After Roger Marshall's border trip, how do we combat drug addiction beyond politics and policing?
Senator Roger Marshall and five Kansas sheriffs headed to the southern border earlier this week for briefings, tours and meetings with border patrol officials.
The Topeka Capital-Journal’s Jason Tidd reports joining Marshall are Shawnee County Sheriff Brian Hill, Jackson County Sheriff Tim Morse, Saline County Sheriff Roger Soldan, Franklin County Sheriff Jeff Richards, and Johnson County Sheriff Calvin Hayden.
They are there according to Marshall’s office because of Title 42, a Trump-era public health order designed to expel asylum-seeking migrants from the United States' borders to avoid spreading COVID-19, which is set to expire, and the growing fentanyl crisis.
"The crisis at our southern border is our biggest, most immediate national security threat," Marshall said in a statement.
Tidd reports statewide data from the Kansas Department of Health and Environment shows a rise in fentanyl overdose deaths. The 54% increase year-over-year was attributed to fentanyl, though the drug had the same number of deaths as methamphetamine.
Meanwhile, CDC data showed Kansas had the sharpest increase in drug overdose deaths of any state in the nation.
It should be noted that yes, a majority of fentanyl in Kansas does originate south of the U.S. border. However, the situation is more complex than stopping illicit drug trafficking at the border.
"The problem is demand," KBI director Kirk Thompson previously told The Capital-Journal. "No matter what the drug is, law enforcement can't solve that problem alone.
"The demand by our citizens, the demand from people here for the illegal drugs, drives that supply chain."
Thompson suggests while law enforcement targets the supply chain, the broader focus should be on addressing addiction.
"If there's no demand for a product, there's going to be no sales of that product," Thompson said. "There's going to be no organizations that develop to bring that product in. So yeah, I think in the equation demand is always the driver."
Last month, Republican senators shot down a proposal which experts say would save lives.
Public health officials suggest fentanyl test strips are one of the best ways politicians can combat overdoses. The test strips alert users to whether fentanyl is in their drugs and are cheap to produce. However, they are illegal in Kansas because they are deemed "drug paraphernalia."
Republicans balked at the idea.
Raising awareness is good and important, but what are the next steps? How can we combat drug addiction beyond politics and policing? These are questions we think Senator Marshall should be asking.
This article originally appeared on Topeka Capital-Journal: Kansas senator, sheriffs should look beyond politics after border trip
