Latest / World Ablaze with George Fontes / 62 - Brian Townsend - Fentanyl Crisis Expert and Retired DEA Special Agent

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62 - Brian Townsend - Fentanyl Crisis Expert and Retired DEA Special Agent · World Ablaze with George Fontes

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  You are listening to a Fonts Media Network production.
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  Welcome, World of Blaze listeners, to episode 62.
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  On today's show, I feature my very special guest, Brian Townsend.
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  He's a 28-year law enforcement veteran and a retired supervisory special agent
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  and former resident agent in charge for the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration, also known as the DEA.
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  Currently, Brian is the founder and principal of Eagle Six Training, where he provides consulting services
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  and training to businesses and law enforcement entities worldwide.
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  He also launched Only Two Milligrams, Inc., a 501c nonprofit organization,
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  where he leverages his extensive experience and knowledge in the opioid field to raise awareness
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  and foster a deeper understanding of the opioid epidemic and illicit fentanyl crisis.
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  We have a very eye-opening and informative conversation.
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  So let's get going.
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  Perfect.
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  Thank you for being flexible.
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  I'm sorry to be barely on time here.
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  Nope, all good.
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  It caught my attention as I was looking and I was searching, literally doing a show on
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  the border. And one of the things that kept coming up, obviously, and they keep talking about is the
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  fentanyl crisis and all the drugs coming across the border. And then I came across your name and
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  then saw that you were a DEA agent. And I'm sure experience goes way beyond that, but involved in
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  law enforcement. So I thought I'd reach out to you. And then I also saw that you train other law
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  enforcement agencies still to this day. Is that correct? That's correct. So I wanted to talk to
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  you because you are an expert on this. And the problem I'm having that we're seeing these days
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  with social media is everybody has an opinion on something, but doesn't have all the facts.
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  And so that's the whole reason I want to talk. Just like, can we get some real inside information
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  on what's really happening, what the realities are, fact from fiction. And then also want to
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  talk about like what you're doing now after you left the DEA and how you're still involved in all
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  of this. Sure. Yeah. Perfect. So I was with the DEA for 23 years. Prior to that, I was a police
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  officer for five years. So 28 years in law enforcement in an active capacity, wearing
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  the badge and gun. But I still work with law enforcement post-DEA in a training capacity.
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  What's your involvement with training in law enforcement though? What are you doing as far
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  training? So I wear a couple hats. I went to work, well, actually when I retired from DEA in 2022,
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  I started my own training and consulting business, Eagle Six Training. And I don't just train law
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  enforcement, but that's a world I navigated in for the last 30 years. So I have a lot of contacts
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  and it just was a natural fit. And I'm doing quite a bit with law enforcement in that capacity. And
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  then that led me to a risk center. There's six risk centers across the United States,
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  And there's one in Missouri that serves the Midwest, and it's the Midwest Organized Crime
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  Information Center.
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  And they hired me as a law enforcement training coordinator, started part-time, and now I'm
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  full-time.
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  And I train law enforcement in the nine states that we serve.
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  So I do Eagle Six training in 41 states and MOCIC in the nine states.
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  And then I started a nonprofit organization, a 501c3 IRS-recognized nonprofit to address specifically the fentanyl crisis.
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  And we're actually expanding into more threats and trends and what we can address to make our community safer.
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  And right now, that focus has been illicit fentanyl.
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  What are you offering through your nonprofit in terms of training and awareness when it comes to fentanyl?
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  So we have three classes.
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  My flagship class is a four-hour comprehensive class.
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  It's the illicit fentanyl crisis, understanding, awareness, and action.
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  It's a four-hour class, and it really is the kitchen sink.
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  We talk about what fentanyl is, the fact that only two milligrams is enough to kill you if it gets in your system, the cartels, the border, social media, the dark web.
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  I mean we really really talk about everything I that presentation changes a lot I keep up to date
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  on on a lot of the research I get I have access to a lot of the bulletins still
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  I'm still involved with a lot of folks at DEA and so I'm quite up to date on on what's going on
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  in the illicit fentanyl world and so I'm always changing that presentation and making sure all
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  with statistics and information's up to date. And like I said, that's a four-hour, very
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  comprehensive program. I've done 95 or 96 now across the United States.
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  I have a shorter presentation that I call a lunch and learn. I've had a lot of executives and
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  senior business leaders that are interested in learning more about licitfentanil, but they've
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  told me they don't have four hours to spare. So they give me an hour and they kind of get the
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  overview. That's gone really well. And then I have a program I call Shattering Dreams,
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  which is for students. And I've done it for younger students, but my primary audience so far
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  has been high school and college students. And that's really just giving them information and
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  making them aware of the fentanyl crisis and the changing drug landscape.
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  So two milligrams is enough to kill?
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  Yeah, two milligrams. So a couple of granules of salt or sand, yeah.
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  Okay. It's so potent and that dangerous that, but there's got to be a huge amount of profit behind it because for the cartels, for example, to take such a risk of using something that you can literally just come in contact with if it absorbs in your skin, right, and gets into your bloodstream.
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  Is it that dangerous? Can it be that dangerous?
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  No, and that is, I'm glad you brought that up.
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  So in 2016, DEA put out a officer safety bulletin, and then that went to the public as well,
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  is that there was a risk of fentanyl exposure that it could absorb in your skin,
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  just being around it could make you overdose.
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  And we now know that's not factual.
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  We know that's incorrect.
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  It's a very dangerous drug, and we should respect that.
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  but just being around, merely being around it, you know, won't put anybody in jeopardy.
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  Again, respect the drug, use whatever PPE makes you feel confident. You know, I always wear
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  nitrile gloves and that's what I recommend and that's what I wore when I was around it and here
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  I am. It has to get into your bloodstream. It has to get through a mucous membrane. You know,
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  you're snorting it, you're injecting it, you're swallowing a pill. It's got to get into your body
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  somehow. Just merely being around or even touching it, it's not going to cause any harm.
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  Is it always the case where fentanyl is being used as something that's mixed into other drugs?
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  Is it ever used just on its own? Because, I mean, two milligrams is not a lot. So,
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  how is it being utilized? Yeah. So, it got into our drug supply via heroin. It was when heroin
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  took off after the legal opioid crisis in the 1990s that started with OxyContin.
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  And we saw an increase in heroin use and the traffickers needed to cut heroin.
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  And fentanyl was the perfect cut because it is an opioid.
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  So it has the same properties as heroin.
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  And it's much cheaper.
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  It's synthetic.
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  And it's very potent.
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  And it's very addictive.
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  So they started to put it into our drug supply via heroin.
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  And then it just took off.
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  And now we see it in cocaine.
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  We see it in methamphetamine.
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  We see it in all the counterfeit pills.
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  Do people use fentanyl alone?
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  Yeah, but typically it's through other drugs.
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  The heroin, the cocaine, the methamphetamine.
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  If you find someone who's struggling with substance use disorders, addiction, who is using just fentanyl,
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  I don't want to say it's rare, but more than likely if you were to follow their path, their drug use path,
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  it probably started with another drug and then it led to the fentanyl.
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  that's actually pretty informative because i think i think there was a lot of um
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  misunderstanding on how it was being used exactly because uh you see on the news lately in social
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  media they just talk about fentanyl by itself and yeah i think some people think it's just they're
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  taking that on its own which would be very dangerous to do um so it seems it's in combination
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  with another drug or used to cut another drug yeah absolutely that that's how it's most likely
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  taken and in fact that's how most people are are why they're dying is they have no idea that's
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  fentanyl in the drugs that they're taking. That's why the street drugs are so dangerous right now
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  is, you know, you think you're getting a pill, you think you're getting Percocet or Oxy or,
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  you know, or even Adderall. It doesn't have to be an opioid. And then boom, you got fentanyl in it,
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  or you think you're using cocaine or methamphetamine. There are people using fentanyl,
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  like I said, but typically it's in combination with another drug.
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  Understood. So what's driving fentanyl and its use in general? Obviously, there's a need or demand,
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  right? We're looking at it from a market or capitalistic perspective. So this is obviously
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  making drugs in general more profitable, right? Who are the major suppliers of fentanyl? I mean,
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  we always hear China thrown around. We hear other countries and other nefarious actors involved. But
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  from your experience, who are the major players involved that really help to supply this for what
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  it's used for? So the chemicals, the major players in the chemicals are China. India is number two,
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  but China is number one and by far number one. So those chemicals are shipped from China primarily
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  into Mexico. And the drug cartels will take shipment usually at the ports. And then from
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  there, they're trucked into locations in Mexico where their chemicals are made into fentanyl.
