[Congressional Record Volume 144, Number 72 (Friday, June 5, 1998)]
[Senate]
[Pages S5690-S5692]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




         TOBACCO LEGISLATION AND THE COVERDELL-CRAIG AMENDMENT

  Mr. DeWINE. Mr. President, I rise this afternoon to support the 
Coverdell-Craig amendment. As the Chair knows, and Members know, the 
Coverdell-Craig amendment was offered yesterday to the underlying 
McCain tobacco bill. I congratulate my colleague from Georgia and my 
colleague from Idaho for this very worthwhile amendment.
  Let me first, though, begin by saying, again, what I have said 
numerous times on the Senate floor in the last few weeks, and that is I 
support the underlying McCain bill.
  It represents a unique and critical opportunity to change attitudes 
and to save young lives from the debilitating effects of smoking. All 
of us know, Mr. President, all too well, that youth smoking is a 
component of an even larger and more dangerous reality, the tragedy of 
youth drug use.
  If we had to talk about the health problems in this country today, 
particularly if we want to talk about the preventable health problems 
in this country, we would talk about illicit drug use, we would talk 
about smoking, and we would talk about abuse of alcohol. Those three 
are clearly the three biggest, the things that will ultimately kill 
tens of thousands of Americans. They prey on our young.
  So I think it makes sense, as we struggle in this Senate to come up 
with a comprehensive bill that deals with our tobacco problem in this 
country, that we also use this as an opportunity to deal with another 
problem, and certainly a related problem, and that is the use of 
illicit drugs. So I congratulate my friends and colleagues from Georgia 
and Idaho, Senator Coverdell, Senator Craig, for this very good 
amendment.
  I think we need to use this unique opportunity to address youth 
smoking. But we also need to take it one step further and address youth 
drug use. Doing so would make this even more effective, this current 
bill, the McCain bill, even more effective in changing the young lives 
for the better.
  Mr. President, drug trafficking remains a tragic reality of life in 
this country today. Let me share some facts with my colleagues.
  Fact: Recent reports suggest that heroin trafficking from Mexico has 
dramatically increased.
  Fact No. 2: The Caribbean is fast becoming once again a major illegal 
drug transit route.
  Fact: While drug production and trafficking have been on the rise, 
our resources we, as a country, have dedicated for drug interdiction 
have dramatically declined.
  In 1987, approximately 27 percent of the entire national drug control 
budget was dedicated to interdiction. During that period of time, the 
United States did, in fact, make a dent in the trafficking of 
narcotics. Cocaine seizures, for example, were significantly up.
  However, Mr. President, starting in the early 1990s, the percentage 
of drug control funds devoted to interdiction has declined 
dramatically. In fact, by 1995, only 10 percent of the national drug 
budget was dedicated to interdiction--a very significant drop. By 1998, 
the percentage still remained at 10 percent. Looking at it another way, 
in 1992, over $2 billion was dedicated to interdiction purposes. But by 
1995, only $1.2 billion was set aside for this specific matter.
  Mr. President, let me be very clear. I strongly support--strongly 
support--increased funding to deal with the demand side of the drug 
situation that is finding ways to persuade Americans, particularly 
young Americans, that doing drugs is wrong, that it destroys lives, and 
destroys families, schools, and communities.

  In a sense, Mr. President, we could argue that in the end reducing 
demand is the only real effective way to ultimately overcome the threat 
of drugs in this country today. As long as there is a demand for drugs, 
there will always be a supply. That is why education as well as drug 
treatment remains central long-term goals.
  The amendment offered by the Senator from Georgia and the Senator 
from Idaho recognizes the need to invest in demand-reduction efforts, 
as well as the need to invest in interdiction efforts. However, 
reducing the demand for drugs is not going to be achieved overnight. It 
will take years, if not generations, to change minds and attitudes 
regarding the use or abuse of drugs.
  I believe one way to reduce demand is to have an effective 
interdiction policy, one that will put a serious dent into the flow of 
drugs into this country. We must find ways to raise the cost of 
narcotics trafficking, making it far more difficult for drug lords to 
bring these drugs to our Nation and making the cost of drugs on the 
streets--whether that be the streets of New York, Los Angeles or 
Cleveland--making the cost of those drugs go up. Just like the 
underlying bill, we can impact demand by raising the street value of 
drugs, and we can do that by going after the supply routes.
  There is an inverse relationship between the cost and consumption. I 
believe that is true with drugs. I believe that is also true with 
cigarettes. That is the basic principle of the McCain bill. I think it 
is logical to extend that principle, as my colleagues have done, 
Senator Coverdell and Senator Craig, in this amendment.
  As I mentioned, I do want to make it very, very clear: Drug 
interdiction,

