[House Hearing, 116 Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]



 
          STRENGTHENING SECURITY AND THE RULE OF LAW IN MEXICO

=======================================================================

                                HEARING

                               BEFORE THE

                            SUBCOMMITTEE ON
          THE WESTERN HEMISPHERE, CIVILIAN SECURITY, AND TRADE

                                 OF THE

                      COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN AFFAIRS
                        HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

                     ONE HUNDRED SIXTEENTH CONGRESS

                             SECOND SESSION

                               __________

                            January 15, 2020

                               __________

                           Serial No. 116-90

                               __________

        Printed for the use of the Committee on Foreign Affairs
        
        
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Available: http://www.foreignaffairs.house.gov/, http://docs.house.gov, 

                           or www.govinfo.gov
                           
                           
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             U.S. GOVERNMENT PUBLISHING OFFICE 
38-914 PDF             WASHINGTON : 2021           

                           
                           
                      COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN AFFAIRS

                   ELIOT L. ENGEL, New York, Chairman

BRAD SHERMAN, California             MICHAEL T. McCAUL, Texas, Ranking 
GREGORY W. MEEKS, New York               Member
ALBIO SIRES, New Jersey              CHRISTOPHER H. SMITH, New Jersey
GERALD E. CONNOLLY, Virginia         STEVE CHABOT, Ohio
THEODORE E. DEUTCH, Florida          JOE WILSON, South Carolina
KAREN BASS, California               SCOTT PERRY, Pennsylvania
WILLIAM R. KEATING, Massachusetts    TED S. YOHO, Florida
DAVID N. CICILLINE, Rhode Island     ADAM KINZINGER, Illinois
AMI BERA, California                 LEE ZELDIN, New York
JOAQUIN CASTRO, Texas                JIM SENSENBRENNER, Wisconsin
DINA TITUS, Nevada                   ANN WAGNER, Missouri
ADRIANO ESPAILLAT, New York          BRIAN MAST, Florida
TED LIEU, California                 FRANCIS ROONEY, Florida
SUSAN WILD, Pennsylvania             BRIAN FITZPATRICK, Pennsylvania
DEAN PHILLIPS, Minnesota             JOHN CURTIS, Utah
ILHAN OMAR, Minnesota                KEN BUCK, Colorado
COLIN ALLRED, Texas                  RON WRIGHT, Texas
ANDY LEVIN, Michigan                 GUY RESCHENTHALER, Pennsylvania
ABIGAIL SPANBERGER, Virginia         TIM BURCHETT, Tennessee
CHRISSY HOULAHAN, Pennsylvania       GREG PENCE, Indiana
TOM MALINOWSKI, New Jersey           STEVE WATKINS, Kansas
DAVID TRONE, Maryland                MIKE GUEST, Mississippi
JIM COSTA, California
JUAN VARGAS, California
VICENTE GONZALEZ, Texas

                                     
                                       

                    Jason Steinbaum, Staff Director

              Brendan Shields,  Republican Staff Director
                                 ------                                

  Subcommittee on the Western Hemisphere, Civilian Security, and Trade

                   ALBIO SIRES, New Jersey, Chairman

GREGORY W. MEEKS, New York           FRANCIS ROONEY, Florida, Ranking 
JOAQUIN CASTRO, Texas                    Member
ADRIANO ESPAILLAT, New York          CHRISTOPHER H. SMITH, New Jersey
DEAN PHILLIPS, Minnesota             TED S. YOHO, Florida
ANDY LEVIN, Michigan                 JOHN CURTIS, Utah
VICENTE GONZALEZ, Texas              KEN BUCK, Colorado
JUAN VARGAS, California               MIKE GUEST, Mississippi

                                     
                                     
                                     
                 Alexander Brockwehl, Staff Director
                                     

                  
                            C O N T E N T S

                              ----------                              
                                                                   Page

                    OPENING STATEMENT FOR THE RECORD

Opening statement submitted for the record from Chairman Sires...     3

                               WITNESSES

Shirk, Dr. David, Professor of Political Science, University of 
  San Diego......................................................     9
Meyer, Maureen, Director for Mexico and Migrant Rights, 
  Washington Office on Latin America.............................    21
Miles, Richard G., Senior Associate (Non-Resident), Americas 
  Program, Center for Strategic & International Studies..........    33

                                APPENDIX

Hearing Notice...................................................    60
Hearing Minutes..................................................    61
Hearing Attendance...............................................    62

            RESPONSES TO QUESTIONS SUBMITTED FOR THE RECORD

Responses to questions submitted for the record from Chairman 
  Sires..........................................................    63


          STRENGTHENING SECURITY AND THE RULE OF LAW IN MEXICO

                      Wednesday, January 15, 2020

                          House of Representatives,
            Subcommittee on the Western Hemisphere,
                       Civilian Security and Trade,
                      Committee on Foreign Affairs,
                                                     Washington, DC

    The subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 2:04 p.m., in 
room 2172, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Albio Sires 
(chairman of the subcommittee) presiding.
    Mr. Sires. This hearing will come to order. This hearing, 
entitled ``Strengthening Security and the Rule of Law in 
Mexico,'' will focus on U.S. policy toward Mexico, U.S. 
Security Assistance programs, and Mexico's progress in 
strengthening its justice sector institutions, combating 
corruption and protecting human rights.
    Without objection, all members may have 5-days to submit 
statements, questions, and extraneous materials for the record, 
subject to the length limitation in the rules.
    I will now make an opening statement and then turn it over 
to the ranking member for his opening statement.
    Good afternoon, everyone. Thank you to our witnesses for 
being here today. I have been sickened to watch in recent 
months as Mexico has experienced one violent incident after 
another. In October, the Sinaloa cartel took control of the 
city of Culiacan, shooting people dead, striking terror into 
the population, and ultimately forcing the release of El 
Chapo's son, Ovidio Guzman. That same week, 13 police officers 
were ambushed and viciously murdered by cartel members in 
Michoacan. In November, a group of American citizens were 
attacked on their way to a wedding in Chihuahua. Nine people 
were brutally killed, including six children.
    Unfortunately, these cases are just the tip of the iceberg. 
Mexico's homicide rate has increased by 30 percent over last 
year's, reaching its highest level in decades. Meanwhile, 
targeted attacks against journalists, human rights defenders, 
and local public officials have continued. During just one week 
in August, three journalists were killed.
    Murders of journalists and human rights defenders, like 
most homicides in Mexico, are rarely solved. In fact, the 
majority of crimes are never even reported, due to citizens' 
lack of faith in the justice system.
    I have long been a proponent of U.S. assistance to Mexico, 
to help strengthen its democratic institutions, combat 
corruption, defend human rights, and improve security. I 
believe that Mexico and the United States have a shared 
responsibility to reduce violent crimes and improve quality of 
life for those living on both sides of the border.
    The U.S. Government must address issues within our own 
country that are helping to fuel cartel violence. For instance, 
the U.S. must enact much stricter gun laws in order to combat 
arms trafficking into Mexico. We should also dedicate further 
resources to stop money laundering by the cartels. And we need 
to take action to reduce U.S. demand for illegal drugs, 
including Fentanyl and other opioids.
    In 2018, three colleagues and I requested that the 
Government Accountability Office review the effectiveness of 
our assistance under the Merida Initiative. Since 2008, the 
U.S. Congress has appropriated $3 billion through the Merida 
Initiative.
    As Members of Congress, we need to be willing to look 
critically at which programs are working, and which are not. I 
know that many of my colleagues share my frustration that we 
have not made more progress under the Merida Initiative. I hope 
that this hearing and a subsequent hearing with Administration 
officials in February will help us develop a clearer sense of 
what next steps we should take. I look forward to working with 
my colleagues on a bipartisan basis to explore solutions to 
these difficult challenges.
    Thank you. And I now turn to the Ranking Member Rooney for 
his opening statement.
    [The prepared statement of Mr. Sires follows:]
    
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    Mr. Rooney. Thank you, Chairman Sires, for holding this 
very important and timely hearing on the security situation in 
Mexico. The relationship with Mexico is among the most 
important strategic relationships for the United States. Our 
two countries are bound by strong economic, historic, and 
cultural ties. Due to its geographic proximity, what occurs in 
Mexico has a direct impact upon the United States. But sadly, 
we have seen the negative impact from continued violence and 
the deteriorating security situation in Mexico, largely driven 
by the drug cartels.
    Security cooperation is a critical component of the U.S.-
Mexico relationship, and it is important that we examine the 
security conditions in Mexico and our security assistance, to 
identify what has been effective and what we clearly see that 
has been ineffective in addressing Mexico's challenges.
    I am deeply concerned about recent events in Mexico that 
have resulted in the deaths of nine U.S. citizens, including 
three children, at the hands of the Mexican drug cartels. These 
events highlight the continued security challenges facing 
Mexico and the need for the United States and Mexico to take 
necessary steps to address them.
    Moreover, the Mexican people are terrorized by these 
cartels, too. Daily, they are intimidated, extorted, and they 
fight corruption and unnecessary violence. Sadly, this has been 
the case for decades. And there is much uncertainty surrounding 
Mexico's security policy and the effectiveness of security 
assistance. It is not for anything that they have something 
called express kidnappings in Mexico.
    Despite the efforts of previous Mexican Administrations to 
combat the cartels and address security, 2019 saw a 30 percent 
increase in Mexico's homicide rate, much of it driven by drug-
related crime. Further, the cartels are constantly evolving and 
have expanded their drug trade to supply the surge in U.S. 
demand for methamphetamine, heroin, and synthetic opioids. I 
recommend the book Dreamland, if you are interested in reading 
more about opioids, heroin, and the Nayarit cartel.
    Further, we must acknowledge that the flow of illegal 
weapons from the United States to Mexico is contributing to the 
violence. This is just but one component. Security challenges, 
systemic corruption, impunity, and economic challenges, are 
also driving violence in Mexico.
    Since 2000, the United States has provided roughly $3 
billion in security assistance for Mexico under the Merida 
Initiative. From 2014 to 2018, U.S. Security Assistance has 
focused on rule of law, anticorruption and human rights in 
Mexico.
    However, under the Trump Administration, an increased focus 
has been placed on attacking the business model of Mexican 
cartels, and on combating the increased trade in opioids and 
synthetic drugs. This is a positive and necessary step, yet 
there is much more that needs to be done, but in doing so 
requires that the United States' assistance complement Mexico's 
security infrastructure and ensure that U.S. priorities are 
addressed.
    Mexican President Manuel Lopez Obrador has taken steps to 
streamline Mexico's security forces, and has created a new 
National Guard, which is focused on security, and is expected 
to reach 92,000 troops. This force has also supported 
immigration enforcement, a welcome development, given the 
crisis at our southern border.
    President Lopez Obrador has also prioritized anticorruption 
and human rights, but the recent surge in violence and 
increased homicide rate raise questions about the government's 
real commitment to dealing with these challenges. It is 
critical that the Mexican Government clearly communicate the 
steps which are being taken to address these problems, and 
present a comprehensive security strategy.
    For its part, the United States should explore ways to 
modernize security assistance under Merida, and recognize the 
areas where it has been ineffective. Continued intelligence 
sharing, capacity building, the provision of technology and 
equipment, are all critical. We should also review our 
coordination on border security and where we can support 
Mexico's efforts to carry out inspections and screenings at the 
border checkpoints.
    The U.S.-Mexico security relationship has come a long way, 
but we must continue to build that relationship on a foundation 
of trust and cooperation. It is a joint responsibility which 
will serve the interests of both of our countries.
    Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    Mr. Sires. Thank you very much, Ranking Member Rooney.
    I will now introduce Dr. David Shirk, professor of 
political science, and graduate director for the Master's and 
International Relation Programs at the University of San Diego. 
Dr. Shirk's research focuses on U.S.-Mexico relations and 
border politics. He is the principal investigator for the 
Justice in Mexico project, which analyzes the trends and 
challenges related to crime, violence, and justice sector 
reform.
    Dr. Shirk, we welcome you to the hearing.
    Dr. Shirk. Thank you so much.
    Mr. Sires. I need to do the other. I just want to introduce 
the other two members.
    Dr. Shirk. Oh, I am so sorry.
    Mr. Sires. We will then hear from Ms. Maureen Meyer, 
Director for Mexico and Migrant Rights at the Washington Office 
on Latin America. Ms. Meyer analyzes U.S.-Mexico security 
policies and their relation to organized crime, corruption, and 
human rights violations in Mexico.
    Ms. Meyer is a member of the Mexican-based Collective for 
Analysis of Security with Democracy, and previously worked for 
5 years in Mexico City with the Miguel Agustin Pro Juarez Human 
Rights Center.
    Ms. Meyer, thank you for joining us.
    Finally, we will hear from Mr. Richard Miles, a senior 
associate of the Americas Program at the Center for Strategic 
and International Studies. Mr. Miles has 20 years of experience 
as a State Department Foreign Service officer, and as an 
intelligence officer with the U.S. Army. He was the alternate 
representative to the Organization of American States, and 
adviser on Western Hemisphere affairs to the Under Secretary 
for Political Affairs, and director for Mexican and Canadian 
issues on the National Security Council staff.
    Mr. Miles, thank you for being here and joining us today.
    We will now hear from our witnesses. Please keep your 
remarks to 5 minutes. And, Dr. Shirk, you want to begin?

