[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 154 (2008), Part 7]
[House]
[Pages 9133-9134]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                           MERIDIA INITIATIVE

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentleman from Texas (Mr. Poe) is recognized for 5 minutes.


[[Page 9134]]


  Mr. POE. Mr. Speaker, as a former prosecutor and long-time judge in 
Texas, I'm concerned about, of course, drugs and corruption, especially 
on the international border between the United States and Mexico. I 
have great sympathy and compassion for the Mexicans living just south 
of the border, especially those that have had the problem of dealing 
with the drug cartels. It's an epidemic that occurs on our southern 
border with Mexico.
  According to the DEA, 500 people were murdered in Nuevo Laredo 
recently. Most of those cases were never solved, and many of those 
individuals were peace officers. There have been 400 kidnappings in 
Nuevo Laredo; 41 of them were Americans, and none of them, not one of 
those cases, have ever been solved. And we understand now that behind 
most of those crimes of violence of murder and kidnappings are the drug 
cartels. What you might be surprised, Mr. Speaker, to find out is that 
many of those people involved in the drug cartels are former 
individuals in the Mexican military that were trained in the United 
States.
  The Department of Homeland Security has reported that in the last 10 
years also, there have been 250 documented cases of incursions by 
suspected Mexican military units into the United States. Most of them 
in Texas, California, and Arizona. Recently, I have been in a place 
called Neely Pass in Hudspeth County where the Mexican military was 
photographed coming into the United States.
  In order to gain control of access corridors into the United States, 
drug cartels are hiring hit men from the elite Mexican military force, 
and this group is known as the Zetas. The Zetas are military deserters 
that are trained in the United States at the School of the Americas in 
Fort Benning, Georgia, as an elite force of anti-drug commandos. But 
unfortunately, after they were trained by Americans, they went over to 
the dark side. They were sent by the Mexican government to the U.S.-
Mexico border to combat drug trafficking, but they switched sides, 
deserted the Mexican military, and worked for the drug cartels. 
Officials suspect that there are more than 200 Zetas, including former 
Mexican police officers.
  And the problem isn't just at the border, either. The Zetas operate 
in the United States. Authorities have believed that the drug cartels 
and the Zetas are responsible for murders in the United States.
  And there's a second group. The second group is called the Kaibiles. 
The Kaibiles were a special operations force in the Guatemalan 
military. Like the Zetas, many of them received training in the United 
States in counter-insurgency operations. And like the Zetas, many of 
them deserted the special forces and began to help the drug cartels.
  Mr. Speaker, I have here a photograph taken by sheriff's deputies on 
the Texas-Mexico border, and this is a group of the Kaibiles. You 
notice they are all in uniform; they all have hoods on them. You notice 
the first person in the front is carrying an AK-47, and they're 
bringing cocaine into the United States in backpacks, and this is what 
has happened to these individuals that were trained in the United 
States and switched sides.
  Now, the reason I bring all of this up, Mr. Speaker, is there is an 
initiative called the Meridia Initiative where the United States 
government is proposing to send $1.5 billion in training and equipment 
south of the American border into Mexico to help combat drug 
trafficking. While this may sound well and good, unfortunately, the 
truth of the matter is that we cannot trust the local officials on the 
Mexican side of the border because of the high rate of corruption 
because of these individuals that continue to switch sides. And it 
would be very unfortunate indeed if we sent equipment to the northern 
portion of Mexico, south of the American border, turned over this 
military equipment to the Mexican military to have it used against us 
as shown in this photograph.
  It would be better money spent in training to send this $1.5 billion 
to the southern border to the second front where there is a war going 
on but keep it on the American side. Let the local officials, the State 
officials, let the sheriffs along the border use this equipment. Many 
of them don't even have enough equipment. As one of them has told me, 
they're outmanned and they're outgunned by the drug cartels.
  So keep that equipment, keep that training on the American side of 
the border. Support the American cause before we turn this equipment 
and turn this training capability to the other side. And it's a sad 
fact of life that we can't trust sending money, equipment, and training 
south of the United States border because of the corruption that occurs 
in northern Mexico.
  So I would hope that Congress, when this initiative comes up, that we 
have lively debate about this $1.5 billion; and before we send it all 
south of the border, that we rethink that and maybe spend part of that 
money, half of that money or most of that money, on the American side 
and let the border sheriffs of Brownsville, Texas, to San Diego use 
that equipment to fight the drug cartels, fight the crime on the 
American side of the border. I think that would be better money spent, 
American taxpayer money spent.
  And that's just the way it is.

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