[[Page S5691]]

which I am talking about this afternoon, is only one of the things that 
we have to do. We have to have good domestic law enforcement. We have 
to deal with the problem of treatment. Treatment does work. It is tough 
but it can, in fact, work. We can save lives. We have to continue to 
invest in treatment. Education prevention--that works, as well, as long 
as we are consistent. As long as we do something consistently through a 
child's life, it works. So we need to focus on that, as well.
  Let me turn now to what I was talking about a moment ago, that is the 
need to increase our emphasis on drug interdiction. As I mentioned 
before, the Caribbean is becoming more and more the transit route of 
choice for drug traffickers. I made two visits to this transit zone in 
the Caribbean in the last several months. During my last visit, I 
learned that our agents in the Bahamas have seized more cocaine in the 
first 3 months of 1998 than in the past previous 3 years combined. With 
sufficient funding, interdiction efforts can make a huge difference. 
Clearly, drastic funding reductions have drastic consequences when it 
comes to results.
  I had the chance on these visits to meet with the soldiers on the 
front lines, or sailors on the front lines of our war on drugs. I 
witnessed our strategy in action. I sat down with the experts, both 
military and civilian, the people who are actually on the front line, 
the people who are charged with carrying out the monitoring, the 
detection, and the interdiction of drugs. Given what I have learned 
during these visits and the conclusions I have reached, the amendment 
by the Senators from Georgia and Idaho could not have come at a better 
time. There is a dire need for a renewed commitment, a rededication of 
resources toward drug interdiction.

  With energy and with adequate resources, our drug interdiction 
efforts can be improved. We cannot ask those tasked to implement our 
drug interdiction strategy to conduct their missions without the proper 
level of resources to do the job. One reason why is simple: This drug 
interdiction puts the lives of these law enforcement officers in 
danger. That is the nature of the business. We have to ensure that they 
have the best equipment, the best resources and the best intelligence 
so that they can carry out this mission, not only so they can be 
effective, but so they can do it in as safe a way as humanly possible. 
The men and women charged with interdicting drugs face a ruthless enemy 
who will go to great lengths to protect their cartel. We are dealing 
with millions and millions of dollars.
  When I visited the Caribbean last month, I saw videos of drug 
traffickers in ``go-fast'' boats--that is what they are called, go-fast 
boats--that are made almost exclusively for the only purpose of 
bringing drugs up from Colombia, bringing up drugs from that part of 
the world. I saw videos of the go-fast boats literally running over 
Customs vessels in the shallow waters south of Florida during a 
nighttime interdiction pursuit. I believe we owe it to these law 
enforcement officers to ensure they have the proper equipment and 
manpower to do the job they were asked to perform. After all, it is 
unfortunate reality that the drug cartels don't have a budget process 
or a bureaucracy to slow them down. These drug cartels, these drug 
lords, are constantly adjusting to their environment and updating their 
equipment.
  What kind of resources are we talking about? What kind of resources 
do I believe we are lacking? Let me use the U.S. Customs Service 
operating in south Florida as just one example. In 1986, Customs had 77 
vessels and 124 maritime officers. Today, they are now down to 30 
vessels and 23 officers. Funding for the Maritime Enforcement Program 
is down from $13.25 million--that was the figure in 1992--to $5.2 
billion. So we have gone from $13.25 million in 1992 to $5.2 million in 
1997.
  Further, Customs no longer has a 7-day, 24-hour operation. To make 
matters worse, Customs not only lacks basic resources, they also lack 
1990s technology. A Colombian go-fast boat can go between 80 and 90 
miles per hour, while the few Customs go-fast boats that are available 
only top about 70 miles per hour. So not only does Customs lack 
resources in general, they lack the state-of-the-art equipment needed 
to match those of the drug lords.
  On my most recent trip, I visited the Joint Inter-Agency Task Force 
located in Key West, FL. This is the primary hub for detection, 
monitoring, and interdiction efforts. During these visits, I saw 
firsthand that our government agencies there--and there are many--have 
tremendous monitoring and detection capability, and they are doing a 
good job. They can detect when a small, drug-carrying aircraft is 
leaving Colombia and making the journey across the Caribbean.
  Unfortunately, however, while we may have the capability to detect 
and monitor drug trafficking in the Caribbean airspace, we do not have 
adequate resources and capabilities for the end game--the actual 
seizing of illegal drugs in transit. And the drug lords know this. For 
example, I was informed that of the total drug air events in the 
Bahamas from April of 1997 until April 1998, our U.S. agents state that 
there was only an 8-percent success rate of stopping drug air flights 
that have been detected--8 percent. That means approximately 92 percent 
got away. And though cocaine seizures are up, their concern is the 
higher amounts seized represent probably a fraction of the total amount 
of drugs coming through the area.
  While in Key West, I was also briefed on specific interdiction 
efforts in the eastern Pacific. I was surprised to find out that in the 
eastern Pacific, off the coast of Mexico and Central America, up this 
region that is cut off on the map, the coast is virtually, literally 
clear for drug lords to do their business. Mr. President, this is 
simply not acceptable.

