Ahead of the Democratic National Convention in Milwaukee, virtually all Democratic presidential candidates have expressed their support for the legalization of cannabis, a new stance for most of them. Just a few years ago, only a select few were championing cannabis, the first of whom was Bernie Sanders.
As early as 1972, Sanders was already standing up to support rights for American citizens to consume marijuana. Following his bid for governor of Vermont, he wrote it plainly in an article: “‘Could I ask Mr. Sanders if he has ever smoked marijuana?’ Strangely enough, despite all the times that I had talked about the need for legalizing marijuana, that was the first time that question was ever directly asked of me. I said, ‘Yes, I have smoked marijuana.’” For decades, Sanders was the only one, among the current roster of Democratic presidential hopefuls, to stand up for marijuana through initiatives like co-sponsoring a medical marijuana bill as early as 1996.
It wasn’t before the early 2000s that others offered tentative support for cannabis reform—Cory Booker, Mike Gravel and Beto O’Rourke, specifically. Then, as the 2016 presidential election loomed and polls reported that 50% of Americans were in favor of cannabis reform, more and more politicians started coming out in favor of it. Steve Bullock and Eric Swalwell were among the first to express support, years before Elizabeth Warren and Kamala Harris did.
Medical Marijuana, Inc. (MJNA), a marijuana and hemp company, recently revealed a timeline and guide of the presidential candidates’ stances on marijuana. It clearly shows that, after Donald Trump’s victory in 2016, the floodgates opened, and a tidal wave of support for marijuana reform hit the Democratic Party. The political trend seems to closely follow the changing opinion of the American people on the matter. Gallup polls report that support for marijuana legalization reached an all-time high of 66% at the end of 2018.
Medical Marijuana, Inc. (MJNA), a marijuana and hemp company, recently revealed a timeline and guide of the presidential candidates’ stances on marijuana.
Two Outliers: Trump and Biden
Despite a nearly unanimous positive stance on legalization among the Democratic roster, one candidate stands out by refusing to budge: Joe Biden. Although Barack Obama’s former vice president said that nobody “should be in jail simply for smoking or possession marijuana,” he favors decriminalization rather than legalization, as he clearly expressed.
“Biden was a driving force behind America’s War on Drugs,” MJNA states. “Biden sponsored and consistently voted for increasingly heavy-handed drug legislation. He introduced a bill that green-lit civil asset forfeiture, eliminated the possibility of bail for individuals charged with certain drug crimes and mandated that the Justice Department ‘aggressively’ combat drug offenders.”
On the other side of the political spectrum, Donald Trump also appears as an outlier for different reasons. Going against typically conservative beliefs, the president signed the 2018 Farm Bill into law, reclassifying hemp as an agricultural commodity. He formally stated during his 2016 campaign that he is “in favor of [medical marijuana] a hundred percent.” He also said, “That should be a state issue, state-by-state.”
More recently, the president admitted he would “probably” support the STATES Act, a bipartisan bill allowing states to write their own marijuana policies. As such, his stance is close to that of Elizabeth Warren, who sponsored the STATES Act, and who’s position on cannabis reform is far more progressive than Biden’s. Trump has sent mixed signals about his position on marijuana. However, in appointing people like Jeff Sessions to his cabinet, he became a staunch opponent of cannabis reform.
