FDR Ended Prohibition. Now, President Biden is Ending the War on Weed.

 

     In March 1933, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt signed legislation repealing Prohibition, quipping, "I think this would be a good time for beer." Later that year, the 21st Amendment took Prohibition out of the Constitution, starting off Roosevelt's historic presidency with the decriminalization of alcohol. We are seeing a modern version of this play out with the Biden administration and its cannabis policy.

     On December 2nd, 2022, President Biden signed the historic Medical Marijuana and Cannabidiol Research Expansion Act, legislation that required the DEA to federally recognize cannabis researchers, allowed them to legally possess the substance, offered protections for cannabis research, and even required annual updates on cannabis research. Even more significantly, this was the FIRST piece of standalone cannabis legislation signed into law in United States history.

     In July of that year, Senators Chuck Schumer, Ron Wyden, and Cory Booker introduced legislation to decriminalize cannabis at the federal level, with Schumer becoming the first Senate Majority Leader in American history to come out in support of cannabis legalization. Although the bill never passed, it did signal a major shift in U.S. cannabis policy.

     On January 12th, 2024, the FDA announced its recommendation that cannabis be rescheduled from a Schedule I drug, in the same category as heroin and LSD, to a Schedule III drug. The DEA is now taking public comment on a plan to reschedule the drug, a rescheduling that the Justice Department also publicly recommended in April 2024.

     President Biden has not only changed the law, but used his executive powers to right the wrongs inflicted by outdated cannabis laws. In October 2022, he announced a pardon for all people federally convicted of simple possession; in December 2023, he expanded that pardon to cover the crimes of marijuana use and attempted simple possession. expunging thousands of federal marijuana convictions from the record. At 4:20 PM on 4/20 of 2024, President Biden and Vice President Harris urged governors and state lawmakers to pardon marijuana offenders and reform state laws, something the president doesn't have the power to do.

     The Biden administration has also seen a historic shift in state-level marijuana laws. Since he took office, 11 states as well as the U.S. Virgin Islands have legalized recreational marijuana, and it will be on the ballot in several other states this November. If these measures pass, more states will have legalized marijuana during the Biden administration than during the Trump and Obama administrations combined. 

     President Biden has the longest list of accomplishments of any president since Lyndon B. Johnson, from the Inflation Reduction Act to the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act to the CHIPS and Science Act to the Honoring Our PACT Act to the Respect for Marriage Act to the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act and dozens of other major bills alongside hundreds of executive actions related to the economy, immigration, defending democracy, gun safety, labor rights, LGBT2SQIA+ rights, climate change, the environment, and other crucial areas. President Biden's record on cannabis is the best of any president in American history, and it's another reason it's crucial to ensure that he is reelected in November.