#decriminalize marijuana

[ivygorgon]

AN OPEN LETTER to THE PRESIDENT & U.S. CONGRESS; STATE GOVERNORS & LEGISLATURES

Support Marijuana Decriminalization for a more Equitable USA

4 so far! Help us get to 5 signers!

I am writing to express my strong support for the decriminalization of marijuana at both the federal and state levels. The current approach to cannabis, rooted in policies dating back to 1971, requires urgent reconsideration given evolving social norms and scientific understanding.

The revelation by President Richard Nixon's domestic policy chief, John Ehrlichman, that the war on drugs was designed to target Black communities underscores the urgent need to rectify the injustices perpetuated by decades of punitive drug policies. The disproportionate impact of these policies on communities of color has fueled systemic inequities in our criminal justice system.

Decriminalization of marijuana would shift our focus from ineffective punitive measures to evidence-based public health strategies, emphasizing harm reduction and regulated use, whether medicinal or recreational. It's crucial to differentiate between decriminalization and unregulated use, prioritizing public health and equitable access.

I urge you to champion legislation that decriminalizes marijuana and addresses the racial disparities entrenched by outdated drug policies. By investing in research and public health initiatives related to cannabis, we can develop policies that protect public health while respecting individual freedoms.

In conclusion, federal and state-level decriminalization of marijuana is imperative to rectify the failures of past policies and promote equitable, evidence-based drug reform. I urge you to seize this opportunity to advance sensible, ethical drug policy reforms that reflect our evolving understanding of cannabis regulation.

Thank you for considering my perspective on this critical matter. I look forward to your leadership in championing meaningful drug policy reform.

📱 Text SIGN PWUITK to 50409

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💘 Q'u lach' shughu deshni da. 🏹 "What I say is true" in Dena'ina Qenaga

#IVYPETITIONS #PWUITK #resistbot #petition #anti racism #racial justice #Marijuana Decriminalization #Cannabis Reform #Drug Policy #Social Justice #Equity #Legalize It #Public Health #Criminal Justice Reform #Racial Justice #Civil Rights #Drug Law Reform #Decriminalize Marijuana #Justice Reform #Drug Policy Reform #End Mass Incarceration #Policy Change #Advocacy #Community Health #Health Equity #Legalization #Racial Equality #Social Change #Drug Reform #Human Rights

[olowan-waphiya]

#indigenous #native american #ndn #marijuana #cherokee #decriminalization #drugs #usa

[dontmean2bepoliticalbut]

#us politics #twitter #tweet #texas #beto o'rourke #2022 #2022 elections #2022 midterms #marijuana #legalize marijuana #recreational marijuana #cannabis #legalize cannabis #decriminalize cannabis #pardons #expunge records for non violent offenders #non violent offenders #vote blue

[dontmeantobepoliticalbut]

The mood at the Sankofa Cultural Arts and Business Center on Chicago’s west side was celebratory on June 25, 2019, as hundreds gathered to watch Illinois make history.

With the stroke of a pen, Gov. J.B. Pritzker made it legal for adults in Illinois to possess up to 30 grams of marijuana without fear of arrest. When sales began in 2020, legalization was expected to be a financial boon for the state, but the promise went deeper for some supporters.

“Today, we're hitting the reset button on the war on drugs,” the bill’s sponsor, Rep. Kelly Cassidy, D-Chicago, said to applause. “Today, we begin the process of undoing the harm of the war on drugs.”

People who had been arrested for, but not charged with, low-level cannabis offenses would have those records erased automatically. Pritzker pardoned thousands more who were convicted of possession of less than 30 grams. Anyone who had been prosecuted for possession of up to 500 grams – a little more than a pound – would be able to petition the court to have those records expunged.

“Today we're giving hundreds of thousands of people the chance at a better life, jobs, housing and real opportunity,” Pritzker said.

Around a third of Americans have some kind of criminal record by the time they are 25, said Daniel Kuehnert, a staff attorney in the western office of Land of Lincoln Legal Aid, a nonprofit serving a swath of Illinois from the Metro East to the Quad Cities. While it may just be an arrest record, “those records are consulted by basically all sorts of entities for important life decisions,” he said.

“And particularly with employment, we see employers who have better jobs doing the heavier criminal background checks,” said Megan Kinney, the managing attorney at Land of Lincoln Legal Aid’s central office, which serves clients in six counties in southwest Illinois. “So it really is not only a barrier to employment, but it's a barrier to good, well-paying, stable jobs with benefits.”

Land of Lincoln Legal Aid was one of 18 nonprofits that joined a coalition called New Leaf Illinois. The state funded the initiative, which provided free legal representation to people who wanted cannabis convictions off their record.

Christopher Bradford was among thousands helped by New Leaf. He was in his mid-20s when he was convicted of felony possession in 2003, giving him a criminal record that potential employers would not overlook.

