OCONTO COUNTY, WI (WTAQ) – Congressman Mike Gallagher met with local lawmakers and county sheriffs on Friday to discuss the impact the issues on the southern border are having right here in Northeast Wisconsin.
The meeting comes in the wake of a fatal shooting in Oconto County involving a suspected Mexican cartel member.
“We might try to fool ourselves into thinking that, because we’re not a southern border state, we don’t actually have impacts from that problem. But as we saw right here in Oconto County, people will die in our own backyard if we allow that problem to persist,” Gallagher said. “Part of this is giving [law enforcement] the resources they need so that no one, particularly people with a track record and a criminal history, is allowed to enter the country illegally.”
Some reports show that in the first quarter of 2021, more fentanyl was seized at the border than in all of 2020.
“If someone doesn’t think the border crisis is in your backyard, it is,” said Fond du Lac County District Attorney Eric Toney. “In Fond du Lac County, we had 30 overdose deaths in 2020. That’s compared to 32 total in the three previous years. 26 of those overdose deaths last year were fentanyl-related.”
But the impact isn’t just on those directly involved with the drugs or violence that may be related to drug activity. Oconto County Sheriff Todd Skarban says the case forced them to pay a lot of overtime and other costs as they investigated the homicide, but also the drug crimes connected to it.
“The bottom line on our end is that this is a federal problem, and we’re spending local tax dollars that can be utilized in so many different ways,” Skarban said. “This one individual was dealing huge amounts of methamphetamine and fentanyl in the surrounding communities. How many other small communities in the United States of America are encountering the same problem?”
Gallagher had a few encapsulating comments that summed up most of the discussion.
“One is the urgent need to secure the southern border open borders is a dangerous and stupid policy we have to secure the southern border,” Gallagher said. “Two, at the risk of sounding like every Catholic school teacher I’ve ever had, don’t do drugs! Alright? You may think you’re only hurting yourself, when you’re making your community less safe and you’re putting law enforcement professionals in harm’s way.”
