SACRAMENTO, Calif. — Assembly Republicans struck a deal Thursday morning to move up a special hearing on fentanyl-related bills in the Assembly Public Safety Committee to next week.
Assemblyman Reggie Jones-Sawyer had planned to hear all fentanyl-related bills in the summer. Republicans in the state legislature felt that was still too long to wait and had planned to force a floor vote on the all the bills that have been killed by the committee.
“Victims are coming and telling you they want something now. For years they’ve said this. And for the chair of the public safety committee to say I’m going to wait till September and have some conversation about it — I’m sorry you’re taking too long,” said Assembly Minority Leader James Gallagher.
GOP legislators and some moderate Democrats have had enough of what they feel is a lack of action from the Assembly Public Safety Committee on the growing fentanyl crisis.
No bill focused on increasing penalties or prison time for fentanyl related offenses, despite having bipartisan support, has passed through the public safety committee.
Earlier this week, Republican lawmakers and people who’ve lost loved ones to fentanyl gathered at the California State Capitol to call out the committee for not acting on the growing crisis.
Matt Capelouto lost his daughter, Alexandra, to fentanyl poisoning after she bought what she thought was a painkiller from someone on Snapchat.
“By not having any means of holding them accountable, they will continue to sell and just like my daughter, more people are going to die and that’s on the hands of the public safety committee,” Capelouto said.
Capelouto has traveled up to Sacramento from Temecula multiple times to support legislation that would have imposed stricter punishments for fentanyl dealers.
“It’s just unconscionable that members of the public safety committee have not done passed a single bill to hold fentanyl dealers accountable,” Capelouto adds.
The grieving father has become numb to all the times the legislators have offered their condolences and then proceeded to vote down the legislation he was advocating for.
“It’s a slap in the face. It’s very disrespectful. Their condolences, their sorrows, are overpowered by the fact that they just don’t give a damn and it’s disgusting,” Capelouto said.
Jones-Sawyer has experienced the personal tragedy of losing family members to drug addiction and is still dealing with the pain that comes with losing a loved one.
“When people say I don’t feel their pain, I feel it deeply and I feel it even now even though it may have happened 10 years ago, it never really goes away,” Jones-Sawyer said.
Jones-Sawyer believes the best way to address fentanyl and drug addiction is as a health crisis and not by imposing penalties that have been ineffective in the past
“I think a lot of bills that don’t get through are based on old paradigms that have proven that they didn’t work,” Jones-Sawyer said.
The Assembly member says he has rejected numerous bills because many of them would have unintended consequences that would create a similar scenario to the War on Drugs in the ‘80s and ‘90s.
“The war on drugs proved that it was really a war on people of color. If you look at the playbook that they are using now for fentanyl, go back to the playbook that they used for crack cocaine. It’s almost the exact same,” Jones-Sawyer explained.
This is a sentiment Capelouto strongly disagrees with due to how much more deadly fentanyl is than other drugs, likening it more to a poison.
“This is not the war on drugs. We have never seen a manmade deadly chemical like fentanyl,” Capelouto said.
For Capelouto and all the other grieving families, imposing stricter penalties would help create a safer future for everyone and bring justice to those who continue to target unsuspecting victims.
The special hearing is scheduled for Thursday April 27 in the Assembly Public Safety Committee.
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