DeSantis, Ramaswamy On Ending Fentanyl Shipments: Kill The Smugglers, Build Two Walls

At Wednesday night’s third Republican presidential primary debate for 2024, the five candidates spent two hours trading jabs in Miami over the usual topics, including how they’d handle the country’s devastating opioid crisis.

One of the moderators, conservative talk radio host Hugh Hewitt, said his listeners view the border with Mexico as a top priority due to the millions of illegals crossing into the U.S. who, he said, become a burden. And then there are the 150 illegals who were found to be on a terrorist list. 

“But I want to talk about opioids specifically and fentanyl,” he said after his not-so-subtle linking of migrants fleeing violence and poverty to fentanyl smugglers.

Fact check: Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas said in February that it was "unequivocally false that fentanyl is being brought to the United States by non-citizens encountered in between the ports of entry who are making claims of credible fear and seeking asylum." 

Hewitt proceeded to ask the presidential hopefuls, “What can you do as commander-in-chief on the first day to stop fentanyl and the waterfall of it into this country?” 

DeSantis: Kill Them Dead

We’ve heard Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis’s plan for drug smugglers on various occasions in the past, but he reiterated it verbatim for the debate: “If someone in the drug cartels is sneaking fentanyl across the border when I’m president, that’s gonna be the last thing they do. We’re gonna shoot them stone-cold dead."

Ramaswamy: Build A Wall On Both Borders 

Vivek Ramaswamy said he would focus on both the southern and northern borders to combat the fentanyl crisis. Why you might ask?

“There was enough fentanyl that was captured just on the northern (Canadian) border last year to kill 3 million Americans. So, we got to just skate to where the puck is going, not just where the puck is,” Ramaswamy said, referring to Canadian hockey star Wayne Gretzky. “Don’t just build the wall; build both walls.”

Fact check: Toxicology experts told The World radio news that to kill three million people would require around 13 pounds of fentanyl.

Claims like Ramaswamy’s assume that every American has the same chance of dying of a fentanyl overdose, which is not the case. 

Secondly, in terms of the two-wall suggestion, the DEA reported 14 pounds of fentanyl were seized on the Canadian border in all of 2022, which represents one-thousandth of the 14,700 pounds seized mostly at official ports of entry at the southern border.

The remaining debaters: Tim Scott talked about Mexican labs and dealing with “our ports of entry.” Chris Christie talked about beefing up law enforcement and Nikki Haley said, "We'll send special operations in to take out the cartels."

Read Next: GOP's Ramaswamy Gives 2 Reasons For Voting Against Ohio Cannabis Legalization After Saying 'It's A Joke' Pot Is Not Legal Nationwide

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