[Congressional Record Volume 171, Number 72 (Wednesday, April 30, 2025)]
[House]
[Page H1735]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                    RECOGNIZING GABRIEL'S CHALLENGE

  (Mr. Baumgartner of Washington was recognized to address the House 
for 5 minutes.)
  Mr. BAUMGARTNER. Mr. Speaker, I rise today, one day after National 
Fentanyl Awareness Day, to honor the memory of a special young man and 
to share a call for action.
  Gabriel Fensler was a much-loved son and brother who had struggled 
with addiction but had fought hard for his recovery. Gabriel relapsed 
one day after his 24th birthday.
  Fentanyl is a crisis. In Spokane, we are feeling the weight of it. 
Last year alone, 270 lives were lost to fentanyl overdoses in Spokane 
County. It is a national epidemic that we must address with urgency. We 
must stop fentanyl from hitting our streets, and border security is a 
part of that.
  Last year, over 21,000 pounds of fentanyl were seized at our borders, 
enough to kill billions. A recent executive order ended duty-free 
treatment for low-cost goods from China, which have been exploited as a 
major pathway to smuggle illicit drugs into the U.S. It was a measure 
that had bipartisan support.
  Alongside law enforcement efforts, we must help those in recovery, 
like Gabriel, with comprehensive treatment and community support.

  Gabriel's remarkable mother, Kitara Johnson-Jones, has turned her 
immense heartbreak into a call for action, launching Gabriel's 
Challenge, a community response to fentanyl, starting on Mother's Day 
and extending to Father's Day.
  She is rallying the community to identify the gaps in support for 
addiction recovery and urging connection and action. It is a call to 
pray, a call to talk, and a call to engage.
  In Kitara's own words:

       No matter how many differences we have, we have one thing 
     in common, and that is the serial killer in our community 
     named fentanyl, and we can all rally behind that.

  Mr. Speaker, let us join her in this fight in honor of Gabriel and so 
many others and work together to combat this fentanyl crisis.

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