Politics
DEA Promotes Ad Campaign From Trump-Linked Group Blaming Marijuana Laced With Fentanyl For Overdose Deaths
The Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) is promoting an anti-drug ad campaign from a Trump-affiliated nonprofit—including one spot that links fentanyl-contaminated marijuana to overdose deaths and depicts a lit cannabis joint as part of the macabre PSA.
The ads, which were created by the organization Make America Fentanyl Free (MAFF), reportedly received input from President Donald Trump, who insisted that he wanted Americans to see more visceral portrayals of the fentanyl crisis. The multi-million dollar campaign is targeting airwaves and social media, including a spot during an NFL game on Monday.
While the president provided guidance on messaging for the campaign and previewed the ads ahead of their release, the effort is not formally a project of the federal government. A spokesperson for MAFF told Axios that Trump “offered great advice, including the use of vivid imagery to show Americans exactly how fentanyl destroys lives, families and communities.”
Even though the ads are not federally funded, DEA earlier this month gave a signal boost to the campaign, sharing a Fox News story about the initiative on its Get Smart About Drugs resource site that it’s also used to send messages warning against marijuana use, linking it to depression and suicidal thinking.
Here’s the transcript for the MAFF ad on fentanyl and marijuana:
Actor 1: Best birthday party ever. Well, except for the weed. Turns out it was laced with fentanyl—and a birthday I’ll never forget, because it was my last.
Actor 2: Just one mistake and you’re out of the game, forever.
Narrator: Taking fentanyl is like playing Russian roulette. Just a few grains can kill you.
Actor 3: I had to pull an all nighter, so I took the pill my roommate gave me. I swore it’d be the last time. It was.
Actor 4: I was immediately addicted to fentanyl, exactly like the drug dealers wanted. My skin turned blue, I aged rapidly, my organs painfully deteriorated, then I died. Alone.
Narrator: Fentanyl kills. Join President Trump’s fight to end the fentanyl crisis.
Another ad says Trump is “taking bold actions to save American lives” and depicts images of his administration’s military attacks on alleged drug boats.
“He won’t let the radical left stop him,” the narrator says as on-screen text shows a headline reading, “Democrats push back on Trump’s drug cartel crackdown.”
In fact, a number of Republican senators have joined Democrats in expressing concerns about the legality of the administration’s lethal strike campaign.
Among those involved in the MAFF ads, according to Axios, were two former senior advisors on Trump’s presidential campaigns—Chris LaCivita and Danielle Alvarez—as well as GOP operative John Brabender.
The link between overdose deaths and fentanyl-contaminated marijuana has proved contentious, with some advocates arguing that sourcing on news reports about such incidents are over-reliant on law enforcement claims, many of which are later walked back following additional testing. But fentanyl has undoubtedly entered the illicit drug supply in other troubling ways.
On the campaign trail, Vice President JD Vance also claimed that “marijuana bags” are being laced with fentanyl, and he said the Biden administration’s border policies made it so youth, including his own kids, couldn’t experiment with cannabis or other drugs without risking fatal overdoses.
New York regulators have worked to debunk what they’ve called a “false” narrative that cannabis is commonly contaminated with fentanyl—a “misconception” that remains “widespread” despite a lack of evidence, they said in 2023.
On the other side of the cannabis debate, another Trump-affiliated political committee—America First Agriculture Action Inc.—recently pushed the president to follow through on rescheduling marijuana, releasing ads that highlight his previous endorsement of the reform on the campaign trail.
Trump said in late August that he’d make a decision on rescheduling within weeks, but that’s yet to happen.
Earlier this year, a marijuana industry-funded political action committee attacked former President Joe Biden’s cannabis policy record as well as the nation of Canada, with ads promoting sometimes misleading claims about the last administration while making the case that Trump can deliver on reform.
Photo courtesy of Martin Alonso.
