this post was submitted on 19 Mar 2025
69 points (97.3% liked)

News

28284 readers
3893 users here now

Welcome to the News community!

Rules:

1. Be civil

Attack the argument, not the person. No racism/sexism/bigotry. Good faith argumentation only. This includes accusing another user of being a bot or paid actor. Trolling is uncivil and is grounds for removal and/or a community ban. Do not respond to rule-breaking content; report it and move on.

2. All posts should contain a source (url) that is as reliable and unbiased as possible and must only contain one link.

Obvious right or left wing sources will be removed at the mods discretion. Supporting links can be added in comments or posted seperately but not to the post body.

3. No bots, spam or self-promotion.

Only approved bots, which follow the guidelines for bots set by the instance, are allowed.

4. Post titles should be the same as the article used as source.

Posts which titles don’t match the source won’t be removed, but the autoMod will notify you, and if your title misrepresents the original article, the post will be deleted. If the site changed their headline, the bot might still contact you, just ignore it, we won’t delete your post.

5. Only recent news is allowed.

Posts must be news from the most recent 30 days.

6. All posts must be news articles.

No opinion pieces, Listicles, editorials or celebrity gossip is allowed. All posts will be judged on a case-by-case basis.

7. No duplicate posts.

If a source you used was already posted by someone else, the autoMod will leave a message. Please remove your post if the autoMod is correct. If the post that matches your post is very old, we refer you to rule 5.

8. Misinformation is prohibited.

Misinformation / propaganda is strictly prohibited. Any comment or post containing or linking to misinformation will be removed. If you feel that your post has been removed in error, credible sources must be provided.

9. No link shorteners.

The auto mod will contact you if a link shortener is detected, please delete your post if they are right.

10. Don't copy entire article in your post body

For copyright reasons, you are not allowed to copy an entire article into your post body. This is an instance wide rule, that is strictly enforced in this community.

founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
JonsJava@lemmy.world
rjc@lemmy.world
Thekingoflorda@lemmy.world
Tenthrow@lemmy.world
gedaliyah@lemmy.world
little_cow@lemmy.world
jeffw@lemmy.world
enu@lemmy.world
WrenFeathers@lemmy.world
69
HALT Fentanyl Act Clears Senate, Poised to Become Law (filtermag.org)
submitted 2 weeks ago by gAlienLifeform@lemmy.world to c/news@lemmy.world
13 comments fedilink hide all child comments
 

On March 14, the Senate passed legislation that would permanently ban fentanyl-related substances (FRS) under Schedule I of the Controlled Substances Act. S. 331, better known as the Halt All Lethal Trafficking (HALT) of Fentanyl Act, would escalate the mass incarceration crisis by fast-tracking prosecution of cases involving any substance with a chemical structure similar to fentanyl, even if the substance is inert.

The Senate approved the legislation by a vote of 84-16. The House already advanced a similar version in February. The Senate bill next heads back to the House so representatives can vote on the most recent version. Once they pass it, which they will, it next goes to President Donald Trump’s desk to await his signature. He is expected to sign it.

The HALT Fentanyl Act also cleared the House when it was introduced during the previous congress, but at that time it didn’t have enough support in the Democrat-majority Senate to make it to a vote. Now, in addition to Republicans holding the Senate majority, the Act has picked up more bipartisan support.

...

Permanent class-wide bans are not the norm. This legislation would bypass the Drug Enforcement Administration and Food and Drug Administration rulemaking process for scheduling controlled substances, allowing new FRS to be placed under Schedule I automatically. (Fentanyl itself would remain in Schedule II.)

Rather than having to produce evidence that a particular FRS is harmful, prosecutors would just have to show that it is an FRS. This will make it a lot less work to convict someone, which in turn will make prosecutors inclined to pursue a lot more of these cases.

The Act would also establish broad quantity-based mandatory minimum sentences for FRS-related convictions. People convicted on distribution charges involving more than 10 grams could not be sentenced to less than five years in prison, and not less than 10 years if they had a prior conviction. For cases involving more than 100 grams, the mandatory minimums for a first-time conviction would be 10 years; for a second conviction, 20 years.

Archived at https://archive.is/pQhYd

top 13 comments
sorted by: hot top controversial new old
[–] Godort@lemm.ee 39 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

Does this mean that someone could be jailed for a decade for carrying narcan in a first aid kit?

[–] AstridWipenaugh@lemmy.world 7 points 2 weeks ago (3 children)

I don't think so. The bill was written by a chemist. I don't know what fentanyl or narcan are from a chemical perspective to be able to evaluate if the law would apply to narcan. It says this:

‘‘(e)(1) Unless specifically exempted or unless listed in another schedule, any material, compound, mixture, or preparation which contains any quantity of a fentanyl-re- lated substance, or which contains the salts, isomers, and salts of isomers of a fentanyl-related substance whenever the existence of such salts, isomers, and salts of isomers is possible within the specific chemical designation.

[–] Godort@lemm.ee 3 points 2 weeks ago* (last edited 2 weeks ago)

This could be read as "Any opioid we haven't made a specific exemption for is illegal."

Narcan is technically an opioid and has no schedule(that I could find), so unless there is a specific exemption, you might be doing 5-10 years if you want to be prepared for an opioid overdose.

[–] SuperNovaStar@lemmy.blahaj.zone 3 points 2 weeks ago

The bill was written by a chemist.

That isn't reassuring.

[–] futatorius@lemm.ee 1 points 2 weeks ago

Well, it's good that they ruled out possession of chemically impossible related substances.

[–] valaramech@fedia.io 24 points 2 weeks ago (2 children)

Ah, yes, let's make the already illegal thing even more illegal. As if that ever stopped anyone...

[–] TragicNotCute@lemmy.world 10 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

It’s double illegal now. Everyone knows that’s when shit gets super serious.

[–] xmunk@sh.itjust.works 5 points 2 weeks ago

I triple dog illegal it.

[–] MoreFPSmorebetter@lemmy.zip -2 points 2 weeks ago

Do you carry this same logic over to additional firearms laws or do laws suddenly stop criminals in that argument?

[–] plz1@lemmy.world 14 points 2 weeks ago

This has a whiff of "punishment for crack is 10x worse than punishment for powder cocaine"...

[–] HowAbt2morrow@futurology.today 12 points 2 weeks ago

All of these folks are going to the Bukele prison system, never to be seen again.

[–] some_guy@lemmy.sdf.org 7 points 2 weeks ago

On March 14, the Senate passed legislation that would permanently ban fentanyl-related substances (FRS) under Schedule I of the Controlled Substances Act. S. 331, better known as the Halt All Lethal Trafficking (HALT) of Fentanyl Act, would escalate the mass incarceration crisis by fast-tracking prosecution of cases involving any substance with a chemical structure similar to fentanyl, even if the substance is inert.

Great. That sounds like a wonderful idea, you clowns. This is the 1990s three-strikes bullshit all over again. But we love locking people up, so…

[–] UltraGiGaGigantic@lemmy.ml 0 points 2 weeks ago

All drugs should be regulated and legal.