“The opioid crisis is an emergency, and I’m saying officially right now it is an emergency,” Trump said at his golf club in Bedminster, New Jersey. “It’s a national emergency. We’re going to spend a lot of time, a lot of effort and a lot of money on the opioid crisis.”

Trump’s surprise announcement came two days after he vowed the U.S. would “win” the fight against the plague but stopped short of acting on the recommendation of the presidential opioid commission to “declare a national emergency.”