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Pandering to potheads: Biden regime readies to ease federal weed laws ahead of 2024 election

September 1, 2023 | | Print Article

President Joe Biden appears intent on getting the stoners’ seal of approval on his 2024 re-election campaign.

On Wednesday, the Biden administration’s U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) announced it has provided a scheduling recommendation to the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) on marijuana, a plant that is currently legal to grow and consume for recreational or medicinal purposes in many states but remains classified as a Schedule I substance by the DEA and a crime to possess by the federal government.

“I can now share that, following the data and science, @HHSGov has responded to @POTUS’ directive to me for the Department to provide a scheduling recommendation for marijuana to the DEA,” HHS Secretary Xavier Becerra stated on X. “We’ve worked to ensure that a scientific evaluation be completed and shared expeditiously.”

As BizPac Review reported, in October 2022, President Biden made the largely performative gesture of pardoning all prior federal offenses of simple marijuana possession.

“As I’ve said before, no one should be in jail just for using or possessing marijuana,” Biden stated at the time.

Part of his marijuana reform plan included asking Becerra “and the Attorney General to initiate the process of reviewing how marijuana is scheduled under federal law.”


It’s quite the change of pace for Biden, who, in 2010 as vice president told ABC News, “I still believe it’s a gateway drug,” according to DailyMail.com.

“I’ve spent a lot of my life as chairman of the Judiciary Committee dealing with this,” Biden said. “I think it would be a mistake to legalize.”

“In 2019, Biden, who has worked during his presidency to reshape US marijuana laws, made similar comments, saying ‘there’s not nearly been enough evidence that has been acquired as to whether or not it is a gateway drug,'” the Daily Mail reports.

According to the Associated Press, rescheduling marijuana from a Schedule 1 drug, such as heroin and LSD, to a Schedule 3 would put pot in the same class as ketamine and certain anabolic steroids.

The DEA considers a Schedule 3 drug to “have a potential for abuse less than substances in Schedules I or II and abuse may lead to moderate or low physical dependence or high psychological dependence,” AP reports.

The left seems to be all aboard the “puff puff pass” train ahead of the 2024 elections.

Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) called current marijuana laws “draconian.”

“HHS has done the right thing,” Schumer said in a statement posted to X. “DEA should now follow through on this important step to greatly reduce the harm caused by draconian marijuana laws.”

“While this is a step forward,” he added, “there is still much more that needs to be done legislatively to end the federal prohibition on cannabis and roll back the War on Drugs.”

In a statement issued on Wednesday, Senate Finance Committee Chairman Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) said, “Ultimately, I believe that cannabis should be descheduled with strong federal regulations put in place to protect public health and safety – that’s why I introduced the Cannabis Administration And Opportunity Act with Leader Schumer and Senator Booker.”

“However, the recommendation of HHS to reschedule cannabis as a Schedule III drug is not inconsequential,” Wyden said. “If HHS’s recommendation is ultimately implemented, it will be a historic step for a nation whose cannabis policies have been out of touch with reality.”

Senator John Fetterman (D-Pa.) is thrilled with the development.

“For many, many years now, I have been pushing for decisive action on marijuana,” Fetterman said on X. “Nearly one year ago to the day, I met with President Biden in Pittsburgh and requested that he and his administration do something on marijuana policy.”

“Yesterday’s move is a massive win for the Biden administration and a strong step in the right direction on marijuana policy,” he continued. “I’m glad to see that the administration agrees with what we have known for a while: marijuana should not be a Schedule I drug.”

“Moving marijuana from Schedule I will have huge benefits for people across Pennsylvania and this country, especially our veterans who rely on it as treatment for conditions like PTSD,” the senator explained. “But we should also be clear that we have been in this exact spot before, with science on the side of rescheduling, only to have the DEA and its destructive ‘War on Drugs’ mindset block reform.”

“That must not happen again,” he stated.

Meanwhile, in the Big Apple, New Yorkers are getting tired of smelling Mary Jane everywhere they go.

“It’s jarring when you walk into a high-end department store where you used to smell Chanel perfume and now it’s weed,” an anonymous stylist who works at Saks Fifth Avenue’s Manhattan flagship told the New York Post. “Everywhere you go in New York City smells like weed. It’s not just Saks — it’s at Bloomingdales, at the movies … there’s no high-end anymore.”

“Indeed, brazen New Yorkers are lighting joints on the F train, ripping vape pens on the Hampton Jitney and firing up at upscale restaurants like Carbone and Nobu 57, observers told The Post,” the outlet reports.

While smoking a joint or vaping some weed indoors in New York State is, like tobacco, prohibited, The Post claims, “the potential $50 fine isn’t stopping everyone.”

According to The Post:

Through Sunday, 8,216 smoke/open flame/vape violations have been issued by NYPD officers in 2023, data obtained by The Post shows.

That’s up 89.7% compared to 4,331 during the same span in 2022.

Criminal summonses related to smoking on MTA trains and facilities has also skyrocketed this year to 692 as of Sunday, compared to 325 in the same span a year ago — a 112.9% surge, according to stats provided by the NYPD.

 

And business owners are holding progressive lawmakers responsible.

“I hold Gov. Hochul responsible. She’s been promoting marijuana use. She’s bending over backwards to get people to use marijuana and get marijuana stores set up,” David G. Evans, organizer of the group Cannabis Industry Victims Seeking Justice, told The Post. “It’s not good for any community.”

Melissa Fine
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