For Immediate Release:
Tuesday, March 19, 2024
Contact:
Nazneen Ahmed (919) 716-0060
(RALEIGH) Attorney General Josh Stein today asked Congressional leaders to give U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) approximately $300 million in funding to install equipment CBP already has to detect fentanyl in vehicles entering the United States. CBP has the equipment but cannot install it without additional funding.
“I urge Congress to provide the funds to stop the deadly flow of fentanyl at the border,” said Attorney General Josh Stein. “Too many North Carolinians are dying. Playing politics with border security is disgraceful.”
More than 95 percent of fentanyl seized at the border arrives in personal vehicles, and more than 27,000 pounds of fentanyl was seized at the border and ports of entry from October 2022 to the end of September 2023. New technology known as Non-Intrusive Inspection (NII) enables CBP to x-ray more cars and trucks using massive drive-through screeners at the border. Bipartisan legislators included funds to install the screeners in the bipartisan border security legislation that congressional Republicans blocked earlier this year.
Attorney General Stein has been working to confront the fentanyl epidemic by:
- Winning $50 billion for treatment, harm reduction, and recovery from the pharmaceutical companies that opened the floodgates to illicit fentanyl.
- Convening the statewide Fentanyl Task Force, which brings local, state, and federal law enforcement leaders to the table to begin building concrete plans to keep this poison out of our communities.
- Asking the legislature for funding to create a Fentanyl Control Unit so DOJ prosecutors can assist local district attorneys and handle large-scale fentanyl trafficking, wiretap, and overdose cases.
- Working with Sen. Tom McInnis in the North Carolina Senate to enact the Stop Counterfeit Pill Act, which updated North Carolina law to address the growing threat of counterfeit pills containing fentanyl, methamphetamine, or other dangerous drugs.
- Opening the renovated Drug Chemistry and Toxicology sections of the North Carolina State Crime Lab’s Raleigh location. Fentanyl was the number two drug found in evidence tested at the Lab in 2022.
- Leading bipartisan attorney general efforts to urge the federal government to make it easier for health care providers to prescribe opioid treatment medication through telehealth and increase the availability of treatment for people who are incarcerated.
A copy of the letter is available here.
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