Bernie Sanders Tells Joe Rogan He'll Legalize Marijuana If President

By Brendan Bures, via The Fresh Toast. Provided exclusively to Benzinga Cannabis for publication.

Presidential candidate Bernie Sanders re-affirmed his pro-marijuana legalization stance on Joe Rogan’s podcast, but that doesn’t mean he’ll decriminalize all drugs.

Perhaps the most revelatory statement Sen. Bernie Sanders said on Joe Rogan’s podcast was his plan to reveal UFO and alien secrets should he become President. Going one step further, Sanders told Rogan “we’ll announce it on the show.” As in, Rogan’s show. Discovering that aliens exist through a comedian’s podcast would be the most 2020 thing ever.

But the conversation eventually turned to one of Rogan’s favorite topics — cannabis. Rogan brought up the flourishing black market in states like California. Though consumers prefer regulated, legally grown cannabis, the majority of consumers live in states without legalized cannabis. As a result, they buy unregulated, pesticide-filled bud, which sometimes contains traces of feces.

Rogan proposed this is a problem directly caused by cannabis prohibition.

Photo by Spencer Platt/Staff/Getty Images

“What I called for then and I call for now is the legalization of marijuana in America,” Sanders said. “Right now you have a federal law — it’s called the Controlled Substance Act. Here’s heroin, here’s marijuana — they’re at the same level. That is insane.

“Heroin is a killer drug,” he continued. You can argue the pluses and minuses of marijuana, but marijuana ain’t heroin. So we have to end that. That’s what I will do. As President of the United States, I believe we can do that through executive order. And I will do that."

Sanders also pointed to the disparity in driving through states like Nevada and California. On the same streets where residents could be pulled over and arrested for marijuana possession, now reigns giant billboard advertisements from cannabis corporations advertising their products. That shock led Sanders to praise the expungement work of clearing prior marijuana convictions by cities like Los Angeles and San Francisco, as well as a state like Illinois.

Related Story: Cory Booker Slams Joe Biden's Marijuana Reform Plan Ahead Of Detroit Dem Debate

However, when Rogan proposed decriminalizing all drugs, Sanders wasn’t exactly buying it.

“No, not at this point. You’re touching on a real tragedy, though,” Sanders said. “When we talk about criminal justice in America, we have over 2 million people in jail. They are disproportionately African America, Latino, and Native American. In the wealthiest country in the history of the world, what we have to do instead of building more jails and locking up more people, we really have to invest in our young people. Especially young people in distressed communities.”

You can listen to the full interview below.

Photo screenshot via PowerfulJRE YouTube