The newly elected Home Democratic chief says marijuana reform is one coverage space the place he believes there will be additional bipartisan progress within the subsequent Congress, even with Republicans within the majority.
Rep. Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY) mentioned his imaginative and prescient for the 118th Congress throughout an look on ABC Information’s “This Week with George Stephanopoulos” on Sunday. He was requested the place he noticed alternatives for “bipartisan compromise” and proactively introduced up marijuana reform.
The congressman, whose colleagues lately voted to make him Home minority chief, cited his work with Rep. Dave Joyce (R-OH) in introducing the Getting ready Regulators Successfully for a Put up-Prohibition Grownup-Use Regulated Setting Act (PREPARE) Act this 12 months, which he mentioned is supposed to “put together the federal authorities to maneuver towards the legalization of hashish, which state after state—blue states and pink states and purple states all throughout America—are doing.”
“There is a chance for widespread floor,” he said, including that he additionally “labored with the Trump administration prior to now on legal justice reform” just like the First Step Act.
Modest marijuana reform, in addition to points like infrastructure and commerce coverage, are “foundational issues that hopefully we will construct upon as we glance to the longer term,” Jeffries mentioned.
After all, the trail ahead for any laws within the subsequent Congress beneath Republican management may even want sign-off from GOP management, and the congressman nominated by his occasion to develop into speaker, Rep. Kevin McCarthy (R-CA), has been hostile to most hashish proposals—besides that he’s supported a bipartisan marijuana banking invoice.
Theoretically, if Congress passes a package deal of modest reforms like banking and expungements as they’re working to do in the course of the lame duck session, that would set Jeffries as much as have interaction in negotiations and attain compromises on extra laws subsequent 12 months.
Final 12 months, Jeffries and Reps. Ayanna Pressley (D-MA) and Cori Bush (D-MO) additionally launched the Truthful and Impartial Specialists in Clemency (FIX Clemency) Act that’s geared toward streamlining the presidential clemency course of, with supporters arguing that it might assist tackle mass incarceration that’s been pushed by punitive insurance policies just like the conflict on medication.
On the whole, advocates really feel {that a} divided Congress with Republicans answerable for the Home nonetheless leaves alternatives to advance some extra modest marijuana laws, however it’s unclear what which may appear to be, including urgency for motion in the course of the last weeks of the lame duck session.
Final month, congressional lawmakers held a listening to to debate federal marijuana legalization and state hashish developments, listening to testimony from a panel of broadly pro-reform advocates.
The chairman of the subcommittee that held that listening to additionally mentioned that he’ll quickly be introducing a invoice geared toward defending federal employees from being denied safety clearances over marijuana.
Sen. Jacky Rosen (D-NV) filed a invoice final month that will enable state-legal marijuana companies to entry sure federal Small Enterprise Administration (SBA) loans and companies which can be accessible to firms in some other business.
These are a couple of examples of reform laws that might be pursued alongside probably bipartisan strains subsequent Congress.
In the meantime, President Joe Biden formally signed a marijuana analysis invoice into legislation final week, making historical past by enacting the primary piece of standalone federal hashish reform laws in U.S. historical past.
Photograph courtesy of Mike Latimer.