This week, the House of Representatives passed the most obvious policy in the world: increasing criminal penalties for fentanyl traffickers. There shouldn’t have even been a debate on this policy, but of course House Democrats found a way to be against this. You can watch my rebuttal to their nonsensical arguments on the House floor in the video above.
The main argument pushed by Democrats against this bill is one we’ve heard before, claiming that permanently scheduling illicit fentanyl as a Schedule I drug will lead to “mass incarceration” for those who use fentanyl. That’s just not true.
Illicit fentanyl has been Schedule I since 2018—if their claims were true, we’d have already seen these so-called negative effects. We haven’t.
This bill doesn’t target users—it targets traffickers. The criminals lacing drugs with illicit fentanyl and killing Americans every single day. Letting temporary scheduling expire would mean weaker enforcement, weaker laws, and more lives lost.
The House did its job by increasing criminal penalties for illicit fentanyl dealers and giving law enforcement more tools to combat fentanyl trafficking. There was a bipartisan vote for this policy, but 107 Democrats still voted against it. Hopefully, the Senate will follow the House’s lead and swiftly send this commonsense policy to President Trump’s desk.
