[Congressional Record Volume 145, Number 128 (Tuesday, September 28, 1999)]
[House]
[Pages H8959-H8964]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                     WHERE WE ARE WITH DRUG POLICY

  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Ms. Granger). Under the Speaker's announced 
policy of January 6, 1999, the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Mica) is 
recognized for 60 minutes.
  Mr. MICA. Madam Speaker, I am pleased to come back to the floor 
tonight, and as usual on Tuesday nights, I try to address the House and 
the American people on the subject of the illegal narcotics situation. 
As I have stated many times on the floor of the House of 
Representatives, I take this issue very seriously.
  I chair the Subcommittee on Criminal Justice, Drug Policy and Human

[[Page H8960]]

Resources of the Committee on Government Reform and Oversight charged 
with the responsibility of trying to coordinate and get back on track 
our war on drugs. And I do say get back on track our war on drugs 
because, as I have stated many times in detail, last week in my 
remarks, the war on drugs basically was closed down in 1993 with the 
beginning of the Clinton administration. When the Clinton-Gore 
administration controlled both the White House, they controlled 
substantial majorities in the House of Representatives, in the United 
States Senate, and in 2 years of domination completely destroyed, 
completely dismantled almost all of our international narcotics 
efforts, took apart the cost-effective source country programs that 
stopped drugs very cost effectively in their production, in their 
route, at their source in the countries that produce them.
  Then, of course, the administration, working with the majority in 
Congress, gutted nearly half the amount of money for interdiction, in a 
very short period of time dismantled almost all of the programs that 
interdicted drugs at the second stages from the source. First, 
destroyed those programs, interdiction where you caught them cost 
effectively at the second level of before entry to our borders, cut 
those programs in half, use of the military almost decimated, use of 
the Coast Guard in areas like Puerto Rico which saw an incredible 
influx of illegal narcotics from throughout the Caribbean and then 
transited it into the United States, even into Central Florida, my home 
area of central Florida from Orlando to Daytona Beach, one of the 
victims of that failed policy.
  Then additionally, Madam Speaker, adopting a very liberal policy as 
far as our national leadership on the issue, soft on the issues, a 
national health officer, Jocelyn Elders, said just say maybe, and our 
kids took that at face value, and we have seen the dramatic results  
among, particularly among, our young people who were so susceptible, we 
found, to that soft message sent out of the White House and out of the 
administration and sent out of the Congress. Again, a short time in 
which they controlled all these mechanisms, but a lot of damage was 
done.

