View source for War on drugs

{{Short description|Campaign against illegal drug use and trade}}

{{Other uses}}
{{Pp-semi-indef}}
{{Use mdy dates|date=March 2016}}
{{Infobox military conflict
| conflict          = War on drugs
| width             =
| partof            =
| image             = Just say no (4647883256).jpg
| image_size        = 
| alt               =
| caption           = A U.S. government [[Public service announcement|PSA]] from the [[Alcohol, Drug Abuse, and Mental Health Administration]] with a photo image of two [[marijuana]] cigarettes and a "[[Just Say No]]" slogan
| date              = June 17, 1971 – present<br />({{Age in months, weeks and days|year1= 1971 |month1= 6|day1= 17}})
| place             = Global
| coordinates       =
| map_type          =
| map_relief        =
| map_size          =
| map_marksize      =
| map_caption       =
| map_label         =
| territory         =
| result            =
| status            = Ongoing, widely viewed as a policy failure<ref>{{Cite web |last=Mann |first=Brian |date=June 17, 2021 |title=After 50 Years Of The War On Drugs, 'What Good Is It Doing For Us?' |website=[[NPR]] |url=https://www.npr.org/2021/06/17/1006495476/after-50-years-of-the-war-on-drugs-what-good-is-it-doing-for-us }}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |last=Lopez |first=German |date=2017-01-30 |title=How the war on drugs has made drug traffickers more ruthless and efficient |url=https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2017/1/30/14346766/drug-war-failure-evolution |access-date=2024-02-17 |website=Vox |language=en}}</ref><ref>{{Cite journal |last=Scherlen |first=Renee |date=4 January 2012 |title=The Never-Ending Drug War: Obstacles to Drug War Policy Termination |url=https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/ps-political-science-and-politics/article/abs/neverending-drug-war-obstacles-to-drug-war-policy-termination/36E26DB84414E6EFE80CF3F96F55703F |journal=PS: Political Science & Politics |volume=45 |pages=67–73 |doi=10.1017/S1049096511001739 |s2cid=153399320 |via=Cambridge Core}}</ref><ref>{{Cite news |last=Doward |first=Jamie |date=2016-04-02 |title=The UN's war on drugs is a failure. Is it time for a different approach? |url=https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/apr/02/un-war-on-drugs-failure-prohibition-united-nations |access-date=2024-02-17 |work=The Observer |language=en-GB |issn=0029-7712}}</ref>
| combatants_header =
| combatant1        = {{flag|United States}}
* [[Law enforcement in the United States|US law enforcement]]
* [[US Armed Forces]]
[[Foreign relations of the United States|Allies of the United States]]
<p>{{flag|United Nations}}</p>
* [[United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime]]
| combatant2        = [[Drug traffickers]]
* [[Drug cartels]]
<p>[[Recreational drug use|Drug users]]{{refn|As a party to the United Nations [[Convention Against Illicit Traffic in Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances]], the US is required to "criminalize possession for personal consumption"; only use for medical and scientific purposes is permitted<ref name="Haase" /> (the treaty wording also provides significant latitude in interpreting personal use criminalization by individual countries).|group=note}}</p>
| combatant3        =
| commander1        =
| commander2        =
| commander3        =
| units1            =
| units2            =
| units3            =
| strength1         =
| strength2         =
| strength3         =
| casualties1       =
| casualties2       =
| casualties3       =
| notes             =
| campaignbox       = {{Campaignbox Operations in the War on drugs}}
}}

The '''war on drugs''' is the policy of a [[Globalization|global campaign]],<ref name="War on Drugs">{{Cite web |date=June 2011 |title=War on Drugs: Report of the Global Commission on Drug Policy |url=https://www.globalcommissionondrugs.org/reports/the-war-on-drugs |access-date=Feb 21, 2024 |website=[[Global Commission on Drug Policy]] |quote=The global war on drugs has failed. When the United Nations Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs came into being 50 years ago, and when President Nixon launched the US government's war on drugs 40 years ago, policymakers believed that harsh law enforcement action against those involved in drug production, distribution and use would lead to an ever-diminishing market in controlled drugs such as heroin, cocaine and cannabis, and the eventual achievement of a 'drug free world'. In practice, the global scale of illegal drug markets – largely controlled by organized crime – has grown dramatically over this period.}}</ref> led by the [[United States federal government]], of [[prohibition of drugs|drug prohibition]], [[Aid|foreign assistance]], and [[military intervention]], with the aim of reducing the [[illegal drug trade in the United States|illegal drug trade in the US]].<ref>{{cite news|url=https://www.npr.org/2016/03/27/472023148/legalize-all-drugs-the-risks-are-tremendous-without-defining-the-problem|title=Legalize All Drugs? The 'Risks Are Tremendous' Without Defining The Problem|first=Writer Dan|last=Baum|website=NPR.org|access-date=April 3, 2018|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180115184433/https://www.npr.org/2016/03/27/472023148/legalize-all-drugs-the-risks-are-tremendous-without-defining-the-problem|archive-date=January 15, 2018|url-status=live}}</ref><ref name="whiteout-chapter-14">Cockburn and St. Clair, 1998: Chapter 14</ref><ref name="Bullington 1990 39–55">{{Cite journal|last1 = Bullington |first1 = Bruce |first2=Alan A. |last2=Block |date=March 1990 |title = A Trojan horse: Anti-communism and the war on drugs |journal = Crime, Law and Social Change |volume = 14 |issue = 1 |pages = 39–55 |issn = 1573-0751 |doi = 10.1007/BF00728225 |s2cid = 144145710 }}</ref> The initiative includes a set of drug policies that are intended to discourage the production, distribution, and consumption of [[psychoactive drugs]] that the participating governments, through [[International drug control conventions|United Nations treaties]], have made illegal.

The term "war on drugs" was popularized by the media after a press conference, given on June 17, 1971, during which [[President of the United States|President]] [[Richard Nixon]] declared drug abuse "public enemy number one".<ref name=":1" /> He stated, "In order to fight and defeat this enemy, it is necessary to wage a new, all-out offensive.{{spaces}}... This will be a worldwide offensive.{{spaces}}... It will be government-wide{{spaces}}... and it will be nationwide." Earlier that day, Nixon had presented a special message to [[United States Congress|Congress]] on "Drug Abuse Prevention and Control", which included text about devoting more federal resources to the "prevention of new addicts, and the rehabilitation of those who are addicted", but that aspect did not receive the same media attention as the term "war on drugs".<ref name=":16">{{cite web|url=https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/node/240245|title=Richard Nixon: Special Message to the Congress on Drug Abuse Prevention and Control|access-date=December 8, 2013|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131212201341/http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/?pid=3048|archive-date=December 12, 2013|url-status=live}}</ref><ref name=":1">{{Cite web |last=Mann |first=Brian |date=Jun 17, 2021 |title=After 50 Years Of The War On Drugs, 'What Good Is It Doing For Us?' |url=https://www.npr.org/2021/06/17/1006495476/after-50-years-of-the-war-on-drugs-what-good-is-it-doing-for-us |access-date=Dec 8, 2023 |website=[[NPR]]}}</ref><ref name="Nixon Calls War on Drugs">{{Cite web |date=June 18, 1971 |title=Nixon Calls War on Drugs |url=https://www.newspapers.com/newspage/129670863/ |access-date=Dec 8, 2023 |website=[[Palm Beach Post]]}}</ref><ref>{{cite news|last=Dufton|first=Emily|title=The War on Drugs: How President Nixon Tied Addiction to Crime|url=https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2012/03/the-war-on-drugs-how-president-nixon-tied-addiction-to-crime/254319/|access-date=October 13, 2012|newspaper=The Atlantic|date=March 26, 2012|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20121105093614/http://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2012/03/the-war-on-drugs-how-president-nixon-tied-addiction-to-crime/254319/|archive-date=November 5, 2012|url-status=live}}</ref>

In the years since, presidential administrations and Congress have generally maintained or expanded Nixon's original initiatives, with the emphasis on law enforcement and interdiction over public health and treatment. [[Cannabis (drug)|Cannabis]] presents a special case; it came under federal restriction in the 1930s, and since 1970 has been [[Controlled Substances Act#Schedule I|classified]] as having a high potential for abuse and no medical value, with the same level of prohibition as heroin. Multiple mainstream studies and findings since the 1930s have recommended against such a severe classification. Beginning in the 1990s, cannabis has been [[Legality of cannabis by U.S. jurisdiction|legalized for medical use in 38 states, and also for recreational use in 24]], creating a policy gap with federal law and non-compliance with the UN drug treaties.

In June 2011, the [[Global Commission on Drug Policy]] released a critical report, declaring: "The global war on drugs has failed, with devastating consequences for individuals and societies around the world."<ref name="War on Drugs" /> In 2023, the [[UN High Commissioner for Human Rights]] stated that "decades of punitive, 'war on drugs' strategies had failed to prevent an increasing range and quantity of substances from being produced and consumed."<ref name=":18" /> That year, the annual US federal drug war budget reached $39 billion, with cumulative spending since 1971 estimated at $1 trillion.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Chinni |first=Dante |date=July 2, 2023 |title=Costs in the war on drugs continue to soar |url=https://www.nbcnews.com/meet-the-press/data-download/costs-war-drugs-continue-soar-rcna92032 |access-date=May 10, 2024 |website=[[NBC News]]}}</ref>

{{As of|2024}}, the war on drugs continues, with a focus on [[fentanyl]] and other [[synthetic drug]]s.

== History ==
{{See also|History of United States drug prohibition|Legal history of cannabis in the United States}}Drugs in the US were largely unregulated until the early 20th century. Opium had been used to relieve pain since the [[American Revolutionary War|Revolutionary War]] (1775–1783), particularly in the treatment of soldiers during wartime. In the 1800s, opium on the world stage was large-scale and lucrative: Britain, and to a lesser degree the other [[Colonialism|European colonial powers]] and the US, were making huge profits in the opium trade in China and southeast Asia; two [[Opium Wars|opium wars]] were fought mid-century by Britain against China to ensure the trade continued to serve millions of Chinese opium addicts.<ref name=":110">{{Cite web |title=A Century of International Drug Control |url=https://www.unodc.org/documents/wdr/WDR_2008/WDR2008_100years_drug_control_origins.pdf |access-date=May 28, 2024 |website=[[UN Office on Drugs and Crime]]}}</ref> At the same time in America, the use of [[opiate]]s in the civilian population began to increase dramatically,<ref name="Trickey">{{cite web |last=Trickey |first=Erick |date=Jan 4, 2018 |title=Inside the Story of America's 19th-Century Opiate Addiction |url=https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/inside-story-americas-19th-century-opiate-addiction-180967673/ |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190105045835/https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/inside-story-americas-19th-century-opiate-addiction-180967673/ |archive-date=January 5, 2019 |access-date=Dec 25, 2023 |website=[[The Smithsonian]]}}</ref> and [[cocaine]] use became prevalent.<ref name=":5">{{Cite journal |last=Das |first=G |date=April 1993 |title=Cocaine abuse in North America: a milestone in history |url=https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/8473543/ |journal=Journal of Clinical Pharmacology |volume=33 |issue=4 |pages=296–310 |doi=10.1002/j.1552-4604.1993.tb04661.x |pmid=8473543 |s2cid=9120504 |via=[[PubMed]]}}</ref><ref name=":6">{{Cite web |date=Aug 21, 2018 |title=Cocaine |url=https://www.history.com/topics/crime/history-of-cocaine |access-date=Dec 15, 2023 |website=[[History.com]]}}</ref> [[Alcoholic beverage|Alcohol]] consumption steadily grew, as did the [[Temperance movement in the United States|temperance movement]], well-supported by the middle class, promoting moderation or [[abstinence]].<ref name="Rorabaugh">{{cite book |last=Rorabaugh |first=W.J. |title=The Alcohol Republic: An American Tradition |publisher=Oxford University Press |year=1981 |isbn=978-0-1950-2990-1 |pages=20–21}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book |last1=Aaron |first1=Paul |last2=Musto |first2=David |date=1981 |title=Temperance and Prohibition in America: A Historical Overview |url=https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK216414/ |access-date=Feb 11, 2024 |via=[[National Library of Medicine]]|publisher=National Academies Press (US) }}</ref> The practice of smoking [[cannabis]] began to be noticed in the early 1900s.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Marijuana Timeline |url=https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/dope/etc/cron.html |access-date=Dec 15, 2023 |website=[[PBS Frontline]]}}</ref> Under the [[Constitution of the United States|US Constitution]], the authority to control dangerous drugs exists separately at both the federal and state level.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Braun |first=Richard L. |date=January 1991 |title=Uniform Controlled Substances Act of 1990 |url=https://scholarship.law.campbell.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?referer=&httpsredir=1&article=1222&context=clr |journal=Campbell Law Review |volume=13 |issue=3 |page=366}}</ref> State and local governments began enacting drug laws in the mid-1800s, while federal drug legislation arrived after the turn of the century.

=== Mid-1800s–1909: Proliferation of unregulated drug use ===
[[File:Drug_store_sign_for_products_Heroin_and_Aspirin_before_US_Heroin_ban_1924.jpg|thumb|Advertising sign from Bayer for use in US drug stores, dating from before the federal prohibition of heroin by the [[Anti-Heroin Act of 1924]].]]
The latter half of the 19th century saw a ramping up of opiate use in America. Early in the century, [[morphine]] had been isolated from [[opium]], decades later, [[heroin]] was created from morphine, each more potent than the previous form.<ref name="morphine isolated">{{cite web |date=June 10, 2019 |title=Heroin, Morphine and Opiates |url=https://www.history.com/topics/crime/history-of-heroin-morphine-and-opiates |accessdate=March 28, 2021 |publisher=history.com}}</ref><ref name="Court2009">{{cite book |last1=Courtwright |first1=David T. |author-link1=:de:David Todd Courtwright |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=GHqV3elHYvMC&pg=PA36 |title=Forces of habit drugs and the making of the modern world |date=2009 |publisher=Harvard University Press |isbn=978-0674029903 |edition= |location=Cambridge, MA |pages=36–37 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170908135509/https://books.google.com/books?id=GHqV3elHYvMC&pg=PA36 |archive-date=8 September 2017 |url-status=live |name-list-style=vanc |df=dmy-all}}</ref> With the invention of the [[Syringe|hypodermic syringe]], introduced in America mid-century, opiates were easily administered and became a preferred medical treatment. During the [[American Civil War|Civil War]] (1861–1865), millions of doses of opiates were distributed to sick and wounded soldiers, addicting some;<ref name="Trickey" /> domestic poppy fields were planted in an attempt to meet shortages (the crops proved to be of poor quality).<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Lewy |first=Jonathan |date=2014 |title=The Army Disease: Drug Addiction and the Civil War |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/26098368 |journal=War in History |volume=21 |issue=1 |pages=102–119 |issn=0968-3445 |quote=The Union, having access to world trade and poppies grown abroad, suffered from very little shortage in either opium or morphine. The Federal Army consumed approximately 10 million opium pills and over 80 tons of opium powder and tinctures. ... The Confederacy, in comparison, attempted to grow poppy fields to supply its armies, but the crops proved inferior, with very little morphine content. Consequently, the South relied on smugglers from the North and blockade-runners to replenish medical stores.}}</ref> In the civilian population, physicians treated opiates like a wonder drug, prescribing them widely, for chronic pain, irritable babies, asthma, bronchitis, insomnia, "nervous conditions", hysteria, menstrual cramps, morning sickness, gastrointestinal disease, "vapors", and on.<ref name="Trickey" /><ref name="The Editorial Board">{{cite news |author=The Editorial Board |date=April 21, 2018 |title=Opinion – An Opioid Crisis Foretold |newspaper=The New York Times |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2018/04/21/opinion/an-opioid-crisis-foretold.html |url-status=live |access-date=January 21, 2019 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190122044505/https://www.nytimes.com/2018/04/21/opinion/an-opioid-crisis-foretold.html |archive-date=January 22, 2019}}</ref><ref name="The United States War on Drugs">{{cite web |title=The United States War on Drugs |url=https://web.stanford.edu/class/e297c/poverty_prejudice/paradox/htele.html |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190106162025/https://web.stanford.edu/class/e297c/poverty_prejudice/paradox/htele.html |archive-date=January 6, 2019 |access-date=January 21, 2019 |website=web.stanford.edu}}</ref>

Drugs were also sold [[Over-the-counter drug|over-the-counter]] as home remedies, and in refreshments. [[Laudanum]], a powdered opium solution, was commonly found in the home medicine cabinet.<ref name="The Editorial Board" /><ref name="The United States War on Drugs" /> Heroin was available as a cough syrup.<ref name="white">{{cite book |last=Cockburn |first=Alexander |url=https://archive.org/details/whiteoutciadrugs00cock |title=Whiteout: The CIA, Drugs and the Press |author2=Jeffrey St. Clair |publisher=Verso |year=1998 |isbn=1-85984-139-2 |url-access=registration}}</ref><ref name="Johnston 2013">{{cite web |last=Johnston |first=Ann Dowsett |date=15 November 2013 |title='Drink' and 'Her Best-Kept Secret' |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2013/11/17/books/review/drink-and-her-best-kept-secret.html |access-date=9 August 2023 |website=The New York Times |quote=In 1897, the Sears, Roebuck catalog offered a kit with a syringe, two needles, two vials of heroin and a handy carrying case for $1.50.}}</ref><ref name="The Atlantic 2019">{{Cite web |last=McKendry |first=Joe |date=March 2019 |title=Sears Once Sold Heroin |url=https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2019/03/sears-roebuck-bayer-heroin/580441/ |access-date=Dec 25, 2023 |work=[[The Atlantic]] |quote=For $1.50, Americans around the turn of the century could place an order through a Sears, Roebuck catalog and receive a syringe, two needles, and two vials of Bayer Heroin, all in a handsome carrying case.}}</ref> Cocaine was introduced as a surgical [[anesthetic]], and more popularly as a pick-me-up,<ref name=":5" /><ref name=":6" /> found in soft drinks, cigarettes, blended with wine, in snuff, and other forms.<ref name=":5" /><ref name=":6" /> Brand names appeared: [[Coca-Cola]] contained cocaine until 1903;<ref>{{Cite web |last=Lee |first=Ella |date=July 25, 2021 |title=Fact check: Cocaine in Coke? Soda once contained drug but likely much less than post claims |url=https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/factcheck/2021/07/25/fact-check-coke-once-contained-cocaine-but-likely-less-than-claimed/8008325002/ |access-date=May 30, 2024 |website=[[USA Today]]}}</ref> [[Bayer]] created the trademark name "Heroin" for their [[Heroin|diamorphine]] product.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Felix Hoffmann |url=https://www.sciencehistory.org/education/scientific-biographies/felix-hoffmann/ |access-date=May 30, 2024 |website=[[Science History Institute]]}}</ref> In the 1890s, the [[Sears|Sears & Roebuck]] catalog, distributed to millions of American homes, offered a syringe and a small amount of heroin for $1.50.<ref name="The Atlantic 2019" /><ref name="white" /><ref name="Johnston 2013" />

==== America's "first opioid crisis" ====
The 1880s saw opiate addiction surge among among housewives, doctors, and Civil War veterans,<ref>{{Cite journal |last1=Golub |first1=Andrew |last2=Bennett |first2=Alex S. |last3=Elliott |first3=Luther |date=Mar 30, 2015 |title=Beyond America's War on Drugs: Developing Public Policy to Navigate the Prevailing Pharmacological Revolution |journal=Aims Public Health |volume=2 |issue=1 |pages=142–160 |doi=10.3934/publichealth.2015.1.142 |pmid=25893215 |pmc=4398966 }}</ref> creating America's "first opioid crisis."<ref>{{Cite web |last=Little |first=Becky |date=Sep 13, 2023 |title=How Civil War Medicine Led to America's First Opioid Crisis |url=https://www.history.com/news/civil-war-medicine-opioid-addiction |access-date=Feb 27, 2024 |website=[[History.com]]}}</ref><ref>{{Cite news |last=Ruane |first=Michael E. |date=December 1, 2021 |title=America's first opioid crisis grew out of the carnage of the Civil War |url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/history/2021/12/01/opioid-crisis-civil-war-addiction/ |access-date=Feb 27, 2024 |newspaper=[[Washington Post]]}}</ref> By the end of the century, an estimated one in 200 Americans were addicted to opiates, 60% of them women, typically white and middle- to upper-class.<ref name="Trickey" /> Medical journals of the later 1800s were replete with warnings against [[Overmedication|overprescription]]. As medical advances like the [[X-ray spectroscopy|x-ray]], [[vaccine]]s, and [[Germ theory of disease|germ theory]] presented better treatment options, prescribed opiate use began to decline. Meanwhile, opium smoking remained popular among Chinese immigrant laborers, thousands of whom had arrived during the [[California gold rush]]; [[opium den]]s were established in [[Chinatown]]s in cities and towns across America. The public face of opiate use began to change, from affluent white Americans, to "Chinese, gamblers, and prostitutes."<ref name="Trickey" /><ref name=":19">{{Cite web |last=Chasin |first=Alexandra |date=Apr 14, 2017 |title=The Man Who Declared War On Drugs |url=https://www.wnyc.org/story/man-who-declared-war-drugs/ |access-date=May 15, 2024 |website=[[WNYC]] |quote=From the late 19th century into the 20th, most opiate addicts were middle-aged middle and upper class women but, as would happen ever after, the new drug laws were far more about race than drugs. So as itinerant workers and urban African Americans became another visible group of drug users, the laws grew harsher.}}</ref>

During this period, states and municipalities began enacting laws banning or regulating certain drugs.<ref name=":0">{{Cite web |date=May 31, 2017 |title=War on Drugs |url=https://www.history.com/topics/crime/the-war-on-drugs |access-date=Dec 8, 2023 |website=[[History.com]]}}</ref> In [[Pennsylvania]], an anti-morphine law was passed in 1860.<ref name=":9">Whitford and Yates. ''Presidential Rhetoric and the Public Agenda 36''</ref> In 1875, [[San Francisco]] enacted an anti-opium ordinance, vigorously enforced, imposing stiff fines and jail for visiting opium dens. The rationale held that "many women and young girls, as well as young men of a respectable family, were being induced to visit the Chinese opium-smoking dens, where they were ruined morally and otherwise." The law catered to resentment towards the Chinese laborer population who were being accused of taking jobs; other uses of opiates or other drugs were unaffected. Similar laws were enacted in other states and cities. The federal government became involved, selectively raising the import tariff on the smoking grade of opium. None of these measures proved effective in significantly reducing opium use,<ref>{{Cite web |last=Brecher |first=Edward M. |date=1972 |title=Licit and Illicit Drugs: The Consumers' Union Report on Narcotics, Stimulants, Depressants, Inhalants, Hallucinogens, and Marijuana – Including Caffeine, Nicotine, and Alcohol |url=https://www.druglibrary.org/schaffer/library/studies/cu/cu6.htm |access-date=Feb 10, 2024 |website=[[Consumers Union]]}}</ref> while the anti-Chinese fervor lead to Congress halting Chinese laborer immigration for 10 years with the [[Chinese Exclusion Act]] of 1882.<ref name="Lee2002">{{Cite journal |last=Lee |first=Erika |date=2002 |title=The Chinese Exclusion Example: Race, Immigration, and American Gatekeeping, 1882–1924 |journal=Journal of American Ethnic History |volume=21 |issue=3 |pages=36–62 |doi=10.2307/27502847 |jstor=27502847 |s2cid=157999472}}</ref> In the following years, opioids, cocaine, and cannabis were associated with various ethnic minorities and targeted in other local jurisdictions.<ref name=":19" /><ref name=":9" />

In 1906, the [[Pure Food and Drug Act]], also known as the Wiley Act, addressed problems with tainted and adulterated food in the growing industrial food system, and with drug quality, by mandating ingredient labels and prohibited misleading or false labeling. For drugs, a listing of active ingredients was required; a set of drugs deemed addictive or dangerous, including opium, morphine, cocaine, caffeine, and cannabis, was specified. Oversight of the act was assigned to the [[United States Department of Agriculture|US Department of Agriculture]]'s Bureau of Chemistry, which evolved into the [[Food and Drug Administration]] in 1930.<ref>{{cite web |author=Swann, John P. |date=April 24, 2019 |title=The 1906 Food and Drugs Act and Its Enforcement |url=https://www.fda.gov/about-fda/changes-science-law-and-regulatory-authorities/part-i-1906-food-and-drugs-act-and-its-enforcement |access-date=May 23, 2023 |series=FDA History – Part I |publisher=U.S. Food and Drug Administration}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |last=Powers |first=Kristin |date=September 14, 2022 |title=A History of Research: 1906 Pure Food & Drug Act – The Birth of the FDA |url=https://obgyn.wustl.edu/a-history-of-research-1906-pure-food-drug-act-the-birth-of-the-fda/ |access-date=May 3, 2024 |website=[[Washington University School of Medicine]]}}</ref>

=== 1909–1971: Rise of federal drug prohibition ===
[[File:PSM V88 D092 Police destroying illegal drugs in Los Angeles 1916.png|thumb|Police destroying illegal drugs in [[Los Angeles]], 1916]]
On February 9, 1909, the Smoking Opium Exclusion Act, "to prohibit the importation and use of opium for other than medicinal purposes", became the first federal law to ban the non-medical use of a substance.<ref name=":0" /><ref name="February 9, 1909. SIXTIETH CONGRESS. SEss. II. CHS. 100,101. 1909. CHAP. 100.-An Act To prohibit the importation and use of opium for other than medicinal purposes.">{{cite web |title=Opium prohibition law in library of congress |url=https://www.loc.gov/law/help/statutes-at-large/60th-congress/session-2/c60s2ch100.pdf |access-date=14 May 2019 |website=[[Library of Congress]]}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |title=Opium and Narcotic Laws |url=https://ojp.gov/ncjrs/virtual-library/abstracts/opium-and-narcotic-laws |access-date=Dec 8, 2023 |website=[[Office of Justice Programs]]}}</ref> This was soon followed by the [[Harrison Narcotics Tax Act]] of 1914, that regulated and taxed the production, importation, and distribution of [[opiate]]s and [[coca]] products.<ref>{{cite web |title=Opium Throughout History |url=https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/heroin/etc/history.html |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20060923053042/http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/heroin/etc/history.html |archive-date=September 23, 2006 |access-date=October 8, 2010 |publisher=PBS Frontline}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |title=Harrison Narcotics Tax Act, 1914 |url=http://www.druglibrary.org/schaffer/history/e1910/harrisonact.htm |access-date=2013-11-18 |publisher=Drug Reform Coordination Network}}</ref> Amending the Smoking Opium Exclusion Act, the [[Anti-Heroin Act of 1924]] specifically outlawed the manufacture, importation and sale of heroin.<ref name="morphine isolated" />

During [[World War I]] (1914–1918), soldiers were commonly treated with morphine, giving rise to addiction among veterans.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Kamieński |first=Łukasz |date=March 7, 2019 |title=Drugs |url=https://encyclopedia.1914-1918-online.net/article/drugs |access-date=Mar 25, 2024 |website=International Encyclopedia of the First World}}</ref> An international wartime focus on military use of opiates and cocaine, for medical treatment and performance enhancement, and concern over potential abuse, lead to a post-war adoption among nations of the [[International Opium Convention|1912 Hague International Opium Convention of 1912]], with oversight by the newly established [[League of Nations]]. This became the basis of current international drug control policy,<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Berridge |first=Virginia |date=November 22, 2014 |title=Drugs, alcohol, and the First World War |url=https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736%2814%2962234-0/fulltext |access-date=Mar 13, 2024 |journal=[[The Lancet]] |volume=384 |issue=9957 |pages=1840–1841 |doi=10.1016/s0140-6736(14)62234-0 |pmid=25478609 |quote=International drug control had been discussed before the war, but a global system was unlikely. ... The [[Hague Convention of 1912]] was the product of this expanded geographical concern. The decision at the Hague that opium, morphine, and cocaine and their use should be confined to "legitimate medical purposes" was central to future international drug control. ... The German Government ... insisted that all 34 participating powers had to ratify the Hague Convention before it could come into force. The convention thus had an "all or nothing" aspect that had not been initially intended. ... The war changed the situation. ... Article 295 of the peace settlement enacted through the [[Treaty of Versailles]] in 1919 brought the Hague Convention into operation and gave the newly established [[League of Nations]] general supervision over international narcotics agreements.}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |date=2009 |title=A Century of International Drug Control |url=https://www.unodc.org/documents/data-and-analysis/Studies/100_Years_of_Drug_Control.pdf |access-date=Mar 26, 2024 |website=[[United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime]] |page=7}}</ref> initially concerned with regulating the free trade of drugs, without affecting production or use. The US, one of the most prohibitionist countries, felt these provisions did not go far enough in restricting drugs.<ref>{{Cite web |last1=Armenta |first1=Amira |last2=Jelsma |first2=Martin |date=Oct 8, 2015 |title=The UN Drug Control Conventions – A Primer |url=https://www.tni.org/en/publication/the-un-drug-control-conventions |access-date=May 21, 2024 |website=[[Transnational Institute]]}}</ref>