 STATEMENT OF DR. DAVID SHIRK, PROFESSOR OF POLITICAL SCIENCE, 
                    UNIVERSITY OF SAN DIEGO

    Dr. Shirk. Thank you, Chairman Sires. Thank you, Ranking 
Member Rooney, and thank you to all the honorable members of 
the committee for your invitation to be here today, and for 
your attention to this vital issue. I have been working on this 
issue for nearly two decades, and I am also deeply worried and 
saddened by the evident worsening of conditions in Mexico.
    As the chairman mentioned, Mexico has experienced elevated 
levels of violent crime for more than a decade, and while final 
figures are still being tabulated by Mexico's security 
agencies, the number of homicide cases reported for 2019 
increased to a record 34,000 victims reported by the National 
Public Security System for 2019, which is an increase from the 
over 33,000 victims reported in 2018, and over 28,000 reported 
in 2017, all record years.
    While clearly appalling, such aggregate statistics do not 
quite capture the picture as well as each individual case, as 
we saw, unfortunately, on November 4, 2019, with the killing of 
three women and six children with dual U.S.-Mexican citizenship 
in two ambush attacks by an organized crime group in northern 
Mexico. The victims ranged in age from 8 months to 43 years. 
And as the chairman mentioned, it is illustrative of the 
horrific nature of the violence that is pervasive and daily, 
with an estimated one murder every 15 minutes in Mexico in 
2019.
    There are numerous and complex factors that have 
contributed to this violence, including chronic macro level 
systemic issues, some of which have been mentioned, lack of 
economic opportunities, lack of education, social problems like 
domestic violence and substance abuse.
    Unfortunately, these larger systemic problems, while 
important, do not readily explain the sharp variations and 
increases in the level of violence from month to month or from 
place to place, and we need to look at more recent developments 
and changes to understand the violence of the past few years. 
One important change are the market shifts and innovations in 
the production of illicit goods, including the distribution of 
methamphetamine and Fentanyl, as mentioned by Ranking Member 
Rooney.
    We also, unfortunately, have seen the policy of targeting 
high-level criminal leaders for arrest through the strategy 
known as the kingpin strategy having unintended consequences of 
contributing to the cycle of splintering, diversification, 
competition and violence among criminal organizations.
    We also must recognize that the recent governmental 
transition in Mexico has had disruptive effects. In 2018, there 
were an unprecedented number of Mexican Federal, State, and 
local offices up for grabs, resulting in the largest turnover 
in public office in modern Mexican history.
    With all these factors in mind, it is clear that Mexico 
needs the continued support and cooperation of the United 
States, which, as the chairman mentioned, has a shared 
responsibility to help address these issues.
    I make several recommendations in my written testimony, so 
I will just point to a few in the minute or so that I have 
remaining. One is, I think, the clear need to assist Mexico in 
developing better long-term comprehensive criminal 
investigations to ensure successful prosecutions targeting not 
only drug kingpins, but all levels and branches of criminal 
enterprises, including corrupt politicians and private sector 
money laundering operations.
    A second one that has also been mentioned, of course, is 
the need to strengthen controls to prevent illegal exports of 
firearms to Mexico, but also the seepage of firearms from 
Mexico's law enforcement and military institutions into usage 
by organized crime groups. I, also, in my written testimony, 
point to the need for better controls on money laundering and 
drug trafficking and other organized crime group financial 
operations as well as the need to prevent blowback from the 
elevated numbers of U.S. deportations of criminal aliens to 
Mexico. I believe that the U.S. Government should work more 
closely with our foreign counterparts to prevent repatriated 
criminal aliens from becoming new recruits for organized crime 
in Mexico and Central America.
    Finally, I will point to the need to really evaluate what 
is happening in drug policy here in the United States and 
around the world, through independent assessment to evaluate 
the fiscal and social impacts of drug decriminalization and 
legalization. As we have seen with Congressman Engel's Western 
Hemisphere Drug Policy Advisory Group, it is urgent that we 
consider what is going on with the changing markets for drugs. 
Thank you.
    [The prepared statement of Dr. Shirk follows:]
    
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       Mr. Sires. Thank you for your testimony.
    Ms. Meyer, we will now hear from you.

  STATEMENT OF MAUREEN MEYER, DIRECTOR FOR MEXICO AND MIGRANT 
           RIGHTS, WASHINGTON OFFICE ON LATIN AMERICA

    Ms. Meyer. Chairman Sires, Ranking Member Rooney, and 
members of the subcommittee, thank you for the opportunity to 
testify on behalf of the Washington Office on Latin America on 
ways to strengthen security and the rule of law in Mexico. I am 
submitting my written testimony for the record, and will 
summarize key points here.
    Mexico is undergoing unprecedented levels of violence. 2019 
will surpass 2018's record number of homicides, and human 
rights violations also remain widespread. From 2006 to 2019, 
the Mexican Government registered over 60,000 cases of 
disappeared people. Uncontrolled corruption and widespread 
impunity are important drivers of violence in Mexico. The 
challenges are great.
    Due to low public trust in public institutions, less than 
10 percent of crimes are reported or investigated in the 
country. While Mexico's previous two Presidential 
Administrations have taken steps to combat these challenges, 
justice institutions remain weak. Through continued engagement 
with Mexico, the United States can be a partner in 
strengthening the rule of law. I will outline how in my 
testimony. But first, I want to touch on the measures adopted 
by the Mexican Government.
    The first measure is criminal justice reforms. In 2008, the 
Mexican Congress approved sweeping constitutional reforms to 
adopt an adversarial criminal justice system based on oral 
trials in public courtrooms, designed to make the system more 
efficient, transparent, and with due-process guarantees. While 
many challenges remain, including a backlog of cases and the 
need to train and specialize more personnel, multiple Mexican 
States have made important advances in implementing the 
reforms.
    The second measure is the autonomy of Mexico's justice 
institutions. In the past, the Mexican executive branch has 
blocked important investigations into corruption and human 
rights violations. In 2014, Mexico's Congress passed 
constitutional reforms to replace the country's Attorney 
Generals' Office with an autonomous National Prosecutor's 
Office, independent from the Executive Branch.
    However, autonomy alone will not make the new institution 
more effective. This will also depend on the actions taken by 
the first national prosecutor named last year, Alejandro Gertz. 
In the coming year, the priorities he lays out for criminal 
prosecutions and the transition, as well as his engagement with 
civil society organizations and victims, will be important 
indicators of whether Mexico is responding to the longstanding 
demands for justice.
    The third is to curtail government collusion with criminal 
organizations. In far too many cases, Mexican Government 
officials and security agents work in collusion with criminal 
networks. To name two important examples, the U.S. Department 
of Justice recently indicted Genaro Garcia Luna, a former 
public security minister, for allegedly colluding with the 
Sinaloa cartel. And in the emblematic case of the 43 forcibly 
disappeared students from Ayotzinapa, the local police officers 
who detained the students were working on behalf of an 
organized criminal organization.
    President Lopez Obrador has made combating corruption a 
center point of his government, and Gertz Manero is moving 
forward in select high-profile cases. However, tackling 
corruption will require more than just a few successful 
prosecutions. His government should also demonstrate a firm 
commitment to Mexico's national anticorruption system, which is 
the mechanism established in 2016 to coordinate all of 
anticorruption efforts at all levels of government in the areas 
of prevention, investigation, and sanction.
    While Mexico must build professional police forces with 
strong accountability mechanisms and remove the military from 
public security, an effective criminal justice system is 
paramount to addressing violence and corruption in the country. 
Detaining more drug traffickers or corrupt officials will be 
ineffective unless the judiciary can prosecute them while 
guaranteeing due process.
    U.S. assistance already contributed to improvements in the 
criminal justice system. USAID's rule of law projects have 
helped State attorneys general offices and courts develop 
capacity, improve victims' access to justice, and investigate 
crimes against journalists and human rights defenders. The 
Department of Justice's OPDAT has trained justice sector 
personnel on the adversarial system and has collaborated with 
the Mexican Government in drafting relevant legislation.
    Moving forward, we need to ensure that U.S. agencies 
involved in justice reform coordinate their efforts and measure 
the impact of U.S. training. We engage with Mexico so that U.S. 
assistance is beneficial in this transition to a national 
autonomous prosecutors office, and we need to support civil 
society organizations who are involved in criminal justice 
reforms, anticorruption efforts, and human rights.
    While the Mexican Government is responsible for 
strengthening the country's institutions to address Mexico's 
security crisis, the United States must also do its part. This 
should include more public health funding to address U.S. 
demand for illicit drugs and additional measures to combat arms 
trafficking to Mexico.
    I want to conclude by thanking the subcommittee for holding 
this hearing and for including a focus on the way to strengthen 
the rule of law in Mexico. For far too long, Mexico has been 
dramatically impacted by high rates of violence, corruption, 
human rights violations and impunity, while transnational 
criminal organizations continue to traffic drugs and harm 
communities on both sides of the border.
    To reduce impunity, the Mexican Government must work to 
create trustworthy rights-respecting institutions. In this 
regard, as the U.S.-Mexico cooperation moves forward, both 
governments should ensure that strengthening the rule of law is 
a centerpiece of these discussions. Thank you.
    [The prepared statement of Ms. Meyer follows:]
    
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        Mr. Sires. Thank you, Ms. Meyer.
    Mr. Miles, we will hear now your testimony.

