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Floor Speech

The fentanyl epidemic is ravaging communities across the United States. We are losing more than 80,000 Americans to overdose every year from opioid overdose. With deaths reaching this level, we do need every tool at our disposal to combat illicit fentanyl, but reclassification of fentanyl-related substances as schedule I substances would limit the government's ability to research overdose and addiction treatment medications, override critical public health considerations in scheduling decisions, and extend the policy approach of the failed War on Drugs.

Schedule I drugs are difficult for scientists to research. Fentanyl's potency and danger demand that we study it and its analogs to combat overdose and addiction. A permanent, blanket schedule I category for any fentanyl-related substance would create barriers to vital research.

This punishment-only categorization for fentanyl-related substances would eclipse the longstanding public health approach to Controlled Substances Act scheduling. The Controlled Substances Act authorizes the administration to consider concrete scientific factors when determining which scheduling category should apply to a drug, and that approach is absent here.

Finally, this bill would bring the United States back to the approach of the failed War on Drugs where we criminalized drug use while ignoring the underlying issues that animate abuse and addiction. Prosecutions under this expansion will continue to disproportionately target people of color. A punishment-only approach will not reduce drugs in our communities.

I have spoken to people on the frontlines of this epidemic: people with substance use disorder, families who have lost a loved one, and healthcare providers. They are the ones on the frontlines when people die from fentanyl. They are the ones who lose their lives or lose their patients, friends, or family when we don't invest in the security and public health tools for communities. They are the ones who are frustrated every day by archaic laws that keep people from the prevention and treatment which they need.

We must do better. We must make sure people have access to tools to keep fentanyl out of their communities. We need to make sure people have access to treatment--like methadone medication--to keep people in recovery, and we need to save lives. But permanently categorizing fentanyl-related substances as schedule I substances would impede our response to the overdose epidemic and lead to overincarceration.

There has to be additional discussion and debate. Let us do that so that we can give this issue the attention which it needs and that it deserves so that any solution is effective and bipartisan.

As a result, at this point, I have to object.

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