In 1919, the US passed the [[Eighteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution|18th Amendment]], prohibiting the sale, manufacture, and transportation of [[ethanol|alcohol]], with exceptions for religious and medical use, and the [[National Prohibition Act]], also known as the Volstead Act, to carry out the provisions of the 18th Amendment. By the 1930s, the policy was seen as a failure: production and consumption of alcohol did not decrease, organized crime flourished in the alcohol [[black market]], and tax revenue, particularly needed after the start of the [[Great Depression in the United States|Great Depression]] in 1929, was lost. [[Prohibition in the United States|Prohibition]] was repealed by passage of the [[Twenty-first Amendment to the United States Constitution|21st Amendment]] in 1933, with President [[Franklin D. Roosevelt]] (1933–1945) asking Americans not to abuse "this return to personal freedom."<ref>{{Cite web |last=Klein |first=Christopher |date=Mar 28, 2023 |title=The Night Prohibition Ended |url=https://www.history.com/news/the-night-prohibition-ended |access-date=Mar 11, 2024 |website=[[History.com]]}}</ref>

In 1922, the [[Narcotic Drugs Import and Export Act]] broadened federal regulation of opiates and coca products by prohibiting import and export for non-medical use,<ref name="uslegal">{{cite web |title=Narcotic Drug Import and Export Act Law & Legal Definition |url=http://definitions.uslegal.com/n/narcotic-drug-import-and-export-act/ |accessdate=9 November 2012 |publisher=definitions.uslegal.com}}</ref> and established the [[Federal Bureau of Narcotics|Federal Narcotics Control Board]] (FNCB) to act as overseer.<ref name="umsl">{{cite web |title=Drugs, The Law, and The Future |url=http://www.umsl.edu/~keelr/180/law.html |accessdate=9 November 2012 |publisher=www.umsl.edu}}</ref>

==== Anslinger era begins ====
[[File:Closer_U.S.-Canada_Marihuana_(Marijuana)_control_discussed._Washington,_D.C.,_March_24._Closer_cooperation_in_the_control_of_the_use_of_marihuana_weed_is_expected_to_be_the_outcome_of_a_LCCN2016873283.jpg|thumb|Anslinger (center) discussing cannabis control with Canadian narcotics chief [[Charles Henry Ludovic Sharman]] and [[United States Assistant Secretary of the Treasury|Assistant Secretary of the Treasury]] Stephen B. Gibbons (1938)|alt=Harry Anslinger discussing cannabis control with Canadian narcotics chief Charles Henry Ludovic Sharman and Assistant Secretary of the Treasury Stephen B. Gibbons (1938)]]
The [[Federal Bureau of Narcotics]] (FBN) was established as an agency of the [[United States Department of the Treasury|US Department of the Treasury]] by an act of June 14, 1930,<ref>{{cite web |url=https://www.archives.gov/research/guide-fed-records/groups/170.html#170.3 |title=Records of the Drug Enforcement Administration DEA |publisher=Archives.gov |access-date=March 27, 2011 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110521222056/http://www.archives.gov/research/guide-fed-records/groups/170.html#170.3 |archive-date=May 21, 2011 |url-status=live }}</ref> with [[Harry J. Anslinger]] appointed as commissioner, a position he held for 32 years, until 1962.<ref>{{cite book |last=Filan |first=Kenaz |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=vDL9JQr_cCMC&q=Harry%20J.%20Anslinger&pg=PA64 |title=The Power of the Poppy: Harnessing Nature's Most Dangerous Plant Ally |date= 2011 |publisher=Park Street Press |isbn=978-1-59477-399-0 |location=Rochester, Vt. |page=64}}</ref> Anslinger supported Prohibition and the criminalization of all drugs, and spearheaded anti-drug policy campaigns.<ref name="obit">{{cite news |last=Krebs |first=Albin |date=18 November 1975 |title=Harry J. Anslinger Dies at 83; Hard-Hitting Foe of Narcotics |volume=CXXIV |page=40 |newspaper=[[The New York Times]] |issue=236 |editor1-last=Sulzberger Sr. |editor1-first=Arthur Ochs |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1975/11/18/archives/harry-j-anslinger-dies-at-83-hardhitting-foe-of-narcotics-us.html |access-date=10 September 2021 |quote=Harry J. Anslinger, an implacable, hard-hitting foe of drug pushers and users during the 32 years he was the Treasury Department's Commissioner of Narcotics, died Friday in Hollidaysburg, Pa. His age was 83. |editor1-link=Punch Sulzberger}}</ref> He did not support a public health and treatment approach, instead urging courts to "jail offenders, then throw away the key." He has been characterized as the first architect of the punitive war on drugs.<ref name=":11">{{Cite web |last=Adams |first=Cydney |date=November 17, 2016 |title=The man behind the marijuana ban for all the wrong reasons |url=https://www.cbsnews.com/news/harry-anslinger-the-man-behind-the-marijuana-ban/ |access-date=Mar 17, 2024 |website=[[CBS News]]}}</ref><ref name=":12">{{cite book |last=Chasin |first=Alexandra |author-link=Alexandra Chasin |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=imUpDQAAQBAJ |title=Assassin of Youth: A Kaleidoscopic History of Harry J. Anslinger's War on Drugs |date=2016 |publisher=[[University of Chicago Press]] |isbn=9780226276977 |publication-place=[[Chicago]] |doi=10.7208/chicago/9780226277028.001.0001 |lccn=2016011027 |access-date=10 September 2021 |via=[[Google Books]]}}</ref><ref>{{Cite magazine |last1=Halpern |first1=John H. |last2=Blistein |first2=David |date=Aug 12, 2019 |title=America's War on Drugs Has Treated People Unequally Since Its Beginning |url=https://time.com/5638316/war-on-drugs-opium-history/ |access-date=March 16, 2024 |magazine=[[TIME]] |quote=Between 1930 and 1962, Anslinger established the standards that continue to serve as basic tools of the trade for America's drug enforcement, such as dramatic drug busts, harsh penalties and questionable data. There remains serious disagreement in scholarly as well as political circles about how successful Anslinger really was in reducing drug sales and use in America, though he achieved several significant legislative victories, including the Uniform State Narcotic Drug Act, which fostered collaboration between federal agents and police in different states (each of which had its own specific laws).}}</ref> According to a report prepared for the [[Senate of Canada]], Anslinger was "utterly devoted to prohibition and the control of drug supplies at the source" and is "widely recognized as having had one of the more powerful impacts on the development of US drug policy, and, by extension, international drug control into the early 1970s."<ref name=":20">{{Cite web |last=Sinha |first=Jay |date=21 February 2001 |title=The History and Development of the Leading International Drug Control Conventions |url=https://sencanada.ca/en/content/sen/committee/371/ille/library/history-e#G.%20The%201946%20Lake%20Success%20Protocol |access-date=May 15, 2024 |website=[[Senate of Canada]]}}</ref>

During his three decades heading the FBN, Anslinger zealously and effectively pursued harsh drug penalties, with a particular focus on cannabis. He used his stature as the head of a federal agency to draft legislation, discredit critics, discount medical opinion and scientific findings, and convince lawmakers. Publicly, he used the media and speaking engagements to introduce hyperbolic messages about the evils of drug use.<ref name=":11" /><ref>{{Cite web |last=Moynihan |first=Colin |date=August 10, 2020 |title=An Exhibition Tells the Story of a Drug War Leader, but Not All of It |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2020/08/10/arts/design/Anslinger-drug-czar-exhibition.html |url-access=subscription |access-date=Mar 17, 2024 |website=[[New York Times]]}}</ref> In the 1930s, he referred to a collection of news reports of horrific crimes, making unsubstantiated claims attributing them to drugs, particularly cannabis. He announced that youth become "slaves" to cannabis, "continuing addiction until they deteriorate mentally, become insane, turn to violent crime and murder." He promoted a racialized view of drug use, saying that blacks and Latinos were the primary abusers.<ref name=":11" /> In Congressional testimony, he declared "of all the offenses committed against the laws of this country, the narcotic addict is the most frequent offender."<ref>{{Cite web |date=April 7, 2022 |title=The Evolution of Marijuana as a Controlled Substance and the Federal-State Policy Gap |url=https://crsreports.congress.gov/product/pdf/R/R44782/6 |access-date=Apr 17, 2024 |website=[[Congressional Research Service]] |page=2}}</ref> He was also an effective administrator and diplomat, attending international drug conferences and steadily expanding the FBN's influence.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Smith |first=Benjamin T. |date=June 2021 |title=Why we should remember Richard Nixon's war on drugs |url=https://www.historyextra.com/period/20th-century/why-remember-nixon-war-drugs/ |access-date=Jan 6, 2024 |website=[[History Extra]]}}</ref>

In 1935, the ''[[The New York Times|New York Times]]'' reported on President Roosevelt's public support of the [[Uniform State Narcotic Drug Act]] under the headline, "Roosevelt Asks Narcotic War Aid".<ref name=":15">{{cite web |url=http://www.druglibrary.net/schaffer/History/e1930/rooseveltasks.htm |title=Roosvelt Asks Narcotics War Aid, 1935 |publisher=Druglibrary.net |access-date=March 27, 2011 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110723103650/http://www.druglibrary.net/schaffer/History/e1930/rooseveltasks.htm |archive-date=July 23, 2011 |url-status=live }}</ref><ref>{{cite web |url=https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/node/208464 |title=Letter to the World Narcotic Defense Association. March 21, 1935 |publisher=Presidency.ucsb.edu |access-date=March 27, 2011 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120203072730/http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/index.php?pid=15024 |archive-date=February 3, 2012 |url-status=live }}</ref> The [[Uniform Law Commission]] developed the Act to address the 1914 Harrison Act's lack of state-level enforcement provisions, creating a model law reflecting the Harrison Act that states could adopt to replace the existing patchwork of state laws.<ref name=":15" /> Anslinger and the FBN were centrally involved in drafting the Act, and in convincing states to adopt it.<ref>{{Cite web |date=1972 |title=Marihuana – A Signal of Misunderstanding (First Report of the National Commission on Marihuana and Drug Abuse) |url=https://www.druglibrary.org/schaffer/library/studies/nc/ncmenu.htm |access-date=Mar 16, 2024 |website=Schaffer Library of Drug Policy |at=[https://www.druglibrary.org/schaffer/library/studies/nc/nc2_4.htm Drafting the Uniform Act] |ref=signal}}</ref>

==== Cannabis effectively outlawed, prescription drugs ====
With the passage of the [[Marihuana Tax Act of 1937]],<ref>For repeal, see section 1101(b)(3), Comprehensive Drug Abuse Prevention and Control Act of 1970, Pub. L. No. 91-513, 84 Stat. 1236, 1292 (Oct. 27, 1970) (repealing the Marihuana Tax Act which had been codified in Subchapter A of Chapter 39 of the Internal Revenue Code of 1954).</ref> federal law reflected state law{{snd}}by 1936, the non-medical use of cannabis had been banned in every state.<ref name="Booth history">{{cite book |last1=Booth |first1=Martin |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=O7AoY6ljSygC |title=Cannabis: A History |date=2005 |publisher=St. Martin's Press |isbn=978-0-312-42494-7 |location=New York}}</ref><ref>{{Cite journal |last1=Galliher |first1=John F. |last2=Walker |first2=Allynn |date=1977 |title=The Puzzle of the Social Origins of the Marihuana Tax Act of 1937 |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/800089 |journal=[[Social Problems]] |volume=24 |issue=3 |pages=367–376 |doi=10.2307/800089 |jstor=800089 }}</ref> That year, the first two arrests for tax non-payment under the Act, for possession of a quarter-ounce (7g), and trafficking of four pounds (1.8&nbsp;kg), resulted in sentences of nearly 18 months and four years respectively.<ref name="Leafly">{{cite web |author=Glick, Daniel |date=December 6, 2016 |title=80 Years Ago This Week, Marijuana Prohibition Began With These Arrests |url=https://www.leafly.com/news/politics/drug-war-prisoners-1-2-true-story-moses-sam-two-denver-drifters-became-cannabis-pioneers |accessdate= |work=[[Leafly]]}}</ref> The [[American Medical Association]] (AMA) had opposed the tax act on grounds that it unduly affected the medical use of cannabis. The AMA's legislative counsel, a physician, testified that the claims about cannabis addiction, violence and overdoses were not supported by evidence.<ref name="Woodward">{{cite web |title=Statement of Dr. William C. Woodward, Legislative Counsel, American Medical Association |url=http://www.druglibrary.org/Schaffer/hemp/taxact/woodward.htm |access-date=2006-03-25}}</ref><ref name="ReferenceA2">Committee on Finance, U.S. Senate, 75c 2s. HR6906. Library of Congress transcript. July 12, 1937</ref> Scholars have posited that the Act was orchestrated by powerful business interests – [[Andrew Mellon]], [[William Randolph Hearst|Randolph Hearst]], and the [[Du Pont family]] – to head off cheap competition to [[Pulp (paper)|pulp]] and [[Lumber|timber]] and plastics from the hemp industry.{{Refn|Various sources discussed this claim. <ref name="nafta-neocolonialism-129">{{Cite book |last1=French |first1=Laurence |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=4ozF1Yg-c4MC&pg=PA129 |title=NAFTA & neocolonialism: comparative criminal, human & social justice |last2=Manzanárez |first2=Magdaleno |publisher=University Press of America |year=2004 |isbn=978-0-7618-2890-7 |page=129 |access-date=May 7, 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20191228064135/https://books.google.com/books?id=4ozF1Yg-c4MC&pg=PA129 |archive-date=December 28, 2019 |url-status=live}}</ref><ref>Earlywine, 2005: [https://books.google.com/books?id=r9wPbxMAG8cC&pg=PA24 p. 24] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160110080209/https://books.google.com/books?id=r9wPbxMAG8cC&pg=PA24|date=January 10, 2016}}</ref><ref name="under-influence-55">Peet, 2004: [https://books.google.com/books?id=uC0_YznYjScC&pg=PA55 p. 55]</ref><ref>{{Cite book |last=Evans |first=Sterling |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=_wFkZgyuGFAC&pg=PA27 |title=Bound in twine: the history and ecology of the henequen-wheat complex for Mexico and the American and Canadian Plains, 1880–1950 |publisher=Texas A&M University Press |year=2007 |isbn=978-1-58544-596-7 |page=27 |access-date=March 6, 2016 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160424191430/https://books.google.com/books?id=_wFkZgyuGFAC&pg=PA27 |archive-date=April 24, 2016 |url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |url=https://archive.org/details/borderlandsofame00ster |title=The borderlands of the American and Canadian Wests: essays on regional history of the forty-ninth parallel |publisher=University of Nebraska Press |year=2006 |isbn=978-0-8032-1826-0 |editor=Evans, Sterling |page=[https://archive.org/details/borderlandsofame00ster/page/199 199] |url-access=registration}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |author=Gerber, Rudolph Joseph |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=WMOdI9pC-gEC&pg=PA7 |title=Legalizing marijuana: drug policy reform and prohibition politics |publisher=Greenwood Publishing Group |year=2004 |isbn=978-0-275-97448-0 |page=7 |access-date=March 6, 2016 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160108200703/https://books.google.com/books?id=WMOdI9pC-gEC&pg=PA7 |archive-date=January 8, 2016 |url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |author=Earleywine, Mitchell |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=r9wPbxMAG8cC&pg=PA231 |title=Understanding marijuana: a new look at the scientific evidence |publisher=Oxford University Press |year=2005 |isbn=978-0-19-518295-8 |page=231 |access-date=March 6, 2016 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160108200703/https://books.google.com/books?id=r9wPbxMAG8cC&pg=PA231 |archive-date=January 8, 2016 |url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |author1=Robinson, Matthew B. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=dwGpsNjv_1kC&pg=PA12 |title=Lies, damned lies, and drug war statistics: a critical analysis of claims made by the office of National Drug Control Policy |author2=Scherlen, Renee G. |publisher=SUNY Press |year=2007 |isbn=978-0-7914-6975-0 |page=12 |access-date=March 6, 2016 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160108200703/https://books.google.com/books?id=dwGpsNjv_1kC&pg=PA12 |archive-date=January 8, 2016 |url-status=live |name-list-style=amp}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |author=Rowe, Thomas C. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=v1tz6nP6fdwC&pg=PA26 |title=Federal narcotics laws and the war on drugs: money down a rat hole |publisher=Psychology Press |year=2006 |isbn=978-0789028082 |page=26 |access-date=March 6, 2016 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160108200703/https://books.google.com/books?id=v1tz6nP6fdwC&pg=PA26 |archive-date=January 8, 2016 |url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=FtgYAAAAIAAJ&q=hearst+hemp |title=Encyclopedia of Law Enforcement: Federal |publisher=Sage |year=2005 |isbn=978-0761926498 |editor=Sullivan, Larry E. |page=747 |access-date=March 6, 2016 |display-editors=etal |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160108200703/https://books.google.com/books?id=FtgYAAAAIAAJ&q=hearst+hemp&dq=hearst+hemp |archive-date=January 8, 2016 |url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |author=Lusane, Clarence |author-link=Clarence Lusane |url=https://archive.org/details/pipedreambluesra00lusa |title=Pipe dream blues: racism and the war on drugs |publisher=South End Press |year=1991 |isbn=978-0896084100 |pages=[https://archive.org/details/pipedreambluesra00lusa/page/37 37]–38 |url-access=registration}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |title=Was there a conspiracy to outlaw hemp because it was a threat to theDuPonts and other industrial interests? |url=http://druglibrary.org/schaffer/library/hemp_conspiracy.htm |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150402154536/http://druglibrary.org/schaffer/library/hemp_conspiracy.htm |archive-date=April 2, 2015 |access-date=March 17, 2015}}</ref>
Despite media reports at the time touting hemp as the new wonder fiber, harvesting and processing technology weren't sufficiently developed to compete commercially.<ref name="Dew">{{cite web |last=LH |first=Dewey |date=1943 |title=Fiber production in the western hemisphere |url=https://archive.org/stream/fiberproductioni518dewe#page/66/mode/2up |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160313011333/https://archive.org/stream/fiberproductioni518dewe#page/66/mode/2up |archive-date=March 13, 2016 |access-date=February 25, 2015 |publisher=United States Printing Office, Washington, DC |page=67}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |last1=Fortenbery |first1=T. Randall |last2=Bennett |first2=Michael |date=July 2001 |title=Is Industrial Hemp Worth Further Study in the US? A Survey of the Literature |url=http://www.aae.wisc.edu/pubs/sps/pdf/stpap443.pdf |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160304041408/http://www.aae.wisc.edu/pubs/sps/pdf/stpap443.pdf |archive-date=March 4, 2016 |access-date=June 25, 2014 |website=Department of Agricultural and Applied Economics, [[University of Wisconsin-Madison]] |page=25}}</ref>|group=note}} After the Act, cannabis research and medical testing became rare.<ref>{{Cite web |date=Dec 20, 2019 |title=Did You Know... Marijuana Was Once a Legal Cross-Border Import? |url=https://www.cbp.gov/about/history/did-you-know/marijuana |access-date=May 1, 2024 |website=[[US Customs and Border Protection]]}}</ref>

In 1939, [[New York City|New York]] Mayor [[Fiorello LaGuardia|Fiorello La Guardia]], an opponent of the Marihuana Tax Act, formed the [[LaGuardia Committee]] to conduct the first US in-depth study of cannabis use. The report, produced by the [[New York Academy of Medicine]] and released in 1944, systematically contradicted government claims, finding that cannabis is not physically addictive, not a gateway drug, and its use does not lead to crime.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Downs |first=David |date=April 19, 2016 |title=The Science behind the DEA's Long War on Marijuana |url=https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/the-science-behind-the-dea-s-long-war-on-marijuana/ |access-date=Jan 31, 2024 |website=[[Scientific American]]}}</ref><ref name="druglibrary.net">[http://www.druglibrary.net/schaffer/History/murd3.htm HARRY J. ANSLINGER: The Murderers THE STORY OF THE NARCOTIC GANGS, 1962]</ref> The FBN's Anslinger branded the study "unscientific", denounced all involved, and disrupted other cannabis studies at the time.<ref>[[Jack Herer]]. 1985. ''[[The Emperor Wears No Clothes]]''. Ah Ha Publishing, Van Nuys, CA.</ref>

In the late 1930s, questions emerged from League of Nations' Opium Advisory Committee concerning the focus on drug prohibition over public health measures such as mental health treatment, drug dispensaries and education. Anslinger, backed by his Canadian counterpart and policy ally, [[Charles Henry Ludovic Sharman]], successfully argued against this view, and kept the focus on increasing global prohibition and supply control measures.<ref name=":20" />

While narcotics were under the jurisdiction of the FBN, the [[Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act of 1938|Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act]] of 1938 required the FDA to ensure that non-narcotic drugs were labeled for safe use. The act determined that certain drugs, including [[amphetamine]]s, commercialized in the later 1930s, and [[barbiturate]]s, were unsafe to use without medical supervision and could only be obtained by doctor's prescription. This marked the beginning of the federal distinction between over-the-counter and prescription drugs (clarified in the [[Durham–Humphrey Amendment|Durham-Humphrey Amendment]] of 1951).<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Swann |first=J.P. |date=Jan–Feb 1997 |title=Drug abuse control under FDA, 1938–1968. |url=https://stacks.cdc.gov/view/cdc/64508 |journal=[[Public Health Reports]] |volume=112 |issue=1 |pages=82–86 |pmid=9018295 |pmc=1381845 |via=[[Centers for Disease Control and Prevention]]}}</ref>
[[File:Syrette.jpg|alt=WWII US Army first aid manual illustration for injecting morphine using a syrette.|thumb|"For the relief of severe pain": WWII US Army first aid manual illustrating self-injection of morphine using a [[syrette]].]]

==== Amphetamines, harsher penalties, international obligations ====
During [[World War II]] (1939-1945), in addition to the widespread use of morphine, [[amphetamine]]s entered military use to combat fatigue and improve morale. In the US, the Benzedrine brand quickly became popular for a variety of medical and recreational applications. During the war, it was widely used in the military and by the public; beginning in 1943, American soldiers could buy Benzedrine directly from the army on demand.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Racine |first=Nicholas |date=Spring 2019 |title=Blood, Meth, and Tears: The Super Soldiers of World War II |url=https://commons.lib.jmu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1127&context=madrush |access-date=Apr 7, 2024 |website=[[James Madison University]]}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |last=Holland |first=James |date=Jun 25, 2019 |title=World War Speed |url=https://www.pbs.org/wnet/secrets/preview-world-war-speed/4337/ |access-date=Apr 7, 2024 |website=[[PBS]]}}</ref> Post-war, amphetamines were promoted as mood elevators and diet pills, to great success; by 1945, an estimated 750 million tablets a year were being produced in the US, enough to provide a million people with a daily supply, a trend that grew during the 1950s and 1960s.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Hicks |first=Jesse |date=Apr 15, 2012 |title=Fast Times: The Life, Death, and Rebirth of Amphetamine |url=https://www.sciencehistory.org/stories/magazine/fast-times-the-life-death-and-rebirth-of-amphetamine/ |access-date=Apr 7, 2024 |website=[[Science History Institute]]}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |last=Blakemore |first=Erin |date=October 27, 2017 |title=A Speedy History of America's Addiction to Amphetamine |url=https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/speedy-history-americas-addiction-amphetamine-180966989/ |access-date=Apr 7, 2024 |website=[[Smithsonian Magazine]]}}</ref>

Having failed to preserve world peace, the League of Nations ended post-war, transferring responsibilities to its successor, the United Nations. Anslinger, supported by Sharman, successfully campaigned to ensure that law enforcement and the prohibitionist view remained central to international drug policy. With the [[1946 Lake Success Protocol]], he helped to ensure that law enforcement was represented on the UN's new drug policy Supervisory Body (today's [[International Narcotics Control Board]]), and that it did not fall under a public health-oriented agency like the WHO.<ref name=":20" />

In the early 1950s, responding to "white suburban grassroots movements" concerned about dealers preying on teenagers, liberal politicians at state level cracked down on drugs. California, Illinois, and New York passed the first mandatory minimum sentences for drug offenses; Congress followed with the [[Boggs Act of 1951]], creating the first federal mandatory minimums for drugs.<ref>{{Cite magazine |last=Lassiter |first=Matthew D. |date=Dec 7, 2023 |title=America's War on Drugs Has Always Been Bipartisan{{snd}}and Unwinnable |url=https://time.com/6340590/drug-war-politics-history/ |access-date=Dec 21, 2023 |magazine=[[Time (magazine)|Time]] |quote=The modern drug war began in the 1950s, with liberals{{snd}}not conservatives{{snd}}leading the charge. In California, the epicenter of the early war on narcotics, white suburban grassroots movements prodded liberal politicians like Governor Pat Brown into action. They blamed "pushers," usually perceived and depicted as people of color, and demanded that elected officials crack down on the drug supply. Legislators in California, Illinois, and New York responded by passing the nation's first mandatory-minimum sentencing laws in an effort to save teenagers from these traffickers.}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book |last=Courtwright |first=David T. |author-link=:de:David Todd Courtwright |date=1992 |title=A Century of American Narcotic Policy |url=https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK234755/ |access-date=Mar 13, 2024 |publisher=[[National Academies Press]]}}</ref> The act unified penalties for the Narcotic Drugs Import and Export Act and the Marihuana Tax Act, effectively criminalizing cannabis. Anslinger testified in favor of the inclusion of cannabis, describing a "stepping-stone" path leading from cannabis to harder drugs and crime.<ref>{{Cite web |date=March 1972 |title=Marihuana: A Signal of Misunderstanding |url=https://www.druglibrary.org/schaffer/library/studies/nc/nc2_7.htm |access-date=May 1, 2024 |website=Shaffer Drug Library}}</ref> First-offense possession of cannabis carried a 2–10 year minimum and a fine of up to $20,000.<ref>{{cite news |title=Marijuana timeline |url=https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/dope/etc/cron.html |access-date=2014-07-31 |work=[[PBS]]}}</ref> This marked a change in Congress's approach to mandatory minimums, increasing their number, severity, and the crimes they covered. According to the [[United States Sentencing Commission]], reporting in 2012: "Before 1951, mandatory minimum penalties typically punished offenses concerning treason, murder, piracy, rape, slave trafficking, internal revenue collection, and counterfeiting. Today, the majority of convictions under statutes carrying mandatory minimum penalties relate to controlled substances, firearms, [[identity theft]], and child sex offenses.".<ref>{{Cite journal |last=United States Sentencing Commission |date=2012 |title=Report to Congress: Mandatory Minimum Penalties in the Federal Criminal Justice System |url=https://www.ussc.gov/sites/default/files/pdf/news/congressional-testimony-and-reports/mandatory-minimum-penalties/20111031-rtc-pdf/Chapter_02.pdf |journal=[[Federal Sentencing Reporter]] |volume=24 |issue=3 |page=28 |quote=As detailed herein, beginning in 1951, Congress changed how it used mandatory minimum penalties in three significant ways. First, Congress enacted more mandatory minimum penalties. Second, Congress expanded its use of mandatory minimum penalties to offenses not traditionally covered by such penalties. Before 1951, mandatory minimum penalties typically punished offenses concerning treason, murder, piracy, rape, slave trafficking, internal revenue collection, and counterfeiting. Today, the majority of convictions under statutes carrying mandatory minimum penalties relate to controlled substances, firearms, identity theft, and child sex offenses. Third, the mandatory minimum penalties most commonly used today are generally lengthier than mandatory minimum penalties in earlier eras.}}</ref>

In 1961, the United Nations' [[Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs]] became the first of [[United Nations drug control conventions|three UN treaties]] that together form the legal framework for international drug control, and required that domestic drug laws in member countries comply with the conventions.<ref name="Haase" /> The Single Convention unified existing international drug agreements,<ref>{{Cite web |last=Hilotin-Lee, J.D. |first=Lyle Therese A. |date=October 20, 2023 |title=The Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs |url=https://www.findlaw.com/criminal/criminal-charges/the-single-convention-on-narcotic-drugs.html |access-date=Dec 15, 2023 |website=[[FindLaw]]}}</ref> and limited possession and use of opiates, cannabis and cocaine to "medicinal and scientific purposes", prohibiting recreational use. Sixty-four countries initially joined; it was ratified and came into force in the US in 1967. The [[Convention on Psychotropic Substances|Convention on Psychotropic Substances of 1971]] added synthetic, prescription and hallucinogenic drugs. The [[United Nations Convention Against Illicit Traffic in Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances|Convention against Illicit Traffic in Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances of 1988]] addressed international drug trafficking and "criminalized the entire drug market chain, from cultivation/production to shipment, sale, and possession."<ref>{{Cite journal |last1=Lines |first1=Rick |last2=Elliott |first2=Richard |last3=Julie |first3=Hannah |last4=Rebecca |first4=Schleifer |last5=Tenu |first5=Avafia |last6=Damon |first6=Barrett |date=June 2017 |title=The Case for International Guidelines on Human Rights and Drug Control |journal=[[Health and Human Rights]] |volume=19 |issue=1 |pages=231–236 |pmc=5473052 |pmid=28630555 |quote=Over time, the punitive nature of the international drug control system also expanded and intensified, with criminal law being used to suppress drug use and drug markets. The third UN drug treaty, the 1988 Convention against Illicit Traffic in Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances, criminalized the entire drug market chain, from cultivation/production to shipment, sale, and possession (although this last obligation is subject to significant caveats, giving states leeway to refrain from criminalizing possession of scheduled substances for personal use).}}</ref><ref name="Haase">{{Cite web |last1=Haase |first1=Heather J. |last2=Eyle |first2=Nicolas Edward |last3=Schrimpf |first3=Joshua Raymond |date=August 2012 |title=The International Drug Control Treaties: How Important Are They to U.S. Drug Reform? |url=https://www2.nycbar.org/pdf/InternationalDrugControlTreatiesArticle.pdf |access-date=Apr 24, 2024 |publisher=[[New York City Bar Association]] (Committee on Drugs & the Law)}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |title=Treaties |url=https://www.unodc.org/unodc/en/treaties/index.html |access-date=Dec 15, 2023 |website=[[United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime]]}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |title=Conventions |url=https://www.undrugcontrol.info/en/un-drug-control/conventions |access-date=Dec 15, 2023 |website=[[Transnational Institute]]}}</ref>