STATEMENT OF RICHARD G. MILES, SENIOR ASSOCIATE (NON-RESIDENT), 
 AMERICAS PROGRAM, CENTER FOR STRATEGIC & INTERNATIONAL STUDIES

    Mr. Miles. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, Ranking Member Rooney, 
and members of the subcommittee.
    I would like to lay out four main points with respect to 
security in Mexico and U.S. security cooperation with Mexico:
    Point No. 1, the 2008 Merida Initiative set out to reduce 
violence and the power of drug trafficking organizations in 
Mexico. It has failed to achieve those goals. As Dr. Shirk and 
Ms. Meyer indicated, 2019 was the most violent year on record. 
The strategy of capturing or killing high-value targets has not 
been sufficient to weaken the drug cartels, and by creating 
leadership vacuums, it has increased lethal violence over 
succession and territory.
    The cartels are still heavily involved in the narcotics 
trade, although the composition of that trade has changed. Less 
marijuana is coming across the border, but 90 percent of the 
heroin that comes in the United States comes from Mexico, and 
the country remains a major transit zone for cocaine. 
Increasingly, heroin is being supplanted by synthetic opioids, 
such as Fentanyl, with precursor chemicals coming from China 
arriving in Mexican ports on the Pacific. According to 2017 
data from the CDC, 48,000 people in the United States died from 
opioids, including heroin, prescription and nonprescription 
opioids.
    Point No. 2, the Merida Initiative, despite its failure to 
rein in violence in drug trafficking, created a historic 
mechanism for security cooperation between Mexico and the 
United States, that I believe is paying dividends. A wide array 
of technical training by U.S. experts continues to improve 
Mexico's institutional capabilities confronting organized 
crime. Most importantly, Merida has made the Mexican Government 
and its law enforcement agencies much more open to and 
accepting of U.S. advice and assistance.
    Several specific examples of the Merida Initiative's 
ongoing programs are a prison accreditation program that has 
resulted in 20 Mexican correctional facilities receiving 
international accreditation since 2011; a national vetting 
system that has identified corrupt officials within Mexican 
Government agencies and military units; assessments, training, 
certification, accreditation and equipment for forensic labs; 
training for prosecutors, investigators, and other justice 
sector personnel; and also training to professionalize Mexican 
Federal, State, and municipal law enforcement agencies and to 
increase their capacity of their specialized investigative 
units.
    Apart from Merida, Mexico, with U.S. assistance, has 
expanded the use of financial intelligence units to identify, 
track, and, if necessary, seize the assets of drug traffickers. 
This is an effective, nonviolent way to shut down the cartel's 
business model. Toward this end, in August of last year, Mexico 
strengthened its asset forfeiture law, a very positive step.
    The Merida Initiative also has created a framework for 
direct military-to-military training and cooperation. As an 
example, between 2001 and 2008--that is before the Merida 
Initiative was implemented--Mexican participation in U.S.-led 
military exercises consisted of just two exercises. Between 
2009 and 2017, after Merida, the number surged to 46 joint 
exercises.
    Mexico, with U.S. help and equipment, also has taken steps 
to increase its maritime interdiction capabilities by beginning 
a program to add eight long-range patrol vessels to its Navy. 
The first of these ships was launched in November 2018. These 
boats will enable the Mexicans to seize more Colombian cocaine 
shipments, and Chinese precursor chemicals for Fentanyl, deter 
illegal fishing vessels, and perform search and rescue missions 
up to 5,000 nautical miles from Mexico's coast.
    Point No. 3 is that the Merida Initiative was conceived as 
a tool to support Mexico's own strategy, not as a substitute 
for it. Mexican and U.S. officials should work together to 
review what the Merida Initiative successfully achieved, and 
what it did not, and help Mexico develop a new comprehensive 
strategy that takes into account new security threats, such as 
violence and instability in Central America.
    The key is to work together as partners to fix what needs 
fixing, and leverage the institutional relationships that we 
have built up over the last 12 years. That work has already 
begun. In two joint U.S.-Mexico declarations from December 2018 
and June 2019, the government of Mexico promised, among other 
things, a Mexican enforcement surge, the deployment of its 
National Guard, especially on its southern border, as well as a 
promise to cooperate with the United States to, quote, 
``enhance security governance and economic prosperity in 
Central America.'' This included a commitment by the government 
of Mexico to invest $25 billion in its southern provinces.
    In early October of last year, Assistant Secretary of State 
for International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs, 
Kirsten Madison, led a delegation that met with senior Mexican 
officials to discuss ways to intensify efforts against the 
shared challenges of synthetic and other drugs, organized 
crime, and related violence. Finally, last month, Attorney 
General Barr met with President Lopez Obrador and his team to 
discuss arms trafficking, money laundering, and international 
drug trafficking, and agreed to strengthen the bilateral High 
Level Security Group created last August.
    These commitments should be tracked and measured, and at 
the end of a comprehensive bilateral security review, the 
United States should provide the level of security cooperation 
funding that matches the severity of the threat Mexico 
continues to face, both internally and from regional 
instability.
    My fourth and final point is stating the obvious. Mexico's 
security is linked to its prosperity. Its prosperity is 
directly related to U.S. policies on trade. I congratulate the 
House of Representatives on the passage of the USMCA Treaty, a 
huge step toward ensuring that Mexico remains on an upward path 
of economic development that will create better opportunities 
for its citizens and conditions for a safe and stable neighbor.
    Thank you. I look forward to your questions.
    [The prepared statement of Mr. Miles follows:]
    
