Federal agents were monitoring fentanyl shipments. The question now before Congress is why some of those drugs allegedly stayed in the hands of traffickers.

House Oversight Chairman James Comer opened an investigation Monday into the Biden-era DEA’s handling of fentanyl in New Mexico, demanding Justice Department records about decisions to monitor shipments without seizing them.

His inquiry centers on whether safeguards developed during President Trump’s first administration were disregarded or relaxed. It also reaches beyond New Mexico: Comer wants to know whether similar decisions were made in other states.

The Oversight Committee announced the investigation Monday morning:

In its announcement, the House Oversight Committee described allegations that agents allowed shipments containing as many as 100,000 pills to remain with criminals. The committee says agents monitored deliveries without intercepting them, permitting hundreds of thousands of pills to reach New Mexico communities between 2023 and 2025.

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The practice is known as allowing drugs to “walk.” According to the committee, the rationale was to build larger cases against trafficking networks. Comer argues that the danger posed by fentanyl made those decisions unacceptable, even when investigators hoped to reach more people in the supply chain.

Those are the chairman’s allegations and conclusions. The investigation announced Monday has not established which officials were responsible for particular decisions or which deaths, if any, can be connected to specific unseized shipments.

The records request is more specific than the public accusations.

In his three-page letter, James Comer gives Attorney General Todd Blanche until September 14 to provide seven categories of documents and communications. The requested material covers January 21, 2021, through January 19, 2025.

Comer is seeking communications between DEA divisions and the U.S. Attorney’s Office in New Mexico, records about implementing the 2019 fentanyl safeguards and subsequent protocols, and internal discussions of decisions to monitor fentanyl locations or distribution. He also asks for records concerning fentanyl deaths associated with criminals already under DEA surveillance.

Two requests address communications about relaxed implementation of the 2019 protocols in other states. That would allow the committee to examine whether the disputed approach was confined to individual cases in New Mexico or reflected decisions with a wider reach.

The letter is a request for records, not an announced subpoena. Whether DOJ supplies the communications, and what those communications actually show, will determine how far the inquiry can move beyond competing accounts.

There is already a conflicting federal finding.

The Justice Department’s Office of Professional Responsibility previously examined a whistleblower disclosure that prosecutors had repeatedly instructed DEA agents in 2023 not to stop vehicles believed to be carrying fentanyl. Its published summary says the inquiry concerned guidance for managing fentanyl risks during wiretap investigations.

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OPR concluded that the guidance allowed investigative teams to exercise discretion, balancing the immediate public-safety risks against the longer-term goals of an investigation. It said supervisory personnel were included in the decision-making process.

For the cases it reviewed, OPR found that decisions to delay overt enforcement had adequate oversight and appeared reasonable under the circumstances. It found no violation of the fentanyl guidance or law, no abuse of authority, and no substantial and specific danger to public health and safety.

That finding does not answer every question in Comer’s new request. It does mean the allegation that agents violated federal rules cannot responsibly be presented as an established finding.

The whistleblowers also allege they paid a professional price for objecting.

Empower Oversight, which represents agents who raised concerns, announced August 5 that it had asked the Office of Special Counsel to investigate alleged retaliation against a third DEA whistleblower in Albuquerque.

The organization said the agent reported his belief that failures to seize large shipments violated DEA and DOJ rules. Its complaint also described his participation in refusing an order he believed would violate those rules and his disclosure of an unsafe operational plan near an occupied daycare facility.

According to the complaint, the agent then faced threats, an involuntary transfer, lost operational responsibilities, and administrative demands not imposed on colleagues. Empower Oversight also represents Special Agent David Howell and has sought an investigation concerning retired DEA veteran Kevin Small.

These remain allegations advanced by the whistleblowers’ representatives, not findings that the accused supervisors retaliated unlawfully. They raise a separate question for investigators: whether agents could challenge operational decisions without risking their careers.

Comer made his own position explicit in a separate response Monday:

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The chairman’s claim that Americans died because of these decisions is serious. Establishing that connection requires evidence about particular shipments, distribution networks and deaths.

A statewide increase in deaths, by itself, cannot identify the consequences of an individual enforcement decision.

The new inquiry puts several concrete questions in front of DOJ: Who approved leaving suspected fentanyl in circulation?

What risks were documented? What did supervisors believe they would gain by waiting?

And what happened when agents objected?

The September 14 deadline is the next test.

The public record now contains both whistleblower accusations and a prior DOJ finding defending the decisions it reviewed. The underlying communications could show where those accounts diverge, and why.

This is a Guest Post from our friends over at WLTReport. View the original article here.

 

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