(WASHINGTON) — Arizona Republican Rep. Andy Biggs on Wednesday rolled out new impeachment articles against Department of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, saying the top Biden administration official has “violated his oath of office, wreaking havoc on this country and he must be impeached.”
“He must be impeached because he is a public official who has lost public trust and is an imminent threat to the United States of America,” Biggs said at a Capitol Hill news conference.
Biggs, who previously introduced articles in 2021, said he would be filing the articles while standing alongside fellow conservative GOP members, including Reps. Lauren Boebert, Marjorie Taylor Greene, Bob Good and others. The presser began as House Speaker Kevin McCarthy’s first in-person meeting with President Joe Biden since winning the gavel was slated to begin.
“Secretary Mayorkas has failed to faithfully uphold his oath and has instead presided over a reckless abandonment of border security and immigration enforcement, the expense of the Constitution and the security of the United States,” the articles read.
Biggs did not provide a hard timeline for when the articles would be moved forward in committee.
When asked if Speaker McCarthy supported the effort to impeach Mayorkas, Biggs didn’t answer directly, but said he was hopeful, adding, “We start this hopefully at the Judiciary Committee.”
Greene made it clear she intends to target President Biden, once again calling to impeach him as well: “It’s also President Biden’s responsibility. I’ve called for his impeachment because of his failure to protect our country as well. And I’ll continue to call to impeach President Biden for that reason as well.”
The articles also come as Republicans held their first hearing on the border crisis, highlighting the issue at the House Judiciary Committee earlier on Wednesday.
The move follows months of conservative Republicans vowing to impeach Mayorkas and even with Speaker McCarthy holding an event on the border weeks back calling for an investigation into the DHS secretary.
Biggs’s announcement also comes weeks after Rep. Pat Fallon, R-Texas, introduced his own impeachment articles against Mayorkas on Jan. 10. Fallon accused Mayorkas of failing to maintain operational control, providing false testimony to Congress and misleading the public. A DHS official said at the time they believed Fallon’s impeachment articles had no factual grounds.
Biggs said Wednesday he and Fallon will co-sponsor each other’s impeachment resolutions.
Mayorkas said in January, just after Republicans took control of the House, that he was ready for any congressional investigations and that he had no intention of resigning.
“I’ve got a lot of work to do, and we’re going to do it,” Mayorkas told ABC News’ George Stephanopoulos on “This Week.”
(VANCOUVER, Canada) — The Canadian province of British Columbia said it’s decriminalizing small amounts of some drugs to help combat the number of drug overdose deaths.
During the three-year pilot program, which started Jan. 31, no one 18 years and older will be charged if caught in possession of 2.5 grams of certain illegal drugs, including heroin, meth, ecstasy, among others, for personal use.
“We know criminalization drives people to use alone. Given the increasingly toxic drug supply, using alone can be fatal,” Jennifer Whiteside, B.C.’s Minister of Mental Health and Addictions, said in a statement Monday. “Decriminalizing people who use drugs breaks down the fear and shame associated with substance use and ensures they feel safer reaching out for life-saving supports. This is a vital step to get more people connected to the services and supports as the Province continues to add them at an unprecedented rate.”
At least 2,272 people died of an overdose in the province in 2022, officials said. At least 2,306 people died in 2021.
The number of “illicit drug toxicity deaths” was about 6.4 deaths per day in November and December last year, authorities said.
“The shocking number of lives lost to the overdose crisis requires bold actions and significant policy change. I have thoroughly reviewed and carefully considered both the public health and public safety impacts of this request,” Carolyn Bennett, Minister of Mental Health and Addictions of Canada, said in a statement. “Eliminating criminal penalties for those carrying small amounts of illicit drugs for personal use will reduce stigma and harm and provide another tool for British Columbia to end the overdose crisis.”
While certain drugs are decriminalized, Bennett said the exemption doesn’t mean they are legal. It means adults will no longer be arrested, charged or have their drugs seized. Instead, police will offer information on available health and social supports and will help with referrals when requested, officials said.
Possession of any drugs will continue to be a criminal offense on school grounds and at child care facilities, officials said.
