[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 146 (2000), Part 4]
[House]
[Pages 5299-5303]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]


[[Page 5299]]

                    THE PROBLEM OF ILLEGAL NARCOTICS

  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Pease). Under the Speaker's announced 
policy of January 6, 1999, the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Mica) is 
recognized for 60 minutes.
  Mr. MICA. Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to come to the floor again 
tonight to talk about the subject I usually attempt to address on 
Tuesday night before the House when we have these Special Orders to 
call to attention to the House of Representatives, my colleagues, Mr. 
Speaker, and the American people, one of the most serious social 
problems we are facing as a Nation. That is the problem of illegal 
narcotics, their disastrous impact on the United States, our economy, 
on families across this Nation, the tremendous toll it takes on our 
judicial system, and the loss of lives.
  In fact, in the last recorded year, 1998, some 15,973 Americans lost 
their lives as a direct result of illegal narcotics. If we take in all 
of the other figures that are not reported, our national drug czar, the 
director of our Office of National Drug Control Policy, Barry 
McCaffrey, has testified before our Subcommittee on Criminal Justice, 
Drug Policy, and Human Resources that the toll exceeds some 50,000 each 
year in the United States.
  That is truly a devastating number when we consider that we have 
incarcerated nearly 2 million Americans, and that some 70 percent of 
them are there because of drug-related offenses or committing crimes, 
in most cases two and three felonies on their record, under the 
influence of illegal narcotics and substance abuse, and we know that 
something is seriously wrong and something needs our attention, not 
only as a Congress but as a people who care about people and should 
care about their fate.
  Unfortunately, the toll continues to mount, the tremendous impact 
illegal narcotics have had again on our Nation. Tonight I wanted to 
cite just some of the most recent statistics we have, and how some of 
the people who are most at risk in our national population are some of 
the highest victims as far as percentage, again in this terrible 
conflict with illegal narcotics.
  According to the 1998 National Household Survey on Drug Abuse, drug 
use increased from 5.8 percent in 1993 to 8.2 percent in 1998 among 
young African-Americans; again, the victims of illegal narcotics and 
drug use, in particular the minority population, and in this case not 
quite doubling but a dramatic increase for African-Americans.
  Also, according to this 1998 survey on drug abuse, drug use increased 
from 4.4 percent in 1993 to 6.1 percent in 1998 among young Hispanics. 
The Hispanic minority in this country, and particularly the youth, have 
been tremendously impacted by illegal narcotics. If we look at the 
population in our prisons, if we look at the population in our 
detention facilities and jails across this Nation, we would see a 
disproportionate number of minorities incarcerated in those facilities, 
and many of them there because of drug-related problems.
  We hear a great deal about legacies at this time of year, especially 
after a 7-year administration. I do not have blow-ups of these 
particular charts tonight, but certainly when history records the 
legacy of the Clinton administration, some of these charts must be 
included in the pages of that history.
  These were recently given to me by the director of our agency called 
SAMHA, the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Agency, Dr. Chavez. Dr. 
Chavez presented me with these charts that show from 1992 problems 
relating to amphetamine and methamphetamine use, and these are 
admission rates for abuse treatment from 1992 to 1997.
  If we look at these charts we see dramatic increases, almost turning 
entirely dark on this chart here in the numbers that are now required 
for treatment and addiction to methamphetamine. This is particularly 
among our young people, but also among our adult population.
  In fact, we get to the Midwest 
and the West and we have methamphetamines in epidemic proportion and 
use. I am going to talk about methamphetamine in a hearing that I did 
in California just several weeks ago, and again, what has taken place 
in this particular area.
  If we look at heroin substance abuse treatment, again, this chart is 
not very big, but we can barely see some coloring here in 1992, up to 
some solid coloring in 1997. My own State of Florida is not darkened 
in, but in my area and Central Florida, heroin substance abuse and use 
of heroin has so dramatically increased that now last year the 
headlines blurted out in what is really tranquil Central Florida, the 
greater Orlando area, that heroin drug overdoses now exceed homicides; 
again, part of what has not been done to address a very serious problem 
and growing problem across our land.
  The marijuana chart is even more revealing. We barely see any 
severity in admission rates or high admission rates in 1992 for 
marijuana substance abuse and admissions, particularly young people 
addicted to the marijuana. And it is not the marijuana of the sixties 
and seventies, with the low purity and low toxicity level. We see now 
again areas almost totally darkened in from a policy of ``Just say 
maybe,'' or ``If I had it to do all over again, I would inhale.'' 
Certainly that type of policy, those statements, have an impact, 
particularly among our young people, a legacy for substance abuse that 
again I think is part of the failure of this administration to address 
this.
  In fact, with the President we can count on probably two hands the 
number of times that he has talked about drug abuse at any length. Even 
in his last speech before the State of the Union, and only less than a 
sentence, a passing note, did the President address this problem again 
that has incredible social impact across our land.
  The results are pretty dramatic. It may not be talked about. We did 
spend several days of debate just in the last 2 weeks here because of 
the crisis in Colombia, because of the sheer amount and volume of 
illegal narcotics now pouring into our country because some of the 
guards that we have traditionally had in place, such as Panama, which 
was a forward operating surveillance operation for all of our drug 
operations in the Caribbean and over South America, had been 
dismantled, again with the Clinton administration's failure to 
negotiate a treaty to allow even our drug surveillance operations to 
continue in Panama.
  With that closed down we have lost most of our surveillance 
capability, and now have cobbled together in Ecuador and the Dutch 
Antilles some minor coverage, but there is a huge gap that allows 
heroin or cocaine and other illegal narcotics to pour in almost 
unabated.
  It certainly must be one of the primary responsibilities of this 
Congress to see that illegal substances and substances that harm our 
population, and particularly when we have this number of people 
incarcerated, when we have somewhere in the area of a quarter of a 
trillion dollars of damages to our economy and to our country every 
year with illegal narcotics, and some close to 16,000 direct deaths in 
just one year, that is 1998, the last recorded, and some 50,000 total, 
certainly it is incumbent upon the representatives of this Nation to do 
something about that problem.

