Schumer aims for bipartisan sanctions on China for fentanyl.
Senate Majority Leader Seeks Bipartisan Support to Sanction China Over Fentanyl
Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) is seeking bipartisan support to impose new sanctions against China over its role in bringing fentanyl to the United States.
Fentanyl is a deadly synthetic opioid that is 50–100 times more powerful than morphine. While its potency has made it a popular and cheap additive in other street drugs, it has also greatly raised the risk of overdoses, contributing to tens of thousands of deaths in the United States. According to a June report by the U.S. Center For Disease Control and Prevention, there were 70,601 overdose deaths linked to non-Methadone synthetic opioids, with fentanyl being a primary source for these deaths.
Mr. Schumer said much of the fentanyl that is currently in the United States comes from production sites in China ”with the total acceptance and acquiescence of the Chinese government.”
At a press conference on Sunday, Mr. Schumer said he would support adding an amendment to the annual defense budget, the 2024 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), that would declare the prevalence of fentanyl in the United States to be a national emergency and to sanction the Chinese communist regime for its contribution to this emergency.
“This will really get tough with them and we will make them clamp down on the fentanyl coming to the United States,” the Democratic Senate leader said.
China’s Role in Fentanyl Trafficking
A 2020 report (
While the Chinese regime has reportedly been more strictly regulating fentanyl and its precursors since 2017, according to the 2020 DEA report, Chinese fentanyl traffickers appeared to reroute their supply lines through India as a way to circumvent Chinese regulations. According to Brookings Institution research Vanda Felbab-Brown,
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