“Decriminalization is an important part of an integrated approach, along with safer supply and public-health supports, to divert persons who use drugs away from the criminal justice system and toward health services and pathways of care because substance use is a health matter, not a criminal one,” Deputy Chief Const. Fiona Wilson, Vancouver Police Department, said in a statement Monday. “This approach has the potential to address harms associated with substance use, reduce stigma, prevent overdose deaths and increase access to health and social services.”
(WASHINGTON) — The FBI has contacted a Navy veteran, Richard Osthoff, as part of an investigation into embattled Rep. George Santos and a GoFundMe campaign to raise money for Osthoff’s sick service dog.
Osthoff confirmed the call from the FBI, and sources familiar with the matter confirmed the nature of the investigation — which adds to the growing list of legal issues and controversies Santos, R-N.Y., is facing.
The freshman lawmaker insists he isn’t a “criminal” and has said he will leave office if he isn’t reelected. He has acknowledged and apologized for lying about parts of his background while maintaining that he was only embellishing his resume.
According to previous ABC News reporting, a source familiar said Santos, using the name Anthony Devolder, ran a GoFundMe account in 2016 under the auspices of a charity, Friends of Pets United, and raised some $3,000 to ostensibly help Osthoff pay for surgery to remove a tumor from his dog.
MORE: Investigations and complaints facing George Santos could bring serious penalties
Osthoff told ABC News that Santos did not come through with the money and ignored text messages about it. Osthoff says his dog, Sapphire, ultimately died from her condition.
“I don’t ever want to see another person, especially another veteran, go through this again,” Osthoff said.
Osthoff told ABC News that he was “glad to get the ball rolling with the big-wigs,” with the FBI involvement.
“I was worried that what happened to me was too long ago to be prosecuted,” he added.
A spokesperson for GoFundMe would not comment on any specifics but said the company will cooperate with any investigations.
Santos’ campaign previously described Friends of Pets United as a 501(c)(3) nonprofit, but IRS records do not list a charity under that name.
Santos told ABC News on Wednesday that he was unaware of the FBI probe and said of Osthoff, “I have no recollection of ever meeting him.” Osthoff previously provided a local news outlet with texts that he said were between him and Santos.
When asked if he was worried about being prosecuted, Santos responded, “I have no clue, I don’t know what it’s about.”
He also told ABC News he had not been contacted by anyone regarding the investigation. “I haven’t been reached out by them. So I can’t comment,” he said.
Federal prosecutors in Brooklyn are investigating Santos, including the charity, which is also part of an investigation by the New York attorney general’s office, according to sources familiar with both investigations.
Spokespeople for both the U.S. attorney’s office for the Eastern District of New York and the FBI’s New York field office declined to comment on the ongoing investigation.
The FBI outreach to Osthoff was first reported by Politico.
In December, as reports emerged about Santos fabricating some of his life story, he told The New York Post that he was sorry for “embellishing” but said: “This [controversy] will not deter me from having good legislative success. I will be effective. I will be good.”
(MIAMI) — But the four indictments laid out in federal court in Miami on Wednesday tell the very real story of a presidential assassination that has thrown Haiti into chaos for nearly two years, leaving the Haitian people with a feeble government and deadly challenges—gang rule, cholera and hunger chief among them, just miles from American shores.
In total, seven suspects are now in U.S. custody and facing charges related to the July 2021 assassination of Jovenel Moïse, including the four arraigned Wednesday: Haitian-American citizens James Solages, Joseph Vincent and Christian Emmanuel Sanon, and Colombian citizen Germán Rivera García.
In contrast, the case in Haiti itself has yet to yield any indictments and is now on its fifth judge amid a string of death threats. The narrative of the case by the government of acting President Ariel Henry, installed just weeks after Moïse’s assassination with U.S. and European backing, has faced some skepticism, fueled further by this week’s charges in Florida’s Southern District.
Sanon, for example, was alleged by Haitian authorities to be a key player at the center of the assassination plot—was arrested days after the killing.
But notably, the Justice Department didn’t charge him with conspiracy to commit murder or kidnapping. In fact, he’s instead facing a separate criminal complaint of smuggling charges.