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  It's the same way they continue to do with methamphetamine. The chemicals come from places
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  like China. They come into the ports, they get trucked into the different labs and different
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  locations, and then they make the methamphetamine, and then they smuggle into the US. The two primary
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  organizations in Mexico that are behind that are the Sinaloa Cartel, the CDS, and the Jalisco New
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  generation, the CJNG. Those are the two primary drug cartels, the transnational criminal organizations
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  that are manufacturing and smuggling fentanyl into the United States.
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  So it is primarily China and the Mexican cartels, or those two Mexican cartels that you mentioned.
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  Yes, absolutely. You know, I think about how methamphetamine, you know, if you follow the
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  history of methamphetamine. You remember in the 1990s and even in the early 2000s, we had a huge
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  meth problem in the United States. And it's still big in the United States. I mean, it's the most
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  seized drug in the US. But we had a lot of these little labs that popped up everywhere, right?
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  And so what do we do? We started to regulate the chemicals like ephedrine. And to this day,
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  if you need good Sudafed, the strong stuff, you have to go to the...
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  Prescription.
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  Yeah. Or behind the counter, you have to give them your driver's license and fill that little
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  thing out. And what that did overnight is it really slowed down the small methamphetamine
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  labs in the United States. I mean, we were getting, gosh, we were getting several hundred a week to
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  now you might get two a year, right? So at that time, the cartel said, hey, wait, this is a great
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  opportunity. So they went to places like China and India and says, hey, can we get these chemicals?
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  Can we get these shipped to us? And that's exactly what happened. They started to ship
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  these chemicals to them and they would make the methamphetamine. And that's where we started the
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  super labs and things like that. And to give you an idea, I worked down on the border from 2009 to
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  2016, and we were paying probably $21,000 a pound for meth at the time. And they just took over.
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  And right now you can buy a pound of methamphetamine for about anywhere from $800 to $1,500
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  for a pound. It's incredible. So now fast forward 10, 20 years, fentanyl becomes popular. They need,
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  like I said earlier, they needed a way to cut heroin to, you know, because you never sell
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  raw product. So the need for fentanyl grew and it's such an addictive substance and it's very
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  cheap, like I said, completely synthetic, man-made. So when they were making those phone
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  calls to the Chinese suppliers and or the suppliers in China they said hey by
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  the way we need the chemicals to make fentanyl now and of course those relationships are already established because of methamphetamine they like yeah perfect So yeah absolutely That the pipeline right there China to the two main cartels in Mexico
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  And then it's transported into the U.S. the same way that they've successfully transported other drugs into the U.S. for decades.
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  Crazy. So when, politics aside, I'm just going to say, so when President Trump says the cartels are a problem and this is why, and people think he's being, whatever, racist, unophobic, however you want to label it, he is telling the truth. The cartels are an issue when it comes to this. Am I right?
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  Yeah, absolutely. And both parties have said that. And I know Trump's a very polarizing figure.
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  But what he said is not, it's not original or it's not unique. This has been a shared feeling from politicians on both sides of the aisle. I mean, 100%. I mean, now the approaches are a little different.
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  But yeah, these two, and that's why, you know, for the last, gosh, for the last couple of years, the strategic focus of DEA has been these two cartels, you know, before I retired.
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  What has been the hurdles?
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  Because I know you have some connections.
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  You can't talk about current investigations.
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  But at the same time, from your experience and what you know, what have been the hurdles in trying to stop this?
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  A lot of it has been, well, I'm a lot more freer to speak now since I'm no longer with DEA.
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  But a lot's been the corruption and the problems in Mexico.
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  We have the information, the pipeline of information, how it flows into Mexico to the law enforcement and to the folks that are supporting us is very restrictive now, especially within the last five years.
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  Very, very restrictive.
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  Where we had vetted teams throughout Mexico, and we still do.
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  There's a lot of, you know, Mexico's a beautiful country, a lot of great people who really trying to make it safer and better.
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  And they want to get rid of this garbage.
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  But the problem is that the corruption and the controls they have really make it hard for us to disseminate information to the people that can really use it.
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  You know, I think earlier this year, or actually earlier, 2024, Rutgers and a couple other organizations were looking at numbers just to give you an idea of what I'm talking about.
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  they wrote they wrote you can google this they wrote a couple things on it
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  we were giving them information on labs fentanyl labs and it was like 80 some or almost almost
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  close to 90 percent of the labs that we gave them information on when they actually went to go get
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  them were inactive i can tell you we the u.s law enforcement's not giving bad information you know
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  sometimes, you know, informants or information gets stale. I get it, but it just doesn't make
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  any sense. I mean, almost 90% of the information we're giving them is no good. No, we wouldn't be
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  wasting our time like that. So what does that mean? There's someone leaking info or as you said,
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  just there's the corruption. Yeah. I mean, that's the concern, right? I mean,
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  yeah, it really is because now when information goes down and it gets funneled a certain way,
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  there's certain offices in Mexico that take that information and they decide how it's going to get
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  disseminated. And the problem is we can't trust that process. You know, I'm not saying every bit
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  of it's corrupt, but there are people who we know have been compromised. So when that information is
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  just thrown down there and is generalized, and then people get to decide what gets disseminated
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  and where it gets disseminated, we lose control of that. And when we lose control of that,
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  what do we get? We get 90% inactive labs. That's crazy. And that's just one example. I mean,
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  And that's been part of the problem.
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  And that's why it's going to be interesting, really, to see how Trump deals with Schimbom and the tariffs and all the different talk.
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  What leverage could that possibly give the U.S. to be more effective and have them target their…
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  Well, what's more interesting, since you brought that up, is the current labeling of these cartels as actual foreign terrorist organizations.
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  which now can involve the military, right?
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  Department of Defense.
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  So that's where it's going to be very interesting
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  is how far they want to go to chase these people down
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  and treat them as true terrorists.
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  What's your opinion on that?
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  I'm actually excited for that.
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  And it really, I think it just, again,
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  it leverages or gives us some leverage on our options.
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  I mean, obviously Mexico is a sovereign nation
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  and we have to respect that.
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  And I think that's the concern is that,
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  you know, we're just going to let our military
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  run wild in Mexico.
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  And I don't-
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  We've got to figure out the partnership in that, right?
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  Yeah, there is absolutely a partnership in that. And I think that's what this does. It enhances our ability to broaden that partnership and actually get some work done.
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  Their position seems to be at least publicly as, hey, we're going to take care of this problem and we're going to be more aggressive on this.
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  And actually, I just read in the Intel Bulletin this morning, they've certainly ramped up their enforcement efforts in Mexico over the last couple of months.
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  And you got to wonder if that's because of the fear of the tariffs and some of the other economic pressure.
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  I mean, for those people who don't know, I mean, Mexico, their number one trading partner is the United States.
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  It used to be China.
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  It's now the United States.
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  So you got a lot of big companies, a lot of people that are calling the president and calling their politicians in Mexico saying, hey, you need to figure out how to play ball with Trump and or the U.S. government because this impacts our bottom line.
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  and that's the reality of it.
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  Yeah, it can literally economically crush them.
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  Absolutely, and that's a concern.
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  And I think, and that's the leverage we have.
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  And again, not to be political,
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  or because I know, again,
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  I know he's a polarizing figure,
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  but I think that's what he's doing.
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  And I don't want to speak for him,
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  but that's my sense of that.
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  That's the advantage,
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  some of the things that he's doing.
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  I agree with you.
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  I think that's what he was using the tariffs for
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  was literally a negotiation tactic.
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  You know, I'm sure he's well aware that we do need our partners and our allies.
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  And I'm looking forward to hopefully seeing a real partnership between Mexico and the United States to try to stamp this issue out.
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  Because if anything, it would help us align with Mexico and helping our ally eliminate the corruption within.
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  And that would be what I would hope for is to see them actually truly have the ability to live a life without under the thumb of, let's be honest, a terrorist organization.
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  Yeah.
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  I know people from Mexico that have family in Mexico.
