Members of the Justice Department’s Task Force on Crime Reduction and Public Safety have been ordered to “undertake a review of existing policies” regarding federal marijuana law enforcement, among other things. Their report is due on or before July 27, and the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws believes the document may use as its template a list by a fellow at the ultra-conservative Heritage Foundation of eleven ways the administration of President Donald Trump can shut down legal cannabis.
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After Attorney General Jeff Sessions told an assembly of the country’s attorneys general that state marijuana laws are in violation of federal law, Colorado Attorney General Cynthia Coffman came out fighting for this state’s rights.
Coffman, a Republican, said that while the Trump administration’s intentions regarding marijuana are unclear, she plans to uphold the Colorado Constitution — including Amendment 64, which legalized the recreational sale and use of marijuana in 2012.
In this essay, retired Judge Mary Celeste (bio below) responds to the Trump administration’s comments on marijuana and opioids:
This past week saw two indications that the Trump administration is uneducated and clueless about drugs in this country. Its first irresponsible action is the potential halting of federal drug-control efforts. According to the New York Times, the White House is potentially eliminating the White House’s Office of National Drug Control Policy, which coordinates federal efforts to reduce drug use and drug trafficking. “The ONDCP’s website was ‘wiped clean’ when President Trump took office and it has not been replaced,” the paper reported.
The Veterans Administration in Colorado says that injured and sick vets using cannabis legally according to state laws won’t face any pushback. The statement came in response to vets concerned that they would lose their federal benefits if marijuana came up in a blood or urine screen.
The Obama administration will not sue to stop Colorado’s Amendment 64, which allows adults 21 and over to use and possess small amounts of marijuana, and establishes a foundation for retail sales of recreational pot. This long-awaited news was confirmed by the office of Colorado-based U.S. Attorney John Walsh shortly after a phone call involving U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder, Colorado Governor John Hickenlooper and Jay Inslee, the governor of Washington, which passed a marijuana measure similar to A64 this past November.
Denver Westword has the local angle, and we’ll have plenty more tomorrow morning right here at Toke of the Town.
In less than five years, Barack Obama has spent nearly $290 million to arrest and prosecute medical marijuana caregivers, patients and dispensary owners. It’s a huge number, but interestingly only makes up about four percent of the overall Drug Enforcement Administration Budget.
According to Americans for Safe Access, which compiled the report using DEA and other federal statistics, says federal intervention flies in the face of state-legal cannabis patients, which number more than 1 million people nationally.
| Pot.tv |
| Aaron Sandusky faces 10 years to life in federal prison. He will be sentenced next month. |
This month will see a number of patients sentenced, sent to prison despite compliance with state medical marijuana laws
Fallout from the Obama Administration’s aggressive federal enforcement in medical marijuana states has reached a fever pitch this month with three people being sentenced, two others due to surrender to federal authorities to serve out sentences of up to five years in prison, and one federal trial in Montana currently scheduled for January 14.
| Ohio Medical Marijuana |
President Obama seeks campaign contributions from Oakland community after federal interference causes hundreds to lose jobs and healthcare benefits
News conference scheduled in conjunction with presidential visit: Monday, July 23, 2012 at 1:45 p.m.
Oaksterdam University, 1600 Broadway, Oakland, CA
President Barack Obama is scheduled to visit the heart of America’s medical marijuana community just days after his appointed U.S. Attorney, Melinda Haag, intentionally and admittedly targeted Harborside Health Center – a state-legal medical cannabis facility – in violation of administration policy.
On July 23, President Obama is scheduled to give a speech at the Fox Theater in Oakland. To coincide with this event, advocates are planning a permitted, peaceful protest originating at Oakland’s City Hall; a press conference at Oaksterdam University; and concurrent actions in Oregon, Washington, and Colorado.
Multiple businesses in the vicinity of the Fox Theater are also expected to display green flags on their storefronts in solidarity with local medical cannabis collectives targeted by the administration.
| StoptheDrugWar.org |
| Drug Czar Gil Kerlikowske (left) and President Obama: “Drug War Autopilot and Co-Autopilot,” according to Phillip Smith at StoptheDrugWar.org |
Cops Slam Obama For Same Old ‘Drug War’ Budget
Despite Promises, President Continues To Favor Punishment Over Treatment
The Obama Administration on Tuesday morning released its annual National Drug Control Strategy, detailing the methods and budgets planned to “combat drug use” for fiscal year 2013. The report stresses that more resources need to be spent on addiction treatment and prevention, and that an enforcement-centric “War On Drugs” is unworkable. But in a prime example of political incongruence, the report also shows that budget allocations for law enforcement methods could increase by hundreds of millions of dollars, including military operations on U.S. soil.
| Photo: The Washington Examiner |
| Deputy Atty. Gen. James M. Cole: “The Ogden Memorandum was never intended to shield such activities from federal enforcement and prosecution, even where those activities purport to comply with state law” |
A troubling new memo has been released which seems to show that the Obama Administration is abandoning its policy of leaving medical marijuana enforcement to the states in states which have legalized it.
The U.S. Department of Justice remains committed to prosecuting “large-scale” cultivation, sale and distribution of marijuana, even in states which have enacted legislation permitting the use of cannabis for medical uses, according to a Justice Department memo obtained by Bloomberg News.
“The Ogden Memorandum was never intended to shield such activities from federal enforcement and prosecution, even where those activities purport to comply with state law,” reads the new memo, authored by Deputy Attorney General James M. Cole.