That’s not to say that U.S. investigators believe he wasn’t involved in the plot. The Justice Department said Tuesday that Sanon sought to build his own “private military” force in Haiti and wanted to replace Moïse as president.
But the criminal complaint against the other three suspects alleged that one month before the assassination, Sanon was no longer seen as a “viable” replacement for Moïse, who critics accused of an illegal power grab.
It’s not the first time doubts have been cast on the Henry government’s narrative of the case. When Sanon was arrested in July 2021, associates were saying then that he was set up, according to The Associated Press.
“Sanon told [an associate] he was approached by people claiming to represent the U.S. State and Justice Departments, who wanted to install him as president. He said the plan was for Moïse to be arrested, not killed, and Sanon would not have participated if he knew Moïse would be assassinated,” the AP reported at the time.
Instead of Sanon, Solages and others turned to a former Supreme Court justice, Windelle Coq Thélot, allegedly securing her signature on a plea for material support to arrest Moïse made just weeks before his killing. She remains on the run, wanted by Haitian authorities.
Solages prepared that document in late June during a trip to southern Florida, requesting guns and other equipment from a private security firm and helping coordinate a team of Colombian mercenaries for the job, including Rivera.
At that point, most of the group reportedly believed the plan was to kidnap Moïse, including an outrageous plot to steal a plane and whisk him away from Port-au-Prince’s airport. Ultimately, that plot “did not go forward when the conspirators failed to obtain the plane and necessary weapons for the operation,” according to court documents.
Afterward, the plot shifted to killing the controversial, embattled president, but it’s unclear who actually knew that was the plan, even up until the day before it was to be executed.
As guns and equipment were being distributed on July 6, 2021, according to court documents, Solages “falsely told those gathered that it was a ‘CIA Operation,’ and, in substance, said that the mission was to kill President Moïse. During a jailhouse interview one year after the assassination, Vincent also told U.S. investigators that members “accepted” the idea of killing Moïse only “a few days prior,” per court documents.
But Solages told investigators at the same time that he knew “by mid-June” that killing Moïse was the plan—fueling suspicions that the others could have been set up or that other individuals were pulling the strings.
Why the plot shifted to killing Moïse and why his presidential guards didn’t better protect him remain key questions, left unanswered even after seven indictments in U.S. federal court.
Nineteen months after Moïse’s murder, Haiti’s government remains in chaos. There are no elected officials left, after a group of senators finished their terms last month. That includes Henry, seen as illegitimate by many Haitians because he was put in office by a power-sharing agreement, with U.S. and European backing. He had been named Moïse’s prime minister just days before the assassination, but had not yet been installed—and to some, his appointment was unconstitutional because he had not been elected.
As governance craters, gangs have commanded even greater authority, by controlling more territory, including in the capital. Last fall, gangs were able to shut the country down, cutting it off from needed fuel and food imports.
The one institution the U.S., and allies like Canada, have continued to support is the national police force. But last week, police rioted because of a lack of local support, especially after gangs killed over a dozen officers in as many days. Those protests targeted Henry’s offices and the airport as Henry returned from Argentina, briefly impeding him from leaving the facility.
The chaos has fueled a public health challenge, too. Cholera is once again spreading, killing approximately 500 people in the last four months and infecting over 25,000, according to the Haitian Ministry of Public Health and Population.
The United Nations has even warned of famine, which by its definition means when people have started dying of starvation.
“It’s difficult to believe that a mere two hours’ flight from Miami, a staggering 4.7 million people—half of Haiti’s population—are in the throes of a food crisis,” Jean-Martin Bauer, the head of the World Food Program in Haiti, said in December.
(DALLAS) — A day after two missing monkeys from the Dallas Zoo were found, the zoo is upping its reward for information on who may have been tampering with its animal exhibits.
The Dallas Zoo is now offering a $25,000 reward–up from $10,000– for information that leads to the arrest of the person, or people, responsible for a string of incidents at the zoo in January.
Two emperor tamarin monkeys went missing from their habitats at the zoo on Monday, which was “intentionally compromised,” the Dallas Zoo told ABC News in a statement.
The Dallas Police Department found the monkeys on Tuesday and alerted zoo officials.
