In response to GOP assaults on the administration over the southern border, President Joe Biden will call on government agencies and Congress to take action on Wednesday to stop the flow of fentanyl into the country.
A senior administration official revealed at a briefing that Biden will release a national security memorandum ordering government departments and agencies to "work together" and "share information." Additionally, the president is anticipated to push Congress to enact a comprehensive bill that would close some gaps and improve the nation's ability to identify fentanyl when it enters the country.
In a statement, Biden stated, "Today, I will issue a National Security Memorandum directing every federal Department and Agency to do even more to stop the flow of narcotics—including fentanyl—into our country." It will improve the amount of information gathered on the changing strategies used by traffickers to bring drugs into our nation. Additionally, it will support our law enforcement officials in capturing more lethal substances before they enter our communities.
Tens of thousands of Americans are killed by fentanyl each year; it is up to 50 times more deadly than heroin.
The memo is released at a time when the campaigns of former president Donald Trump and vice president Kamala Harris are attacking each other's immigration policies in an attempt to gain an advantage in a presidential contest that has been drastically shifted in the last few days by Biden's announcement that he will not be running for the Democratic ticket in 2024.
On Wednesday, Biden is expected to urge Congress to approve the "Detect and Defeat proposal," as the administration is calling it.
"By addressing a gap that drug traffickers take advantage of, the proposal would provide border agents with the resources they need to identify and target the millions of small-dollar shipments that cross our borders every day more successfully. In order to track these devices and prevent their illegal usage in the production of phony fentanyl pills, it would create a national pill press and tableting machine registry. Additionally, it would classify chemicals similar to fentanyl as "Schedule I" drugs for all time, carrying stiffer penalties for both possession and delivery, according to the White House.
According to the White House, the president will be briefed on the "ongoing work to crack down on drug traffickers smuggling deadly drugs, including fentanyl" on Wednesday afternoon.
The anticipated revelations occur one day after the Trump campaign launched its first significant ad campaign, focusing on Harris' immigration history in commercials that aired in multiple crucial battleground states.
The first look at the vice president's strategy for fending off those assaults has come from his reelection campaign. A 50-second campaign commercial, which debuted on CNN on Tuesday, contrasts Trump's and Harris's approaches to immigration, emphasizing the latter's emphasis on border security and referencing the latter's support for spending money on new technology to keep fentanyl out of the country.
According to early data from the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's National Center for Health Statistics, fentanyl has been the primary driver of the most recent wave of overdose deaths, with synthetic opioids accounting for more than two-thirds of overdose deaths last year.
Despite a slight decline in drug overdose mortality in the US during the Covid-19 epidemic, which occurred in 2023 for the first time in five years, these extremely powerful drugs still have a disproportionate impact. In 2023, they contributed to about 70% of overdose deaths. Nonetheless, the new data indicates that in 2023 compared to 2022, there were roughly 1,500 fewer overdose deaths involving fentanyl and other synthetic opioids.
In 2023, law enforcement recovered almost 115 million pills that contained illicit fentanyl, up from less than 50,000 in 2017 and approximately 71 million in 2022.
