CRIME/DRUGS: “President Donald Trump pledged a tougher law enforcement response to an epidemic of opioid addiction, and top officials in his administration said they wanted to increase the availability of an anti-overdose treatment in response to the crisis…
Mr. Trump cited a dramatic rise in opioid overdose deaths in the past two decades and a decline in federal drug prosecutions and drug offender prison sentences in recent years…
A former Obama administration official said the Department of Justice worked to raise awareness of the opioid crisis and that while the number of drug prosecutions declined, it was because the administration opted to focus resources on a smaller number of more dangerous offenders.
A White House commission on the opioid crisis led by New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, a Republican one-time rival and subsequent backer of Mr. Trump, had recommended that Mr. Trump declare a national emergency in a preliminary report released last week.
Declaring an emergency would ’empower’ the administration, Mr. Christie’s commission said. The report also proposed that Mr. Trump’s administration eliminate a Medicaid rule that prohibits federal Medicaid funds from being used to finance much inpatient treatment of mental illnesses, including substance-use disorders. It also suggested increasing access to anti-addiction medications such as buprenorphine and methadone.”
-Louise Radnofsky and Arian Campo-Flores, “Trump Pledges Tough Law-Enforcement Response to Opioid Crisis,” The Wall Street Journal online, Aug. 8, 2017 06:35pm