  The U.S. Government--and I am talking about us--is not effectively 
dealing with this increasingly large threat in the Eastern Pacific. We 
have virtually no presence because of the lack of funding. I was 
briefed about an operation called Caper Focus, which would have focused 
on interdiction efforts in the area. We would have had a number of 
surface assets and aircraft to patrol the waters and interdict. This 
operation, unfortunately, was canceled before it started because of a 
Department of Defense decision to send the needed surface assets 
elsewhere. To date, this issue has not been resolved, and the coastal 
waters in the Eastern Pacific are open for drug business.
  Mr. President, our men and women who work on interdiction matters on 
a daily basis are committed to success, but they are not getting the 
support that they really need from us. Because of limited resources, we 
are selectively spending resources--a little bit here and a little bit 
there, a little bit at a time, and in different places. This, of 
course, has tremendous negative consequences.
  With more limited resources, we could seal off one or two of the so-
called ``drug corridors,'' but the reality is that drug routes are 
constantly in flux, as the traffickers always seek to exploit the 
chinks in the armor of law enforcement. This phenomenon has been 
compared to the squeezing of a balloon--squeezing it at one end and it 
pops out on the other. That is the problem we have constantly run into 
in this antidrug effort. When we step up efforts in one area, like 
squeezing a balloon on one end, the traffickers just move to another 
area.
  Let me give my colleagues an example of this. On one of my recent 
trips I saw that, in particular, Haiti has become an attractive rest-
stop on the cocaine highway. Haiti is strategically located about 
halfway between the source country--Colombia--and the destination 
country--right here in the United States. Haitian law enforcement, 
though slowly getting better, is really unequipped to put a dent in the 
drug trade. What's more, their coast guard fleet, while it is improving 
and we are working with it, consists of a handful of boats. And as it 
is the poorest country in the hemisphere, by far, Haiti is extremely 
vulnerable to the kind of bribery and corruption that the drug trade 
needs in order to flourish. It is not surprising that the level of 
drugs moving through Haiti has dramatically increased.
  According to a U.S. Government interagency assessment on cocaine 
movement, in 1996, between 5 and 8 percent of the cocaine coming into 
the U.S. passed through Haiti. By the third quarter of 1997, the 
percentage jumped 12 percent, and then it increased to 19 percent by 
the end of that year.

