LIMA, OH (WLIO) - An Ohio senator says a new funding bill to help war-torn areas around the world will also help fight the growing drug problem in the United States.
President Biden signed the $95 billion funding bill for aid to help Ukraine, Israel, and Taiwan. The U.S. Senate passed the bill last night, and Senator Sherrod Brown calls the legislation important to national security. Brown says we know who our enemies are: North Korea, Russia, Iran, and China, and he adds that we don't want to go to war with them, but this funding tells them we mean business.
"If Russia overruns Ukraine, then Russia bumps up against NATO, against those borders, and that's only more trouble for the United States. So, it's to protect our national interests, our national security. It's helping to make sure that humanitarian aid gets into Gaza. Too many innocent people have died. The Iron Dome, which is important in Israel, to keep Iranian attacks, to blunt Iranian attacks is important. To keep China in check in Taiwan is important," stated Senator Sherrod Brown, (D) Ohio.
With the foreign aid bill, Senator Brown's "Fend Off Fentanyl Act" was also signed into law. He says 400 Ohioans die every month from the synthetic opioid, and this will hit Mexican and Chinese traffickers where it hurts the most.
"Forget the statistics, think of what it does to a family in Lima, or a family in Wapak, or a family in Ottawa, and think what it does to a community. So, we are attacking at its source, we are sanctioning the Chinese communist parties, precursor chemical makers, and we are sanctioning the cartels in Mexico that make the fentanyl and how it important it is to go to the source, hit them where it hurts, their pocketbooks," explained Senator Brown.
Brown says efforts need to be increased at the border to prevent the drug from coming into the United States and help law enforcement and treatment centers deal with the fentanyl issue in their communities.
