The Global War on Fentanyl

PAST EVENT VIDEO

Jake Braun, Katie Tobin, and Cécile Shea analyze the federal government’s counter-fentanyl strategy in a partner event with the University of Chicago Harris School of Public Policy.

US Border Patrol agents and a dog check a vehicle at a checkpoint in California.

Elliot Spagat / AP

Speakers

Jacob Braun
Katie Tobin
Cécile Shea

Event Date

December 3, 2025

About This Event

Fentanyl has become one of the deadliest public health crises of our time. In his new book Fentanyl: Fighting the Mass Poisoning of America and the Cartel Behind It, former White House official Jake Braun—now executive director of Harris’s Cyber Policy Initiative—details the federal government’s strategy to save lives and disrupt the networks behind the epidemic.

In partnership with the Chicago Council on Global Affairs, Harris welcomes Braun and former White House official Katie Tobin, a national security expert and lecturer at Harris, for a conversation about the US government’s evolving counter-fentanyl strategy, which spanned both the Biden and Trump administrations and helped drive overdose deaths down by more than a third.

The discussion, led by Cécile Shea, a nonresident senior fellow on security and diplomacy at the Chicago Council on Global Affairs, will explore how global supply chains, cartels, and geopolitics collide in the fentanyl trade—and what this unprecedented challenge reveals about the intersection of public health, security, and modern policymaking.

This is a partner event between the University of Chicago Harris School of Public Policy and the Chicago Council on Global Affairs.

About the Speakers

Jacob Braun

Executive Director, Cyber Policy Initiative, University of Chicago; Co-Founder, Cambridge Global Advisors; Former Acting Principal Deputy National Cyber Director, The White House

Jacob Braun is the executive director of the Cyber Policy Initiative at the University of Chicago Harris School of Public Policy and co-founder of Cambridge Global Advisors, a national security consulting firm. He most recently served in the White House as acting principal deputy national cyber director.

Katie Tobin

Senior Advisor, WestExec Advisors LLC; Former Deputy Assistant to the President and Senior Director for Transborder, National Security Council

Katie Tobin is a homeland security expert with over twenty years of experience in the industry. She currently serves as a senior advisor at WestExec Advisors LLC and is a nonresident scholar with Carnegie Endowment for International Peace' American Statecraft Program. She also teaches part time at University of Chicago’s Harris School of Public Policy and is a frequent public speaker and press contributor.

Cécile Shea

Senior Nonresident Fellow, Global Security and Diplomacy, Chicago Council on Global Affairs

Cécile Shea is a senior nonresident fellow on security and diplomacy at the Chicago Council on Global Affairs. She is the president of Wakaru Communications and a special advisor to the Council’s Next Generation programs.

Partner