Today is the day to tell President Obama that you’re fed up with his broken promises and his attacks on medical marijuana providers. Please join thousands of Americans in a National Call-In Day taking place from 10:00 am to 5:00 pm ET.

As you no doubt have heard by now, all four U.S. attorneys in California announced on Friday that they plan to aggressively target state-legal medical marijuana providers for violations of federal law. With virtually no justification, the Obama administration is going to deny patients safe access to their medicine and force them back into the criminal market.

This new development is especially disturbing, considering President Obama’s previous position: In 2009, based on an earlier campaign pledge, his Justice Department issued a memo declaring that individuals acting in compliance with state medical marijuana laws would not be prosecuted. Now, the president has gone back on his word.

Please join supporters of medical marijuana everywhere by making a quick call to the White House and telling President Obama how you feel. Finally, pass this along to all your friends so that we can generate as many calls as possible in opposition to this new policy!

UPDATE: Write President Obama and make your voice heard!

In a press conference today, all four U.S. Attorneys in California announced that the administration will no longer ignore dispensaries and will actively prosecute many commercial operations. The attorneys said they will concentrate on criminal prosecution and asset forfeiture against the landlords of medical marijuana dispensaries or cultivation centers, and threaten action against certain commercial organizations. Multiple businesses throughout the state have been given 45 days to close down. To support the increased efforts to eliminate the medical marijuana industry, they claim that it has been overtaken by criminal organizations and harms communities, yet do not offer justification of these claims at the present time. In the absence of regulated and licensed dispensaries, however, many patients will likely be forced to obtain medical marijuana from street dealers and gangs, which will doubtless create additional law enforcement and public safety problems for California.

Despite campaign promises not to spend limited law enforcement resources interfering with state medical marijuana laws and a 2009 Department of Justice policy directive against targeting individuals acting in compliance with state medical marijuana laws, the U.S. Attorneys signaled that they now intend to prosecute individuals who provide that medicine to patients under safe, regulated conditions.

“How can the Obama administration say that it’s fine for sick people to use this proven medicine, and yet tell them they can’t have any legal place to get it?” asked Rob Kampia, executive director of the Marijuana Policy Project. “Medical marijuana isn’t going away. Over 70 percent of Americans support making medical marijuana legal, and 16 states allow it.”

“The end result of the federal government’s policy is to ensure that medical marijuana is sold illegally in most parts of the country, as well as to create needless suffering for patients who can’t find a place to buy medical marijuana.”

Since 2009, eight states have enacted or implemented laws that set high standards and strict regulations on medical marijuana dispensing, moving away from previous “gray market” models that lacked licensing or regulations. During the previous administration, targeting providers in California did not prevent marijuana profiteers from operating. Instead, a federal policy of interference with state medical marijuana laws pushes states towards programs with confusing legal gray areas and little to no control over the operation of providers.

We will be continuing to post updates on this issue and the response from the medical marijuana industry and patients.

For a full text of the Department of Justice press release, go here.

UPDATE: Write President Obama and make your voice heard!

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In yet another illustration of how the marijuana debate has gone completely mainstream, the freshly-crowned winner of the Miss USA pageant, Alyssa Campanella, stated that she supported the use of marijuana for medical purposes. As the California representative at the pageant, the judges thought it appropriate to ask the young lady about her opinions on marijuana. She had this to say:

“Well, I understand why that question would be asked, especially with today’s economy, but I also understand that medical marijuana is very important to help those who need it medically,” she said during the pageant.

“I’m not sure if it should be legalized, if it would really affect, with the drug war,” she said. “I mean, it’s abused today, unfortunately, so that’s the only reason why I would kind of be a little bit against it, but medically it’s OK.”

Well, it’s great that a Miss USA contestant feels comfortable supporting people finding relief from this proven, if unaccountably still controversial, medicine. It seems to me, however, that her position regarding ending marijuana prohibition altogether was a little less assertive. I’m willing to wager that she felt she had to say she was against taxing and regulating marijuana for all adults to please the judges, even if it was just “a little bit against it.”

What is even more significant is that this question has become so prominent in the public arena that it is being asked at such a traditionally tame event as the Miss USA contest.

AP Photo/Julie Jacobson

Today, in a 5-4 ruling, the U.S. Supreme Court upheld a decision ordering California to reduce its state prison population by more than 30,000 prisoners. It found that as a result of overcrowding, the prisoners’ “medical and mental health care … has fallen short of minimum constitutional requirements … .” Even after the prison population is reduced, California’s prisons could still be over 37% above capacity.
 
The dissent painted a picture of a public safety disaster if the inmates were released. But, in reality, California prisons are far more dangerous to some of these inmates than those inmates have ever been to society. As the court noted, “needless suffering and death have been the well documented result” of current conditions.
 
Outrageously, many prisoners are there for nothing more than growing or delivering a plant that has never caused a fatal overdose — marijuana. In California, cultivation of marijuana (other than under the medical marijuana law) is a felony punishable by up to three years in state prison.
 
For participating in the production or sale of a substance safer than alcohol, these non-violent marijuana offenders face possible death in prison. The Supreme Court quoted a lower court ruling that prisoners were needlessly dying every five to six days as a result of the conditions. For example, “A prisoner with severe abdominal pain died after a five-week delay in referral to a specialist; a prisoner with ‘constant and extreme’ chest pain died after an eight-hour delay in evaluation by a doctor; and a prisoner died of testicular cancer after a ‘failure of MDs to work up for cancer in a young man with 17 months of testicular pain.’”
 
The state of California will decide who will be released. But this decision should result in the release of all non-violent marijuana offenders who are in state prison. Unlike violent and property criminals, their crimes had no victims. Then again, if decisions on who to imprison and who to let free were in keeping with reason and morality, we wouldn’t see non-violent marijuana offenders sentenced to life while convicted child sex offenders walk free on probation …
 
 

I’m starting to sound like a broken record. Yesterday, the DEA, assisted by local law enforcement, raided several Michigan medical marijuana businesses and arrested the owners. No information has been released since the investigation is ongoing.

This sounds awfully familiar. Last month, federal authorities cracked down on medical marijuana facilities in Montana and California. According to all available information, those raided were in compliance with state law and were legitimate businesses.

It seems that the DEA is going to continue taking an active role in investigating and prosecuting medical marijuana patients and caregivers, regardless of Justice Department direction to the contrary. While they are legally allowed to enforce federal law in states where medical marijuana is permitted, the current policy directs them to only do so if state law is being broken.

I’m left wondering why the DEA is involved if the people and organizations being targeted are operating within state law. If these “criminals” are not following state law, why is it necessary to call in the feds? One would think local law enforcement is perfectly capable of enforcing their own state’s laws and wouldn’t want anyone nosing in on their jurisdiction. Could it be that some law enforcement and certain politicians see this as a way to impose extreme penalties on a group of people with whom they have personal and ideological problems?

Or is the DEA simply taking it upon themselves to interpret state law, storming in when someone is operating within a legal gray area?

Either way, the DEA has no business going after medical marijuana businesses in the states. This is a state issue that is best dealt with through debate and regulation, not with assault weapons and battering rams.

Please sign this petition asking President Obama to keep his promise and end the raids.