Tax Extenders Act Of 2009
Floor Speech
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Mr. LeMIEUX. Mr. President, I rise today to speak about our relations with our neighbors to the south in Latin America. I recently had the opportunity to travel to Latin America and visit the countries of Honduras, Panama, and Colombia. These meetings were very productive.
During these meetings I had the chance to meet with the new President of Honduras, President Lobo, as well as our great ally and friend, President Uribe of the country of Colombia.
Our partnership and friendship with Latin America goes back many decades. In recent times we have used wonderful programs such as USAID and the Millennium Challenge Corporation to help build the infrastructure of Latin America as well as provide the tools to create jobs that will be sustainable in these countries.
Our goal in Latin America is simply this: We want them to succeed. We want strong neighbors with good democracies, with a respect for the rule of law, a place where their people can be free and prosper and hopefully establish great trading partnerships with us in the United States of America.
But the history of Latin America, even recently, is while there have been many successes, there have also been setbacks. We have recently had troubles in Honduras with President Zelaya, the former President who tried to stay in office, and then we had an ouster of him. There is a debate among us as to whether that was a coup or whether it was legally done. But, nonetheless, it was a disruption in that country's emerging democracy.
In meeting with President Lobo, I was impressed that he has put together a national unity government endeavoring to create those democratic institutions and strengthen the ones that Honduras was building upon and establish a rule of law that will give countries such as America and business people from our country the opportunity to transact business in that country.
I believe that under President Lobo's leadership, we have got a good chance for Honduras reemerging on the stage in Latin America as a good and healthy democracy.
I was pleased that Secretary Clinton recently recognized the democratically elected president. I encourage President Obama to receive President Lobo. We need friends in the region. We need friends for a number of reasons. We need friends in Latin America, specifically Central America, because of the devastating and harmful drug trade. The drug trade in Latin America that funnels drugs and guns to this country is not just a challenge in and of itself because of the deadly narcotics it brings to America, it is a challenge because of the violence and the organized structure of violence that goes with it.
Recently we saw drug gangs in Mexico extract the worst form of vengeance upon a family of a young military officer. A military officer died in Mexico killing the head of a drug cartel. He was celebrated by that country in what would be akin to a state funeral. And the drug cartel, to exact vengeance and to send a signal, killed all of the members of that soldier's family. That is terrible.
The money that is provided by these drugs that run from northern South America, the Colombia region, and then through Central America, these connections, that violent chain is very dangerous to this country. It is dangerous for many reasons, but there is an increasing danger. There is an increasing danger that has occurred with the entrance of Iran and its progeny into Latin America. We now know that Ahmadinejad is trying to show his sphere of influence in Latin America; that Hezbollah and Hamas, surrogate groups for Iran, who have done most of their damage in Lebanon and in Gaza, are now setting up shop in Latin America.
One of the reasons I am here to speak on the floor today is I am concerned that the same networks that transported violence and drugs and guns to this country could be used by Hezbollah and Hamas to provide a national security threat to us in this country and potentially bring terrorism to us in that way.
So our friendship with these countries such as Honduras, our friendship with countries such as Panama, our friendship with countries such as Colombia matter. It not only matters because we care about the human rights of the people in those countries and we want them to be prosperous and free, but it matters because of our own national security.
Good, stable democratic partners are good for the United States of America. So we should continue to acknowledge President Lobo. We should restore the visas that were suspended during the Zelaya incident. We should do everything we can to encourage trade to continue with the Millennium Challenge Corporation, continue with USAID so that country can be prosperous and free and secure.
The same goes for Panama. Panama is a wonderful friend and partner to the United States. The Panama Canal, which the United States had for many years but now is in the hands of Panama, is a tremendous trading conduit to our country, and the Panama Canal is expanding. Right now, dredging and other works are being put in place to allow larger ships to come through the Panama Canal. Why is that important to the United States of America? Well, no longer will these post-panamax ships from China have to go to California to let off their goods. No longer will they have to go around the bottom of South America. Now they can come through the Panama Canal and service the eastern seaboard of the United States.
For a State such as mine in Florida this is very important. So we have to do the work in this country to make sure we are ready for those, what they call post-Panamax ships, that our ports are dredged deep enough that we have the security and the infrastructure in place to make sure we can receive those large ships.
I have been an advocate for making sure that Florida's ports are ready to receive those ships, because that trade will create thousands of jobs not just in my home State but all across this country.
That brings me to the point of trade. We have pending trade agreements that have not yet been sent over by the White House to be ratified by this Congress; trade agreements with Panama that need to be ratified, trade agreements with Colombia that need to be ratified, and also with South Korea. It makes no sense not to ratify those agreements.
