HUTCHINSON SAYS DEA WOULD FIGHT PROFILING

Rep. Asa Hutchinson (R-Ark.), President Bush's nominee to head the Drug
Enforcement Administration, said yesterday he would not tolerate racial
profiling instruction by DEA agents who teach local police drug enforcement
tactics.

Several members of the Senate Judiciary Committee conducting Hutchinson's
confirmation hearing expressed concern about racial profiling and what
steps he would take to ensure the DEA didn't engage in it.

Hutchinson offered no specific remedies but said that "I know that we
already have a policy that prohibits racial profiling and that needs to be
enforced. I will certainly go over there [DEA] with that intent."

Sen. Richard J. Durbin (D-Ill.) noted that while blacks make up 13 percent
of U.S. drug users, they make up 35 percent of the people arrested for
drugs and 55 percent of those convicted of drug crimes. "The majority of
users are not black or brown; they are white," Durbin said.

Hutchinson, 50, is a former federal prosecutor. He has a reputation in
Congress as a conservative who supports local drug courts, which offer
alternatives to prison that usually combine treatment with the threat of
incarceration.

All 50 states and the District of Columbia have established drug courts as
part of the effort to reduce the number of nonviolent drug offenders in the
nation's prisons.

Hutchinson said he favors more emphasis on treatment but added that
stepping up law enforcement also is key to winning the drug war. "Many
times it's a law enforcement activity that leads someone into treatment,"
he said.

If he is confirmed, Hutchinson will head an agency with 9,000 employees and
a $ 1.5 billion annual budget.

Hutchinson has won support of Republicans and Democrats. Sen. Patrick J.
Leahy (D-Vt.), chairman of the Judiciary Committee, called Hutchinson "a
man of integrity and intelligence who is committed to reducing drug abuse
in this country."

Hutchinson was elected to Congress in 1997. He was considered earlier this
year as a possible deputy attorney general, but ties to his alma mater, Bob
Jones University in South Carolina, hurt his chances.

The institution, which awarded Hutchinson a bachelor's degree in 1972 and
an honorary law degree in 1999, prohibited interracial dating until March 2000.