WASHINGTON — In Donald Trump’s thoughts, there’s a “massive” quantity of lethal fentanyl pouring into the nation throughout the U.S. northern border with Canada.
In the actual world, precisely 43 kilos of the lethal artificial drug have been seized on the U.S.-Canada border final yr — two one-thousandths of the 21,000 kilos seized on the U.S.-Mexico border.
That disconnect illustrates succinctly the president’s strategy to each the very actual fentanyl downside and the nation’s commerce relationships with our North American neighbors — an strategy apparently based mostly on his whims and the political expediency of the second moderately than details and a coherent plan.
White Home communications director Steven Cheung wouldn’t say why Trump was equating the fentanyl downside from Canada with the one from Mexico. He as an alternative prompt that any quantity of the drug getting into from a overseas nation was an excessive amount of and would possibly warrant retaliation.
“So you might be saying there may be an appropriate degree of fentanyl?” he mentioned. “Are you saying 40 kilos of fentanyl is suitable? As a result of based on the DEA, two milligrams, equal to a couple grains of salt, can kill somebody.”
For months, Trump has been claiming that fentanyl from Canada required the imposition of punitive tariffs — solely to later say that Canada deserved tariffs as a result of it ran a commerce surplus in opposition to america whereas concurrently suggesting that the whole downside might be resolved if it agreed to grow to be the 51st U.S. state.
This week, Trump backed down from his 25% tariff risk in opposition to each Canada and Mexico for not less than one month with out gaining something. Mexico once more promised to deploy troops to assist stop unlawful border crossings, because it has repeatedly in recent times. Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau promised the identical $1.3 billion in border safety enhancements he had already pledged in December, solely this time with the addition of a brand new “fentanyl czar” within the Canadian authorities.
Within the meantime, Trump has completed nothing since taking workplace to push for the fentanyl-detecting gear that had been contained in bipartisan border safety laws that he blocked final summer season.
“He stood in the way in which of 100 fentanyl detection machines,” mentioned Andrew Bates, a former White Home aide underneath President Joe Biden, referring to the gadgets that the Division of Homeland Safety says are the perfect software for stopping the move of the drug.
Andrej Ivanov/Bloomberg through Getty Photographs
Presently, solely a small fraction of all vehicles crossing northward into america from Mexico are scanned as they enter. The overwhelming majority of fentanyl seized on the border is taken from vehicles pushed by Americans at official ports of entry. Had the invoice that Trump blocked final summer season handed — he mentioned he informed his allies in Congress to kill it as a result of it might have helped Democrats beat him in November — the 100 new machines would have dramatically elevated the share of scanned vehicles.
“If he actually cared about individuals being harm by fentanyl, he wouldn’t have blocked the most important package deal of anti-fentanyl trafficking measures in years,” Bates mentioned.
Cheung wouldn’t reply to questions on Trump’s alternative to dam that laws — nor would he reply to a query about Trump’s pardon of convicted drug seller Ross Ulbricht, given his marketing campaign speeches praising the dying penalty for drug sellers.
Ulbricht created the “Silk Street” website on the so-called darkish internet, which was designed particularly for the sale of unlawful medication around the globe. Greater than a decade in the past, it was used within the earliest days of the fentanyl epidemic to mail the drug immediately into the nation.
Federal prosecutors confirmed how not less than six People died from an overdose utilizing Silk Street, with Ulbricht getting a fee from each transaction. He was convicted by a jury and sentenced to 2 life phrases plus 40 years.
Trump mentioned he pardoned Ulbricht as a result of he promised pro-drug libertarians he would achieve this in the event that they supported his candidacy. “The scum that labored to convict him have been a number of the identical lunatics who have been concerned within the modern-day weaponization of presidency in opposition to me,” Trump wrote in a Jan. 21 social media put up.
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Trump’s “weaponization” declare refers to 2 federal prosecutions in opposition to him: one for his Jan. 6, 2021, coup try, and the opposite for his refusal to show over secret paperwork he took with him to his South Florida nation membership upon leaving the White Home in 2021. Each instances have been dismissed after his November election win due to the Division of Justice’s longstanding coverage in opposition to prosecuting a sitting president.
