Jelly Roll wants to do his part to stop the fentanyl crisis in the United States.
“I’ve attended more funerals than I care to share with y’all,” the country singer, 39, said during his Thursday, January 11, testimony in front of the Senate’s Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs Committee as he voiced his support for the bipartisan Fend Off Fentanyl Act. “With this committee, I could sit here and cry for days about the caskets I’ve carried of people I loved dearly, deeply in my soul.”
Jelly Roll explained that he’s had to say goodbye to “good people” who were more than just “drug addicts,” noting they were “uncles, friends, cousins and normal people.” The musician shared that he wasn’t appearing on Capitol Hill to “defend the use of illegal drugs” and understood it was a bit of a “paradox” for him to speak on that matter due to his “history as a drug dealer.”
“I think that’s what makes me perfect to talk about this. I was a part of the problem,” he shared. “I am here now standing as a man that wants to be a part of the solution. I brought my community down. I hurt people. I was the uneducated man in the kitchen playing chemist with drugs I knew absolutely nothing about, just like these drug dealers are doing right now when they’re mixing every drug on the market with fentanyl and they’re killing the people we love.”
Jelly Roll might consider himself the son of a sinner, but he’s found an angel in wife Bunnie XO. Following two stints in jail — Jelly Roll (real name Jason Bradley DeFord) was arrested for aggravated robbery at 16 and served one year before being incarcerated for drug dealing at the age of 23 — […]
Jelly Roll shared that his desire to combat the issue is personal to him, as his crisis has spread to his own family.
“Now I have a 15-year-old daughter whose mother is a drug addict. Every day I get to look in the eyes of a victim in my household of the effects of drugs,” he reflected. “Every single day, I have to wonder … if today will be the day I have to tell my daughter that her mother became a part of the national statistic.”
The Grammy nominee is the father of daughter Bailee and son Noah from prior relationships. In 2016, he wed his current wife, Bunnie XO. While Jelly Roll knows what it’s like to have someone you care about struggling with addiction, he also knows the crisis has affected his supporters.
“At every concert I perform, I witness the heartbreaking impact of fentanyl. Fans, grappling with this tragedy in their families, seek solace in music and hope that their experiences won’t befall others,” he shared. “They crave reassurance — that their elected representatives value their lives and those of their lost loved ones above political agendas. My appeal to this committee, and to all members of the House and Senate, is to offer this hope.”
Jelly Roll drew on his past struggles as inspiration for his music, which has since made him a breakout star of the country music world.
“I’ve made a lot of peace with my past. I mean, it still haunts me like the ghosts I know, but I tell you what, I don’t think about doing no drugs today,” he said in a December 2023 interview with People. “As far as today goes, I don’t know about tomorrow, but I can tell you, today, right now, I’m happy.”
