Democrats Omit Cannabis Decriminalization and Med Pot Legalization From 2024 Platform
Democrats will vote on their platform today at the DNC. Sadly, the latest draft of the platform shows both cannabis decriminalization and medical marijuana legalization have been completely omitted.
The platform mentions Joe Biden’s pardoning of cannabis convictions and his administration’s efforts to “reschedule” marijuana, but that’s about it.
From Marijuana Moment:
Notably, however, more broadly decriminalizing or legalizing cannabis is not explicitly mentioned in this year’s platform. Kevin Sabet, president of the prohibitionist group Smart Approaches to Marijuana (SAM), cheered that exclusion on Monday, commending those who “helped so much behind the scenes.”
In addition to decriminalization, the prior 2020 platform DNC adopted also pushed for medical marijuana legalization, which is also omitted from this new draft version.
The draft platform mentions cannabis policy reform using broad platitudes, but then completely lacks any direct policy changes that would fix the issue besides “rescheduling”, instead focusing on pardons for people already convicted:
No one should be in jail just for using or possessing marijuana. Sending people to prison for possession has upended too many lives and incarcerated people for conduct that many states no longer prohibit. Those criminal records impose needless barriers to employment, housing, and educational opportunities, disproportionately affecting Black and brown people. President Biden took historic action to end this failed approach by pardoning people convicted federally for using or possessing marijuana. He has called on governors to use their pardon power to do the same for state-level offenses. And his Administration is taking a major step to reschedule marijuana so it’s no longer classified as more dangerous than fentanyl or methamphetamine.
As noted by Marijauna Moment in the same story, the platform also says Democrats
“will take action to expunge federal marijuana-only convictions.” While Biden had repeatedly suggested his pardons already cleared records, he more recently clarified that that’s not the case. While pardons represent formal forgiveness, a president cannot unilaterally expunge records.
Despite the policy draft change, Harris-Walz is still the only major ticket made up of politicians who say they support cannabis legalization.
Vice-presidential candidate Tim Walz, two-term Governor of Minnesota, signed cannabis legalization into law in the state. The US Cannabis industry is generally “thrilled” that he is on the ballot.
Read the full DNC Policy draft.
