The new year and new presidential administration could mark a significant shift in the U.S. response to the opioid crisis.
While drug deaths trended steadily upward under President Donald Trump, they skyrocketed during Covid-19 and in the early years of the Biden administration, reaching an annual peak of roughly 110,000 in 2023. Though overdose mortality has since begun to decline, the toxic, fentanyl-driven illicit drug supply is still killing Americans at astonishing rates.
Trump’s return to power likely marks a new era in drug policy — and not just because of his threats to use trade tariffs against Mexico and Canada as punishment for failing to control illicit drug smuggling, or to impose the death penalty on drug dealers. More broadly, many Americans appear to have become less tolerant in their view of people with addiction, especially in light of ongoing frustrations with drug use in traditionally Democratic cities like Portland, Ore., San Francisco, and Philadelphia.
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