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    Mr. Sires. Thank you for your testimony. We will now go to 
questions. I will start with the questioning and then the 
ranking member.
    Ever since I have been, now, 13 years in this committee, 
2008, I was one of the biggest supporters of the Merida 
Initiative. And we have appropriated about $3 billion worth of 
American dollars into this program. What should we change to 
make this program more effective? Mr. Miles?
    Mr. Miles. Mr. Chairman, I think, clearly, the strategy has 
to change and, as I noted, that has already started. And as the 
other witnesses noted as well, it is really the long, hard, 
patient work of institution building, particularly in the 
criminal justice sector. I think our training with the 
prosecutors, with the defense side, with the prisons, is 
starting to bear some fruit. It is not as fast as we would like 
and it is not fast enough to reduce the violence that we have 
seen, but it is some progress.
    And I think the key thing is the partnership with the 
Mexicans and the investment that we have already put in over 
the 10, 12 years at the institutional level.
    Mr. Sires. Anyone else?
    Ms. Meyer. I would agree. I think it is, one, looking at 
what you have called for, which is assessing what has or has 
not worked. I know there has been a real call to develop more 
indicators of progress. I think there is a real challenge, 
especially on training, and I think that is where we have 
trained thousands of police and prosecutors.
    How do you measure the impact of has that training had any 
real difference in the way they operate? And so, I think there 
is a real need to assess particularly the impact of U.S. 
training moving forward.
    And I think what Mr. Miles also referenced, accompanying 
prosecutors, and really, that more technical assistance, which 
takes a long time in terms of longer-term tool sets, but is 
where we can provide more impact in terms of successful 
prosecutions in Mexico.
    Mr. Sires. Thank you. Dr. Shirk--Shirk. If I mispronounce 
your name, I apologize.
    Dr. Shirk. No, that is fine. You can call me Shrek. You can 
call me Shirk, whatever works.
    But I will just say, I think there is a lot of agreement 
among all of the witnesses. I do think that we have to evaluate 
what are the goals, what were the goals of the Merida 
Initiative. I mean, on the one hand, we want to make Mexico 
more secure. We want to build the rule of law. We want 
security. And on that front, I agree that we have not achieved 
that. In that sense, the Merida Initiative could be seen as a 
failure.
    But we also have the goals of institution-building in 
Mexico and strengthening the capacity of the Mexican judicial 
sector. On that front, I think there has been real progress, as 
Dr. Meyer pointed out.
    And also, part of our goal has been to partner more 
effectively with Mexico, to ensure cooperation between our two 
governments. And in that regard, the Merida Initiative has been 
a huge success across three U.S. Presidential Administrations--
sorry, four, and three Mexican Presidential Administrations of 
different parties. And sustaining that cooperation has been, I 
think, one of the key successes.
    What I would certainly recommend, and have recommended for 
some time, is the need to really evaluate the kingpin strategy. 
There is no way we can allow people like Chapo Guzman to roam 
free. But at the same time, we have to be much smarter about 
the methods that we use to take them out. If you take out Chapo 
Guzman, but you do not take out his business partners, you do 
not take out the assets that he has placed in other areas, in 
the Mexican Government and in the financial sector, it is not 
going to be an effective strategy, because the power vacuum 
that is created when you take out someone like Chapo Guzman is 
a major contributor to the violence we have seen recently.
    Mr. Sires. Can you talk a little bit about President Lopez 
Obrador? Has he fulfilled his campaign promise to take 
meaningful steps to combat corruption in Mexico?
    Ms. Meyer. I think Lopez Obrador has a really important 
message of corruption, and he has certainly worked to curtail 
government largess, meaning the government officials that are 
taking advantage of public funds for their own benefit.
    I think what we have not seen is real progress made on the 
national anticorruption system itself. They have focused on a 
few high-level prosecutions. That is important. I mean, key 
people. And the budget for this year actually provides more 
money to the special prosecutor for corruption at the Federal 
level, which is also important.
    But I think beyond that, we have not seen a real strong 
signal that he supports the system as an institution, and that 
he wants to really ensure that throughout Mexico, meaning at 
the State level and the Federal level, there is a real 
coordination of anticorruption efforts. They have not named the 
18 judges that are supposed to be part of the system to 
sanction grave cases of public corruption. They have cut 
funding for other parts of the anticorruption system.
    And there is a real concern about public procurement 
processes in Mexico, which is one of the main sources of some 
of the bigger corruption scandals we have seen during the Pena 
Nieto Administration. They actually have even more funds that 
are basically used through the public procurement, and I think 
that is where there needs to be more oversight.
    I think there is a commitment there, at least in terms of 
discourse. What we really have not seen yet is how he is going 
to make this new system, which was something pushed for by 
civil society. The anticorruption system was really a goal of 
achievement of Mexican civil society, and we have not yet seen 
him really back that.
    Mr. Sires. Thank you. My time is up.
    Ranking Member Rooney.
    Mr. Rooney. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I would like to start 
maybe with a question for anybody, but I would start with Dr. 
Shirk. Can you compare and contrast, briefly, the Calderon 
approach versus the Pena Nieto approach to dealing with these 
drugs and gangs and the violence? And then now, having had 
those two different approaches, how will AMLO's shift in 
strategy on fighting the cartels, this hugs over bullets 
business, affect the original mandate of the Merida Initiative?
    Dr. Shirk. I think Calderon, President Calderon was very 
aggressive in his fight against the organized crime groups, and 
was particularly reliant on the kingpin strategy, targeting 
high-level operatives in Mexican organized crime. 
Unfortunately, evidently unbeknownst to President Calderon, his 
top drug fighter was on the take from the Sinaloa cartel, 
Genaro Garcia Luna. And how that affected the fight, I think, 
is something we are going to have to study more carefully.
    Pena Nieto came into office very skeptical of collaboration 
through the Merida Initiative, and initially, wanted to greatly 
restrict efforts to work with the United States, but very 
quickly saw that there were opportunities to help address the 
real threat of organized crime, and we started to see that 
cooperation increase.
    Lopez Obrador comes in with similar skepticism and, in 
fact, announced that his government was going to no longer 
cooperate through the Merida Initiative, that the Merida 
Initiative was effectively canceled, until he realized both how 
grave the threat is and how vital U.S. assistance has been. And 
so, I think that there is room for continued cooperation with 
the Lopez Obrador Administration.
    I am also very skeptical of the hugs, not gunfight slogan 
of this Administration, but I understand that part of the 
rationale, part of the thinking behind that position is the 
deep skepticism that exists in Mexico about the efforts we have 
seen in previous Administrations through the kingpin strategy, 
and the desire to find some other approach that will work. I 
think we can find ways of working with this government.
    Mr. Rooney. Ms. Meyer? Mr. Miles?
    Mr. Miles. I would just add that I think there is a gap in 
the policing strategy that has arisen from this consensus that 
the uniformed military needs to be pulled back from policing 
duties, and that a National Guard needs to be stood up to 
accomplish that. That has had very mixed results, but at the 
same time, you have pulled back Federal and State policing in 
those areas in which it is most needed.
    So the Mexican Government, at many levels, has effectively 
lost control of some of that territory, because it is not 
entirely clear from a policy view or organizational hierarchy 
who has responsibility now that the uniformed military has been 
pulled back from those duties, largely.
    Mr. Rooney. Well, in that respect then--oh, Ms. Meyer, you 
have a comment?
    Ms. Meyer. I was just going to really briefly say I think 
on that in terms of the police and the National Guard really 
looking at U.S. support on accountability. The U.S. has funded 
in the past the internal affairs unit for the Federal Police, 
which has now been basically absorbed by the National Guard. 
And I think if you are looking at concerns on corruption within 
security forces, or human rights violations, having strong 
internal affairs units is really important.
    So as the National Guard is being built up, that is an area 
where the U.S. could also be very effective. It is certainly a 
key aspect of Lopez Obrador's security strategy is this 
National Guard. And so, making sure that if you are deploying 
these forces, they are being held accountable for their 
actions.
    Mr. Rooney. Another question is, what can we do, bilateral 
steps the United States and Mexico could take to combat this 
flow of firearms crossing the border from the United States 
into Mexico?
    Dr. Shirk. One thing, I think, has been a very positive 
development in the last few months is the agreement between the 
Trump Administration and the Lopez Obrador Administration to 
regularly revisit each month, through a high-level strategic 
group, the progress that is being made on firearms trafficking. 
That is something that has never happened before, and I think 
there is real potential for progress in monitoring what is 
going on.
    I do think that there are a number of things that hobble 
that kind of cooperation. I recommend, for example, greater 
transparency and access to information about the number of 
firearms that are being seized in Mexico, so we can better 
identify what are the origins of those firearms.
    Ms. Meyer. I think there are a lot of issues in terms of 
how do you look at using universal background checks in the 
United States, classifying gun trafficking and straw purchases 
as Federal crimes, things that would be more broad picture, 
requiring the reporting of multi-sales of long guns.
    I think the last, which David referred to earlier, in terms 
of legal gun sales, so increased oversight, because there is a 
lot of concern about seepage of even guns that are legally 
purchased by the Mexican Government for their security forces 
that end up in the hands of criminal organizations. So are 
there ways that we can exercise more oversight over legal sales 
as well?
    Mr. Sires. Congressman Phillips.
    Mr. Phillips. Thank you, Mr. Chair, and to each of our 
witnesses.
    I want to start by asking more about the National Guard. 
Apparently, about a third of the 60,000 or so new National 
Guard members that have been hired in the last year or so have 
been assigned to migration and immigration enforcement issues 
rather than addressing violent crime in Mexico. So I would love 
your perspective on your perceptions of the current strategy, 
how much of their time and energies are being dedicated to 
each, and whether you think that is an effective use of the 
enhanced number of National Guard members? Perhaps we can start 
with you, Dr. Shirk.
    Dr. Shirk. Yes, I think this is a real problem. The very 
first task with which the National Guard was directed, was 
essentially order maintenance functions on Mexico's southern 
border. There are a number of flaws in the National Guard. The 
National Guard is not an investigative unit, does not have 
investigative capacity. It is mainly, again, an order 
maintenance agency. And that does not help to get at this huge 
impunity problem which Dr. Meyer mentioned, that 90 percent of 
crimes essentially go unpunished in Mexico.
    So I think that there is potential to work with the 
National Guard. It is arguably--it has not even been a year 
that the National Guard has been in force. But I am concerned 
that the National Guard has been, essentially, diverted from 
its main purpose, not only to address the migration situation, 
but it is also monitoring ports. It is doing all kinds of other 
things that it is not most urgently needed for.
    Mr. Phillips. Ms. Meyer.
    Ms. Meyer. I think there is currently about 12,000 National 
Guardsmen in southern Mexico, about 2,000 at the border. When 
we went down there in August to the Rio Suchiate, which is 
where a lot of border crossings are, they looked pretty bored 
to me.
    I mean, I think there is a lot of need to really reassess 
is this the best use of this new security force, given Mexico's 
own limited resources, and are there other agencies that could 
take on, particularly the immigration agency, more of that 
immigration enforcement role.
    Mr. Phillips. When you ask that question are there, can you 
help answer it? Are there?
    Ms. Meyer. Other?
    Mr. Phillips. Other units or forces that can take on that 
responsibility?
    Ms. Meyer. There is National Immigration Agency. That is 
their task. In the past, they have been supported for security 
reasons sometimes with the Federal Police, but I think there is 
certainly a need to assess can you grow your immigration 
agency. They had 5,000 members for the entire country, and so I 
think that is also where they have used these other forces as a 
stopgap measure, because they have not increased the size.
    And the second is just training. The National Guard is not 
trained to be interacting with vulnerable populations like 
migrants, and so you, like, really have the concern of what 
that could mean for asylum seekers and others.
    Mr. Phillips. I appreciate it.
    Mr. Miles, any comments?
    Mr. Miles. I would just add that I would agree that the 
National Guard has a very, very broad mandate, probably too 
broad, and it cannot do the policing functions that I think it 
is more intended to do.
    I would note, though, that given the drop in numbers that 
we have seen on the southwest border due to a U.S. policy 
change, I think that the policy change will, in effect, relieve 
the National Guard of having to do a lot of things that Lopez 
Obrador wanted them to do and force these drops in migration, 
and that, hopefully, if that trend continues, would allow them 
to do the sort of policing that was the original intent.
    Mr. Phillips. I appreciate it.
