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Trump Invokes Brother's 'Tough Life' With Alcoholism During Speech on Opioid Crisis

October 26, 2017

President Donald Trump discussed his older brother's struggles with alcoholism on Thursday during his address declaring the opioid epidemic in the United States to be a national health emergency, saying he learned from his brother's "very tough" life.

Fred Trump, Jr. died in 1981 as an alcoholic at the age of 43, and his younger brother has previously said watching Fred's suffering caused him to avoid alcohol and cigarettes.

"I learned myself. I had a brother, Fred. Great guy. Best-looking guy. Best personality. Much better than mine," Trump said in remarks at the White House. "But he had a problem. He had a problem with alcohol. And he would tell me, 'Don't drink. Don't drink.'"

Trump, who was eight years his junior, said he listened to his brother's admonitions, and to this day has never had a drink.

"I have no longing for it. I have no interest in it. To this day, I've never had a cigarette," he said, adding jokingly, "Don't worry. Those are only two of my good things. I don't want to tell you about the bad things. There's plenty of bad things, too."

Trump said he had someone who "guided" him and said Fred's life was "very, very tough" because of his alcohol problems.

"If we can teach young people not to take drugs, just not to take them ... It's really, really easy not to take them, and I think that's going to end up being our most important thing," Trump said, calling for advertising that will stop people from taking opioids and drugs before they get addicted.

Trump said his administration is distributing nearly $1 billion in grants for addition prevention and treatment, and over $50 million to support law enforcement programs assisting people facing prison and addiction.

According to CNN, since 1999, the number of American overdose deaths involving opioids has quadrupled:

From 2000 to 2015, more than 500,000 people died of drug overdoses, and opioids account for the majority of those. Recently released numbers from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention found that around 64,000 people died from drug overdoses in 2016.