This week, the House of Representatives approved a slate of historically weed-friendly amendments to the annual bill funding the Department of Justice.
“We’re really, really close to having the votes to end marijuana prohibition,” Dan Riffle, director of federal policies at the Marijuana Policy Project, told The Hill.
U.S. representatives voted to prevent the DOJ from interfering with states that have legalized medical marijuana and agricultural hemp production – a boon for Colorado’s weed industry.
An amendment sponsored by Boulder Democrat Rep. Jared Polis to move $9 million away from the Drug Enforcement Administration’s efforts at “Cannabis Reduction and Eradication” passed. The money would be re-routed to more successful anti-domestic violence and anti-child-abuse programs.
Another of Polis’s amendments failed narrowly, but it’s the one that has everyone in the weed biz buzzing. His move to prohibit the DOJ from messing with states that have legalized recreational weed snagged more than 200 votes, just a few shy of a win.
“The federal government shouldn’t be swooping into Colorado to decide how we regulate marijuana any more than it should be swooping into Louisiana to tell them how they should regulate fried crawfish,” Polis said in a release. “In Colorado, we’ve seen that regulating the marijuana industry is a far more successful approach than leaving the market in the hands of criminal cartels. With each passing year, Congress moves one step closer to leaving marijuana policy up to the states, where it belongs. I’m confident that with time, we’ll finally get there.”
Image by new 1lluminati
I wouldn’t brag about it until it’s a done deal, and it’s not a done deal yet. There’s still a lot of work to do.
When it’s a done deal, I will jump up and down, and dance around, and celebrate.