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  And I get little insights of what goes on and how the streets in certain towns are controlled.
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  And it's no way for anyone to live.
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  It really isn't.
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  It's a sad state.
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  100% agree with you.
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  In such a beautiful country, and there's so many people down there who really, truly do want to make a positive difference.
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  But it's a struggle when you look at the number of politicians that have been attacked.
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  Look at the number of police officers who've lost their lives.
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  I mean, it's scary.
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  It is. It's a sad state of affairs, and it's unfortunate for the people there.
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  Let's shift to the northern border, though, because how serious is the trafficking through the Canadian border?
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  Trafficking of fentanyl into the U.S. from Canada isn't, from my perspective, a huge problem.
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  Certainly not like it is from our southern border.
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  Canada has some issues itself because they've been very progressive in their drug laws,
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  and it really is starting to bite them in the butt.
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  You look at the super labs
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  and the amount of fentanyl seizures in Canada
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  and the problem that they're having in Canada
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  is, oh gosh, it's getting out of hand
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  just like it is in the United States.
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  As far as those drugs being smuggled into the US,
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  I haven't seen any significant numbers.
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  Certainly not like we do on the Southern border.
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  So most of it is staying in Canada?
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  Yeah, they're, I mean,
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  Mexico has a problem with fentanyl as well.
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  I mean, I think a report just came out like Tijuana is losing like 10 people a day to overdoses.
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  Just Tijuana, I mean, that's just one little city, right?
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  And Canada is having tenfold that problem.
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  They're really struggling.
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  I know they went through a crazy problem with methamphetamines too.
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  With meth in general, once the Hells Angels took hold of that area up there for a long time.
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  and a couple of other biker gangs were dug in and starting to get in,
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  you know,
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  expand that market out there.
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  So I know that that happened years back.
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  Is a lot of the drugs though,
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  because is this true?
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  Is a lot of the drugs getting there?
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  Like the cartels,
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  if they're supplying us,
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  why are they not supplying cancer?
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  Are they coming through America and smuggling stuff across our border into
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  Canada?
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  Is that,
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  is that a true statement?
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  Is that something that's happening?
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  Yeah,
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  there,
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  there are,
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  there are cartel involvement in Canada as well.
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  Absolutely.
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  and they also have a problem with chemicals coming into Canada and like you said the labs we're
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  seeing more many the most manufacturing of fentanyl is occurring in Mexico but we've certainly seen an
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  increase in Canada but yeah I mean they're having the same issues and challenges that we are not at
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  the scale yet that that we have I mean it's unprecedented in the U.S. our demand for drugs
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  is out of hand here. But they are certainly having problems as well, unfortunately.
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  Yeah. So when did this drug issue really become big? Was it pretty much like in the mid to late
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  80s with the cocaine craze? Well, it really depends on, I mean,
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  if opioid specific was really the 1990s. As far as opioids?
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  Yeah. I mean, we had an opioid problem in the 1800s in the United States following the Civil
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  war. And if, if you really dive into our history, that was the first time we saw widespread
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  addiction. I mean, we were using morphine and opium for, for everything during the civil war.
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  And, and, and that caused widespread addiction. And, and, and after the war, those soldiers took
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  that back to their, you know, their homes, their communities. And we'd never seen anything like
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  that before. And, and, and we continued to use it because there wasn't any regulation. There wasn't
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  any, you know, it wasn't, wasn't anything preventing that, that widespread abuse.
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  And it just got worse and worse and worse.
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  And in the early 1900s, we started to, we started to clamp down on that.
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  In fact, the first federal ban of drugs was opium.
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  First time our government ever did that.
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  And so from the year, and then, and then because of what happened during the civil war, we really
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  turned away from pain management.
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  I mean, we used opioids for pain, but if you had an opioid prescription from the early 1900s to 1996, we know the date, you were probably dying.
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  I'm not saying there wasn't some exceptions or people that fooled the system, but if you had an opioid prescription, it wasn't subjective.
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  It was probably objective, meaning the doctor could look at you and see that your arm was in eight different directions and you were probably in pain.
• 24:01
  You couldn't just go in there and say, my back hurts and walk away with a 30-day script of hydrocodone.
• 24:07
  Again, I know there's some exceptions, but for the most part, that's how we treated pain management.
• 24:11
  And there was this big, big push in the United States to change that.
• 24:14
  And we now know that the pharmaceutical industry was behind that.
• 24:18
  Purdue was the big one.
• 24:20
  And they weren't alone, but they were the big one.
• 24:22
  And there was millions and millions of dollars into this campaign to change the way that we treated pain.
• 24:29
  and they would tell doctors that,
• 24:31
  hey, we need to, you know,
• 24:33
  we've advanced the society since the Civil War.
• 24:36
  And the research is clear now
• 24:38
  that this isn't as addictive.
• 24:40
  And they were just beating this drum for 10, 20 years.
• 24:44
  And it worked.
• 24:45
  In 1996, we added pain as a fifth vital sign.
• 24:48
  And at the same time, they said,
• 24:50
  oh, and we have the pill for you, OxyContin.
• 24:53
  And it's interesting,
• 24:54
  if you read some of the FOIA and Sunshine Laws
• 24:56
  and all the, some of the things that have come out now,
• 24:59
  you know, internally Purdue was talking about how this was going to be for terminal cancer patients,
• 25:03
  but they agreed that that, that pool of people was too small. And then all of a sudden it was
• 25:08
  going to be for everyone. Right. And, and that's exactly what they did is they marketed for everyone
• 25:12
  and they, they did it under the guise that less than 1% of people will become addicted. And we
• 25:16
  know that's not true. It's all in the name of profit. Really? It was, I mean, we went, we had
• 25:21
  a pill that, um, I think it took them, you know, three or four years after it was released, they
• 25:28
  were spending $200 or $300 million a year just on marketing. It was incredible. And this was a $35
• 25:34
  billion pill. And again, they weren't alone, but this was a big one. And then you look at what that
• 25:39
  did. I mean, we went from, think about that, from the early 1900s to 1996, if you had an opioid,
• 25:45
  you were statistically speaking, probably dying. And then we went from, no, they're safe. So in
• 25:52
  1996 on, you had your wisdom to have taken out,
• 25:57
  you probably went home with 30 60 90 pills no questions asked Your kid hurt their arm throwing baseball in a little league game He probably went home with 30 60 90 pills no question to ask And then they were going after the doctors who were concerned about this potential problem of
• 26:13
  overprescribing. And they would threaten their licenses. And then the government started looking
• 26:18
  at this and they started forming the, you know, Congress would form these committees and they'd
• 26:21
  have these doctors on there. And we now know a lot of these doctors on these committees were paid for
• 26:25
  by Purdue and the other pharmaceutical companies. So to give you an idea, by 2012, I think it was
• 26:33
  81, it was 81 prescriptions, 81 or 82 prescriptions per a hundred people, not a hundred thousand,
• 26:40
  not a million, but per a hundred people. So 81 prescriptions per a hundred people,
• 26:46
  opioid prescriptions. I mean, we were, it was literally, we're just giving it out for anyone.
• 26:50
  Out of every hundred, out of every group of 100, there was 81 people on opioids.
• 26:55
  There were 81 prescriptions, yeah.
• 26:57
  Or 81 prescriptions.
• 26:58
  Yeah, prescriptions.
• 27:00
  And to give you an idea, right now, it's come down quite a bit.
• 27:02
  Right now, I think the national average is about 37 and a half per 100 people.
• 27:07
  And so one of the things I look at, especially when I travel, is I look at the counties and
• 27:11
  what counties are suffering the most because we do see a correlation of high opioid use,
• 27:16
  legal opioid use to people turning to the illegal market.
• 27:20
  And that's exactly what happened in the 1990s.
• 27:22
  When we were giving opioids out like it was candy and we saw more and more opioids out there, a lot of doctors are like, whoa, this is crazy.
• 27:31
  We've been lied to.
• 27:32
  We've been fooled by Purdue and these other companies.
• 27:35
  We can't just give this stuff out.
• 27:36
  We've got to be a little more responsible than this.
• 27:38
  So they started to wean some of their patients or even just go cold turkey.
• 27:43
  And a lot of these patients would just go to other doctors.
• 27:47
  And that's when we saw the pill mills pop up.
• 27:49
  That's when we see the people get in their vehicles and they would just drive around the whole regions and they would just get many pills as they could.
