Despite his claims of sobriety, Donald Trump loves drugs. Without them, he wouldn’t have the bogeyman he requires to push forward the most authoritarian aspects of his agenda: mass surveillance, squads of secret police and wars of imperialism. Like every U.S. president since Richard Nixon, the architect of the militarized approach to drug policy, Trump has enjoyed the excess powers afforded by the drug war. But that doesn’t mean the current president truly understands the battle he’s fighting.

Trump on his most recent jaunt through Asia met with Chinese President Xi Jinping to discuss the trade war he started. One of his negotiations was to lower tariffs by 10% in return for China cracking down on fentanyl precursors — the chemicals used to make some synthetic opioids.

“I put a 20% tarif

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