Obama: I haven't ruled out NYC terror trial

WASHINGTON - President Barack Obama said yesterday he has not ruled out a federal court trial in New York for self-proclaimed 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, but he was taking into account the objections of the city's mayor and police commissioner.

The Obama administration has come under withering attack, mainly from Republicans, for a decision by the Justice Department to try the terrorist mastermind in a federal court near Ground Zero.

In a pre-Super Bowl interview with CBS' Katie Couric, Obama also said that passing health care reform remained the key to bringing down America's skyrocketing budget deficit. He said he was calling Republican and Democratic congressional leaders to a live, televised meeting Feb. 25 to thoroughly air the issue.

"The biggest thing, the most important thing we can do on deficits . . . is to get a health reform package passed," he said.

It was his first major step to revive his health care agenda after his party's loss of a filibuster-proof Senate majority. Obama's move came amid widespread complaints that efforts so far by him and his Democratic allies in Congress have been too partisan and secretive.

As for the 9/11 trial, Obama said using the traditional judicial method was a "virtue of our system" in which Americans should take pride.

He also defended his decision, noting again that the administration of former President George W. Bush had handled terror suspects arrested in the United States in the same way.

"They prosecuted 190 folks in these Article III courts, got convictions and those folks are in maximum security prisons right now. And there have been no escapes," Obama said. "And it is a virtue of our system we should be proud of."

Meanwhile, Obama also told Couric that negotiations in Congress that gave special concessions to Democratic Sens. Mary Landrieu of Louisiana and Ben Nelson of Nebraska in return for their health care votes "did not help. They frustrate me."

"I would have loved nothing better than to have come up with some very elegant, academically approved approach to health care and didn't have any legislative fingerprints on it," he said. "But hey, that's the way democracy works."