                              {time}  2245

  The Federal portion of that problem certainly is to interdict and 
stop those illegal substances from coming onto our shores before they 
even reach our borders, but that, in fact, has not been the policy of 
this administration. It has been a policy of changing the emphasis on 
taking apart successful programs of the Reagan and Bush 
administrations, where we had drug abuse on a steady decline and drug 
use on a steady decline, and have it now skyrocketing as these charts 
so aptly describe.

[[Page 5300]]

  I spoke for a few minutes about methamphetamine and the national 
epidemic that we have. We have held several hearings on the subject of 
methamphetamine, both here in Washington and field hearings. I was 
shocked to find the incredible impact that methamphetamines have had in 
the West, also, of course, in the Midwest, rural areas like Iowa, other 
tranquil areas like Minnesota, where we heard testimony at our hearings 
here in Washington of incredible amounts of Mexican methamphetamine 
coming in to those areas, and the action of the individuals who consume 
methamphetamine is as bizarre, as strange and damaging as anything we 
had in the crack cocaine epidemic of the 1980s, in fact probably even 
more of a detrimental impact on families and individuals.
  One hearing that I conducted at the request of the gentleman from 
California (Mr. Ose) was in his district, which encompasses part of the 
capital city of California, which is Sacramento. Testimony that we had 
in Sacramento by one caregiver there was particularly revealing, 
something that even shocked me and I have heard testimony from a number 
of witnesses that is quite moving, but this individual who testified 
put together a program in Butte County, and Butte County is a small 
county in California compared to others, I think it is in the 200,000 
population range, and this witness testified that since 1993 they 
created a drug endangered children's program which was established and 
actually allowed the program to detain 601 children from drug houses.
  Now, again, we have to think of this as a small county, but 601 
children were rescued from drug houses. One hundred sixty-two of those 
children were detained from methamphetamine labs so these children 
actually lived where their parents or guardians who were producing 
methamphetamine. This all came about as a result of an L.A. newspaper 
staff reporter, I believe his name was Don Winkle, who began writing a 
story after three children were left to burn to death by their mother 
when a methamphetamine lab exploded in Los Angeles. His story brought 
him to Butte County, and there this particular reporter reviewed the 
program that had been put in place. The testimony by this social worker 
was most revealing, and of course we hear on the news from time to time 
the very attention-getting child killing child with a gun case, and I 
have also cited both of the most recent cases where a 6-year-old child 
killed a 6-year-old child, brought in a gun and a horrible crime and 
everyone focused on the gun but very few in the media and others took 
time to reveal to the public or discuss that the child came, in fact, 
from a crack house, from a cocaine-infested home, if it could be called 
that. The father, I believe, was in jail and had been involved in 
illegal narcotics charges, but again the focus was on the gun but not 
on the setting.
  Many of the other children who I will talk about here have not been 
publicized. This one particular case, where 3 of these children died in 
Los Angeles, again illustrates some of the problems that we face from 
illegal narcotics; in this case, from methamphetamines. The 601 
children that this care worker talked about, she went on to describe in 
her testimony to us and let me read a little bit of what she said. The 
601 children's names and faces are different but each case and story is 
the same. One would think that 9 years later, with hundreds of suspects 
arrested, countless doors kicked in and the writing of thousands of 
reports that I would grow callous, but upon entering the bad guy's 
house again and seeing those small, round, innocent eyes looking up at 
me, finally someone came to save me, I turn a marshmallow. I do not 
have to make up stories or use the same photographs or tell the worst 
of the worst. They are all bad.