In 1968, President [[Lyndon B. Johnson]] (1963–69) decided that the government needed to make an effort to curtail the [[Counterculture of the 1960s|social unrest]] that blanketed the country at the time. He focused on illegal drug use, an approach that was in line with expert opinion on the subject at the time. In the 1960s, it was believed that at least half of the crime in the US was drug-related, and this estimate grew as high as 90% in the next decade.<ref>James Inciardi, ''The War on Drugs'' IV, ed. 4. (Delaware: Pearson Allyn and Bacon, 2008), 286.</ref> He created the Reorganization Plan of 1968 which merged the Bureau of Narcotics and the [[Bureau of Drug Abuse Control]] to form the [[Bureau of Narcotics and Dangerous Drugs]] within the [[United States Department of Justice|Department of Justice]].<ref>Andrew B. Whitford and Jeffrey Yates, ''Presidential Rhetoric and the Public Agenda'' (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2009), 40.</ref>

==== Federal drug schedule system introduced ====
The [[Richard Nixon]] presidency (1969–74) incorporated his predecessor's anti-drug initiative in a [[Law and order (politics)|tough-on-crime]] platform. In his 1968 presidential nomination acceptance speech, Nixon promised, "Our new Attorney General will ... launch a war against organized crime in this country. ... will be an active belligerent against the loan sharks and the numbers racketeers that rob the urban poor. ... will open a new front against the filth peddlers and the narcotics peddlers who are corrupting the lives of the children of this country."<ref>{{Cite web |date=Aug 30, 2008 |title="Law and Order" in Richard Nixon 1968 Presidential acceptance speech |url=https://www.c-span.org/video/?c4612766/law-order-richard-nixon-1968-presidential-acceptance-speech |access-date=Jan 8, 2024 |website=[[C-SPAN]]}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |last=Newell |first=Walker |date=26 April 2013 |title=The Legacy of Nixon, Reagan, and Horton: How The Tough On Crime Movement Enabled A New Regime Of Race Influenced Employment Discrimination |url=https://lawcat.berkeley.edu/record/1125583/files/fulltext.pdf |access-date=Feb 8, 2024 |website=Berkeley Journal of African-American Law & Policy}}</ref> In a 1969 special message to Congress, he identified drug abuse as "a serious national threat".<ref name=":42">{{Cite web |date=April 2, 2007 |title=Timeline: America's War on Drugs |url=https://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=9252490 |access-date=Dec 5, 2023 |website=[[NPR]]}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book |last1=Payan |first1=Tony |title=A War that Can't Be Won |last2=Staudt |first2=Kathleen |last3=Kruszewski |first3=Z. Anthony |publisher=[[University of Arizona Press]] |year=2013 |page=180}}</ref>

On October 27, 1970, Nixon signed into law the [[Comprehensive Drug Abuse Prevention and Control Act of 1970]], establishing his approach to drug control. The Act largely repealed mandatory minimum sentences:<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Gill |first=Molly M. |date=Oct 2008 |title=Correcting Course: Lessons from the 1970 Repeal of Mandatory Minimums |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/10.1525/fsr.2008.21.1.55 |journal=[[Federal Sentencing Reporter]] |volume=21 |issue=1 |pages=55–67 |doi=10.1525/fsr.2008.21.1.55 |jstor=10.1525/fsr.2008.21.1.55 }}</ref> simple possession was reduced from a felony to a misdemeanor, the first offense carried a maximum of one year in prison, and judges had the latitude to assign probation, parole or dismissal. Penalties for trafficking were increased, up to life depending on the quantity and type of drug. Funding was authorized for the Department of Health, Education and Welfare to provide treatment, rehabilitation and education. Additional federal drug agents were provided, and a "no-knock" power was instituted, that allowed entry into homes without warning to prevent evidence from being destroyed. Licensing and stricter reporting and record-keeping for pharmaceutical manufacturers and distributors occurred under the Act.<ref>{{Cite web |agency=Associated Press |date=October 28, 1970 |title=Nixon Signs Drug Abuse Control Bill |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1970/10/28/archives/nixon-signs-drug-abuse-control-bill.html |access-date=Dec 13, 2023 |website=[[New York Times]]}}</ref> Title II of Act, the [[Controlled Substances Act]] (CSA), helped align US law with the UN Single Convention, with "many of the provisions of the CSA ... enacted by Congress for the specific purpose of ensuring U.S. compliance with the treaty." The CSA's five drug Schedules, an implementation of the Single Convention four schedule system, categorized drugs based on medical value and potential for abuse.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Preliminary Note Regarding Treaty Considerations |url=https://www.deadiversion.usdoj.gov/schedules/marijuana/Preliminary_Note_Regarding_Treaty_Considerations.pdf |access-date=May 28, 2024 |website=[[US Department of Justice]]}}</ref><ref name="frontline">[https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/drugs/cron/ Thirty Years of America's Drug War, a Chronology] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110224054034/http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/drugs/cron/|date=February 24, 2011}}. [[Frontline (U.S. TV series)]].</ref>

Under the new drug schedules, cannabis was provisionally placed by the administration in the most restrictive Schedule I, "until the completion of certain studies now underway to resolve the issue."<ref>{{cite web |author=Aggarwal, Sunil |date=2010 |title=Cannabis: A Commonwealth Medicinal Plant, Long Suppressed, Now at Risk of Monopolization |url=http://www.cannabinologist.org/Documents/Aggarwal-Macroed1.pdf |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20151222161017/http://www.cannabinologist.org/Documents/Aggarwal-Macroed1.pdf |archive-date=December 22, 2015 |access-date=13 December 2015 |work=Denver University Law Review |quote=Since there is still a considerable void in our knowledge of the plant and effects of the active drug contained in it, our recommendation is that marihuana be retained within schedule I at least until the completion of certain studies now underway to resolve the issue. If those studies make it appropriate for the Attorney General to change the placement of marihuana to a different schedule, he may do so in accordance with the authority provided under section 201 of the bill.}}</ref> As mandated by the CSA, Nixon appointed the [[Shafer Commission|National Commission on Marijuana and Drug Abuse]], known as the Shafer Commission, to investigate.

=== 1971–present: The "War on Drugs" ===
On May 27, 1971, after a trip to Vietnam, two congressmen, Morgan F. Murphy (Democrat) and Robert H. Steele (Republican), released a report describing a "rapid increase in heroin addiction within the United States military forces in South Vietnam". They estimated that "as many as 10 to 15 percent of our servicemen are addicted to heroin in one form or another."<ref>{{Cite report |last1=Murphy |first1=Morgan F. |last2=Steele |first2=Robert H. |date=May 27, 1971 |title=The World Heroin Problem |url=https://www.cia.gov/readingroom/document/cia-rdp73b00296r000300060002-1 |access-date=Dec 14, 2023 |via=[[Central Intelligence Agency]]}}</ref><ref name="frontline" /><ref name="dupoint">[https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/drugs/interviews/dupont.html WGBH educational foundation. Interview with Dr. Robert Dupoint] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170905012229/http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/drugs/interviews/dupont.html|date=September 5, 2017}}. Pbs.org (February 18, 1970).</ref><ref name="npr">[https://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=9252490 Timeline: America's War on Drugs] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180329060119/https://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=9252490|date=March 29, 2018}}. April 2, 2007. [[National Public Radio|NPR]].</ref> On June 6, a ''New York Times'' article, "It's Always A Dead End On 'Scag Alley'", cited the Murphy-Steele report in a discussion of heroin addiction. The article stated that, in the US, "the number of addicts is estimated at 200,000 to 250,000, only about one‐tenth of 1 per cent of the population but troublesome out of all proportion." It also noted, "Heroin is not the only drug problem in the United States. 'Speed' pills{{snd}}among them, amphetamines{{snd}}are another problem, and not least in the suburbs where they are taken by the housewife (to cure her of the daily 'blues') and by her husband (to keep his weight down)."<ref>{{Cite web |last=Buckley |first=Tom |date=June 6, 1971 |title=It's Always A Dead End on "Scag Alley" |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1971/06/06/archives/its-always-a-dead-end-on-scag-alley-u-s-and-heroin.html |access-date=Dec 14, 2023 |website=[[New York Times]]}}</ref>

On June 17, 1971, Nixon presented to Congress a plan for expanded anti-drug abuse measures. He painted a dire picture: "Present efforts to control drug abuse are not sufficient in themselves. The problem has assumed the dimensions of a national emergency. ... If we cannot destroy the drug menace in America, then it will surely in time destroy us." His strategy involved both treatment and interdiction: "I am proposing the appropriation of additional funds to meet the cost of rehabilitating drug users, and I will ask for additional funds to increase our enforcement efforts to further tighten the noose around the necks of drug peddlers, and thereby loosen the noose around the necks of drug users." He singled out heroin and broadened the scope beyond the US: "To wage an effective war against heroin addiction, we must have international cooperation. In order to secure such cooperation, I am initiating a worldwide escalation in our existing programs for the control of narcotics traffic."<ref>{{Cite web |last=Nixon |first=Richard |date=June 17, 1971 |title=Special Message to the Congress on Drug Abuse Prevention and Control. |url=https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/documents/special-message-the-congress-drug-abuse-prevention-and-control |access-date=Dec 13, 2023 |website=[[UC Santa Barbara]] – The American Presidency Project}}</ref>

Later the same day, Nixon held a news conference at the White House, where he described drug abuse as "America's public enemy number one." He announced, "In order to fight and defeat this enemy, it is necessary to wage a new, all-out offensive. ... This will be a worldwide offensive dealing with the problems of sources of supply ... It will be government wide, pulling together the nine different fragmented areas within the government in which this problem is now being handled, and it will be nationwide in terms of a new educational program." Nixon also stated that the problem wouldn't end with the addiction of soldiers in the Vietnam War.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Nixon |first=Richard |date=June 17, 1971 |title=Remarks About an Intensified Program for Drug Abuse Prevention and Control |url=https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/documents/remarks-about-intensified-program-for-drug-abuse-prevention-and-control |access-date=Feb 22, 2024 |website=The American Presidency Project}}</ref> He pledged to ask Congress for a minimum of $350 million for the anti-drug effort (when he took office in 1969, the federal drug budget was $81 million).<ref>{{Cite news |last=Farber |first=David |date=June 17, 2021 |title=The War on Drugs turns 50 today. It's time to make peace. |url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/outlook/2021/06/17/war-drugs-turns-50-today-its-time-make-peace/ |access-date=Dec 12, 2023 |newspaper=[[Washington Post]]}}</ref>

The news media focused on Nixon's militaristic tone, describing his announcement with variations of the phrase "war on drugs". The day after Nixon's press conference, the ''[[Chicago Tribune]]'' proclaimed, "Nixon Declares War on Narcotics Use in US". In England, ''[[The Guardian]]'' headlined, "Nixon declares war on drug addicts." The US anti-drug campaign came to be commonly referred to as the war on drugs;<ref>{{Cite book |last=Rosino |first=Michael |title=Debating the Drug War: Race, Politics, and the Media |publisher=[[Routledge]] |year=2021 |isbn=9781315295176 |publication-date=March 17, 2021 |page=4}}</ref> the term also became used to refer to any government's prosecution of a US-style prohibition-based drug policy.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Ricordeau |first=Gwenola |title=The Palgrave Encyclopedia of Global Security Studies |publisher=Palgrave Macmillan |year=2023 |chapter=War on Drugs |quote=The War on drugs is a prohibition-based policy that combats the production, the trade and consumption of illegal drugs. ... The expression first strictly referred to the United States antidrug policy that began in the 1970s ... But the expression "War on drugs" has also been used in other countries that followed the USA's stance.}}</ref>

Facing reelection, with drug control as a campaign centerpiece, Nixon formed the [[Office of Drug Abuse Law Enforcement]] (ODALE) in late 1971. ODALE, armed with new federal enforcement powers, began orchestrating drug raids nationwide to improve the administration's watchdog reputation. In a private conversation while helicoptering over [[Brooklyn]], Nixon was reported to have commented, "You and I care about treatment. But those people down there, they want those criminals off the streets." From 1972 to 1973, ODALE performed 6,000 drug arrests in 18 months, the majority of the arrested black.<ref>Whitford and Yates. ''Presidential Rhetoric and the Public Agenda'' 47</ref>

In 1972, the Shafer Commission released its report, "Marihuana: A Signal of Misunderstanding", comprising a review of the medical literature and a national drug survey. It recommended decriminalization for personal possession and use of small amounts of cannabis, and prohibition only of supply. The conclusion was not acted on by Nixon or by Congress.<ref>{{Cite web |date=February 1, 2019 |title=National Commission on Marijuana and Drug Abuse 1971 Poll |url=https://ropercenter.cornell.edu/national-commission-marijuana-and-drug-abuse-1971-poll |access-date=Apr 16, 2024 |website=[[Roper Center]]}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |last=Downs |first=David |date=Apr 19, 2016 |title=The Science behind the DEA's Long War on Marijuana |url=https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/the-science-behind-the-dea-s-long-war-on-marijuana/ |access-date=Apr 16, 2024 |website=[[Scientific American]]}}</ref> Citing the Shafer report, a lobbying campaign from 1973 to 1978, spearheaded by the [[National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws]] (NORML), convinced 11 states to decriminalize cannabis for personal use.<ref name="Heddleston">{{cite thesis |last1=Heddleston |first1=Thomas R. |title=From the Frontlines to the Bottom Line: Medical Marijuana, the War on Drugs, and the Drug Policy Reform Movement |date=June 2012 |publisher=UC Santa Cruz Electronic Theses and Dissertations |url=http://escholarship.org/uc/item/1t7220hj |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20151019053506/http://escholarship.org/uc/item/1t7220hj |archive-date=October 19, 2015 |url-status=live}} [[iarchive:MedicalMarijuanaTheWarOnDrugsAndTheDrugPolicyReformMovement|Alt URL]]</ref>

In 1973, Nixon created the [[Drug Enforcement Administration]] (DEA) by an [[executive order]] accepted by Congress, to "establish a single unified command to combat an all-out global war on the drug menace."<ref>{{Cite web |last=Esquivel-Suárez |first=Fernando |date=August 23, 2018 |title=The Global War on Drugs |url=https://globalsouthstudies.as.virginia.edu/key-issues/global-war-drugs |access-date=Feb 22, 2024 |website=[[University of Virginia]]}}</ref> The agency was charged with enforcing US controlled substances laws and regulations nationally and internationally, coordinating with federal, state and local agencies and foreign governments, and overseeing legally-produced controlled substances.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Drug Enforcement Administration |url=https://www.justice.gov/doj/organization-mission-and-functions-manual-drug-enforcement-administration |access-date=Apr 19, 2024 |website=[[United States Department of Justice]]|date=December 6, 2022 }}</ref> The DEA absorbed the Bureau of Narcotics and Dangerous Drugs, ODALE, and other drug-related federal agencies or personnel from them.<ref name="frontline" />

==== Nixon's role reviewed ====
Decades later, a controversial quote attributed to [[John Ehrlichman]], Nixon's domestic policy advisor, claimed that the war on drugs was fabricated to undermine the anti-war movement and African-Americans. In a 2016 [[Harper's Magazine|''Harper's'']] cover story, Ehrlichman, who died in 1999,<ref>{{Cite web |date=February 15, 1999 |title=John D. Ehrlichman Dead At 73 |url=https://www.cbsnews.com/news/john-d-ehrlichman-dead-at-73/ |access-date=Jan 6, 2024 |website=[[CBS News]]}}</ref> was quoted from journalist [[Dan Baum]]'s 1994 interview notes: "... by getting the public to associate the hippies with marijuana and blacks with heroin, and then criminalizing both heavily, we could disrupt those communities. We could arrest their leaders, raid their homes, break up their meetings, and vilify them night after night on the evening news. Did we know we were lying about the drugs? Of course we did."<ref>{{cite web |title=Dan Baum – Harper's Magazine |url=https://harpers.org/author/danbaum/ |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170730230827/https://harpers.org/author/danbaum/ |archive-date=July 30, 2017 |access-date=July 30, 2017 |website=harpers.org |quote=The Nixon campaign in 1968, and the Nixon White House after that, had two enemies: the antiwar left and black people. You understand what I'm saying? We knew we couldn't make it illegal to be either against the war or black, but by getting the public to associate the hippies with marijuana and blacks with heroin, and then criminalizing both heavily, we could disrupt those communities. We could arrest their leaders, raid their homes, break up their meetings, and vilify them night after night on the evening news. Did we know we were lying about the drugs? Of course we did.}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |title=Home – Dan Baum Writer |url=http://www.danbaum.com/ |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170126153541/http://www.danbaum.com/ |archive-date=January 26, 2017 |access-date=February 7, 2017 |website=www.danbaum.com}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |last=Linkins |first=Jason |date=June 8, 2009 |title=Dan Baum, Fired By New Yorker, Recounting His Story On Twitter |url=https://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/05/08/dan-baum-fired-by-inew-yo_n_200457.html |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190219184511/https://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/05/08/dan-baum-fired-by-inew-yo_n_200457.html |archive-date=February 19, 2019 |access-date=February 20, 2020 |via=Huff Post}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |last=Lopez |first=German |date=March 22, 2016 |title=Nixon official: real reason for the drug war was to criminalize black people and hippies |url=https://www.vox.com/2016/3/22/11278760/war-on-drugs-racism-nixon |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170530191049/https://www.vox.com/2016/3/22/11278760/war-on-drugs-racism-nixon |archive-date=May 30, 2017 |access-date=June 13, 2017 |website=Vox}}</ref> The veracity of the quote was challenged by Ehrlichman's children,<ref>{{Cite web |last=LoBianco |first=Tom |date=March 24, 2016 |title=Report: Aide says Nixon's war on drugs targeted blacks, hippies |url=https://www.cnn.com/2016/03/23/politics/john-ehrlichman-richard-nixon-drug-war-blacks-hippie/index.html |access-date=Dec 19, 2023 |website=[[CNN]] |quote=Ehrlichman died in 1999, but his five children in questioned the veracity of the account. ... 'The 1994 alleged 'quote' we saw repeated in social media for the first time today does not square with what we know of our father. And collectively, that spans over 185 years of time with him. ... We do not subscribe to the alleged racist point of view that this writer now implies 22 years following the so-called interview of John and 16 years following our father's death, when dad can no longer respond.'}}</ref> and Nixon-era officials.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Hanson |first=Hilary |date=Mar 25, 2016 |title=Nixon Aides Suggest Colleague Was Kidding About Drug War Being Designed To Target Black People |url=https://www.huffpost.com/entry/richard-nixon-drug-war-john-ehrlichman_n_56f58be6e4b0a3721819ec61 |access-date=Dec 19, 2023 |website=[[HuffPost]] |quote=[T]hree former Nixon aides say the quote just doesn't sound like Ehrlichman, and if he did say it, he was mistaken. ... 'The comments being attributed to John Ehrlichman in recent news coverage about the Nixon administration's efforts to combat the drug crisis of the 1960's and 70's reflect neither our memory of John nor the administration's approach to that problem,' wrote Jeffrey Donfeld, Jerome H. Jaffe and Robert DuPont in a joint statement ...}}</ref> In the end, the increasingly punitive reshaping of US drug policy by later administrations was most responsible for creating some of the conditions Ehrlichman described.<ref name="Lopez2">{{Cite web |last=Lopez |first=German |date=Mar 29, 2016b |title=Was Nixon's war on drugs a racially motivated crusade? It's a bit more complicated. |url=https://www.vox.com/2016/3/29/11325750/nixon-war-on-drugs |access-date=2024-01-06 |website=Vox |language=en |quote=Ehrlichman's claim is likely an oversimplification, according to historians who have studied the period and Nixon's drug policies in particular. There's no doubt Nixon was racist, and ... race could have played one role in Nixon's drug war. ... he [also] personally despised drugs {{snd}} to the point that it's not surprising he would want to rid the world of them. And there's evidence that Ehrlichman felt bitter and betrayed by Nixon after he spent time in prison over the Watergate scandal, so he may have lied. ... More importantly, Nixon's drug policies did not focus on the kind of criminalization that Ehrlichman described. Instead, Nixon's drug war was largely a public health crusade {{snd}} one that would be reshaped into the modern, punitive drug war we know today by later administrations, particularly President Ronald Reagan.}}</ref>

In a 2011 commentary, [[Robert DuPont]], Nixon's [[drug czar]], argued that the Comprehensive Drug Abuse Act had represented a degree of [[Drug liberalization|drug reform]]. He noted that the Act had rolled back mandatory minimum sentencing and balanced the "long-dominant law enforcement approach to drug policy, known as 'supply reduction'" with an "entirely new and massive commitment to prevention, intervention and treatment, known as 'demand reduction'". Thus Nixon was not in fact the originator of what came to be called the "war on drugs".<ref name="dup2">[http://www.ibhinc.org/pdfs/IBHCommentaryonGlobalCommissionReport71211.pdf Global Commission on Drug Policy Offers Reckless, Vague Drug Legalization Proposal, Institute for Behavior and Health, Inc, July 12, 2011] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110726165232/http://ibhinc.org/pdfs/IBHCommentaryonGlobalCommissionReport71211.pdf|date=July 26, 2011}}. (PDF).</ref> During Nixon's term, some 70% of federal anti-drug money was spent on demand-side public health measures, and 30% on supply-side interdiction and punishment, a situation reversed under subsequent administrations.{{Sfn|Lopez|2016b|ps="According to the federal government's budget numbers for anti-drug programs, the 'demand' side of the war on drugs (treatment, education, and prevention) consistently got more funding during Nixon's time in office (1969 to 1974) than the 'supply' side (law enforcement and interdiction). ... Historically, this is a commitment for treating drugs as a public health issue that the federal government has not replicated since the 1970s. (Although President Barack Obama's budget proposal would, for the first time in decades, put a majority of anti-drug spending on the demand side once again.)"}}<ref>{{Cite web |last=The Editorial Board |date=Feb 22, 2023 |title=America Has Lost the War On Drugs. What Now? |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2023/02/22/opinion/harm-reduction-public-health.html |website=[[New York Times]]}}</ref>

The war on drugs under the next two presidents, [[Gerald Ford]] (1974–77) and [[Jimmy Carter]] (1977–81), was essentially a continuation of their predecessors' policies. Carter's campaign platform included decriminalization of cannabis and an end to federal penalties for possession of up to one ounce.<ref name=":42"/> In a 1977 "Drug Abuse Message to the Congress", Carter stated, "Penalties against possession of a drug should not be more damaging to an individual than the use of the drug itself." None of his advocacy was translated into law.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Sullum |first=Jacob |date=Jun 17, 2011 |title=Did Jimmy Carter End the War on Drugs? |url=https://reason.com/2011/06/17/did-jimmy-carter-end-the-war-o/ |access-date=Dec 19, 2023 |website=[[Reason (magazine)|Reason]]}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |last=Carter |first=Jimmy |date=August 2, 1977 |title=Drug Abuse Message to the Congress |url=https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/documents/drug-abuse-message-the-congress#axzz1PSLOq2Hj |access-date=Dec 19, 2023 |website=The American Presidency Project – [[UC Santa Barbara]]}}</ref>

==== Reagan escalation, militarization, and "Just Say No" ====
The [[presidency of Ronald Reagan]] (1981–89) saw an increase in federal focus on interdiction and prosecution. Shortly after his inauguration, Reagan announced, "We're taking down the surrender flag that has flown over so many drug efforts; we're running up a battle flag."<ref>Whitford and Yates. ''Presidential Rhetoric and the Public Agenda'', 58.</ref> From 1980 to 1984, the annual budget of the [[Federal Bureau of Investigation]] (FBI) drug enforcement units went from $8 million to $95 million.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Beckett |first1=Katherine |title=Making Crime Pay: Law and Order in Contemporary American Politics |date=1997 |publisher=Oxford University Press |isbn=0195136268 |edition=1999 Revised |location=London |pages=52–53, 167}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |author=((98th Congress, 1st Session)) |title=Federal Budget of United States Government, 1984 |publisher=Federal Reserve of Saint Louis |page=451}}</ref> In 1982, Vice President [[George H. W. Bush]] and his aides began pushing for the involvement of the [[Central Intelligence Agency]] (CIA) and the US military in drug interdiction efforts.<ref>Scott and Marshall, 1991: p. 2</ref>

Early in the Reagan term, [[First Lady of the United States|First Lady]] [[Nancy Reagan]], with the help of an advertising agency, began her youth-oriented "[[Just Say No]]" anti-drug campaign. Propelled by the First Lady's tireless promotional efforts through the 1980s, "Just Say No" entered the American [[vernacular]]. Later research found that the campaign had little or no impact on youth drug use.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Stuart |first=Tessa |date=Mar 7, 2016 |title=Pop-Culture Legacy of Nancy Reagan's 'Just Say No' Campaign |url=https://www.rollingstone.com/culture/culture-news/pop-culture-legacy-of-nancy-reagans-just-say-no-campaign-224749/ |access-date=Dec 29, 2023 |website=[[Rolling Stone (magazine)|Rolling Stone]]}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |last1=Lilienfeld |first1=Scott O. |last2=Arkowitz |first2=Hal |date=Jan 1, 2014 |title=Why "Just Say No" Doesn't Work |url=https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/why-just-say-no-doesnt-work/ |access-date=Dec 29, 2023 |website=[[Scientific American]]}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |date=Aug 21, 2018 |title=Just Say No |url=https://www.history.com/topics/1980s/just-say-no |access-date=Dec 29, 2023 |website=[[History.com]]}}</ref> One striking change attributed to the effort: public perception of drug abuse as America's most serious problem, in the 2-6% range in 1985, rose to 64% in 1989.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Tarricone |first=Jackson |date=Sep 10, 2020 |title=Richard Nixon and the Origins of the War on Drugs |url=https://www.bostonpoliticalreview.org/post/richard-nixon-and-the-origins-of-the-war-on-drugs |access-date=Jan 17, 2024 |website=[[Boston Political Review]]}}</ref>

In January 1982, Reagan established the [[Organized Crime Drug Enforcement Task Force#History|South Florida Task Force]], chaired by Bush, targeting a surge of cocaine and cannabis entering through the [[Miami]] region, and the sharp rise in related crime. The project involved the DEA, [[Customs|Customs Service]], the FBI and other agencies, and [[United States Armed Forces|Armed Forces]] ships and planes. It was called the "most ambitious and expensive drug enforcement operation" in US history; critics called it an election year political stunt. By 1986, the task force had made over 15,000 arrests and seized over six million pounds of cannabis and 100,000 pounds of cocaine, doubling cocaine seizures annually{{snd}}administration officials called it Reagan's biggest drug enforcement success. However, law enforcement agents at the time said their impact was minimal; cocaine imports had increased by 10%, to an estimated 75-80% of America's supply. According to the head of the task force's investigative unit, "Law enforcement just can't stop the drugs from coming in." A Bush spokesperson emphasized disrupting smuggling routes rather than seizure quantities as the measure of success."<ref>{{Cite web |last=Brinkley |first=Joel |date=Sep 4, 1986 |title=4-Year Fight in Florida 'Just Can't Stop Drugs' |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1986/09/04/us/4-year-fight-in-florida-just-can-t-stop-drugs.html |access-date=Apr 24, 2024 |website=[[New York Times]]}}</ref><ref>{{Cite news |last=Pincus |first=Walter |date=October 7, 1982 |title=War on Florida Drug Smugglers Is Costly, Political, Makes a Dent |url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/politics/1982/10/08/war-on-florida-drug-smugglers-is-costly-political-makes-a-dent/11fcc04d-c20b-4176-bed7-06547f1d8675/ |access-date=Apr 24, 2024 |newspaper=[[Washington Post]]}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |last=President's Commission on Organized Crime |date=1986 |title=America's Habit: Drug Abuse, Drug Trafficking, & Organized Crime{{snd}}Chapter V Drug Enforcement, Policy, and Reducing Drug Demand |url=https://www.druglibrary.org/schaffer/govpubs/amhab/amhabc5.htm |access-date=Apr 24, 2024 |website=Shaffer Library of Drug Policy}}</ref>

In 1984, Reagan signed the [[Comprehensive Crime Control Act of 1984|Comprehensive Crime Control Act]], which included harsher penalties for cannabis cultivation, possession, and distribution. It also established [[equitable sharing]], a new [[Civil forfeiture in the United States|civil asset forfeiture]] program that allowed state and local law enforcement to share the proceeds from asset seizures made in collaboration with federal agencies.<ref>{{cite web |last1=Thurmond |first1=Strom |title=S.1762 – 98th Congress (1983–1984): Comprehensive Crime Control Act of 1984 |url=https://www.congress.gov/bill/98th-congress/senate-bill/1762 |website=www.congress.gov |access-date=26 June 2019 |date=25 September 1984 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190627002729/https://www.congress.gov/bill/98th-congress/senate-bill/1762 |archive-date=June 27, 2019 |url-status=live }}</ref><ref name="twsLATimes122">{{cite web |author=JOHN ENDERS (ASSOCIATED PRESS) |date=April 18, 1993 |title=Forfeiture Law Casts a Shadow on Presumption of Innocence : Legal system: Government uses the statute to seize money and property believed to be linked to narcotics trafficking. But critics say it short-circuits the Constitution. |url=https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1993-04-18-me-24209-story.html |access-date=October 11, 2014 |work=Los Angeles Times |quote=....Prosecutors and law enforcement officials insist the program, included in the Comprehensive Crime Control Act of 1984, is helping them fight the drug war. ... seizures hurt dealers where it counts--in the pocketbook....}}</ref> Under the controversial program, up to 80% of seizure proceeds can go to local law enforcement, expanding their budgets. {{As of|2019|pre=By|bare=yes}}, $36.5 billion worth of assets had been seized, much of it drug-related, much of it distributed to state and local agencies.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Freivogel |first=William |date=Feb 18, 2019 |title=No Drugs, No Crime and Just Pennies for School: How Police Use Civil Asset Forfeiture |url=https://pulitzercenter.org/stories/no-drugs-no-crime-and-just-pennies-school-how-police-use-civil-asset-forfeiture |access-date=Feb 13, 2024 |website=[[Pulitzer Center]]}}</ref>

