Kamala Harris embraces 'harm reduction' to treat substance abuse, but only makes things worse
Jason Rantz exposes 'safe drug kits': It is 'so ludicrous'
KTTH Seattle radio host Jason Rantz discusses the impact of 'safe drug kits' on 'The Ingraham Angle.'
It’s never been easier to get taxpayer-funded meth pipes and fentanyl freebasing kits in cities across the country. And if you want to know what drug policy would be under a Kamala Harris presidency, look no farther than the very cities operating under the Biden-Harris administration’s embrace of so-called "harm reduction" strategies that, rather than address a drug crisis, make it worse.
Harm reduction strategies were initially designed to mitigate the negative effects of drug use by providing clean needles, pipes and other paraphernalia to prevent the spread of diseases like HIV and hepatitis. The idea is that people will use drugs whether we like it or not, so why not make it "safer"?
As I explain extensively in my book "What’s Killing America: Inside the Radical Left’s Tragic Destruction of Our Cities," what these strategies have done is normalize drug use, creating more addicts and leaving cities grappling with rising overdose deaths, open-air drug markets and the complete collapse of public safety.
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I’ve seen this firsthand in Seattle, where I live. It took me about three minutes to get my hands on taxpayer-funded drug kits from Public Health Seattle-King County. I walked into a needle exchange office in downtown Seattle and walked out with enough gear to start my own drug den. No questions asked. All I had to do was ask for a "party kit."
A Seattle drug kit procured from Public Health – Seattle and King County. (Jason Rantz/AM 770 KTTH)
I got to choose which meth pipe I wanted and chose a "hammer," though I could have gone with a straight glass pipe or what’s known colloquially as a "bubble." They had cookers, tin foil and even instructions on how to turn tin foil into a pipe to freebase fentanyl. The drug paraphernalia was casually handed to me, courtesy of your hard-earned tax dollars, by an agency meant to help save me from addiction, not enable it.
Most shockingly, there wasn’t even a hint of concern about whether I was an addict, a dealer or just someone trying to get a freebie. There wasn’t even a comment, in passing, about how they could connect me with detox services when I was ready.
This is what harm reduction looks like in practice — facilitating drug use, with taxpayers footing the bill.
And if Vice President Kamala Harris gets anywhere near the White House, these policies will not only continue but spread in your community. Harris’s history of supporting drug legalization, as evidenced in her 2019 response to an ACLU questionnaire, shows she is all in on these so-called "harm reduction" measures. And it should be a terrifying thought for anyone paying attention to how these programs are destroying cities like New York, San Francisco, Los Angeles and Dallas.
New York City opened the nation's first "supervised consumption site" in 2021. They’re little more than a magnet for addicts — and the nearby dealers are ready to sell addicts their next fix. The surrounding neighborhoods have become war zones, with residents living in fear as drug-related crime skyrockets.
Then there’s San Francisco, a city that’s become the poster child for failed progressive policies. Harm reduction efforts there include distributing fentanyl test strips, aluminum foil and clean needles en masse. The result? The city saw an all-time high number of fatal overdoses, the majority coming from fentanyl. Open-air drug use is rampant because there’s no incentive for addicts to get clean when the city provides everything they need to stay hooked.
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Los Angeles and its county aren’t far behind. As pipes are handed out to addicts, the morgue gets filled with dead homeless people at alarming rates. Meanwhile, Dallas activists have jumped on the harm reduction bandwagon, too, though its efforts are less publicized because they’re handing out drug paraphernalia against state law, though they’re not paying any legal price for it. Though advocates claim harm reduction helps prevent overdose deaths, drug fatalities in Texas have seen a steady rise, with Dallas County at the center of the crisis.
Let’s not pretend for a second that a President Harris would put public health first, especially since harm reduction is already in play. A key element of the administration's multi-billion-dollar National Drug Control Strategy is to increase harm reduction interventions to curb overdose deaths and promote treatment for substance use disorders. It’s failed to reach meaningful results on either goal.
A Public Health – Seattle and King County building in Seattle. (Jason Rantz/AM 770 KTTH)
Harm reduction is enabling addiction, not fighting it. And with Harris in the White House, it’ll only get worse with cities across the country seeing an even greater influx of taxpayer-funded drug kits, more supervised consumption sites, and higher overdose deaths.
What we need are policies that emphasize treatment, recovery and accountability — not ones that hand out pipes and syringes to addicts, keeping them locked in the very cycle we should be helping them escape. This isn’t compassion; it’s negligence.
We’ve already seen the damage done in Democrat-run cities. Do we really want to let it spread farther?
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Jason Rantz, author of "What’s Killing America: Inside the Radical Left’s Tragic Destruction of Our Cities," is a Seattle-based talk show host on KTTH Radio. Follow him on Twitter @JasonRantz.