  Her testimony went on, and let me describe this, if I may, the yard 
is covered with garbage, old bicycles, toys and rusted car parts. Three 
or four dogs run under the house or aggressively approach. Inside the 
house it is dark with no electricity. The stench of rotten food, animal 
urine and feces and soiled diapers permeate the house. Chemical odors 
irritate my eyes and nose. We fumble down hallways into bedrooms 
stepping on filthy clothing and debris. The children are startled when 
a flashlight shines in their way. They are sleeping on soiled 
mattresses with no sheets or blankets. They sleep in clothes for the 
third day in a row. They have not had a bath in days and cannot 
remember when they last ate. They rarely attend school due to lice 
infestation and cockroaches have become their pets. The soiled food 
stored in an ice chest is moldy. There is no running water and the 
methamphetamine laboratory is all over the kitchen. The children draw 
pictures for me of mommy with a methamphetamine pipe and show me 
bruises where mom's boyfriend hit them. The oldest child comforts the 
younger sibling as obviously trying to parent. None of the kids cry or, 
for that matter, show any emotion at all. They all exhibit a classic 
attachment disorder. Domestic violence is obvious with the holes kicked 
in the doors and the walls. A loaded firearm is found next to the couch 
and another under the bed, both where children have access.
  Again she goes on, a description of what she sees in this house and 
it is unfortunately very typical. She told us that she saw these scenes 
over and over and over again. She said these children were lucky. We 
rescued them before they were injured, maimed or killed.
  The newspaper clippings I collected from all over the State and even 
a few other States tell more horrific stories. These are some of the 
clippings that she provided our subcommittee and stories: Fifteen month 
overdoses on methamphetamine; five month old tests positive for 
methamphetamine and succumbs to death with 12 rib fractures, a burned 
leg and scarred feet by a methamphetamine addict in Los Angeles; 13 
month old dies of heart trauma, broken spine and neck by 
methamphetamine addict. She was also raped and sodomized.
  Twenty-five month old Oregon toddler overdoses on methamphetamine; a 
2 year old dies with methamphetamine in the system, San Jose, 
California; a 2 year old eats methamphetamine from a baby food jar in 
Twenty-Nine Palms, California; a 14 month old drinks lye in water from 
a parent's methamphetamine laboratory, hospitalized permanently with 
severe organ damage; new baby dies from mother breast milk laced with 
methamphetamine in Orange County; 8 week old, 11 pound boy dies from 
methamphetamine poisoning found inside baby bottle in Orange County; an 
8 year old watches and hears mom die in a methamphetamine laboratory in 
Oroville, California; a 6 month old overdoses semi-comatose seizuring, 
hospitalized, drank methamphetamine, also in Oroville, California; a 4 
year old tests positive for methamphetamine, beaten and hair pulled out 
by mom and boyfriend, Chico, California; 8 children exposed to 
methamphetamine laboratory in day care center in southern California; 
and mom on methamphetamine and her addicted boyfriend drown a 2 year 
old in a bathtub in Sacramento.
  This is just a sampling of the death, destruction and mayhem that was 
provided to us by this one witness from one county in California.
  Most people do not know much about methamphetamines, and the 
addiction and epidemic is limited at this point to the Midwest and to 
the far West, but spreading across the country. We had Dr. Leshner, who 
is head of NIDA, National Institute of Drug Abuse, come and testify 
before our subcommittee and give us the latest information on what 
methamphetamines do to people. Most people who are involved in taking 
methamphetamine really do not know that they are setting themselves up 
for brain damage and destruction. We found also that the damage that is 
done to the brain causes such bizarre behavior that parents abandon 
their children.
  In California, we were told where they attempted to return 35 of 
these children to their parents, only 5 parents were capable or 
willing, after being on methamphetamines, to take their children back. 
We were told of one parent on methamphetamine who tortured their child 
and then finished the child off by boiling the child alive.

