By The Fresh Toast's Brendan Bures, provided exclusively to Benzinga Cannabis.Â
The senators analyzed how cannabis criminalization drives deep wedges into society with long-term, damaging consequences.
Sens. Cory Booker and Bernie Sanders held a virtual town hall meeting last week to discuss criminal justice reform, which included a lengthy dialogue about the role cannabis enforcement plays in social inequities. Booker said he and Sanders discuss âmarijuana justice all the timeâ and how the War on Drugs influences systems of oppression.
âIâm all for [marijuana] legalization,â Booker said. âI came to the Senate speaking about legalization. But to say that in the same breath and not to include expunging records, reinvesting profits into communities that have been economically devastated by the drug war; youâre not talking about justice if you suddenly say, âOkay, everybody started in the same field. Go ahead.ââ
At campaign rallies, Sanders stated he would often ask attendees to raise their hand if they or a known acquaintance had been arrested for cannabis possession.
âI was astounded by the hands that went up,â he said. âThen if you get a criminal record [âŠ] youâre looking for a job and the boss says, âHave you ever been arrested?â âWell, yeah, I have been.â âOkay, well, thank you. Weâll interview somebody else.ââ
RELATED:Â Post-Pandemic Cannabis: Are Amazon, Uber And Other Mainstream Delivery Services The Future?
Booker and Sanders have established themselves as two of the loudest voices fighting for marijuana legalization at the federal level. Sanders promised immediately removing cannabis as a banned substance if he was elected President. Booker, meanwhile, introduced a bill that would legalize cannabis at the national level with support from Sanders and other 2020 presidential candidates like Sens. Elizabeth Warren and Kamala Harris.
Photo by Joe Raedle/Staff/Getty Images
Since dropping out of the presidential race in January, Booker has continued driving dialogue about marijuana reform. Amid the coronavirus pandemic, he questioned why some state lawmakers had labeled cannabis an âessential good,â but the substance remained federally illegal. He also underlined how marijuana enforcement represented the racist inequities spurring protests following the death of George Floyd while in the custody of Minneapolis police.
He echoed those sentiments in conversation with Sanders, when a viewer asked: âWhat would legalizing marijuana, expunging the records of those arrested for marijuana, mean for people of color?â
RELATED: Is The NBA Pro-Marijuana Now?
âIn 2017, the last year we have data for, there were more marijuana possession arrests than all violent crime arrests in America combined,â Booker said. âAnd again, theyâre arresting people of color. Theyâre not arresting folks of greater privilege.â
As Booker referenced, that data also showed black Americans were more than four times as likely to be arrested for marijuana possession than white Americans. The groups, however, consumer marijuana at similar rates.
âNow you get a nonviolent drug charge for doing something that two of the three last presidents admitted to doing,â the senator said. âNow you have 40,000 collateral consequences that strip you from your economic power. You canât get Pell grants, canât get public housing, canât get jobs, canât get loans from the bank.â
Noticias sobre cannabis en Español en El Planteo.
Photo by Scott Eisen/Stringer/Getty Images; Randy Shropshire/Stringer/Getty Images
© 2024 Benzinga.com. Benzinga does not provide investment advice. All rights reserved.
Comments
Trade confidently with insights and alerts from analyst ratings, free reports and breaking news that affects the stocks you care about.
Cannabis rescheduling seems to be right around the corner
Want to understand what this means for the future of the industry? Hear directly for top executives, investors and policymakers at the 19th Benzinga Cannabis Capital Conference, coming to Chicago this Oct. 8-9. Get your tickets now before prices surge by following this link.