Alcohol related crimes cost this country millions of dollars every year. Despite that fact the alcohol industry goes on supporting officials who continue to stall bills that would curb alcohol purchases by residents on a dry Indian reservation, The New York Times reports.
The bill, in question, would allow authorities to establish “alcohol impact zones” in areas with high levels of alcohol-related crime.
At least seven of the eight senators on the committee considering the bill have received campaign funding from Anheuser-Busch, according to the report. The company makes Hurricane High Gravity Lager, a high-alcohol malt liquor that is popular among people who sleep outside beer shops in Whiteclay, Nebraska. Whiteclay sells four million cans of beer and malt liquor a year to residents of the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation, just across the border in South Dakota which is a dry county.
Members of the committee have received more than $21,000 from alcohol companies and their lobbyists during the past five years. The members say the contributions have not had any effect on their positions.
In February, the Oglala Sioux tribe sued the beer manufacturers for $500 million in damages, in a suit that alleges the companies knowingly contributed to alcohol-related problems on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation.