U.S. NEEDS ALTERNATIVE TO ANNUAL CHARADE WITH MEXICO

The beginning of a century ushers in new eras of political leadership for
the United States and Mexico. In particular, the inauguration of Vicente
Fox as president of Mexico on Dec. 1 will end 71 years of domination by the
Institutional Revolutionary Party. That offers an opportunity for a fresh
start in many aspects of the U.S.-Mexico relationship. President-elect
Fox's visits to Washington and Dallas this week should jump-start the process.

Nowhere is it more critical that we take the right first steps than in our
mutual efforts to stop the flow of drugs into the United States through
Mexico. After fewer than two months in office, Mr. Fox will do business
with an entirely new U.S. administration. Unfortunately, just as the two
new leaders are assuming the reins of power and before they have gotten to
know each other as presidents, a well-intended but ultimately ineffective
U.S. law will introduce an element of crisis. By March 1, after a scant six
weeks in office, the next U.S. president will have to recertify to Congress
that Mexico is making progress in the war on drugs.

Forcing a confrontation so soon on the most important issue that we face
will serve neither country, and it won't loosen the grip that the drug
culture has on our societies and economies. To forestall a face-off, I will
offer legislation, when Congress reconvenes after Labor Day, to authorize a
one-year waiver from the annual certification process. That will give both
countries and their new leaders more time to develop a process that will
make us partners rather than adversaries in addressing the one issue that
can make moot all the pressing matters and promising opportunities our two
nations face.

The North American Free Trade Agreement cemented and strengthened our
partnership and our interdependence. Just last year, Mexico surged past
Japan as our nation's second-largest trading partner. But that success
masks a fact that threatens the relationship at its core. Mexico has become
a funnel through which illegal drugs from around the world are entering the
United States. About 30 percent of the heroin, 70 percent of the
foreign-grown marijuana and 60 percent of the cocaine come through Mexico
en route to our main streets and schoolyards.

In one recent year, nearly $1 billion in drugs was seized by the Border
Patrol in Texas alone. Associated activity has turned the U.S.-Mexico
border into a region of lawlessness that threatens to overwhelm the growing
law-enforcement assets being committed there by both countries. Former Drug
Enforcement Administration Director Thomas Constantine testified before
Congress that official corruption in Mexico is "unparalleled to anything I
have seen in 30 years of law enforcement."

Because of our close relationship and in spite of those facts, Mexico never
has been decertified. But many in Congress have long sought a different
option to a process that forces us to choose between false alternatives of
full cooperation (certification) or insufficient cooperation
(decertification). Even with a waiver on national security grounds as
permitted by the law, decertification places a country in a status reserved
for those that the United States hopes to isolate from the rest of the
world. It simply isn't in either country's best interest to put Mexico in
that category. From its perspective, the Mexican government resents the
fact that it annually is under the threat of being grouped with
Afghanistan, Iran and Iraq by the country with which it engages in tens of
billions of dollars of commerce.

Mr. Fox appears to understand that the drug crisis threatens his entire
agenda. His reforms will be unattainable without effective action to
destroy the major drug cartels and imprison their kingpins, implement laws
to curtail money laundering, set up an acceptable extradition process,
increase interdiction efforts and promote mutual cooperation between our
respective law enforcement agencies. He has shown every intention to work
with the United States in reaching our shared objective to eradicate the
drug threat that endangers both our countries.

Mr. Fox knows the challenges ahead, and it is in our own interest to clear
his path as much as we can. We should start by at least temporarily
suspending a law that just isn't working.

Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison, R-Texas, has led several congressional
delegations to Mexico as chairman of the U.S.-Mexico Interparliamentary Group.