  Now, digging our way out again, we have increased source country 
programs. We are getting them almost back to the 1992 levels. The 
interdiction programs' involvement of the military, the Coast Guard, 
almost back again to the 1992 levels. And education program which we 
have no match. For which again, I credit the gentleman from Illinois 
(Mr. Hastert) who is now Speaker of the House who helped secure funding 
for that program in the last Congress under his leadership as a 
chairman of the Subcommittee on National Security on which I served 
with him that had drug policy jurisdiction. Education.
  And of course, contrary to what is out there, the Geraldo Riveras and 
the others who give these programs about how the war on drugs is a 
failure, they do not have a clue. Of course we never mention that the 
war on drugs, in fact, was closed down by the liberal elements. But, in 
fact, the war on drugs is successful when it is multi-faceted, as I 
said, where it deals with stopping drugs at their source, interdicting 
drugs, a strong education program.
  And, of course, the Riveras and others will not tell you that in the 
Clinton agenda most of the money went for solely, treatment. The 
increases from 1993 to 1995--1996 nearly doubled for treatment, and 
they continue to double. And, of course, we think treatment, this new 
majority does, is a very critical part to any multi-faceted and 
effective anti-narcotics program. But by itself it is sort of like 
treating only the wounded in a battle, and we cannot just be taking in 
the casualties, treating them and sending them back out or allowing 
them just the alternative of a life of addiction as we compared with 
Baltimore last week.
  Madam Speaker, Baltimore now has the distinction of probably 60,000 
addicts in a liberal Clinton-Gore type policy which has enslaved almost 
one-tenth. A Council person from Baltimore said it is one in eight who 
are now victims of addiction. And that is the liberal policy as opposed 
to the Giuliani zero tolerance, tough enforcement approach and the 
approach that the majority in this Congress, the new majority in this 
Congress, has adopted.
  So we know that stopping illegal narcotics at their source is very 
cost effective, works. We have seen dramatic decreases in Bolivia, 
Peru, two countries which were really the major sources of coca and 
cocaine production. Now that has shifted to Colombia because mostly, as 
I pointed out and documented very well last week, of the Clinton-Gore 
policy that stopped all assistance, all aid, closed down the war on 
drugs basically in Colombia so that Colombia is now the largest 
producer. And the little programs that were started under this 
Republican majority in Peru and Bolivia have now dramatically cut, and 
again with small expenditures, production there.
  But again it closed down the shoot-down policy; it closed down the 
assistance programs, a close-down of the cooperation in providing 
intelligence to Colombia. It destroyed those programs and now has 
Colombia, which was really not a coca producer, a producer of the raw 
source, it was a producer as far as transforming of the coca and 
processing it into cocaine is now the major producer in the world of 
cocaine, a great achievement that the Clinton-Gore administration has 
managed to pull off in less than 6 short years.
  And now, of course, we have the rampage of heroin. Again, 6 years 
ago, almost no heroin coming from Colombia. Now the largest source of 
heroin in the United States grown in Colombia, a by-product of the 
Clinton-Gore failed foreign policy towards Colombia. And the solution 
as they run to the Congress, whether it is Bosnia, Haiti, Somalia, or 
wherever is more money and funds. And, of course, we will be saddled 
with an estimated $1 billion request which is coming forth to the 
Congress to help solve the problem that suddenly sprung up in Colombia 
that actually they created with a failed policy over the last 4 or 5 
years.
  So that is where we were last week, and tonight I want to talk about 
where we are with drug policy. Some things happened in the House of 
Representatives, in fact, just the last few days. Those who watch the 
House of Representatives may have watched a resolution that was brought 
up by my good friend, the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Hastings) asking 
for fair and free elections in Haiti. Now this, my colleagues, is the 
same Haiti that had the same failed policy that was adopted by this 
administration that sort of got us in this mess and at no small expense 
to the American taxpayers or the Congress.
  Now stop and think about this. We went in to save Haiti, and we went 
in by a Clinton-Gore method of destroying Haiti by imposing an embargo 
which I spoke out very actively against. I had been to Haiti many 
times, knew a little bit about Haiti. It is the poorest Nation in the 
western hemisphere. People there make about a dollar a day, and we 
imposed an economic embargo.

                              {time}  2015

  What we did with this Clinton war solution was we closed down 100,000 
manufacturing jobs that supported almost 1 million Haitians, and almost 
all those manufacturing opportunities were owned by U.S. employers who 
had worked with Haitians to start a little bit of a real economy in a 
land that had known nothing but poverty. It really is the saddest case. 
Haitians are some of the most wonderful people I have ever met on the 
face of the Earth. So we imposed an economic embargo.
  What that did was it destroyed any business that might have been 
legitimate in Haiti, and it turned these folks of this island into 
basically a liberal Clinton-Gore type welfare state, sort of a 
socialized system where they relied on Federal funding really from 
Washington, D.C. to supply food stations and foreign aid and 
assistance.
  I remember talking to the ambassador and others, like what did you do 
after we imposed this embargo and we sent our troops in? Recall, we 
spent over $3 billion on this nation-building experiment that has 
turned into such a disaster that here we are on the floor of the House 
of Representatives passing a resolution saying can you participate in 
free elections and can you stop the corruption with your police and 
with your government?
  This is after those billions and billions of American taxpayer 
dollars were spent for nation-building programs, institution-building 
programs.

[[Page H8961]]