    My next question is relative to anticorruption efforts. And 
we talk about it a lot, but rather than just hope for change, 
what can the U.S. Congress specifically do to provide 
incentives and resources, perhaps, to ensure that the effort is 
as robust as it can possibly be?
    Ms. Meyer, perhaps you could start. Specifics.
    Ms. Meyer. I think it is important, USAID has a pretty good 
transparency and, like, area of work that has been working on, 
particularly at the State level, how do you work with the 
business community on their own obligations for compliance with 
anticorruption efforts? How do you educate a broader population 
about what their role is in reporting corruption?
    They are also supporting the Citizen Participation 
Committees, which are State- and Federal-level committees that 
in the Federal level actually have control over oversight for 
the entire system. And so I think there is a lot that USAID 
could do to strengthen those efforts.
    And the second would probably be accompany more cases and 
prosecutions and getting better skill sets to go after these 
cases. We have not seen any dismantling of corruption networks 
by this government. We have not seen yet a successful 
conviction. They still have some time to do that. Maybe looking 
at can there be ways of U.S. know-how to support their 
anticorruption investigations.
    Mr. Phillips. You have about 30 seconds left, either Dr. 
Shirk or Mr. Miles, if you have----
    Dr. Shirk. I would just add that the United States is much 
more successful in its rate of prosecutions. And one thing that 
we can do is to target companies and individuals that are 
facilitating these criminal enterprises by prosecuting them 
here in the United States.
    Mr. Phillips. I appreciate that.
    All right. I yield back my time. Thank you.
    Mr. Sires. Congressman Yoho.
    Mr. Yoho. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    I appreciate you all being here. And, Ms. Meyer, I want to 
start with you. You were talking about, you know, what we have 
been trying to do with foreign affairs, or foreign aid, and 
USAID and the Merida Initiative. With that initiative, we have 
put in $3 billion since 2008. Good governance, rule of law, 
decrease corruption, get rid of the drugs.
    And I think it is a dismal failure. I know there are some 
good things. And, Mr. Miles, look forward to talking to you, 
because you said there are some good things that have come out 
of this, but I am not seeing it here. And when I talk to my 
taxpayers, they are, like, What are we doing? We have got to 
have a reset in this.
    And yet, when the corruption is allegedly going up to the 
top, the reports of President Pena Nieto in the bribery scandal 
with El Chapo, that is an alleged, so we have to see if that 
follows through. But when you have that level of corruption at 
the very top, you cannot have the rule of law in your big 
cities, let alone your little cities. And those 42 people, the 
teachers and students that got killed, we knew what happened, 
but yet nobody comes clean on that. Nobody goes to jail on 
that. And then you brought up, Ms. Meyer, that less than 10 
percent of the cases ever get reported, let alone tried. And 
so, the people do not even come forward, because they say it is 
a waste of time and I am sure it puts their life at risk.
    So when I look at the policies that we have had since--just 
go back to 2008, it is not working. We have to do something 
different. You know, we have got this war on drugs. Mexico is 
supposed to be with us; yet, there is over 70,000 acres of 
heroin growing in Mexico. We know 90 to 95 percent of the 
heroin, the cocaine that comes into America transports via 
Mexico. It goes through their cartels. I mean, if this was a 
business model, we would be out of business. Nobody would lend 
you money for this business model.
    And what I propose is that this country needs to look at 
things differently. You know, Mr. Miles, you brought up--and I 
got to shout out to him, because he is one of our constituents 
and he is here with his great wife, Phoebe, out here, just a 
great family. And he has done a lot of work in this realm.
    You brought up that Mexico depends on trade, primarily with 
the U.S. We have the USMCA trade deal. I voted against it for 
some other reasons, but one of the things I brought up to the 
Mexican ambassador when she was here is the drugs transiting. 
If Mexico knows they are dependent on trade, primarily with the 
U.S. and Canada, a weakened America is a weakened Mexico. And 
we know a lot of these drugs are coming up via the produce that 
comes in, or other things that are coming into this country.
    And, so, my proposal is we move from aid to trade, and we 
base that trade based on policies. When we have a country that 
aligns with us in rule of law, getting rid of corruption--and 
we have got our own problems here in this country. But when we 
start having countries align up with us philosophically, and 
the rule of law so that we can work across the border, whether 
it is on the drugs, on the narco trafficking, the human 
trafficking. I do not think we should give them favored trade 
status. What are your thoughts on that? Anybody?
    Mr. Miles. I do not think there is any scenario in my mind 
in which the Mexicans will be able to defeat these 
organizations on their own without U.S. training and 
assistance. So I think that always has to be a part of the 
policy answer.
    Mr. Yoho. Do they want to defeat them?
    Mr. Miles. Well, in the Mexican Presidential election, the 
top two issues were anticorruption and violence. So there is 
clearly the political desire among the Mexican people to do 
this. Surprisingly enough, the United States, the Trump 
Administration, migration were not top issues in the Mexican 
Presidential campaign. It was reducing violence and 
anticorruption.
    Mr. Yoho. Where is the antidrugs in there?
    Mr. Miles. Well, I mean, I think that is rolled up in the 
violence piece. I mean, when they say violence, it is the 
cartel violence.
    But, again, we are talking about a country that has weak 
institutions, particularly at the local levels. And I think 
that is where we can actually make the contribution is 
strengthening that institutional capability all the way down, 
not just the national government, State, local, all the way.
    Mr. Yoho. Well, and that is the frustrating thing, because 
we put billions and billions and billions of dollars in there 
to strengthen those. They are not strengthened.
    Mr. Chairman, I am going to yield back. I appreciate your 
time. I look forward to talking to you afterwards. Thank you.
    Mr. Sires. Thank you. Congressman Espaillat.
    Mr. Espaillat. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    Just yesterday, international media reported the killing of 
Maria Guadalupe Lopez Esquivel, also known as La Catrina, who 
was a member of the cartel Jalisco Nueva Generacion, 
responsible for the killing of 15 police officers last October. 
This 21-year-old sicaria, who, at one point, was reported to be 
a good student, was killed in an exchange of gunfire between 
the drug cartel and Mexican Drug Enforcement officers in the 
region of Tierra Caliente, Mexico.
    According to InSight Crime, back in the 1980's, 75 percent 
of the drugs seized in the United States came from the 
Caribbean. By 2010, the number went down to 10 percent, with 80 
percent of the drugs seized coming from Mexico and Central 
America. However, there has been a significant shift in that 
model. With a significant increase and investment in the drug 
war in Central America and Mexico, the numbers have begun to 
shift back to the Caribbean. This is also fueled by the growing 
prominence and importance of Venezuela in the drug trade, only 
a few miles away from the Caribbean.
    Last December the 2nd, after escaping a raid in his 
residence in the Dominican Republic, Cesar Emilio Peralta, also 
known as el Abusador, was arrested in Cartagena, Colombia. 
Known to be the Pablo Escobar of the Caribbean, el Abusador 
today sits in a Colombian jail awaiting extradition to the 
United States.
    He trafficked thousands of kilos of cocaine that hit the 
streets in the United States, in my district in the northeast, 
in New Jersey, Florida, New England States, all over the 
country, contributing to the opioid crisis that we now face in 
America. Yet, the Caribbean Basin Security Initiative only gets 
$58 million a year, a total of $600 million since its 
implementation back in 2010, as compared to the $3 billion 
given to the Merida Initiative, or the $1.2 billion given to 
CARSI.
    What is your take on the potential shift of the drug trade 
going back to the Caribbean? Should we invest more in 
interdiction in the Caribbean and law enforcement in the 
Caribbean to combat the emergence of Venezuela and the shifting 
of the drug trade back to the way it was in the 1980's? Any one 
of you.
    Dr. Shirk. I think you point to a very important problem, 
these shifting networks. When enforcement is increased in one 
place, the flows move to another. We frequently refer to this 
as a game of whack-a-mole when we see these shifting networks.
    And I do not think we are quite there yet. Unfortunately, 
the flows of drugs through Mexico remains very robust, even as 
drug traffickers are fighting amongst themselves. I do, 
however, think that there should be more coordination between 
CARSI and the Merida Initiative, and a more united front to try 
to make sure that it is not as easy for those networks to shift 
from one region to another.
    Mr. Espaillat. Anybody else on that?
    Ms. Meyer. I think just to add that we do need to look more 
at the U.S. side of this, in terms of billions of dollars that 
have been invested in prevention, treatment-and-recovery 
efforts, but a lot more still needs to be done. The U.S. lags 
far behind, in terms of access to treatment and getting 
treatment centers to people in need in the United States, 
particularly on the opioid crisis, and looking at taking to 
scale harm reduction efforts in the United States.
    And so we can look at the sort of balloon effect, which is 
we are effective in one place and it moves somewhere else 
because there is also that demand in the U.S., and so looking 
at ways to really address demand in a more holistic way.
    Mr. Espaillat. Thank you.
    Mr. Chairman, let me just stress the interest that I have 
in seeing a substantial increase in funding in the Caribbean 
Basin Initiative and, of course, in working together with the 
Colombian authorities to extradite Cesar Peralta el Abusador.
    Thank you, and I yield back the remaining part of my time.
    Mr. Sires. Thank you, Congressman.
    Congressman Guest.
    Mr. Guest. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    Members of the panel, thank you for being with us today. I 
want to focus my question particularly on drug cartels. Mr. 
Miles, you state in your written testimony that cartels are 
heavily involved in the narcotics trade, that 90 percent of the 
heroin that comes in the United States comes from Mexico and 
the country remains a major threat for cocaine. Increasingly, 
heroin is being supplanted by synthetic opioids, such as 
Fentanyl, and precursors from China arriving in Mexican ports 
on the Pacific. And according to 2017 data from CDC, 48,000 
people died in the United States from opioids, including heroin 
prescriptions and nonprescription opioids.
    I believe you would also agree that the Mexican drug 
cartels also play a major role in the exporting of 
methamphetamine into our country. Would that be correct, Mr. 
Miles?
    Mr. Miles. Yes, based on the data I have seen. I would just 
add, I think we are probably in the midst of a huge 
transformation because of synthetics. There has already been 
some very interesting research that the decline of poppy 
production in Mexico is declining because of synthetic opioids. 
And these are things that can be produced anywhere, including 
the United States. So I think we are still trying to get a 
handle on exactly what that is doing to the drug trade.
    Mr. Guest. But would you agree, Mr. Miles, that most of the 
street-level narcotics that we see today in America do actually 
come into our country by Mexican drug cartels across our 
southwest border?
    Mr. Miles. Certainly on heroin, and probably transit most 
cocaine. I do not know what has happened to the marijuana 
market.
    Mr. Guest. And then, Ms. Meyer, you, in your written 
testimony, talk a little bit about the fact that there are 
roughly nine predominant drug organizations, 200 smaller-based 
organizations, that they are involved in things beyond drug 
trafficking that include extortion, pirated goods, kidnapping, 
oil theft, vehicle theft, human trafficking, and human 
smuggling.
    And then you go on to talk a little bit about the violent 
nature of these organizations. You say that roughly a third of 
the homicides in Mexico can be attributed to criminal drug 
organizations. You talk about a 33 percent increase in 
homicides since 2017. And would some of these homicides also 
include what we would refer to as political assassinations?
    Ms. Meyer. Yes. I mean, I think especially we saw that up 
to the elections for 2018, where there was an unprecedented 
number of mayors that were actually--or mayoral candidates or 
local candidates that were killed. And so, I think there is 
certainly a part of that violence that is related to organized 
criminal organizations going after local politicians or 
candidates.
    Mr. Guest. And does violent activity generally go hand in 
hand with drug cartels and the way that they do business, 
particularly in Mexico?
    Ms. Meyer. Yes. I think an important thing that we are 
highlighting is that these drug cartels are no longer just drug 
trafficking organizations. We look at them as transnational 
criminal organizations, because of their involvement in so many 
other illicit activities, including oil theft in Mexico, which 
is a really large priority for the current government, as well 
as all the other issues that you mentioned.
    Mr. Guest. And also, we are seeing a continued increase in 
drug cartels and human trafficking and sex trafficking. Is that 
correct?
    Ms. Meyer. I think there is still the murky area of how 
much you have the human smuggling networks connected to the 
larger cartels. It is unquestionable that when they get to the 
U.S.-Mexico border, small trafficking human smugglers are 
paying fees to these larger organizations, but whether they 
are--I think there is still somewhat of a disconnect between 
the broader organized criminal organizations, and then the 
groups that are working, particularly involved in human 
smuggling.
    Mr. Guest. And then, Dr. Shirk, you talk in your testimony 
about the policy that Mexico had implemented for a number of 
years known as the kingpin strategy, that it was responsible 
for the takedown of El Chapo, a cartel leader there in Mexico, 
but that Mexico has recently moved away from the kingpin 