• 27:55
  And if they couldn't, they'd turn to the street for heroin.
• 28:00
  So we saw a huge spike in heroin.
• 28:02
  We hadn't seen that type of spike in heroin since the Vietnam War.
• 28:06
  And then that's how fentanyl came in.
• 28:08
  So can we, this is an assumption, by the way, but from all the information you're giving me, does it not sound like, the cartels are part of the problem,
• 28:16
  but the bigger problem to addiction is internally
• 28:20
  and kind of fueled or was started by the big pharma corporations.
• 28:27
  Because, I mean, I would say they knew they were peddling something addictive.
• 28:30
  They had to.
• 28:31
  I mean, the more you give someone, if they like it,
• 28:33
  they're going to want more of it.
• 28:35
  Yeah, and I agree.
• 28:36
  And let me say this real quick.
• 28:39
  Yeah, I have a problem with the pharmaceutical industry.
• 28:41
  I have a problem with the cartels.
• 28:43
  I have a problem with China.
• 28:44
  But we do need to reduce the demand
• 28:46
  Because at the end of the day, it is our demand that fuels them and that allows them to be successful and exploit these people.
• 28:52
  But to your question, yeah, absolutely.
• 28:54
  I mean, we had an industry that became billionaires.
• 28:58
  Who created the demand, though?
• 28:59
  Like, if we had to say where it started, how was that demand created?
• 29:04
  They created the demand.
• 29:05
  I mean, when we went from, when we added pain as a fifth vital sign and they started to give 30, 60, 90 pills, no questions asked for just the, I mean, you ever been by a pill mill?
• 29:18
  I mean, we used to work those all the time at DEA and, you know, they'd open up at, let's say seven in the morning and by 5.30, you'd have a hundred people waiting in line, you know, and I can tell you tons of cases, investigations we worked.
• 29:31
  I mean, we had a bad guy who was putting homeless people on buses, and he'd take these people to the pill mills.
• 29:37
  They'd go in there and they'd fake, you know, my back hurts, my knee hurts, whatever.
• 29:41
  They'd get these scripts, no questions asked.
• 29:44
  You know, they'd just pay their $25, $30 copay, and then they would be bused to a pharmacy, and they would fill these scripts.
• 29:52
  And then they would be paid $20, $30 or maybe a bottle of liquor or something.
• 29:55
  And I mean, this was widespread abuse and it still happens a little bit, but yeah, it absolutely was fueled in the 1990s. I mean, they were out of control. I mean, it wasn't until 2012 that we, actually 2013, when our government actually declared legal opioids a crisis. You know, 2013, and no one even knows that.
• 30:16
  So it sounds like that was the gateway, basically, like everything that happened and how it was handled by the pharmaceutical industry.
• 30:25
  Well, the companies that were involved in pushing opioids anyway, that's what it sounds like.
• 30:30
  That's what got people to start seeking and craving other illicit and illegal drugs for their own use.
• 30:36
  Because once it was shut off, like, hey, you no longer get a prescription for this.
• 30:39
  Now you got to seek another solution to your addiction.
• 30:42
  Then enters, you know, the increase in illegal drug use and distribution.
• 30:46
  And am I connecting the dots there correctly?
• 30:50
  Yes, sir.
• 30:50
  Yeah, absolutely.
• 30:51
  We saw a substantial increase in heroin use.
• 30:55
  And we know there's been a lot of research.
• 30:58
  At least 80% of heroin users started with legal opioid prescriptions.
• 31:04
  Let me repeat that.
• 31:06
  80% or more of heroin users started with a legal opioid prescription.
• 31:11
  I think that's one of the most important things you've said so far as far as it relates to the drug demand and use in the United States and illegal drugs.
• 31:21
  And what's crazy is when you were given the history on this earlier, the reality is how is it okay?
• 31:28
  How does our administration think it's okay to market and advertise prescription drugs on TV and radio and other media?
• 31:37
  The average person has no idea what these things do.
• 31:39
  It's just associating the name of their head.
• 31:41
  So when they go to the doctor, like, oh, I heard this might cure this.
• 31:44
  Can you please give this to me?
• 31:46
  Isn't that ridiculous?
• 31:47
  I agree.
• 31:48
  Let me throw another one at you.
• 31:49
  This is an opioid related, but it's the same problem.
• 31:53
  You've heard we have an Adderall shortage in the United States.
• 31:55
  I heard something about that.
• 31:56
  Yeah.
• 31:56
  We don't have a short shortage.
• 31:58
  We can't meet the demand.
• 31:59
  Is that what it is?
• 31:59
  They can't be fast enough.
• 32:01
  So you look at the pharmaceutical industry and what they did in the 1990s and really prior to the 1990s,
• 32:07
  when they were orchestrating this event to change the way we dealt with pain.
• 32:11
  they have been telling us for the last 10, 20 years that our kids need stimulants in this medicine.
• 32:20
  And if you look at the numbers and you start going into high school, middle school, elementary school,
• 32:26
  it's incredible that you see these slight increases of people using these stimulants,
• 32:30
  kids using these stimulants, and now they've spiked substantially.
• 32:34
  I mean, monitoring the future study, which is a huge study out of University of Michigan,
• 32:39
  and doing it probably 25, 30 years.
• 32:42
  Last year, I think it was 15% of high school seniors
• 32:45
  now say they're under some medical stimulant
• 32:48
  from a doctor, 15%.
• 32:50
  And then when you, again,
• 32:51
  when you go into middle school and elementary school,
• 32:54
  it's increased substantially.
• 32:56
  And it doesn't make sense.
• 32:57
  I mean, I don't study statistics,
• 32:59
  but I do know that with statistics,
• 33:01
  there's an average or range,
• 33:04
  I forget what they call that.
• 33:05
  And then when you look, when you see those spikes,
• 33:08
  you look at them, why are those spikes?
• 33:09
  And then we're seeing that.
• 33:11
  Yeah.
• 33:11
  Well, what you do is you start to correlate the data.
• 33:14
  I mean, you're correlating the data.
• 33:16
  And then after that, outside of correlating the data, you start to recognize patterns.
• 33:21
  And so that's what you're seeing in these reports.
• 33:24
  It's like, hold on.
• 33:25
  There's a correlation here.
• 33:27
  Let me see.
• 33:28
  There's more Adderall or whatever types of drugs being prescribed, more demand for this
• 33:33
  drug, that drug.
• 33:35
  And you're seeing the spikes on these reports.
• 33:37
  Like, yeah, there's a correlation there.
• 33:38
  There's something going on.
• 33:38
  this is absolutely connected. So it's crazy that we have this data and yet we don't really do
• 33:43
  anything about it. Or on the surface, it doesn't look that way anyway. No, I agree. And what's
• 33:49
  interesting is we're supposed to use this data. Like one of the things DEA does, a lot of people
• 33:53
  don't know this, is they have what we call quotas. And working with the FDA, DEA regulates the amount
• 33:59
  of drugs. And I've never worked in this section, so I hope I'm not messing up the description of
• 34:05
  this, but basically what they do is they monitor and they regulate the amount of the drugs that a
• 34:12
  pharmaceutical company manufactures. And like I said, we can no longer meet the demand of Adderall.
• 34:20
  So people were freaking out like, where's our Adderall? Is our Adderall? So what do they do?
• 34:24
  They go to their congressman, they go to their senators, and then they come to DEA and say,
• 34:28
  hey, you need to increase your quotas. And if you follow the money, again, this goes right back to
• 34:33
  the pharmaceutical industry, and they are putting a lot of pressure on their senators and congressmen
• 34:38
  to tell DEA and the FDA and the federal government, hey, you need to increase
• 34:41
  the manufacturing numbers. That's exactly what we did. So if you look at the number of,
• 34:46
  let me time myself out for just a second. I know there are kids out there who need certain things.
• 34:52
  I get it. I'm not telling people how to parent, but it doesn't make sense when you look at the
• 34:56
  overall numbers. We are feeding our kids drugs at an earlier age. These stimulates, and it's already
• 35:02
  having impact. I work with law enforcement every state and the number of narcotic agents who've
• 35:08
  told me that, hey, we've already seen an increase in methamphetamine and cocaine arrests from young
• 35:12
  people. If you look at the number of people dying from psychostimulants, cocaine and methamphetamine,
• 35:18
  it's increased. And sadly, I think it's going to continue to increase, especially for our young
• 35:23
  people. The same thing, it really pisses me off. The same thing that happened in the 1990s
• 35:28
  with the pharmaceutical industry targeting opioids happen with psychostimulants.
