Last week, we took a major step to crack down on fentanyl traffickers, so that we can keep this deadly drug out of Ohio. After months of building bipartisan support, we passed my FEND Off Fentanyl Act and the president signed it into law.
It means we’re now able to impose new, more powerful sanctions targeting the entire fentanyl supply chain — all the way from the chemical suppliers in China, to the cartels in Mexico that traffic the drugs into our country, to the money launderers who help keep them in business.
By going after the billions of dollars that chemical suppliers and drug cartels make in illicit profits, we are targeting them where it hurts the most: their bank accounts. Our bill gives the U.S. government the power to block and freeze the assets of fentanyl traffickers, restrict access to the cartels’ money and property in the United States, and cut cartels off from the U.S. banking system. We are making it much harder and much less profitable to produce fentanyl and bring it into Ohio communities.
Right now, fentanyl is responsible for the vast majority of drug overdose deaths in Ohio and across the country. It’s devastating communities from Youngstown to Defiance to Middletown to Ironton and everywhere in between. I’ve traveled across Ohio meeting with sheriffs and police officers, and they tell us the best way we can support them in this fight is by doing more to keep fentanyl out of the country in the first place. It’s why we worked with Ohio and national law enforcement to write this bill, to build bipartisan support for it, and to get it signed into law.
We introduced the bill last spring with a Republican partner in the Senate. We built a broad coalition, both in Ohio and around the country. We worked every angle to try to get this passed. We called a hearing in our committee, and brought in the performer Jelly Roll to testify about his experiences, and call for passage of our bill. And after a year of work, we got it done.
This bill is going to help save lives. It’s good news for law enforcement and for families on the front lines who have demanded action for years now.
It’s a reminder of what we can accomplish when we put politics aside and work together on the issues that matter most to the communities we serve.
Sherrod Brown is the senior U.S. senator from Ohio.
