The Liberty Daily 
(The Epoch Times)—The federal government should target drug cartels and their supply lines, and Americans should work to create a drug-free nation, the federal office that is tasked with fighting drug addiction said in its updated strategy on May 4.
“We will take the fight to the enemy with a relentless offense,” Sara Carter, director of the Office of National Drug Control Policy, said in a letter accompanying the nearly 200-page strategy document.
“The era of containment has failed.”
She said the document outlines how the government would “hunt the cartels in their safe havens, dismantle their labs, seize their assets, and sever their supply lines.”
The office prepares a new national strategy on drug control every two years.
The 2024 version called for cracking down on global suppliers of illegal drugs and on criminal networks associated with them. Officials said then that they were working with other countries, including Mexico and China, to combat drug trafficking. The efforts included levying sanctions and providing equipment such as rubber boots that Mexican authorities used in law enforcement operations, according to that document.
The new document states that transnational criminal groups and foreign terrorist organizations are waging a “chemical war” against Americans. It states that the United States is looking to “relentlessly pursue and dismantle drug trafficking networks wherever they operate,” including in other countries and online, and is going to “aggressively prosecute” members of the entities.
Under President Donald Trump, U.S. personnel have been targeting cartels in Mexico, which has resulted in lower levels of illegal drugs flowing across the border, border czar Tom Homan has said. The U.S. military has also been taking out people on boats in the Caribbean who officials say were identified as drug traffickers, with dozens of strikes carried out since 2025.
The military significantly increased its presence at the U.S.–Mexico border in 2025 and will provide unique support, such as advanced surveillance, in the future, according to the strategy.
“The strategy expands and formalizes joint operations through the Homeland Security Task Forces … and enhances border security through Department of War support,” the White House stated in a fact sheet.
Deaths attributed to drug overdoses shot up in recent years, although they declined from 2022, and again from 2023 to 2024, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said in a January data brief.
The drug control office also said on May 4 that it will attempt to help create a drug-free country “as a social norm” by ramping up financial support for tools and programs proven to prevent drug use, including programs in schools, and provide help to people who are addicted to drugs as part of an effort to avoid overdoses.
Some 214 million Americans do not use illegal drugs. Objectives of the strategy include increasing the number of Americans who are drug-free.
“In the land of the free, every American deserves to live a drug-free life,” Trump wrote in a statement that was released with the document. “We will never stop fighting to protect our children and families, break the grip of drug addiction, and keep lethal substances out of our communities and out of the hands of our citizens.”
The Office of National Drug Control Policy works with 19 different agencies and oversees a budget of $44 billion that funds efforts to address drug addiction and overdoses.