strategy.
    And my question is, what alternative strategy has the 
Mexican Government implemented in place of the kingpin 
strategy?
    Dr. Shirk. Effectively, the Mexican Government has insisted 
that it will not target high-level operatives of criminal 
organizations, because of the destabilizing effects that it has 
on the drug trade and the resulting power vacuums and violence 
that follow. Unfortunately, I do not think that is the right 
approach or right response.
    The problem with the kingpin strategy is that it only goes 
after the head, the hydra, and does not deal with the other 
component parts of these criminal organizations through more 
effective and broader prosecutorial investigations and 
prosecutions.
    So, I think that the U.S. Government needs to work very 
closely with Mexico, and demonstrate that more effective 
prosecutions of the many component parts of a criminal 
enterprise can actually be effective in debilitating organized 
crime in Mexico, as it has worked in the United States really 
since the 1970's.
    Mr. Guest. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I yield back.
    Mr. Sires. Thank you. Congressman Gonzalez.
    Mr. Gonzalez. Thank you. I have a few questions. I am going 
to ask Mr. Miles, to your knowledge, how are we measuring 
success to the Merida plan? I mean, $3 billion, what specific 
metrics are we using with the State Department to measure 
progress on our investment of $3 billion?
    Mr. Miles. Well, one of the things we are doing is trying 
to see if any of the institution-building is having an effect, 
and to take as an example, the new criminal justice system, as 
they are switching over to an entirely new system of oral 
prosecutions. There has been some measurement that the States 
that went earlier to that in Mexico have, indeed, seen higher 
conviction rates, more arrests.
    Mr. Gonzalez. How many States have gone into this new 
method?
    Mr. Miles. All of them at this point. But it was phased in 
over roughly an 8-year period, so there were some that went 
right away and others that waited. The ones that went right 
away are starting to see positive results. They are small, but 
they are positive. That is one metric.
    I think another one is just sort of the 
professionalization, the level of professionalization we are 
starting to see in the law enforcement agencies and 
intelligence agencies. If you talk to our officials on their 
counterparts, they all to, you know, a man or woman, testify to 
the professionalization of those forces that used to be, you 
know, very unreliable and mostly corrupt. It does not mean they 
are entirely not corrupt, but huge advances in those 
institutions.
    Mr. Gonzalez. Well, living on the border and traveling to 
Mexico all my life and doing business in Mexico as a lawyer 
before I ever came here, I see the Merida plan--I hate to say 
this--as a monumental failure, in terms of if you do an 
economic cost-benefit analysis of, you know, we have spent $3 
billion, but yet, I cannot get in my car and drive 2 hours into 
Monterrey without feeling like my life is in danger.
    And what more can we do in terms of--and what are we doing 
in terms of putting pressure that we have police that are 
actually not corrupt and making arrests, and then more than 
that, because there are a lot of arrests. They just all get let 
go, because they pay bribes and get out of jail. How do we 
guarantee, that they get prosecuted, and that they actually go 
to prison and serve their jail time? What are we doing with 
this vast investment that we have made to assure that those 
institutions have accountability?
    Dr. Shirk. I just want to say that we need to think about 
this as a very complex problem. Yes, we have invested $3 
billion over the last 10 years. We spend more than 10 times 
that every year on U.S. border security.
    Mr. Guest. Yes, I know that.
    Dr. Shirk. So sometimes these complex problems do not go 
away just because you are spending billions of dollars, and 
they are problems that require much deeper interventions.
    But I will say that, you know, there is not a lot I think 
that we can do to improve the overall integrity of Mexico's law 
enforcement institutions as long as there is not professional 
compensation and merit-based promotion in Mexican police 
agencies and prosecutorial agencies. The sort of flip side of 
punishing corrupt individuals is making sure that honest 
individuals----
    Mr. Gonzalez. Are compensated.
    Mr. Shirk [continuing]. Are compensated properly, and 
properly motivated and incentivized.
    Mr. Gonzalez. Right. What are we doing in that respect?
    Dr. Shirk. Well, in that regard, the Merida Initiative, I 
think, is absolutely key for the training component, and also 
in helping to identify administrative regulations within police 
agencies and the fiscalias, the prosecutorial agencies, to help 
increase that professionalization.
    But we can only do so much. I think the Mexican Government, 
at all levels, needs to be spending more on salaries and 
benefits and training, and continued monitoring of all law 
enforcement personnel.
    Mr. Gonzalez. I agree. So are we doing any of that with the 
Merida Initiative?
    Dr. Shirk. Yes. Particularly, I know through USAID, through 
INL.
    Mr. Gonzalez. What are they doing?
    Dr. Shirk. They are doing trainings of Mexican prosecutors, 
and also, coordination with U.S. prosecutorial agencies, groups 
like CWAG, Center for Western Attorneys General has spent 5 to 
10 years working to coordinate between----
    Mr. Gonzalez. But, still, more than 90 percent of criminals 
do not get prosecuted in Mexico.
    Dr. Shirk. That is true in, especially, places where the 
new criminal justice system is just taking root. But, as Mr. 
Miles mentioned, the new criminal justice reforms, which we 
drove very heavily through the Merida Initiative and other 
USAID preceding the Merida Initiative, has been instrumental in 
improving the integrity of the criminal justice system and 
criminal procedure.
    One example, we did a study in December and found that in 
States that had made progress in the criminal justice reforms 
earlier, we saw a 5 percent reduction in the use of torture by 
law enforcement agents.
    Mr. Gonzalez. What States are those?
    Dr. Shirk. In States like Chihuahua, in States like Baja, 
California. Even though there has been violence in those 
places, we are seeing more integrity in law enforcement. We can 
see small but important improvements in the----
    Mr. Gonzalez. Crime, from my point of view, seems like it 
has skyrocketed in Mexico. They have lost more people to 
violence in the last 2 years than we did in the entire war in 
Vietnam, soldiers in Vietnam. I mean, we could not stomach 
seeing body bags coming in this way. It is amazing that this is 
happening right next door and we kind of sometimes look the 
other way here in the Congress.
    Dr. Shirk. It is horrific. And sometimes the doctors are to 
blame when their patients die, but sometimes there are other 
epidemiological factors that contribute to the violence, as we 
talked about earlier. We can make better doctors, better police 
in Mexico, but at a certain level, there are so many other 
factors that have contributed to this violence that we have to 
keep the overall trends in violence sometimes separate from the 
progress we are making on institution building.
    Mr. Gonzalez. So, we see more than 90 percent of criminals 
not being prosecuted in Mexico, and you are saying it is 
improving in some States. What do you see in the next 10 years?
    Ms. Meyer. I think I would add looking at the importance of 
what the Federal Government is doing, because that can be the 
model for what the States do, in terms of reforms. The Federal 
Government dragged its feet a lot on the adversarial system, 
and that, I think, right now, we are at a turning point, 
because you have a national prosecutor's office. I think there 
is a lot the U.S. could do to engage with a new prosecutor's 
office, and what are their priorities for criminal 
prosecutions, because you should not just go after all crimes 
if you have limited resources. So how do you target your 
efforts on the more serious violent crimes? I think that is 
where the U.S. could be more effective and supportive. I think 
it was mentioned before when you're looking at alternative----
    Mr. Gonzalez. Specific areas, right?
    Ms. Meyer. Specific to the Federal Government and looking 
at how they are transforming to this new prosecutor's office 
and looking at what their priorities are for criminal 
prosecutions.
    The second is just on forensics. I think there isn't--not 
every State in Mexico has a forensic lab. And of the forensics, 
they do not have ballistics, they do not have all the 
analytical capacity they need. So that is another area where if 
you do not have the ability to gather scientific evidence that 
is going to stand up in court, cases fall apart.
    The third would be policing. The police are like the last 
missing part of the criminal justice reform. They were the last 
to be prioritized, in terms of training. Less than half of the 
police that are involved now in crime scene preservation have 
been given any training on their roles in the new system. And, 
so, I think doubling down on how do we work to support Mexico's 
police in their new role in investigating crimes.
    Mr. Gonzalez. Thank you.
    Mr. Sires. Congressman Vargas.
    Mr. Vargas. Thank you very much, Mr. Chair and Ranking 
Member, for bringing this forward.
    I want to agree totally and completely with my colleagues 
from Florida when he stated, when you have corruption at the 
top, the very top, you do not have the rule of law. I think 
that was very appropriate, especially today. So thank you for 
those comments. I totally agree with them completely.
    Drugs really is a symbiotic evil. The reality is that in 
the United States we consume them and we pay a heavy price for 
that. A lot of our young people, and even middle age people die 
because of illicit drugs. But the reality is, that that same 
evil affects Latin America and Mexico too.
    It is interesting Mexicans will tell you it is very easy to 
stop the drug trafficking. Stop using them, because most of the 
drugs come to the United States. We love to point at Mexico and 
say: "Why are you supplying these horrible drugs?" Mexico is 
saying: "Why are you consuming them? Because it is killing our 
people too."
    So we have to figure it has to be a holistic strategy. And, 
again, we are trying different things. I mean, the reality is 
in California, I think, many people voted to legalize marijuana 
not because they thought marijuana was a good thing, but to try 
to get the money out of it, the illicit money. And, you know, 
it is a strategy that I do not particularly like. However, I 
did vote to legalize marijuana for that reason.
    I thought maybe if we take the money out of it that maybe, 
you know, kids will not use it as much and, you know, it will 
not be a gateway drug and maybe we can get some of the deaths, 
the murder, and all this other mayhem out of there. So we will 
see if that works.
    Now, I do have to ask about the new President in Mexico. 
Obviously, he has a different strategy than previous 
Presidents, as you have been talking about, but his security 
plan, you know, the hugs versus bullets or whatever, I do not 
have a lot of faith in that.
    And I would like to ask Dr. Shirk, you first, because you 
said this thing is a many-headed thing and you chop one off and 
it pops up. What about his strategy? What are the gaps in his 
security? And I do agree with, by the way, the use of the 
National Guard. I think it has been ridiculous when they are 
trying to stop a bunch of these poor people from coming up. 
They do not have the drugs. They are not selling drugs. They 
are not killing anybody. But he uses most of the money for the 
National Guard to stop these people from migrating. If you 
could talk about where you think the gaps are in his security 
policy?
    Dr. Shirk. So, first of all, thank you. You are my 
Congressman, so I appreciate the opportunity to speak to you as 
a professor from the University of San Diego. I would say, you 
know, the----
    Mr. Vargas. Take all the time you would like.
    Dr. Shirk. Thank you. The Lopez Obrador Administration is 
focused on trying to, for example, deal with the roughly 2.6 
million Mexicans that are neither--young people who are neither 
enrolled in school nor employed, by giving them scholarships 
and internships. He has tried to address the problem of crime 
and violence by creating a new Public Security Secretariat, he 
has created a National Guard, and he has created this new 
fiscal prosecutorial mechanism.
    These look really good on paper. Each of these elements, or 
each of these changes, I think, potentially has merit. 
Unfortunately, it all comes down to the implementation. And 
giving, you know, $200 scholarships to tens of thousands of 
Mexican students does not really get to the most violent 
actors, for example. And so, I am a little bit dubious about 
the long-term benefit of his scholarship initiative.
    When it comes to the Public Security Secretariat, what is 
very clear is that the new National Guard is nominally 
reporting to the new Public Security Secretariat, but it is 
effectively an outgrowth of the Mexican military, and lacks 
some of the important accountability mechanisms that we would 
expect for law enforcement.
    And last, the new fiscalia is still really trying to build 
this agency while the caris in motion. So, I think we have seen 
very few results so far from the Administration. I think it is 
very distressing to the Mexican public, the idea of----
    Mr. Vargas. I am going to stop you just for 1 second, 
because I am running out of time, but I do want to ask you 
about extradition and prosecution in the United States. It does 
not seem like he is very much in favor of that either.
    Dr. Shirk. I agree with that.
    Mr. Vargas. So that, I think, is going to be a big problem. 
Do you suspect that is going to be a big problem, too? Because 
there is always that fear. I think the drug traffickers have 
that fear they are going to be extradited to the United States 
and they will not be able to escape here, and I do not think he 
is very anxious to extradite anybody.
    Dr. Shirk. I think we will see fewer extraditions over the 
next 5 years remaining in his Administration than we have seen 
over the last 5 to 10 years through other Administrations.
    Mr. Vargas. Thank you very much, Doctor. Thank you.
    Mr. Sires. Thank you. Congressman Castro.
    Mr. Castro. Thank you, Chairman.
    As we speak, hundreds of people from Central America 
seeking refuge at our borders are forced to wait in Mexico as 
their asylum claims are processed. Tomorrow, the congressional 
Hispanic Caucus will be visiting some of these folks in 
Brownsville, and later in Matamoros, Mexico.