[[Page S5692]]

  Mr. President, accordingly, because of that, we responded to this 
crisis with a military operation called Operation Frontier Lance. 
Operation Frontier Lance utilized Coast Guard cutters, speedboats, and 
helicopters to detect and capture drug dealers on a 24-hour per day 
basis. Incidentally, Mr. President, this operation was modeled after 
another successful interdiction effort off the coast of Puerto Rico, 
called Operation Frontier Shield. However, unfortunately, funding for 
Frontier Lance ran out and the operation just ceased. In fact, it 
ceased on Monday of this week. I had the opportunity to be on one of 
the cutters that was off the coast of Haiti and talk to the men and 
women who were so proud of the tremendous job they were doing. This 
potential roadblock on the cocaine highway is no more. Again, it ceased 
to exist this past Monday. The reality also is that Coast Guard funding 
has been slashed in the past several years. I think this is a mistake.

  It is my hope that by passing the Coverdell-Craig amendment, we can 
jump start Operation Frontier Lance, and other similar programs. We 
need to get back into the game.
  Now, Mr. President, our first and best resource in this antidrug 
effort, of course, is people. We are lacking in personnel in areas 
where we need it the most. Of the more than 100 U.S. drug enforcement 
agents authorized to be in the Caribbean, I was surprised to find only 
one agent in Haiti last March when I visited. Since my March visit, the 
DEA has agreed to add six more agents; that is clearly the direction in 
which we ought to go. But we also need additional manpower, men and 
women, to go to the Dominican Republic, and other areas of the 
Caribbean as well.
  Mr. President, as I mentioned earlier, one of the major problems 
regarding our current interdiction efforts is that we are using scarce 
resources sparingly. The drug traffickers know that if we place 
resources in one or two selective places, they will just switch their 
routes and go elsewhere. A more logical approach, more funding 
permitting, would be to have more manpower and resources at different 
key places at the same time; or, in other words, ``squeeze the 
balloon'' at different ends--all at the same time. I believe that we 
can do that by passing the Coverdell-Craig amendment. That is why I 
support this timely amendment.
  Mr. President, I believe it is time to rededicate ourselves to an 
effective interdiction strategy. A lot of good work is now going on. 
But we can do a lot more and we can do better. I have had the 
opportunity to see our efforts firsthand. We are competing with an 
enemy that has increased its resources to do the job, while we 
tragically have cut our resources by more than half. Having said that, 
I also believe that we must have a clear idea what we should expect 
with increased funding. In short, we need to ascertain from the 
relevant agencies, whether it be from the Navy, Coast Guard, Customs, 
DEA, FBI, or whatever the agency may be, what we can expect to 
accomplish with more resources, and we have to look to them to tell us 
what they think they can do. I believe it is our obligation to give 
them those resources and to give them the direction. My point is that 
we need to make sure that the Government agencies have the necessary 
amount of money and that they indeed strictly use the funds for 
counter-narcotics efforts.
  Again, I want to commend my friend from Georgia, Senator Coverdell, 
as well as Senator Craig, for their efforts in this regard, their 
efforts in combating the drug threat both within and beyond our 
borders. I look forward to working with them and other colleagues on 
this important, new initiative.
  In conclusion, let me just say again how important I believe it is 
that we pass the McCain bill. It has been a struggle. No one should 
have expected it not to be a struggle. This is a big bill. It is 
comprehensive legislation. It is tough sledding. We knew that when we 
started. But we should not be discouraged. The stakes, I think, are 
very high. What are the stakes? The stakes are whether or not we are 
going to seize this historic opportunity to pass legislation that will, 
in fact, have a significant impact on reducing the number of young 
people who start smoking every day. The consequence of this legislation 
will affect not only young people today, it is going to impact our 
society for years and years to come. So we should continue, we should 
push on, and we should get the job done.
  The amendment that I am speaking about this afternoon--I am sure we 
will be back on it again next week--which was brought to the floor by 
Senator Coverdell, is an amendment that I believe will improve the 
McCain bill. It will improve it by taking some of the resources from 
the bill and using it in the antidrug effort, using it on drug 
interdiction, which I believe is so urgently needed. With some 
additional resources, I am convinced that the men and women who I have 
had the chance in the last several years to meet with, to see, that are 
on the front lines, along our borders--and I have had the chance to 
visit our borders--as well as in the Caribbean and other areas, I 
believe they can get the job done.
  I believe that they can impact the drug trade. They can only do it 
though if we are willing to give them the resources and give them the 
backing to allow them to do that job.
  Mr. President, I yield the floor.
  I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The bill clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. LOTT. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for 
the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.

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