....Clinton's $10 billion plan does not include drug enforcement efforts aimed at stopping drugs from entering the U.S.
...Clinton's plan is focused on boosting access to treatment and recovery programs. State efforts could include building more beds in hospitals and residential treatment facilities, training more health care providers and recovery coaches, subsidizing child care for people in treatment and enforcing parity laws that require insurance companies to cover substance abuse treatment.
Clinton also wants to promote greater use of medically assisted treatment, which can halt drug cravings and create adverse reactions to taking drugs. The Democrat would push for stricter prescribing laws and requiring states to use prescription drug monitoring systems to prevent doctor shopping. Developing an addiction to painkillers is a frequent path toward using heroin or other opioids.
Clinton would also boost evidence-based prevention programs in schools and make naloxone, the overdose reversal drug, more widely available. Some states have already made naloxone available over the counter so family members and friends of addicts can purchase it. She's also stressed a need to improve and integrate mental health and substance abuse care, as the two often occur together.
On criminal justice reform:
CLINTON: Clinton says she will ask her attorney general to issue guidance telling states to prioritize treatment over incarceration for low-level offenders. She supports the drug court programs that many states have created. She says she'll also push states to consider alternatives to incarceration for low-level offenders, such as going through drug court programs that focus on treatment.
What's Trump offering? A border wall. And more mandatory minimum sentences for drug traffickers. Only someone seriously stuck in a time warp would make that recommendation. Even some major Republicans now recognize they were a mistake.
He is pledging, however, to "aggressively prosecute traffickers of illegal drugs." In his Oct. 15 speech, he praised running mate Mike Pence for instituting stricter mandatory minimum sentences for drug offenses as governor of Indiana and suggested he'd pursue a similar policy federally.
Trump showed off his (lack of) knowlege on the topic a few weeks ago in New Hampshire with this bizarre comment:
"How does heroin work with these beautiful lakes and trees?" he said recently in New Hampshire. "It doesn't."
Case closed. It's not even close.