    These individuals and families are subject to gang 
violence, extortion, and crime when waiting at the border. Can 
you tell us what the conditions are in Mexican border cities 
where these asylum seekers are having to remain, because of the 
Trump Administration's Remain in Mexico policy?
    Ms. Meyer. I think the conditions are very dire in the 
majority of the cities we have seen, particularly in Nuevo 
Laredo, Matamoros, tent cities that are stood up I think, in 
part, because when the Mexican Government also accepted the 
expansion of this program, they did very little on their side 
of the border to ensure that they had the public services they 
needed. So you have lots of people living on the streets in 
very precarious situations and, as you mentioned, victims of 
crime.
    I think that is the key issue is we have seen migrants 
kidnapped in Mexico historically. For over a decade, migrants 
have been targeted by criminal organizations at the border, and 
yet it continues, in part, because, as we mentioned, there is 
very little investigations into these crimes in Mexico.
    Mr. Castro. Many of these Mexican cities the U.S. 
Government has advised Americans not to travel to.
    But my follow-up question to that is not, in this case, 
about the American Government. We know what the Trump 
Administration is doing. AMLO ran as a reformer for President 
of Mexico, but there have been reports about his possible 
complicity with the Trump Administration in perhaps abusing the 
human rights of some of these asylum seekers and making their 
path harder, not in a just way but perhaps in an unjust way. 
Can any of you speak to that?
    Ms. Meyer. I think there is twofold here: One, we would 
certainly view, as a human rights organization, the migrant 
protection protocols in that program is inhumane and should be 
ended, because of the impact it has on the safety of asylum 
seekers and their ability to get protection in the United 
States, including processing their cases and having legal 
assistance.
    I think the Mexican Government's own detention strategy has 
likely deported back to the dangerous situations people are 
fleeing from, because they do not adequately screen people when 
they are apprehended in Mexico. That said, there were 70,000 
asylum requests in Mexico last year, and they are certainly 
working to expand their own capacity to protect people. So I 
think they certainly have a responsibility ensuring that people 
that want protection have the opportunity to request it, but 
they have not done nearly enough in this area.
    Mr. Castro. On a different subject, a significant 
contributor to gang violence and cartel violence in Mexico is 
the export, both authorized and unauthorized, of small arms 
bought in the United States and taken to Mexico or exported to 
Mexico. In your estimation, what can the United States do to 
prevent small arms, including assault weapons, bought in the 
United States from being sent to Mexico to be used by cartels 
and organized crime?
    Dr. Shirk. Well, I think in my written testimony I 
suggested, for example, a ban on the import of assault weapons 
to the United States, which make their way into the Mexican 
marketplace is one good place to start.
    I also think that our efforts to increase the capacity for 
ATF and other agencies to investigate straw purchases is 
greatly needed. It would be nice to have a registration 
requirement for large-volume ammunition purchases and 
unassembled assault weapon kit imports.
    There are I think many things that we can do, and these 
have been on the table for a very long period of time. What I 
am encouraged by is that in the last few months, we have seen 
the United States and Mexico set up a commission, a binational 
commission to address those issues. And I think it would be 
very valuable for this committee to monitor actively the 
progress that is being made through those binational dialogs.
    Mr. Castro. Any other remarks on that question?
    And there was a comment made earlier about the amount of 
drugs that come from Mexico. But I think as we think about that 
fact, we also have to consider the fact that the United States, 
right now, is spending billions of dollars on a border wall, 
billions of dollars on border security in a way that is not 
necessarily dealing with the customs, with the things that come 
in or slip in, and the fact that a fraction of the vehicles, 
for example, that come through the U.S.-Mexico border are 
actually properly and fully inspected. I think for the U.S. 
Congress, for the President, I think it is something that we 
have to think about, in terms of how we dedicate our own 
resources.
    I yield back.
    Mr. Sires. Thank you very much. We are going to have a 
second round, if you do not mind, of questioning. I will let 
the ranking member start.
    Mr. Rooney. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    Mr. Miles, in your testimony, you mentioned these financial 
intelligence units to track and identify and, if necessary, 
seize drug traffickers' assets. And I know a lot of people have 
been interested in our ability through the Treasury Department, 
et cetera, to identify and track those kind of assets, just 
like we do in other parts of the world.
    And I would be interested in your thought of how effective 
the kingpin designation and the seizing of U.S. assets of 
cartel members is and what else we might do better, and also, 
how effective this new Mexican law to sequester assets in 
Mexico might be as well and how we might be able to help them 
do a better job with that.
    Mr. Miles. I think this is one area in which the United 
States could make a lot of progress with Mexico. There is 
certainly the willingness there. And we have developed very 
sophisticated tools, you know, separately as part of the war on 
terror, with financial tracking and seizing. And there is 
definitely political willingness on the Mexican side.
    What is missing, as you said, is the technical capacity. 
Right now, I think the Treasury attache's office in the U.S. 
Embassy in Mexico is, you know, very thinly staffed, and this 
is, really, activities the Treasury Department needs----
    Mr. Rooney. So kind of compare it to the one in Luxembourg 
that is, like, 100 people.
    Mr. Miles. Exactly. And I think it is single digits in 
Mexico City.
    But this is an area really in which, you know, it is 
nonviolent, it is very effective, and it gets the cartels' 
attention very, very quickly. So in regards to the kingpin 
strategy, if that is what it means, I think that is a good 
idea. Snatch-and-grab, missions, I think as we have talked 
about, have not been effective.
    Mr. Rooney. Thank you. Any other comments about this?
    Dr. Shirk. I would just add that one thing that is sorely 
lacking in Mexico are witness protections and whistleblower 
protections. If we really want to identify corruption, if we 
want to identify where those assets are, having stronger 
whistleblower protections and having stronger witness 
protection would be a great way of getting lower level 
operatives of a criminal enterprise to help identify where 
those assets might lie or where funds are being diverted.
    Unfortunately, there are no real examples of successful 
prosecutions using witnesses that have been turned, 
essentially, from criminal organizations in Mexico in the way 
that our prosecutorial agencies are able to do, because no one 
feels safe to do that.
    Mr. Rooney. Thank you. I yield my time.
    Mr. Sires. Congressman Gonzalez.
    Mr. Gonzalez. Thank you. Just in follow-up, one last issue 
that I wanted to discuss. And I guess, Mr. Miles, I am sorry to 
pick on you, but you seem to have the background for the 
questions that I have.
    So what are we doing, or what should we be doing to 
secure--and I am talking about security along with trade--to 
secure our trade routes? In the small city of McAllen, which is 
the southern portion of my congressional district, we get about 
$1 billion a year of legitimate Mexican deposits into our 
banking institutions. This year by, I think it was October, we 
had over $1 billion of retail sales to Mexican nationals who 
come and shop and own second homes, either in south Texas or 
Padre Island, somewhere in south Texas.
    So they have been great business partners and clients and 
customers. What are we doing to assure those trade routes stay 
safe? And the reason I ask is, I hear of 18-wheelers being 
pulled over and extorted, depending what product they are 
bringing through and depending what is hot at the time. 
Tourism, even though it is high, it has been impacted, because 
people from Monterrey, which is the biggest city where most 
people come and shop and own second homes, do not come as much 
anymore, are selling their second homes on Padre Island and in 
south Texas because of those routes being so dangerous. And I 
think it has a direct economic impact, and I am curious what 
can we do?
    I have been down there. I have met with Secretary Durazo 
about trying to secure Highway 40, and I have talked to the 
officials. They have sent people down there recently and they 
tell me it is better, but we should be securing our trade 
routes. In fact, I thought that that should have been part of 
the USMCA, which I was very proud to vote for, but I thought it 
was missing a security component to assure that our trade and 
business is also safe, and tourism is safe when they travel, 
especially on those main throughways to ports of entry.
    Mr. Miles. Well, I think without a doubt, No. 1, investing 
in border infrastructure and particularly on the security side 
is critical, and this is something that you have probably heard 
quite a bit. Using better technologies to do those inspections 
at the border so that we have much higher confidence.
    Two, I think intelligence sharing has also been one of the 
bright spots in the U.S.-Mexico security relationship. I think 
that needs to be expanded to include, as you said, those routes 
coming in on the trade side, not just, for instance, in the 
areas of the border in which there is no security.
    And then maybe something like what we similarly do in 
airports outside the United States, where you do sort of 
prechecks, using U.S. personnel or at least U.S. assistance. Do 
something like that.
    Mr. Gonzalez. On the other side of the border?
    Mr. Miles. On the other side, with Mexican cooperation.
    Mr. Gonzalez. That would be great. I would love to see 
that.
    Mr. Miles. These are all tools I think that would make a 
dent.
    Mr. Gonzalez. I envision like safe zones. I know people do 
not want to hear the green zone as an example, but having a 
trade route, having it completely secured from the port of 
entry to say Monterrey or whatever the major city hub is where 
the trade is happening, that they can have either military or 
some kind of security every so many miles to completely shield 
trade and tourism through those routes.
    And it does not seem like it should be that complicated to 
do, but I can assure you that it is having a huge economic 
impact and there is a price tag to that insecurity that we do 
not seem to talk much about, and we did not really get into 
that thoroughly during the USMCA. I felt that it was rushed 
without having that security component. But whatever opinions 
you guys want to share on that idea, I would be happy to 
listen.
    Ms. Meyer. I think Mexican security experts have brought 
forward that idea several times, are there areas where the 
Mexican Government should be looking at securing highways, 
particularly for these high-traffic areas. I am not sure with 
the Lopez Obrador Administration how far they have gone with 
those discussions.
    I would caution, though, I think the other kind of missing 
part of that is looking at corruption within the security 
forces. So putting up checkpoints is important, but making sure 
that the people manning the checkpoints are working on the 
right side of it. And, so, I think it goes back to we need to 
ensure that Mexico has really strong accountability for this.
    Mr. Gonzalez. Right. So we need to, like, find ways to be 
there in those trade routes.
    Ms. Meyer. And work with them on these controls over the 
security forces.
    Mr. Gonzalez. So is that going to happen?
    Ms. Meyer. I think it should be part of the discussions of 
future cooperation, how can we really work much more on these.
    Mr. Gonzalez. What can we do, as Members of Congress, to be 
helpful with that idea?
    Ms. Meyer. I would say, raise it in questions, report 
language for appropriations, raise it with Mexican officials in 
terms of their security policies. How much are they looking at 
security in the highways as an issue.
    Certainly, you have dialog with Mexican officials. And I 
think the other is talking to State Department, in terms of 
what their priorities are going to be and raising this issue, 
that we want to make sure that there are security forces that 
are securing the areas, but also working on the right side.
    Mr. Gonzalez. Thank you.
    Mr. Sires. Thank you, Congressman.
    Congressman Yoho.
    Mr. Yoho. Thank you, sir.
    Mr. Gonzalez, we have a bill that we are putting together 
to do just that on the supply chain of stuff coming in, and so 
I will have my office reach out to you and I appreciate your 
attention on that.
    I got to respond to my good colleague from San Diego 
talking about corruption. I do not believe after 3 years of 
investigation, that was part of the articles that got sent over 
there, to correct the record.
    What percent of the drug and human trafficking or illicit 
business, that money, what percent of the GDP of Mexico does 
that account for? Does anybody have an estimate? Dr. Shirk.
    Dr. Shirk. Mexico has a roughly $15 trillion economy, and 
estimates of drug revenues and other illicit revenues range 
between--they range widely between about $6 billion and as high 
as $40 billion a year. So if you do the math on that, you are 
talking about a fraction of a percent of the total Mexican GDP.
    Mr. Yoho. OK. I heard a higher number, you know, and I 
think that goes back to why this is such a hard thing to get 
rid of. And I thought you brought--go ahead.
    Dr. Shirk. I apologize. I said $14 trillion. I meant $1.5 
trillion.
    Mr. Yoho. $1.5 trillion, yes. So it is a significant amount 
of money. I mean, nobody is going to walk away from that. The 
idea of incentivizing, you know, the officials, whether it is 
law enforcement, court officials, or whoever in the legal 
system, to incentivize them, I think, is a good thing. But then 
there is always somebody coming by on the other side going to 
offer them a little bit more money or threaten their family.
    And we saw this in the cocaine growing regions in Colombia 
and Peru, you know, to move the cocaine farmers into coca or 
another product. Well, the drug traffickers come back and say, 
no, you are going to grow this one. And they may pay them a 
little bit more, but they also become more violent and threaten 