• 35:33
  And we just let it happen.
• 35:36
  And that's a trend in the next five, 10 years.
• 35:39
  People like me are going to be talking about in schools after the fact,
• 35:43
  because we're a reactive society.
• 35:45
  We're never proactive.
• 35:46
  I have said that more than once.
• 35:48
  I agree with you.
• 35:49
  We are way too reactive, way too reactive.
• 35:52
  So even if we get, the cartels are an issue regardless.
• 35:56
  I mean, it's everything from sex trafficking, violence, you name everything.
• 35:59
  It's not just drugs.
• 36:00
  So we do got to get a handle on that.
• 36:02
  But it sounds like our drug issue is not going to really make a difference until we change how we handle the pharmaceutical industry and the medical industry in general when it comes to these addictive prescription drugs.
• 36:15
  Yeah, and that's a challenge because that's where the money is.
• 36:18
  I mean, you look, we talked about the opioid crisis, and I told you about OxyContin and how by 2012 we hit like 80, 82 prescriptions per 100 people.
• 36:30
  In 2016, Congress passes, and it was pretty much an anonymous bill.
• 36:35
  I mean, both Republicans and Democrats supported it.
• 36:38
  And I forget the name of the bill, but it was basically to make DEA's job harder to go after suspicious drug suppliers.
• 36:46
  And if you follow the money, it's the pharmaceutical industry that puts money in both parties' pockets.
• 36:52
  And this was in 2016.
• 36:54
  We already had a problem.
• 36:55
  Isn't this crazy?
• 36:56
  So they're putting money in their pockets, but it's considered lobbying, right?
• 36:59
  And air quotes for people who aren't watching us.
• 37:01
  So it's lobbying.
• 37:03
  And they're able to influence policy by lobbying, right?
• 37:06
  And you can't go after them because the company is its own entity, which is kind of its own person.
• 37:12
  So you're not really directly going after the people making the actual decisions unless you can, well, Rico, I guess, right?
• 37:18
  Correlate their actions to what's going on in the company.
• 37:21
  Is that right?
• 37:22
  Am I on the right path there?
• 37:24
  Yeah, you're absolutely, yeah.
• 37:26
  It's frustrating.
• 37:27
  It really is.
• 37:28
  Yeah, very.
• 37:30
  It's like when they were convening committees and they put these doctors together.
• 37:34
  And we now know that a significant number of these doctors were bought and paid for by the companies that they were there to talk about.
• 37:41
  I mean, what kind of conflict of interest is that?
• 37:44
  At the end of the day, I just don't know how people can go to bed at night.
• 37:49
  How do they look at themselves in the mirror and then close their eyes and think, man, what are we doing?
• 37:54
  I mean, the greed and the – it's just disgusting.
• 37:57
  And that's something that really just, quite frankly, pisses me off as well.
• 38:01
  And so when Scheinbaum said, you know, President of Mexico, when she made that statement, people hated this, like all over X everywhere, especially the hard right conservatives were like, how dare she say that the only way we can hound the cartels or one way is to decrease the demand in the United States?
• 38:18
  Like we're craving it.
• 38:19
  So that's why it's being sold.
• 38:20
  So she is spot on that in that statement.
• 38:22
  But it's not the complete answer, but she is correct.
• 38:28
  you know it is a holistic answer right like you said i mean we gotta we gotta take we gotta we
• 38:34
  gotta have some challenge challenging questions and and and discussions within our own country
• 38:40
  and our own pharmaceutical industry and a lot of things not just them you know i know we're
• 38:44
  picking on them but i i also agree with the fact that we knew we need to reduce the demand i mean
• 38:49
  look at the global population of the world the u.s is about four maybe four and a half percent of
• 38:55
  the global population, the entire world population,
• 38:58
  we only represent 4 let say Yet we consume the most amount of drugs in the world And you can look at study after study after study We are the market right We the global market
• 39:08
  We are the market. And people can say, oh, you're thinking of third world countries. No.
• 39:15
  USC did a study back in 2019, and they looked at just first world countries, you know, the England,
• 39:21
  Germany, Italy, Australia, just the big countries, right? Your chances from dying from drugs are
• 39:29
  three times greater than those countries. The two lowest in the world, Italy and Japan,
• 39:33
  your chances from dying from drugs in the US, 27 times greater than those two countries.
• 39:38
  Your chances from dying from drugs in the US by age 50, greater than any of those countries.
• 39:43
  I mean, we have to reduce the demand. So- And it started by our own
• 39:48
  healthcare industry, for example, hooking our own people on this.
• 39:52
  Yeah. Yeah. That was certainly, certainly didn't hurt.
• 39:56
  That's a blunt way to say it, but I mean, that's what, what it is, right?
• 40:00
  Yeah. Yeah. I mean, we, a lot of people were exploiting from within.
• 40:04
  Let me, let me be clear. I'm not, I'm not saying that every doctor's bad.
• 40:08
  Like I'm with, I'm not saying that,
• 40:10
  but if you're looking at the facts and data and all of all the years,
• 40:14
  you know all of it back to when you're talking about the 90s and etc yeah it all leads back to
• 40:20
  that it really does and the greed of the people who are making the policy decisions it's insane
• 40:27
  i don't i don't disagree with you i i that's it is insane and that's the ethical and moral issues
• 40:33
  there that that's that's what that's what really bothers me i know there's criminal activity but
• 40:38
  but how do people again how do they how do they look themselves in the in the mirror and so brenton
• 40:43
  Do you know of anything that's being done now to help with that situation, with our prescription drug problem?
• 40:53
  Are they still focusing on that?
• 40:55
  Is that still something that's being looked at?
• 40:57
  Or did they kind of just step away from it after 96 or 97 and say, well, we did what we did.
• 41:03
  Now we're good.
• 41:05
  No, once it hit its peak, which was 2012.
• 41:08
  In 2013, our government says, hey, we have a problem.
• 41:11
  So in 2013?
• 41:12
  Yeah.
• 41:13
  So we've seen, we started to regulate it more.
• 41:15
  So we've seen a significant increase.
• 41:18
  So we went from, like I said, around 81, 82 prescriptions per 100 people to where we are now, which is 37 and a half, I believe, as of 2024.
• 41:27
  That's still quite a bit though.
• 41:28
  It is.
• 41:29
  And then, like I said, when I travel, I actually look at the states that I travel in and some states are significantly high.
• 41:37
  And to give you an example, the worst and the, well, the number one state in the United States for drug deaths is West Virginia.
• 41:46
  And if you look at the history of West Virginia, they were really ground zero for the opioid crisis.
• 41:50
  So there is a correlation there.
• 41:52
  And then if you start diving into the counties in West Virginia, there were six counties that had over 200 prescriptions per 100 people.
• 42:01
  200 plus prescriptions.
• 42:02
  And there's still a lot of, they're still struggling in West Virginia with overdoses and drug poisonings and legal opioids.
• 42:11
  And it's just, it's going to take some time.
• 42:14
  Is educating people enough though?
• 42:15
  I mean, a lot of people say, well, if you were educated or if you're educated about how these drugs affect you, you wouldn't take them or so easily take the prescription, for example.
• 42:26
  Is that a true statement?
• 42:27
  Is education enough?
• 42:29
  I think it's.
• 42:29
  Or is it?
• 42:30
  I'm sorry.
• 42:31
  Second part.
• 42:32
  I forgot.
• 42:32
  I didn't mean to cut it off.
• 42:33
  So here's the two part.
• 42:35
  Is education enough?
• 42:36
  And two, if they are educated,
• 42:38
  is it still enough to overcome the money
• 42:40
  behind the big pharma industry?
• 42:42
  Because with all the advertisements
• 42:44
  and everything that's going on behind them,
• 42:46
  peddling the drugs and associating it
• 42:49
  with its current use case, right?
• 42:55
  So I have a bad back, hence I need to use brand A, right?
• 42:58
  So is education enough?
• 43:00
  And is it enough to compete with the money
• 43:01
  that big pharma has?
