By Raga Justin | Times Union, Albany
Albany, N.Y. — New York’s congressional Democrats are urging stricter federal action on the criminal organizations behind large-scale drug trafficking — including labeling the surge in the illicit fentanyl supply a national emergency. This signals a growing demand for law enforcement to step up as such substances wreak havoc in communities across the state.
U.S. Senate Majority Leader Charles E. Schumer and U.S. Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand have been touting federal legislation that aims to broadly crack down on cartels and individuals involved in the flourishing illicit pharmaceutical industry. The legislation, which passed the Senate earlier this summer and faces an uncertain future in the House of Representatives, has been dubbed the “FEND Off Fentanyl Act” and would allow for stronger sanctions on drug traffickers as well as empower the U.S. Treasury Department to combat money laundering schemes in the illicit drug trade.
The legislation would require President Joe Biden’s administration to sanction transnational criminal organizations that produce illicit substances or their precursor chemicals, including those based in Mexico and China. It would also require the administration to enforce any violations of those sanctions, as well as require a stricter focus on fentanyl-related financial transactions between cartels.
Schumer and Gillibrand have been visiting New York communities recently touched by bouts of drug-related deaths or arrests to tout the bill. Both Democrats have invoked the direct impact of large-scale trafficking operations in the Capital Region and across the rest of New York.
On Tuesday, Schumer will be in Plattsburgh citing recent major drug busts in the area as well as calling for the legislation’s final passage. “From Albany to Schenectady and across the Capital Region, fentanyl continues to take the lives of far too many New Yorkers each and every day. We must make getting this deadly drug off…
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