Senators pressure Biden administration to crack down on fentanyl sales through cryptocurrency

CNN —

A bipartisan pair of US senators is pressuring the Biden administration to do more to crack down on how drug cartels use cryptocurrency to traffic fentanyl, a drug that kills tens of thousands of Americans each year.

Sens.Elizabeth Warren, a Massachusetts Democrat, and Bill Cassidy, a Louisiana Republican, have asked for information on “specific actions” the administration has taken regarding crypto’s role in the fentanyl trade and what metrics the administration uses to measure success in a new letter to the Drug Enforcement Administration and White House obtained by CNN.

The letter reflects growing anxiety in Congress about the fentanyl crisis and the ease with which Mexico’s most dangerous drug cartels can cheaply buy ingredients online to make the synthetic opioid.

A CNN investigation published in August examined the increasing use of cryptocurrency in the fentanyl trade and efforts by the DEA and other agencies to try to catch up to the threat in their investigations. Those efforts included federal agents poring over notes that drug traffickers left in stash houses and tracing crypto payments to accounts allegedly used by the cartels. Cryptocurrency transactions for fentanyl ingredients surged 450% in the year through April 2023, according to data from private crypto-tracking analysis firm Elliptic.

The Biden administration has in the last year announced multiple initiatives involving law enforcement, intelligence gathering and anti-money laundering capabilities across the federal bureaucracy to track and intercept fentanyl proceeds.

But now, Warren and Cassidy want to know what progress those initiatives are making, any roadblocks the administration is facing and what Congress can do to help. The