Policy

Group of Black Government Employees Calls for End to the Drug War

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A group representing black government employees, including a former DEA agent and member of the U.S. Marshals, has released a petition calling for an end to the drug war. Authored by Matthew F. Fogg, a retired DEA agent, the Blacks In Goverment (BIG) petition calls for a "Federal investigation for solutions to eliminate the pretense and continued arrest and incarceration of African-Americans at extraordinarily disparate rates for drug-related charges," as well as for Attorney General Eric Holder and President Barack Obama to immediately end "racial bias drug enforcement operations, provide retroactive reduction in sentences for victims and suggest alternatives to incarceration that may in part, include a model to regulate and control the distribution of some drugs."

Fogg covered D.C. for the DEA during the late 80s and 90s. In a statement from Law Enforcement Again Prohibition, Fogg says, "I personally witnessed racially biased enforcement procedures when I ran a joint DEA task force…When I requested equal enforcement of upscale suburban areas, I met internal resistance." So Fogg never busted down doors in Chevy Chase, McLean, or Bethesda? Shocking.  

More from LEAP's statement: 

BIG and LEAP have noted that African Americans constitute 53.5 percent of all persons who entered prison because of a drug conviction despite the fact that blacks are no more likely than whites to use drugs.

The BIG resolution calls for "a federal investigation for solutions to eliminate the pretense and continued arrest and incarceration of African Americans at extraordinarily disparate rates for drug related charges." 

In passing the anti-drug-war resolution, BIG joins other African-American groups that have taken similar positions, such as the NAACP, the National Black Caucus of State Legislators and the National Black Police Association.

"The war on drugs has put blacks behind bars for drug offenses at more than ten times the rate of whites, even though the evidence consistently shows that blacks are no more likely to use or sell currently illicit drugs than whites are," Fogg added. "It is time to end this virtual race war."

BIG's petition comes hot on the heels of the NAACP's call for drug law reform.