[[Page 5301]]

  This is the type of bizarre behavior that methamphetamine produces in 
the brain in individuals who take methamphetamine.
  This is the scientific data that Dr. Leshner provided our 
subcommittee. This first slice of brain and this view of the brain 
shows dopamine, with normal dopamine levels that are required for an 
active, healthy brain. The second and third illustration here is a 
gradual reduction in dopamine levels in the brain due to 
methamphetamine uses. The fourth illustration here that has been 
provided is a brain from an individual who suffers from Parkinson's 
disease, and we can see the deterioration of methamphetamine from a 
normal brain into various stages of methamphetamine, the most severe 
stage, this happens to be Parkinson's but also mirrors methamphetamine. 
So this is what this wonderful drug has done for one county in 
California, what it can do for an individual, and again the damage that 
can be imposed on individuals. It really is shocking and I do not think 
most people who get hooked on methamphetamines have any idea what they 
are doing to themselves or the potential damage they can do to their 
family or their children.
  The cases we have are just unbelievable.

                              {time}  2300

  Again, I do not want to go into any more of them tonight, but I will 
be glad to provide Members upon request additional information on what 
our subcommittee has found relating to methamphetamine and its horrible 
impact.
  The other chart that I showed is heroin. I showed how heroin has now 
caused tremendous problems across the United States. We have a heroin 
epidemic in many regions of the country, including the area that I 
represent, which is central Florida. Heroin use and abuse is up 
dramatically.
  Heroin is not the heroin of the 1960s, 1970s, or even 1980s. The 
purity in those days was in the low percentile, single digits, a 9 
percent pure. The heroin that we are getting in from South America and 
Mexico is now running 70, 80 percent pure. That is why we have an 
incredible death rate in Central Florida and around the country.
  Young people and others are taking heroin. They are mixing it with 
some other substance, alcohol or some other drug. Or even first-time 
users are hit with this high 70 percent pure heroin, go into 
convulsions, and die.
  Now, I think that many people would believe that heroin has been 
glorified by Hollywood, and heroin is the type of drug that the stars 
and others in important places use. Most people do not realize the 
severe consequence of heroin.
  Unfortunately, I am one Representative that has heard more about the 
tragedy of heroin than many of my colleagues. As I said, in Central 
Florida, our heroin overdose deaths, particularly among our young 
people, now exceed our rate of homicides.
  One of the parents provided me with the permission to show the 
effects of heroin. This is particularly a gruesome depiction of the end 
of the life of this constituent's death, a young man in Central 
Florida. This is how the coroner placed the body before the body was 
removed.
  Now, again, I know young people and many people across this land 
think that heroin use is somewhat glamorous. The picture I am about to 
show is her son as the coroner found him in Orlando, a rather gruesome 
picture. I show it only to show what the potential holds for using this 
high purity heroin. This young man died a horrible death. His mother 
told me. The autopsy would reveal that.
  This is not glamor. This is not celebrity status. This is death by 
heroin. The pure deadly heroin that suffocates one to death, causes 
one's blood vessels to burst. It causes one to go into uncontrollable 
seizures and then die one of the most horrible deaths imaginable.
  Time and time again, in Central Florida, this has happened and 
happened in record numbers again this last year. This is only one 
victim. But people must understand what is happening with heroin and 
what heroin, what methamphetamines, and some of these other narcotics 
