Meet the Press - July 2, 2023
Interview
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Good to be back, Chuck. Thanks.
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I don't know that Ohio's a lot worse than other states in that. I think Ohio partly because -- until I explain, it won't sound quite accurate, but because we've been hit so hard by bad trade agreements, from NAFTA, through PNTR with China. Where companies -- when I went to Johnny Appleseed Junior High School, I went to school in Mansfield, Ohio with the sons and daughters of machinists -- electrical workers at Westinghouse, and machinists at Tappan, and auto workers from GM, and carpenters and electricians, and insulators, and laborers. And those jobs -- ten years after I graduated, those jobs started to go south because these companies were looking for cheap labor. Then it went overseas. NAFTA, PNTR with China. And those communities have struggled and I think that, you know, addiction generally, whether it's alcohol, whether it's -- whether it's cocaine, whether it's fentanyl, tends to follow despair. I think that's probably why -- it doesn't mean fentanyl doesn't hit all segments of society, but it's probably worse in those communities.
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I'm agnostic on how we label them. I think the important thing is an all the above approach. When you look at it from the supply chain, to addiction, to death, in too many cases from fentanyl, it means we need to scale up treatment programs. I spent time at the Talbert House in Cincinnati, Brigid's Path in Dayton, all kinds of places where I'll sit around. One man in Cincinnati put his hand on the arm of his maybe 32-year-old daughter and said, "Without this treatment facility, Talbert House, my daughter would be dead." I hear those stories far too often. So I don't care what we call it.
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Yeah, we can scale them up if there's interest. But it's a partnership. And we have a state legislature that's about to eliminate apparently the sales tax on guns, continuing to cut taxes for rich people. They don't fund public education and public treatment programs the way that we should. We have a federal government that's too -- that's too sort of just uncertain about steps to take on these issues. A lot of local communities are stepping up. YWCAs are stepping up, all kinds of local programs like I mentioned. But it's all the above. So it's treatment programs, it's giving -- it's giving police the tools they need to bust fentanyl sellers safely because this stuff is so dangerous, to cutting off the actual source of it, the precursor chemicals coming out of China, and what's happening in Mexico,
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-- the crime syndicates.
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It's not in the Mexican government's interest that these cartels thrive the way they do. These are --
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Well, I'm not sure what he thinks. But I can't imagine by any measure of any quantifiable measure there that he can think this is good for his country. These are blood-thirsty people that'll do anything to make this kind of money. There's always death surrounding. I don't even mean deaths of Americans and Mexicans that overdose, I mean deaths because you can't penetrate them. And we have people that know how to do that in this country. We have people that know how to do the sanctions. And it's too important for us to back off. I don't think that -- I think he sees it's not in his interest to do that. He's a civilized guy that understands power, but he understands that cooperation with us matters too.
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I don't think nearly --
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First of all, it's probably impossible. And I would say presidents of both parties for years have failed at the border and have failed this whole issue of immigration at the border. So you can talk about all the technology. And I want the technology. I want our agents to have all the latest technology. Not just our agents, but our police and in Ohio, in Norwood, in Ohio, in Southern Ohio to have the kind of technology that could protect their lives and help them ferret this stuff out better. But I think that not nearly all the fentanyl through -- comes across the border. That's why our bill that Scott and I worked on is so important because it will cut back on the production, because we can't stop it all from coming in because it comes in a whole bunch of different ways.
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We need a secure border. And we need Congress to actually work together on that, not just demagogue issue after issue. But even a secure border doesn't keep this stuff out, nor will our sanctions mean none is produced. Again, it's all the above. It's treatment. It's police work. It's sanctions. It's border protection. It's all that.
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I like to think we learned something from the last -- from other, quote-unquote, "wars on drugs." First of all, we've learned that you can't just imprison everybody. You just can't arrest, and arrest, and arrest your way out of it. That's why we have this all of the above approach, that we're going after the source. We're giving police more. We're doing better on treatment. We've never dealt with alcoholism in this country either. We've tried.
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Yeah, we tried everything. Right. Right. I know lots of people who joined AA in their teens, their twenties, their thirties, and their lives have been really good, with temptations always around them. Some have committed suicide. Some have had all kinds of problems. So, I don't think we ever give up. But it's a human condition people have, of potential addiction.
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Thanks, Chuck.
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Good to be back.
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Yeah. Fair enough. Thank you.
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