Biden Missing Opportunity To Sway Young Voters On Legalizing Cannabis

WASHINGTON DC – Cannabis advocates say President Biden is missing an opportunity to sway young voters with his reluctance to take bigger steps to legalize marijuana at the federal level.

The Biden administration has opened several avenues for marijuana reform including issuing federal pardons for simple possession and starting the process of potentially rescheduling marijuana’s status under the Controlled Substances Act from Schedule I to Schedule III.

But those measures have failed to excite advocates, who say Biden is falling short of his 2020 campaign promises and failing to address the disparate overcriminalization of the drug that has unduly impacted minority communities.

Progressive lawmakers in the Senate are urging the administration to go further and completely deschedule the drug, which would effectively decriminalize it at the federal level, as opposed to rescheduling it, which would reduce penalties and restrictions.

“Marijuana’s placement in the [Controlled Substances Act] has had a devastating impact on our communities and is increasingly out of step with state law and public opinion,” 12 Democratic lawmakers wrote to the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) last month.

Karen O’Keefe, director of state policies at the Marijuana Policy Project (MPP), told The Hill that rescheduling would be better than the “status quo” but still “vastly less than what we need from the federal government and where the public at large is.”

“It’s a popular issue that’s up for grabs for whatever candidate is willing to listen to the people on it,” O’Keefe added.

Public opinion is strongly in favor of marijuana legalization. A Gallup poll from November found a record 70 percent of Americans believed marijuana should be legal.

More recent polling from Lake Research Partners backs up public support for federal marijuana reform, with 58 percent supporting a rescheduling to Schedule III, compared to 19 percent who opposed the move.

“It’s a really strong issue with some constituencies that Democrats really need to increase their support and enthusiasm, specifically young people, African Americans, Democratic base voters, people of color, young men of color,” said Celinda Lake, a Democratic pollster and strategist who serves as president of Lake Research Partners.

Hayley Matz Meadvin, executive vice president of communications at Precision Strategies and a former Biden administration staffer, noted the “supermajority of support” behind marijuana legalization could help Biden lure in voters across the political spectrum.

“This is a popular issue that motivates voters, and it doesn’t just motivate — it clearly just doesn’t motivate [exclusively] Democrats. And … that will be critical this fall,” Meadvin said.