can do to their lives and their bodies. One ends up being taken out by 
the coroner in this fashion. These pictures end up as the last reminder 
your parents have of you or your family has of you.
  Unfortunately, I have met many of the parents of young men and women 
in my district whose child has or loved one has ended up in that 
condition. That is one reason why I come to the floor every Tuesday 
night, why I continue to hammer away to get the attention of the House 
of Representatives, the Congress, and the American people on what is 
taking place with illegal narcotics. We should not have one more person 
fall victim as we have had in Central Florida.
  Some of the most disturbing news I received is during a recent recess 
when I was home and talking with our law enforcement officials. They 
told me that we have, in fact, more drug-related deaths in Central 
Florida, particularly heroin. Again, there is an unabated flow coming 
in from Colombia, from Central and South America.
  Tomorrow, we are going to focus a hearing on some of that trafficking 
pattern, particularly as it relates to Haiti. We have focused on the 
major source of production which is Colombia, which produced the heroin 
that killed the young man whose picture I showed just a few minutes 
ago.
  But what is particularly sad about all of this is that, in fact, we 
could prevent much more of this death and destruction. We could stop a 
great deal more of the hard narcotics coming into this country. 
Certainly we have a responsibility to stop illegal narcotics coming 
into this country.
  Unfortunately, the Clinton administration in 1993 dramatically 
changed the policy that kept some of these illegal narcotics from 
coming into our borders.
  In fact, we were making good progress. Heroin was dramatically down. 
Cocaine was dramatically down. As my colleagues saw from the charts I 
presented earlier, methamphetamines were not even on the charts in 
1992.
  Unfortunately, this administration made a complete reversal in 
policy. They decided to put all of their eggs in the treatment basket.
  Since 1993, we have nearly doubled the amount of money in treatment. 
In fact, we have also, through Republican efforts, added another 
billion dollars in money for education. But it has been the focus, 
particularly treatment, treating the wounded in this battle, rather 
than conducting a war on drugs as we had in the 1980s under the Bush 
and the Reagan administration.
  The results are most telling. The Clinton administration slashed the 
international programs, the programs of stopping drugs at their source 
in the source countries by some 50 percent beginning in 1993 when they 
controlled the House, the White House, and the other body.
  Next they slashed the interdiction programs. Interdiction is also 
cost effective in that it stops illegal narcotics before they get to 
our borders. The most expensive way to go after illegal narcotics is 
once it gets into our streets and communities. It requires us to put 
massive police forces and massive resources in law enforcement to keep 
up with the sheer volume that spreads and is diffused among our 
communities and our streets and our schools throughout our society.
  But a very serious mistake was made in 1993 in cutting the source 
country programs and cutting the interdiction programs and use of the 
military for surveillance. The military never has and never will, 
because of our laws, become involved in enforcement. They merely 
provide intelligence and surveillance and information, particularly to 
source countries, so they could go after both the production of illegal 
narcotics, the trafficking of illegal narcotics, and the transit of 
illegal narcotics out of their country. A very effective strategy 
because, again, we had dramatic decreases in drug use and drug 
trafficking and the sheer availability of hard narcotics.
  The results again are devastating. We are seeing, particularly in the 
last few years, huge, huge volumes of heroin coming in.

[[Page 5302]]



