It is the lead agency for domestic enforcement of the Controlled Substances Act, sharing concurrent jurisdiction with the Federal Bureau of Investigation and U.S. Customs and Border Protection.

Subsequently, the DEA headquarters complex was classified as a Level IV installation under United States federal building security standards, meaning it was to be considered a high-risk law enforcement target for terrorists.

[11] Security measures include hydraulic steel roadplates to enforce standoff distance from the building, metal detectors and guard stations.

Special Agents at the 13 step 5 level in high cost of living areas of the United States make near the federal pay cap of $191,000.

Because the DEA is responsible for enforcing the Controlled Substances Act, it excludes from consideration job applicants who use or have a recent history of using narcotics or illicit drugs.

[citation needed] The DEA's relatively firm stance on personal drug use contrasts with those of the Central Intelligence Agency and the Federal Bureau of Investigation, which in 2023 considered further relaxing their eligibility guidelines so as to combat dwindling recruitment rates.

Covertly located throughout the nation, DEA SRT teams are available to respond to practically any CONUS geographical area with little to no preparation or notification.

Basic Agent Trainees (BATs) who fail the initial pistol qualification course of fire are placed in a remedial program to receive additional training.

After passing their pistol qualification, Basic Agent Trainees move on to receive formal training on the DEA's standard-issue long guns and will continue to frequently shoot the agency-issued sidearms that they have already qualified on.

[33][34][35] In contrast to the statistics presented by the DEA, the United States Department of Justice released data in 2003 showing that purity of methamphetamine was on the rise.

An entity that has been issued a DEA number is authorized to manufacture (drug companies), distribute research, prescribe (doctors, pharmacists, nurse practitioners and physician assistants, etc.

An estimated 19,416 individuals died of a drug overdose in the United States in the first 3 months of 2020 compared with 16,682 in the same 3-month period in 2019; this trend was fueled by synthetic opioids (especially illicitly manufactured fentanyl and analogs).

[38] In October 2021, the US reported another record in fentanyl deaths, as federal agencies were unable to stem the tide of illicit, synthetic drugs entering the US.

Based on all of the evidence and facts presented at the time, the DEA's administrative law judge did not see MDMA and its analogues as being of large concern and recommended that they be placed in Schedule III.

The DEA administrator, expressing concern for addictive potential, overruled the recommendation and ruled that MDMA be put in Schedule I, the Controlled Substances Act's most restrictive category.

Critics assert that some such decisions are motivated primarily by political factors stemming from the U.S. government's war on drugs and that many benefits of such substances remain unrecognized due to the difficulty of conducting scientific research.

Recurrently, billions of dollars are spent yearly, focusing largely on criminal law and demand reduction campaigns, which has resulted in the imprisonment of thousands of U.S.

[50] In April 2012 in San Diego, California, DEA agents detained a student, Daniel Chong, and left him locked in a holding room for five days.

[54] On August 12, 2013, at the American Bar Association's House of Delegates meeting, Attorney General Eric Holder announced the "Smart on Crime" program, which is "a sweeping initiative by the Justice Department that in effect renounces several decades of tough-on-crime anti-drug legislation and policies.

"[55][56] David Coleman Headley (born Daood Sayed Gilani, June 30, 1960) who was working as an informant for the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) simultaneously made periodic trips to Pakistan for LeT training and was one of the main conspirators in the 2008 Mumbai attacks.

"[66] In his 1996 series of articles and subsequent 1999 book, both titled Dark Alliance, journalist Gary Webb asserts that the DEA helped harbor Nicaraguan drug traffickers.

This occurred soon after Bolivian president Evo Morales expelled all DEA agents from the country due to a revolt in the traditional coca-growing Chapare Province.

[72] In 2013, Reuters published a report about the DEA's Special Operations Division (SOD) stating that it conceals where an investigative trail about a suspect truly originates from and creates a parallel set of evidence given to prosecutors, judges, and defense lawyers.

Nancy Gertner, a former federal judge who had served from 1994 to 2011 and a Harvard Law School professor, stated that "It is one thing to create special rules for national security.

"[73] Andrew O'Hehir of Salon wrote that "It's the first clear evidence that the “special rules” and disregard for constitutional law that have characterized the hunt for so-called terrorists have crept into the domestic criminal justice system on a significant scale.

"[74] A 2014 report by the Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies and the Drug Policy Alliance accuses the DEA of unfairly blocking the removal of cannabis from Schedule I.

[75] The DEA continues to refuse the removal of cannabis from Schedule I despite wide-scale acceptance of the substance among the medical community, including 76% of doctors, for the treatment of various diseases.

"[81][82] As a result, the Wo/Men's Alliance for Medical Marijuana, with the City and County of Santa Cruz, had sued the DEA, Attorney General Michael Mukasey, and the ONDCP.

[citation needed] In 2008 the Special Operations part of the agency launched a multi-agency effort named Project Cassandra[85] to investigate Hezbollah for allegations of illicit drug trafficking and terrorist financing.

The Department of Justice issued several sealed indictments but declined to seize, prosecute, extradite, or further investigate likely targets of these alleged foreign criminal activities operating in the United States due to White House diplomatic objectives involving the international nuclear agreement with Iran.