“And I just felt like, that wasn’t right,” he said in a video posted to New Leaf’s website. “I felt like I was being singled out from others because I had a felony conviction.”

New Leaf helped Bradford clear his record, which allowed him to get a job as a kitchen manager at a restaurant in Springfield, Illinois.

“I’m working, I’m providing for my family, so you know, I’m happy,” he said.

PITFALLS IN THE PROCESS

The law wasn’t perfect.

The word “automatic” was a misnomer, said Kinney. An individual with a criminal record for marijuana had to take an active role in the court system to make that record go away, and every single court in the state is its own entity.

"You have to file a petition in every single county in which there was a charge and arrest or conviction,” Kinney said. “There's not just some magic button that someone can press and all these records just go poof, and they go away.”

The law also failed to address local restrictions on marijuana, said Kuehnert. While some counties were willing to expunge those ordinance violations, “we’ve been encountering some counties where the Judge is like, ‘Oh, hey, wait a minute, this law doesn't say anything about ordinance violations.’”

Despite those complications, Kuehnert said, Illinois generally gets high marks nationwide for how its law is structured.

“It’s been pretty good at helping people get their records cleared, helping folks move forward in their lives and helping heal some of the damage to both individuals and our communities from the war on drugs,” he said.

EXPUNGEMENT IN MISSOURI

When advocates for recreational marijuana in Missouri drafted their ballot measure, they made sure to include expungement provisions as well.

All nonviolent marijuana offenses, except for operating under the influence or sales to a minor, were to be automatically removed by the court, said John Payne, the campaign manager for Legal Missouri 2022.

While there was no formal organization like New Leaf Illinois in Missouri’s initiative, the campaign coordinated with groups like the ACLU and Empower Missouri, Payne said.

“A government program is never 100% accurate the first time,” he said. “We've talked to attorneys from some of these organizations and other attorneys who are just not necessarily affiliated with them but who have said, we'd be happy to help assist.”

Misdemeanors were supposed to be expunged by June 8, while the deadline to remove felony records is Dec. 6. But experts told KCUR those dates did not take into account how time-consuming and complicated it can be to expunge even a misdemeanor case. And while the courts asked for additional money from the state, lawmakers have not provided the assistance.

“I do know that they're making a hell of an effort because I know that the clerk's offices have hired extra people to come in and help,” Stephen Sokoloff, senior counsel for the Missouri Association of Prosecuting Attorneys, told KCUR. “In some places, I think retirees have been asked to come back and help.”

The law does not outline a penalty for missing the expungement deadlines.

#us politics #news #stlpr #npr #2023 #Missouri #Illinois #expunge records for non violent offenders #Gov. J.B. Pritzker #legalize marijuana #marijuana #legalize cannabis #recreational cannabis #decriminalize cannabis #medical marijuanna #Kelly Cassidy #Land of Lincoln Legal Aid #New Leaf Illinois #Empower Missouri #american civil liberties union #Missouri Association of Prosecuting Attorneys #kcur

[siriuslydandy]

#proud of my home state #minnesota #marijuana legalization #blaze it #twin cities #decriminalization

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

Is this really happening?  Wow this is really happening.  We're decriminalizing marijuana at the Federal level

#dark brandon #marijuana decriminalization

[the-sayuri-rin]

Biden is pardoning all prior federal offenses of simple marijuana possesson -WHITE HOUSE

President Joe Biden on Thursday announced he will take executive action to pardon thousands of people convicted of marijuana possession under federal law.

Biden said he would also encourage governors to take similar action with state offenses and would ask the Department of Health and Human Services and the Department of Justice to review how marijuana is scheduled under federal law.

The president’s action marks a significant shift in the federal government’s approach to marijuana policy and takes a step towards making good on his campaign commitment to decriminalize marijuana.

#marijuana #decriminalization

[lichposting]

Just had a “teen in political cartoon” moment when I briefly wondered why this organization in an ad in a newsletter from 1978 didn’t have a website link

#text #misc #perso #like dude how will people join your marijuana decriminalization organization… #wait I looked it up and they’re still around+DO have a site #huh

[peterfankoffski]

I hate it here and the sooner I can get to New York the better

#missouri continuing to have terrible terrible policies #probably the only good thing that happened recently is marijuana being partially decriminalized #like I’m not a stoner in the slightest and have no plans to try weed #but like? it’s still a net positive ig

[cannabisbusinessexecutive]

Voters in five Texas cities approved decriminalizing marijuana. Now city officials are standing in the way.

Voters in five Texas cities approved decriminalizing marijuana. Now city officials are standing in the way.

