Source: Reuters Pubdate: Thu, 11 Dec 1997 CLINTON PLAN WOULD CURB DRUGS FROM MEXICO By Steve Holland MIAMI (Reuters) President Clinton promoted new successes in the war on illegal drugs Thursday, and his drug policy chief said plans are afoot for a huge crackdown on narcotics smuggling from Mexico into the United States. Clinton interrupted an intense Democratic fundraising spree to take a U.S. Coast Guard cutter through a shipping channel to a Coast Guard station. There, he said the U.S. drug interdiction battle has enjoyed an upsurged in arrests of traffickers in the Caribbean region and a 300 percent rise in cocaine seizures 103,000 pounds this year. "Thanks in no small measure to heroic efforts on the high seas, in the air, and along our borders, the strategy is starting to show promising results," he told Coast Guard personnel on a hot, hazy south Florida day with a line of Coast Guard cutters bedecked with colorful flags arrayed behind him. His drug policy director, retired Gen. Barry McCaffrey, announced that the Clinton administration was working on a plan to dramatically reduce crossborder drug smuggling from Mexico into the United States. That border is blamed for much of the illegal drugs that enter the United States. "We're going to try and stop drug smuggling into the United States across the MexicanU.S. border in the next five years substantially stop it while still allowing our second biggest trading partner to continue economic cooperation," he said. Such a massive crackdown could inflame antiAmerican passions that have flared up in Mexico in the past. McCaffrey, seeking a $73 million increase in his drug budget for the 1999 fiscal year, said he talked to Clinton about the idea on Thursday and was told to have a concept ready to share by the president's State of the Union address early next year. He said customs agents at border crossings now rely on handheld machines to check vehicles for drugs but that the United States was deploying large Xray machines, designed to look through Soviet nuclear missile shipping containers, for examining trucks for smuggled drugs. A strong antidrug message was part of Clinton's day of politicking in Florida, where he was attending three events raising an estimated $1.4 million for Democrats. That included a luncheon that brought in about $400,000 for the Democratic candidate for governor of Florida, Buddy MacKay, who is likely to face tough competition from Republican Jeb Bush, son of former President George Bush. On a mission to reduce his party's $13 million debt and build up a warchest for 1998 midterm congressional elections, Clinton told enthusiastic MacKay boosters that Democrats may get outspent. "It is not easy to run a campaign and they are not inexpensive," he said. "And normally our side is running against people who have more money than we do. But the important thing is not whether they have more, it's just whether we have enough." Clinton flew to Florida from New York, where he raised $1.4 million at two events on Wednesday. His wife Hillary also showed prowess in attracting donations by raising $500,000 at two events, in Boston on Tuesday and New York on Wednesday. Some MacKay supporters at the luncheon event were wearing buttons that said, "Buddy's a Veteran, Jeb's Not." Said MacKay: "Do you want somebody that's going to move this state forward...or do you want somebody that's going to take us on a radical detour and cause us to fall back?" After a round of golf, Clinton was to attend two evening fundraisers, picking up about $1 million, before returning to Washington. Copyright © 1997 Reuters Limited.