The 2020 U.S. presidential election is going to determine the future of marijuana legislation nationwide. In recent years, marijuana entered the public debate and garnered support from a vast majority of Americans, culminating in efforts like the recent Marijuana Justice Act, which aims to legalize it federally. As a whole, the Democratic Party has made cannabis reform into a central issue that their presidential hopefuls all support to different degrees. Here are some of their positions on the subject:
Joe Biden
Biden supports decriminalization but not legalization on the federal level. His plan includes rescheduling cannabis as a Schedule II drug (what cocaine currently is) and letting states choose whether to legalize it. He wants to automatically expunge prior criminal records for marijuana possession. “Nobody should be in jail for smoking marijuana,” Biden said.
Cory Booker
Booker introduced the Marijuana Justice Act in Congress, making full legalization a central tenet of his platform. He particularly cares about addressing the racial inequalities created by the so-called “War on Drugs” and retroactively pardoning all the people convicted for marijuana offenses in the past. Booker believes in accelerating progress by using federal resources to incentivize marijuana reform at the state level. “The War on Drugs has not been a war on drugs, it’s been a war on people and disproportionately people of color and low-income individuals,” said Booker.
Pete Buttigieg
A latecomer to the discussion, he made marijuana legalization a secondary goal of his criminal justice reform plan. Rather than focusing on marijuana itself, he frames legalization as a social justice issue, stressing the importance of reversing the harmful effects of the criminalization of cannabis as well as racial inequality within the justice system. “The safe, regulated and legal sale of marijuana is an idea whose time has come for the United States, as evidenced by voters demanding legalization in states across the country,” he declared.
Kamala Harris
Despite admitting to smoking marijuana in the past, she used to oppose cannabis reform. She has since changed her mind, however, and now expresses support for legalization and regulation of marijuana—though her stance may mirror public opinion rather than a genuine conviction. “Legalizing marijuana is the smart thing to do and the right thing to do in order to advance justice and equality for every American,” Harris wrote in support of the Marijuana Justice Act.
Beto O’Rourke
O’Rourke defends the idea of full legalization on the federal level and a nationwide reform of the prison system. Marijuana reform is one of the main talking points of his campaign and has been since his first years in politics. “Let us not just end the prohibition of marijuana, or the expungement of the records of those arrested solely for possession of a substance legal in most of this country, [but also] confront the true legacy of slavery, segregation and suppression,” he wrote in his political program.
Bernie Sanders
Sanders is currently one of the most outspoken proponents of cannabis legalization. He wants to reform the criminal justice system and end the War on Drugs by entirely legalizing marijuana. “Right now, marijuana is at the same level as heroin, which is basically insane,” Sanders said. In a tweet, he wrote, “The time is long overdue for us to take marijuana off the federal government’s list of outlawed drugs.”
Elizabeth Warren
After skirting around the issue for years, Warren has expressed support for and co-sponsored several marijuana reform bills, in particular to expunge the records of people convicted of marijuana possession. She wants the federal government to reschedule marijuana and leave it up to states to legalize it, although she supported the Marijuana Justice Act earlier this year. “The federal government needs to get out of the business of outlawing marijuana. States should make their own decisions about enforcing marijuana laws,” she wrote.
