Halt All Lethal Trafficking of Fentanyl Act

Floor Speech

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Mr. JOYCE of Pennsylvania. Mr. Speaker, I thank the chairman for yielding me time.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to give my emphatic support for H.R. 27, the HALT Fentanyl Act. This commonsense solution is exactly what our Nation needs to effectively crack down on the illicit fentanyl flowing across our borders.

For years, the Mexican drug cartels have recruited college chemistry majors to chemically alter the fentanyl precursors that come from the Chinese Communist Party right into Mexico to make more deadly and less- illegal fentanyl analogues.

Classifying these fentanyl analogues as schedule I drugs will allow our law enforcement officers and our Border Patrol agents the ability to effectively seize these substances and will result in harsher penalties for the criminals who make, traffic, and sell these poisons.

In 2023, in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, an individual died every 2 hours from an overdose. More than three-fourths of those overdose deaths were the result of fentanyl.

The future generations of our great Nation cannot afford to wait any longer. The time is right now to stop this scourge on our society and to pass the HALT Fentanyl Act, which will allow us to do just that.

Mr. Speaker, I urge all of my colleagues on both sides of the aisle to help save American lives, starting today with their vote to pass the HALT Fentanyl Act.

This is critical legislation. It does not care which party the individuals who are dying from these fentanyl overdoses belong to. This poison must be stopped, and this important legislation will allow that to occur.

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