Obama: Auto workers shouldn't take 'all the hits' in rescue plans

DETROIT -- President-elect Barack Obama isn't saying if he'll make changes to the auto industry loan package announced Friday morning by President Bush. But Obama warned auto companies Friday that "the American people's patience is running out."

He said automakers should "seize on this opportunity" to come up with plans to make their companies sustainable.

Obama also said a final restructuring package shouldn't just include concessions from auto workers. He said they shouldn't be the ones "taking all the hits."

Obama said everyone involved with the auto industry has to be "part of the process."

He said his economic team will talk with management and workers to find out how the industry and its jobs can be preserved not just in the short term, but in the years to come.

After all-night negotiations, the White House unveiled a bailout plan for the auto industry early Friday that gives automakers $13.4 billion in short-term financing.

The automakers can access an additional $4 billion in February, if Congress makes available the next $350 billion of financial bailout money.

Using the financial rescue fund to help the auto industry, along with a string of other rescue efforts, has tapped out the first half of the $700 billion fund. Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson says Congress needs to release the second half of the money, although he says he is confident the Treasury Department, Federal Reserve, and Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. have the resources to address a significant market event if one should happen before the second half of the money is allocated.

But the plan lacks the teeth to get that accomplished, since Bush and his team will be out of office Jan. 20.

Bush, a free-market conservative, said he would have preferred to push the companies into bankruptcy "under ordinary economic circumstances."