Jeb Bush Opens Up About His Daughter’s Drug Abuse

Correction appended, Nov. 9, 2015

Republican presidential candidate Jeb Bush talked openly about his daughter’s battle with drug addiction Thursday.

In an interview with the Huffington Post, Bush opened up in detail about his daughter Noelle, who he has tried to keep out of the spotlight since she began struggling with drug abuse while Bush was Governor of Florida.

“She went through hell,” he said. “And so did her mom and so did her dad. And it was in a private setting, but then it became very public when I was Governor. And it wasn’t easy.”

“One of the things I found was, when I would travel and do my regular job, I could just look in someone’s eyes and I could just tell that they were going through something similar. You could just see it,” he added. “I have so many friends, so many people i’ve known that have gone through this. It crosses all barriers, all lines, all races, all income. It’s not easy.”

Drug abuse has become a major issue on the presidential campaign trail. Republican candidate Carly Fiorina opened up in September about losing her step-daughter in 2009 to drug addiction. A voter question at a New Hampshire event led Hillary Clinton to announce a $10 billion plan to combat drug and alcohol addiction.

A video of New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie speaking out about the costs of addiction at a New Hampshire town hall in October has gone viral this week with some 5.5 million views on Facebook.

Correction: An earlier version of this post included a photo that was not of Noelle Bush.

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