Rep. DesJarlais introduces House version of bill to allow Title 42 to be used to stop drug smuggling

FIRST ON FOX: Rep. Scott DesJarlais, R-Tenn., has introduced the House version of a bill that would allow the Title 42 public health order – which the Biden administration is moving to lift -- to be used to prevent the smuggling of drugs into the U.S. via the southern border.

Title 42 was implemented by The Trump administration in March 2020 in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. While it is a public health order to be used to prevent communicable diseases, it has become a central border policy for both the Trump and Biden administrations.

HAGERTY INTRODUCES BILL TO ALLOW TITLE 42 TO BE USED TO PROTECT US FROM DRUG SMUGGLING 

Now, with pandemic restrictions winding down across the country, the Biden administration announced on Friday it will end Title 42 on May 23 -- raising fears that the already high number of migrants coming to the southern border will surge in the months ahead. Border Patrol Chief Raul Ortiz recently said that the U.S. was on track to have encountered a million migrants in the first six months of FY 2022.

"After considering current public health conditions and an increased availability of tools to fight COVID-19 (such as highly effective vaccines and therapeutics), the CDC Director has determined that an Order suspending the right to introduce migrants into the United States is no longer necessary," the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention announced in a statement.

BIDEN ADMINISTRATION TO LIFT TITLE 42 AT END OF MAY, DESPITE FEARS OF LOOMING MIGRANT WAVE 

The legislation, first introduce by Sen. Bill Hagerty, R-Tenn., in the Senate, would add a further circumstance in which Title 42 can be used -- to prevent the smuggling of illicit drugs into the U.S. 

DesJarlais and Hagerty have pointed to the flow of opioids, specifically fentanyl, that come in via the southern border after production in Mexico after being produced with precursors from China.

"It’s an important issue because we’ve seen record numbers crossing our borders and that was slowed down due to Title 42, but the opioid epidemic is killing in the neighborhood of 100,000 people a year," DesJarlais told Fox News Digital in an interview. 

"To put into perspective, that's as many people in one year we've lost to drug overdoses than we have to combat casualties dating back to the Korean War, so it certainly should be considered a public health emergency, and it puts a tool in the arsenal of our Border Patrol agents to stem the unprecedented flow of illegals across the southern border."

The legislation allows for the use of Title 42 when it is determined that "by reason of the existence of substantial illicit drug smuggling from a foreign country, there is serious danger of the introduction of such drugs into the United States, and that this danger is so increased by the introduction of persons and property…"

REPUBLICAN STATES SUE TO STOP BIDEN ADMIN'S LIFTING OF TITLE 42 BORDER POLICY 

DesJarlais, himself a physician, said that daily opioid deaths across the country are now exceeding COVID-19 deaths, and that it is killing Americans as the cartels include fentanyl in their supplies of other drugs, including marijuana.

"Its such a dangerous drug because it’s so potent, its 60-100 times for potent than morphine which is dangerous when improperly used, but it's being disguised by the cartels as other drugs and being added and derivatives are being made that can be dangerous and unpredictable," he said.

The legislation is one of a number of moves by Republicans to push back against the Biden administration’s plans to end Title 42. But DesJarlais noted that a number of Democrats, including those in the border states, have also sounded the alarm about the move -- and said it should be a bipartisan issue.

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"I just have a hard time understand why Democrats, Republicans, anyone would want to allow a system that is so generous allowing one million each year to emigrate here legally would turn a blind eye to letting another million in especially when we know that there's crime, sex trafficking and…drug trafficking coming in and killing Americans," he said. "So it shouldn't be a partisan issue, it’s an issue of national security."