==== Crackdown on crack ====
As the media focused on the [[Crack epidemic in the United States|emergence of crack cocaine]] in the early 1980s, the Reagan administration shored up negative public opinion, encouraging the DEA to emphasize the harmful effects of the drug. Stories of "crack whores" and "crack babies" became commonplace.<ref name=":2">Michelle Alexander. ''[[The New Jim Crow]]: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness''. (New York: The New Press, 2010), 51.</ref> In the summer of 1986, crack dominated the news. ''[[Time (magazine)|Time]]'' declared crack the issue of the year.<ref name=":2" /> ''[[Newsweek]]'' compared the magnitude of the crack story to Vietnam and [[Watergate scandal|Watergate]].<ref name=":3">{{Cite web |last=Gelber |first=Jonathan |date=29 Jun 2021 |title=How Len Bias's death helped launch the US's unjust war on drugs |url=https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2021/jun/29/len-bias-death-basketball-war-on-drugs |access-date=Dec 18, 2023 |website=[[The Guardian]]}}</ref> The cocaine overdose deaths of rising basketball star [[Len Bias]], and young NFL football player [[Don Rogers (safety)|Don Rogers]],<ref>[https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=xbhaAAAAIBAJ&sjid=8VkDAAAAIBAJ&pg=3461,3972101&dq=don+rogers+died&hl=en Rogers' death is a second warning]</ref> both in June, received wide coverage.<ref name=":3" /> Riding the wave of public fervor, that October Reagan signed into law much harsher sentencing for crack through the [[Anti-Drug Abuse Act of 1986|Anti-Drug Abuse Act]], commonly known as the Len Bias law.<ref name=":3" /><ref>Whitford and Yates. ''Presidential Rhetoric and the Public Agenda'', 61.</ref> According to historian [[Elizabeth Hinton]], "[Reagan] led [[United States Congress|Congress]] in criminalizing drug users, especially African American drug users, by concentrating and stiffening penalties for the possession of the crystalline rock form of cocaine, known as 'crack', rather than the crystallized [[methamphetamine]] that White House officials recognized was as much of a problem among low-income white Americans".<ref name="Hinton">Hinton, Elizabeth. "From the War on Crime to the War on Drugs". From the War on Poverty to the War on Crime: the Making of Mass Incarceration in America, by Elizabeth Hinton, Harvard University Press, 2017, pp. 307–332.</ref>

The Anti-Drug Abuse Act appropriated an additional $1.7 billion to drug war funding, and established 29 new mandatory minimum sentences for drug offenses (until then, the American legal system had seen 55 minimum sentences in total).<ref>Jesse Ventura. ''American Conspiracies'' (New York: Skyshore Publishing, 2010), 117.</ref> Of particular note, the Act made sentences for larger amounts of cocaine 100 times more severe for crack than for the powder form.<ref name=":14" /> With the 100:1 ratio, conviction in federal court for possession of 5 grams of crack would receive the same 5-year mandatory minimum as possession of 500 grams of powder cocaine.<ref name="celling-america-246-247" /><ref name="gates-of-injustice">{{Cite book |last=Elsner |first=Alan |url=https://archive.org/details/gatesofinjustice00elsn/page/20 |title=Gates of Injustice: The Crisis in America's Prisons |publisher=Financial Times Prentice Hall |year=2004 |isbn=978-0-13-142791-4 |location=Saddle River, New Jersey |page=[https://archive.org/details/gatesofinjustice00elsn/page/20 20]}}</ref> Debate at the time considered whether crack, generally used by blacks, was more addictive than the powder form, generally used by whites,<ref name=":2" /> comparing the effects of snorting powder cocaine with the briefer, more intense high from smoking crack;<ref>{{Cite journal |last1=Hatsukami |first1=D.K. |last2=Fischman |first2=M.W. |date=Nov 20, 1996 |title=Crack cocaine and cocaine hydrochloride. Are the differences myth or reality? JAMA. 1996 Nov 20;276(19):1580-8. PMID: 8918856. |url=https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/8918856/ |journal=[[JAMA]] |volume=276 |issue=19 |pages=1580–1588 |doi=10.1001/jama.1996.03540190052029 |pmid=8918856 |access-date=Jan 29, 2024 |quote=Cocaine hydrochloride is readily converted to base prior to use. The physiological and psychoactive effects of cocaine are similar regardless of whether it is in the form of cocaine hydrochloride or crack cocaine (cocaine base). However, evidence exists showing a greater abuse liability, greater propensity for dependence, and more severe consequences when cocaine is smoked (cocaine-base) or injected intravenously (cocaine hydrochloride) compared with intranasal use (cocaine hydrochloride). The crucial variables appear to be the immediacy, duration, and magnitude of cocaine's effect, as well as the frequency and amount of cocaine used rather than the form of the cocaine. Furthermore, cocaine hydrochloride used intranasally may be a gateway drug or behavior to using crack cocaine.}}</ref> pharmacologically, there is no difference between the two.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Cocaine and crack drug profile |url=https://www.emcdda.europa.eu/publications/drug-profiles/cocaine_en#pharmacology |access-date=Jan 29, 2024 |website=[[European Monitoring Centre for Drugs and Drug Addiction]]}}</ref> According to the DEA, at first crack "was not fully appreciated as a major threat because it was primarily being consumed by middle class users who were not associated with cocaine addicts ... However, partly because crack sold for as little as $5 a rock, it ultimately spread to less affluent neighborhoods."<ref name="CrackDEA85">{{Cite web |date=2006-08-23 |title=DEA History Book, 1985–1990 |url=https://www.dea.gov/sites/default/files/2021-04/1985-1990_p_58-67.pdf |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20060823024931/http://www.usdoj.gov/dea/pubs/history/1985-1990.html |archive-date=August 23, 2006 |access-date=2024-01-29 |website=[[Drug Enforcement Administration]]}}</ref>

Support for Reagan's drug crime legislation was [[Bipartisanship|bipartisan]]. According to historian Hinton, [[Democratic Party (United States)|Democrats]] supported drug legislation as they had since the [[Presidency of Lyndon B. Johnson|Johnson administration]],<ref name="Hinton" /> though Reagan was a [[Republican Party (United States)|Republican]].

Internationally, the Reagan term saw a huge increase in US military anti-drug activity in other countries. The [[United States Department of Defense|Department of Defense]] budget for interdiction increased from $4.9 million in 1982 to $397 million by 1987. The DEA also expanded its foreign presence. Countries were encouraged to adopt the same type of punitive drug approach that was in place in the US, with the threat of economic sanctions for non-compliance. The UN Single Convention provided a legal framework, and in 1988, the Convention against Illicit Traffic expanded that framework, working the US-style punitive approach into international law.<ref>{{Cite book |last1=Buxton |first1=Julia |title=The Impact of Global Drug Policy on Women: Shifting the Needle |last2=Burger |first2=Lona |publisher=[[Emerald Publishing]] |year=2020 |isbn=978-1-83982-885-0 |pages=9–22 |chapter=International Drug Policy in Context |doi=10.1108/978-1-83982-882-920200003}}</ref>

By the end of Reagan's presidency in 1989, illicit drugs were more readily available and cheaper than at the start of his first term in 1981.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Foldvary |first=Fred E. |date=Jul 15, 2013 |title=The Foreign Economic Effect of the U.S. War on Drugs |url=https://scholarsbank.uoregon.edu/xmlui/bitstream/handle/1794/13606/Foldvary.pdf |access-date=Aug 7, 2024 |website=[[Oregon Law Review]]}}</ref>

==== Hard line maintained and a new opioid crisis ====
[[File:George_H._W._Bush_holds_up_a_bag_of_crack_cocaine_during_his_Address_to_the_Nation_on_National_Drug_Control_Strategy.jpg|thumb|upright |President [[George H. W. Bush]] holds up a bag of [[crack cocaine]] during his Address to the Nation on National Drug Control Strategy on September 5, 1989.]]
Next to occupy the [[Oval Office]], Reagan protégé and former VP George H. W. Bush (1989–93) maintained the hard line drawn by his predecessor and former boss. In his first [[Prime time|prime-time]] address to the nation, Bush held up a plastic bag of crack "seized a few days ago in a park across the street from the White House" (turned out that DEA agents had to lure the seller to [[Lafayette Park (Washington, D.C.)|Lafayette Park]] to make the requested arrest).<ref>{{Cite news |last=Isikoff |first=Michael |date=Sep 22, 1989 |title=Drug Buy Set Up For Bush Speech |url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/local/longterm/tours/scandal/bushdrug.htm |access-date=Dec 12, 2023 |newspaper=[[Washington Post]]}}</ref> The administration increased narcotics regulation in the first National Drug Control Strategy, issued by the [[Office of National Drug Control Policy]] (ONDCP) in 1989.<ref>Tonry. ''Malign Neglect – Race, Crime and Punishment in America'', 91.</ref> The director of ONDCP became commonly known as the US drug czar.<ref name="frontline" /> In the [[National Defense Authorization Act]] for 1990–91, Congress included Section 1208{{snd}}the 1208 Program, expanded into the [[Law Enforcement Support Office|1033 Program]] in 1996{{snd}}authorizing the Department of Defense to transfer surplus military equipment that the DoD determined to be "suitable for use in counter-drug activities", to local law enforcement agencies.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Wofford |first=Taylor |date=Feb 25, 2016 |title=How America's Police Became an Army: The 1033 Program |url=https://www.newsweek.com/how-americas-police-became-army-1033-program-264537 |access-date=May 14, 2024 |website=[[Newsweek]]}}</ref>

As president, [[Bill Clinton]] (1993–2001), seeking to reposition the [[Democratic Party (United States)|Democratic Party]] as tough on crime,<ref>{{Cite book |last=From |first=Al |title=The New Democrats and the Return to Power |date=2013 |publisher=St. Martin's Publishing Group |isbn=978-1-137-40144-1 |page=198}}</ref> dramatically raised the stakes for drug felonies with his signing of the [[Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act|Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act of 1994]]. The Act introduced the federal "[[Three-strikes law|three-strikes]]" provision that mandated life imprisonment for violent offenders with two prior convictions for violent crimes or drugs, and provided billions of dollars in funding for states to expand their prison systems and increase law enforcement.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Farley |first=Robert |date=April 12, 2016 |title=Bill Clinton and the 1994 Crime Bill |url=https://www.factcheck.org/2016/04/bill-clinton-and-the-1994-crime-bill/ |access-date=Dec 21, 2023 |website=[[FactCheck.org]]}}</ref> During this period, state and local governments initiated controversial drug policies that demonstrated racial biases, such as the [[Stop-and-frisk in New York City|stop-and-frisk]] police practice in New York City, and state-level "three strikes" felony laws, which began with California in 1994.<ref>Michelle Alexander. ''The New Jim Crow – Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness'', 92</ref>

During the 1990s, opioid use in the US dramatically rose, leading to the ongoing situation commonly called the [[Opioid epidemic in the United States|opioid epidemic]]. A loose consensus of observers describe three main phases to date: [[Overmedication|overprescription]] of legal opioids beginning in the early to mid-1990s; a rise in heroin use in the later 2000s as prescription opioids became more difficult to obtain; and the rise of more powerful [[fentanyl]] and other synthetic opioids around the mid-2010s.<ref>{{Cite journal |last1=Pembleton |first1=Matthew R. |last2=Weimer |first2=Daniel |title=US Foreign Relations and the New Drug History |url=https://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/full/10.1086/702690 |journal=[[The Social History of Alcohol and Drugs]] |date=2019 |publisher=[[University of Chicago Press]] |volume=33 |issue=1|pages=4–12 |doi=10.1086/702690 }}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |date=January 2020 |title=Fentanyl Flow to the United States |url=https://www.dea.gov/sites/default/files/2020-03/DEA_GOV_DIR-008-20%20Fentanyl%20Flow%20in%20the%20United%20States_0.pdf |access-date=Jun 2, 2024 |website=[[Drug Enforcement Administration]]}}</ref><ref>{{Cite report |url=http://www.nber.org/papers/w29983.pdf |title=The Opioid Crisis, Health, Healthcare, and Crime: A Review Of Quasi-Experimental Economic Studies |last1=Maclean |first1=Johanna Catherine |last2=Mallatt |first2=Justine |date=Apr 2022 |publisher=National Bureau of Economic Research |issue=w29983 |doi=10.3386/w29983 |location=Cambridge, MA |language=en |last3=Ruhm |first3=Christopher |last4=Simon |first4=Kosali}}</ref> Prior to 1990s, the use of opioids to treat chronic pain in the US was limited; some scholars suggest there was hesitation to prescribe opioids due to historical problems with addiction dating back to the 1800s. A critical point in the development of the epidemic is often seen as the release in 1996 of OxyContin ([[Oxycodone|oxicodone]]) by [[Purdue Pharma]], and the subsequent aggressive and deceptive opioid marketing efforts by Purdue and other pharma companies, conducted without sufficient official oversight.{{Sfn|Maclean|2022|p=4}} Thus the problem emerged from within the healthcare system: the DEA initially targeted doctors, pharmacists, [[pill mill]]s, and pharmaceutical companies. As law enforcement cracked down on the pharmaceutical supply, illicit drug trafficking in opioids grew to meet demand.<ref>{{Citation |last1=National Academies of Sciences |first1=Engineering |title=Evidence on Strategies for Addressing the Opioid Epidemic |date=2017-07-13 |work=Pain Management and the Opioid Epidemic: Balancing Societal and Individual Benefits and Risks of Prescription Opioid Use |url=https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK458653/ |access-date=2024-10-13 |publisher=National Academies Press (US) |language=en |last2=Division |first2=Health and Medicine |last3=Policy |first3=Board on Health Sciences |last4=Abuse |first4=Committee on Pain Management and Regulatory Strategies to Address Prescription Opioid |last5=Phillips |first5=Jonathan K. |last6=Ford |first6=Morgan A. |last7=Bonnie |first7=Richard J.}}</ref>

The [[George W. Bush]] (2001–2009) administration maintained the hard line approach.<ref>Whitford and Yates. Presidential Rhetoric and the Public Agenda. 72</ref> In a TV interview in February 2001, Bush's new Attorney General, [[John Ashcroft]], said about the war on drugs, "I want to renew it. I want to refresh it, relaunch it if you will."<ref name="Boyd" /> In 2001, after [[September 11 attacks|9/11]] and the [[Patriot Act]], the DEA began highlighting the tie between drug trafficking and international terrorism, gaining the agency expanded funding to increase its global presence.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Beith |first=Malcolm |date=August 29, 2016 |title=The DEA's war on narco-terrorism just got more complicated |url=https://www.vice.com/en/article/59e88n/the-dea-war-on-narco-terrorism-just-got-more-complicated |access-date=Feb 13, 2024 |website=[[Vice (magazine)|Vice]]}}</ref>

==== Growing dissent ====
[[File:World prison population 2008.svg|thumb|upright=1.15|The US incarceration rate peaked in 2008. The US rate was the highest in the world in 2008. Chart is for prisoners per 100,000 population of all ages.<ref name=icps8>Walmsley, Roy (30 Jan 2009). [http://www.prisonstudies.org/sites/default/files/resources/downloads/wppl-8th_41.pdf World Prison Population List (8th Edition)]. From [http://www.prisonstudies.org/research-publications?shs_term_node_tid_depth=27 World Prison Population Lists]. By [[World Prison Brief]]. "The information is the latest available in early December 2008. ... Most figures relate to dates between the beginning of 2006 and the end of November 2008." According to the summary on page one there were 2.29 million U.S. inmates and 9.8 million inmates worldwide. The U.S. held 23.4% of the world's inmates. The U.S. total in this report is for December 31, 2007 (see p. 3), and does not include inmates in juvenile detention facilities.</ref><ref name=cpusa2016>[https://www.bjs.gov/index.cfm?ty=pbdetail&iid=6226 Correctional Populations in the United States, 2016] (NCJ 251211). Published April 2018 by [[U.S. Bureau of Justice Statistics]] (BJS). By Danielle Kaeble and Mary Cowhig, ''BJS statisticians.'' See [https://www.bjs.gov/content/pub/pdf/cpus16.pdf PDF]. Appendix table 1 on p. 11 has rates and counts by state. See p. 1 "highlights" section for the "1 in ..." numbers. See table 4 on page 4 for a timeline of nationwide incarceration rates. See appendix table 3 on p. 13, for "Persons held in custody in state or federal prisons or in local jails, 2000, 2010, and 2015–2016". That table also has incarceration rates. See appendix, table 2, p. 12 for the number or persons incarcerated in territorial prisons, military facilities, and jails in Indian country.</ref>]]
[[File:US timeline graphs of number of people incarcerated in jails and prisons.png|thumb|upright=1.15|US timeline graphs of number of people incarcerated in jails and prisons<ref name=Vera>Jacob Kang-Brown, Chase Montagnet, and Jasmine Heiss. [https://www.vera.org/publications/people-in-jail-and-prison-in-spring-2021 People in Jail and Prison in Spring 2021]. New York: [[Vera Institute of Justice]], 2021.</ref>]]
[[File:No More Drug War - 6316413344.jpg|thumb|Anti-war on drugs protest in Los Angeles, 2011.|alt=Holding up signs at an anti-war on drugs protest in Los Angeles, 2011.]]

In the summer of 2001, a report by the [[American Civil Liberties Union]] (ACLU), "The Drug War is the New [[Jim Crow laws|Jim Crow]]", tied the vastly disproportionate rate of African American incarceration to the range of rights lost once convicted. It stated that, while "whites and blacks use drugs at almost exactly the same rates ... African-Americans are admitted to state prisons at a rate that is 13.4 times greater than whites, a disparity driven largely by the grossly racial targeting of drug laws." Between federal and state laws, those convicted of even simple possession could lose the right to vote, eligibility for educational assistance including loans and work-study programs, custody of their children, and personal property including homes. The report concluded that the cumulative effect of the war on drugs amounted to "the US apartheid, the new Jim Crow".<ref name="Boyd">{{cite web |last=Boyd |first=Graham |year=2001 |title=The Drug War Is the New Jim Cro |url=http://www.aclu.org/other/drug-war-new-jim-crow |work=[[American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU)]]}}</ref> This view was further developed by lawyer and civil rights advocate [[Michelle Alexander]] in her 2010 book, ''[[The New Jim Crow|The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness]]''.<ref>{{cite news|last=Remnick|first= David|title=Ten Years After 'The New Jim Crow.'|newspaper= [[The New Yorker]]|date= 17 January 2020|url= http://www.newyorker.com/news/the-new-yorker-interview/ten-years-after-the-new-jim-crow}}</ref>

In the year 2000, the US drug-control budget reached $18.4 billion,<ref name="Alter, Jonathan 2001, pp. 37-43">Alter, Jonathan. "The War on Addiction". ''Newsweek'', February 12, 2001, pp. 37–43</ref> nearly half of which was spent financing law enforcement while only one-sixth was spent on treatment. In the year 2003, 53% of the requested drug control budget was for enforcement, 29% for treatment, and 18% for prevention.<ref>''How Goes the "War on Drugs": An Assessment of U.S. Drug Problems and Policy''. RAND Corporation Drug Policy Research Center, 2005</ref>

During his presidency, [[Barack Obama]] (2009-2017) implemented his "tough but smart" approach to the war on drugs. While he claimed that his method differed from those of previous presidents, in reality, his practices were similar.<ref name="Lassiter">Lassiter, Matthew. "'Tough and Smart' The Resilience of the War on Drugs During the Obama Administration." The Presidency of Barack Obama: A First Historical Assessment, edited by Julian E. Zelizer, Princeton University Press, 2018, pp. 162–178.</ref> In May 2009, [[Gil Kerlikowske]], Director of the ONDCP{{snd}}Obama's drug czar{{snd}}indicated that the [[Barack Obama administration|Obama administration]] did not plan to significantly alter drug enforcement policy, but that it would not use the term "war on drugs", considering it to be "counter-productive".<ref name="WSJCZAR">{{Cite news |last=Fields |first=Gary |date=May 14, 2009 |title=White House Czar Calls for End to 'War on Drugs' |work=The Wall Street Journal |url=https://www.wsj.com/articles/SB124225891527617397 |url-status=live |access-date=May 14, 2009 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150101124834/http://www.wsj.com/articles/SB124225891527617397 |archive-date=January 1, 2015}}</ref> In August 2010, Obama signed the [[Fair Sentencing Act]] into law, reducing the 100:1 sentencing disparity between crack and powder cocaine to 18:1 for pending and future cases.<ref name=":14">{{Cite web |last=Lampe |first=Joanna R. |date=January 19, 2023 |title=The Controlled Substances Act (CSA): A Legal Overview for the 118th Congress |url=https://crsreports.congress.gov/product/pdf/r/r45948 |access-date=Mar 28, 2024 |website=[[Congressional Research Service]] |page=43}}</ref><ref name="WashPost2">[https://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/08/02/AR2010080204360.html "The Fair Sentencing Act corrects a long-time wrong in cocaine cases"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171120014727/http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/08/02/AR2010080204360.html|date=November 20, 2017}}, ''[[The Washington Post]]'', August 3, 2010. Retrieved September 30, 2010.</ref><ref name="thomas.loc.gov">[http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/bdquery/z?d111:SN01789:@@@L&summ2=m& Bill Summary & Status – 111th Congress (2009–2010) – S.1789 – All Information – THOMAS (Library of Congress)] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140922214716/http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/bdquery/z?d111:SN01789:@@@L&summ2=m&|date=September 22, 2014}}. Thomas.loc.gov.</ref> In 2013, Obama's Justice Department issued a policy memorandum known as the [[Cole Memorandum|Cole Memo]], stating that it would defer to state laws that authorize the production, distribution and possession of cannabis, "based on assurances that those states will impose an appropriately strict regulatory system."<ref name=":17">{{Cite web |last=Avery |first=Dan |date=May 31, 2023 |title=Where Is Marijuana Legal? Cannabis Laws in Every State |url=https://www.cnet.com/news/politics/marijuana-laws-by-state-where-is-weed-legal/ |access-date=Apr 21, 2024 |website=[[CNET]]}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |date=August 29, 2013 |title=Justice Department Announces Update to Marijuana Enforcement Policy |url=https://www.justice.gov/iso/opa/resources/3052013829132756857467.pdf |access-date=Apr 21, 2024 |website=[[US Department of Justice]]}}</ref>

In 2011, the [[Global Commission on Drug Policy]], an international non-governmental group composed primarily of former [[Head of state|heads of state and government]], and leaders from various sectors, released a report that stated, "The global war on drugs has failed." It recommended a paradigm shift, to a public health focus, with decriminalization for possession and personal use.<ref>{{Cite web |title=War on Drugs: Report of the Global Commission on Drug Policy |url=https://www.globalcommissionondrugs.org/wp-content/themes/gcdp_v1/pdf/Global_Commission_Report_English.pdf}}</ref> Obama's ONDCP did not support the report, stating: "Drug addiction is a disease that can be successfully prevented and treated. Making drugs more available ... will make it harder to keep our communities healthy and safe."<ref name="dup2" />

==== International divisions, state-level changes ====

[[File:Attorney General Harris Tours U.S.-Mexico Border N2063 border 3 0.jpg|thumb|California Attorney General [[Kamala Harris]] visiting the [[Mexico–United States border|U.S.–Mexico border]] on March 24, 2011, to discuss strategies to combat [[drug cartel]]s]]
In May 2012, the ONDCP published "Principles of Modern Drug Policy", broadly focusing on public health, human rights, and criminal justice reform, while targeting drug traffickers.<ref>[https://obamawhitehouse.archives.gov/ondcp/policy-and-research/principles-of-modern-drug-policy Principles of Modern Drug Policy] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170123192527/https://obamawhitehouse.archives.gov/ondcp/policy-and-research/principles-of-modern-drug-policy |date=January 23, 2017 }}. Whitehouse.gov.</ref> According to ONDCP director Kerlikowske, drug legalization is not the "silver bullet" solution to drug control, and success is not measured by the number of arrests made or prisons built.<ref>[https://obamawhitehouse.archives.gov/ondcp/news-releases-remarks/principles-of-modern-drug-policy-directors-remarks-at-the-world-federation-against-drugs Statement of the Government of the United States of America World Federation Against Drugs 3rd World Forum, May 21, 2012, Stockholm, Sweden] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170123192355/https://obamawhitehouse.archives.gov/ondcp/news-releases-remarks/principles-of-modern-drug-policy-directors-remarks-at-the-world-federation-against-drugs |date=January 23, 2017 }}. Whitehouse.gov (September 21, 2012).</ref> That month, a joint statement, "For a humane and balanced drug policy", was signed by [[Italy]], [[Russia]], [[Sweden]], the [[United Kingdom]] and the US, promoting a combination of "enforcement to restrict the supply of drugs, with efforts to reduce demand and build recovery."<ref>[http://www.wfad.se/images/articles/Final_statement_WFAD.pdf Joint statement For a humane and balanced drug policy, Stockholm 20 May 2012] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160109132326/http://www.wfad.se/images/articles/Final_statement_WFAD.pdf |date=January 9, 2016 }}</ref> Meanwhile, at the state level, 2012 saw Colorado and Washington become the first two states to legalize the recreational use of cannabis with the passage of [[Colorado Amendment 64|Amendment 64]] and [[Washington Initiative 502|Initiative 502]] respectively.<ref>{{cite news |last1=Coffman |first1=Keith |last2=Neroulias |first2=Nicole |date=November 6, 2012 |title=Colorado, Washington first states to legalize recreational pot |work=Reuters |url=https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-marijuana-legalization/colorado-washington-first-states-to-legalize-recreational-pot-idUSBRE8A602D20121107 |access-date=February 9, 2018}}</ref>

A 2013 ACLU report declared the anti-marijuana crusade a "war on people of color". The report found that "African Americans [were] 3.73 times more likely than whites to be apprehended despite nearly identical usage rates, and marijuana violations accounting for more than half of drug arrests nationwide during the previous decade". Under Obama's policies, nonwhite drug offenders received less excessive criminal sanctions, but by examining criminals as strictly violent or nonviolent, mass incarceration persisted.<ref name="Lassiter"/>

In March 2016, the [[International Narcotics Control Board]] stated that the UN's international drug treaties do not mandate a "war on drugs" and that the choice is not between "'militarized' drug law enforcement on one hand and the legalization of non-medical use of drugs on the other", health and welfare should be the focus of drug policy.<ref>[http://www.unis.unvienna.org/unis/en/pressrels/2016/unisnar1264.html INCB Report 2015 ] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170426031831/http://www.unis.unvienna.org/unis/en/pressrels/2016/unisnar1264.html |date=April 26, 2017 }} United Nations Information Service 2.3.2016.</ref> That April, the [[United Nations General Assembly|UN General Assembly]] [[United Nations General Assembly#Special sessions|Special Session (UNGASS)]] on the "World Drug Problem" was held.<ref>{{Cite web |date=2016 |title=30th Special Session of the General Assembly on the World Drug Problem, 19-21 April 2016, New York |url=https://www.un.org/en/conferences/drug/newyork2016 |access-date=Apr 9, 2024 |website=[[United Nations]]}}</ref> The [[The Wall Street Journal|''Wall Street'' ''Journal'']] assessed the attendees' positions as "somewhat" in two camps: "Some European and South American countries as well as the U.S. favored softer approaches. Eastern countries such as China and Russia and most Muslim nations like Iran, Indonesia and Pakistan remained staunchly opposed."<ref>Fassihi, Farnaz, [https://www.wsj.com/articles/u-n-conference-on-drugs-ends-without-shift-in-policy-1461299583 "U.N. Conference on Drugs Ends Without Shift in Policy"], Wall Street ''Journal'', April 22, 2016. Retrieved 2016-04-25.</ref> The outcome document recommended treatment, prevention and other public health measures, and committed to "intensifying our efforts to prevent and counter" drug production and trafficking, through, "inter alia, more effective drug-related crime prevention and law enforcement measures."<ref>{{Cite web |date=2016 |title=Outcome Document of the 2016 United Nations General Assembly Special Session on the World Drug Problem |url=https://www.unodc.org/documents/postungass2016/outcome/V1603301-E.pdf |access-date=Apr 9, 2024 |website=[[United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime]]}}</ref><ref>[http://enewspf.com/2016/04/21/public-statement-by-the-global-commission-on-drug-policy-on-ungass-2016 "Public Statement by the Global Commission on Drug Policy on UNGASS 2016"], Press release, April 21, 2016. Retrieved 2016-04-25.</ref>

