Trump’s Focus on Drug War Means Big Business for Defense Startups

The U.S. military has turned its attention southward, and the defense industry is lining up to sell it the tools for a different kind of war. 

Defense-tech companies and artificial-intelligence startups have found a vital new market in President Trump’s rapidly escalating drug war. Weapons and AI platforms that were designed for a future conflict with China or struggled to prove themselves on the Ukrainian battlefield have found a niche in the administration’s tech-enabled crackdown on drug trafficking.