Director Sara Carter
The White House Office of National Drug Control Policy

Remarks at the 69th Session of the United Nations’ Commission on Narcotic Drugs in Vienna, Austria

March 9, 2026

Good morning, ladies and gentlemen.

First, Mr. Chair, allow me to congratulate you on your appointment and assure you of our full cooperation to work with you to have a successful session. Thank you very much.

I join you all today not only to speak for the United States of America, but to give a voice to the mothers and fathers of murdered children…

The families torn apart…

The communities ravaged…

And the millions of Americans who cannot join us today because their lives were cut short by illicit drugs.

But, now under President Donald J. Trump’s leadership, we are saving lives and driving a stronger global response against the terror of drugs.

For example, Operation Southern Spear in the Caribbean Sea and the successful apprehension of the dictator, Maduro, has brought the world’s attention to the Western Hemisphere.

And we are not alone in our strengthened efforts.

Our neighbors and allies are joining us to banish these poisons from our streets, our communities, and our homes.

We are working together to protect our children from those who value profit over their lives.

I have recently participated in an event in Florida that is evidence of this renewed cooperation.

In Miami, our Secretary of War Pete Hegseth convened a meeting with military and security leaders of the Western Hemisphere to discuss how we can further our work together to take down cartels.

Our reinvigorated collaboration also comes on the heels of Mexico’s elimination of “el Mencho”, a notorious cartel leader.

Despite their successes, our friends and neighbors took significant losses.

I join the Government of Mexico and the families of the fallen in their grief. Thank you.

And my heart weeps for the families of those across the region whose lives were taken far too soon by cartel violence.

But now we must double down…

We must bring the fight to where these criminal networks stash their poisons, store their money, ship their deadly inventory, and feel the safest.

Last year, we seized over 47 million fentanyl-laced counterfeit pills and nearly 100,000 pounds of fentanyl powder coming into our country, representing almost 369 million lethal doses of fentanyl.

Yet, almost 80,000 American lives were lost to drug overdoses and poisonings. This includes cocaine and methamphetamine laced with illicit fentanyl.

In response, the U.S. has recently designated fentanyl, and its precursors, weapons of mass destruction.

Cartels and dealers see fentanyl as another way to boost their profits, even at the risk of some of their customers dropping dead, because adulteration with this substance enhances addiction.

These bad actors, and we know there are many, are waging a chemical war…

A war they can easily fight by putting in minimal effort to skirt still-nascent regulations on fentanyl and other deadly precursor chemicals.

But we know where the chemical precursors are coming from. 

They are manufactured by the millions of tons in China.

We know they move through the global supply chain.

We know that China’s weak export controls and lax enforcement allow its chemical industry to foster friendships with the cartels. At the same time, China’s overly effective controls over rare earth minerals wreak havoc on legitimate industries.

And we are working tirelessly to halt the trade of precursors at its source, not only to protect American lives, but to protect the lives of the citizens of the world.

This forum is an opportunity for the nations of the world to band together and combat not only narcotics, but criminal enterprises and their funding mechanisms, their allies in places of power, their disrespect for the law, and their terror over our citizens.

Their advantage is that they do not have to play by any rules and they don’t have anyone to answer to.

But our advantage is our ability to work together, to respect the law, to leverage the talents and good character of all of our citizens, and to pool our might to target those bringing about this deadly destruction.

If our joint goal is truly a peaceful world and thriving, healthy citizenry, then we cannot let the cancers that aim to destroy us continue to prosper.

Thank you.