Halt All Lethal Trafficking of Fentanyl Act

Floor Speech

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Mr. OBERNOLTE. Mr. Speaker, I rise in strong support of S. 331, the HALT Fentanyl Act.

Mr. Speaker, opioid overdoses have become an epidemic in this country. Last year, over 100,000 Americans lost their lives to overdose, and fentanyl poisoning is the driving force behind that.

Mr. Speaker, it is not just the country at large that has experienced this problem. In my own district, we have seen an over 1,000 percent increase in the rate of fentanyl poisoning and deaths.

Mr. Speaker, I had the most difficult day in my over 20 years in public office recently when I had to console one of my constituents, a mother who lost both of her sons on the same day to the same fentanyl poisoning event.

We must give our law enforcement the tools to combat this problem. This bill does exactly that. It permanently reschedules fentanyl and its analogues as a schedule I narcotic, and it gives our law enforcement agencies the tools that they need to begin dealing with this problem.

That is why I am proud to be a cosponsor of the House version of this legislation, and I urge my colleagues to vote in support of it.

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