(Beaver Falls, PA) 12th District United States Congressman Keith Rothfus joined Frank Sparks and News Director Pat Septak on Teleforum Tuesday October 23, 2018 to talk about Opioid Legislation and the need for a secure border.

The Congressman talked about his support for the bipartisan House-passed conference report to H.R.6, the Substance Use Disorder Prevention that Promotes Opioid Recovery and Treatment, commonly known as SUPPORT, for Patients and Communities Act.  This is a very comprehensive bill that contains several provisions of the Congressman’s bipartisan legislation for combating the opioid epidemic.

Rothfus told Frank and Pat that in June of this year the house passed more than 70 bipartisan bills to help combat the opioid crisis and that three sections of Rothfus’ legislation was incorporated into the conference report that President Trump is scheduled to sign into law Wednesday  October 24, 2018.  The three sections of Congressman Rothfus’ legislation are

• H.R. 5769, The Expanding Access to treatment Act– Helps offset the costs of training clinicians in Federally Qualified Health Centers and Rural Health Clinics.
• H.R. 6029, The REGROUP Act– Reauthorizes the Department of Justice’s Comprehensive Opioid Abuse Program through 2023 and triples its funding to $330 million per year.
• H.R. 5980, the CODE RED Act — Authorizes, develops, and implements a coordinated tracking system for federally-funded initiatives and grant programs dealing with opioid and substance abuse to enhance grant program effectiveness.

Rothfus also talked about the need  to secure our borders and that border security and the opioid crisis go hand in hand because 90 percent of the heroin in our country comes across the southern border of Meixico and massive amounts of fentanyl come from Mexico and China. Rothfus said these alone are good reasons to secure our borders.

You can listen to Congressman Rothfus’ interview by pressing the play button below…