Optimism about drug war grows, reaches highest level in 30 years

45% of Americans believe the country has made progress in the fight against illegal drugs, according to a recent Gallup poll. That is a 25-year high.

The figure contrasts with the last time the pollster polled Americans, when it recorded 24% of adults who saw progress in the fight against drugs. Also a record percentage, but on the low side.

If the positive assessment went up, the opposite is true of the negative: the percentage of Americans who said the nation lost ground in the fight against drugs dropped from 52% to 23%. The first historical high, the second low.

"The net result of these changes is that Americans have shifted from being the most pessimistic they’ve been about the nation’s drug problem in Gallup polls since 1995 (-28 net negative) to ranking among the most optimistic (+22 net positive) Gallup has measured in the past 30 years," according to the pollster.

Gallup further notes that the "relatively strong sense of progress in the U.S. population occurred against a backdrop of the White House's fight against trafficking. It lists the designation of cartels as terrorist organizations, the imposition of tariffs on countries it sees as enabling trafficking and attacks on boats in the Caribbean.

The new optimism is mostly Republican. Three in four Republicans claim to have noticed some or a lot of progress. A 62% improvement over 2023.

Although to a lesser extent, both independents and Democrats also said they noticed improvements. Among the former, perception improved by 13% with respect to 2023, while among the latter by 12%.

However, it is worth noting that all three groups agree on a decrease in the perception of the seriousness of the problem. The only exception is Democrats when asked about its importance in their local area, rather than as a national problem.