He has been privately telling people that he believes the reason why drug consumption is so low in the rich Asian nation, is because of the death penalty threat to dealers.
“He says that a lot,” said a source. “He says, ‘When I ask the prime minister of Singapore do they have a drug problem [the prime minister replies,] ‘No. Death penalty’.”
Killing drug dealers has been on the American president’s mind it appears. “You know the Chinese and Filipinos don’t have a drug problem. They just kill them.”
A senior administration official told Axios that Trump is passionate about the subject, saying drug dealers are as bad as serial killers and should all get the death penalty.
Trump believes showing sympathy to the offenders and giving them more lenient sentences, will never work. Children have to be taught that they will die if they take drugs and the authorities have got to make drug dealers fear for their lives, he often says.
Trump has said he would love to have a law to execute all drug dealers but has admitted that it would be almost impossible pass such a law under the American system.
Kellyanne Conway, the Trump administration’s chief anti-drug official, says some harsher measures would have widespread support however. “There is an appetite among many law enforcement, health professionals and grieving families that we must toughen up our criminal and sentencing statutes to match the new reality of drugs like fentanyl, which are so lethal in such small doses,” she said.
“The president makes a distinction between those that are languishing in prison for low-level drug offenses and the kingpins hauling thousands of lethal doses of fentanyl into communities, that are responsible for many casualties in a single weekend.”
Trump and some of his advisers are currently discussing some aspects of Singapore’s “zero tolerance” drug policies, focusing on anti-drug education into schools.