 If you stop and look, they are spending American taxpayer money on 
teaching them how to be legislators, and they could not even convene 
their legislature; teaching them how to be political people; teaching 
them law enforcement, and here we have one of the highest levels of 
corruption in the entire hemisphere, some 4 or 5 years later, and 
billions and billions of American taxpayer dollars down the drain.
  But I did ask the question to the ambassador and the others involved 
after we sent our troops in there, and we have got established, what 
have you done to bring back businesses to help American businesses in 
partnerships which we had started with Haiti before this embargo? 
Basically, they had done very little or nothing.
  Even to this day, they still do not get it. They think that the way 
to nation-build is to provide just the institutional assistance and not 
real sound economic development. You can spend all the American 
taxpayer money you want in the world in Haiti; and until you have some 
real market activity, tourism, manufacturing, things that create jobs, 
some agriculture that allows them to provide for themselves, the 
handout programs do not work. Yet we have done this.
  How embarrassing it must be for this administration and this Congress 
to stand here in the last few days and pass a resolution asking them to 
sort of clean up their act, after spending billions in this nation-
building.
  The reason I cite that as a failed Clinton-Gore policy in relation to 
narcotics is because we have seen the corruption of the police force 
there. Allegations have been filed on members of the Haitian National 
Police Force accusing them of a wave of murders, disappearance of 
detainees and drug-related crimes and other illegal activities. These 
are the latest reports that we have had.
  The United States, in the billions we spent, we spent $75 million to 
help train and build the police force, and the police department has 
had to dismiss over 530 officers over the last 4 years for corruption.
  This little report in the Tuesday, September 28, Washington Post 
Foreign Service said, and it quotes a Colin Granderson, ``If you are 
asking me whether I am more concerned about rot in the police than a 
year ago, the answer is yes,'' said Colin Granderson, Executive 
Director of an international civilian mission here in Port-au-Prince, 
run by the Organization of American States and the United Nations.
  Let me quote him further. He says, ``We have both human rights 
concerns and concerns about the broader conduct of officers, 
specifically with respect to criminal activity, in particular drug 
smuggling.''
  Now, if that is not the crown jewel of the accomplishments of the 
Clinton-Gore administration. We spent billions of dollars, we have an 
economy that is defunct, we have corruption in the political levels 
unknown to the Western Hemisphere, and we again have spent a fortune in 
these training and assistance and aid and handout programs. And what do 
we have? We have Haiti being named as one of the drug smuggling centers 
of the Western Hemisphere.
  It was interesting too in checking into the airport just this past 
weekend, I noticed, I think it was with, I believe, Nigeria, but I am 
not certain about that, but there was one other nation mentioned, as 
you enter the security, it says ``Please note that these airports in 
these countries are not in compliance with international security.''
  There was one other country, and, again I do not recall if it was 
Nigeria, but I do know very well that the second country named in the 
list was Haiti and Port-au-Prince Airport.
  What a great distinction, again, Clinton-Gore policy, on spending 
these billions on destroying the economy and real market activity and 
instituting a social handout program, the institutional training by all 
these ``experts,'' and we have drug smuggling; and we have one of the 
worst security risk airports in the world cited as, again, in Haiti.
  So I am very concerned about what has taken place there. I am even 
more concerned now that Haiti has become a haven for illegal narcotics 
activity.
  Tonight I also want to go sort of around the hemisphere and talk in 
addition about Colombia, which I mentioned last week. I will review it 
again tonight, and about Haiti, another third Clinton-Gore failure of 
policy.
  I cannot give 100 percent credit to President Clinton and Vice 
President Gore for this disaster. This took a combination of 
leadership. It started with President Carter, who negotiated the 
turnover of the Panama Canal, and maybe it was rightful and just for 
the United States to eventually cede back the canal to Panama, but it 
did take an administration that was in place in the past year or two to 
begin some of the final negotiations for departure of American 
interests and personnel from Panama.

  Here again when they write the history books, they will have, of 
course, Somalia and Haiti and Colombia; but another crown jewel of 
policy failure has to be Panama.
  I did not take over the subcommittee until January; but, again, I 
served with Speaker Hastert who was then Chair of the subcommittee.
  Everyone has known that the United States' lease was up, that we had 
to be out of Panama by the end of 1999, December 31. That was a given. 
The question was the negotiations; the question was the resources that 
we had there. Most Americans do not know it, but we had over $10 
billion in assets, American assets, over 5,500 buildings in Panama.
  When I assumed chairmanship of the Subcommittee on Criminal Justice, 
Drug Policy and Human Resources, I went down to Panama early on and met 
with our folks in charge there. I also stopped in Miami and met with 
our SOUTHCOM officials who were also responsible for DOD operations in 
that area.
  We were told then that the administration was negotiating a 
withdrawal of United States troops that in particular had been involved 
in the interdiction effort and the surveillance effort through South 
America and Central America. We had been doing, I believe, up to 15,000 
flights from Howard Air Force Base in an FOL, forward operating 
location, surveillance for international narcotics trafficking.
  We knew that our time was limited, but we knew that we must negotiate 
with the Panamanians. We might not have been able to keep a military 
presence, but certainly it was in everyone's interest in the region and 
the hemisphere for the United States to continue these narcotics 
flights to the south and cover all of South and Central America, where 
we have the problems.
  We know all of the cocaine in the world comes from Colombia, Peru, 
and Bolivia. We know that 80 percent of the heroin entering the United 
States is produced and comes from Colombia, and it all travels up 
through that region. So that is why the Howard Air Force Base 
operations were critically important to that forward oversight and 
surveillance mission. We were told that negotiations were under way 
when I visited there and met with officials and this would all be done.
  What happened, in fact, is May 1, Howard Air Force Base was basically 
closed down as far as further flights. The United States was summarily 
kicked out. The negotiations failed. Our State Department failed in 
negotiations to continue the drug flights. So in a mad scurry, the 
Department of State began, along with the Department of Defense, to 
find new locations.
  They did bring us rather late to the gate several alternatives. One 
was Aruba and Curacao in the Dutch Antilles and the other was in Manta, 
Ecuador. Of course, the price tag now may reach one-quarter of a 
billion dollars before we are through relocating these, but we have 
closed down all operations.
  There has been a huge gap in surveillance of those drug and illegal 
narcotic activities in the time that the negotiations failed and 
alternatives were being explored and pursued.
  To date, I do not believe that we have in place, either with Aruba, 
Curacao and the Netherlands, and I have met recently with the Dutch 
officials on this issue and I do not think there is anything new, but 
we do not have a long-term agreement on an operation there. So it is 
very difficult for us to take American taxpayer money and put it into 
this location for facilities, improvements or operations.
  Some of those operations are up. We are still at a very low 
percentage, less than 50 percent, of the flights that we

