The Senate is considering a fentanyl exposure bill that would fund “containment devices.” Rarely do sponsors elaborate on what these actually are, other than that they’re very important, but they’re usually described as devices that contain and safely store suspected drug samples so that they can be preserved as evidence for later testing. If you’re picturing some sort of airtight container, that is wrong. If you’re picturing a pepper spray-like aerosol can that officers carry in a holster so they can “neutralize” fentanyl by coating it in orange goo, that’s correct.
S 180, “Protecting First Responders from Secondary Exposure Act of 2025,” is the latest version of legislation that’s been attempted several times in previous sessions. This time it was set to be discussed at a Senate committee hearing May 15, but the hearing ended before any bills were discussed because committee members couldn’t reach a quorum. S 180 was, however, added to the Senate legislative calendar not long after.
Sponsored by pro tempore Senate President Chuck Grassley (R-IA) and Senator Amy Klobuchar (D-MN), S 180 would amend the Omnibus Crime Control and Safe Streets Act of 1968, which authorizes federal funding for grants to state and local law enforcement. In this case the Act would be amended to include grants that provide “training and resources for first responders on the use of containment devices to prevent secondary exposure to fentanyl and other potentially lethal substances, and purchasing such containment devices for use by first responders.”
“Casual contact to the skin does NOT result in an overdose,” claims a company manufucturing the devices. “Inhalation is the main route of exposure.”
TruBLOC LLC, a company that manufactures the type of fentanyl containment devices in question, sells 1.5-ounce canisters as a set of 12 for $359.40, or as a set of 48 for $1,437.60. The training advertised as “free,” despite the apparent funding carveouts for such training in the bill.
“Many agencies were told incorrect information about fentanyl,” states TruBLOC on its website. “Casual contact to the skin does NOT result in an overdose. Inhalation is the main route of exposure.”
Neither is the main route of exposure, because fentanyl only poses an overdose risk when consumed directly. This would include inhalation if the term were being used to refer to sniffing or snorting fentanyl, but in this context the term is describing passive inhalation—i.e. breathing air while standing somewhere in the vicinity of fentanyl.
“Detained persons are placed into clean backseats, but when taken out, officers find the suspects have emptied their drugs onto the seat,” reads the narrative text on an extremely realistic-looking video showing how the device might be used. “Small amounts of opioids can kill an officer. BLOC encapsulates the powder. BLOC cures to a peel-able membrane. BLOC does not affect testing.”
The video then shows the gloved hands of an officer/paid actor awkwardly peeling the orange residue off the seat in a manner that strongly recalls attempting to peel off sour candy that’s melted. The hands remain gloved, despite the fact that the threat that did not exist to begin with has been contained.
Joyce has been pushing for the containment devices for years on behalf of Customs and Border Protection, which doesn’t seem to want them.
The companion bill in the House, HR 621, has not moved since its introduction in January by Rep. David P. Joyce (R-OH). Joyce sponsored a version that did not advance in 2023, and another in 2021, and along with Grassley and other legislators has also tried to push through legislation that’s almost identical, but specific to Customs and Border Protection officers. That bill got a unanimous vote in the House but failed to make it through the Senate. Joyce reintroduced it without success in 2023.
Joyce has been circulating the “accidental absorption” myth for years on behalf of law enforcement and CBP officers who he says urgently need the containment devices. The current legislation has been endorsed by the National Fraternal Order of Police, but CBP didn’t really appear to want it. In a 2023 budget hearing, Joyce asked Customs and Border Protection Acting Commissioner Troy A. Miller why the agency hadn’t moved forward with the devices, noting that since the wall at the southern border had not progressed since 2021 we surely needed “additional physical barriers to help secure the border and buy time for agents to apprehend migrants illegally.”
A weary-looking Miller replied that the agency is looking into it and will definitely move forward if the devices are “determined to be viable technology.”
“Sir, it exists,” Joyce replied impatiently. “It’s not, ‘having to look at it,’ it exists, and if one of these—if powder form [fentanyl] had exploded in one of your offices, it’d kill everybody in your office.”
Miller said that definitely, they’ll look into it.
Image (cropped) via United State Drug Enforcement Administration
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