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A desperate battle has been waged at the Capitol to address the number one killer of people between the ages of 18 and 45 fentanyl. Minnesota may finally be on a better path.

Thanks to a coalition including grieving families, community leaders, law enforcement and prosecutors, common sense legislation increasing penalties for fentanyl trafficking to equal the penalties for heroin are included in the public safety bill (SF2909) thats on its way to Gov. Tim Walz for his expected signature. A bill to require and fund lifesaving Narcan in Minnesota schools is included in the education finance bill.

These glimmers of hope confront a sobering reality. Well more than 107,000 Americans and more than 1,200 Minnesotans were killed by drug overdoses in 2021, and fentanyl is the biggest killer. Fentanyl deaths are rising sharply. One kilogram of fentanyl can kill 500,000. The emergency department at Hennepin County Medical Center is overwhelmed by 100 overdose patients a week.

As a prosecutor, I have witnessed this carnage: Parents appearing at court hearings scared to death that if released from jail and without treatment, their children will die. Heartbroken friends and families of overdose victims speaking at sentencing hearings. Desperate addicts marshaling strength and courage to fight a demon that has consumed them.

We have a moral imperative to do everything in our power to save the lives of our young people from this poison. Success will require us to recognize two essential truths.

First, the threat from fentanyl and other powerful synthetic drugs is a threat to public health exponentially greater than any prior drug epidemic we have faced.

Second, knee-jerk partisan narratives must be rejected in favor of a nuanced approach that considers every possible solution.

Fentanyl is 50 times more powerful than heroin.

Experts suggest that between 40% and 60% of fentanyl pills are potentially fatal.

Fentanyl is present in as many as 90% of the counterfeit oxycodone pills seized by law enforcement, and is frequently mixed with cocaine, methamphetamine, and heroin.

Its so bad that bipartisan legislation in Congress seeks to classify fentanyl as a weapon of mass destruction. Indeed, given its lethality it may be more accurate to consider it a poison than a drug.

There is no clear historical precedent for fentanyl or other super-charged synthetic drugs. Yes, methamphetamine, cocaine, heroin and prescription drugs have ruined and taken lives. Never, however, have we been faced with a drug that carries a significant potential of a life-threatening overdose every time it is used. But for Narcan and the heroic work of emergency responders, far more overdoses would result in death.

Prior to the 2023 legislative session, boilerplate political narratives blocked any progress. As recently as 2021 the Minnesota Senate, with Republicans in the majority, passed a bill increasing penalties for fentanyl trafficking by a decisive bipartisan vote of 62-5. The bill never received a vote in the DFL-majority House. The legislation requiring and funding Minnesota schools to have lifesaving Narcan failed to survive the legislative gridlock in both 2021 and 2022.

Some folks on the left would label any effort to prosecute purveyors of this poison for profit as a part of the failed War on Drugs strategy of the past.

But thats the wrong analysis, given Minnesotas approach to prosecuting drug offenses coupled with fentanyls unique threats to public health.

Minnesota is in fact a probation-first/treatment-first state. Our prison rates by population are low, whereas the number of residents on probation is comparatively high. In courthouses throughout the state, defense attorneys, prosecutors and judges continue to find ways to keep users and user-dealers out of prison. The Minnesota Drug Sentencing Reform Act of 2016 aimed specifically to keep addicts out of prison wherever possible.

Knowingly selling fentanyl again, a poison as much as a narcotic even if in part to fuel an addiction, is a criminal act worthy of punishment. Selling a product as lethal as fentanyl knowing the result could be overdose or death cannot be excused as simply an act of addiction or economic desperation.

Concerns from progressives as to the unequal impact of the War on Drugs on communities of color have merit. A different racial inequity, however, can be seen in the tragic disparities in death rates by fentanyl overdose in our Indigenous communities and communities of color. Minnesota has among the largest racial disparities gap in overdose deaths in the United States. As a percentage of population, more than nine times as many Indigenous residents die of overdoses as white Minnesotans. Overdose deaths among Black Minnesotans are three times as high as in white Minnesotans.

The storyline we hear from the right has also been destructive. Addiction is a disease. Deterrence through harsher penalties must be focused rather than indiscriminate. Fentanyl is coming into the United States through Mexico, but generally through sophisticated networks involving commercial vehicles and not desperate migrants crowding the border. Treatment and harm reduction must be central to any effort to stop this epidemic.

House and Senate members on both sides of the aisle can learn from GOP Rep. Dave Bakers support of both a public safety and a public health approach. Rep. Kelly Moller, DFL-Shoreview, and Sen. Ron Latz, DFL-St. Louis Park, have worked with Baker and GOP members in a refreshing show of bipartisanship.

As chair of the Opioid Epidemic Response Advisory Council, Baker, who lost a son to opioids, is working with an impressive board of doctors and health professionals dedicated to a comprehensive public health approach to opioid addiction.

There are also hopeful signs that congressional action may be on the horizon. President Joe Biden, no doubt spurred to action by reports from high level public safety and national security experts, specifically called for increasing federal penalties for fentanyl trafficking in his recent State of the Union address. U.S. Rep. Angie Craig, a Democrat from the 2nd District, spoke powerfully of the need to address fentanyl through aggressive drug interdiction efforts at the recent rally at the Minnesota Capitol.

Former Attorney General Eric Holder recently cautioned both the left and the right to avoid a reflexive response to the historic challenges of the fentanyl epidemic. The breadth and scope of this challenge requires both a vigorous criminal justice approach and a public health response.

We need an all-of-the-above approach, including focused deterrence, harm reduction, education and awareness and a comprehensive public health response.

With every passing day that we dont act, more people die.

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Let's applaud the bipartisan approach to fentanyl at the state Capitol ... - Minnesota Reformer