[[Page H8962]]

had prior to May 1. So we have lost 5,500 buildings; we lost $10 
billion in assets, no opportunity to opt out of Howard, and now the 
taxpayer is going to pay for moving these operations to the Antilles 
and to Ecuador.
  In Ecuador the situation is even more dismal. The country there has 
had economic and political turmoil. We do not have a permanent 
agreement in place, and even though Manta, Ecuador, where the facility 
is to be located, is a good forward operating location, it will take 
even more dollars than suspected; and we have had additional requests 
already from the administration to put our forward operating locations 
in.
  So both of those are still up in the air. Again, another crown jewel 
in failure to be prepared, failure to negotiate with the Panamanians. 
For possibly the payment of a small amount, we might have retained our 
bases and operations just for the narcotics operation, a great savings 
to the taxpayers, but yet have an ideal location where we were already 
operating out of. Now we are operating on sort of a half-baked fashion, 
half-performance fashion, at great cost to the taxpayers.
  If we had not lost just Howard Air Force Base and closed down the 
operations there, the situation, again as it affects the United States, 
is very serious. I was pleased to read just yesterday, I believe it 
was, yesterday's National Media, that the Senate majority leader, Trent 
Lott, has asked the Senate Armed Services Committee to conduct hearings 
on China's growing presence around the Panama Canal, a strategic 
waterway, which is, of course, being transferred to Panamanian control.
  I am very pleased that the majority leader of the other body is in 
fact focusing attention, because what I learned in not only my visit to 
Panama in anticipation of problems and requesting the administration to 
take action so we did not get ourselves into this pickle, but what I 
found out about what had already taken place or was taking place as far 
as possible future strategic damage to the security interests of the 
hemisphere and the United States in particular, I believe, again, we 
have missed our mark, that we have a failed policy, that we have 
allowed also the ports, both on the Pacific side and on the Caribbean 
side, I believe it is Cristobal and Balboa, now to fall into the hands 
of possibly Red Chinese interests.