Under President [[Donald Trump]] (2017-2021), Attorney General [[Jeff Sessions]] reversed the previous Justice Department's cannabis policies, rescinding the Cole Memo that deferred federal enforcement in states where cannabis had been legalized<ref name=":17" /><ref>{{citation |author=Laura Jarrett |title=Sessions to nix Obama-era rules leaving states alone that legalize pot |date=January 4, 2018 |url=http://www.cnn.com/2018/01/04/politics/jeff-sessions-cole-memo/index.html |publisher=[[CNN]]}}</ref> He instructed federal prosecutors to "charge and pursue the most serious, readily provable offense" in drug cases, regardless of whether mandatory minimum sentences applied, which could trigger mandatory minimums for lower-level charges.<ref>{{Cite web |date=May 12, 2017 |title=Jeff Sessions enacts harsher sentencing and charges in criminal justice overhaul |url=https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/may/12/jeff-sessions-prison-sentences-obama-criminal-justice |access-date=Apr 21, 2024 |website=[[The Guardian]]}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |last=Beckett |first=Lois |date=Aug 21, 2017 |title=How Jeff Sessions and Donald Trump have restarted the war on drugs |url=https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/aug/21/donald-trump-jeff-sessions-war-on-drugs |access-date=Jan 14, 2024 |website=[[The Guardian]]}}</ref><ref>{{Cite magazine |last=Laslo |first=Matt |date=January 19, 2018 |title=Pot Showdown: How Congress Is Uniting to Stop Jeff Sessions' War on Drugs |url=https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-features/pot-showdown-how-congress-is-uniting-to-stop-jeff-sessions-war-on-drugs-203859/ |access-date=Jan 14, 2024 |magazine=[[Rolling Stone]]}}</ref> With cannabis legalized to some degree in over 30 states, Sessions' directive was seen by both Democrats and Republicans as a rogue throwback action, and there was a bipartisan outcry. Trump fired Sessions in 2018 over other issues.<ref>{{Cite web |date=November 8, 2018 |title=Trump fires Attorney General Jeff Sessions |url=https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-46132348 |access-date=Jan 14, 2024 |website=[[BBC]]}}</ref>
==== Some policy reversal attempts and successes ====
In 2018, Trump signed into law the [[First Step Act]] which, among other federal prison reforms, made the 2010 Fair Sentencing Act retroactive. A US Supreme Court decision in 2021 determined that retroactivity applied to cases where mandatory minimum penalties had been imposed.{{Sfn|Lampe|2023|p=44}}

In 2020, both the ACLU and the ''New York Times'' reported that Republicans and Democrats were in agreement that it was time to end the war on drugs. While on the [[Joe Biden 2020 presidential campaign|presidential campaign trail]], President [[Joe Biden]] (2021–present) stated that he would take the steps to alleviate the war on drugs and end the [[opioid epidemic]].<ref name="Ofer">{{cite web |last=Ofer |first=Udi |date=6 January 2021 |title=50 Years Into the War on Drugs, Biden-Harris Can Fix the Harm It Created |url=http://www.aclu.org/news/criminal-law-reform/50-years-into-the-war-on-drugs-biden-harris-can-fix-the-harm-it-created/ |work=[[American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU)]]}}</ref><ref>{{cite news |first=Nicholas |last=Kristof |date=2020-11-07 |title=Republicans and Democrats Agree: End the War on Drugs |work=[[The New York Times]] |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2020/11/07/opinion/sunday/election-marijuana-legalization.html |url-status=live |url-access=subscription |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210628181409/https://www.nytimes.com/2020/11/07/opinion/sunday/election-marijuana-legalization.html |archive-date=2021-06-28}}</ref>

On December 4, 2020, during the Trump administration, the [[United States House of Representatives|House of Representatives]] passed the [[Marijuana Opportunity Reinvestment and Expungement Act]] (MORE Act), which would decriminalize cannabis at the federal level by removing it from the list of scheduled substances, expunge past convictions and arrests, and tax cannabis to "reinvest in communities targeted by the war on drugs".<ref name="Ofer"/><ref>{{Cite web |date=Apr 1, 2022 |title=Summary: H.R.3617 {{snd}} 117th Congress (2021–2022) |url=https://www.congress.gov/bill/117th-congress/house-bill/3617 |access-date=Jan 28, 2024 |website=[[Congress.gov]]}}</ref> The MORE Act was received in the Senate in December 2020 where it remained.<ref>Nadler, Jerrold. "H.R.3884 – 116th Congress (2019–2020): MORE Act of 2020." Congress.gov, 7 Dec. 2020, [https://www.congress.gov/bill/116th-congress/house-bill/3884 www.congress.gov/bill/116th-congress/house-bill/3884.] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210210093633/https://www.congress.gov/bill/116th-congress/house-bill/3884 |date=February 10, 2021 }}</ref> In April 2022, the Act was again passed by the House, and awaits Senate action.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Adams |first=Benjamin M. |date=Apr 1, 2022 |title=U.S. House Passes MORE Act To Decriminalize Cannabis at the Federal Level |url=https://hightimes.com/news/u-s-house-passes-more-act-to-decriminalize-cannabis-at-the-federal-level/ |access-date=Mar 17, 2024 |website=[[High Times]]}}</ref>

Over time, states in the US have approached [[Drug liberalization#United States|drug liberalization]] at a varying pace. Initially, in the 1930s, the states were ahead of the federal government in prohibiting cannabis; in recent decades, the trend has reversed. Beginning with cannabis for medical use in California in 1996, states began to legalize cannabis. {{As of|2023}}, 38 states, four [[Territories of the United States|US territories]], and the [[Washington, D.C.|District of Columbia]] (DC) had [[Medical cannabis in the United States|legalized cannabis for medical use]];<ref name="ncsl states">{{cite web |date=June 27, 2018 |title=State Medical Marijuana Laws |url=http://www.ncsl.org/research/health/state-medical-marijuana-laws.aspx |access-date=July 3, 2018 |website=National Conference of State Legislatures}}</ref> for [[Legalization of non-medical cannabis in the United States|non-medical use]], 24 of the states, three territories, and DC, had legalized it, and seven states decriminalized.<ref name="ncsl">{{cite web |title=MARIJUANA OVERVIEW |url=http://www.ncsl.org/research/civil-and-criminal-justice/marijuana-overview.aspx |access-date=January 23, 2018 |website=National Conference of State Legislatures}}</ref> Decriminalization in this context usually refers to first-time offenses and small quantities, such as, in the case of cannabis, under an ounce (28g).<ref>{{Cite web |date=September 23, 2020 |title=Decriminalization of marijuana in the United States |url=https://www.leafly.com/learn/legalization/decriminalized-states |access-date=Dec 21, 2023 |website=[[Leafly]]}}</ref> In November 2020, Oregon became the [[2020 Oregon Ballot Measure 110|first state to decriminalize a number of drugs]], including heroin, methamphetamine, [[Phencyclidine|PCP]], [[LSD]] and [[oxycodone]], shifting from a criminal approach to a public health approach;<ref name="Selsky2">{{cite news |last=Selsky |first=Andrew |date=November 4, 2020 |title=Oregon leads the way in decriminalizing hard drugs |url=https://apnews.com/article/oregon-first-decriminalizing-hard-drugs-01edca37c776c9ea8bfd4afdd7a7a33e |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201122074111/https://apnews.com/article/oregon-first-decriminalizing-hard-drugs-01edca37c776c9ea8bfd4afdd7a7a33e |archive-date=November 22, 2020 |access-date=December 1, 2020 |work=Associated Press News |location=Salem, Oregon}}</ref><ref>{{Cite news |date=3 November 2020 |title=Oregon Measure 110 Election Results: Decriminalize Some Drugs and Provide Treatment |url=https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/11/03/us/elections/results-oregon-measure-110-decriminalize-some-drugs-and-provide-treatment.html |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210202072131/https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/11/03/us/elections/results-oregon-measure-110-decriminalize-some-drugs-and-provide-treatment.html |archive-date=2 February 2021 |access-date=4 November 2020 |newspaper=The New York Times}}</ref><ref name="Ofer" /> portions of that policy were reversed in April 2024.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Campbell |first=Josh |date=April 1, 2024 |title=Oregon governor signs drug re-criminalization bill, reversing voter ballot measure |url=https://www.cnn.com/2024/04/01/politics/oregon-governor-drug-re-criminalization-bill/index.html |access-date=Apr 19, 2024 |website=[[CNN]]}}</ref>

In 2022, Biden signed into law the [[Medical Marijuana and Cannabidiol Research Expansion Act]], to allow cannabis to be more easily researched for medical purposes. It is the first standalone cannabis reform bill enacted at the federal level.<ref>{{cite news |last1=Wadman |first1=Meredith |date=December 2, 2022 |title=New U.S. law promises to light up marijuana research |work=Science Magazine |url=https://www.science.org/content/article/new-u-s-law-promises-light-marijuana-research |access-date=December 3, 2022}}</ref><ref>{{cite news |last1=Jaeger |first1=Kyle |date=December 2, 2022 |title=Biden Signs Marijuana Research Bill, A Historic First For Federal Cannabis Reform |work=Marijuana Moment |url=https://www.marijuanamoment.net/biden-signs-marijuana-research-bill-a-historic-first-for-federal-cannabis-reform/ |access-date=December 3, 2022}}</ref><ref name="Fertig20221116">{{cite news |first=Natalie |last=Fertig |date=November 16, 2022 |title=Congress sends first weed bill to Biden |newspaper=Politico |url=https://www.politico.com/amp/news/2022/11/16/congress-sends-first-weed-bill-to-biden-00068082 |quote=Passage of the legislation signaled a new era in federal cannabis policy: It's the first standalone marijuana-related bill approved by both chambers of Congress.}}</ref> That October, Biden stated on social media, "We classify marijuana at the same level as heroin – and more serious than fentanyl. It makes no sense," and pledged to start a review by the Attorney General on how cannabis is classified.<ref name=":10">{{Cite web |last=Sinclair |first=Sarah |date=Jan 18, 2024 |title=DEA Considers Rescheduling Cannabis: What This Means For U.S. And Global Policy |url=https://www.forbes.com/sites/sarahsinclair/2024/01/18/dea-considers-rescheduling-cannabis-what-this-means-for-us-and-global-reform/?sh=656879b3743f |access-date=Mar 16, 2024 |website=[[Forbes]]}}</ref> On October 6, he pardoned all those with federal convictions for simple cannabis possession (to a degree symbolic, as none of those affected were imprisoned at the time), and urged the states, where the large majority of convictions rest, to do the same. His action affected 6,500 people convicted from 1992 to 2021, and thousands convicted in the District of Columbia.<ref>{{Cite web |last1=Hutzler |first1=Alexandra |last2=Gomez |first2=Justin |date=October 6, 2022 |title=Biden announces pardons for thousands convicted of federal marijuana possession |url=https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/biden-announces-pardons-thousands-convicted-federal-marijuana-possession/story?id=91122888 |access-date=Apr 10, 2024 |website=[[ABC News (United States)|ABC News]]}}</ref>

==== The War continues, focus on fentanyl ====
In 2023, the [[US State Department]] announced plans to launch a "global coalition to address synthetic drug threats", with more than 80 countries expected to join.<ref>{{cite web |last1=Paun |first1=Carmen |last2=Schumaker |first2=Erin |last3=Leonard |first3=Ben |title=Wanted: A united front against opioids |url=https://www.politico.com/newsletters/future-pulse/2023/07/06/can-the-world-unite-to-fight-opioids-00104840 |website=Politico |language=en |date=6 July 2023}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |last1=Wilkinson |first1=Tracy |title=Biden administration to launch global coalition to fight fentanyl |url=https://www.latimes.com/politics/story/2023-07-07/us-coalition-fighting-fentanyl |website=Los Angeles Times |date=7 July 2023}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |title=Assistant Secretary for International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Todd D. Robinson On the Secretary's Participation in a Virtual Ministerial to Launch the Global Coalition to Address Synthetic Drug Threats |url=https://www.state.gov/briefing-with-assistant-secretary-todd-d-robinson-on-the-secretarys-participation-in-a-virtual-ministerial-to-launch-the-global-coalition-to-address-synthetic-drug-threats/ |website=www.state.gov}}</ref> That April, [[Anne Milgram]], head of the DEA since 2021, stated to Congress that two Mexican drug cartels posed "the greatest criminal threat the United States has ever faced." Supporting a DEA budget request of $3.7 billion for 2024, Milgram cited fentanyl in the "most devastating drug crisis in our nation's history."<ref>{{Cite web |last=MND Staff |date=April 28, 2023 |title=DEA: 2 Mexican cartels pose 'greatest criminal threat' ever faced by the US |url=https://mexiconewsdaily.com/news/dea-2-mexican-cartels-pose-greatest-criminal-threat-ever-faced-by-the-us/ |access-date=Dec 21, 2023 |website=[[Mexico News Daily]]}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |last=Milgram |first=Anne |date=Apr 27, 2023 |title=Fiscal Year 2024 Request for the Drug Enforcement Administration |url=https://www.dea.gov/sites/default/files/2023-04/HHRG-118-AP19-Wstate-MilgramA-20230427.pdf |access-date=Dec 21, 2023 |website=[[Drug Enforcement Administration]]}}</ref>

In January 2024, the DEA confirmed that it was reviewing the classification of cannabis as a Schedule I narcotic. Days later, documents were released from the [[United States Department of Health and Human Services|Department of Health and Human Services]] stating that cannabis has "a currently accepted medical use" in the US and a "potential for abuse less than the drugs or other substances in Schedules I and II."<ref name=":10" /> On April 30, indicating a DEA decision, the Justice Department announced, "Today, the Attorney General circulated a proposal to reclassify marijuana from Schedule I to Schedule III. Once published by the Federal Register, it will initiate a formal rulemaking process as prescribed by Congress in the Controlled Substances Act."<ref>{{Cite web |last1=Miller |first1=Zeke |last2=Goodman |first2=Joshua |last3=Mustian |first3=Jim |last4=Whitehurst |first4=Lindsay |date=April 30, 2024 |title=US poised to ease restrictions on marijuana in historic shift, but it'll remain controlled substance |url=https://apnews.com/article/marijuana-biden-dea-criminal-justice-pot-f833a8dae6ceb31a8658a5d65832a3b8 |access-date=May 11, 2024 |website=[[Associated Press]]}}</ref> Schedule III drugs, considered to have moderate to low potential for dependence, include [[ketamine]], [[anabolic steroid]]s, [[Testosterone (medication)|testosterone]], and [[Paracetamol|Tylenol with codeine]].<ref>{{Cite web |title=Drug Scheduling |url=https://www.dea.gov/drug-information/drug-scheduling |access-date=May 11, 2024 |website=[[Drug Enforcement Administration]]}}</ref>

In the DEA's "National Drug Threat Assessment 2024", director Milgram outlined the "most dangerous and deadly crisis", involving synthetic drugs including fentanyl and methamphetamine. She singled out the [[Sinaloa Cartel|Sinaloa]] and [[Jalisco New Generation Cartel|Jalisco]] cartels in Mexico, who manufacture the synthetics in Mexican labs supplied with precursor chemicals and machinery from China, sell through "vast distribution networks" in the US, and use Chinese money laundering operations to return the proceeds to Mexico. Milgram states, "As the lead law enforcement agency in the Administration's whole-of-government response to defeat the Cartels and combat the drug poisoning epidemic in our communities, DEA will continue to collaborate on strategic counterdrug initiatives with our law enforcement partners across the United States and the world."<ref name=":24">{{Cite web |date=2024 |title=National Drug Threat Assessment 2024 |url=https://www.dea.gov/sites/default/files/2024-05/NDTA_2024.pdf |access-date=Jul 31, 2024 |website=[[Drug Enforcement Administration]]}}</ref>

==Foreign involvement==
[[File:Colpolwpowell.png|thumb|[[Colin Powell]], then the [[United States Secretary of State]], visiting Colombia in the early 2000s as part of the United States' support of [[Plan Colombia]].<br /><ref>{{cite web |title=Colombia Program At-A-Glance |url=https://www.usaid.gov/sites/default/files/Colombia%20Country%20Fact%20Sheet%20Augst%202013_USAID_at_a_Glance.pdf |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160109132325/https://www.usaid.gov/sites/default/files/Colombia%20Country%20Fact%20Sheet%20Augst%202013_USAID_at_a_Glance.pdf |archive-date=January 9, 2016 |access-date=October 20, 2015 |url-status=live |website=usaid.gov |publisher=United States Agency for International Development}}</ref><ref>{{cite news |last=Bennett |first=Brian |date=June 9, 2011 |title=U.S. can't justify its drug war spending, reports say |work=Los Angeles Times |url=https://www.latimes.com/world/la-xpm-2011-jun-09-la-fg-narco-contract-20110609-story.html |url-status=live |access-date=February 20, 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180912225040/http://articles.latimes.com/2011/jun/09/world/la-fg-narco-contract-20110609 |archive-date=September 12, 2018}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |title=Drug War Clock |url=http://www.drugsense.org/cms/wodclock |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110810163837/http://www.drugsense.org/cms/wodclock |archive-date=10 August 2011 |access-date=29 November 2021 |publisher=DrugSense}}</ref><ref>{{cite news |last=Vulliamy |first=Ed |date=April 3, 2011 |title=How a big US bank laundered billions from Mexico's murderous drug gangs |work=The Guardian |location=London |url=https://www.theguardian.com/world/2011/apr/03/us-bank-mexico-drug-gangs |url-status=live |access-date=December 18, 2016 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20161222155445/https://www.theguardian.com/world/2011/apr/03/us-bank-mexico-drug-gangs |archive-date=December 22, 2016}}</ref><ref>{{cite news |last1=Spak |first1=Kevin |date=9 June 2011 |title=Congress: US Wasting Billions in War on Drugs |agency=[[Newser]] |url=http://www.newser.com/story/120578/congress-us-wasting-billions-in-war-on-drugs.html |access-date=29 November 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130514084709/http://www.newser.com/story/120578/congress-us-wasting-billions-in-war-on-drugs.html |archive-date=14 May 2013}}</ref>]]
US international involvement in drug control rests on the premise that assisting foreign governments in their anti-drug efforts reduces drug supply within the US.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Rosen |first=Liana W. |date=March 16, 2015 |title=International Drug Control Policy: Background and U.S. Responses |url=https://sgp.fas.org/crs/row/RL34543.pdf |access-date=May 5, 2024 |website=[[Congressional Research Service]] |page=12}}</ref>

Scholars have claimed that the war on drugs, a [[War as metaphor|metaphorical war]], is propaganda cloaking an extension of earlier military or paramilitary operations.<ref name="Bullington 1990 39–55" /> Others have argued that large amounts anti-drug foreign aid money, training, and equipment actually goes to fighting leftist insurgencies and is often provided to groups who themselves are involved in large-scale [[narco-trafficking]], such as corrupt members of the Colombian military.<ref name="whiteout-chapter-14" />

=== UN treaties and US influence ===
The [[United Nations drug control conventions|three UN drug control conventions]], adopted by over 180 countries, provide a legal framework for cooperation between countries. Each state is obligated to incorporate the treaty provisions in their domestic laws. While there is a degree of interpretative flexibility, "each of the treaties encourages – and often requires – that member countries put in place strong domestic penal provisions" to deal with illicit drugs; punitive policies have been the common approach.<ref name=":20" /> The US, emerging as the dominant power after WWII, exerted considerable influence over how the conventions were adopted by other nations, promoting a prohibitionist and criminalizing view.<ref>{{Harvnb|Armenta|Jelsma|2015}} "Emerging from the Second World War as the dominant political, economic and military power, the United States was then in a position to forge a new drug control regime (the 1946 Lake Success Protocol) and apply the necessary pressure to impose it on other countries in the setting of the United Nations. The political climate enabled the globalisation of prohibitionist anti-drug ideals."</ref> Historically, the US has been "the key player in most multilateral negotiations" and the prohibitionist approach "derives largely from U.S. policy – the various forms, past and present, of the U.S. 'war on drugs'".<ref name=":20" />

US economic power is focused on the war on drugs through the [[Foreign Assistance Act]] (FAA). Enacted in 1961, the FAA integrated various federal foreign aid initiatives under the new [[United States Agency for International Development|US Agency for International Development]] (USAID), and has remained the core legislation governing foreign financial assistance. In 1972, reacting to concerns over illicit drugs from foreign sources, Congress added an "International Narcotics Control" chapter to the FAA, which allowed the President to enter into agreements and provide assistance for counternarcotic activities in foreign countries. It also made US economic and military aid, including arms sales, dependent on countries aligning with US anti-drug policies. Later, the terms "major illicit drug-producing country" and "major drug-transit country" were defined in the Act; as of 1986, the President has been required to annually determine which countries fit those definitions. Those not adequately cooperating with counter-drug efforts would not be eligible to receive US financial aid, although the President could and has provided waivers to individual countries. The so-called "majors list" has influenced how US assistance money is used internationally in the war on drugs, although in recent years, it has remained relatively static and lost a degree of relevancy.<ref>{{Cite web |date=Feb 25, 2021 |title=The U.S. "Majors List" of Illicit Drug-Producing and Drug-Transit Countries |url=https://crsreports.congress.gov/product/pdf/R/R46695 |access-date=Aug 7, 2024 |website=[[Congressional Research Service]] |quote=For nearly four decades, the statutory process for identifying the world's major illicit drug producing and drug-transit countries has shaped how the United States engages foreign governments on illicit drug control matters. ... Despite some changes over time, including significant modifications in 2002 and 2006, some in Congress have questioned whether the current process remains relevant.}}</ref>

Foreign anti-drug initiatives initially focused on Latin America, and expanded globally over time. Since the 1970s, billions of US aid dollars have been directed to anti-drug activity in Latin America.  The US initially treated drug control as a law enforcement issue in foreign countries, providing assistance to police forces. In the 1980s, the US increasingly involved the military and private security firms, to provide training and support to armed forces in drug-producing and transit countries.<ref>{{Cite web |date=June 2023 |title=Militarization and privatization of security: From the War on Drugs to the fight against organized crime in Latin America |url=https://international-review.icrc.org/articles/militarization-and-privatization-of-security-923#footnote3_zckdbw1 |access-date=Dec 31, 2023 |website=[[International Review of the Red Cross]]}}</ref> {{As of|2024}}, the DEA has, in addition to 241 domestic offices, 93 foreign offices in 69 countries.<ref>{{Cite web |date=2024 |title=Divisions |url=https://www.dea.gov/divisions |access-date=Feb 21, 2024 |website=[[Drug Enforcement Administration]]}}</ref> In addition to numerous cooperative law enforcement actions worldwide against drug trafficking and [[money laundering]], the DEA and other agencies, and the US military, have been involved in multi-year foreign drug campaigns, including in Colombia, Mexico and Afghanistan.

=== Latin America ===
In 2021, [[Gustavo Gorriti]], journalist and founder of corruption-focused ''[[IDL-Reporteros]]'' news media, wrote a sharply critical editorial in the [[The Washington Post|''Washington Post'']] on the impact of 50 years of the war on drugs on Latin America. He described the flow of drugs to the US as an "unstoppable industry" that triggered an economic revolution throughout the region, where the illegal drug trade with its high profit margins far exceeded the potential of legitimate businesses. Corruption among politicians and anti-drug forces soared, even as those in charge were "cultivating close relationships with U.S. enforcement and intelligence agencies." An underclass of poor farmers became economic hostages, depending on drug crops for their survival. The big winners were "the systems built to wage a fight that they soon realized would have no end. ... [The war on drugs] became a source for endless resources, inflated budgets, contracts, purchase orders, power, influence – new economies battling drug trafficking but also dependent on it."<ref>{{Cite news |last=Gorriti |first=Gustavo |date=June 14, 2021 |title=It's time to end five decades of strategic fallacy |url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2021/06/14/peru-war-on-drugs-violence-strategic-failure/ |access-date=Jan 6, 2024 |newspaper=[[Washington Post]] |quote=When, 50 years ago, President Richard M. Nixon declared drug abuse 'America's public enemy number one' and called for 'an all-out offensive' to defeat it, he mobilized an army of disparate bureaucracies that quickly became ensnared in an inadequate and ineffective metaphor (defeat the 'enemy'). ... The war narrative prevailed, and the biggest winners were the systems built to wage a fight that they soon realized would have no end – but this was a good thing: It became a source for endless resources, inflated budgets, contracts, purchase orders, power, influence – new economies battling drug trafficking but also dependent on it. ... The booming market of potentially dangerous substances flowing from Latin America to the United States became an unstoppable industry. Starting in the mid-1970s, it triggered an economic revolution in the region. ... became a growth sector that put all export industries to shame. ... pioneered a capitalist revolution ... triggering vast inequality and violence. ... The clandestine nature of the industry and its high profit margins elevated political corruption to new heights. There are many examples across the region of those charged with fighting drug trafficking who ended up profiting from it, all while cultivating close relationships with U.S. enforcement and intelligence agencies. ... Beneath ... lies a vast foundation: the cocaine proletariat, farmers from Peru, Bolivia, Colombia, who depend on the crops for survival. Poverty binds them to an industry that offers liquidity and consistent returns, but that also devalues their rights and lives.}}</ref>

At a meeting in Guatemala in 2012, three former presidents from Guatemala, Mexico and Colombia said that the war on drugs had failed and that they would propose a discussion on alternatives, including decriminalization, at the [[Summit of the Americas]] in April of that year.<ref>{{cite news |date=March 31, 2012 |title=Politics this week |newspaper=The Economist |url=http://www.economist.com/node/21551550 |url-status=live |access-date=April 2, 2012 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120402040340/http://www.economist.com/node/21551550 |archive-date=April 2, 2012}}</ref> Guatemalan President [[Otto Pérez Molina]] said that the war on drugs was exacting too high a price on the lives of Central Americans and that it was time to "end the [[taboo]] on discussing decriminalization".<ref>[https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-latin-america-17502417 BBC News – Guatemala's president urges debate on drug legalisation] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190706154837/https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-latin-america-17502417|date=July 6, 2019}}. Bbc.co.uk (March 25, 2012).</ref> At the summit, the government of Colombia pushed for far-reaching changes to drugs policy, citing the catastrophic effects of the war on drugs in Colombia.<ref name="EdVu 15Apr2012">{{cite news |last=Vulliamy |first=Ed |date=April 15, 2012 |title=Colombia calls for global drugs taskforce |newspaper=The Observer |url=https://www.theguardian.com/world/2012/apr/15/colombia-global-drugs-taskforce |url-status=live |access-date=April 15, 2012 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131016010720/http://www.theguardian.com/world/2012/apr/15/colombia-global-drugs-taskforce |archive-date=October 16, 2013}}</ref>

==== Colombia ====
{{Main|Plan Colombia|Paramilitarism in Colombia}}{{US involvement in Colombia}}

Historically, the iillicit drug trade in Colombia had important connections to revolutionary groups like the leftist [[Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia]] (FARC) and right-wing [[United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia|United Self-Defenders of Colombia]] (AUC), and US anti-drug efforts in the country overlapped with counterinsurgency efforts.<ref>{{Cite web |date=May 3, 2002 |editor-last=Evans |editor-first=Michael |title=War in Colombia: Guerrillas, Drugs and Human Rights in U.S.-Colombia Policy, 1988-2002 |url=https://nsarchive2.gwu.edu/NSAEBB/NSAEBB69/part2.html |access-date=Oct 9, 2024 |website=[[National Security Archive]] |quote=The Bush administration's proposal to provide direct support against Colombian insurgent groups as part of an intensified strike on international terrorism and drug trafficking is the latest step in a series of policy decisions over the last decade that have steadily increased the scope of U.S. involvement in Colombia's civil conflict. While U.S. support activities have been nominally limited to the counternarcotics mission, in practice these operations often bring Colombian security forces into conflict with guerrillas and other armed groups. ... many U.S. policymakers [complained] that the aid is often used in pure counterguerrilla operations, sometimes with no measurable benefit against drug trafficking. ... The U.S. Embassy complained publicly that the military had been using U.S. counterdrug aid to fight guerrillas.}}</ref> In the late 1960s, drug smuggling from Mexico rose to a major scale,<ref>{{Cite book |last=Vulliamy |first=Ed |title=Amexica: war along the borderline |date=2010 |publisher=Bodley Head |isbn=978-1-84792-128-4 |location=London}}</ref> and the US and Mexican governments launched the war on drugs in Mexico; the disruption gave Columbian traffickers an opportunity to fill the US demand for cannabis. Until the 1970s, Columbia "had played no major role in the production and circulation of illegal drugs in the hemisphere".<ref name=":02">{{Citation |last=Britto |first=Lina |title=The Drug Wars in Colombia |date=2020-09-28 |url=https://oxfordre.com/latinamericanhistory/display/10.1093/acrefore/9780199366439.001.0001/acrefore-9780199366439-e-504 |access-date=2024-10-08 |language=en |doi=10.1093/acrefore/9780199366439.013.504 |isbn=978-0-19-936643-9 |encyclopedia=Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Latin American History}}</ref> After a military coup in Chile in 1973 and the spread of political repression through the [[Southern Cone]] countries disrupted cocaine smuggling from Peru and Bolivia, Colombia stepped in to fill the demand for cocaine. Pressed by the US, the Colombian government, under president [[Misael Pastrana Borrero|Misael Pastrana]] (1970–1974), worked with the newly formed DEA to establish the future path for the country's war on drugs.<ref name=":02" />

