Nearly one-third of U.S. adults know someone who’s died of A drug overdose

Changing semantics — ie. instead of being an addict someone is experiencing opioid use disorder — without changing outcomes is lip service. Whatever one calls it, reversing overdose has become frontline emergency work.

DPA’s lobbying grip on Democrats is softening, with 98 of them joining Republicans to back the HALT Fentanyl Act of 2025. The Trump “fentanyl penalty” re-regulated the international drug trafficking landscape before he even took office. The Guardian reported on December 4, 2024:

Mexican security forces have impounded more than a ton of fentanyl pills in what officials have called the biggest seizure of the synthetic opioid in the country’s history…It is clear that the Mexican government has been managing the timing of fentanyl seizures,” …

But under the pressure by Donald Trump, it appears President Claudia Sheinbaum’s administration is willing to increase the capture of drug traffickers and drug seizures that Washington is demanding…it’s clear the Mexican government “doesn’t see fentanyl as one of its own problems, and fighting it isn’t its priority”…

there would only be big busts “when there is pressure from Washington”.

Dems Must Define Their Relationship with HArd Drugs

Perspective: as the war on drugs was revving up in the 1980s and 90s, it was Democrats, specifically Delaware Senator Joe Biden, who sponsored the crime bills. Ds and Rs were united about controlling drugs. To thread this needle as precisely as possible: after 25 years of lobbying, Democrats have become united about not-controlling drugs. By prioritizing increased drug access despite the emergence of fentanyl, Democratic drug policy contributes to suffering and death.

If progressives continue to advocate for harm reduction, where does it end?

Since recent policy changes ease the pathway into drug proficiency, why not just include the drugs too? If the government gave drug users free drugs (along with the free paraphernalia) that would eliminate the trafficked juvenile drug dealers, much street crime, prostitution to support addiction etc. While they’re at it, if the government started manufacturing the fentanyl they could cut out Chinese and Mexican cartels, clear up a lot of international displacement and reduce ferocious violence.

Is this viable?

How non-negotiable is the activist stance that society must adapt to drugs? Case in point: Oregon’s PSA for us to “Expect Fentanyl”. Is fentanyl in our world, or are we in fentanyl’s? Are Democrats ready, yet, to force drugs to adapt to society?

Cannabis Comment

Water, seed, soil, sun. The federal scheduling of marijuana as a drug more dangerous than fentanyl is ridiculous. But, the drugging up of cannabis by Big Chronic™ is dangerous, unnecessary and more rooted in profiteering than plant medicine. Let’s get back to the roots with weed.

Expand Drug Courts

DPA has never been an advocate for Drug Courts because they consider them to be a concession from the drug war. This valuable resource should be appreciated, funded and scaled up.

Dems Must Look At their Relationship With The Soros Family

For the record: I have been drawing attention to this relationship since Demainstay’s beginning. There’s a Soros pile-on presently (10/25), but political donors should be scrutinized. THE PEOPLE WHO SPEND THE MONEY CREATE THE CONDITIONS ON MAIN STREET. Just because the Soros name has been vilified on the right doesn’t mean that the billions they’ve spent under the umbrella of the Open Society Foundations hasn’t impacted people’s lives significantly. When is society open enough? If our safety net’s webbing is too loose, those who need it will just slip through.

25 years of harm reduction has become ruinous. Decriminalizing all drugs in Oregon in 2020 was bad public policy. And the Soros men only grew their social capital under the last Democratic administration. Son, Alex made his society debut at the Met Gala in 2024 and married the shadow party to the Democratic Party with his summer wedding to Huma Abedin. Father, George, was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in January 2025.

Their philanthropy has spent hundreds of millions of dollars moving the dial on drug policy. Like it or not they have the receipts. Democratic lawmakers, especially in Oregon, need to reject DPA money and follow the wishes of their constituents that actually live here in the state.

We want common sense and common decency; a civic environment where professionals, families, playful young adults, the elderly and tourists can enjoy thriving public places and irreverent (but safe) urban offerings. And in the Portland area, we want a city that’s weird not wilting.

Drug Reform will Benefit From new Philanthropic voices

This field has been dominated by men. To the female mega-philanthropists: you are mature women, bosses, long-term advocates in your families and now in the public good. Invest in drug reform! The only voices speaking to the Democratic party are funneled through DPA.

To all other donors, even those who don’t usually focus on Drug Policy, how about a new emphasis on Addiction Policy?

You won’t just have a lane, there’s an entire freeway available to promote compassionate, 21st century evidence-based approaches to growing drug misuse and America’s opioid consumption problem grounded in addiction medicine.

Let’s move past the shadow party’s dead-end thinking of mass incarceration vs. increasing access and imagine interventions with more life-affirming outcomes for the people involved in risky drug behavior, as well as those around them and the greater community.

Every week in 2022, the equivalent of a high school classroom’s worth of students died of drug overdoses in the United States

Fighting fentanyl and the “well organized, well funded, tech-savvy transnational enterprises” that supply it should be unwavering and nonpartisan. Our national family and shared futures depend on it.