On behalf of ten million working men and women of the American Federation of Labor and the Congress of Industrial Organizations (AFL-CIO), the Director of the International Department of the AFL-CIO, urges Congressmembers Berman and Delahunt to oppose the Merida Initiative funding for FY 08 and FY 09!

Read her excellent letters to Chair of the Foreign Affairs Committee Congressman Berman (D-California) and to Congressman Delahunt (D-Massachusetts) telling them “to oppose the Administration’s funding request.”

We’ve been urging Congressman Berman, Chair of the Foreign Affairs Committee, to hold hearings (as has the United Steelworkers and many others) to counter the Bush Administration’s boosters who have been the exclusive invitees to past “congressional oversight hearings”. The reasoned voice of opponents to the bill - including the United Steelworkers, Witness for Peace, Global Exchange and many other organizations and individuals in the U.S. and Mexico - have provided cogent arguments against the Bush ’security’ initiative, even with “human rights certification” warning that Plan Mexico (as the Merida Initiative is called) would:

- arm unaccountable, corrupt and brutal military and police;
- contribute to the erosion of civil liberties in one of our largest trading partners, Mexico;
- increase violence and instability in Mexico;
- waste U.S. taxpayer money.

Is the Democratic Majority Congress unwilling to listen to us? Are they partners with Bush (and Mukasey and Gates) to ignore impunity by the Mexican security forces and the glaring absence of a a real plan to ensure that the above predictable impacts of a military aid package are avoided?