The fight in several Texas cities to decriminalize marijuana has entered a new phase, as some city leaders have rebuffed voter-approved rules that largely end criminal enforcement against having small amounts of the substance. Last month, residents in Denton, San Marcos, Killeen, Elgin and Harker Heights overwhelmingly approved ballot measures that sought to ban arrests and citations for carrying…

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#marijuana decriminalization #texas marijuana

[kingproblem]

part of me was thrilled how easy it was to get my medical card, part of me was annoyed that i had waited so long, most of me was mad that people are paying hundreds to these rent-a-doctors for a 30 second phone call to get approved for something that has millions of black people wrongfully incarcerated 

#ugh #annoyed #personal #medical marijuana #systemic racism #legalize it #no one should be in jail for weed #no one should be in jail for drug use period #decriminalize everything!!!!!

[personal-blog243]

#legalize marijuana #legalize weed #legalize it #decriminalize weed #war on drugs #end the war on drugs #good news for leftists #good news #positive news #good news for progressives #good news for the left

[shirkers2018dirsanditan]

watching all the successful ballot initiatives knowing we are allowed to have them or recall elections or constitutional amendments in texas 😔

#some cities in texas did vote for decriminalize small amounts of marijuana though :-)

[memenewsdotcom]

Biden pardons federal marijuana possession offenses

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#America #biden #cannabis #crime #decriminalization #legalize #marijuana #meme #memes #news #possession #united states

[dontmeantobepoliticalbut]

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R), a 2024 GOP presidential candidate, said he would not federally decriminalize marijuana if elected to the White House—arguing that cannabis use hurts the workforce, inhibits productivity and could even lead to death if contaminated.

At a campaign event in South Carolina on Thursday, a person who said they were representing wounded veterans asked DeSantis if he would “please” decriminalize cannabis as President.

The Governor responded directly: “I don’t think we would do that.”

He then talked about Florida’s medical marijuana program that was enacted by voters, saying veterans are “actually allowed access” to cannabis under that model. But he said the issue is “controversial because obviously there’s some people that abuse it and are using it recreationally.”

DeSantis rattled off a number of concerns he has about cannabis use, starting with the potency of marijuana that “they’re putting on the street” and his understanding that illicit products are being laced with other drugs such as fentanyl.

“If you do something with that, it could be goodnight right then and there,” he said. “You could die just by ingesting that, so I think that that’s problematic.”

Experts and advocates have questioned law enforcement claims about the prevalence of fentanyl-tainted cannabis in the illicit market. In any case, DeSantis also didn’t acknowledge that creating a regulatory regime where marijuana is subject to testing before consumers can buy it could mitigate instances of contamination.

“I think that we have we have too many people using using drugs in this country right now. I think it hurts our workforce readiness. I think it hurts people’s ability to prosper in life,” he said, adding that people he knew in high school who used marijuana “suffered.”

“All their activities, all their grades and everything like that—so particularly for the youth, I just think we have to be united,” the candidate said. He also plugged a Florida program overseen by his wife that involves sending athletes to schools to warn students about “the stakes of using some of these drugs nowadays, and this is not something you want to mess around with.”

He went on to say that, in order to address the fentanyl issue, “you’ve got to fight the supply, put the dealers in prison for a long time—but you also got to work on demand, and you also have to work on treatment for people once they get addicted.”

DeSantis’s opposition to legalization isn’t anything new, though this is the first time he’s addressed the issue since launching his presidential campaign.

Former Florida Agriculture Commissioner Nikki Fried, a cannabis reform advocate who now chairs the state Democratic Party after unsuccessfully running for her party’s gubernatorial nomination last year, reacted to the DeSantis’s comments by pointing out that polling shows widespread public support for legalization and decriminalization among Floridians.

“Ron doesn’t care what the people want,” she said.

Several Republican 2024 presidential hopefuls have addressed drug policy issues in recent weeks.

For example, former President Donald Trump seemed confused during a recent interview when he was confronted with the fact that his proposed plan to impose the death penalty on drug traffickers would have condemned a woman he pardoned and promoted as an example of a key criminal justice reform achievement during his administration.

At a CNN town hall event this month, former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie (R) said that he would “end” the war on drugs if elected, emphasizing the need for a treatment-based approach to people experiencing addiction—while at the same time maintaining that he’d seek to increase enforcement against those who sell drugs.

#us politics #news #marijuana moment #medical marijuana #legalize marijuana #medical marijuanna #legalize cannabis #recreational cannabis #decriminalize cannabis #medical cannabis #republicans #conservatives #tweet #gov. ron desantis #nikki fried #chris christie #donald trump #2023 #2024 elections #2024 presidential race #2024 republican primaries #YouTube #videos #decriminalize drugs #decriminalization

[lashton-is-my-drug]

Ashton posted via his ig story a link to Time magazine’s post about Thailand decriminalizing cannabis.

August 26, 2022

Link to time post

#ashton irwin ig story #time magazine #instagram #decriminalize cannabis #marijuana #august 26 #2022 #cannabis #thailand