Outgoing Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte on Thursday urged incoming Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. to exert “stronger pressure” on the nation’s illicit drug industry during his upcoming administration, the Manila Bulletin reported.
President Duterte said during a regular public address on May 12 that he hoped Marcos Jr. will continue an effort to eradicate the trade and use of illegal drugs in the Philippines established by Duterte’s administration.
The leader said he “would insist on a continuance of the drug war” during Marcos’s impending administration, which is slated to begin on June 30.
“This will not stop because of the lure of millions that will be gotten by the businessmen, the traffickers and the drug lords,” Duterte said on Thursday.
“This one, it has to be war. You cannot say it’s just a special operation of the police or the military. It cannot be because this thing is a very sinister and a virulent activity that would affect the life of the nation,” he added.
President Duterte’s “war on drugs” has been among his administration’s most infamous campaigns during its six-year span. Illicit methamphetamine gangs largely led by Chinese nationals have flooded the Philippines with the drug in recent years. The phenomenon has fueled an ongoing drug crisis in the Philippines surrounding the highly addictive and deadly “shabu,” which is the Philippine slang term for crystal methamphetamine.
While profiling Duterte’s crackdown on the illicit trade and use of methamphetamines in the Philippines in December 2016, Reuters highlighted “an uncomfortable truth” at the heart of the campaign.
In this Monday, Feb. 15, 2021, photo provided by the Malacanang Presidential Photographers Division, Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte gestures as he meets members of the Inter-Agency Task Force on the Emerging Infectious Diseases in Davao city, southern Philippines. (Joey Dalumpines/Malacanang Presidential Photographers Division via AP)
“The problem he’s fighting is largely made in China, the country he is embracing as a potential ally at the expense of longstanding ties with the United States,” the news agency observed.
“China’s dominant role in the Philippine meth trade has not dissuaded President Duterte from cozying up to Beijing, even as he declares drugs to be his country’s greatest scourge,” Reuters noted at the time. “Duterte is waging a brutal anti-narcotics campaign that has killed more than 2,000 people and led to the arrest of more than 38,000. Police are investigating some 3,000 more deaths.”
Political analysts have said they expect Marcos to continue the pro-China policies of Duterte during his upcoming presidency, as he has previously expressed sentiments suggesting a favorable eye toward Beijing. Marcos unofficially won the 2022 Philippine presidential election on May 9 with a landslide victory, though he awaits a formal confirmation of the election’s results by the Philippine Congress in June.
Marcos will rule the Philippines alongside Rodrigo Duterte’s daughter, Sara Duterte, who unofficially secured the office of the Philippine vice presidency on May 9. Rodrigo Duterte will step down as Philippine president on June 30 following a term that began in June 2016. Philippine presidents are allowed to serve only a single, six-year term.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Do you think we’re headed towards recession?
LLOYD BLANKFEIN: We’re certainly heading — it’s a very, very high risk factor. There’s a path, a narrow path, but I think the Fed has very powerful tools. It’s hard to finely tune them and hard to see the effects of them quickly enough to alter it. But I think they are responding well. It’s definitely a risk. If I was running a big company I would be very prepared for it. If I was a consumer, I would prepared for it. But it’s not baked in the cake.
The White House claimed President Joe Biden’s administration made the baby formula shortage crisis a top priority as early as February, even though the president claimed ignorance of the problem on Thursday.
“This is something he is focusing on very acutely and again I said 24/7 we’ve been working on this since we have learned about this back in February,” White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said during the daily briefing about Biden, calling the issue “one of the presidents top priorities.”
Biden bristled when asked by reporters on Friday if he could have acted sooner to fix the crisis.
“If we had been better mind readers, I guess we could’ve, but we moved as the problem became apparent to us,” Biden said.
The president did not even personally mention the crisis until Friday, despite weeks of reports highlighting the problem.
“I’ll answer the baby formula question because, all of a sudden, it’s on the front page of every newspaper,” Biden grumbled on Friday.
He announced the launch of a new government website to help parents locate baby formula in stores, but it was beset by extremely long hold times and unhelpful information.
Jean-Pierre alluded to a comment from Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Bacerra claiming the Biden administration had been working on the issue since February and even as early as last year in 2021.
CNN: “You are satisfied with the government’s response throughout [the baby formula shortage]?”
HHS Sec. Xavier Becerra: “FDA has kept me apprised of this from LAST YEAR. We have been moving as quickly as we can” pic.twitter.com/5WRZa5chYg
“You’ve heard us talk about this, you’ve heard colleagues talking about what we have done since February,” Jean-Pierre said. “We’ve been working on this 24/7.”
Jean-Pierre refused to offer a timeline for when supplies of baby formula would return to normal.
“What I can say is there are a lot of dates floating around out there,” she said.
President Joe Biden struggled Monday with the correct pronunciation of the name of Aaron Salter Jr., a heroic ex-cop and security guard who died Saturday confronting the Buffalo mass shooting suspect.
“We pay tribute to all law enforcement officers and their families who understand what it takes, what’s at risk, to save and protect all of us,” Biden said. “That includes paying tribute to the Buffalo police officer Aaron Salder — Slater, excuse me — who gave his life trying to save others.”
Biden spoke about Salter during a Public Safety Officer Medals of Valor ceremony at the White House for law enforcement and public safety officials.
Salter was a Buffalo police officer for 30 years before retiring in 2022 and taking a security job at the Tops Friendly Market where the shooting took place.
Salter hit the alleged shooter with at least one round from his pistol, but it was blocked by the alleged shooter’s bulletproof armor. Salter was later shot and killed during the attack.
“You’re the heart and soul and very spine of this country and communities,” Biden continued, praising the public safety officials in the room.
During the ceremony, Biden also botched the name of Rep. Adriano Espaillat, a Democrat congressman from New York.
“Excuse me. You can call me ‘Bidden,’” Biden joked, mispronouncing his own name. “We’ve known each other so long and I still stumbled. I apologize.”