• 43:02
  I don't think it's enough on its own, but I certainly think it's an important in the solution.
• 43:10
  To me, this is not a complex solution.
• 43:13
  I think it has to be holistic.
• 43:15
  I think it has to be different.
• 43:17
  I think we have to ramp up our efforts and our strategic focus on the two cartels.
• 43:26
  But I think the education part is important.
• 43:30
  It's one thing that I've really dedicated this portion of my life to, and it's why I started a nonprofit.
• 43:37
  I truly believe that information empowers people.
• 43:41
  I really do, especially young people.
• 43:44
  I know that we're going to be faced, or I know that they're going to be faced with a lot of decisions.
• 43:49
  And sometimes, even with the right information, they're still going to make bad decisions.
• 43:53
  But it does work.
• 43:55
  And there is a lot of research that says that people that have, especially young people that have the information, are less likely, not no, but less likely to make those bad decisions.
• 44:07
  But on its own, no.
• 44:09
  Again, I think we have to approach this from several different angles.
• 44:14
  And like you said, the second part of your question there, I mean, we're facing an industry that throws billions of dollars.
• 44:22
  and and it's always it's always that you look at smoking i mean we we've made we made a lot of
• 44:27
  progress at smoking especially for young people and now i mean what did what a lot of these
• 44:32
  companies do they turn their focus to like vaping and yeah and uh and marijuana and things like that
• 44:38
  so now we're we're we're starting the the same thing with this new generation trying to warn them
• 44:46
  just like we we did back you know 20 or 30 years ago on smoking right yeah it's it's like these um
• 44:52
  big pharma companies really have a huge hand in the social engineering or engineering of our
• 44:58
  culture. And I think the education part is important. I wanted your perspective on it because
• 45:03
  the only way to change a culture or a habit of a culture is to start with the youth and then
• 45:06
  generationally, eventually, you'll be able to make that change. So it's not going to be overnight,
• 45:10
  but we got to start. We got to start and stick to the plan. Sounds like that's exactly what you're
• 45:14
  doing with your two companies, with your nonprofit and your Eagle Six. Because even your Eagle Six,
• 45:19
  you train law enforcement on some of this stuff as well, right?
• 45:23
  We do, yeah.
• 45:24
  We get into more, you know, some other things,
• 45:26
  leadership and some other things that I have an interest in.
• 45:28
  But yeah, certainly.
• 45:30
  And I agree.
• 45:32
  I mean, if we can change a generation
• 45:34
  and get them to think differently,
• 45:36
  then that sets us up for success in the future.
• 45:40
  And that's what we need.
• 45:40
  Okay, well, back to the cartels.
• 45:42
  Are we on the right path so far?
• 45:43
  Are we?
• 45:44
  I mean, labeling them a terrorist organization,
• 45:46
  is that the right,
• 45:47
  is that the perfect way to start this
• 45:49
  by actually saying, yeah, it's a serious issue?
• 45:51
  I think so.
• 45:52
  Yeah, I mean, we got to address it.
• 45:54
  I mean, that's one thing I do like about,
• 45:56
  you know, that we're actually having
• 45:58
  this conversation nationally now.
• 45:59
  It's, you know, and I know that there's still people
• 46:01
  that are playing politics
• 46:02
  and because it came out of his mouth
• 46:04
  and there are people that have to just,
• 46:06
  you know, oppose it just because it was him.
• 46:08
  People are very team oriented.
• 46:10
  You know what I'm saying?
• 46:11
  Yeah, and, you know, Derek Maltz,
• 46:15
  I know there's been some change in the DEA
• 46:18
  this last couple of days,
• 46:19
  But, you know, he, I think he's still the acting administrator. I mean, he always says, and I steal this line, it's not a red issue or a blue issue. It's a red, white, blue issue. And I wholeheartedly agree. I mean, we've got to take off our R's and our D's and say, hey, you know, this is killing our country, especially our young people.
• 46:35
  And so I think I'm happy that we're having this discussion nationally.
• 46:40
  You know, I don't know how it's going to end up with us in Mexico, but hey, you know what?
• 46:47
  Both countries are at the table talking, and that's exactly what we need.
• 46:51
  We need action.
• 46:52
  Yeah, we do.
• 46:53
  Absolutely.
• 46:54
  And it is a, there's not like a blanket solution to this.
• 46:58
  I mean, we got to change our cultural perspective on how we use drugs and how we think drugs
• 47:03
  are beneficial to us, right?
• 47:05
  I think they need to stop letting big pharma advertise.
• 47:08
  That's got to stop.
• 47:10
  That's got to stop.
• 47:11
  Advertisement is meant for you to recognize a brand.
• 47:14
  And if you're at the point where you recognize a prescription drug brand,
• 47:17
  every day in your life, you're like, oh, Ozempic.
• 47:21
  I'm just throwing it out there, by the way.
• 47:22
  I'm not talking bad about it.
• 47:24
  But just saying, everybody knows it now, right?
• 47:25
  So the first thing you think when you want to lose weight is Ozempic.
• 47:28
  That's exactly what marketing does.
• 47:30
  And the fact that they're allowing big pharma to do that in America is ridiculous.
• 47:33
  I don't think any other country allows that currently.
• 47:37
  No, it's funny.
• 47:39
  When my four-hour class, I do dive into a little bit of the history of the pharmaceutical industry.
• 47:45
  And interestingly enough, it actually goes back to a guy named Arthur Sackler.
• 47:49
  And if you know that name, Sackler, that's because Richard Sackler was the head of Purdue during the release of 1996.
• 47:57
  But his uncle was a guy named Arthur.
• 47:58
  And Arthur was a doctor as well.
• 48:01
  but he was actually an advertising quote unquote genius.
• 48:06
  In fact, they say that he invented the wheel
• 48:09
  when it came to modern medical advertising.
• 48:11
  And a lot of things that he did back in the 50s
• 48:14
  are regulated today that they can't do.
• 48:19
  I mean, he was uber aggressive.
• 48:21
  I mean, pharmaceutical reps.
• 48:23
  He actually is the guy that started it.
• 48:25
  They called him detail man.
• 48:26
  So he was the first guy that said,
• 48:27
  we can't target patients. We can't target people because they're idiots. We need to go after the
• 48:35
  physicians and we need to keep records on them. And we need to educate the physicians that aren't
• 48:40
  prescribing enough. And we need to use the ones that are and reward them and use them to educate
• 48:46
  the ones that aren't prescribing enough. And he was just very aggressive. And if you look at his
• 48:51
  history and how successful he made the pharmaceutical industry. I mean, Pfizer, I mean,
• 48:58
  Terramizin that was released in 1950, he made them a household name. This was 30 or 40 years
• 49:03
  before Viagra came out. I mean, that's just one example. Valium, Diazepam. I mean, he made them
• 49:09
  the first pharmaceutical to make a billion dollars in sales. That's crazy. A billion dollars in sales.
• 49:14
  That's crazy. Absolutely. And it was very in-your-face aggressive advertising. And like I
• 49:19
  said it may not seem like it but there are a lot of restrictions on them you know i think we both
• 49:27
  agree there probably needs to be more um but a lot of the current restrictions are because of some of
• 49:32
  the stuff that he invented uh so and it's and it's just fascinating because here's here's a
• 49:37
  Sackler and then you look you know 40 years later his his nephew Richard Sackler would would make
• 49:43
  them billionaires and then run them into the ground that just that just speaks to the um
• 49:48
  that just speaks to how far they will go to make a dollar because if they're if they're looking at
• 49:54
  their product that that that can be addictive for example can be addictive and they know this they
• 50:00
  know that certain drugs have side effects and they're knowingly advertising it in the ways that
• 50:07
  they do that just tells you what they really care about are they really caring about treating people
• 50:11
  and offering them pain management or they just really looking for as much profit that they can
• 50:16
  make yeah i'd i'd make an argument that uh at least with purdue they were it was about profit
• 50:23
  i mean we know that from a lot of internal documents and and i think you could make that
• 50:27
  argument with a lot of the companies i mean at least you could certainly a question you you we
• 50:32
  could ask let's also ramp up in the food industry you know i mean the fielders that i actually did
• 50:37
  a show where i did deep dive on this and the the ingredients that are used in food here in america
• 50:43
  would never be used in the EU.
• 50:44
  They're labeled as poisonous substances,
• 50:46
  but yet we're consuming them.
