Political Quotes

“I rise to talk about an amendment that I filed. We are hoping we will get to the point where both sides will come together and have an agreement on amendments, but I know we have some more work to do. If I had to describe this amendment, this is one of those you can describe in one word: ``fentanyl.'' There is not a community in the country--big city, small town, rural area, suburban community--that hasn't been ravaged by fentanyl in one way or another. We all know it is in every State. When I consider the challenge we have in Pennsylvania, when I look at the counties with the largest percentage of their population who have been victims of an overdose, the so-called overdose death rate, those counties are not one kind of county. They are a lot of small, rural counties that have a lot of small towns. They are counties with big cities in them and big urban populations. So no matter where you live, fentanyl is a problem. The overdose death rate is almost all fentanyl-related in my State of Pennsylvania. Something on the order of 70 or 75 percent or higher of the overdose deaths are fentanyl-related. So I don't think anyone in this Chamber--Democrat, Republican, or Independent--would disagree with the scale and the severity of the fentanyl problem. There are some things we can do about it, investments we can make that we should not fail to make in the short term, in the near term, and, I hope, with this legislation.…”