those.
    So I think we need to look into this, you know, differently 
as far as the percentage of the GDP of that country. And then, 
we also know that a lot of that money is in the black economy, 
so it is never reported. And we also know that a lot of that 
money is coming into our country via produce or other things.
    Dr. Shirk, you brought up some ideas on getting the amount 
of guns going down there under control. So I assume you have an 
idea. What percentage of guns go down there from the United 
States versus from South or Central America, or seepage from 
the military or police down there? What percent do guns coming 
out of the United States account for, in your estimate?
    Dr. Shirk. So we do not have very good data on that, 
frankly. When ATF does firearm searches for Mexico, they are 
only searching the firearms that Mexico presents as potential 
searchable firearms. So they are most likely U.S. firearms.
    The percentage then of total identified firearms that come 
from the United States that ATF has looked at is somewhere 
between 70 and 80 percent, but that is not necessarily a great 
reflection, because ATF does not trace firearms that may have 
come from Central America or other places.
    I will just say that on the percent of GDP question, I 
completely agree with you that if it is $6 billion, it is still 
a lot of money, even if it is not a large percentage of the 
Mexican economy.
    Mr. Yoho. Right.
    Dr. Shirk. $6 billion will buy you a lot of political 
science professors, for example.
    Mr. Yoho. It will.
    Dr. Shirk. Or police officers, or other government 
officials. So getting at the corruption issue, as I said 
before, really requires us to see professionalization of law 
enforcement in Mexico.
    Mr. Yoho. And I agree with that, but that has to go back to 
rule of law, you know, and have all those things set up, those 
institutions.
    I am going to put out a word of caution before you start 
recommending how we should do gun control or monitoring things 
in this country. We should get a handle on that so that we can 
talk from that perspective than just saying, it is America's 
fault, we need to have a gun registry, which I do not think 
that is a good way to go. Other than that, I mean, we see this 
problem. It is something we need to get under control.
    Mr. Miles, you have been down there a long time and I look 
forward to talking to you more when we are in the district. But 
this is something that it is a cancer on a society. You know, 
countries cannot perform to their ultimate goal and reach their 
full potential when you have all this corruption around you, 
when you have all these threats around you.
    And, of course, we see it here in this country. We have 
certain cities and certain areas that are just terrible, you 
know, and we have got to get this under control. And that is 
going to be all of us working together. And if we are all on 
the same team, as I shared with the Mexican ambassador, a 
strong America is a strong Mexico. A weakened America is a 
weakened Mexico. So we are all in this together.
    I yield back.
    Mr. Sires. Thank you. Congressman Vargas.
    Mr. Vargas. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
    Just to amplify the record, I do not think President Nieto 
was convicted of any corruption crime either, or impeached.
    One of the things that is interesting about living along 
the border is the irony, the irony of having one of the most--
one of the safest cities in the United States, certainly safest 
large cities in San Diego. So if you want to come to a safe 
place, come to San Diego. And you simply cross the border, and 
then you go to, probably, the most dangerous city in the world, 
and that is the irony of the border.
    The other irony would be that if you decided to check every 
car that passed that border every day, the economic damage that 
you would do to San Diego and to Tijuana would be catastrophic. 
It is interesting, the fact that San Ysidro Chamber of 
Commerce, which is right on the border, did a study and showed 
that most recently, the highest increase of daily crossers are 
actually American citizens that are now living in Tijuana, 
because the rents are cheaper, the homes are less expensive, 
and they have decided to move now and to live in Tijuana and 
work in San Diego. So we do have a great relationship there, 
but the irony again is the level of violence that you have.
    And it is not an easy question. I mean, that is why I get 
so frustrated, because there are lots of things that we have 
been trying. And I am not sure that this new President, what he 
is trying is going to work. In fact, I have been somewhat 
disappointed and that is why I asked--you know, his focus on 
corruption has been great, but what about the notion that these 
drug traffickers have literally brought incredible levels of 
violence, and he does not seem to address it or he does not 
seem--even with the massacres that have happened, he seems to 
have put this off on the back burner.
    Could you comment about that? Ms. Meyer, it seems like you 
want to comment. Go ahead. But put your microphone on so I can 
hear you.
    Ms. Meyer. I think one of the big differences is that in 
Mexico, there are very little consequences when you kill 
somebody. And I think if you can kill because you can and the 
odds of you actually getting investigated and prosecuted are so 
low, there is very little disincentive for those type of 
crimes. So that goes back to the institutions in Mexico.
    And one is effective policing. So how do you have police 
that people actually trust and that they are the first person 
you are going to go to when you get robbed instead of maybe 
thinking they are part of the problem, and having criminal 
justice systems or prosecutors that can gather scientific 
evidence that stands up in court. And so, I think that it is a 
long-term issue.
    We have talked about what should be done in Mexico. Experts 
estimate it is going to take about 10 more years for the 
criminal justice reforms to be fully effective in the country. 
But I think it goes back to that is the big difference----
    Mr. Vargas. So are you hopeful then that that is going to 
happen? Do you believe that is going to happen? Is that your 
conclusion?
    Ms. Meyer. I am hopeful that you will see more progress on 
the State levels, in terms of these reforms. I think with the 
Federal Government, Lopez Obrador has not given really clear 
signs of his commitment to strengthening the institutions he 
needs, and we will have to see, you know, what that might 
evolve into this coming year.
    Mr. Vargas. Would anyone else like to comment? Because I do 
want to hear some hope. I mean, we have heard all the negative 
things and it seems crime has gotten worse, but is there hope 
out there?
    Mr. Miles. I think one macro change is the demand for 
accountability by the Mexican public, and this is something 
relatively new. It is not just in Mexico, you have seen it 
across the region. But you have seen one very brave journalist 
and also, several very brave NGO's they are essentially--they 
are breaking these major cases on anticorruption. And it is 
reflecting this desire and demand by the Mexican public to hold 
their officials accountable.
    There is still a lot of work to be done before we get 
there, but the public in Mexico and Brazil and other countries 
are now saying, we are not going to put up with governments who 
simply ignore or, you know, kick the can down the road.
    So I think to the extent that we can work and keep 
attention on those civil society journalists and public 
institutions force accountability into that system.
    Mr. Vargas. Doctor.
    Dr. Shirk. I would just add that the Merida Initiative 
helped support those civil society organizations. Groups like 
Mexico Evalua, groups like the World Justice Project, which is 
based here in the United States, but has a program monitoring 
and evaluating justice reform in Mexico, are helping to fuel 
what has been the largest wave of increase in the number of 
civil society organizations in the last 100 years in Mexico.
    We have seen a proliferation of organizations focused on 
justice sector improvements, anticorruption, and other 
accountability mechanisms. So that is something that this 
committee and our government can definitely do to help.
    Mr. Vargas. Well, I am still hopeful, and I want to say 
that, you know, we worked with Colombia and certainly the 
situation got a lot better there. And I hope that in Mexico it 
does too, and I am certainly willing to work with anybody that 
wants to do that. Thank you.
    Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    Mr. Sires. Thank you, Congressman.
    Congressman Guest.
    Mr. Guest. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    We spoke a few minutes ago about the nine major drug 
trafficking organizations and roughly the 200 smaller 
organizations that are involved in illicit activity, including 
narcotics trafficking, extortion, pirated goods, kidnapping, 
oil theft, vehicle theft, human trafficking and human 
smuggling. We also spoke that roughly a third to a half of all 
homicides can be attributed to organized crimes, and that some 
of those homicides do include political assassinations.
    Last year, it was reported that the Administration was 
contemplating designating Mexican drug cartels as foreign 
terror organizations. My question is, one, would you support 
this designation and why or why not? So, Dr. Shirk, I will 
start with you.
    Dr. Shirk. I would not. Most importantly, because I would 
not want to see our valuable counterterrorist resources 
diverted to address what is effectively a law enforcement and 
organized crime problem, particularly when I do think that we 
have very strong mechanisms already available to us, in order 
to go after their financial assets, in order to prosecute those 
individuals involved in drug trafficking on the U.S. side of 
the border.
    That, to me, is--our resources I think are correctly 
allocated. The problem is the lack of capacity and the lack of 
integrity in Mexican judicial sector institutions that allows 
for these high levels of impunity. And so, I would just say 
that I would not support that designation.
    Mr. Guest. Ms. Meyer?
    Ms. Meyer. I also would not support it, I think, because in 
one part, you are looking at criminal organizations that are 
widely profit-driven and are looking more at earning money and 
there is not a big ideological, looking for social ideological 
transformation in Mexico. And so, even with the political 
cooptation, it is more to have control over routes than trying 
to impose a different political or social model over a society.
    And the other is the impact it would have on U.S.-Mexico 
relations, and, perhaps, impact future cooperation on security, 
on migration, and a lot of other areas. I think there are a lot 
of other tools that the U.S. already has at its disposal in 
looking at organized criminal organizations, the kingpin 
designation, et cetera, that we should pursue more than looking 
at a foreign terrorist organization designation.
    Mr. Guest. And Mr. Miles?
    Mr. Miles. I would expand on that point. I think an FTO 
designation would be counterproductive for two reasons: One, as 
Ms. Meyer already mentioned, my reading of the legislation for 
FTO designation is that there has to be an ideological 
component present, not just a threat to the United States, but 
the ones that are currently on the list, they are either 
Islamic terror groups or Marxist or national separatists. I do 
not know how you would get there to make the argument that 
cartels have an ideological component, and I think it would 
probably get challenged in court and tie that up.
    But No. 2, more importantly, I think anything that, you 
know, smacks of a desire to do unilateral action, whether it is 
enforcement or targeting by the United States in Mexico I think 
would set us back decades, in terms of our cooperation, the 
relationships that we have built with the intelligence and the 
law enforcement agencies.
    So if they interpreted an FTO designation as a green light 
or permission slip from the Administration to go in 
unilaterally, I think that would seriously damage our 
interests.
    Mr. Guest. Would each of you agree--and if you do not, 
please let me know--that the tools that we currently have at 
our disposal, and the strategies that we have implemented have 
failed to adequately control the drug trafficking organizations 
in Mexico?
    Mr. Miles. As I mention in my remarks, if we are measuring 
the level of violence and the involvement in drug trafficking, 
we have failed to achieve that objective, absolutely. It does 
not mean Merida did not accomplish other things, which I 
believe it did. That objective clearly was not met.
    Mr. Guest. Ms. Meyer.
    Ms. Meyer. I think I would agree, in terms of looking at 
violence in Mexico. If we are looking at it more on how do we 
expand the relationship between the countries, build trust and 
create those institutions, I think the Merida Initiative has 
certainly made progress in those areas.
    Mr. Guest. And Dr. Shirk.
    Dr. Shirk. I would agree with those statements.
    Just going back to this terrorism point. In many ways drug 
trafficking organizations are worse than ideological terrorists 
in the sense that they are killing for money, and they are 
killing 8-month-old babies, and they are drowning people, or 
mutilating their bodies in horrible ways. And so, I think we 
tend to look at the acts that they commit as terrible and 
horrifying and we want to condemn them, but I think that there 
are smarter ways that we can go about fighting these 
organizations.
    Mr. Guest. Dr. Shirk, just to follow-up on that, you know, 
based upon what you just said, shouldn't we use every tool in 
our disposal to fight drug trafficking organizations to make 
sure that, one, that violence does not come to our shores; and 
then, two, to try to help our friends in Mexico as they are 
continuing this battle which has raged in their country now for 
decades?
    Dr. Shirk. I have sometimes problems with my cell phone, 
but I would not use a hammer.
    Mr. Guest. I am sorry. Mr. Chairman, I yield back.
    Mr. Sires. Well, thank you very much.
    Thank you all for being here today. As our witnesses have 
explained, the challenge of insecurity in Mexico is immense. I 
plan to work with my colleagues in the coming months to further 
evaluate our assistance to Mexico and find ways to improve our 
strategy going forward.
    I thank the witnesses and all members for being here today.
    With that, the committee is adjourned.
    [Whereupon, at 3:44 p.m., the subcommittee was adjourned.]

                                APPENDIX
                                
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            RESPONSES TO QUESTIONS SUBMITTED FOR THE RECORD
            
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