It’s a wise man who thinks things over, but it’s a fool who hesitates.
– Proverb
On Oct. 15, 2016, President Donald J. Trump released a campaign press release on the opioid epidemic, particularly the prescription pills such as Oxycodone and hydrocodone plaguing New Hampshire and other rural areas.
He promised that: “we will not only stop the drugs from pouring in, but we will help all of those people so seriously addicted get the assistance they need to unchain themselves.” He said he would do this through his southern border wall, stiff “mandatory minimum sentences for the most serious drug offenders,” and “expanding access to [substance use disorder] treatment and prevention options for those struggling with [drug] addiction.”
Almost a year later, on Aug. 10, 2017, following a report from his President’s Commission on Combating Drug Addiction and the Opioid Crisis, led by Gov. Chris Christie, the President told reporters, “The opioid crisis is an emergency and I’m saying officially right now it is an emergency. It’s a national emergency. … We’re going to spend a lot of time, a lot of effort and a lot of money on the opioid crisis.”
Almost two months later, and nine months after taking office, he still hasn’t “officially” declared the opioid crisis an emergency (apparently that involves paperwork, not an extempore statement to reporters).
To be fair, the President has had other things on his plate – multiple hurricanes, the resignation of his Health and Human Services secretary, racial and political unrest in Charlottesville, tensions with North Korea – but whether these have actually prevented him from acting seems unclear.
You’d think he would delegate the paperwork to some lawyers. He already had a detailed report and recommendation from his Commission that included this statement:
“With approximately 142 Americans dying every day, America is enduring a death toll equal to September 11th every three weeks. Your declaration would empower your cabinet to take bold steps and would force Congress to focus on funding and empowering the executive branch even further to deal with this loss of life.”
The commission has delayed its final report until Nov. 1. Maybe that’s the reason for the delay. Let’s hope it wasn’t because he was distracted by campaign rallies for Luther Strong, tweets about football athletes not standing for the National Anthem and bickering with a Puerto Rican mayor about hurricane relief.
