Earlier this week, a letter that he wrote to congressional leaders in May 2017 became public. In this letter, he asks for the repeal of the Rohrabacher-Farr Amendment. Enacted in 2014, the Amendment prohibits the Justice Department from using federal funds to interfere with state legislature regarding medical marijuana. Basically, Sessions wants to prosecute medical marijuana businesses and medical marijuana providers.
In the letter, Sessions writes
“I believe it would be unwise for Congress to restrict the discretion of the Department to fund particular prosecutions, particularly in the midst of an historic drug epidemic and potentially long-term uptick in violent crime.”
“Historic drug epidemic”
The United States has a major problem with opioid abuse. But marijuana is not an opioid. In fact, research is being conducted to consider cannabis for opioid abuse treatment. In addition to that, Columbia University’s Mailman School of Public health recently published a study that shows that the number of fatal car accidents involving the use of opioids decrease in states with a medical marijuana program.
With a plethora of information at his fingertips, and with dozens of scientific studies at his disposal, one must ask:
WTF is Sessions’ problem?
Seriously, he’s conflating medical marijuana businesses with heroin traffickers. They’re not in the same ballpark. Honestly, marijuana and heroin aren’t even the same sport. There are two possible explanations. One is that Jeff Sessions is so far removed from reality that outdated theories about cannabis and antiquated social attitudes actually seem logical to him.
The other possibility is that he wants to go after medical marijuana businesses as a precursor to launching us back into the earliest days of cannabis prohibition. AKA Reefer Madness. What could possibly be the motivation for this? Denying patients life-saving healthcare? Higher rates of criminal convictions and incarcerations? General misery?
Well, we are in fact talking about a man who willingly and enthusiastically works with Donald Trump. Either of these possibilities are plausible.
