Washington—Senators Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) and Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), co-chairs of the U.S. Senate Caucus on International Narcotics Control, today introduced legislation to help combat transnational drug trafficking.

Senators Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.), Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.), and Heidi Heitkamp (D-N.D.), Tom Udall (D-N.M.) joined Feinstein and Grassley in introducing the bill.

The Transnational Drug Trafficking Act, which passed the Senate unanimously in the 112th and 113th Congresses, would provide the Department of Justice with new tools to prosecute drug traffickers from foreign countries. Specifically, it will help the department build extradition cases on drug kingpins from the Andean region, which includes Colombia and Peru. Kingpins from these countries often use Mexican drug trafficking organizations as intermediaries to ship illegal narcotics to the United States.

“Drug traffickers have found new ways to circumvent U.S. laws, and our bill gives law enforcement much-needed tools to reduce the supply of drugs crossing our borders,” said Senator Feinstein. “The federal government needs the authority to aggressively pursue transnational criminal organizations and drug kingpins to reduce the flow of illegal drugs into the United States.”

“Since drug cartels are continually evolving, this legislation ensures that our criminal laws keep pace,” said Senator Grassley. “This legislation closes a loophole abused by drug traffickers who intend for drugs to end up in the United States but supply them through an intermediary.”

The Transnational Drug Trafficking Act would:

•         Establish penalties for extraterritorial drug trafficking activity when individuals have reasonable cause to believe that illegal drugs will be trafficked into the United States.
•         Ensure current penalties apply to chemical producers from other countries (including producers of pseudoephedrine used for methamphetamine) that illegally ship precursor chemicals into the U.S. knowing these chemicals will be used to make illegal drugs.
•         Support the administration’s “Strategy to Combat Transnational Organized Crime.”
 

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