Once the stuff of fairy tales, the Clinton administration’s approach to official Mexican drug corruption has turned into a tale of horror. With each new White House apology for each new Mexican bombshell, it is becoming clear that President Clinton’s mind is more focused on free trade than on the menace of drugs.
After last month’s historic arrest of Mexico’s drug czar on charges of colluding with drug lords, yet another Mexican army general was recently locked up on similar allegations. Anyone slightly familiar with the growing Mexican record of official corruption and drug-related assassinations knows it to be appalling. Yet Clinton is decertifying Colombia as a fully cooperating partner of the United States in fighting drugs but certifying Mexico–even as Mexico is becoming progressively more Colombianized.
If Clinton’s logic is hard to grasp, so is that of an increasing number of senators who are opposing a recent House vote of 251-175 to decertify Mexico. During recent meetings with drug czar Barry McCaffrey and other administration personnel, Sens. Kay Bailey Hutchison (R-Texas), Paul Coverdell (R-Ga.) and Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) abandoned a previous hard line. Feinstein had introduced a bill to decertify Mexico with a no-sanctions provision.
But these senators and White House officials proceeded to craft a binding resolution that expresses concern about Mexico’s shortcomings in the anti-drug fight, but requires very little other than an administration report to Congress by Sept. 1 on Mexico’s progress in enforcing its drug laws. Senate staffers say the fig-leaf certification resolution will go to the House after passing the Senate.
Mexican officials had threatened to expel U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration agents if Congress had decertified Mexico. Former DEA officials are not surprised. They point out that Mexican officials are loath to answer the question of why law enforcement in Mexico conducts high-level drug arrests only when the certification issue is on the table.
The answer may be found in the jailing last month of former drug czar Gen. Jesus Gutierrez Rebollo: Corrupt officials often arrest drug trafficker A so that bribe-paying drug trafficker B can go on about his business with less competition. Citing the arrest of drug trafficker A to U.S. officials desperate for any sign of cooperation allows corrupt officials to appease Uncle Sam while continuing to pocket bribes from drug trafficker B.
In a recent interview, Sen. Hutchison chose to downplay the drug decertification controversy and focus on the need to nurture free trade. She seems to view any U.S. action that may interrupt free trade at the border as bad, as does her Republican colleague, Sen. Phil Gramm. The Texans’ concern that the Senate not rock the boat on the Rio Grande is un-surprising. Texas enjoys three or four times more trade with Mexico than the other large border state, California.
But it does raise the question: Should the corrosive threat of drug smuggling to communities, to police and to the U.S. political system be ignored in the name of free trade? More trade with China is also good, but is it so good that U.S. officials should have downplayed the smuggling into this country of thousands of AK-47 assault rifles by a Chinese shipping company that occurred in 1995? As at land ports of entry, customs officials at seaports are being denied the resources to conduct critically important inspections.
Stipulating President Zedillo’s personal commitment to fighting drugs does not absolve him of his record of lying by omission. On Feb. 18, Mexico City announced drug czar Gutierrez’s arrest for corruption and the facilitation of cocaine trafficking. But the announcement came only after Mexico City reporters found the government’s initial explanation of the drug czar’s whereabouts to be false.
In fact, Gen. Gutierrez had been arrested nearly two weeks earlier, on Feb. 6. But Zedillo failed to inform his own compatriots and the White House, even though he knew the administration had given Gutierrez a detailed briefing of drug-fighting operations in Mexico. Then, on Feb. 28, Zedillo committed a second sin of omission: He failed to announce until after Clinton’s certification that a top drug money launderer had “inexplicably” been allowed to walk out of police custody just days before.
By proceeding with his plans to visit Mexico on April 11-12, the president is making a mistake. Such a trip sends the wrong message at the wrong time. Sadly, Clinton and his new Senate allies are undermining America’s national interest by ignoring Mexico’s record instead of acting on it. No lasting good can come from their manifestation of a human failing that Winston Churchill once described as “the triumph of hope over experience.”
