Foreign Operations, Export Financing, and Related Programs Appropriations Act, 2005

FOREIGN OPERATIONS, EXPORT FINANCING, AND RELATED PROGRAMS APPROPRIATIONS ACT, 2005 -- (House of Representatives - July 15, 2004)

The Committee resumed its sitting.

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Mr. NORWOOD. Mr. Chairman, I appreciate the gentleman from Georgia bringing this amendment tonight. I am a little distressed that it needs to be an amendment, frankly. This is a problem that must and has to be dealt with.

I am happy that this amendment does deal with any country that will not extradite nationals to the U.S., but I am particularly concerned about the one I know of particularly from Mexico, David March, one that a lot of us have been concerned about, frankly, for a long time. We do not really understand why the United States Government does not deal with this.

At the first of the year, we had written the President and asked why in the world do we not deal with a problem like this, the extradition back into our country. We really do have a formal agreement with them for extradition. It was not something that I could understand why you would put a family through this.

The White House sends it to the State Department, the State Department works overnight and gets us an answer back 6 months later to say that, gosh, we're sorry we can't help with that. President Fox is not in the judiciary in Mexico. We couldn't possibly bother him because he is in the executive branch.

None of that makes any sense to me, but what does make sense to me is that we tell any country but in this case and in particular we tell Mexico that if you want to be our friend, act like our friend. If you do not want to be our friend, there has to be some penalties; and in this case and in this bill we simply say that we are not going to fund the Mexican government. Is it $40 million a year, I believe, that we send down there or there is $40 million in this bill? You just do not get that this year.

I know we are going to hear a lot of concerns about that. I really need to ask the gentleman from Georgia a question or two, if I may, about the effects of this bill and the $40 million. I am told, and I think I am told correctly, that Mexico, that country, sends more illegal drugs into this country than any other. Of course, that does not sound very friendly to me, as if they are real friends, but the fact that they do send so many drugs into our country, we have to send them $40 million or we cannot possibly stop. That may not be the best use of $40 million, but I would like to hear your response to that, the maker of the amendment, why this is or is not such a bad thing.

Mr. DEAL of Georgia. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?

Mr. NORWOOD. I yield to the gentleman from Georgia.

Mr. DEAL of Georgia. In response to the gentleman's inquiry, I think it is certainly an appropriate inquiry. I would suggest that if we really want to stop the flow of drugs from Mexico, rather than sending that $40 million there, we could use it on our border to beef up our DEA, our Customs and others to try to stop it here.

The real irony of the argument that we cannot deal with the lack of extradition is that, first of all, if we really want to deal with Mexican drug problems, under the current status of affairs if a Mexican drug dealer comes to our country and in the process of his illegal activity of selling drugs in our country he kills either an officer or a private citizen and then
That to me is the greatest irony of all. I would suggest that if we really want to do something about the Mexican drug traffic, I understand their cartels are the leading distributors and manufacturers of drugs in our own country. So I would suggest that we can use the money better here at home.

Mr. NORWOOD. Mr. Chairman, reclaiming my time, so the gentleman is telling me that when Mexico does not cooperate with us on a treaty that we have with them, we are not going to send them that $40 million to try to stop the illicit drug trade, but we could use that $40 million, for example, in other places to stop that illicit drug trade.

Does the gentleman have any idea, and I do not know, the 40 millions of dollars we were sending down to Mexico in the past to work with International Narcotics Control, are they doing any good? Do we have any proof that that money is working?

Mr. DEAL of Georgia. Mr. Chairman, if the gentleman would continue to yield, I am sure there are arguments that can be made that it does some good, but Mexico continues to be the main source of illegal drugs into this country. And if we are doing something, it has not been as effective as it should have been.

Mr. NORWOOD. Mr. Chairman, reclaiming my time, if, in fact, Mexico was sending us 5,000 metric tons of marijuana, 50 metric tons of amphetamine, and 10 metric tons of heroin, we are not doing really good stopping it with that $40 million. I will tell the gentleman that. Maybe we need to tell them if they do not want to work with us in sending murderers back to our justice system, perhaps we need to keep our $40 million and put it in American hands to stop the illegal traffic.