Two GOP congressmen are asking President Joe Biden to promptly handle “discriminatory” federal marijuana enforcement points in tribal territories, imploring him to direct the related businesses to prioritize extra severe crimes like human trafficking and respect tribal sovereignty as an alternative of going after hashish.
Reps. Dave Joyce (R-OH) and Brian Mast (R-FL), the Republican co-chairs of the Congressional Hashish Caucus, despatched a letter to the president on Friday, looking for administrative motion with respect to hashish coverage for the Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA).
The lawmakers stated that they needed to boost consideration to the difficulty in gentle of Biden’s proclamation final week pardoning individuals who have dedicated federal marijuana possession offenses and his directive for an administrative evaluate of hashish scheduling.
“We request that you simply use your authority to maintain the Bureau of Indian Affairs and associated businesses, such because the Nationwide Indian Gaining Fee, targeted on extra urgent public security and justice wants, together with Lacking and Murdered Indigenous Ladies and human trafficking, and require such businesses to respect Tribal sovereignty transferring ahead,” they wrote.
“Authorized, thriving hashish packages are financial engines for Tribes,” the letter says. “Implementing federal hashish legal guidelines on Tribal land, particularly in circumstances the place the Tribe and the State have legalized hashish use, is flawed and it must cease. Not solely is it not proper, however it’s discriminatory.”
Joyce and Mast cited a BIA enforcement motion in New Mexico final yr, when federal brokers raided the backyard of a member of the Pueblo of Picuris and destroyed 9 crops he was rising for private therapeutic use in compliance with state and tribal regulation.
The New Mexico man lately filed a declare indicating his intention to file a lawsuit looking for $3.5 million in damages from the federal authorities over what he and others view as a double normal of racially discriminatory hashish criminalization.
The BIA hashish raid was strongly condemned by Pueblo of Picuris Gov. Craig Quanchello, who informed Marijuana Second in an earlier interview that he equally felt that the motion constituted racial discrimination. The tribal authorities stated in a letter to BIA that the raid was “a gross invasion of the Pueblo’s sovereign authority over its members and different individuals residing on its land.”
“These misguided enforcement actions have despatched a chill by way of Indian Nation—Tribes are not sure if the Federal Authorities will proceed to implement and prioritize federal hashish legal guidelines solely on reservations,” the congressmen wrote to Biden.
Outdoors of the administration, Joyce helped safe Fiscal 12 months 2023 appropriations language within the Inside base invoice to offer protections for Indian tribes in opposition to being federally prosecuted just because they’ve legalized marijuana inside their territory.
The language is considerably much like earlier sections hooked up to totally different spending measures as amendments which have pushed to provide hashish safeguards to tribes.
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“Tribes are sovereign nations, they usually have simply as a lot of a proper to enact and implement their very own legal guidelines as States do,” the lawmakers stated.
At a congressional listening to in April, Joyce individually raised the tribal hashish difficulty with Inside Secretary Deb Haaland.
The secretary was additionally pressed on the company’s marijuana enforcement coverage at a Senate Appropriations subcommittee listening to in July.
“Once more, we request that you simply take immediate motion to have the Bureau of Indian Affairs concentrate on extra urgent points like human trafficking and Lacking and Murdered Indigenous Ladies, relatively than implementing Federal hashish legal guidelines inconsistent with Tribal legal guidelines,” the GOP lawmakers’ letter to Biden concludes.
In June, a Senate committee held a listening session to broadly handle marijuana points for Indian tribes, discussing related laws and the significance of tribal sovereignty with respect to hashish.
Members of the Senate Indian Affairs Committee, chaired by Sen. Brian Schatz (D-HI), heard testimony from quite a few representatives of Indian tribes and commerce associations throughout the nation, together with the Suquamish Tribe, Pueblo of Laguna, Kumeyaay Nation, Puyallup Tribe and Santee Sioux Tribe.
Whereas most of the conversations targeted on tribal-specific insurance policies and points equivalent to taxation and tribal contracts with state governments, there have been additionally a number of witnesses who harassed the necessity for a complete finish to federal prohibition to uplift tribal markets.
In March, a coalition of 9 U.S. senators despatched a letter to Lawyer Normal Merrick Garland, urging him to direct federal prosecutors to not intervene with marijuana legalization insurance policies enacted by Native American tribes.
The letter requested that the Justice Division “respect the inherent sovereignty of Tribal governments and stop the enforcement of the Managed Substances Act on Tribal land because it pertains to the expansion, possession, and use of hashish for medicinal, agricultural, and leisure functions, the place these Tribes have legalized this exercise for its personal members and people performing in compliance with Tribal regulation.”
There was earlier Obama-era DOJ steerage on prosecutorial discretion for tribal governments that opted to legalize hashish. However that steerage, often known as the Wilkinson Memo, was rescinded by then-Lawyer Normal Jeff Classes in 2018, together with a separate memo urging prosecutors to not go after states that established regulated hashish markets.
The senators urged the lawyer normal to “reinstate prosecutorial discretion and permit U.S. Attorneys to deprioritize hashish enforcement the place states and Tribes have legalized hashish.”
Whereas the tribe-specific DOJ steerage was rescinded, the federal authorities has typically taken a hands-off strategy to marijuana enforcement in states which have chosen to legalize the plant—with a obtrusive exception being final yr’s BIA raid in Pueblo of Picuris.
In the meantime, the Pueblos of Pojoaque and Picuris signed an intergovernmental cooperative agreements with New Mexico’s authorities in Could that enables the tribes to impose their very own tax on hashish merchandise offered inside their tribal jurisdictions.
Different states like Washington equally enable Native tribes to enter into intergovernmental agreements that may authorize Indian territories to enact their very own rules, penalties and tax insurance policies for hashish.
Learn the congressional letter to Biden on federal marijuana enforcement coverage for tribes under: