The Great American Recovery: The 2026 National Drug Control Strategy’s Historic Reignition of Faith in Our Communities

Introduction

Over 1.2 million Americans have died from drug overdoses since 1999, a loss felt in nearly every family and community across the nation.

As part of the Trump Administration’s ongoing efforts to end this devastation unleashed by illicit drugs, this May, Drug Czar Sara Carter published the National Drug Control Strategy for 2026. This Strategy outlines a whole-of-government approach to confronting addiction and the ongoing drug crisis. It is built on two equally important fronts: a campaign to disrupt the illicit drug supply, paired with a comprehensive public health effort to reduce demand and consumption.

The Trump Administration has achieved historic progress in disrupting the supply chain through effective border security, a focus on cartel disruption, and active intervention to stop trafficking, including military strikes against drug traffickers. Yet the Strategy makes clear that supply reduction, while necessary, is insufficient without parallel demand reduction.

For the first time in federal drug policy, the Strategy places faith-based organizations and community institutions at the center of this demand-side response. Understanding this framework and the specific commitments it contains is essential for policymakers and practitioners to build an infrastructure for recovery.

What Has the Trump Administration Done to Disrupt the Drug Supply?

Working hand-in-hand with China and India, who are the main suppliers of precursors for synthetic opioids, Mexican cartels have run illegal drug smuggling operations, resulting in the death of tens of thousands of Americans each year. This problem was amplified during the four years of open borders under the Biden Administration, which provided the perfect opportunity for cartels to conduct their deadly business with ease. In 2023, halfway through the open-border crisis, an estimated 76,282 Americans died from fentanyl poisoning. As cartels continued their work with China to funnel illicit fentanyl and other drugs into the United States, the conditions were ripe for devastation.

President Trump’s Administration took swift action on day one, signing the executive order Designating Cartels and Other Organizations as Foreign Terrorist Organizations and Specially Designated Global Terrorists. As a result of this order, eight cartels, including the Jalisco New Generation, Tren de Aragua, and the Sinaloa Cartel, prominent suppliers of the drugs circulating on the streets of America, are now designated Foreign Terrorist Organizations (FTOs).

As stated in the executive order:

Cartels have engaged in a campaign of violence and terror throughout the Western Hemisphere that has not only destabilized countries with significant importance for our national interests but also flooded the United States with deadly drugs, violent criminals, and vicious gangs.

This designation not only provides the government and law enforcement the necessary powers and broader authorities to combat cartels, including prosecution powers to target cartel members operating abroad and those providing material support to cartels, an expansion of grounds of inadmissibility for illegal aliens, and increased ability to seize assets linked to cartels, but it also sends a strong signal that America will no longer be complacent in the war being waged against Americans via the deadly drugs crossing the border.

A critical step in stopping drugs from entering the United States is securing the border. Due to strong policy and effective enforcement, average encounters along the southwest border have decreased by 94% compared to the monthly average under President Biden. As the flow across the border slows to a trickle, more manpower and resources have been directed to drug interdiction and enforcement. Results have already been seen in just one year, as the flow of fentanyl across the border was cut in half.

To further disrupt the drug supply chain rather than waiting for drugs to reach the border, in September 2025, the U.S. military began to conduct targeted strikes on vessels carrying drugs to the U.S. The border should be the last line of defense, not the first, which is exactly what these strikes exemplify.

Battling the drug epidemic here at home, particularly with respect to fentanyl, President Trump issued an executive order in December 2025, Designating Fentanyl as a Weapon of Mass Destruction. Section 2 of the order directs all heads of relevant executive departments and agencies to take appropriate action to eliminate the threat of illicit fentanyl along with its precursor chemicals.

These actions reflect a paradigm shift in policy, one that signals America is no longer a passive nation in allowing the deadly drug market to exist. Rather, the Administration is proactively seeking the dismantling of long-reigning cartels, effectively closing the border, and imposing the necessary consequences for those aiding in the killing of Americans.

Why Has Enforcement Not Been Fully Sufficient?

Since illicit fentanyl flooded the market in 2013, overdose deaths have risen tremendously, having exceeded 100,000 per year under the previous administration. While recent data show a slight decline for the 12 months ending August 2025, drug overdoses still vastly exceed those of pre-fentanyl levels. The trajectory evidently exposes a gap that the 2026 Strategy directly seeks to bridge: enforcement, while necessary, seldom succeeds fully without simultaneous demand reduction.

Chapter 5 of the 2026 Strategy emphasizes that avoiding illicit drugs and shedding addiction must be encouraged as part of American culture, arguing that “a drug-free life must become culturally desirable, not just legally enforced.” The Strategy commits federal resources to national media campaigns, school-based prevention messaging, and workplace education programs designed to establish and reinforce this cultural norm. The 2026 Strategy also recognizes that families, faith communities, schools, and employers—not government alone—shape communities. Federal policy provides resources and coordination, but the real cultural transformation resides with those who face this crisis each day.

Chapter 6 of the 2026 Strategy makes clear that law enforcement alone cannot be the only means necessary to accomplish a drug-free cultural norm. Addiction is a perverse issue that is not only a chemical condition, but a crisis of disconnection from family, faith, and community. Sustained recovery happens through relationships. Family members with welcoming arms back home, peers who understand the daily struggle, and faith communities that deliver purpose, meaning, and belonging all play a vital, interconnected role in helping individuals recover from addiction. Roughly 23.5 million Americans are in recovery, and over two-thirds affiliate with God or a spiritual force. By positioning faith-based organizations and community relationships as pivotal to recovery, the 2026 Strategy pursues restoration of a drug-free America grounded in faith and relational healing.

How Does the 2026 Strategy Change the Federal Approach to Recovery?

For the first time, a federal drug Strategy formally recognizes faith-based organizations as critical partners when addressing addiction recovery. By contrast, the Biden Administration's 2022 National Drug Control Strategy prioritized Medication-Assisted Treatment and harm reduction measures such as naloxone distribution, never naming faith as a viable recovery approach. This omission of faith was reflective of a larger pattern in the previous administration. The Biden Administration was explicit in excluding faith-based providers and individuals, restricting funds and access in ways that outwardly deterred those of the Christian faith from inclusion. The 2022 National Drug Control Strategy, put forth by the Office of National Drug Control Policy under President Biden, reflected this pattern, eliminating the role of faith as a key component in addiction recovery and never naming it as a viable approach. The DOJ’s April 2026 report further documents the systemic barriers that many faith-based providers faced in disaster relief, foster care funding, and homeless services under the previous administration.

Sidelining the faith community from substance abuse programming was an unfortunate action that removed vital support necessary for recovery. Roughly 130,000 churches and religious congregations in the United States host alcohol and drug recovery groups. These groups save taxpayers an estimated 317 billion dollars annually. Faith-based approaches are also desired by many treatment seekers themselves. In one study, 84% of clients in addiction counseling expressed a desire for greater emphasis on spirituality in their treatment. A review of the broader literature found that faith was associated with reduced risk of alcohol use in 86% of 278 studies, and with a reduced risk of drug abuse in 84% of 185 studies. Research examining religious conversion in faith-based residential treatment programs has shown that faith-based support builds recovery capacity and improves treatment completion. Additional studies on spirituality and recovery confirm that faith integration enhances substance use disorder outcomes, with recent analysis demonstrating sustained improvements in long-term recovery rates.

Fortunately, the 2026 Strategy acknowledges the benefits of the faith community’s involvement in alcohol and substance abuse issues and openly reverses the Biden-era approach. Now, faith-based organizations can openly serve at the forefront of recovery infrastructure development. This shift is grounded in a fundamental recognition: faith has proven effective for many recovering from drug addiction, and embracing the power of faith has the potential to help millions of Americans achieve recovery.

First, the Strategy ensures direct federal resource allocation to faith-based prevention and recovery programs while building capacity for addiction treatment through close partnerships with faith-based organizations. Second, it positions faith-based organizations as primary, not secondary, delivery agents in the addiction recovery ecosystem. Third, it partners with faith leaders and communities as co-equal architects of anti-drug strategy at all levels of government: federal, state, local, and tribal.

Through President Trump’s Great American Recovery Initiative, the Administration is advancing efforts to make treatment more accessible than the drug(s) themselves. With the established benchmarks for demand reduction set out in the 2026 Strategy, the Trump Administration is pursuing clear objectives to tackle the pain and death inflicted on communities from addiction. Creating a baseline on the 79,384 deaths in 2024, the Trump Administration is targeting a 10% reduction by the end of 2026 and another 24% by 2029. Meeting these targets would represent considerable progress in reducing demand, while supply-side operations continue.

By expanding recovery infrastructure, including peer support workforce, recovery-ready workplaces, and faith-based capacity, the 2026 Strategy will help sustain long-term recovery across generations in our communities. As our companion analysis on community mental health argues, the first line of care is often best for those who share the same lived experiences and close relationships, rather than the institutions themselves. Real change is possible when faith and the community are given the respect they deserve to enact change.

Conclusion

In addition to strong actions taken to dismantle the supply chain, for the first time, federal drug policy treats faith-based communities as a legitimate partner in recovery, not an afterthought. Addiction, in part, is a crisis of disconnection, and the evidence shows faith communities are well-positioned to meet it. By removing the barriers of the previous administration, the 2026 Strategy builds toward a recovery infrastructure grounded in relationships as much as treatment.