America’s drug problem doesn’t need more death, it needs better treatment and prevention.
President Trump recently proposed a lethal solution to the opioid crisis: giving the death penalty to drug dealers. Not only will such a misguided policy fail to reduce addiction and overdoses, but it’ll harm more families and cost even more money than we’re spending now.
The opioid crisis requires innovative solutions including legal cannabis, not additional prohibition-esque policies such as the death penalty for nonviolent crimes. Everyone can agree that we must take action to reduce opioid abuse — more than 115 people die from opioid overdoses per day. So why would the president want to add to that death count with another misguided and dangerous drug policy?
In his State of the Union address, Trump not only discussed the heroin crisis but also expressed a desire to see right-to-try legislation sent to his desk — a policy that allows terminally ill patients to try medicine that hasn’t yet received approval from the Food and Drug Administration. If Trump is concerned about terminally ill patients and opioid addicts alike, he should equally support their right to try a lifesaving medicine: cannabis.
Unfortunately, the Trump administration’s archaic approach to the war on drugs ignores the realities of the opioid crisis, including cannabis’ role in harm-reduction. Opioid addiction is at least in part prompted by policies currently on the books: overprescription of opioids and counterintuitive cannabis prohibition. We enable the opioid crisis when doctors are handing out bottles full of oxycodone for pain treatments and are simultaneously prohibited from prescribing medical cannabis — a much less dangerous and nonaddictive alternative. Overprescription of opioids can lead to other illicit drug use, whereas medical cannabis does not. Giving drug dealers the death penalty won’t change these crippling policies. To paraphrase Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., we don’t have a pot problem, we have a prescription opioid problem.
America can do more to solve the opioid epidemic, and some states have already enacted innovative measures. States with legal cannabis already see a direct relationship between their legalization efforts and reduced opioid addiction. There is evidence that addiction decreases when marijuana is out of the black market — sold by entrepreneurs in the free market looking to make their communities great again — likely because patients know it’s a safer alternative. But there is also evidence that cannabidiol, the main medical component of cannabis, can even wean addicts off of opioids. In states with such policies, legal cannabis is directly helping reduce opioid-related deaths.
However, such state-based policies are in jeopardy thanks to Attorney General Jeff Sessions’ old-school approach to cannabis, a substance less harmful than alcohol or combustion tobacco. Sessions is not only undermining states’ rights but is also ignoring the science when standing in the way of patients and doctors by blocking their right to try. States are in fear that they’ll have to retreat to the black market and therefore leave families facing addiction without legal solutions for their loved ones.
The United States already overspends on drug prohibition, shelling out $51 billion annually for status quo programs and extra law enforcement that clearly has not worked. Trump’s proposal to add the death penalty for nonviolent drug dealers on top of that spending is not only fiscally irresponsible, but also ineffective at deterring crime and harm-reduction.
Now is the time to reform the war on drugs and public opinion supports it.
Recent polling illustrates that the majority of Americans support legal cannabis. But more importantly for Trump and other Republican officials, polling suggests that the majority of Republicans support some form of legal cannabis. Not only is reforming our pot laws good public policy, it also has the stamp of approval from the public.
This should be a no-brainer for Trump: Legalize pot, alleviate opioid addiction, and foster economic opportunity all in one go. After all, Colorado’s cannabis industry hit a profit milestone last year, pulling in over $500 million since they legalized in 2014. As the laboratory for legal pot, Colorado experienced no increase in drug addiction, a worry prohibitionists perpetually fall back on.
But in order to truly make America great again, we must make great, science-based public policy. As the science shows, American doctors overprescribe opioids and legal marijuana alleviates opioid addiction. Most importantly, paternalistic prohibition efforts such as the death penalty for nonviolent drug crimes does nothing to help addicts.
Trump should rethink his approach towards the heroin crisis and cannabis. If there was ever a time to enact successful drug policy reform, now is that time. American lives depend on it.
Matthew Boyer is a media relations associate with Students For Liberty and a policy analyst for the Consumer Choice Center.
