#Trump asks Florida narcotics cops if they ‘blow up’ seized drugs

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President Trump speaks as he is briefed on enhanced narcotics operations at the US Southern Command in Doral, Florida.
Saul Loeb/Getty Images

WASHINGTON — President Trump flew to Florida on Friday to meet with the nation’s top narcotics cops and had one very pressing question: What do they do with the drugs?

The president was in Doral to meet with United States Southern Command, a Department of Defense operation which patrols the US coastal border, to celebrate their new counter-narcotics operation.

“In a single four-day period in May, our courageous coast guard men and women stopped three narcos submarines packed with poisonous drugs, keeping thousands of pounds of lethal narcotics off of our streets and off of our city areas,” Trump told the crowd.

“We got rid of it. We got it. We have it and I don’t know what you do with it. What do you do with it, by the way?” the president continued.

“You get all that stuff, you dump it? What do you do with it, Admiral?” he pressed.

“I want to hear, what do you do with that? You blow it up or just dump it someplace,” Trump joked.

“They burn it, sir,” one defense official responded.

Responded Trump: “They burn it? That sounds like a good way of doing it.”

The president was criticized for deciding to fly to Florida on Friday as the state experiences a record scourge of new coronavirus infections.

In his speech, Trump said he wanted to make the trip to “personally thank” United States Southern Command troops for their “phenomenal” effort in seizing billions of dollars of narcotics and the arrest of 1,000 drug traffickers.

“We’re taking the fight directly to the sinister criminal cartels and we’re showing them no mercy,” he warned.

“Our message is clear, you will not threaten our citizens, you will not poison our children, and you will not infiltrate our borders,” he continued.

“We will find you, we will stop you, and we will put everybody that we find behind bars, if you’re lucky.”

Later Friday, Trump will visit a church and hold a roundtable on the crisis in Venezuela before meeting supporters at a private residence and flying back to the White House on Friday evening.

Trump had been due to hold a rally in New Hampshire on Saturday evening but it was canceled due to bad weather.