• Trump Opioid Crisis Plan Includes Death Penalty for Drug Dealers
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The Trump administration is finalizing a long-awaited plan that it says will solve the opioid crisis, but it also calls for law enforcement measures — like the death penalty for some drug dealers — that public health advocates and congressional Republicans warn will detract from efforts to reverse the epidemic. ... The administration claims its plan will reduce opioid prescriptions by one-third within three years and that the initiative will fulfill Trump's campaign promise to "stop opioid abuse." However, that will be a tall order. There were more than 64,000 drug overdose deaths in 2016, mostly involving opioids, according to the most recent federal mortality data. The CDC last week reported that emergency rooms recorded a 30 percent spike in opioid overdoses last summer, indicating that the devastating crisis is worsening. ... According to language circulating this week, the Trump administration will call for the death penalty as an option in "certain cases where opioid, including Fentanyl-related, drug dealing and trafficking are directly responsible for death." Sen. Shelley Moore Capito (R-W.Va.), whose home state is one of the hardest hit by the opioid epidemic, said she doesn't support the death penalty for drug cases. “I mean, I get the message he’s delivering: We’ve got to treat it seriously,” she said. “I don’t see that that’s going to solve the problem.” ... The White House plan also calls for making it easier to invoke the mandatory minimum sentence for drug traffickers who knowingly distribute illegal opioids that can be lethal, like fentanyl. It also proposes a new Justice Department task force known as “Prescription Interdiction and Litigation,” or PIL, which would be empowered to step up prosecutions of criminally negligent doctors, pharmacies and other providers. _______________________________ source I've been paying attention to this ever since Trump made those comments about other countries that had the death penalties for dealers. Now he's literally going full Duterte
What an absolute fucking madman.
Defining a drug dealer has always been a problem here, I imagine this basically means if you get caught with a certain amount you get the death penalty, whether intent to sale is there or not.
Isn't the majority of opioids coming from over prescriptions by doctors in the US?
Indeed. Guess we're about to have a lot of doctors on death row.
Well you see that's also part of his healthcare reform.
Not all the time. My aunt before kicking her addiction used to get Vicodin from a worker friend of hers whose nurse wife would steal pills after her shift. I'm not sure what opioids are prescribed and the frequency of them by doctors.
It's almost like these people think the War on Drugs was a resounding success.
So... Would this not fall under cruel and unusual punishment? I mean there is no way this would pass as is... I hope..
I'm pretty optimistic that the death penalty is DOA, even a good amount of GOP Republicans think it's a stupid idea to execute drug dealers
Of course not. (I hope) This is more of Trump's "strong man" pantomime act.
Guess we can all see what Philippine president he got this idea from.
What the fuck?
Scary thought. You take a lil weed to a party a roll someone a spliff. Next thing you know the US gov is testing new execution drugs on you. Weed kills 🙏 💀👃
Hopefully no one is serious about pushing this and they're just hoping to "scare dealers straight". I'd honestly go from being embarrassed from our situation to ashamed if we started doing something like this.
Well, it did disenfranchise a whole bunch of people who might otherwise vote democrat...
This is barbaric and asinine What next, cutting the hands off petty thieves?
This is going to be used to kill a ton of minorities.
Obviously a fucking dumb idea to say the least, but I do like the idea of making it harder to get a prescription in the first place. Prescriptions are way too easy to get extended and abused.
pushing death penalty for this is like shoving all your toys under the bed when told to clean your room
a great idea, this could have absolutely no negative repercussions whatsoever! /s
What a fucking psycho
So between this, saying "We should try that one day" when talking about China's Xi making himself president for life, and wanting to gut the freedom of the press - when can we call this a dictatorship?
it's not there yet but as you say, he has had nothing but praise for dictators in the last two months so those cards are definitely on the table
I mean, it clearly says that the death penalty would be for drug dealers who's actions directly lead to someone's death. So, really, we're talking about the death penalty for a form of manslaughter or negligent homicide, not just "drug dealing." That doesn't make it right or wrong, but let's at least recognize it for what it is.
I mean if they're going to pursue this line of logic why not give the death penalty to any store clerk that's ever sold some cigarettes or alcohol seeing as those also directly contribute to deaths.
I would assume it's because you don't OD on cigarettes and alcohol is legal. With that said, that's a good reason why I wouldn't support it unless it constituted first degree murder, and our current laws would already cover that. So I see no reason to expand it explicitly to drug dealers.
I see it as a similar case of a gun shop owner selling a gun to someone who they know shouldn't be allowed to own a gun being help responsible for that person committing a murder. In the same way, a drug dealer is selling something that they know they shouldn't be selling. So they ought to have some culpability if their actions lead to death. I'm not supporting this specific policy, though. So I'm not sure why you're responding to me as if I am. I agree that a drug dealer should hold some responsibility over the deaths they cause, but I wouldn't call it first degree murder (they aren't intending to kill anyone). So while I would make the punishment severe, I wouldn't support making it the death penalty.
You're creating a false dichotomy. We can both punish drug dealers for what they do and do other things.
This impeachment can't come soon enough.
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