Crackdown: A revolutionary testament from the frontlines of the drug war

published on July 29, 2025 by Tony Tracy in Spring Magazine

In a political moment when right-wing forces mobilize to dismantle even the most modest harm reduction measures, Garth Mullins’ memoir-manifesto arrives as an essential weapon of resistance, exposing the brutal violence of prohibition while charting a path toward collective liberation through user-led organizing.

Crackdown: Surviving and Resisting the War on Drugs emerges as perhaps the most important book on drug policy published in Canada this decade. As Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre weaponizes the overdose crisis for political gain, and governments across the country roll back life-saving harm reduction services, Mullins delivers what those who oppose real harm reduction practices fear most: a powerful, unapologetic account from the frontlines of drug user resistance that fundamentally challenges us to reimagine our relationship to substances and to each other.

This is not merely another addiction memoir of individual redemption or sanitized recovery narratives. Instead, Mullins offers a manifesto rooted in lived experience, speaking to the violence of prohibition, centring the leadership of drug users, and demanding a revolutionary reimagining of our approach to drugs, harm, and solidarity…