During the 1970s, the "marijuana boom" dominated Colombia's drug trade, peaking mid-decade. That soon gave way to cocaine and the rise of the infamous [[Medellín Cartel|Medellin]] and [[Cali Cartel|Cali cartels]], which grew through the 1980s and early 1990s to dominate the global cocaine market.<ref name=":02" /> By the end of the century, the brutal anti-drug war left the security situation in Colombia in critical condition. Through the [[Plan Colombia]] program, between 2000 and 2015, the US provided Colombia with $10 billion in funding,<ref>{{cite news |last=Rampton |first=Roberta |date=4 February 2016 |title=Obama pledges more than $450 million aid to help Colombia peace plan |url=https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-colombia-idUSKCN0VD2XM |access-date=8 April 2018 |website=[[Reuters]]}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |last=Lee |first=Brendon |date=Jan 9, 2020 |title=Not-So-Grand Strategy: America's Failed War on Drugs in Colombia |url=https://hir.harvard.edu/americas-failed-war-on-drugs-in-colombia/ |access-date=Jan 17, 2024 |website=[[Harvard International Review]]}}</ref> primarily for [[military aid]], training, and equipment,<ref name="house-colombia-appropriations">{{cite web |year=2010 |title=Summary : FY 2010 State and Foreign Operations Appropriations |url=http://Fappropriations.house.gov/pdf/FY10_SFOPS_Conference_Summary.pdf |access-date=February 2, 2010 |website=U.S. House of Representatives}}{{Dead link|date=May 2020|bot=InternetArchiveBot|fix-attempted=yes}}</ref> to fight both drugs and left-wing guerrillas such as FARC, which had been accused of participation in drug trafficking.<ref>Weiser, Benjamin. (September 5, 2012) [http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/organizations/r/revolutionary_armed_forces_of_colombia/index.html FARC – Revolutionary Armed forces of Colombia"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120527125840/http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/organizations/r/revolutionary_armed_forces_of_colombia/index.html|date=May 27, 2012}} ''The New York Times''.</ref>

The Clinton administration initially waived all but one of the human rights conditions attached to Plan Colombia, considering such aid as crucial to national security at the time.<ref name="doug">{{Cite book |last=Stokes |first=Doug |url=http://bailey83221.livejournal.com/54324.html |title=America's Other War: Terrorizing Colombia |publisher=Zed Books |year=2005 |isbn=978-1-84277-547-9 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160109132325/http://bailey83221.livejournal.com/54324.html |archive-date=January 9, 2016 |url-status=dead |df=mdy-all}} p.&nbsp;99</ref> Private US military contractors, including the former [[DynCorp]], the largest private company involved, were contracted by the State Department and Defense Department, to carry out anti-drug initiatives as part of Plan Colombia.<ref>''[http://www.colectivodeabogados.org/article.php3?id_article=1253 Private Security Transnational Enterprises in Colombia] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080417203427/http://www.colectivodeabogados.org/article.php3?id_article=1253|date=April 17, 2008}}'' José Alvear Restrepo Lawyers' Collective February 2008.</ref> Colombian military personnel received extensive [[counterinsurgency]] training from US military and law enforcement agencies, including the [[School of Americas]] (SOA). US-trained officers have been accused of being directly or indirectly involved in many massacres during the 1990s, including the [[Massacre of Trujillo|Trujillo Massacre]] and the 1997 [[Mapiripán Massacre]].{{Citation needed|date=February 2024}}

The efforts of the US and Colombian governments have been criticized for focusing on fighting leftist guerrillas in southern regions without applying enough pressure on right-wing paramilitaries and continuing drug smuggling operations in the north of the country.<ref name="soa-gill-180">{{Cite book |last=Gill |first=Leslie |url=https://archive.org/details/schoolofamericas00lesl |title=The School of the Americas: military training and political violence in the Americas |publisher=Duke University Press |year=2004 |isbn=978-0-8223-3392-0 |page=[https://archive.org/details/schoolofamericas00lesl/page/180 180] |url-access=registration}}</ref><ref name="under-influence-61">Peet, 2004: [https://books.google.com/books?id=uC0_YznYjScC&pg=PA61 p. 61]</ref> Human Rights Watch, congressional committees and other entities have documented the existence of connections between members of the Colombian military and the [[United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia|AUC]], which the US government has listed as a terrorist group, and that Colombian military personnel have committed human rights abuses which would make them ineligible for US aid under current laws.{{Citation needed|date=August 2010}}

Coca eradication by [[Plan Colombia#Fumigation strategy and criticisms|aerial spraying]] of [[herbicide]]s such as [[glyphosate]] as a controversial element of Plan Colombia. Environmental consequences resulting from spraying have been criticized as detrimental to some of the world's most fragile ecosystems;<ref>{{cite journal |last=Bowe |first=Rebecca |date=October 27, 2004 |year=2004 |title=The drug war on the Amazon |url=https://emagazine.com/the-drug-war-on-the-amazon/ |journal=E: The Environmental Magazine |issue=Nov–Dec}}</ref> the same spraying practices are further credited with causing health problems in local populations.<ref name="ReferenceA">{{cite news |last=Rohter |first=Larry |date=May 1, 2000 |title=To Colombians, Drug War is a Toxic Foe |newspaper=The New York Times}}</ref>

A report by the [[RAND Corporation]], examining the Colombian experience for insights applicable to the [[Mexican drug war]], noted that "Plan Colombia has been widely hailed as a success, and some analysts believe that, by 2010, Colombian security forces had finally gained the upper hand once and for all." The report cited dramatic reductions in kidnappings and terrorist acts, and the recapture of territory, attributed to "a reinforced military and reinvigorated police force." It also found that, as of 2010, "Colombia is still a major source country for illicit narcotics. Moreover, the state continues to share sovereignty with a range of violent nonstate actors, including rebel groups and rightwing paramilitaries allied with drug traffickers and wealthy landowners."<ref>{{cite web |title=Mexico Is Not Colombia |url=https://www.rand.org/content/dam/rand/pubs/research_reports/RR500/RR548z2/RAND_RR548z2.pdf |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160304073123/http://www.rand.org/content/dam/rand/pubs/research_reports/RR500/RR548z2/RAND_RR548z2.pdf |archive-date=March 4, 2016 |access-date=October 20, 2015 |website=rand.org |publisher=RAND Corporation National Security Research Division}}</ref> The [[Washington Office on Latin America]] concluded in 2010 that both Plan Colombia and the Colombian government's security strategy "came at a high cost in lives and resources, only did part of the job, are yielding diminishing returns and have left important institutions weaker."<ref>Washington Office on Latin America [http://www.wola.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=viewp&id=1134&Itemid=2 "Colombia: Don't Call it a Model"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100804065237/https://www.wola.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=viewp&id=1134&Itemid=2|date=August 4, 2010}}, July 13, 2010 Retrieved on May 8, 2010</ref>

==== Mexico ====
{{Main|Mexican drug war}}
[[File:Fuerza del Estado Michoacán.jpg|thumb|right|Mexican troops during a gun battle in [[Michoacán]], 2007. [[Mexican Drug War|Mexico's drug war]] claims nearly 50,000 lives each year.{{citation needed|date=August 2023}}]]One of the first anti-drug efforts in the realm of foreign policy was Nixon's [[Operation Intercept]], announced in September 1969, aiming to severely reduce the amount of cannabis entering the US from Mexico,<ref name=":22" /> by government estimates the source of 80% of the US supply.<ref name=":23" /> The effort began with an intense inspection crackdown that resulted in a near shutdown of cross-border traffic.<ref name=":22">{{cite web |title=Operation Intercept: The perils of unilateralism |url=http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB86/ |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090424224527/http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB86/ |archive-date=April 24, 2009 |access-date=May 14, 2009}}</ref> The US Air Force and Navy were also on alert to pursue traffickers in the air and at sea. The burden on border crossings was controversial in border states; the effort lasted only 20 days.<ref name=":23">{{cite web |title=Consumers Union Report on Licit and Illicit Drugs |url=http://www.druglibrary.org/Schaffer/library/studies/cu/CU59.html |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110514191129/http://www.druglibrary.org/schaffer/library/studies/cu/CU59.html |archive-date=May 14, 2011 |access-date=March 27, 2011 |publisher=Druglibrary.org}}</ref>

The [[Mérida Initiative]], launched in 2008, was a security cooperation program between the US and Mexico, aimed at combating drug trafficking and [[transnational crime]]. From 2008 to 2021, the US provided $3.5 billion in funding. The initial focus was anti-drug and rule-of-law measures, later broadened to include US-Mexico border activities. Components included military and law enforcement training and equipment, and technical advice and training to strengthen the national justice systems. In 2021, it was replaced by the [[Bicentennial Framework for Security, Public Health, and Safe Communities]].<ref>{{Cite web |last=Ribando Seelke |first=Clare |date=Oct 9, 2023 |title=U.S.–Mexico Security Cooperation: From the Mérida Initiative to the Bicentennial Framework |url=https://sgp.fas.org/crs/row/IF10578.pdf |access-date=Jan 17, 2024 |website=[[Congressional Research Service]]}}</ref>

In 2013, a Pew Research Center poll found that 85% of Mexican citizens supported using the Mexican army against drug cartels, 74% supported US training assistance for their police and military, 55% supported the US supplying of weapons and financial aid, and 59% were against deploying US troops on Mexican soil.<ref>{{Cite news |title=Mexican public favors military use, U.S. aid to fight drug cartels |url=http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2013/07/16/mexican-public-favors-military-use-u-s-aid-to-fight-drug-cartels/ |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20181112223531/http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2013/07/16/mexican-public-favors-military-use-u-s-aid-to-fight-drug-cartels/ |archive-date=November 12, 2018 |access-date=2018-10-23 |work=Pew Research Center |language=en-US}}</ref> Anti-drug efforts were seen as making progress by 37%, losing ground by 29%, and staying the same by 30%; 56% believed that the US and Mexico are both to blame for drug violence in Mexico.<ref>{{Cite news |date=2013-04-29 |title=U.S. Image Rebounds in Mexico |url=http://www.pewglobal.org/2013/04/29/u-s-image-rebounds-in-mexico/ |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20181110154912/http://www.pewglobal.org/2013/04/29/u-s-image-rebounds-in-mexico/ |archive-date=November 10, 2018 |access-date=2018-11-01 |work=Pew Research Center's Global Attitudes Project |language=en-US}}</ref>

{{As of|2024}}, the DEA considers the [[Sinaloa Cartel|Sinaloa]] and [[Jalisco New Generation Cartel|Jalisco]] cartels, tied to materials and services from China, as the major source of synthetic drugs like fentanyl and methamphetamine, posing the biggest threat to the US.<ref name=":24" />

==== Central America ====
The countries of Central America – [[Belize]], [[Costa Rica]], [[El Salvador]], [[Guatemala]], [[Honduras]], [[Nicaragua]], and [[Panama]] – are major transit and storage points for drugs headed to Mexico and the US<ref>{{Cite web |title=North and Central America |url=https://www.dea.gov/foreign-offices/north-and-central-america |access-date=July 17, 2024 |website=[[Drug Enforcement Administration]]}}</ref> that annually appear on the American "majors list".<ref>{{Cite web |last=Rosen |first=Liana W. |date=February 25, 2021 |title=The U.S. "Majors List" of Illicit Drug-Producing and Drug-Transit Countries |url=https://crsreports.congress.gov/product/pdf/R/R46695 |access-date=July 17, 2024 |website=[[Congressional Research Service]]}}</ref> The US has had varying levels of direct anti-drug involvement in each of these countries, particularly since the late 2000s when concern over trafficking activity increased. Beginning in 2008, the [[Central America Regional Security Initiative]] (CARSI) has provided the seven countries with equipment, training, and technical support for law enforcement efforts, and the US has advised taking an [[Strategic intelligence|intelligence-based]] approach.<ref>{{Cite web |last1=Meyer |first1=Peter J. |last2=Ribando Seelke |first2=Clare |date=Dec 17, 2015 |title=Central America Regional Security Initiative: Background and Policy Issues for Congress |url=https://crsreports.congress.gov/product/pdf/R/R41731 |access-date=Aug 9, 2024 |website=[[Congressional Research Service]]}}</ref>

During the [[Nicaraguan Revolution|1980s civil war]] in [[Nicaragua]], the drug situation was intertwined with the US backing of the anti-leftist rebel force known as the [[Contras]]. [[US Senate|Senator]] [[John Kerry]]'s 1988 [[U.S. Senate Committee on Foreign Relations|Senate Committee on Foreign Relations]] report on [[CIA involvement in Contra cocaine trafficking|Contra drug links]] concluded that members of the State Department "who provided support for the Contras are involved in drug trafficking ... and elements of the Contras themselves knowingly receive financial and material assistance from drug traffickers."<ref>Cockburn and St. Clair, 1998: {{Page needed|date=September 2010}}</ref> The involvement included payments to drug traffickers from funds authorized by the Congress for humanitarian assistance to the Contras, in some cases after the traffickers had been indicted by federal law enforcement agencies on drug charges, in others while traffickers were under active investigation by these same agencies."{{Citation needed|date=July 2024}}

[[File:Panama clashes 1989.JPEG|thumb|right|The [[U.S. Military|U.S. military]] [[United States invasion of Panama|invasion of Panama]] in 1989]]
On December 20, 1989, the [[United States invasion of Panama|US invaded Panama]] with 25,000 American troops in [[United States invasion of Panama|Operation Just Cause]], to depose and arrest the Panamanian head of government, [[Manuel Noriega]]. Noriega had been providing military assistance to Contra groups in Nicaragua at the request of the US, which in turn paid him and tolerated his drug trafficking activities, known since the 1960s.<ref name="whiteout-noriega">Cockburn and St. Clair, 1998: pp. 287–290</ref><ref name="panama-buckley">{{Cite book |last=Buckley |first=Kevin |url=https://archive.org/details/panamawholestory00buck |title=Panama: The Whole Story |publisher=Simon and Schuster |year=1991 |isbn=978-0-671-72794-9 |url-access=registration}}</ref> Relations with the US deteriorated in the mid-1980s, and his dealings with the US government were exposed in the US news media. The killing of a US soldier in Panama was the final act leading to the invasion. Noriega surrendered to US soldiers on January 3, 1990.<ref>{{Cite news |last=Baker |first=Russell |date=January 3, 1990 |title=Observer; Is This Justice Necessary? |url=https://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9C0CE5DF123FF930A35752C0A966958260 |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080616105410/http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9C0CE5DF123FF930A35752C0A966958260 |archive-date=June 16, 2008 |access-date=March 5, 2010 |work=The New York Times Company}}</ref> He was indicted by the DEA and sentenced by a US court to 45 years in prison for [[racketeering]], drug smuggling, and money laundering.<ref name="whiteout-noriega" /><ref name="verdict">{{Cite news |last=Rohter |first=Larry |date=April 10, 1992 |title=The Noriega Verdict; U.S. Jury Convicts Noriega of Drug-Trafficking Role as the Leader of Panama |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1992/04/10/us/noriega-verdict-us-jury-convicts-noriega-drug-trafficking-role-leader-panama.html |access-date=September 28, 2017 |work=The New York Times |issn=0362-4331}}</ref> The [[United Nations General Assembly|UN General Assembly]] resolved that the invasion was a "flagrant violation of international law."<ref>United Nations General Assembly, A/RES/44/240, 88th Plenary Meeting, December 29, 1989 [http://www.un.org/documents/ga/res/44/a44r240.htm]</ref>

[[Ecuador]], located between the world's two largest cocaine-producing countries, Colombia and Peru,has long been a major drug transit point.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Goette-Luciak |first=CD |date=Jan 11, 2024 |title=Cocaine, cartels, and corruption: The crisis in Ecuador, explained |url=https://www.vox.com/world-politics/2024/1/11/24034891/ecuador-drugs-cocaine-cartels-violence-murder-daniel-naboa-columbia-crime |access-date=Mar 22, 2024 |website=[[Vox (website)|Vox]]}}</ref> From 1999, the [[Manta, Ecuador|Manta]] air base was the US military's most prominent South American presence, originating some 100 drug surveillance flights monthly. In 2009, citing unwanted internal influence by the CIA, Ecuador declined to renew the base's lease, ending official US military presence.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Romero |first=Simon |date=April 21, 2008 |title=Ecuador's Leader Purges Military and Moves to Expel American Base |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/21/world/americas/21ecuador.html |access-date=Mar 22, 2024 |website=[[New York Times]]}}</ref><ref name=":13">{{Cite web |date=January 24, 2024 |title=Ecuador: Country Overview and U.S. Relations |url=https://crsreports.congress.gov/product/pdf/IF/IF11218 |access-date=Mar 22, 2024 |website=[[Congressional Research Service]]}}</ref> Since 2018, drug activity and [[War on drugs in Ecuador|anti-drug efforts in Ecuador]] have dramatically intensified.<ref>{{Cite news |last=Collyns |first=Dan |date=2023-09-12 |title='We should treat it as a war': Ecuador's descent into drug gang violence |url=https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/sep/12/ecuador-violence-bloody-drug-war |access-date=2024-02-09 |work=The Guardian |language=en-GB |issn=0261-3077}}</ref> In 2023, the US-Ecuador Defense Bilateral Working Group was formed to address the Ecuadorian situation, and a memorandum of agreement to help strengthen the Ecuadorian military was signed.<ref name=":13" /> A drug-related [[2024 Ecuadorian conflict|wider conflict]] broke out in 2024.<ref>{{Cite news |last=Saviano |first=Roberto |date=2024-02-09 |title=The world is hungry for cocaine and happy to buy it. But think of the ravaged countries that pay the price |url=https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2024/feb/09/cocaine-ravaged-countries-ecuador-drug-coup-complicit |access-date=2024-02-09 |work=The Guardian |language=en-GB |issn=0261-3077}}</ref>

In 2012, the US sent DEA agents to [[Honduras]] to assist security forces in counternarcotic operations. Honduras has been a major stop for drug traffickers, who use small planes and landing strips hidden throughout the country to transport drugs. The DEA, working with other US agencies such as the State Department, the CBP, and Joint Task Force-Bravo, assisted Honduran troops in conducting raids on traffickers' sites of operation.<ref>{{cite news |date=May 31, 2012 |title=A New Front Line in the U.S. Drug War |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2012/06/01/world/americas/honduran-drug-raid-deaths-wont-alter-us-policy.html?pagewanted=all |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20121129131648/http://www.nytimes.com/2012/06/01/world/americas/honduran-drug-raid-deaths-wont-alter-us-policy.html?pagewanted=all |archive-date=November 29, 2012 |access-date=October 13, 2012 |newspaper=New York Times}}</ref>

[[File:MilitaresMichoacán.jpg|thumb|[[Mexico]] is scheduled to receive US$1.6 billion in equipment and strategic support from the [[United States]] through the [[Mérida Initiative]].]]

==== Impact on growers ====
The US-supported coca eradication policy has been criticized for its negative impact on the livelihood of South American coca growers, in a region where the coca leaf has traditionally been chewed and used in tea and for religious, medicinal and nutritional purposes by locals<ref name="wa-times-bolivian-coca-growers-fight">{{Cite news |last=Lindsay |first=Reed |date=March 25, 2003 |title=Bolivian Coca Growers Fight Eradication |url=http://www.globalpolicy.org/component/content/article/211-development/44365.html |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090910174116/http://www.globalpolicy.org/component/content/article/211-development/44365.html |archive-date=September 10, 2009 |access-date=February 3, 2010 |work=Washington Times}}</ref> Making traditional coca cultivation illegal is viewed as unjust. In areas where forced eradication also destroyed other food or market crops, without providing an alternative, farmers were left starving and destitute.<ref name="wa-times-bolivian-coca-growers-fight" />
<!--
Section on poppy eradication in Afghanistan removed because it was not relevant to the War on Drugs and it was factually inaccurate and directly contradicted sourced facts on [[Opium production in Afghanistan#Rise of the Taliban (1994–2001)]] and [[Taliban#Opium]]-->

=== Afghanistan ===
{{See also|Opium production in Afghanistan|War in Afghanistan (2001-2021)}}
In 2001, a US-led military coalition [[United States invasion of Afghanistan|invaded Afghanistan]] and toppled the ruling [[Taliban]] as part of the [[war on terror]] response to [[September 11 attacks|9/11]]. For generations, Afghanistan had been producing opium; the Taliban, in power since 1996, banned opium in 2000, reducing domestic production by 90% within a year, cutting the world opium supply by an estimated 65%. With the invasion, poppy cultivation and opium manufacture resumed, and the war on drugs became an element of the US presence.<ref name=":21" />

Initially, "everyone did their own thing, not thinking how it fit in with the larger effort. [[United States Department of State|State]] was trying to eradicate, [[United States Agency for International Development|USAID]] was marginally trying to do livelihoods, and DEA was going after bad guys," a senior Department of Defense official stated in a later report. In 2004, opium production dramatically increased and eradication became the focus. The DEA operating budget in Afghanistan grew from $3.7 million in 2004 to $40.6 million in 2008. In 2009, eradication was halted{{snd}}a senior US official called it "the least effective program ever"{{snd}}in favor of an "alternative livelihoods" approach that encouraged farmers to grow other crops. In 2017, eradication once again became the main initiative; the US military launched an aerial campaign involving [[Boeing B-52 Stratofortress|B-52]] bombers and [[Lockheed Martin F-22 Raptor|F-22]] fighters striking a network of drug labs that turned out to be mostly empty compounds, though there were significant civilian casualties.<ref name=":21" />

Undermining US efforts, the prohibitionist policies encouraged a flourishing opium black market, which in turn incentivized widespread, systemic corruption in the Afghan government.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Hall |first=Abigail |date=July 20, 2015 |title=The Drug War Failed in Afghanistan Too |url=https://www.usnews.com/opinion/economic-intelligence/2015/07/20/war-on-drugs-failed-in-afghanistan-helped-the-taliban |access-date=May 5, 2024 |website=[[US News and World Report]]}}</ref> In 2018, the US [[Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction]] called the counternarcotics operation to date "a total failure".<ref>{{Cite web |last=Woody |first=Christopher |date=Dec 5, 2019 |title=The war on drugs in Afghanistan 'has just been a total failure,' the US's top watchdog there says |url=https://www.businessinsider.com/sigar-chief-us-war-on-drugs-afghanistan-a-total-failure-2019-12?op=1 |access-date=May 5, 2024 |website=[[Business Insider]]}}</ref> As the US military presence neared an end in 2020, Afghanistan was producing an estimated 85% of the world's opium. Having spent some $9 billion in the 20-year anti-drug campaign, US forces left Afghanistan in 2021, and the Taliban returned to power.<ref name=":21">{{Cite web |last=Fox |first=Kara |date=September 29, 2021 |title=Afghanistan is the world's opium king. Can the Taliban afford to kill off their 'un-Islamic' cash cow? |url=https://www.cnn.com/2021/09/29/asia/taliban-afghanistan-opium-drug-economy-cmd-intl/index.html |access-date=May 5, 2024 |website=[[CNN]]}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |date=June 2018 |title=Counternarcotics: Lessons from the U.S. Experience in Afghanistan |url=https://www.sigar.mil/pdf/lessonslearned/SIGAR-18-52-LL-Executive-Summary.pdf |access-date=July 24, 2024 |website=[[Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction]]}}</ref>

== Domestic impact ==

The social consequences of the drug war have been widely criticized by such organizations as the ACLU as being racially biased against minorities and disproportionately responsible for the exploding [[Incarceration in the United States|United States prison population]]. Critics have compared the wholesale incarceration of the dissenting minority of drug users to the wholesale incarceration of other minorities in history.{{Citation needed|date=March 2024}} Psychiatrist [[Thomas Szasz]] wrote in 1997, "Over the past thirty years, we have replaced the medical-political persecution of illegal sex users ('perverts' and 'psychopaths') with the even more ferocious medical-political persecution of illegal drug users."<ref>''The Manufacture of Madness: A Comparative Study of the Inquisition and the Mental Health Movement'' (1997), p. xi</ref> Assessing from a health perspective, a study in the ''[[Annals of Medicine]]'' noted: "The U.S. war on drugs has subjected millions to criminalisation, incarceration, and lifelong criminal records, disrupting or altogether eliminating their access to adequate resources and supports to live healthy lives."<ref>{{Cite journal |last1=Cohen |first1=A |last2=Vakharia |first2=SP |last3=Netherland |first3=J |last4=Frederique |first4=K |date=Dec 2022 |title=How the war on drugs impacts social determinants of health beyond the criminal legal system |journal=[[Annals of Medicine]] |volume=54 |issue=1 |pages=2024–2038 |doi=10.1080/07853890.2022.2100926 |pmid=35852299 |pmc=9302017 }}</ref>

=== Arrest and incarceration ===
{{see also|Incarceration in the United States}}
The war on drugs caused soaring arrest rates in the US that [[Race and the War on Drugs#African American Communities|disproportionately targeted African Americans]] due to various factors.<ref name="HRW">{{cite web |url=https://www.hrw.org/legacy/reports/2000/usa/Rcedrg00-05.htm |title=The Impact of the War on Drugs on U.S. Incarceration |date=May 2000 |access-date=June 10, 2007 |publisher=Human Rights Watch |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20081128173127/http://www.hrw.org/legacy/reports/2000/usa/Rcedrg00-05.htm |archive-date=November 28, 2008 |url-status=live }}</ref> Anti-drug and tough-on-crime policies from the 1970s through the 1990s created a situation where the US, with less than 5% of the world population, houses nearly 25% of the world's prisoners. Increased demand lead to the development of privatization and the [[Incarceration in the United States#Privatization|for-profit prison industry]].<ref>[[Private prison#Development 3|Development of private prisons in the United States]]</ref> {{As of|2015}}, the US prison population rate was 716 per 100,000 people, the highest in the world, six times higher than Canada and six to nine times higher than Western European countries.<ref>{{Cite news |last=Ye Hee Lee |first=Michelle |date=April 30, 2015 |title=Does the United States really have 5 percent of the world's population and one quarter of the world's prisoners? |url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/fact-checker/wp/2015/04/30/does-the-united-states-really-have-five-percent-of-worlds-population-and-one-quarter-of-the-worlds-prisoners/ |access-date=Dec 30, 2023 |newspaper=[[Washington Post]]}}</ref>

[[File:US incarceration rate timeline.gif|thumb|upright=1.35|Graph demonstrating increases in [[United States incarceration rate]]]]
In the 1980s, while the number of arrests for all crimes had risen by 28%, the number of arrests for drug offenses rose 126%.<ref>Austin J, McVey AD. The 1989 NCCD prison population forecast: the impact of the war on drugs. San Francisco: National Council on Crime and Delinquency, 1989.</ref> In 1994, the ''[[New England Journal of Medicine]]'' reported that the war on drugs resulted in the incarceration of one million Americans each year.<ref>{{Cite journal |last1=Grinspoon |first1=Lester |author-link1=Lester Grinspoon |last2=Bakalar |first2=James B. |date=February 3, 1994 |title=The War on Drugs – A Peace Proposal |journal=[[New England Journal of Medicine]] |volume=330 |issue=5 |pages=357–360 |doi=10.1056/NEJM199402033300513 |pmid=8043062}}</ref> In 2008, ''[[The Washington Post]]'' reported that of 1.5 million Americans arrested each year for drug offenses, half a million would be incarcerated, and one in five black Americans would spend time behind bars due to drug laws.<ref name="WaPo">{{cite news |first=George F. |last=Will |url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/10/28/AR2009102803801.html |title=A reality check on drug use |author-link=George Will |date=October 29, 2009 |newspaper=[[The Washington Post]] |page=A19 |access-date=September 18, 2017 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171008145041/http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/10/28/AR2009102803801.html |archive-date=October 8, 2017 |url-status=live }}</ref> In 2019, the FBI estimated about 1.5 million drug arrests nationally, 32.1% for cannabis and 31% for "other dangerous nonnarcotic drugs".<ref>{{Cite web |date=2019 |title=Crime in the United States 2019 |url=https://ucr.fbi.gov/crime-in-the-u.s/2019/crime-in-the-u.s.-2019/topic-pages/persons-arrested |access-date=June 28, 2024 |website=[[Federal Bureau of Investigation]]}}</ref><!---quoting the March 2009 Economist--->

Federal and state policies also impose [[Collateral consequences of criminal charges|collateral consequences]] on those convicted of drug offenses, separate from fines and prison time, that are not applicable to other types of crime.<ref name="collateral">Gabriel J. Chin, [https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=390109 "Race, The War on Drugs, and the Collateral Consequences of Criminal Conviction"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080421195145/https://ssrn.com/abstract=390109 |date=April 21, 2008 }}, v. 6 ''Journal of Gender, Race, Justice'' p. 253 (2002)</ref> In order to comply with a federal law known as the [[Solomon–Lautenberg amendment]], a number of states require a six-months driver's license suspension for anyone convicted of a drug offense.<ref>{{cite news|title=States Are Pressed to Suspend Driver Licenses of Drug Users|url=https://www.nytimes.com/1990/11/16/us/states-are-pressed-to-suspend-driver-licenses-of-drug-users.html|access-date=May 29, 2018|work=The New York Times|agency=Associated Press|date=November 16, 1990|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180704093811/https://www.nytimes.com/1990/11/16/us/states-are-pressed-to-suspend-driver-licenses-of-drug-users.html|archive-date=July 4, 2018|url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{citation |last1=Aiken |first1=Joshua |title=Reinstating Common Sense: How driver's license suspensions for drug offenses unrelated to driving are falling out of favor |url=https://www.prisonpolicy.org/driving/national.html |access-date=May 29, 2018 |publisher=Prison Policy Initiative |date=December 12, 2016}}</ref><ref>{{citation |title="Possess a Joint, Lose Your License": July 1995 Status Report |url=http://www.mpp.org/site/c.glKZLeMQIsG/b.1087547/k.33C1/Possess_a_Joint_Lose_Your_License.htm |publisher=Marijuana Policy Project |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20071008235035/http://www.mpp.org/site/c.glKZLeMQIsG/b.1087547/k.33C1/Possess_a_Joint_Lose_Your_License.htm |archive-date=October 8, 2007 |url-status=dead}}</ref> Other examples of collateral consequences for drug offenses, or for [[felony]] offenses in general, include loss of [[Licensure|professional license]], loss of ability to [[Gun law in the United States|purchase a firearm]], loss of eligibility for [[Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program|food stamps]], loss of eligibility for [[Federal Student Aid]], loss of eligibility to live in [[Subsidized housing in the United States|public housing]], [[Felony disenfranchisement in the United States|loss of ability to vote]], and [[deportation]],<ref name="collateral" /> a total of over 460 benefits at risk at the federal level alone.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Schlosser |first=Eric |date=August 1994 |title=Reefer Madness |url=https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/1994/08/reefer-madness/303476/ |access-date=May 15, 2024 |website=[[The Atlantic]]}}</ref> The US provides for the deportation of non-citizens convicted of drug offenses.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Yates |first1=Jeff |last2=Collins |first2=Todd |last3=Chin |first3=Gabriel J. |year=1995 |title=A War on Drugs or a War on Immigrants? Expanding the Definition of 'Drug Trafficking' in Determining Aggravated Felon Status for Non-Citizens |url=https://ssrn.com/abstract=774866 |journal=Maryland Law Review |volume=64 |page=875 |access-date=February 28, 2021}}</ref>