According to the Dallas Zoo, on Wednesday, the monkeys, named Bella and Finn, were examined by veterinarians and were uninjured.
Dallas Police received a tip that the monkeys were at an abandoned home in Lancaster, a city in the Dallas area, and responding officers found the animals in a closet in the home shortly before 5 p.m. local time, police said.
Before the animals were found, Dallas PD released a photo on Tuesday of an unidentified man they are looking to speak with about the tamarin monkeys.
On Monday, the zoo said that it believed the monkeys were taken because emperor tamarin monkeys are most likely to stay close to their homes.
No arrests have been made and the investigation is ongoing, police said.
The missing monkeys were the latest in a series of animal incidents to rock the Dallas Zoo in January.
Last month, a clouded leopard escaped her enclosure after her fence was “intentionally cut,” officials said at the time. According to zoo officials, the female leopard, named Nova, was found the same day it went missing. Dallas police launched a criminal investigation into the incident.
In a similar incident last month, the Dallas Police Department opened a criminal investigation after finding a second fence cut inside the langur monkey habitat at the Dallas Zoo.
Despite the cut fence, no langurs escaped their habitat or appeared to be in danger or harmed, Dallas PD said in a press release.
Zoo workers found a rare and endangered vulture dead in its enclosure on Jan. 21, describing its death as “unusual.” Both police and zoo officials said the vulture, named Pin, did not appear to die from natural causes.
The Dallas Zoo confirmed that it had increased its security measures after the vulture’s death and the leopard’s escape.
(NEW YORK) — A revamped legal team representing Hunter Biden is taking the first steps in what appears to be a more aggressive approach to his defense, disseminating on Wednesday a batch of criminal referrals and cease-and-desist letters targeting some of his most vocal detractors.
Abbe Lowell, a lawyer for Hunter Biden, wrote to the Justice Department and the Delaware attorney general’s office asking investigators to examine the conduct of several operatives who allegedly played a role in “accessing, copying, manipulating, and/or disseminating Mr. Biden’s personal computer data,” including Rudy Giuliani, Steve Bannon, and other supporters of former President Donald Trump.
“The actions described above more than merit a full investigation and, depending on the resulting facts, may merit prosecution under various statutes,” Lowell said. “It is not a common thing for a private person and his counsel to seek someone else being investigated, but the actions and motives here require it.”
Law enforcement agencies are not obligated to act on such referrals, nor are they required to acknowledge them.
Lowell also wrote to the Internal Revenue Service requesting a probe into Garrett Ziegler, a former Trump White House aide who recently published a trove of emails allegedly tied to Hunter Biden. That letter challenges the tax-exempt status of Ziegler’s organization, Marco Polo, which is filed as a 501(c)(3).
Ziegler’s organization “has failed to operate solely for charitable purposes,” Lowell wrote to the agency. “To the contrary, [Marco Polo] has operated as little more than a thinly disguised political operation to attack the Biden administration and the Biden family.”
Bryan Sullivan, a defamation lawyer retained by Hunter Biden, also sent a cease-and-desist letter to Fox News and Tucker Carlson, asking the network and its primetime host to retract and correct a report they ran about alleged rent payments Hunter Biden made to his father, which they have claimed as evidence that the president was more closely tied to his son’s financial arrangements.
Carlson’s promulgation of the story stands in “flagrant violation of all journalistic professionalism,” wrote Sullivan, who also warned of “potential litigation” if the network fails to agree to a retraction by the end of the day on Thursday. Sullivan also asked that Fox News preserve any records related to its handling of the story.
The change in tack by lawyers for the president’s only living son comes at a precarious time for the younger Biden, as Republican scrutiny of his business dealings ramps up and federal prosecutors reportedly near the conclusion of their years-long probe into his tax affairs.
Federal authorities in the Delaware U.S. attorney’s office, led by U.S. Attorney David Weiss, a Trump-era appointee, have been investigating Hunter Biden since 2018, ABC News has previously reported, but paused for several months ahead of the 2020 presidential election.
The probe spilled into public view in December 2020, shortly after Joe Biden secured the presidency, when Hunter Biden confirmed the probe into his “tax affairs.” Prosecutors have since examined whether he paid adequate taxes on millions of dollars of his income, including money he made from multiple overseas business ventures.