                              {time}  2310

  In 1993, there was almost zero, almost no heroin produced in 
Colombia. Almost none. Since 1993, again through a policy that really 
has been a policy of failure, the Clinton administration has managed to 
turn Colombia into the major source of heroin coming into the United 
States.
  This is hard to believe, but in 1993, there was almost no coca, no 
cocaine produced in Colombia. There was transit from Peru and Bolivia, 
and some processing and transshipment from Colombia, but it was not the 
source of growth of coca and production. Today, Colombia is now the 
source of some 80 percent of the cocaine coming into the United States. 
And, again, a much more deadly and purer form of cocaine that is 
reaching our shores and killing our population.
  It was not easy for the Clinton administration to make Colombia the 
largest producer and transiter in some 6 or 7 years, but they did 
manage to do it. And it has been in spite of protests by the Republican 
majority, in spite of direct legislative actions, in spite of 
appropriations trying to get resources to Colombia.
  The fiasco started in 1994, when the Clinton administration stopped 
information sharing to Colombia and stopped intelligence exchanges with 
that country and some of the other source countries. It took us several 
years to straighten out that fiasco. And, again, in the last 2 years, 
the Clinton administration is now repeating the fiasco. And we see 
where we have been able to decrease the production of cocaine in Peru 
by some 66 percent, in Bolivia by some 55 percent. For the first time 
in just the last few months some increase in production in Peru, again 
because the Clinton administration has shut down some of the exchange 
of intelligence.
  That is all documented in a report that was provided to me by GAO. I 
asked this independent agency to conduct a review of what is taking 
place. This report was produced by the General Accounting Office. It 
says Drug Control Assets DOD Contributes to Reducing the Illegal Drug 
Supply Have Declined. This is a documentation and information of what 
has taken place.
  In fact, even the President's own ambassador to Peru cautioned that 
the United States should not drop its surveillance information being 
provided to Peru because a successful program of the information 
sharing was reducing the production of illegal narcotics and transiting 
of illegal narcotics in that country. So we have even the 
representative of the President speaking out against the 
administration's change in policy, a second disastrous change after the 
1994 fiasco.
  Then we have documentation here that, in fact, the DOD assets as far 
as flight times have dramatically decreased; that, in fact, flying 
hours dedicated to tracking suspect shipments in transit to the United 
States declined from 46,264 to 14,770, or a 68 percent decline in 
flight time.
  So, basically, when they closed down the war on drugs, they did a 
very effective job not only with flight surveillance but also with the 
maritime shipments. This report also indicates a 62 percent decrease in 
maritime tracking of illegal narcotics shipments. Again, documentation 
of a policy that has failed and steps, including the decertification of 
Colombia without a national interest waiver, which would have allowed 
resources to get to Colombia to fight illegal narcotics.
  So, basically, for the last number of years, they have allowed 
Colombia no assistance. Aid even appropriated and designated by this 
Congress has been denied to that country. And that is what has brought 
us to the situation we currently find ourselves in requesting the 
President coming forward, with a region in disarray, with 35,000 people 
being killed in Colombia, with complete disruption of that important 
and strategic region of our hemisphere, the President coming forward at 
the last minute with a request for a billion dollar-plus aid package. 
We have passed that in the House. We hope that the Senate will take 
action on that.
  That is a little bit of the history of where we are and how we have 
gotten ourselves into this situation with Colombia and also with the 
tide of illegal narcotics coming into the United States. We know the 
programs we have put in place, where we have been allowed to in Peru 
and Bolivia, will work if properly resourced, and with very little 
money, very few funds in comparison to a $17.8 billion drug budget 
having gone to the source country programs or to alternative crop 
substitution programs or stopping drugs at their source or before they 
get to our border.
  The other thing that I wanted to address tonight is the attack on 
some of the zero tolerance policies. We know that zero tolerance 
policies have worked very well across the landscape where they have 
been instituted. Probably the most successful example of a zero 
tolerance drug policy in the United States has been that of New York 
City and that devised by the current mayor, Rudy Giuliani.
  I know that Rudy Giuliani has been attacked recently for some of the 
problems that they have had with their enforcement of some of the laws 
in that community. And to watch television and to hear the liberal 
media, one would think that New York City police are out of control and 
that, in fact, a zero tolerance policy somehow is a policy of 
intolerance and a policy that would abuse the rights of individuals.
  A story by, and I guess an editorial piece by columnist Judy Mann in 
the Friday March 24 Washington Post really set me off, and I spoke 
before about this, but the title of her liberal piece was The War on 
Drugs Can't Help But Run Amuck. She's a very determined liberal and she 
has used the case of Patrick Dorismond, who was shot in New York City, 
as a case in point for a zero tolerance drug policy that has run amuck; 
a war on drugs that cannot work.
  She went on in her article saying that the attempted drug buy that 
led to Dorismond's death was part of Giuliani's latest scheme to reduce 
the rising homicide rate in the city.

