 "US President Donald Trump signs an executive order on tariffs in the Rose Garden at the White House in Washington, D.C., U.S. File image/Reuters")
US President Donald Trump has signed an executive order classifying “illicit fentanyl and its core precursor chemicals” as weapons of mass destruction.
“Today I’m taking one more step to protect Americans from the scourge of deadly fentanyl flooding into our country with this historic executive order. No bomb does what this is doing," Trump said in the Oval Office.
US law already classifies the use, threat, or attempted use of weapons of mass destruction as a criminal offence, one that can carry the death penalty depending on the circumstances. The statute also defines weapons of mass destruction to include “any weapon involving a biological agent, toxin, or vector.”
What changes now?
The new order has described fentanyl as “closer to a chemical weapon than a narcotic” and directs Attorney General Pam Bondi to “immediately pursue investigations and prosecutions into fentanyl trafficking.”
US State Secretary Marco Rubio, along with Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, is also required to “pursue appropriate actions against relevant assets and financial institutions in accordance with applicable law for those involved in or supporting the manufacture, distribution, and sale of illicit fentanyl and its core precursor chemicals.”
The order has said that the manufacturing and distribution of fentanyl will be a threat to national security from now on.
“The production and sale of fentanyl by Foreign Terrorist Organizations and cartels fund these entities’ operations, which include assassinations, terrorist acts, and insurgencies around the world, and allow these entities to erode our domestic security and the well-being of our Nation,” the order says.
Trump’s war on drugs
The fentanyl classification ties in with the Trump administration’s war against alleged “narco-terrorists,” which has included a military campaign targeting alleged drug-smuggling boats with strikes that have left nearly 90 people dead since early September.
But while Trump claims that each boat destroyed, there have been more than 20, saves 25,000 American lives, the vessels are thought to be transporting cocaine rather than far-deadlier fentanyl, which is primarily smuggled into the United States from Mexico rather than by boat from Colombia or Venezuela.
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View AllTrump has accompanied the strikes with a massive military buildup in the Caribbean that includes the world’s largest aircraft carrier and a slew of other warships, while a string of US military aircraft have flown along Venezuela’s coast in recent weeks.
With inputs from agencies