By Debra J. Saunders / syndicated columnist
There is one issue where President Biden has not moved further left and in lockstep with other liberal leaders: marijuana. The oldest man to take the oath of office — he’s now 78 — just can’t bring himself to support legalization.
On the 2020 campaign trail, Biden claimed he wanted to decriminalize it and leave legal questions for states to decide.
But does Biden even want to do that?
As Senate Judiciary Committee chairman, Biden was the driving force behind the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act of 1994 that, among other things, meted out draconian federal sentences for nonviolent drug offenders.
Now that he is in the Oval Office, nothing is happening on the modest federal decriminalization front.
“He at least pledged to decriminalize marijuana possession, expunge (criminal) records, legalize medical cannabis,” reschedule marijuana under the Controlled Substances Act and “let the states do what they want,” Tom Angell of Marijuana Moment told me. “However, since coming into office, so far the only official acts his administration has taken on marijuana were to fire White House employees for having used it” — after Team Biden said past marijuana use would not be a disqualifier — and include in his budget language to block the District of Columbia from legalizing and regulating the sale of cannabis.
On Wednesday, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer and fellow Democratic Sens. Cory Booker of…
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By Debra J. Saunders / syndicated columnist
There is one issue where President Biden has not moved further left and in lockstep with other liberal leaders: marijuana. The oldest man to take the oath of office — he’s now 78 — just can’t bring himself to support legalization.
On the 2020 campaign trail, Biden claimed he wanted to decriminalize it and leave legal questions for states to decide.
But does Biden even want to do that?
As Senate Judiciary Committee chairman, Biden was the driving force behind the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act of 1994 that, among other things, meted out draconian federal sentences for nonviolent drug offenders.
Now that he is in the Oval Office, nothing is happening on the modest federal decriminalization front.
“He at least pledged to decriminalize marijuana possession, expunge (criminal) records, legalize medical cannabis,” reschedule marijuana under the Controlled Substances Act and “let the states do what they want,” Tom Angell of Marijuana Moment told me. “However, since coming into office, so far the only official acts his administration has taken on marijuana were to fire White House employees for having used it” — after Team Biden said past marijuana use would not be a disqualifier — and include in his budget language to block the District of Columbia from legalizing and regulating the sale of cannabis.
On Wednesday, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer and fellow Democratic Sens. Cory Booker of…