                              {time}  2320

  This liberal reporter would have you believe that murders and 
homicides are up under Mayor Giuliani. Our subcommittee called Mr. 
Giuliani in last January, we have updated some of this information.
  Before Mayor Giuliani came into office in New York, there were 
actually over 2,000 murders per year in New York City. In 1998, it was 
629, and it rose slightly to about 670 in 1999, last year, which we do 
not have on the chart. Does this in any way show an increase in murder? 
In fact, if we had stayed at the same rate, we would be killing some 
1,300 to 1,400 per year under this policy.
  Now, this liberal columnist would also have you believe, and she says 
so, civil liberties have been another casualty on the war on drugs. 
This is the type of liberal nonsense that she spews out.
  In fact, we looked at New York City from our subcommittee research, 
and we found the latest statistics revealed that crime is down 57.6 
percent overall for major crimes. Murder is down 58.3 percent. Rape is 
down 31 percent under the Giuliani plan. Robbery is down some 62.1 
percent. Felony assaults are down 35.4 percent. Burglary in New York 
City is down 61.7 percent. Grand larceny is down some 41.9 percent. 
Grand larceny auto is down some 68.8 percent.
  Now, Ms. Mann and the liberals on the other side of the aisle here 
would have you believe that the Giuliani policy is a failure. These 
happen to be the facts. Now, of course, the liberals do not like to 
deal with facts. The facts only confuse the situation. These are the 
facts about crime in New York City under a zero tolerance policy.
  Now, Ms. Mann and the liberals and the media out there would have you 
believe that there is some type of intolerance, their loss of civil 
liberties, or that the New York City Police department or Mayor 
Giuliani is in some way out of control, and that there are these 
rampant shootings by police officers and abuse by police officers.
  The facts are, and we checked this carefully, our subcommittee did, 
for example, the number of fatal shootings

[[Page 5303]]

by police officers in 1999, 11 was the lowest any year since 1973. What 
is absolutely more amazing is Mayor Giuliani increased the police force 
by 25 percent. Now, that may sound like just a small figure, or a minor 
figure, but New York went from 30,000 to 40,000 police, a 25 percent, 
10,000 increase in police officers, and the lowest number of fatal 
shootings by police officers since 1993.
  This zero tolerance policy that is so offensive to the liberal 
population, it has probably saved thousands and thousands of lives, 
people that would have been murdered. And we cannot even calculate the 
number of people that would have been raped, robbed, victims of felony 
assault, burglary, grand larceny or auto larceny.
  Now, they go on. They would have you believe that, in fact, this drug 
policy and zero tolerance policy enforcement would take its toll in 
some other way. I wonder where Ms. Mann and the liberals were when 
Mayor Giuliani was not in office back in 1990, under that 
administration in the city. In 1990, 41 police killings took place with 
a fewer number of police. Moreover, the number of rounds intentionally 
fired by police declined 50.6 percent since 1993.
  This is tough policy that is so impossible for the liberals to deal 
with, and the facts relating to what has taken place in New York City 
and the number of intentional shootings, incidents by police dropped 
66.5 percent, while the number of officers actually increased during 
that period some 37.9 percent.
  In the last 5 years alone, there were 159 cases in which police were 
fired upon and did not return fire, 42 officers were wounded and 6 
killed in those incidents. There is probably not a more restrained-on 
an incident basis or population basis, police or law enforcement agency 
in the United States of America.
  Now, where were the liberals when David Dinkins was in office? There 
were 62 percent more shootings by police officers per capita in the 
last year of David Dinkins' administration than last year under Mayor 
Giuliani. Specifically in 1993, there were 212 incidents involving 
police officers in intentional shootings; in 1994, there were 167; in 
1998, under Mayor Giuliani, there were 111.
  It is terrible when the liberals have to deal with fact. Heaven 
forbid Ms. Mann should ever research fact. Heaven forbid she should 
ever look at the actual statistics relating to New York City and what 
Mayor Giuliani has done, but she can slam a zero tolerance enforcement 
policy, a zero tolerance on drug policy. She can slam and try to twist 
facts that murders have somehow increased.
  These listed are the seven major felony categories from 1993 to 1998 
from 429,000 down to 212,000. I am not great at math, but I think that 
is about half, 50 percent reduction. Ms. Mann and the liberals would 
want you to be confused and make you think that zero tolerance and 
tough law enforcement is done in some harmful way.
  These, in fact, are the facts. These, in fact, are the statistics. I 
always liked to contrast them, and I will close tonight, contrast with 
the liberal policies, the hero of the liberal side, try those drugs, 
folks, they are fine for you. Go ahead, let your kids use them. God 
forbid we should have any enforcement.
  Baltimore, Maryland is the example. Thank heavens Mayor Schmoke is 
gone. Thank heavens we have a new mayor, Mayor O'Malley. We conducted a 
subcommittee hearing there a little over a week ago, the best thing 
that came from that hearing, I believe the mayor fired the police 
chief, and we have hired in Baltimore one of the prime developers of 
the New York City's zero enforcement policy, but this is the record of 
Baltimore, where Mayor Schmoke said we are not going to enforce.
  I was stunned at the hearing to find out that HIDTM, high intensity 
drug traffic money, made available by the Federal Government for tough 
enforcement in Baltimore, the police chief, who again was removed, told 
me that they did not use those funds to go after major open drug 
markets. These are the results, the deaths in 1998, 212; 1999, 300.
  In the last 8, 10 years under this policy, probably 3,000 young 
people in Baltimore were slaughtered. These are the constant kinds of 
numbers that we have seen in Baltimore.

