kerry, the carpenters have held back because they say some of his environmental positions, such as restricting timber harvesting in the Pacific Northwest and his opposition to drilling in the Artic National Wildlife Refuge, would mean fewer jobs for their members. Carpenters union leaders meet next month to consider an endorsement but may remain neutral.

One carpenters union member who sat onstage said the president's speech, which ranged from the economy to national security, didn't sway him.

"I'm still up in the air," said George Cappiello, 55, of Shelton, Wash. A Democrat, Cappiello said Bush had no advantage on national security.

"I feel they're kind of even, Kerry and Bush."

Kurtzman covered Bush from Las Vegas. Knight Ridder Newspapers correspondent Tom Fitzgerald, who is with Kerry, contributed to this report from California.

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