In a letter from Congress on July 2nd, the President was asked if his administration had prior knowledge of known drug trafficking from Honduras, including the complicity of Manuel Zelaya, the deposed President.

The letter starts, “We write to seek your explicit personal assurances that U.S. intelligence or law enforcement agencies have no information implicating officials of the Honduran administration of Manuel Zelaya, including Mr. Zelaya himself, in the transit of illegal narcotics through Honduran territory or in any other ties to drug trafficking.”

(AP Photo/Mark Lennihan)

The letter, written by Rep. Thaddeus McCotter of Michigan, seeks to have the President clarify his position of public support for the former Honduran President. “In light of your personal, public demands that Mr. Zelaya should be restored to power, we believe that you must assume personal responsibility for ensuring that our government is not aware of any information that suggests that Mr. Zelaya or his associates have been complicit in the trafficking of cocaine or any other illegal substances to the United States.”

The letter comes on the heels of an Associated Press article which reported that Honduran Foreign Minister Enrique Ortez told CNN en Espanol, “Every night, three or four Venezuelan-registered planes land without the permission of appropriate authorities and bring thousands of pounds … and packages of money that are the fruit of drug trafficking…. We have proof of all of this. Neighboring governments have it. The DEA has it.”

The Associated Press article also referenced a February 27th State Department report in which the State Department concluded, “official corruption continues to be an impediment to effective law enforcement and there are press reports of drug trafficking and associated criminal activity among current and former government and military officials.”

The February 27th, 2009 report also stated, “The Government Of Honduras Organized Crime Prosecutor continued to collaborate with the U.S. Attorney’s Office on U.S. investigations that resulted in criminal indictments of Honduran nationals engaged in narcotics trafficking. However, prosecution efforts in Honduras are still affected by judicial corruption, inefficiency, overwhelming caseloads and funding constraints. Furthermore, Honduras has the legal framework to allow the seizure of traffickers’ assets and use to them to fund interdiction and prosecution. However the process for making use of those assets is inefficient and overly cumbersome.”

La Prensa

La Prensa, a Latin American news agency, reported deaths related to narco-trafficking were on the rise in 2008 by 25% from 2007, and the guess is that 2009 is no exception. Some people across the internet are expressing fears that Honduras could become a “narco-state”.

The State Department and the Obama Administration understood the conditions in Honduras prior to the ousting of Manuel Zelaya by his own people. If in fact, the Obama Administration and the State Department, headed by Hillary Clinton, knew of the corruption and drug trafficking in Honduras, their position to reinstate Manuel Zelaya is complicity in allowing drug trafficking to continue into the United States.

The June 30th AP article also noted, “U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration spokesman Rusty Payne in Washington said he could neither confirm nor deny a DEA investigation.”

The illegal drug trade has costs American taxpayers billions of dollars annually to combat.

A Justice Department report from April, 2006 states, “In 2003 the United States spent a record $185 billion for police protection, corrections, and judicial and legal activities. Expenditures for operating the Nation’s justice system increased from almost $36 billion in 1982 to over $185 billion in 2003, an increase of 418%”
Source: Hughes, Kristen A., “Justice Expenditure and Employment in the United States, 2003″ (Washington, DC: US Dept. of Justice, Bureau of Justice Statistics, April 2006), NCJ212260, p. 2.

The Office of National Drug Control Policy concluded in its 2000 Annual Strategy Report that, “The heavy toll drug abuse exacts on the United States is reflected in related criminal and medical costs totaling over $67 billion. Almost 70 percent of this figure is attributable to the cost of crime.”
Source: Office of National Drug Control Policy, National Drug Control Strategy 2000 Annual Report (Washington DC: US Government Printing Office, 2000), p. 66.

The public support of a man (Manuel Zelaya) that has worked to shield his legislators and administration from prosecution on corruption charges and allowed the trafficking of illegals drugs through his country so they can make their way to the United States, by our government is very concerning. We applaude Rep. McCotter’s efforts, on behalf of the American taxpayer, to have the President clarify the administration’s knowledge of criminal activities.

H/T to Kermit.