                              {time}  2030

  Let me just cite from this report. The Hutchinson-Whampoa, Limited, 
the Hong Kong based company that won a long-term shipping contract to 
operate two canal ports, is rumored to have Chinese military and 
intelligence ties.
  I have been personally told, and it has been confirmed by the 
director of our National Office of Narcotics Control, our Drug Czar, 
that he believes that the tenders that were conducted thereto and 
contracts for these ports were not above the board and that these 
contracts and tenders were done in a corrupt fashion. That has been 
confirmed by many others.
  But now we have possible links to Chinese military and intelligence 
as far as controlling interests in both of these ports. It is important 
to the United States because the United States is the number one user 
of the canal, which carries 13,000 ships per year.
  Panama has always served as a major transit area for illegal 
narcotics. If my colleagues will recall, the reason the United States 
sent troops, and American troops died on Panamanian soil when Noriega 
was the President and dictator of that country, George Bush's policy 
was to go in and route out illegal narcotics trafficking. We knew 
Noriega was involved. We knew he was corrupt. We knew he was involved 
in money laundering.
  George Bush's solution was to tackle the problem and go after 
Noriega, who is in United States prison. That is some only 10 years 
ago. American men and others lost their lives in that battle to reclaim 
the strategic interests.
  Here we are signing away and giving away that interest. What is 
interesting is that one of the things that was done with the fall of 
Noriega was really the dispersal of the Panamanian military. There is 
almost no military in Panama today, just a national police force.
  That creates a very difficult situation, because most of the illegal 
narcotics transiting up through the isthmus of Panama into Central 
America and Mexico and across the U.S. border must again come through 
that area and under the control of either military or police.
  There being no Panamanian military, we have a great problem with a 
force that is small, inadequate, and, at times, sometimes subject to 
corruption again with large amounts of money in the drug trade.
  We also have the terrible problem of the insurgency that is in 
Colombia, which I spoke about last week, the Marxist insurgency, of 
which there is no line between the insurgency and Marxist guerilla and 
narco-trafficking. They are supported. They are intertwined. Our Drug 
Czar has said one cannot tell the difference between the line.
  These Marxist forces are now going from Colombia, which borders 
Panama, into Panama and making incursions further into Panama which is 
weaker and more corrupt.
  My prediction is that the United States will end up again some years 
down the pike, when the corruption becomes so bad, when narcotic 
trafficking becomes so bad, and, again, will pay the price, hopefully 
not in American lives, but to take back our interests.
  We are not interested in running Panama, but securing for the entire 
hemisphere that strategic location, that strategic transportation link 
between the two seas. I am pleased that the Majority Leader is taking 
action, as again reported, and demanding hearings on that issue.
  In addition to the fiasco in Panama, tonight I wanted to again 
mention that the statistics, the information that we have on illegal 
narcotics, the effect of illegal narcotics in our country, particularly 
among our young people and our population at large, is becoming more 
and more serious.
  I come from an area that has had more deaths by heroin overdoses than 
homicides. If one stops and thinks about that, people think of crime 
and murder and its ravages and guns destroying lives. But illegal 
narcotics overdoses, particularly heroin, in Central Florida now exceed 
homicides.
  As one parent who lost a son told me at a hearing, drug overdoses are 
homicides. I am always reminded of his comments. But we have seen that 
impact in Central Florida; and now, unfortunately, we see it repeated 
across our Nation, not only with heroin, but with methamphetamines, 
with cocaine.
  One thing that I started to mention at the end of my remarks last 
week and really did not get it in is the difference that we are seeing 
between the cocaine and the heroin of the 1980s and the 1970s and even 
the marijuana.
  We will talk about marijuana tonight too, about the difference in the 
drugs that are on the streets and in the marketplace and also being 
used by our young people and why we have so many deaths and destruction 
of lives.
  First of all, in the 1970s and 1980s, the heroin and cocaine that was 
on the street had sometimes a 6 and 7 percent purity, 100 percent being 
pure. It was 6 or 7. Sometimes strong stuff might have reached 9 
percent purity.
  Today, through the processing, through the chemistry, through the 
product that is being produced and entering this country of heroin and 
cocaine, the purity levels are 70, 80 percent. These narcotics are 
deadly substances. Basically people are dealing in death and 
destruction. That is why we are having this epidemic of deaths among 
young people.
  I do not have this past week's statistics, but I had just several 
cites from the Orlando area: One 30-year-old woman who died of an 
overdose of cocaine. That is powerful, deadly cocaine. Heroin, several 
heroin deaths I cited. One, a 12-year-old boy went in and found his 
father who had overdosed on heroin. That is deadly heroin.
  Particularly our young people, sometimes the first time they use it, 
they mix it with alcohol or some other substance, and they go into 
convulsions, and they are history. But that is the difference that we 
see.
  Even the marijuana today, the levels of purity are much higher. I 
believe it is the TCH levels that are substantially higher than 
anything that we have ever seen. Scientific studies have

[[Page H8963]]

