Trump’s Caribbean Killing Spree Won’t Stop Cartels—But Legalization Would – Drug Wars 2.0

Donald Trump, the self-proclaimed “anti-war” president who campaigned on ending endless conflicts, has found himself a new war to fight. In January 2025, he signed Executive Order 14157, formally designating eight Latin American cartels and gangs as Foreign Terrorist Organizations—the same legal classification used for ISIS and Al-Qaeda. By September, he’d escalated from designation to execution, launching a campaign of missile strikes against boats in the Caribbean Sea that has, by the administration’s own count, killed at least 43 people across 10 separate attacks.