NASHVILLE, Tenn. (WSMV) – New Tennessee Attorney General Jonathan Skrmetti has joined a multi-state effort to urge President Joe Biden to classify fentanyl as a “weapon of mass destruction.”
Skrmetti has joined a group of 18 state attorneys general to demand Biden take “decisive action” in response to a record spike in fentanyl-related overdose deaths, a media release said.
“Fentanyl has caused too many tragic deaths on an individual level and, as we have seen overseas, it can also be weaponized to cause mass casualties,” Skrmetti said in the release. ”Our governments at every level must take a broad-spectrum approach to protecting American lives from the harms of fentanyl.”
This would require the Department of Homeland Security and the Drug Enforcement Administration to coordinate a response with other agencies, including the Department of Defense, “as opposed to the federal government only treating the substance as a narcotics control problem.”