With the majority of Americans now supporting marijuana legalization, and with legalization being a key component of broader criminal justice reform — a top issue among voters — primary constituents want to hear where candidates stand on our issue.
As MPP’s director of federal policies, I am currently on the ground for primary week in New Hampshire, attending campaign events and town halls all over the state and relentlessly pursuing the Democratic presidential hopefuls concerning their positions on cannabis.
From Claremont to Nashua, I am engaging with the candidates and working to raise the profile of marijuana policy reform in the presidential election. It’s important that we hold candidates accountable for their positions, and last week, I recorded a short conversation with Joe Biden in which the former vice president appeared to shift from his typical opposition to fully legalizing marijuana.
"I think it is at the point where it has to be, basically, legalized," Biden said in the recording, though it’s unclear whether the former vice president’s position on marijuana legalization has officially changed. You can hear the whole exchange, featured on Politico, here.
Although it sounded like Biden was on the verge of endorsing legalization (as all the 2020 Democratic presidential candidates have, Bloomberg excepted), he failed to clarify his position and ultimately, only made it more unclear. As I told Marijuana Moment, “it turned out to be a big nothing.”
At the conclusion of our taped dialogue, however, I urged Biden to raise the issue with the American electorate, discuss it on the debate stage, and address the conflict between state and federal marijuana laws.
These on-the-ground efforts are just one of the ways MPP is working to drive the conversation on federal marijuana policy, both nationally and locally. Help us continue these kinds of exchanges and keep injecting marijuana policy reform into the discussion by making a donation today.
— Don Murphy, Director of Federal Policies