                              {time}  2330

  What was more stunning with this liberal policy that the other side 
embraces that Ms. Mann thinks is the way to go in Baltimore is now, 
from the chart that we have here that was provided by DEA, Baltimore 
has gone from some 39,000 drug addicts to somewhere between 60,000 and 
80,000 drug addicts in just the City of Baltimore. It is absolutely 
incredible, the damage that has been done to Baltimore through this 
liberal policy. In fact, one of the City Council Members, Councilwoman 
Ricki Spector, said it is more like 1 in 8 is now a drug addict in 
Baltimore.
  The former Mayor Schmoke's non-enforcement liberal policy provided 
these things for Baltimore. In 1996, Baltimore led the Nation in drug-
related emergency admissions, 785 per 100,000 population. Of 20 cities 
analyzed by NITA, or the National Institute of Drug Abuse, Baltimore 
ranked second in heroin emergency admissions. Baltimore accounted for 
63 percent of all of Maryland's drug overdoses.
  This is the policy that the other side is advocating, along with the 
liberal commentators. This is just a health problem. The tough 
enforcement will harm people, their civil rights will be violated, 
there will be shootings, that there will be some type of harmful 
enforcement.
  This is the harm, an addicted city population, dead in incredible 
numbers. Remember the numbers in New York City, which is 20 to 30 times 
the population of Baltimore, is just about double this figure, and that 
is a reduction of some 60 percent since Mayor Giuliani took office.
  So these are the facts, these are the options. Tomorrow our 
subcommittee will focus on the emerging drug threat from Haiti, part of 
the Clinton Administration's failed foreign policy no one likes to 
focus on, but a policy in which we spent nearly $4 billion in taxpayer 
money in nation building, primarily to support a law enforcement and 
judiciary which is now in charge of the biggest drug trafficking 
operation in the Caribbean and probably the source of more transit of 
illegal hard narcotics into the United States from across Haiti through 
the Dominican Republic up through Puerto Rico and the Caribbean into 
Florida and other parts of the United States, and then into our streets 
and schools, and their gift to our children, after spending so much of 
the money of American taxpayers in that nation in an effort to rebuild 
it.
  Tomorrow we will hear that failed story, and we will find out where 
the Clinton Administration intends to go from here, and, hopefully, we 
can develop a better policy, learn by the mistakes, learn by the 
failures of this administration, and not repeat them. To do otherwise 
would be an injustice to the American people and to the next 
generation.
  Mr. Speaker, I know my time is about to expire and I will not return 
until after the break for one of these, when we will provide another 
update, but I do appreciate your indulgence, Mr. Speaker, and the 
staff, who stayed to this late hour. But this is an important message. 
It needs to be repeated over and over again, until we have action by 
the Congress, until we have interest by the American people, and that 
we turn this deadly situation and plague on our population around.

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