shown that the damage that is done to the brain through these high 
levels of purity is substantial.
  I was interested to note, I got a report, again, as chair of this 
Subcommittee on Criminal Justice, Drug Policy, and Human Relations, 
about substance abuse and addiction to substances by our teenagers and 
young people. I would have thought maybe alcohol might be up there. I 
was absolutely stunned to see that the vast, vast majority of addiction 
and treatment is for marijuana, that these young people become, 
addicted to this high purity level.
  I have met, we have a Stewart Marchman Center in the Daytona Beach 
area, and I have sat at a little round table with young people there 
and also down in Orlando, the Center For Drugfree Living, have met with 
young people there without and, some instances, with counselors and 
talked to them confidentially about their involvement.
  Almost all of them had become victims of this high grade of marijuana 
that destroys their motivation, that begins to affect their 
performance, their routine, their ambitions, and, again, leads to 
addiction and crime in many instances.
  We have an incredible problem. The national drug crisis, I always try 
to cite some statistics about the problem. Tonight, let me just mention 
that, in 1998, more than three-quarters, that is 78 percent, of high 
school teens report that drugs are sold and kept at their schools, a 6 
percent increase over 1996. That is even with some of the education 
programs that have been instituted. So, indeed, we have a problem. That 
is part of a CSA teen study in 1998.
  From 1993, and again remember 1993 was the close-down of the war on 
drugs, to 1997, a youth aged 12 to 17 using illegal drugs has more than 
doubled. That is again, we had the time that the Clinton-Gore 
administration ruled supreme. They controlled the House and Senate. 
They closed down some of the programs I spoke about. The results are 
pretty dramatic: 120 percent increase in illegal drug use by our 12 to 
17 year olds. There has been a 17 percent increase between 1996 and 
1997 alone. That is a 1998 national household survey.
  The overall number of past month heroin users increased a startling 
378 percent from 1993 to 1997. That is part of the inheritance, I 
believe, also of this liberal policy to just say maybe, the Joselyn 
Elders approach of, if it feels good, do it.
  For kids 12 to 17, first-time heroin use, which is proven to kill, 
that surged a whopping 875 percent from 1992 to 1996, again dramatic 
figures that are a result of a failed policy. There was no war on 
drugs, remember, from 1993, the beginning of the Clinton-Gore 
administration, until just several years ago with a new majority and 
restarting all of the efforts that are necessary to combat illegal 
narcotics.
  The other failed policy I would like to talk about tonight is a very 
serious failed policy. I talked some about Haiti. I talked about 
Panama, reiterated the problems that we have had in Colombia, which I 
detailed last week. Tonight, I must talk about Mexico.
  I have spoken probably more than anyone in the House of 
Representatives about the problems with Mexico and illegal narcotics 
trafficking. But the story is a very important story in our war on 
drugs, because the majority of illegal narcotics, whether it is 
marijuana, heroin, cocaine, all come through Mexico.
  When we went to Panama, we also met with Mexican officials early this 
year and asked for their cooperation and assistance. We reviewed what 
Mexico has done. We reviewed what this Congress has done for Mexico and 
the American people as good friends and neighbors and allies. We have 
millions of Mexican-Americans who are productive citizens.
  The picture, unfortunately, about what this Mexican Government and 
Mexican officials have done, the picture is very sad. Indeed, the 
problem again is that we have an estimated 70 percent of the cocaine 
coming from Mexico. We have 50 percent of the marijuana and 20 percent 
of the heroin in the United States now coming through our southwest 
border.
  Last week, on Friday morning, I conducted a hearing on the southwest 
border. When we came back from Mexico, we stopped at the border and met 
with our officials, and they basically told us, Members of Congress in 
charge of national drug control policy, that the situation on our 
southwest border dealing with illegal narcotics is out of control.

