The D.A.R.E. (Drug Abuse Resistance Education) program, launched in the 1980s during Ronald Reagan’s presidency, was part of a broader “War on Drugs” campaign that disproportionately targeted communities of color. While D.A.R.E. was presented as a school-based program to educate children about the dangers of drugs, it was deeply connected to Reagan-era policies that criminalized drug use rather than addressing it as a public health issue. Reagan’s administration promoted harsh sentencing laws an