Jeff Bingaman United States Senator from New Mexico

WASHINGTON – U.S. Senators Jeff Bingaman (D-NM) and Kay Bailey Hutchison (R-TX) today renewed their push to enact legislation to reduce drug-related violence in the border region by cracking down on organizations smuggling weapons illegally from the United States into Mexico.  Senators Richard Durbin, Dianne Feinstein, Jon Kyl, and John McCain are also cosponsors of the legislation.

Ongoing violence in Mexico is having a devastating impact on Mexico and is raising concerns for border communities on both sides of the border.  In 2008, more than 5,300 people were killed in Mexico -- double the number in the previous year.  More than 1,600 of those deaths were in Ciudad Juarez, near El Paso, Texas.  Drug traffickers are at war with each other.  Assassinations of police and government officials are commonplace.  Lawyers and journalists have been killed, and many innocent civilians have been caught up in the crossfire.

According to the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF), 90 percent of the weapons seized in Mexico are from sources within the United States.  These weapons are used by drug cartels to violently control their drug shipment routes and funnel illegal narcotics into the United States.  Because Mexico has stringent rules on gun possession, stopping the flow of illegal guns into Mexico is essential in the fight against transnational drug trafficking organizations.

To that end, the Senators today introduced the Southwest Border Violence Reduction Act of 2009 – a measure to crack down on illegal gun smuggling networks.    They first introduced this bill last spring.

"This escalating violence isn't just a problem for Mexico.  It's also a serious concern for the many New Mexicans, Texans, Arizonans and Californians who live in communities along our shared border," Bingaman said.  "We must recognize that the guns smuggled into Mexico from the United States are fueling this violence and take immediate action to keep these weapons out of the hands of violent drug gangs."

"Narcotic trafficking organizations aren't confined by borders," Hutchison said.  "The increasing violence in Mexico is now a U.S. national security issue.  The powerful Mexican drug cartels are a threat to the safety and security of U.S. communities and the U.S. law enforcement officials who seek to protect us."

The Senators' bill authorizes $30 million over the next two years to expand the U.S. Department of Justice's "Project Gunrunner Initiative" – a successful initiative that targets gun trafficking networks.  The funding would enable ATF to hire, train and deploy additional special agents to the U.S. border states as part of Project Gunrunner. 

The bill also authorizes $19 million over the next two years to enhance cooperation between the United States and Mexico.  This funding would allow ATF to assign additional agents to U.S. consulates in Mexico to support Mexico's efforts to trace seized weapons and to train Mexican law enforcement officials in anti-trafficking investigative techniques. 

"Drug violence in Mexico is taking a terrible human toll.  But it's also having an impact on the economies of border communities in terms of reduced trade, bilateral business ventures, and tourism.  The sooner we enact our common-sense legislation to reduce the violence, the better," Bingaman said.

"We must commit to providing the necessary resources to end the destructive violence of the Mexican drug cartels, on both sides of the border," said Hutchison.  "This legislation takes an important step toward protecting our citizens from the terrorism that drug cartels seek to spread."