Hunter Biden has repeatedly said he is cooperating with investigators and remains “100% certain” that he will be cleared of any wrongdoing. President Biden has said he and his son never discussed his foreign business dealings, and there are no indications that the federal investigation involves the president in any way. The White House has repeatedly sought to distance the president from the probe.
Meanwhile, on Capitol Hill, Republicans have taken their first investigative steps in a long-awaited congressional probe into the younger Biden. House Oversight Committee Chairman James Comer and Rep. Jim Jordan, chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, have called investigations into the president’s family a “top priority” and have pledged to “pursue all avenues” of wrongdoing. They said they “would love” to speak with Hunter Biden, but did not announce plans to issue a subpoena.
Lowell, a celebrated defense lawyer, joined Hunter Biden’s legal team in December to assist with congressional oversight inquiries. He has represented a number of high-profile political figures, including Jared Kushner and Ivanka Trump; Sen. Bob Menendez, D-N.J.; and former Sen. John Edwards.
(WASHINGTON) — President Joe Biden and House Speaker Kevin McCarthy met in the Oval Office for more than hour Wednesday, and afterward McCarthy called it a “good meeting, suggesting the two men might find a compromise over spending.
The highly anticipated meeting, the first the two men have held since McCarthy narrowly won the speakership last month, comes amid an ongoing standoff over the national debt limit.
“I think, at the of the day, we can find common ground,” McCarthy told reporters in the White House driveway.
There was no immediate characterization of how things went from the White House.
The president told reporters Monday that his message for McCarthy would be “show me your budget,” showing specific cuts he’s proposing in exchange for Republican support to lift the debt ceiling — and avoid a catastrophic default.
The White House has repeatedly said it would not negotiate with Republicans — that the stakes for the U.S. economy were too high, and that the limit had been raised 74 times before, including with Republican support under then-President Donald Trump.
But on Tuesday, the president suggested he was open to talking. Asked if he would negotiate with the speaker during Wednesday’s meeting, Biden responded simply, “Show me his budget.”
The president has long cast himself as a dealmaker, eager to sit down with Republicans to reach bipartisan agreements. At a fundraiser in New York on Tuesday, Biden referred to McCarthy as “a decent man.”
But he has also lambasted congressional Republicans as “extreme” and said McCarthy had given in to that faction to take control.
“Look at what he had to do,” the president said Tuesday. “He had to make commitments that were just absolutely off the wall for a speaker of the House to make in terms of being able to become a leader.”
Responding to Biden’s comments at the fundraiser, McCarthy said, “apparently he doesn’t understand.”
“I’m looking forward to sitting down with the president negotiating for the American public — the people of America — on how we can find savings,” McCarthy said.
When asked if he planned to make Biden a specific offer, McCarthy said, “I think we’re gonna sit down and negotiate.”
That public posturing was only the latest salvo launched between the two men.
Earlier Tuesday, McCarthy told reporters that he was “willing to sit down” with Biden “and finally get this done long before the debt limit hits its point that we have to get something done.”
“Because why would you put the economics of America in jeopardy?” he said. “Why would you play political games?”
McCarthy has noted he and Biden had “met many times prior to him being president,” although “not as often as being president.”
He said Tuesday the White House should “say they’re willing to negotiate, because the only irresponsible way is to play a political game and say, we’re not going to talk about it. It sounds pretty childish to me.”
Earlier in the day, top White House officials wrote in a memo that Biden planned to pose two questions to McCarthy during the meeting.
The president is expected to ask McCarthy if he will “commit to the bedrock principle that the United States will never default on its financial obligations” and whether he agrees with “former presidents, including Presidents Trump and Reagan, that it is critical to avoid debt limit brinksmanship,” according to the memo, which was first obtained by ABC News.
The authors of the memo — the president’s top economic adviser, Brian Deese, and the director of the White House budget office, Shalanda Young – noted Biden planned to release a budget on March 9. They challenged McCarthy to do the same.
