SPRINGFIELD (WBBM NEWSRADIO) — Illinois Senate Republicans have proposed a bill to make the punishment for fentanyl manufacturing and distribution more severe, but it faces an uncertain fate in an environment where Democrats are reluctant to expand penalties.
The Democratic Party has maintained its supermajority in both the state House and Senate going into 2023.
Under the proposal, selling or dispensing a scheduled drug would carry a punishment of nine to 40 years in prison. That includes prescription drugs, such as Adderall and Vicodin, both of which contain fentanyl.
The bill also creates a crime, with a fine of up to $100,000, for using electronic communications in the furtherance of trafficking any drug that includes fentanyl.
“Nationally, nearly 70,000 people from the age of 18 and older died in 2021 from synthetic opioid-related incidents, according to the CDC,” said one of the sponsors, State Sen. Sue Rezin (R-Morris), at a statehouse news conference Tuesday. “And 90% of those deaths were fentanyl-related.”
“This is the equivalent of one plane crashing each and every day,” she said.
If that happened, it would be all over the news — unlike the fentanyl crisis, Rezin said.
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