• 50:48
  It was about almost a three-hour episode
• 50:50
  where I really dove into all this,
• 50:52
  and it's ridiculous what we're allowed to use here
• 50:54
  and what the FDA says is suitable for consumption
• 50:57
  that in the EU they wouldn't even touch.
• 50:59
  Not even touch?
• 51:00
  Even the foods we have, for example,
• 51:02
  like Kraft, let's say macaroni and cheese,
• 51:04
  if it's shipped to the EU,
• 51:05
  or let's say even if it was to Italy,
• 51:08
  the cheese substance they use,
• 51:10
  the powdered cheese substance,
• 51:11
  is entirely different to those countries than what we're consuming,
• 51:15
  what's considered acceptable for us to have.
• 51:17
  So it's not, like you said, it's not just the pharma industry.
• 51:20
  It's ridiculous that it's like money before health, right?
• 51:25
  Money before looking out for the welfare of the actual people.
• 51:29
  It is.
• 51:30
  I was in Germany last week,
• 51:32
  and I had some French fries, and I was eating ketchup, right?
• 51:39
  And I was like, why does this ketchup taste like different?
• 51:43
  And I realized it was like real, it was fresh.
• 51:48
  Just tomatoes and maybe a little sugar.
• 51:50
  It wasn't.
• 51:51
  Some vinegar.
• 51:52
  Yeah.
• 51:53
  And, and, and, you know, and I actually had this conversation with someone else, very similar
• 51:57
  conversation about like the food.
• 52:01
  I mean, you taste the difference, right?
• 52:02
  And you come back and you read our labels and.
• 52:04
  And then, like you said, none of this stuff would even be legal in some of those countries.
• 52:09
  What was it?
• 52:10
  Yeah, at the end of the day, it's all about profits, unfortunately.
• 52:13
  It is.
• 52:13
  And what's funny about the food, when you're talking about the labels, once they said that every manufacturer had to actually list all the ingredients, I noticed that the labels got really tiny and I need a magnified glass to read them.
• 52:25
  They don't want us to read them.
• 52:27
  Well, let's talk about your nonprofit, the Only 2 Milligrams Inc.
• 52:32
  let's talk about that and what you offer and then how people can contact your company
• 52:37
  to procure your services.
• 52:41
  So I'm the executive director. I started this nonprofit
• 52:45
  officially in early 2024 when we got IRS
• 52:48
  designation as a 501c3. Our entire board of directors is
• 52:53
  retired DEA agents.
• 52:57
  And like I said, our mission has been drug education,
• 53:01
  specifically illicit fentanyl, but we are expanding that and looking at other ways that we can deal
• 53:08
  with trends and things that are impacting our communities because ultimately our goal is to
• 53:13
  make our community safer. And so we're looking at ways to expand our reach and to get into other
• 53:21
  things other than just drug education. My website is at only2mg.com. So it's O-N-L-Y and then just
• 53:29
  the number two, it's not spelled out. And then MG, which stands for milligrams.com. And you can,
• 53:36
  you can learn more about the presentations I do, my schedules on there. You know, if you want my
• 53:42
  bio, things like that, uh, uh, you can, you can contact me, my information's on there. If I don't
• 53:49
  get back to you right away, it's because I'm flying or teaching, uh, or, or I'm on a podcast.
• 53:54
  so right like this one that's right uh uh i travel uh throughout the u.s uh last year i did 54
• 54:03
  main presentations uh in about 20 states so that's quite a bit um i uh i self-fund a lot of what i did
• 54:15
  last year um i can't i'm not a rich person i can't i can't continue to do that but i but i don't want
• 54:22
  money to get in the way of this. So when an organization calls me, if they can't afford to
• 54:27
  fund my travel out there, then I'll find a way somehow. And that's typically through my
• 54:32
  for-profit organization, Eagle Six Training. I pretty much put all that money into only 2MG
• 54:39
  because like I said, I don't want someone to say, hey, we can't afford to have you out here.
• 54:43
  No, I mean, I'll find a way to get out there because this discussion is too important not to
• 54:48
  have. Well, and as you said earlier, man, the education is very important in all this, and
• 54:53
  that's where it really starts. It really is. And yeah, you know, and I started this with actually
• 54:58
  law enforcement because, you know, like I said, I navigated in that world for 30 years,
• 55:01
  and I still work in that world. But now, I mean, these are wildly popular with just the public.
• 55:09
  I still get usually specific sectors, you know, a lot of healthcare, a lot of education,
• 55:14
  a lot of people that are in the treatment recovery, you know, a lot of law enforcement,
• 55:19
  but I wish I could get more parents and just general public. That's been a struggle. I'm not
• 55:26
  alone. I remember when I first started this, a friend of mine, retired agent out in California
• 55:31
  said because if you get more than 1 of the families in the room then good luck because it just not going to happen And I remember when he first said that I like come on now you know And and I had a I had a a specific
• 55:47
  presentation I was doing just for families and I had six people show up.
• 55:54
  Wow. You know,
• 55:56
  out of several thousand people in this particular school that I was working
• 55:59
  with. So I experienced that firsthand. I mean, so, like I said,
• 56:03
  most of the folks that come are, you know, from those industries that I talked about, but, uh,
• 56:08
  but I would love to, I'd love to see more people just give a damn and really want to educate
• 56:13
  themselves. And that's one of the things that I try to tell people as well, uh, is in all my
• 56:17
  presentations is, is take this information, do some research, call me, I'll help you with that
• 56:24
  and be a force multiplier, you know, take this information back to your homes, back to your,
• 56:29
  your communities, your Rotary Club, church, whatever. I mean, let's have this discussion.
• 56:36
  I mean, we're losing 300 people every single day in this country to drugs. That's about one person
• 56:42
  every five to six minutes. And we know that of the total numbers that we're losing, about two
• 56:46
  thirds because of one drug, fentanyl. And I can tell you after 30 years in law enforcement,
• 56:52
  I've never seen a drug more impactful. I really haven't. I mean, this has changed the drug
• 56:56
  landscape. And education is such an important piece. And like I said, something I've devoted
• 57:03
  this part of my life to doing. And I hope that I can be a force multiplier and give people a
• 57:10
  foundation that they can take the information back and they can have these discussions.
• 57:14
  And at the end of the day, knowledge is power. And that's what we have to do. We have to make
• 57:20
  people more knowledgeable. I agree. And I hope that people don't avoid these sessions because
• 57:25
  they don't want it to be in their face that it's confirming what they already know.
• 57:31
  Yes, there is a problem.
• 57:32
  Yeah.
• 57:33
  That could be a case too.
• 57:35
  Some people don't want to, they have an idea that there's a problem, but they really don't
• 57:40
  want it confirmed.
• 57:41
  I've had parents actually tell me out of sight, out of mind.
• 57:45
  Basically what I was saying.
• 57:47
  Yeah.
• 57:47
  Yeah.
• 57:48
  Yeah.
• 57:48
  And at first I was like, but now I just tell them, do you realize that someone's going
• 57:53
  to have this discussion?
• 57:54
  I mean, if it's not you, you're the parent.
• 57:57
  If it's not you, then it's going to be social media.
• 57:59
  It's going to be a friend.
• 58:00
  It's going to be a drug trafficker.
• 58:02
  Someone's going to have this discussion with your child.
• 58:06
  You know, and it's just, it makes me sad.
• 58:10
  It really does.
• 58:11
  I mean, here's an example.
• 58:12
  I won't say the school district, but I was invited to a school district that wanted to
• 58:15
  have, wanted to provide different resources for parents.
• 58:19
  And they, so it was drugs.
• 58:20
  It was teen pregnancy.
• 58:21
  It was nutrition.
• 58:22
  It was suicide.
• 58:24
  It was online predators.
• 58:26
  I mean, my goodness, they probably had 10 experts in different fields come in.
• 58:30
  And then they said, we get it.
• 58:32
  Parents work.
• 58:33
  They're busy.
• 58:33
  We're going to do one on a weekend.
• 58:35
  And we're going to do one on a weeknight.
• 58:37
  And we're going to have 10 experts in all these different fields come in two different times.
• 58:42
  And I was the drug guy.
• 58:44
  You know how many folks had come in for my class?
• 58:46
  Zero.
• 58:47
  And it wasn't me.