“It is essential,” they wrote, “that Speaker McCarthy likewise commit to releasing a budget, so that the American people can see how House Republicans plan to reduce the deficit – whether through Social Security cuts; cuts to Medicare, Medicaid, and Affordable Care Act (ACA) health coverage; and/or cuts to research, education, and public safety – as well as how much their Budget will add to the deficit with tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans and large corporations, as in their first bill this year.”
In response, McCarthy wrote in a statement Tuesday: “Mr. President: I received your staff’s memo. I’m not interested in political games. I’m coming to negotiate for the American people.”
Republicans in the House have insisted on deep spending cuts in exchange for their cooperation on raising the debt ceiling.
The Republican Study Committee, which represents the largest group of Republicans in the House, previously called for revisions to Social Security and Medicare, including raising the age for Medicare to 67 and Social Security to the age of 70 for younger workers.
But McCarthy recently said any cuts to Social Security and Medicare would be “off the table.”
McCarthy pointed to the “Commitment to America” plan presented by Republicans before the midterms, which he said “strengthens” Medicare and Social Security. The White House has accused McCarthy of being “evasive” on his plan for government spending.
Pressed on what he meant by “strengthen” and whether he would seek to raise the retirement age — McCarthy said: “No, no, no. What I’m talking about Social Security, Medicare, you keep that to the side.”
“I want to find a reasonable and a responsible way that we can lift the debt ceiling but take control of this runaway spending,” McCarthy said.
Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell has expressed support for McCarthy. “We’re all behind Kevin,” he said Tuesday. “Wishing him well in the negotiations.”
Meanwhile, the White House has repeatedly said Biden will not negotiate or compromise by tying a debt limit increase to spending cuts, with the administration pointing to the bipartisan history of the ceiling being increased by both parties over the years.
“Attempts to exploit the debt ceiling as leverage will not work,” White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre told reporters last month. “There will be no hostage taking.”
Earlier this month, McCarthy made it clear he was holding firm.
“For the president to say he wouldn’t even negotiate — that’s irresponsible. We’re going to be responsible. We’re going to be sensible, and we’re going to get this done together. So the longer he waits, the more he puts the fiscal jeopardy of America up for grabs,” McCarthy told ABC News Senior Congressional Correspondent Rachel Scott last month. “We should sit down and get this done and stop playing politics,” he added.
The debt limit doesn’t allow government spending on new programs — instead it allows the U.S. to borrow any money it needs to pay for the nation’s existing bills.
The federal government hit the current debt ceiling, about $31.4 trillion earlier this month prompting the Treasury Department to step in with “extraordinary measures” which will allow the nation to avert a catastrophic default until June.
“President Biden will ask Speaker McCarthy to publicly assure the American people and the rest of the world that the United States will, as always, honor all of its financial obligations,” the memo stated.
ABC News’ Lauren Peller and Allison Pecorin contributed to this report.
(DETROIT) — Detroit police are searching for three local rappers who went missing after they were expected to perform at an event almost two weeks ago.
Police are looking for leads in the search for 38-year-old Armani Kelly, 31-year-old Dante Wicker and 31-year-old Montoya Givens, saying their phone records are very concerning.
“We are very concerned because there has been no activity on any of their phones,” Detroit Police Chief James White said during a press conference.
Police obtained search warrants for the three men’s phone records and said the phones are not hitting any towers nor have their owners communicated with anyone. There also has not been any activity on their online accounts.
The three men were together for a rap event at Lounge 31 on Jan. 21, but that event was canceled at the last minute. Police said they are unaware if the three men left the local bar together. Police are unsure what happened from that point, but White said they know the three men were together at some point that evening.
White said police are looking at video in the area as they continue their investigation.
A representative for Lounge 31 could not confirm to ABC News if the three men arrived at the venue the day of the performance, but said they are cooperating with police.
The event was canceled due to an issue with the DJ about 30 minutes before it was scheduled to begin, the representative said.
Police were able to locate a vehicle that belonged to an acquaintance of Kelly, but White said there were no signs of the three men. Police are also looking into an individual who was in possession of the vehicle when they found it to see if they are connected to the disappearance, according to White.
Detroit police asked members of the public to come forward with any information they have about the men.
