The 2026 National Drug Control Strategy was released on May 4 by former Fox News contributor, Sara A. Carter, the current director of the Office of National Drug Control Policy. Carter is also known as the Drug Czar, or Drug Czarina.

The strategy is strong on choking the supply of illicit drugs entering the United States, but it’s weak on doing anything meaningful to deal with demand for illicit drugs. The problem is money, and the money is going to law enforcement rather than addiction treatment. To quote KFF Health News (the links are theirs):

[A]ccomplishing such goals will be difficult in the face of the administration’s mass layoffs of federal employees, cancellation of research and community grants, attacks on organizations and practices that serve people who use drugs, and cuts to Medicaid, the state-federal health insurance program for low-income people that is the largest payer for addiction and mental health care nationwide.

Let’s take a look at some of the priorities in the battle against drug addiction and see how the new National Drug Control Policy measures up.

Reducing Overdose Deaths

Reducing overdose deaths should be the first item on the list, but it’s the last item in the government’s report. The first half of the nearly 200-page document is about protecting America from foreign terrorist and transnational criminal organizations.

Overdose deaths have declined for the past three years, but not due to the reduction of fentanyl available on the market. Rather, the decline in overdose deaths is largely due to the widespread distribution of Narcan (naloxone) and the training to administer it. The funding for this program has been gutted.

The second factor in reducing overdose deaths is the increased funding for addiction treatment resulting from opioid settlements, a short-term burst of funding for states that will soon disappear. The funds have enabled dozens of experiments as to what works and doesn’t work in treating addiction.

The fact that the federal government will fund a “national wastewater-based monitoring system and biosurveillance” program under its “Overdose Response Strategy,” but pull funding for Narcan, shows its priorities are data collection, not data-driven.

Improving Addiction Treatment

Thanks to the previously-mentioned opioid settlements, we have a pretty good idea of what works and what doesn’t work in addiction treatment. What works is:

• Intervention at the emergency room or clinic
• Immediate enrollment into a 30-day medicine-assisted treatment (MAT) program
• Residential housing provided at no cost during treatment
• Small prizes or rewards offered for adhering to treatment
• Subsidized housing placement, if needed after treatment
• Educational and job placement counselling
• Workforce training and job placement

Rather than devoting a chapter to the critical issue of housing during and immediately after treatment, the administration’s strategy seems positively cruel:

In 2024, the number of people experiencing homelessness reached record levels. Between 2023 and 2024, under the failed “Housing First” model, the number of people experiencing homelessness increased by 18%, with nearly 150,000 children experiencing homelessness, reflecting a 33% increase (32,618 more children) over 2023. The policy shift is about restoring dignity to vulnerable Americans. We need to greatly decrease homelessness and addiction and restore the ability to be self-sufficient and productive.

The increase in homelessness cannot be attributed to a “housing first” policy. If we had pursued a housing first policy, we would not have rates of homelessness so much higher than those of other advanced nations. The solution is not to reduce the amount of subsidized housing, but to vastly increase it. This can be done in a way that also benefits the private equity barons who carry much weight with this administration.

Instead, the federal government’s Executive Order on Ending Crime and Disorder on America’s Streets proposes gutting subsidized housing, arresting the homeless, and subjecting them to involuntary addiction treatment while in jail. This is a giant leap backward in addiction treatment, by criminalizing behavior often induced by legal prescriptions, then destroying individuals and families by incarcerating loved ones at a cost to the citizens upwards of $50,000 per inmate per year.

Improving Drug Abuse Prevention

This is one area where the federal government is willing to spend heavily, but not on programs that work. Rather, they continue to fund scare programs such as D.A.R.E., which is proven to not work. In fact, scare programs are contributors to adolescent drug use. That’s because drug use usually starts as a result of stress from peer pressure, physical abuse, and sexual abuse.

What the new strategy says about stress is somewhat poetic:

It is normal to feel stress, be anxious or nervous, or sad on occasion. These are normal emotions. It is not normal or healthy to reach to drugs as an answer to these emotions. Learning healthy coping skills for natural emotions [is] important for promoting health and drug prevention.

Why doesn’t the administration take the money away from scare programs, which add to children’s stress, and put it into stress management, which teaches lifelong skills for de-escalating conflict and displacing stressful energy without drugs? Why? Because many big financial donors have a favorite scare program they think should be taught in every school.

Instead of programs to deal with stress, the strategy recommends procedures for screening. Specifically, the Screening, Brief Intervention, and Referral to Treatment (SBIRT) program, which is administered after a child has a substance abuse episode. The program suggests assessment, a brief discussion to gauge awareness and motivation to change behavior, and then a referral for additional treatment or care.

SBIRT is a poor substitute for programs proven to reduce childhood stress, such as Parent-Child Interactive Therapy, which reduces the stress of parenting and, thus, the stress of being an infant. Or how about funding programs to reduce child abuse, something more than half the people being treated for addiction have in common?

Why is it a good strategy to wait until drug abuse happens, then come down on it with the full weight of law enforcement? As KFF Health News pointed out, this strategy does not match the goals. 

Written by Steve O’Keefe. First published May 13, 2026.

Sources:

“Trump’s Drug Strategy Aims To Bolster Addiction Services — Despite Gutting of Government Support,” KFF Health News, May 6, 2026.

“2026 National Drug Control Strategy Released,” The White House, May 4, 2026.

“Fact Sheet: 2026 National Drug Control Strategy,” The White House, May 4, 2026.

“National Drug Control Strategy 2026,” Office of National Drug Control Policy, May 4, 2026.