                              {time}  2045

  It is disorganized. It is in disarray. There is a lack of 
communication, a lack of coordination. And that is of great concern.
  Dealing again as chair of this Subcommittee on Criminal Justice, Drug 
Policy and Human Resources, and with billions of dollars involved in 
some of these efforts in these agencies, we wanted to see specific 
results. I was pleased that our drug czar Barry McCaffrey came in and 
testified, and he told me beforehand he was glad that we conducted a 
hearing on the Hill on the southwest border because it gave him 
additional clout to deal with these agencies, and also the opportunity 
to bring them together to see what was working and what was not 
working.
  And that was the purpose of our mission, and our exchange last Friday 
at our meeting. We know that there have been some successes in 1998. 
The U.S. Customs Service seized 32,000 pounds of cocaine, 150,000 
pounds of marijuana, and 407 pounds of heroin. We also heard testimony 
that reconfirmed what we had heard in our site visit back at the early 
part of this year, that the Customs agency does not talk to the INS and 
the INS does not talk to the DEA and the DEA does not talk to the FBI 
and other agencies, again 23 agencies that deal with border 
interdiction and four cabinet level posts, are not all operating in 
sync.
  And we certainly have seen the results of some of the narcotics 
trafficking that has occurred along this border. Let me just tell my 
colleagues a little bit about what we heard at our hearing about border 
violence.
  In April 1998, four marijuana smugglers, dealing with that so-called 
harmless marijuana on the west side of Nogales, Arizona, assassinated a 
United States border patrol agent. His name was Alex Kurpnick, and 
committed murder in a so-called harmless trafficking of illegal 
marijuana.
  We have heard of increased violence against United States border 
patrol agents, with more rock throwing, laser beam pointing and actual 
incoming fire from Nogales, Mexico. All this we heard is on the 
increase. In Santa Cruz County, Arizona, along the border, the majority 
of crimes committed there are drug related.
  In March of 1999, a few months ago, Phoenix police department 
officer, Mark Atkinson, was killed when he was ambushed by a Mexican 
illegal alien teen. His name was Felipe Petrona-Cabanas, who was 
involved specifically in drug dealings.
  In July 1999, three apparent sniper attacks, possibly by the same 
gunman, within a 45-minute period, were aimed at United States border 
patrol agents from El Centro, California. Again, we heard of more 
situations along our border with Mexican illegal narcotics trafficking 
raising havoc, and again problems with our agency coordination and 
efforts to combat this problem.
  In border violence there have been 151 documented incidents from 
January 1, 1999, to date involving violence toward Federal law 
enforcement officers along our southern borders. In 1998, there were 
140 instances of border violence.
  The drug smuggling along the border continues to take on even more 
sophisticated techniques. I think some of my colleagues may have read 
about the Santa Cruz Metro Task Force which recently uncovered two 
secretly dug tunnels that connected to Nogales, Mexico. The tunnel was 
designed to smuggle drugs across the border. It was also discovered 
from the Tijuana National Airport to the outskirts of San Diego. So 
these drug traffickers become even more and more clever in their 
approach.
  All this is very interesting, again as far as the violence and the 
problems and the disorganization of our agencies, and it would be 
fodder for congressional investigation on its own, if we did not look 
at the efforts that we have made to increase the number of border 
patrol agents, the Southwest Strategy as it is called. In the last 6 
years, the border patrol agents have increased from 3,928 to 8,027. In 
the same 6-year

[[Page H8964]]

