Please Match the Federal List in Your Kratom Bill

Dear Rep. Turner,

I am writing as a resident of House District 15 to thank you for taking on the concentrated synthetic compounds being sold under the kratom name, and to ask you to keep your bill in line with what the federal government has already done.

This year the Justice Department announced emergency Schedule I placement of mitragynine pseudoindoxyl, MGM-15 and MGM-16, the DEA carried it out, and HHS and the FDA both supported it. Attorney General Todd Blanche said the action was directed at deliberately manufactured and concentrated opioid products, “not traditional botanical kratom.” The FDA said its threshold approach was not intended to capture the botanical leaf.

That is the right line, and it is the same line you drew when you announced your bill — that you were not trying to take the natural herb away. Concentrated synthetic 7-OH is not natural kratom. It is a lab-made compound, sold in tablets and shots, that borrows the name of a plant.

My concern is what happens between now and January. I would respectfully ask that the bill name all four compounds the federal government has targeted — concentrated synthetic 7-OH, mitragynine pseudoindoxyl, MGM-15 and MGM-16 — and that it use the same standard Washington used to keep natural kratom leaf out of scope. Oklahoma should be consistent with the administration on this, not out ahead of it.

If the Legislature wants to protect Oklahomans, the tools are straightforward: Schedule I for the synthetic compounds, and a 21+ age requirement, mandatory product testing and honest labeling for natural kratom leaf.

[Please share your own experience with natural kratom leaf, or explain why this issue matters to you.]

Thank you for your service to our district and for your time.

Sincerely,

[Your Name]

[City/Town], Oklahoma — House District 15