==== Prison overcrowding ====
One consequence of the war on drugs policy has been the overcrowding of American prisons. The policy's approach to prosecuting drug-related crimes led to a surge in incarcerated individuals for nonviolent drug offenses. As a result, many prisons have become overburdened, often operating at capacities far beyond their intended limits. Overcrowding strains the prison system and raises questions about the effectiveness of incarceration as a solution to drug-related issues.<ref>{{cite web |date=June 2013 |title=The War on Marijuana in Black and White |url=https://www.aclu.org/press-releases/war-marijuana-black-and-white-billions-dollars-wasted-racially-biased-arrests |website=[[American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU)]] |publisher=}}</ref> Resources that could be allocated to address the root causes of drug abuse, provide rehabilitation and treatment programs, or support communities affected by drug-related issues, are instead used to manage the considerable prison population. Critics argue that focusing solely on incarceration fails to address the underlying social factors contributing to drug abuse and perpetuates a cycle of criminality without offering pathways to recovery and reintegration into society.<ref>{{cite web |title=The Human Rights Impact of Over-Incarceration in the U.S. |date= May 2015 |url=https://www.ohchr.org/sites/default/files/Documents/Issues/RuleOfLaw/OverIncarceration/ACLU.pdf |publisher=Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR)}}</ref>

==== Racial disparities in sentencing ====
{{Main|Race and the War on Drugs}}
Racial disparities have been a prominent and contentious aspect of the war on drugs in the US. In 1957, a belief at the time about drug use was summarized by journalist [[Max Lerner]] in his work, ''America as a Civilization'': "As a case in point we may take the known fact of the prevalence of reefer and dope addiction in Negro areas. This is essentially explained in terms of poverty, slum living, and broken families, yet it would be easy to show the lack of drug addiction among other ethnic groups where the same conditions apply."<ref>{{Cite book |last=Inciardi |first=James A |title=The War on Drugs IV: The Continuing Saga of the Mysteries and Miseries of Intoxication, Addiction, Crime, and Public Policy |publisher=[[Allyn and Bacon]] |year=2008 |page=248}}</ref>

The Anti-Drug Abuse Act of 1986 created a 100:1 sentencing disparity in the US for the trafficking or possession of [[crack cocaine|crack]] when compared to penalties for trafficking of [[cocaine|powder cocaine]].<ref name="wa-post-dispar-2010">{{Cite news|title=Congress passes bill to reduce disparity in crack, powder cocaine sentencing|last=Abrams|first=Jim|newspaper=[[The Washington Post]]|date=July 29, 2010|url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/07/28/AR2010072802969.html|access-date=September 18, 2017|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170905174012/http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/07/28/AR2010072802969.html|archive-date=September 5, 2017|url-status=live}}</ref><ref name="celling-america-246-247">Burton-Rose (ed.), 1998: pp. 246–247</ref><ref name="gates-of-injustice" /><ref>{{cite web| author = United States Sentencing Commission | title = Cocaine and Federal Sentencing Policy | year = 2002 | page = 6 | url = http://www.ussc.gov/r_congress/02crack/2002crackrpt.pdf | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20070715212213/http://www.ussc.gov/r_congress/02crack/2002crackrpt.pdf | archive-date = July 15, 2007 | access-date=August 24, 2010 | quote = As a result of the 1986 Act ... penalties for a first-time cocaine trafficking offense: 5 grams or more of crack cocaine = five-year mandatory minimum penalty}}</ref> The bill had been widely criticized as discriminatory against minorities, mostly blacks, who were more likely to use crack than powder cocaine.<ref name="WashPost">[https://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/08/02/AR2010080204360.html "The Fair Sentencing Act corrects a long-time wrong in cocaine cases"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171120014727/http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/08/02/AR2010080204360.html |date=November 20, 2017 }}, ''[[The Washington Post]]'', August 3, 2010. Retrieved September 30, 2010.</ref> In 1994, studying the effects of the 100:1 sentencing ratio, the [[United States Sentencing Commission]] (USSC) found that nearly two-thirds of crack users were white or Hispanic, while nearly 85% of those convicted for possession were black, with similar numbers for trafficking. Powder cocaine offenders were more equally divided across race. The USSC noted that these disparities resulted in African Americans serving longer prison sentences than other ethnicities. In a 1995 report to Congress, the USSC recommended against the 100:1 sentencing ratio.<ref>{{Cite web |title=A Social History of America's Most Popular Drugs |url=https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/drugs/buyers/socialhistory.html?scrlybr |access-date=Dec 13, 2023 |website=[[PBS Frontline]]}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |last=United States Sentencing Commission |date=Feb 1995 |title=Special Report to the Congress: Cocaine and Federal Sentencing Policy |url=https://www.ussc.gov/sites/default/files/pdf/news/congressional-testimony-and-reports/drug-topics/199502-rtc-cocaine-sentencing-policy/1995-Crack-Report_Full.pdf |access-date=Dec 13, 2023 |website=[[United States Sentencing Commission]]}}</ref> In 2010, the 100:1 sentencing ratio was reduced to 18:1.<ref name="WashPost" /><ref name="thomas.loc.gov"/>

Other studies indicated similarly dramatic racial differences in enforcement and sentencing. Statistics from 1998 show that there were wide racial disparities in arrests, prosecutions, sentencing and deaths. African-American drug users made up for 35% of drug arrests, 55% of convictions, and 74% of people sent to prison for drug possession crimes.<ref name="celling-america-246-247" /> Nationwide African-Americans were sent to state prisons for drug offenses 13 times more often than other races,<ref name="hrw-race-key-findings">{{cite web |title=Key Findings at a Glance |url=https://www.hrw.org/legacy/campaigns/drugs/war/key-facts.htm |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140816062935/http://www.hrw.org/legacy/campaigns/drugs/war/key-facts.htm |archive-date=August 16, 2014 |access-date=February 3, 2010 |website=Racial Disparities in the War on Drugs |publisher=Human Rights Watch}}</ref> even though they supposedly constituted only 13% of regular drug users.<ref name="celling-america-246-247" /> Human Rights Watch's report, "Race and the Drug War" (2000), provided extensive documentation of racial disparities, citing statistics and case studies highlighting the unequal treatment of racial and ethnic groups by law enforcement agencies, particularly in drug arrests.<ref name="Human Rights Watch 2000">{{cite web |author=Human Rights Watch |date=2000 |title=Race and the Drug War |url=https://www.hrw.org/legacy/reports/2000/usa/Rcedrg00-04.htm}}</ref> According to the report, in the US in 1999, compared to non-minorities, African Americans were far more likely to be arrested for drug crimes, and received much stiffer penalties and sentences.<ref name="hrw-race-summary-recommendations">{{cite web |year=2000 |title=I. Summary and Recommendations |url=https://www.hrw.org/legacy/reports/2000/usa/Rcedrg00.htm#P54_1086 |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100207063858/http://www.hrw.org/legacy/reports/2000/usa/Rcedrg00.htm#P54_1086 |archive-date=February 7, 2010 |access-date=February 3, 2010 |website=Punishment and Prejudice: Racial Disparities in the War on Drugs |publisher=Human Rights Watch}}</ref>

Reporting on the effects of state initiatives, the Department of Justice found that, from 1990 through 2000, "the increasing number of drug offenses accounted for 27% of the total growth among black inmates, 7% of the total growth among Hispanic inmates, and 15% of the growth among white inmates."{{Citation needed|date=May 2024}}

In ''Malign Neglect – Race Crime and Punishment in America'' (1995), criminologist [[Michael Tonry]] wrote, "The War on Drugs foreseeably and unnecessarily blighted the lives of hundreds and thousands of young disadvantaged black Americans and undermined decades of effort to improve the life chances of members of the urban black underclass."<ref>Michael Tonry, Malign Neglect – Race Crime and Punishment in America (London: Oxford University Press, 1995), 82.</ref>

==== Permanent underclass creation ====
[[File:Utah State Prison Wasatch Facility.jpg|thumb|Approximately 1 million people are [[United States incarceration rate|incarcerated every year in the United States]] for drug law violations.]]
Penalties for drug crimes among American youth almost always involve permanent or semi-permanent removal from opportunities for education, [[Felony disenfranchisement|strip them of voting rights]], and later involve creation of criminal records which make employment more difficult. One-fifth of the US prison population are incarcerated for a drug offence.<ref>{{Cite web |last1=Plant |first1=Michael |last2=Singer |first2=Peter |date=2021-05-04 |title=Why drugs should be not only decriminalised, but fully legalised |url=https://www.newstatesman.com/international/2021/05/why-drugs-should-be-not-only-decriminalised-fully-legalised |access-date=2021-05-22 |website=www.newstatesman.com |language=en}}</ref> Thus, some authors maintain that the War on Drugs has resulted in the creation of a permanent underclass of people who have few educational or job opportunities, often as a result of being punished for drug offenses which in turn have resulted from attempts to earn a living in spite of having no education or job opportunities.<ref>{{cite web |last1=Blumenson |first1=Eric |last2=Nilsen |first2=Eva S. |date=May 16, 2002 |title=How to construct an underclass, ''or'' how the War on Drugs became a war on education |url=http://blogs.law.columbia.edu/4cs/files/2008/11/blumenson-and-nilsenlawrev.pdf |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100622164812/http://blogs.law.columbia.edu/4cs/files/2008/11/blumenson-and-nilsenlawrev.pdf |archive-date=June 22, 2010 |access-date=August 7, 2011 |publisher=Drug Policy Forum of Massachusetts}}</ref><ref name="HuffPost">{{Cite web |last=Newman |first=Tony |date=Jan 3, 2013 |title=Connecting the Dots: 10 Disastrous Consequences of the Drug War |url=https://www.huffpost.com/entry/drug-war-consequences_b_2404347 |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190623232618/https://www.huffpost.com/entry/drug-war-consequences_b_2404347 |archive-date=June 23, 2019 |access-date=July 5, 2019 |work=HuffPost}}</ref>

In her 2010 book, ''The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness'', Michelle Alexander argues that the war on drugs has effectively perpetuated a racial caste system, with African American and Hispanic individuals experiencing disproportionately high rates of arrest, conviction, and incarceration for drug-related offenses. This system functions as a modern form of racial control, stripping individuals of their rights and opportunities, and reinforcing societal inequalities. According to Alexander, the consequences extend beyond criminal justice, affecting economic opportunities, access to education, and overall social mobility for affected individuals and communities.<ref name="Michelle Alexander 2010">{{cite book |last=Alexander |first=Michelle |title=The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness |publisher=The New Press |year=2010 |isbn=978-1595581037}}</ref>

[[File:Marion_Barry_smoking_crack.gif|right|thumb|[[D.C. Mayor]] [[Marion Barry]] captured on a surveillance camera smoking [[crack cocaine]] during a sting operation by the [[FBI]] and [[D.C. Police]]]]

=== Drug testing in the workplace ===
Workplace [[drug test]]ing has been widespread and controversial in the US since the late 1980s: there is no clear measure of its effectiveness in improving safety and productivity, and testing affects significantly more non-whites than whites. Testing is more prevalent in the US than elsewhere in the world.<ref name=":4">{{Cite web |last=Engber |first=Daniel |date=Dec 27, 2015 |title=Why Do Employers Still Routinely Drug-Test Workers? |url=https://www.slate.com/articles/health_and_science/cover_story/2015/12/workplace_drug_testing_is_widespread_but_ineffective.html |access-date=Jan 24, 2024 |website=[[Slate (magazine)|Slate]]}}</ref> Most common is urine analysis for amphetamines, cocaine, marijuana, opioids and PCP;<ref>{{Cite web |date= November 21, 2023|title=Drug Testing |url=https://nida.nih.gov/research-topics/drug-testing#detect |access-date=Jan 24, 2024 |website=[[National Institutes of Health]]}}</ref> usually with no practical discrimination between the effects of the different drugs.<ref name=":4" /> Workplace testing rapidly gained popularity after the Reagan administration made it mandatory for federal workers, peaking in 1996, with 81% of companies reporting drug screening, up from 21% in 1987.<ref name=":8">{{Cite news |last=DePillis |first=Lydia |date=March 10, 2015 |title=Companies drug test a lot less than they used to – because it doesn't really work |newspaper=[[Washington Post]] |url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2015/03/10/companies-drug-test-a-lot-less-than-they-used-to-because-it-doesnt-really-work/ |access-date=Jan 24, 2024}}</ref><ref name=":4" />

In the 1980s, testing had been promoted to business as a way to reclaim what were said to be huge losses in productivity caused by drug use. Studies released in the 1990s refuted these claims; a 1994 report from the [[National Academy of Sciences]], "Under the Influence? Drugs and the American Work Force", concluded that "the data... do not provide clear evidence of the deleterious effects of drugs other than alcohol on safety and other job performance indicators." By 2004, workplace testing was down to 62% of companies,<ref name=":8" /> in 2015, it was reported as below 50%. Drug use continues to be blamed for productivity losses, and testing remains common.<ref name=":4" />

In 2021, some companies began to reduce drug testing in order to improve hiring prospects in a tight labor market. [[Amazon (company)|Amazon]], America's second largest employer, eliminated cannabis testing in job pre-screening, where not required by government regulations, stating, "Pre-employment marijuana testing has disproportionately affected communities of color by stalling job placement." In a survey of 45,000 companies worldwide, 9% reported the elimination of testing in order to improve hiring.<ref>{{Cite magazine |last=McCluskey |first=Megan |date=Oct 20, 2021 |title=Amid a Labor Shortage, Companies Are Eliminating Drug Tests. It's a Trend That Could Create More Equitable Workplaces |url=https://time.com/6103798/workplace-drug-testing/ |access-date=Jan 24, 2024 |magazine=[[Time (magazine)|TIME]]}}</ref> In 2022, thousands of US truck drivers were taken off the road after testing positive for cannabis, contributing to a severe driver shortage; a conflict between the majority of states with some form of cannabis legalization, and the federal [[United States Department of Transportation|Department of Transportation]]'s zero-tolerance cannabis policy, even for medical use, is cited as an issue.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Davis |first=Leesa |date=May 18, 2022 |title=Marijuana violations have taken over 10,000 truck drivers off the road this year, adding more supply chain disruptions |url=https://stacker.com/society/marijuana-violations-have-taken-over-10000-truck-drivers-road-year-adding-more-supply-chain |access-date=Feb 17, 2024 |website=[[Stacker]]}}</ref>

=== Public opinion ===
{{further|Arguments for and against drug prohibition}}
[[File:ONDCP_Pothead.gif|thumb|upright|A US government domestic public interest poster {{circa}} 2000 concerning [[cannabis in the United States]]]]
In the 21st century, according to polling, a majority of Americans have been skeptical about the methods and effectiveness of the war on drugs. In 2014, a [[Pew Research Center]] poll found found that 67% of Americans feel that a movement towards treatment for drugs like cocaine and heroin is better versus 26% who feel that prosecution is the better route. Moving away from mandatory prison terms for drug crimes was favored by two-thirds of the population, a substantial shift from a fifty-fifty split in 2001. A large majority saw alcohol as a greater danger to health (69%) and society (63%) than cannabis.<ref>{{Cite news |date=2014-04-02 |title=America's New Drug Policy Landscape {{!}} Pew Research Center |url=http://www.people-press.org/2014/04/02/americas-new-drug-policy-landscape/ |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20181029091742/http://www.people-press.org/2014/04/02/americas-new-drug-policy-landscape/ |archive-date=October 29, 2018 |access-date=2018-10-23 |work=Pew Research Center for the People and the Press |language=en-US}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |date=2014-04-01 |title=New Pew Poll Confirms Americans Ready to End War on Drugs |url=https://drugpolicy.org/news/new-pew-poll-confirms-americans-ready-end-war-drugs/ |access-date=2018-10-22 |website=Drug Policy Alliance |language=en}}</ref> In [[Gallup, Inc.|Gallup]] polls on whether cannabis should be legal, 15% of Americans agreed in March 1972, rising to 28% in April 1977, where it roughly stayed until 2000, when it began rising again, to 68% in October 2021.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Qamar |first=Zoha |date=Oct 14, 2022 |title=Five Decades Into The War On Drugs, Decriminalizing Marijuana Has High Bipartisan Support |url=https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/five-decades-into-the-war-on-drugs-decriminalizing-marijuana-has-high-bipartisan-support/ |access-date=Apr 11, 2024 |website=[[FiveThirtyEight]]}}</ref> In May 2021, a Bully Pulpit Interactive/ACLU poll found that 83% of Americans, across party lines, considered the war on drugs a failure, and 12% considered it a success.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Slisco |first=Aila |date=Jun 10, 2021 |title=Two-Thirds of American Voters Support Decriminalizing All Drugs: Poll |url=https://www.newsweek.com/two-thirds-american-voters-support-decriminalizing-all-drugs-poll-1599645 |access-date=Apr 11, 2024 |website=[[Newsweek]]}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |date=June 9, 2021 |title=Poll Results on American Attitudes Toward War on Drugs |url=https://www.aclu.org/documents/poll-results-american-attitudes-toward-war-drugs |access-date=Apr 11, 2024 |website=[[American Civil Liberties Union]]}}</ref>

=== Legality ===
{{Main|Legality of the War on Drugs}}

The legality of drug prohibition within the US has been challenged on various grounds. One argument holds that drug prohibition, as presently implemented, violates the [[substantive due process]] doctrine in that its benefits do not justify the encroachments on rights that are supposed to be guaranteed by the [[Fifth Amendment to the United States Constitution|Fifth]] and [[Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution|Fourteenth]] Amendments to the U.S. Constitution.<ref>{{cite web |last=Redlich |first=Warren |authorlink=Warren Redlich |date=2005-02-05 |title=A Substantive Due Process Challenge to the War on Drugs |url=http://www.redlichlaw.com/crim/substantive-due-process-drug-war.pdf |url-status=dead |archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20150217035034/http://www.redlichlaw.com/crim/substantive-due-process-drug-war.pdf |archivedate=2015-02-17 |quote=It is true that the approach suggested in this paper would limit police power. Constitutional protection of individual rights exists for that very purpose. We face coercive government action, carried out in a corrupt and racist manner, with military and paramilitary assaults on our homes, leading to mass incarceration and innocent deaths. We can never forget the tyranny of a government unrestrained by an independent judiciary. Our courts must end the War on Drugs.}}</ref><ref>[http://www.boalt.org/bjcl/v8/v8tennenprint.htm Is the Constitution in Harm's Way? Substantive Due Process and Criminal Law] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110703081522/http://www.boalt.org/bjcl/v8/v8tennenprint.htm|date=2011-07-03}} Eric Tennen</ref> Another argument interprets the [[Commerce Clause]] to mean that drugs should be regulated in state law not federal law.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Shapiro |first=Ilya |date=Summer 2020 |title=This is Your Constitution on Drugs |url=https://www.nationalaffairs.com/publications/detail/this-is-your-constitution-on-drugs |access-date=May 2, 2024 |website=[[National Affairs]]}}</ref> A third argument states that the reverse [[Legal burden of proof|burden of proof]] in drug-possession cases is incompatible with the [[rule of law]], in that the power to convict is effectively taken from the courts and given to those who are willing to plant evidence.<ref>{{cite web |last=Anon |title=The universally unconstitutional war on drugs (3rd Ed.) |url=http://atlanta.indymedia.org/local/universally-unconstitutional-war-drugs-3rd-ed |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://archive.today/20120707011613/http://atlanta.indymedia.org/local/universally-unconstitutional-war-drugs-3rd-ed |archive-date=2012-07-07 |access-date=2011-07-31}}</ref>

{{anchor|Efficacy}}

== Efficacy ==
There is no clear measure of the effectiveness of the war on drugs, and it has been widely called a [[Governance failure|policy failure]].<ref name="War on Drugs" /><ref>{{Cite web |last=Chalabi |first=Mona |date=Apr 16, 2016 |title=The 'war on drugs' in numbers: a systematic failure of policy |website=[[TheGuardian.com]] |url=https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/apr/19/war-on-drugs-statistics-systematic-policy-failure-united-nations |access-date=Feb 21, 2024 |quote=Since Richard Nixon declared the war on drugs in 1971, it seems as though people rather than products have been most directly affected. But lack of data makes it hard to understand the impact: like most illicit activities, drug production, trade and use is hard to measure accurately. And without knowing baseline values, it's hard to understand the effect of any given policy – let alone comparing the impact of various policies. However, where long-term data is available, it does point to systematic failures in drug policies.}}</ref>{{Refn|News media, scholarly studies, government officials and leaders, and a variety of NGOs have determined the war on drugs to be a policy failure<ref>{{cite magazine |title=End the Drug War |url=https://foreignpolicy.com/2012/03/20/end-the-drug-war/ |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170913015602/http://foreignpolicy.com/2012/03/20/end-the-drug-war/ |archive-date=September 13, 2017 |access-date=12 July 2017 |magazine=Foreign Policy}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last1=Friesendorf |first1=Cornelius |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Vxx9AgAAQBAJ&pg=PA19 |title=US Foreign Policy and the War on Drugs: Displacing the Cocaine and Heroin Industry |date=2007 |publisher=Routledge |isbn=9781134123940 |language=en |access-date=12 July 2017}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |last1=Peter |first1=Andreas |author-link=Peter Andreas |date=22 June 2003 |title=A Tale of Two Borders: The U.S.–Mexico and U.S.–Canada Lines After 9/11 |url=https://escholarship.org/uc/item/6d09j0n2 |url-status=live |journal=Center for Comparative Immigration Studies |language=en |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180827075426/https://escholarship.org/uc/item/6d09j0n2 |archive-date=August 27, 2018 |access-date=12 July 2017}}</ref><ref>{{cite thesis |last=Westhoff |first=Lotte Berendje Rozemarijn |date=2013 |title=Ronald Reagan's War on Drugs: A Policy Failure But A Political Success |type=MA |publisher=Leiden University |hdl=1887/21802 |url=https://hdl.handle.net/1887/21802 |access-date=29 November 2021}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |last1=Bagley |first1=Bruce Michael |date=1988 |title=US Foreign Policy and the War on Drugs: Analysis of a Policy Failure |journal=Journal of Interamerican Studies and World Affairs |volume=30 |issue=2/3 |pages=189–212 |doi=10.2307/165986 |jstor=165986}}</ref><ref>{{Cite journal |last=Mitchell |first=Ojmarrh |date=2009-01-01 |title=Ineffectiveness, Financial Waste, and Unfairness: The Legacy of the War on Drugs |url=https://doi.org/10.1080/0735648X.2009.9721268 |journal=Journal of Crime and Justice |volume=32 |issue=2 |pages=1–19 |doi=10.1080/0735648X.2009.9721268 |issn=0735-648X |s2cid=144508042}}</ref>|group=note}} Thirty years into the campaign, a [[United States National Research Council|National Research Council]] report, "Informing America's Policy on Illegal Drugs" (2001), found that "existing drug-use monitoring systems are strikingly inadequate to support the full range of policy decisions that the nation must make." The report noted that studies of efforts to address drug usage and smuggling, from US military operations to eradicate coca fields in Colombia, to domestic drug treatment centers, had all been inconclusive, if the programs had been evaluated at all: It concluded, "It is unconscionable for this country to continue to carry out a public policy of this magnitude and cost without any way of knowing whether and to what extent it is having the desired effect."<ref>[https://web.archive.org/web/20081205024427/http://www.dpeg.org/dpeg_2001_spg.pdf Drug Policy News], Drug Policy Education Group, Vol. 2 No. 1, Spring/Summer 2001, p. 5</ref><ref>{{Cite book |date=2001 |editor-last=Manski |editor-first=Charles F. |editor2-last=Pepper |editor2-first=John V. |editor3-last=Petrie |editor3-first=Carol V. |title=Informing America's Policy on Illegal Drugs: What We Don't Know Keeps Hurting Us |url=https://nap.nationalacademies.org/read/10021/chapter/1 |access-date=Feb 3, 2024 |publisher=[[National Academies of Sciences]] |doi=10.17226/10021 |isbn=978-0-309-07273-1 }}</ref>

Writing in the ''[[New Statesman|New Statesmen]]'' in 2021, journalist [[James Bloodworth (journalist)|James Bloodworth]] stated, "The war on drugs is a failure. We know this. We've long known it. In fact, there is such an abundance of evidence for its failure that we have more certainty here than in most areas of policy. ... According to the [[International Drug Policy Consortium]] there was a 31 per cent global increase in drug taking between 2011 and 2016. ... It is impossible to suppress the demand for drugs." He quoted [[Helen Clark]], former prime minister of [[New Zealand]] and head of the Global Commission on Drug Policy: "The total elimination of drugs? Dream on, there's never been a time in human history where human beings haven't resorted to some kind of substances that will take them out of their current reality for whatever reason."<ref>{{Cite web |last=Bloodworth |first=James |date=Dec 7, 2021 |title=The government is tripping if it thinks this renewed war on drugs won't backfire |url=https://www.newstatesman.com/politics/health/2021/12/the-government-is-tripping-if-it-thinks-this-renewed-war-on-drugs-wont-backfire |access-date=Apr 9, 2024 |website=[[New Statesman]]}}</ref>

=== Interdiction ===
{{See also|Supply reduction|Illegal drug trade}}
[[File:Rentz vs Narcotics Smugglers.jpg|thumb|upright=1.35|right|{{USS|Rentz|FFG-46}} attempts to put out a fire set by drug smugglers trying to escape and destroy evidence.]]