 period, the INS budget, Immigration and Naturalization Service, who 
has a large activity along the border, their budget has increased from 
approximately $1.5 billion to nearly $4 billion. During the same 
period, the INS staff grew from approximately 17,000 employees to 
28,000 full-time employees as of June of this year.
  So it is not that the Congress has not put an effort into this border 
problem. The problem is that we have put the funds there and we still 
do not have the cooperation and the effectiveness to deal with this 
situation.
  Now, each of the agencies who came before our subcommittee promised 
to do better and to work together. That remains to be seen. But, again, 
we will try to keep the pressure on to see that American taxpayer 
dollars, which have been heavily loaded in this effort, are more 
effectively expended.
  Again, we have received these problems from our good friend and ally 
Mexico, and I want to talk a little bit about the country that gave us 
these problems. Mexico has been a good ally. We have many, many Mexican 
Americans who are loyal citizens and very productive. But the 
government of Mexico has failed to cooperate on almost every front.
  This is another one of the crown jewels of the failed Clinton-Gore 
administration policy. They gave them NAFTA, which was probably the 
best trade deal ever created by the United States Congress, a trade 
agreement that is unparalleled in the history of international 
negotiations. Great trade advantages to Mexico. We put our people out 
of business, lost jobs across the Nation, and gave them great economic 
opportunity.
  We once had a positive trade balance, and now we have a huge trade 
deficit. They are pouring their goods in, which are produced across the 
border with lower wages, lower standards, lower environmental 
requirements across the board. It is not a level playing field, but we 
gave them those benefits.
  When they got in financial trouble, what did we do? This 
administration bailed them out. We bailed them out with an 
unprecedented number of dollars in financial support. They have gotten 
as a nation and an ally and friend almost every advantage possible.
  And what have they given us? We ask and we require, in order to get 
trade and foreign aid and assistance, we ask the President and the 
Secretary of State to certify each year to Congress that they are 
cooperating in stopping illegal narcotics production and trafficking. 
That is the drug certification law. In other words, if they cooperate, 
they get this assistance. If they do not, they are supposed to be 
decertified. Each time, Clinton-Gore has certified Mexico as 
cooperating.
  The worst insult was in the last year. And I want my colleagues to 
look at these figures from 1998. Mexican drug seizures. We asked them 
to help in seizing illegal narcotics, and this is what we got: from 
1997 to 1998, in seizing heroin, a drop of 56 percent; in seizing 
cocaine, a drop of 35 percent. Is this cooperation?
  This Congress passed 2 years ago a resolution asking Mexico to help 
in signing a maritime agreement. To date, they have not signed a 
maritime agreement.
  We asked for protection of our agents, because some years ago Enrique 
Camarena, a United States drug enforcement agent, was tortured and died 
in a horrible death and slaughtered like an animal by Mexican drug 
dealers. So we have asked for protection of our small number of agents, 
and we still do not have those guarantees of protection.
  We asked for enforcement of laws. They pass laws in Mexico, but they 
do not enforce them. And what did we get? We got kicked in the teeth 
like no other nation has been kicked in the teeth after giving them 
incredible trade benefits. What did they do? We started a sting 
operation in Mexico, because we knew, and we had reports of incredible 
amounts of money laundering. In fact, this operation was called 
Operation Casablanca by our customs agents. Our customs agents 
discovered the biggest money laundering operation in the history of the 
world.
  In fact, in testimony that we had by one former Customs agent, he 
told us that he was in the process of trying to money launder over $1.1 
billion for a Mexican official, who was identified as a cabinet member, 
possibly a secretary of defense, and possibly with ties to the 
president of Mexico, the current president of Mexico.
  Now, we know the former president, Salinas, and his brother and 
family, were up to their eyeballs in illegal narcotics and money 
laundering and every sort of crime; but, again, we had testimony before 
our subcommittee about what was going on there. Instead of cooperation, 
instead of enforcing the laws, they threatened to expel and even to 
arrest our United States customs agents. This is a travesty.
  What was very interesting, and what I think warrants, what I think 
warrants investigation, and I am going to ask the director of the FBI 
to look into it, is the latest death of a former Deputy Attorney 
General who died awaiting trial here. In a suicide note, he died a few 
weeks ago, he implicated Mexican President Ernesto Zedillo and members 
of the country's ruling party in the slaying of his brother. He also 
said that the Mexican Government is opposing a push by the United 
States Congress to level major penalties against business ties to drug 
traffickers. This is additional information that we have gotten.
  What is sad is that we have information now that implicates even the 
highest office. What is sad is that the initial investigation of the 
money laundering of $1.1 billion was basically closed down by our 
Department of Justice, closed down by our Customs operation. That is 
even after comments by individuals like Tom Constantine, who is the 
former head of DEA, who said, ``In my lifetime, I have never witnessed 
any group of criminals that has had such a terrible impact on so many 
individuals and communities in our Nation. Corruption among Mexican 
antidrug authorities was unparalleled with anything I have seen in 39 
years of police work.''
  The story gets even more difficult as we look into the evidence that 
continues to arise about the level of corruption with Mexican officials 
at every level. We have reports now that the Baja Peninsula, the 
western state connected to California, is now almost entirely under the 
control of illegal narcotics traffickers. We have reports that the 
Yucatan Peninsula is also in a similar state and other States of 
Mexico.
  So we have been good friends. We have been good allies. And every 
report that we get paints an even grimmer picture.

                              {time}  2100

  Finally, we asked the Mexicans to extradite major drug kingpins. The 
United States, on November 13, 1997, entered into and signed a protocol 
to the current extradition treaty with Mexico. This protocol has been 
ratified by the other body, the United States Senate; and it still has 
not been ratified by the Mexican parliamentarians.
  This is a very sad state of affairs, again an example of failed 
Clinton policy granting them certification and granting them trade, 
granting them financial assistance, and getting in return none of the 
requests of this Congress, failure of cooperation in narcotics.
  Mexico today has the crown and glory of being the major drug 
transport area from Colombia through Mexico, again the largest source 
of illegal narcotics entering the United States, a very dismal picture 
presented and brought to my colleagues, unfortunately, by this 
administration.
  Hopefully, working with this new Congress, we can turn this around, 
we can get the resources to Colombia, we can take a tougher stand with 
Mexico, we can continue to hold hearings, make the American people and 
the Congress aware of this situation, and reverse this sad state of 
affairs with our closest ally, our closest friend, in exporting to the 
United States terror, death, and destruction in the form of illegal 
narcotics trade and business.
  Madam Speaker, I am pleased to conclude at this time and, hopefully, 
be back next week with another report on the problem of illegal 
narcotics and how it impacts both this Congress, the American people, 
and the next generation. Madam Speaker, I am pleased to yield back the 
balance of my time.

                          ____________________