The Biden administration on Wednesday announced it is pursuing two new actions aimed at curbing the flow of illicit fentanyl and other synthetic opioids into the U.S.

What You Need To Know

  • The Biden administration on Wednesday announced it is pursuing two new actions aimed at curbing the flow of illicit fentanyl and other synthetic opioids into the U.S. 
  • The steps include issuing a national security memorandum and calling on congress to pass new legislation to address the crisis 
  • The proposed legislation would establish a national pill press and tabletting registry, impose new penalties on drug smugglers and traffickers; permanately make fentanyl-related substances schedule one drugs, and require importers to provide more information to Customs and Border Protection to better identify packages containing fentanyl precursor chemicals 

The steps include issuing a national security memorandum and calling on Congress to pass new legislation to address the crisis. 

Through legislation, a senior administration official told reporters on a call previewing the announcement, President Joe Biden is hoping Congress can make progress in closing loopholes exploited by drug traffickers through four pathways. 

Those include establishing a national pill press and tabletting registry, which would help enforcement officials track the machines used to press fentanyl into pills that look like legitimate prescription medication; imposing new penalties on drug smugglers and traffickers; permanently making fentanyl-related substances schedule one drugs, the most restrictive category, and requiring importers to provide more information to Customs and Border Protection to better identify packages containing fentanyl precursor chemicals. 

The national security memorandum set to be issued by President Joe Biden, meanwhile, will direct federal departments and agencies to step up efforts to take on illicit fentanyl and synthetic opioids through expanding intelligence collection, increasing coordination and communication and leading work with the private sector. 

“It requires departments and agencies to do even more, to work together, to share information across intelligence and law enforcement and within different law enforcement channels, and to break down any existing information silos so that we can more effectively go after drug traffickers and the supply chain,” the official told reporters on the call. 

Overdose deaths soared during the COVID-19 pandemic and the rate of deaths from synthetic opioids like fentanyl  was 18 times higher in 2020 compared to 2013, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. 

The senior official told reporters that the U.S. has seized more than 442 million potentially lethal doses of fentanyl at the border in the last five months, adding that the administration has seized more of the substance in the last two years than the previous five years combined. 

Provisional data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention show that drug overdose deaths decreased slightly last year from 2022, marking the first annual decline since 2018. 

Combating fentanyl was a large part of Biden’s meeting with China’s Xi Jinping last year on the sidelines of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit in San Francisco. The president emerged from his sit-down with Xi touting that China had agreed to take action to stem the flow of precursor chemicals and pill presses from China to the Western Hemisphere. 

The official on the call said the administration believes there is “a lot more” China needs to do but noted conversations are on-going. The official said a delegation of senior officials are coming to meet on Wednesday to continue discussions on the matter. 

China and Mexico play a large role in the flow of synthetic fentanyl into the U.S., with chemicals coming from China and the drugs largely mass-produced in Mexico before being trafficked into the U.S. 

Biden has also worked with Mexico on the issue.