“The case is wide open and extremely active,” White said.
(NEW YORK) — With the nation still in the grips of an opioid epidemic that began decades ago, the crisis has deepened in recent years with the introduction of fentanyl, a synthetic opioid that is up to 100 times more potent than morphine.
The driving force behind a record-breaking 100,000 overdose deaths per year, fentanyl is now being laced in traditional opioids like oxycodone and heroin, and increasingly, in non-opioids like cocaine and various counterfeit pills.
But with its high death rate, why would drug dealers lace drugs with fentanyl, effectively killing off their potential customers?
According to experts, there are many reasons fentanyl has become such a widely used illicit drug, despite its high overdose potential.
Fentanyl is not always a death sentence
Fentanyl isn’t just a street drug. It is also a legal painkiller than can be given safely under the right circumstances.
When it comes to why some people overdose after taking fentanyl and some do not, it’s really “the fluctuation in purity that makes it unpredictable and deadly,” according to Nabarun Dasgupta, PhD, epidemiologist at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill studying opioids.
According to law enforcement officers and former drug dealers interviewed by ABC News, drug dealers often think they can mitigate the risk for their clients by measuring the fentanyl carefully.
Done correctly, lacing illicit drugs with fentanyl often creates a return stream of customers because fentanyl is considered highly addictive. This is why fentanyl is often found in drugs like cocaine, counterfeit Xanax, counterfeit Adderall, or other drugs not classified as opioids.
“Fentanyl is good for business if you layer addiction into it,” Dasgupta said.
Fentanyl is a cheap alternative to other opioids
A fraction of fentanyl could mimic the highs of other opioids, like heroin or prescription painkillers. Dealers will often use simple binding agents and a small amount of fentanyl when making counterfeit opioid pills or what they say is heroin, according to law enforcement.
Because a smaller dose has a similar effect relative to other opioids, it is also easier to smuggle.
Eric Falkowski, an incarcerated former fentanyl dealer interviewed by ABC News, claimed he could make over ten times the amount of counterfeit opioid pills with a kilo of fentanyl rather than with a kilo of traditional components.
Fentanyl production does not have tight quality control
Legal pharmaceutical products are manufactured with safeguards in place to ensure quality control. Drug dealers may not have professional chemistry skills and may not have quality control tests, which means that small mistakes when mixing the drug can be fatal.
“Street drugs have gotten a lot more variable since the start of the pandemic. Now you have mom and pop shops making street drugs – that creates disincentives for stability and control,” Dasgupta said.
In a phone interview with ABC News from prison last year, Falkowski spelled out his process and blamed the death in Tennessee on faulty equipment/mismanagement.
“I felt like I could mitigate some of the dangerousness by using better manufacturing techniques […] and that worked for a long time.” He said, adding that the Tennessee overdose outbreak caused by his counterfeit pills “really came from some inadequate procedures and equipment.”
Falkowski was ultimately convicted and sentenced to up to 25 years in prison in 2018 for intentionally adding fentanyl to counterfeit pills that resulted in someone’s death and over a dozen near-fatal overdoses in Murfreesboro, Tennessee.
Overdose deaths usually lead to investigation by law enforcement, which is bad for business and can often result in the dealer’s arrest. However, the drug is so profitable that it’s worth the risk. Falkowski told ABC he was able to have “a pretty long run” selling drugs laced with fentanyl before his pills killed someone.
(NEW YORK) — Conagra Brands is recalling over 2.5 million pounds of canned meat and poultry after a packaging defect that might cause contamination was found, the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Food Safety and Inspection Service announced Tuesday.
The problem was discovered when a Congra location in Iowa notified FSIS after someone saw spoiled and leaking cans with multiple production dates in a warehouse, the agency said.
“Subsequent investigation by the establishment determined that the cans subject to recall may have been damaged in a manner that is not readily apparent to consumers, which may allow foodborne pathogens to enter the cans,” FSIS said in a statement.
The goods were produced between Dec. 12, 2022, and Jan.13, and shipped to retail locations across the country. The affected products have the establishment number “P4247,” according to the agency.
Customers who have purchased these products are asked not to consume them and to either throw them out or return them to the place of purchase.
