Marijuana legalization activists across the country are holding their breath with every stop and start in the push to legalize weed in the Garden State.
And it's not just because of their hopes that New Jersey becomes a billion-dollar linchpin in the tristate area.
Amol Sinha, executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union of New Jersey, likes that a recent draft of the legislation allows some people to get their arrests records cleared if they’ve successfully completed parole or probation, or finished serving time in prison. But he'd also like to see people still in the system cleared, and released if they're still incarcerated.
People in Colorado still remember John Hickenlooper’s crack after the state legalized marijuana, a move he opposed: “Don’t break out the Cheetos or Goldfish too quickly.”
But Mr. Hickenlooper, the governor at the time of the 2012 initiative allowing recreational use of cannabis, eventually changed his mind. He acknowledged that fears of increased use by children did not materialize, and he boasted of the tax revenues for social programs that regulated sales delivered.
What Rice now represents is an unsettling crack in Murphy’s effort to unite Democratic support behind his plan to legalize marijuana as a social justice initiative to keep the disproportionate number of African-Americans who are arrested on minor pot possession charges from going to prison.
Rice does not buy Murphy’s message.
“It’s not about social justice,” he told me. “It’s about money.”
Rep. Barbara Lee (D-CA) introduced three wide-ranging marijuana bills in Congress on Thursday.
The congresswoman, who was named as a co-chair of the Congressional Cannabis Caucus last month, re-filed legislation to end federal cannabis prohibition, bar the federal government from using funds to interfere in state-legal marijuana programs and encourage reform policies to help communities of color participate in the legal market.
New Jersey Sen. Cory Booker, one of half a dozen Democratic senators running for the White House, is reintroducing a bill on Thursday that would fundamentally end the federal government's prohibition on marijuana.
But you may want to wait before you go out and buy that vape pen or box of EZ Wider papers. Holdouts, led by Newark’s Sen. Ron Rice, say legal weed will be a death knell to communities of color where drugs and crime have made economic development impossible.
“I’m still a no. Every day there is new information about why we shouldn’t do this,” he said in a statement Tuesday. “This is about money, it’s not about social justice. Why should we pass something that makes money for investors on the backs of black and brown people?”
Social justice is the primary reason Governor Phil Murphy and a host of politicians have pushed for legalization of cannabis in New Jersey.
Among the many effects of the War on Drugs – especially marijuana – has been the negative impact on communities of color from arrest rates to incarceration and now to the great difficulty in entering legal markets from the ownership side.
It’s expected that New Jersey cannabis legalization will happen this year and the state's pot-friendly governor is eager to get the ball rolling. Gov. Phil Murphy says that legalizing marijuana will help to right the wrongs done by the war on drugs and allow law enforcement to focus on serious and violent crimes.
Five key statewide leaders—representing advocates and opponents—offered a range of opinions on the future legalization of marijuana in New Jersey, while highlighting the uncertainties of what such legalization may bring at a luncheon forum Jan. 25 in Hackensack.
The leaders from politics, civil liberties, law enforcement, banking and the cannabis industry covered most aspects roiling a legislative and social debate over legalization and left over 100 attendees at Bergen Volunteer Center’s Fifth Friday luncheon at Stony Hill Inn with many lingering questions and concerns.