{{External media | width = 210px | float = right | headerimage= | video1 =[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xWY79JCfhjw A Conversation with President Obama and David Simon] (''The Wire'' creator), discussing ''[[The Wire]]'' and the War on Drugs, The [[White House]]<ref name="Pres">{{cite web | title =The President Interviews the Creator of "The Wire" About the War on Drugs | date =March 26, 2015 | url =https://obamawhitehouse.archives.gov/blog/2015/03/26/watch-president-sits-down-creator-wire-talk-about-war-drugs | access-date =March 28, 2015 | archive-url =https://web.archive.org/web/20170130023411/https://obamawhitehouse.archives.gov/blog/2015/03/26/watch-president-sits-down-creator-wire-talk-about-war-drugs | archive-date =January 30, 2017 | via =[[NARA|National Archives]] | work =[[whitehouse.gov]] | url-status =live }}</ref> }}

In 1988, the [[RAND Corporation]] released a [[United States Department of Defense|Department of Defense]]-funded two-year study, ''Sealing the Borders: The Effects of Increased Military Participation in Drug Interdiction''. It concluded that the use of the armed forces to interdict drugs coming into the US would have little or no effect on cocaine traffic and might, in fact, raise the profits of cocaine cartels and manufacturers. It noted that seven prior studies, including one by the Center for Naval Research and the [[Office of Technology Assessment]], had come to similar conclusions.<ref>Peter H. Reuter, ''Sealing the borders: the effects of increased military participation in drug interdiction'' (RAND 1988); Robert E. Kessler, "Study: Military Can't Curb Drugs", ''Newsday'', May 23, 1988 at 23; "Military support would have little effect on drug smuggling, study says", United Press International, March 4, 1988.</ref>

[[File:MOJO-July-August-Cover200x262.jpg|thumb|upright|2009 ''[[Mother Jones (magazine)|Mother Jones]]'' magazine cover]]

In mid-1995, the US government tried to reduce the supply of [[methamphetamine]] precursors to disrupt the market of this drug. According to a 2009 study, this effort was successful, but its effects were largely temporary.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Dobkin |first1=Carlos |last2=Nicosia |first2=Nancy |title=The War on Drugs: Methamphetamine, Public Health, and Crime |journal=American Economic Review |date=February 2009 |volume=99 |issue=1 |pages=324–349 |doi=10.1257/aer.99.1.324 |pmid=20543969 |pmc=2883188}}</ref>

In the six years from 2000 to 2006, the U.S. spent $4.7 billion on [[Plan Colombia]], an effort to eradicate coca production in Colombia. The main result of this effort was to shift coca production into more remote areas and force other forms of adaptation. The overall acreage cultivated for coca in Colombia at the end of the six years was found to be the same, after the US Drug Czar's office announced a change in measuring methodology in 2005 and included new areas in its surveys.<ref name = "est">{{cite web| date =April 14, 2006 | url =http://www.whitehousedrugpolicy.gov/news/press06/041406.html | title =2005 Coca Estimates for Colombia | publisher =Office of National Drug Control Policy |access-date=October 4, 2007 |archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20070927234649/http://www.whitehousedrugpolicy.gov/news/press06/041406.html <!-- Bot retrieved archive --> |archive-date = September 27, 2007}}</ref> Cultivation in the neighboring countries of Peru and Bolivia increased, some would describe this effect like squeezing a balloon.<ref>Juan Forero, "Colombia's Coca Survives U.S. plan to uproot it", ''The New York Times'', August 19, 2006</ref>

[[Richard Davenport-Hines]], in his book ''The Pursuit of Oblivion'', criticized the efficacy of the war on drugs by pointing out that "10–15% of illicit heroin and 30% of illicit cocaine is intercepted. Drug traffickers have gross profit margins of up to 300%. At least 75% of illicit drug shipments would have to be intercepted before the traffickers' profits were hurt."<ref>{{cite book |last1=Davenport-Hines |first1=Richard Peter Treadwell |url=https://archive.org/details/pursuitofoblivio00dave |title=The Pursuit of Oblivion: A Global History of Narcotics |publisher=W. W. Norton |year=2002 |isbn=978-0-393-05189-6 |location=New York |oclc=301684673 |author-link1=Richard Davenport-Hines}}</ref>

[[Alberto Fujimori]], president of Peru from 1990 to 2000, described US foreign drug policy as "failed": "For 10 years, there has been a considerable sum invested by the Peruvian government and another sum on the part of the American government, and this has not led to a reduction in the supply of coca leaf offered for sale. Rather, in the 10 years from 1980 to 1990, it grew 10-fold."<ref>Don Podesta and Douglas Farah, "Drug Policy in Andes Called Failure", ''[[The Washington Post]]'', March 27, 1993</ref>

According to a report commissioned by the [[Drug Policy Alliance]], and released in March 2006 by the Justice Policy Institute, harsher sentences for drug offenses committed in [[drug-free school zone]]s are ineffective at keeping youths away from drugs, and instead create strong racial disparities in the judicial system.<ref name="justice">{{cite web |title=How drug-free zone laws impact racial disparity–and fail to protect youth |url=http://www.justicepolicy.org/article.php?id=575 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20060718134920/http://www.justicepolicy.org/article.php?id=575 |archive-date=July 18, 2006 |accessdate=July 27, 2006 |publisher=Justice Policy Institute |df=mdy}}</ref>

According to data collected by the [[Federal Bureau of Prisons]] 45.3% of all criminal charges were drug related and 25.5% of sentences for all charges last 5–10 years. Furthermore, non-whites make up 41.4% of the federal prison system's population and over half are under the age of 40.<ref>{{Cite web |title=BOP Statistics: Inmate Race |url=https://www.bop.gov/about/statistics/statistics_inmate_race.jsp |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190730093024/https://www.bop.gov/about/statistics/statistics_inmate_race.jsp |archive-date=July 30, 2019 |access-date=2019-08-15 |website=www.bop.gov}}</ref> The Bureau of Justice Statistics states that over 80% of all drug related charges are for possession rather than the sale or manufacture of drugs.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Crime & Justice Electronic Data Abstracts, Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS) |url=https://www.bjs.gov/content/dcf/tables/salespos.cfm |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190815133306/https://www.bjs.gov/content/dcf/tables/salespos.cfm |archive-date=August 15, 2019 |access-date=2019-08-15 |website=www.bjs.gov}}</ref>

=== Drug use ===
In 2005, the federally funded [[Monitoring the Future]] annual survey reported about 85% of high school seniors found marijuana "easy to obtain", virtually unchanged since 1975, never dropping below 82.7% in three decades of national surveys.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.monitoringthefuture.org/data/05data/pr05t13.pdf |title=Table 13: Trends in Availability of Drugs as Perceived by Twelfth Graders |last1=Johnston |first1=L. D. |last2=O'Malley |first2=P. M. |last3=Bachman |first3=J. G. |last4=Schulenberg |first4=J. E. |date=November 30, 2005 |website=Teen drug use down but progress halts among youngest teens |publisher=Monitoring the Future |access-date=August 23, 2007 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110724223128/http://www.monitoringthefuture.org/data/05data/pr05t13.pdf |archive-date=July 24, 2011 |url-status=live }}</ref> The DEA stated that the number of users of cannabis in the US declined between 2000 and 2005, even with many states passing new [[medical cannabis]] laws, making access easier,<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.justice.gov/dea/marijuana_position.html#lobby|archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20100710025900/http://www.justice.gov/dea/marijuana_position.html#lobby|url-status=dead|title=The DEA Position On Marijuana|archivedate=July 10, 2010}}</ref> though usage rates remain higher than they were in the 1990s according to the [[National Survey on Drug Use and Health]].<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.briancbennett.com/charts/nsduh/past-month-percent.htm|title=truth: the Anti-drugwar NSDUH Trends in Past Month Substance Use (1979–2008) by Percentage of Population 1 of 2|access-date=February 3, 2011|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110708093137/http://www.briancbennett.com/charts/nsduh/past-month-percent.htm|archive-date=July 8, 2011|url-status=live}}</ref>
[[File:US timeline. Drugs involved in overdose deaths.jpg|thumb|upright=1.35|[[US]] yearly overdose deaths, and the drugs involved. There were around [[United States drug overdose death rates and totals over time|110,500 drug overdose deaths overall in 2022 in the US]].<ref name="NIDA-deaths">[http://www.drugabuse.gov/related-topics/trends-statistics/overdose-death-rates Drug Overdose Death Rates] By [[National Institute on Drug Abuse]] (NIDA).</ref>]]
The [[ONDCP]] stated in April 2011 that there had been a 46% drop in cocaine use among young adults over the previous five years, and a 65% drop in the rate of people testing positive for cocaine in the workplace since 2006.<ref name="ker">[http://www.whitehousedrugpolicy.gov/news/press11/032111.html White House Drug Policy Director Kerlikowske Meets with Swedish Counterdrug Officials, ONDCP, March 21, 2011] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221227081043/https://www.whitehouse.gov/ondcp/ |date=December 27, 2022 }}. Whitehousedrugpolicy.gov.</ref> At the same time, a 2007 study found that up to 35% of college undergraduates used stimulants not prescribed to them.<ref>[http://www.jaacap.com/article/S0890-8567%2809%2962081-5/abstract Elsevier] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221227081055/https://www.jaacap.org/article/S0890-8567%2809%2962081-5/fulltext |date=December 27, 2022 }}. Jaacap.com.</ref>

A 2013 study found that prices of [[heroin]], [[cocaine]] and [[cannabis (drug)|cannabis]] had decreased from 1990 to 2007, while the purity of these drugs had increased.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Werb |first1=D. |last2=Kerr |first2=T. |last3=Nosyk |first3=B. |last4=Strathdee |first4=S. |last5=Montaner |first5=J. |last6=Wood |first6=E. |title=The temporal relationship between drug supply indicators: an audit of international government surveillance systems |journal=BMJ Open |date=September 30, 2013 |volume=3 |issue=9 |page=e003077 |doi=10.1136/bmjopen-2013-003077 |pmid=24080093 |pmc=3787412}}</ref><ref>{{Cite news |url=https://obamawhitehouse.archives.gov/sites/default/files/ondcp/about-content/fy_2015_budget_highlights_-_final.pdf |title=National Drug and Control Budget |date=March 2014 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170606172558/https://obamawhitehouse.archives.gov/sites/default/files/ondcp/about-content/fy_2015_budget_highlights_-_final.pdf |archive-date=June 6, 2017 |via=[[NARA|National Archives]] |publisher=[[Office of National Drug Control Policy]] |url-status=live}}</ref>

The [[National Survey on Drug Use and Health]] for 2019 found that 1.7% of US adults over 25 had used cocaine in the previous 12 months, compared to 1.8% in 2002, and cannabis use went from 7% in 2002 to 15.2%. The DEA's 2021 National Drug Threat Assessment stated that "a steady supply of cocaine was available throughout domestic markets" in 2019 and 2020.<ref>{{Cite web |last1=Raisbeck |first1=Daniel |last2=Vásquez |first2=Ian |date=2022 |title=Cato Handbook for Policymakers: The International War on Drugs |url=https://www.cato.org/cato-handbook-policymakers/cato-handbook-policymakers-9th-edition-2022/international-war-drugs |access-date=Mar 28, 2024 |website=[[Cato Institute]]}}</ref>

According to the [[Centers for Disease Control and Prevention|Centers for Disease Control]] (CDC), drug abuse fatalities in 2021 reached an all-time high of 108,000 deaths,<ref name="Reason.com">{{cite web |url=https://reason.com/2022/05/13/a-record-number-of-drug-related-deaths-shows-the-drug-war-is-remarkably-effective-at-killing-people/ |title=A Record Number of Drug-Related Deaths Shows the Drug War Is Remarkably Effective at Killing People |publisher=Reason.com |date=May 13, 2022}}</ref> a 15% increase from 2020 (93,000)<ref>{{cite web |url=https://reason.com/2021/07/15/a-record-number-of-drug-related-deaths-illustrates-the-lethal-consequences-of-prohibition/|title=A Record Number of Drug-Related Deaths Illustrates the Lethal Consequences of Prohibition|publisher=Reason.com |date=July 15, 2021}}</ref> which, at the time, was the highest number of deaths and a 30% increase from 2019, .<ref name="Reason.com" />

During [[Prohibition in the United States|alcohol prohibition]], from 1920 to 1933, alcohol use initially fell but began to increase as early as 1922. It has been extrapolated that even if prohibition had not been repealed in 1933, alcohol consumption would have surpassed pre-prohibition levels. One argument against the war on drugs is that it uses similar measures as Prohibition and is no more effective.<ref>{{cite web |date=July 17, 1991 |title=Alcohol Prohibition Was a Failure |url=http://www.cato.org/pubs/pas/pa-157.html |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131229232307/http://www.cato.org/pubs/pas/pa-157.html |archive-date=December 29, 2013 |access-date=March 27, 2011 |publisher=Cato.org |df=mdy-all}}</ref>

=== Government efficiency ===
In 1997, ''[[Rolling Stone]]'' published a comprehensive snapshot of the US government's implementation of the war on drugs, spanning 44 federal agencies and hundreds of thousands of government workers, and without unified management, oversight, or cohesive strategy. Among the agencies there were over a dozen separate drug intelligence operations. The White House's Office of National Drug Control Policy, home of the drug czar and ostensibly the coordinating agency, had a staff of 150, and a $36 million dollar budget; the overall federal drug war budget for 1998 was $16 billion. Most of the agencies involved did not report to the ONDCP, instead to one of 13 congressional appropriations subcommittees. The largest single share of the budget, $2 billion, went to the Bureau of Prisons. Federal agencies also passed on billions of anti-drug dollars to the states, with little oversight or accountability.<ref>{{Cite magazine |last=Dreyfuss |first=Bob |date=Dec 11, 1997 |title=The Drug War: Where the Money Goes |url=https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-news/the-drug-war-where-the-money-goes-100201/ |access-date=Apr 29, 2024 |magazine=[[Rolling Stone]] |quote=The War on Drugs is a vast enterprise. Virtually every agency of the U.S. government has a piece of it, from the Pentagon and the Coast Guard to the National Park Service and the Bureau of Indian Affairs. Yet unlike a real war, the crusade against drugs has no central command, no coordinated intelligence effort and very little accountability.}}</ref> In 2024, the ONDCP requested $461 million of a $46 billion federal budget allocated across some 50 federal agencies.<ref>{{Cite web |date=March 2023 |title=National Drug Control Budget: FY 2024 Funding Highlights |url=https://www.whitehouse.gov/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/FY-2024-Budget-Highlights.pdf |access-date=May 14, 2024 |website=[[Office of National Drug Control Policy]]}}</ref>

==Alternatives==
{{See also|Responsible drug use}}
Alternatives to the predominantly punitive, law enforcement approach to the war on drugs in the US fall under two broad categories: a public health orientation built around education, prevention and treatment, and decriminalization or legalization with regulation similar to the handling of alcohol.<ref>Fish, J. M. (Ed.) (1998). ''How to legalize drugs''. Northvale, New Jersey: Jason Aronson.</ref><ref>Fish, J. M. (Ed.) (2000). "Is our drug policy effective? Are there alternatives?" New York City, New York: ''Fordham Urban Law Journal''. (Proceedings of the March 17 & 18, 2000 joint conference of the New York Academy of Sciences, New York Academy of Medicine, and Association of the Bar of the City of New York. Vol. 23, No. 1, pp. 3–262.)</ref><ref>Fish, J. M. (Ed.) (2006). ''Drugs and society: U. S. public policy''. Lanham, Maryland: Rowman & Littlefield.</ref>

=== A public-health approach ===
A common critical view holds that the war on drugs has been costly and ineffective largely because US federal and state governments have chosen the wrong methods, focusing on interdiction and punishment rather than regulation and treatment of drug abuse and addiction.<ref name=":7">{{Cite web |last=Pearl |first=Betsy |date=Jun 27, 2018 |title=Ending the War on Drugs: By the Numbers |url=https://www.americanprogress.org/article/ending-war-drugs-numbers/ |access-date=Mar 20, 2024 |website=[[Center for American Progress]]}}</ref> In the US, current public health-oriented interventions include [[Harm reduction in the United States|harm reduction]], [[Drug courts in the United States|drug courts]], and [[Law Enforcement Assisted Diversion]] (LEAD) programs which give police treatment or social services options rather than arrest with minor drug offenses. Harm reduction approaches include provision of sterile syringes, medically [[supervised injection site]]s (SIF), and availability of the opioid overdose-countering drug [[naloxone]].<ref name=":7" />

As an alternative to imprisonment, drug courts in the US identify substance-abusing offenders and place them under strict court monitoring and community supervision, as well as provide them with long-term treatment services.<ref name="whitehouse-policy-2004">[http://whitehousedrugpolicy.gov/publications/policy/ndcs04/index.html The President's National Drug Control Strategy], ''White House'', 2004. {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090213091104/http://whitehousedrugpolicy.gov/publications/policy/ndcs04/index.html|date=February 13, 2009}}</ref> According to a [[National Drug Court Institute]] report, 16.4% of the nation's drug court graduates are rearrested and charged with a felony within one year of completing the program; overall 44.1% of released prisoners end up back in prison within one year. The drug court program is also significantly cheaper than imprisonment.<ref name="ReferenceB">Huddleston, C. West III, et al. ''Painting the Current Picture: A National Report Card on Drug Courts and Other Problem Solving Court Programs in the United States'', Vol. 1, Num. 1, May 2004</ref> Annual per offender cost is $20,000–$50,000 for imprisonment, and $2,500–$4,000 in the drug court system.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Drug Courts as an Alternative to Incarceration |url=https://addictionpolicy.stanford.edu/drug-courts-alternative-incarceration |access-date=Apr 29, 2024 |website=[[Stanford University]]}}</ref>

A survey by the [[Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration]] (SAMHSA) found that substance abusers who remain in treatment longer are less likely to resume their former drug habits. Of the people studied, 66% were cocaine users. After experiencing long-term in-patient treatment, only 22% returned to the use of cocaine.<ref name="Alter, Jonathan 2001, pp. 37-43" />

During the 1990s, the [[Clinton administration]] commissioned a major cocaine policy study by the RAND Drug Policy Research Center. The report recommended that $3 billion be switched from federal and local law enforcement to treatment, concluding that treatment is the cheapest way to cut drug use, and twenty-three times more effective than the supply-side war on drugs.<ref>C. Peter Rydell, ''Controlling Cocaine: Supply Versus Demand Programs'' (Rand Drug Policy Research Center 1994).</ref>

In the constitution of the multinational non-governmental [[World Federation Against Drugs]], the "Declaration of the World Forum Against Drugs" (2008), advocates for "no other goal than a drug-free world", and states that a balanced policy of drug abuse prevention, education, treatment, law enforcement, research, and supply reduction provides the most effective platform to reduce drug abuse and its associated harms and calls on governments to consider [[demand reduction]] as one of their first priorities. It supports the UN drug conventions, the inclusion of cannabis as one of the "hard drugs", and the use of criminal sanctions "when appropriate" to deter drug use. It opposes legalization in any form, and [[harm reduction]] in general.<ref>{{Cite web |date=June 26, 2009 |title=Constitution of World Federation Against Drugs (Appendix I: Declaration of the World Forum Against Drugs) |url=https://wfad.se/wfad-declaration/wfad-declaration-wfad-declaration/constitution-of-world-federation-against-drugs/ |access-date=Mar 31, 2024 |website=[[World Federation Against Drugs]]}}</ref>

=== Decriminalization and legalization ===
In a 2023 UN report, the [[UN High Commissioner for Human Rights]] stated that "decades of punitive, 'war on drugs' strategies had failed to prevent an increasing range and quantity of substances from being produced and consumed", described punitive drug policies as a failure, and called for an approach "based on health and human rights, including through the legal regulation of drugs."<ref name=":18">{{Cite web |last=Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights |date=August 15, 2023 |title=Human rights challenges in addressing and countering all aspects of the world drug problem |url=https://www.ohchr.org/en/calls-for-input/2023/call-inputs-ohchrs-report-human-rights-challenges-addressing-and-countering |access-date=Apr 20, 2024 |website=[[United Nations]] |page=6}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |last=jstaff |date=2023-09-20 |title=The International Community Must Act on UN Human Rights Chief's Ground-Breaking Call for Systemic Drug Policy Reform |url=https://www.wola.org/2023/09/international-community-must-act-systemic-drug-reform/ |access-date=2023-10-01 |website=WOLA |language=en-US}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |title=134 NGOs sign collective statement urging the international community to act on UN human rights chief's ground-breaking call for systemic drug policy reform |url=https://idpc.net/news/2023/09/133-ngos-sign-collective-statement-urging-the-international-community-to-act-on-un-human-rights |access-date=2023-10-01 |website=IDPC |language=en}}</ref>

Considering outright legalization of recreational drugs, ''New York Times'' columnist Eduardo Porter noted: <blockquote>Jeffrey Miron, an economist at Harvard who studies drug policy closely, has suggested that legalizing all illicit drugs would produce net benefits to the United States of some $65 billion a year, mostly by cutting public spending on enforcement as well as through reduced crime and corruption. A study by analysts at the RAND Corporation, a California research organization, suggested that if marijuana were legalized in California and the drug spilled from there to other states, Mexican drug cartels would lose about a fifth of their annual income of some $6.5 billion from illegal exports to the United States.<ref>{{cite news |last=Porter |first=Eduardo |date=July 3, 2012 |title=Numbers Tell of Failure in Drug War |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/04/business/in-rethinking-the-war-on-drugs-start-with-the-numbers.html |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170129051604/http://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/04/business/in-rethinking-the-war-on-drugs-start-with-the-numbers.html |archive-date=January 29, 2017 |access-date=4 July 2012 |work=The New York Times}}</ref></blockquote>

In 2007, "An Open Letter to the President, Congress, Governors, and State Legislatures" signed by over 550 economists, including [[Nobel Laureate]]s [[Milton Friedman]], [[George Akerlof]] and [[Vernon L. Smith]], endorsed the findings of a 2006 paper, "The Budgetary Implications of Marijuana Prohibition," by [[Harvard]] economist [[Jeffrey A. Miron]]. Comparing the cost of prohibition to the tax revenue if cannabis was taxed as regular consumer good, or similarly to alcohol, the letter stated that the budgetary impact, considered alongside evidence that "suggests prohibition has minimal benefits and may itself cause substantial harm", favors "a regime in which marijuana is legal but taxed and regulated like other goods."<ref>{{cite web |title=An open letter |url=http://www.prohibitioncosts.org/endorsers.html |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20071017021537/http://prohibitioncosts.org/endorsers.html |archive-date=October 17, 2007 |access-date=February 20, 2008 |publisher=Prohibition Costs}}</ref> According to a 2010 report on co-authored by Miron, the annual savings on enforcement and incarceration costs from the legalization of drugs would amount to roughly $41.3 billion, with $25.7 billion being saved among the states and over $15.6 billion accrued for the federal government. Miron further estimated at least $46.7 billion in tax revenue based on rates comparable to those on [[tobacco]] and [[alcohol (drug)|alcohol]]: $8.7 billion from [[marijuana]], $32.6 billion from [[cocaine]] and [[heroin]], and $5.4 billion from other drugs.<ref>{{Cite news |last1=Miron |first1=Jeffrey A. |last2=Waldock |first2=Katherine |name-list-style=amp |year=2010 |title=The Budgetary Impact of Ending Drug Prohibition |url=http://www.cato.org/sites/cato.org/files/pubs/pdf/DrugProhibitionWP.pdf |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130512134045/http://www.cato.org/sites/cato.org/files/pubs/pdf/DrugProhibitionWP.pdf |archive-date=May 12, 2013 |access-date=May 15, 2013 |publisher=CATO.org}}</ref>

Regarding economic arguments for legalization that make a comparison with alcohol, a 2013 study noted that the $14.6 billion in annual alcohol tax collected at the US federal and state levels represented less than 10% of the estimated $185 billion of alcohol-related health care, criminal justice and lost productivity costs.<ref>{{Cite web |last1=Paterson |first1=Pat |last2=Robinson |first2=Katy |date=July 2014 |title=Measuring Success in the War on Drugs |url=https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/GOVPUB-D5-PURL-gpo120008/pdf/GOVPUB-D5-PURL-gpo120008.pdf |access-date=May 17, 2024 |website=[[William J. Perry Center for Hemispheric Defense Studies]] |page=19}}</ref>

==See also==
{{Div col|colwidth=30em}}
* [[Baker (military code-name)|Baker]], a series of counter-narcotics training exercises conducted by the United States Army and several Asian countries
* [[Cartoon All-Stars to the Rescue]]
* ''[[Chasing the Scream]]''
* [[Class conflict|Class war]]
* [[Cognitive liberty]]
* [[Drugs in the United States]]
* [[Latin American drug legalization]]
* [[Law Enforcement Action Partnership]]
* [[November Coalition]]
* [[Philippine drug war]]
* [[Prison-industrial complex]]
* [[Race war]]
* [[Recreational use of drugs]]
* ''[[Smoke and Mirrors: The War on Drugs and the Politics of Failure]]''
* [[Victimless crime]]
* [[War on gangs]]

'''Covert activities and foreign policy'''
* [[Allegations of CIA drug trafficking]]
* [[Golden Crescent]]
* [[Golden Triangle (Southeast Asia)|Golden Triangle]]
* [[Military Cooperation with Civilian Law Enforcement Agencies Act]]
* [[CIA transnational anti-crime and anti-drug activities]]
* [[UMOPAR]]
* [[Air Bridge Denial Program]]

''Government agencies and laws''
* [[Continuing Criminal Enterprise]]
* [[Marijuana Control, Regulation, and Education Act]]
* [[United Nations Drug Control Programme]]
{{div col end}}

==Notes==
{{reflist|group=note}}

==References==
{{Reflist}}

==Further reading==
{{Library resources box}}
* {{cite book|last=Hari|first=Johann|title=Chasing the Scream: The First and Last Days of the War on Drugs|location=London; New York|year=2015|publisher= Bloomsbury|isbn=978-1620408902|title-link=Chasing the Scream}}
* {{Cite journal|last1=Blanchard|first1=Michael|first2=Gabriel J.|last2=Chin|ssrn=1128945|title=Identifying the Enemy in the War on Drugs: A Critique of the Developing Rule Permitting Visual Identification of Indescript White Powders in Narcotics Prosecutions|journal=American University Law Review|issue=47|page=557|year=1998}}
* Daniel Burton-Rose, ''The Celling of America: An Inside Look at the U.S. Prison Industry.'' Common Courage Press, 1998.
* Stephanie R. Bush-Baskette, "The War on Drugs as a War on Black Women," in Meda Chesney-Lind and Lisa Pasko (eds.), ''Girls, Women, and Crime: Selected Readings.'' Sage, 2004.
* {{Cite journal|last=Chin|first=Gabriel|ssrn=390109|title=Race, the War on Drugs and the Collateral Consequences of Criminal Conviction|journal=Gender, Race & Justice|issue=6|page=253|year=2002}}
* Alexander Cockburn and Jeffrey St. Clair, ''Whiteout: The CIA, Drugs and the Press.'' New York: Verso, 1998.
* Mitchell Earlywine, ''Understanding Marijuana: A New Look at the Scientific Evidence.'' New York: Oxford University Press, 2005.
* Kathleen J. Frydl, ''The Drug Wars in America, 1940–1973.'' New York: Cambridge University Press, 2013.
* {{Cite journal|first=Kenneth B.|last=Nunn|url=http://heinonline.org/HOL/LandingPage?collection=journals&handle=hein.journals/jgrj6&div=19&id=&page=|title=Race, Crime and the Pool of Surplus Criminality: Or Why the War on Drugs Was a War on Blacks|journal=Gender, Race & Justice|volume = 6|issue=6|page=381|year=2002}}
* Tony Payan, "A War that Can't Be Won." Tucson: The University of Arizona Press, 2013.
* Preston Peet, ''Under the Influence: The Disinformation Guide to Drugs.'' The Disinformation Company, 2004.
* Thomas C. Rowe, ''Federal Narcotics Laws and the War on Drugs: Money Down a Rat Hole.'' Binghamton, NY: Haworn Press, 2006.
* Eric Schneider, [http://www.berfrois.com/2011/11/eric-schneider-smack-demand/ "The Drug War Revisited,"] ''Berfrois,'' November 2, 2011.
* Peter Dale Scott and Jonathan Marshall, ''Cocaine Politics: Drugs, Armies, and the CIA in Central America.'' Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 1911.
* Dominic Streatfeild, ''Cocaine: An Unauthorized Biography.'' Macmillan, 2003.
* Douglas Valentine, ''The Strength of the Wolf: The Secret History of America's War on Drugs.'' New York: Verso, 2004.

===Government and NGO reports===
* [https://www.justice.gov/ndic/pubs31/31379/index.htm National Drug Threat Assessment 2009] from the [[United States Department of Justice]]
* [https://fpc.state.gov/documents/organization/19493.pdf War On Drugs: Legislation in the 108th Congress and Related Developments], a 2003 report from the [[Congressional Research Service]] via the [[United States Department of State|State Department]] website
* [http://www.druglibrary.org/schaffer/Library/studies/ledain/ldctoc.html The Report of the Canadian Government Commission of Inquiry into the Non-Medical Use of Drugs – 1972]
* {{citation |author=Drug Enforcement Administration |year=2017 |title=Drugs of abuse: A DEA resource guide |edition=2017 |location=Washington, D.C. |publisher=Author |url=https://www.dea.gov/pr/multimedia-library/publications/drug_of_abuse.pdf |access-date=January 23, 2018 |archive-date=December 3, 2016 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20161203195836/https://www.dea.gov/pr/multimedia-library/publications/drug_of_abuse.pdf |url-status=dead }}
* [https://www.healthpovertyaction.org/news-events/revealing-the-missing-link-to-climate-justice-drug-policy/ Revealing the missing link to Climate Justice: Drug Policy], a 2023 report from the International Coalition on Drug Policy Reform and Environmental Justice

==External links==
{{commons category}}
* [http://www.narconews.com/ Narco News] – news site focusing on drug war in Latin America
* [https://www.drugpolicyfacts.org/ Drug Policy Facts]
* [https://www.druglibrary.org/schaffer/library/studies/studies.htm Major Studies of Drugs and Drug Policy] Full text of major government commission reports on the drug laws from around the world over the last 100 years
* [https://www.druglibrary.org/schaffer/history/history.htm Historical Research on the Drug War] Full text of numerous full histories of the drug war and thousands of original historical documents
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20080705105743/http://cato.org/current/drug-war/index.html Cato Institute Drug Prohibition Research]

{{drug use}}
{{United States topics}}
{{Colombia conflict}}
{{Mexican Drug War}}
{{Internal conflict in Peru}}
{{Presidency of Richard Nixon}}
{{Presidency of Gerald Ford}}
{{Presidency of Jimmy Carter}}
{{Presidency of Ronald Reagan}}
{{Presidency of George H. W. Bush}}
{{Presidency of Bill Clinton}}
{{Presidency of George W. Bush}}
{{Presidency of Barack Obama}}
{{First presidency of Donald Trump}}
{{Joe Biden}}
{{Second presidency of Donald Trump}}

[[Category:Drug policy of the United States]]
[[Category:History of drug control in the United States]]
[[Category:Illegal drug trade in the United States]]
[[Category:Law enforcement operations in the United States]]
[[Category:Mexican drug war]]
[[Category:Organized crime events]]
[[Category:Organized crime conflicts]]
[[Category:Presidency of Richard Nixon]]
[[Category:Presidency of Gerald Ford]]
[[Category:Presidency of Jimmy Carter]]
[[Category:Presidency of Ronald Reagan]]
[[Category:Presidency of George H. W. Bush]]
[[Category:Presidency of Bill Clinton]]
[[Category:Presidency of George W. Bush]]
[[Category:Presidency of Barack Obama]]
[[Category:Presidency of Donald Trump]]
[[Category:Presidency of Joe Biden]]
[[Category:Drug control law in the United States]]
[[Category:United States–Asian relations]]
[[Category:United States–Central American relations]]
[[Category:United States–South American relations]]
[[Category:1970s neologisms]]
[[Category:United States federal policy]]
[[Category:Metaphors referring to war and violence]]
[[Category:Moral panic]]