Let me turn my attention, if I can, to Colombia. We have no better friend in Latin America than President Uribe. President Uribe will go down in history as one of the greatest leaders in this hemisphere. He, in my mind, is akin to Abraham Lincoln to their country, because when he came into office about 8 years ago, we were on the verge of Colombia turning into a narcoterrorist state, in which the drug gangs would have taken over the country.
In fact, before President Uribe came to office, the previous President sought to negotiate with the FARC by setting aside a part of the country as a safe haven for the FARC. It was a disaster. I am told that when President Uribe was sworn into office, almost 8 years ago, that the FARC was shelling and bombing Bogota to try to kill him on his inauguration. It is hard for us to realize what a civil war would be like, but that has been the situation in Colombia.
Because of the efforts of the United States of America, and because of our military and trade support, and Plan Colombia, which we put $1 billion into, Colombia turned the tide. The good guys are winning, and the FARC, the narcoterrorists, are losing. We are doing a very good job of beating those folks back. President Uribe must be commended.
But of all of our friends in the hemisphere, we have not ratified the free trade agreement with Colombia. We have done it with Peru, we have done the Central America Free Trade Agreement, CAFTA, but not Colombia. This agreement is 4 years old. I have spoken to our United States Trade Representative and urged him to urge this administration to send these trade agreements here.
I know the problem is not the Senate. The problem is down the hall with our colleagues in the House. I know they are concerned about certain issues in Colombia. I want to point out for my friends in the House of Representatives, because they are concerned about organized labor in Colombia, that under the leadership of this government in Colombia, homicides of union members are down nearly 80 percent since 2002. Homicides, in general, are down 45 percent in 2008, the lowest point in 22 years. Kidnappings are down by more than 80 percent, and acts of terrorism are down 63 percent.
I had a chance to go to Bogota. It is a beautiful and wonderful city. It rises nearly 8,000 feet above sea level, which is 3,000 more feet than Denver. Yet it is green and verdant, and it is one of the world's most unbelievable places to grow flowers, and 75 percent or more of the flowers that come in this country that you get at your florist come to us through Colombia. When they come from Colombia, guess where they go through to get to the United States of America. They all come through Miami, which makes me proud as a Senator from Florida.
That trade we have right now, the Colombians benefit from free trade but we do not benefit in return. We must ratify this agreement. We must acknowledge our friends in Colombia. By not ratifying the agreement, the signal we are sending is that perhaps our relationship with them, under this administration, is not as good as it has been with previous administrations. We do not want to send that wrong signal to a model country for Latin America.
But let me again talk about this concern I have about the emerging threat of Iran and its influence in Latin America. There is a deadly combination forming between Ahmadinejad of Iran and Hugo Chavez of Venezuela. I ask unanimous consent that this newspaper article which I am about to read from be printed in the Record.
There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in the RECORD
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Mr. LeMIEUX. This article from March 2, 2010, I believe it is a Wall Street Journal article, talks about the revelation that has occurred that Hugo Chavez and his government were involved with the Basque separatist group in Spain in an effort to assassinate the President of Colombia, President Uribe.
This article from March 2, 2010 says that:
Spanish National Court Judge Eloy Velasco alleged Monday that the Venezuelan government had collaborated with Basque separatist group ETA and Colombia's main guerrilla group [which is the FARC] in a plot against leaders living in or traveling to Spain that began in late 2003.
The allegations were part of an indictment that ordered 12 alleged members of ETA and of the FARC to stand trial on charges of conspiracy to commit murder and terrorism.
This was an effort to assassinate the President of Colombia. And it was done, according to this judge, in combination with the President of Venezuela, Hugo Chavez, who is just as bad as Raul Castro in Cuba. He is trying to spread the same tyranny to the country of Venezuela, a country that was formerly free. He is shutting down media, he is arresting college students, he is destroying the economy to the point where there are now brownouts because they cannot provide enough electricity, a country which has tremendous oil reserves and energy reserves.
But he is not using those to bring money into the country, he is shutting the economy down. He is bringing despair to his people. The Cuban Government is now involved in the operation of Venezuela. They are calling it Vene-Cuba. This is a danger to us. Who is received by Hugo Chavez in Venezuela? Ahmadinejad from Iran. And what do we believe and what are we concerned about? That Hezbollah and Hamas are now setting up shop in Venezuela, in the region as well.
I have another article that I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record from the Associated Press by Curt Anderson. ``Three men charged in Miami with financing Hezbollah.''
There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in the RECORD
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