• 58:49
  The other classes, a lot of zeros.
• 58:51
  They had 17 parents show up total for the two different days. Total. This was a huge school
• 58:58
  district. And who do you think when, when, when, when, when daughter gets pregnant or something
• 59:03
  happens, who do you think gets the blame? You know, well, you didn't do enough. You didn't do
• 59:07
  enough No people got to get involved And and it just it aggravating It really is Do you think they should make these this information like a mandatory class like they they do Used to you years ago in school I remember when I was going to school
• 59:22
  that there was a class that you would have to attend
• 59:25
  to where they would address these issues.
• 59:28
  Or it would literally be like a rally, for example,
• 59:32
  where the whole school, like it's during school time
• 59:33
  and you have to be there and they would give these presentations.
• 59:36
  Are they still allowing that? Are they still doing that?
• 59:38
  Yeah, and I love when they do.
• 59:39
  I was up in rural Missouri in the middle of the state, on the very top of the state, I don't know, probably two or three weeks ago.
• 59:46
  And I got to address a couple of school districts, and that was wonderful.
• 59:49
  And I love when schools do that.
• 59:51
  We even had some parents show up, which was even better, right?
• 59:54
  Because they're supporting their children.
• 59:55
  They're supporting the school district.
• 59:57
  Some states have, I think Oregon just came on and said they're going to require that now.
• 1:00:05
  You know, I know people are going to hear this and say, oh, no, read and write.
• 1:00:08
  And yeah, we should be teaching our kids to read and write.
• 1:00:10
  I'm totally with you.
• 1:00:12
  But let me tell you, these are conversations that we're not having in the home.
• 1:00:17
  So if a school can bring someone in like me or anyone who come in and give their children
• 1:00:22
  accurate information to help them successfully navigate some of these challenges they're
• 1:00:28
  going to face, then why not?
• 1:00:30
  I mean, why can't we get behind this?
• 1:00:31
  And that's why I created my Shattering Dreams presentation.
• 1:00:34
  is specifically for students is to give them the information
• 1:00:38
  and, again, empower them to make better decisions
• 1:00:42
  when they're faced with these challenges.
• 1:00:44
  Maybe these sessions that, for example,
• 1:00:47
  like what you offer should be something that,
• 1:00:50
  let's say, district administration at a school should have.
• 1:00:53
  It should be like a mandatory, you know,
• 1:00:55
  hey, school's starting again, summer's over.
• 1:00:58
  Let's get, you know, it's all part of their professional development training, right?
• 1:01:01
  they should integrate this as part of that um have have you have you seen any district do that
• 1:01:08
  a few yeah yeah and and there are i mean i i know some folks in the same space uh you know my space
• 1:01:14
  has been kind of a lot of adults a lot of law enforcement i know some people some people that
• 1:01:20
  are specifically focused in that in that uh space for for students and and they've been pretty
• 1:01:25
  successful uh okay well that's a positive yeah yeah that's a positive and then when you when you
• 1:01:30
  do these big rallies, what's out of school is, do you get a positive reaction from, from students
• 1:01:34
  there? Yeah. And let me tell you, it, uh, it really drives me. It really does. When you, when
• 1:01:40
  you have a student come up to you, I had a college student come up to me at a different event that I
• 1:01:46
  was at probably a month after I did this particular, uh, uh, session. And, uh, he was like, Hey,
• 1:01:54
  can I, and I didn't even know who it was. He was like, can I tell you something? And I'm like, yeah.
• 1:01:56
  And he goes, I saw you speak.
• 1:01:58
  And, you know, I've been really, you know, making some really bad decisions in my life.
• 1:02:03
  You made me think about some things.
• 1:02:05
  And, you know, thank you.
• 1:02:07
  You know, I mean, and I was almost in tears.
• 1:02:09
  I mean, just even thinking about it really just kind of moves me.
• 1:02:11
  And I can't tell you how many young people who have come up to me in middle school students and just hug you and say, you know, thank you.
• 1:02:18
  You know, because they're getting really impactful information and that no one's given them before.
• 1:02:24
  And that, I've got to tell you, that has been the overwhelming response.
• 1:02:29
  I have had zero, and I hope I'm not jinxing myself here,
• 1:02:33
  I've had zero negative response from talking to young people.
• 1:02:37
  It's just, oh, it's been a wonderful experience.
• 1:02:40
  We need to continue the education.
• 1:02:43
  We definitely need to change how prescription drugs are handled in America period And yeah the cartels are definitely a problem that we need to get a hold of especially if they the ones who are responsible for I mean the majority of all drugs
• 1:02:57
  that are being imported into the U.S. or smuggled into the U.S. It's crazy. It's not an easy issue
• 1:03:05
  to get a hold of. I mean, you know better than I, you were in law enforcement. This is what you did.
• 1:03:10
  And before we go, though, I got to ask you,
• 1:03:14
  have you seen a positive change at all in getting a handle on the situation?
• 1:03:18
  I mean, we talked a lot, got a lot of history,
• 1:03:20
  but have you seen a positive change?
• 1:03:22
  Or are we in the same place?
• 1:03:24
  Are we taking steps backwards?
• 1:03:26
  Where do you see us at now?
• 1:03:29
  I have seen a positive change.
• 1:03:31
  I mean, we're nowhere out of this mess.
• 1:03:36
  I mean, we are in an illicit fentanyl crisis.
• 1:03:38
  And, you know, we're, like I said, we're losing 300 people a day.
• 1:03:42
  And the majority of those people are because of this one drug.
• 1:03:44
  We're having this discussion more.
• 1:03:46
  I think that's a healthy thing.
• 1:03:48
  You know, I think that's going to hopefully lead to more solutions and more people that
• 1:03:52
  are, that are, you know, hitting the ground and actually trying to work towards solutions.
• 1:03:58
  So yeah, I'm optimistic.
• 1:04:00
  I think we have seen some progress and I think we need to have a long way to go.
• 1:04:05
  I think, you know, one thing we didn't talk about was the stigma.
• 1:04:07
  You know, how we treat people that are struggling with substance use disorder, with addiction.
• 1:04:12
  You know, I think that's slowly getting better, but it's, you know, that's going to be part of the solution is how do we deal with that as well?
• 1:04:24
  Yeah, the bottom line is I've seen a, I think it's more positive, but it's been a slow movement.
• 1:04:31
  How's that?
• 1:04:32
  Well, at least you're seeing it as a positive.
• 1:04:34
  As someone who's still involved, at least you're seeing things start to go the right
• 1:04:40
  direction and getting a handle on all this.
• 1:04:43
  So, well, I think that's my time, your time for now.
• 1:04:47
  Doesn't mean we won't connect again.
• 1:04:49
  I think we will.
• 1:04:50
  I'll stay in touch with you.
• 1:04:51
  I'd like to have you back.
• 1:04:53
  But yeah, thank you, Brian.
• 1:04:54
  And again, tell everybody your websites and I'll try to put all that our show notes as
• 1:04:59
  well.
• 1:04:59
  So when they listen to this, they have the links.
• 1:05:00
  so again you have only two milligrams ink and then of course you have the eagle six training
• 1:05:06
  and uh yeah thank you very much want anything else you want to add no i appreciate that your
• 1:05:13
  time and and happy to reconnect anytime uh if someone wants to get in touch with me only 2mg
• 1:05:19
  is the best way to to read more about it or about me and and and to contact me and i'm happy to
• 1:05:25
  happy to help in any capacity I can.
• 1:05:28
  Okay. Well, appreciate it.
• 1:05:29
  And thanks for adjusting your time for me.
• 1:05:33
  All good.
• 1:05:34
  Yeah, man.
• 1:05:35
  Hey, great conversation.
• 1:05:36
  A lot of good info.
• 1:05:37
  Thank you very much for being on the show.
• 1:05:39
  Appreciate it.
• 1:05:40
  Okay. World of Blaze listeners, as always,
• 1:05:42
  thanks for listening.
• 1:05:42
  And don't forget to like, subscribe,
• 1:05:44
  share the show and click the notification button.
• 1:05:48
  Have a great day.
• 1:05:49
  I want to taste your content,
• 1:05:52
  hold you back and feel the tension.
• 1:05:55
  Devils hide behind redemption
• 1:05:58
  Honesty is a one way gate to hell
• 1:06:01
  Bye.