DOJ green light for Wash., Colo. pot reformers

Washington state Gov. Jay Inslee, left, is joined by state Attorney General Bob Ferguson as he talks to the media in Olympia, Wash. about the federal government’s announcement that it will not sue to stop Washington and Colorado from taxing and regulating recreational marijuana for adults, on Thursday, Aug. 29, 2013. Last fall, voters made both states the first in the country to legalize the sale of marijuana to adults over 21 at state-licensed stores. The states are creating rules for the system, with sales expected to begin early next year. (AP Photo/Rachel La Corte)

Washington state Gov. Jay Inslee, left, is joined by state Attorney General Bob Ferguson as he talks to the media in Olympia, Wash. about the federal government’s announcement that it will not sue to stop Washington and Colorado from taxing and regulating recreational marijuana for adults, on Thursday, Aug. 29, 2013. Last fall, voters made both states the first in the country to legalize the sale of marijuana to adults over 21 at state-licensed stores. The states are creating rules for the system, with sales expected to begin early next year. (AP Photo/Rachel La Corte)

FILE – In this in Dec. 31, 2012 file photo, Rachel Schaefer of Denver smokes marijuana on the official opening night of Club 64, a marijuana-specific social club, where a New Year’s Eve party was held, in Denver. According to new guidance being issued Thursday, Aug. 29, 2013 to federal prosecutors across the country, the federal government will not make it a priority to block marijuana legalization in Colorado or Washington or close down recreational marijuana stores, so long as the stores abide by state regulations. (AP Photo/Brennan Linsley)

FILE – In this April 20, 2013 file photo, members of a crowd numbering tens of thousands smoke marijuana and listen to live music, at the Denver 420 pro-marijuana rally at Civic Center Park in Denver. The U.S. government said Thursday, Aug. 29, 2013 that the federal government will not make it a priority to block marijuana legalization in Colorado or Washington or close down recreational marijuana stores, so long as the stores abide by state regulations. (AP Photo/Brennan Linsley, File)

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SEATTLE (AP) — For generations, pot crusaders have called for an end to the nation’s prohibition of marijuana, citing everything from what they say are the government’s exaggerated claims about its dangers to the racial disparities in who gets busted for drug possession.

Now, they will get their chance in Colorado and Washington state to show that legalizing pot is better, less costly and more humane than the last 75 years of prohibition — all with the federal government’s blessing.

In a sweeping new policy statement, the Justice Department said Thursday it will not stand in the way of states that want to legalize, tax and regulate marijuana as voters in Washington and Colorado did last fall, as long as there are effective controls to keep marijuana away from kids, the black market and federal property.

“It’s nothing short of historic,” said Dan Riffle of the Marijuana Policy Project, which backed Colorado’s new law. “It’s a very big deal for the DOJ to say that if the states want to legalize marijuana, that’s fine. Everybody in this movement should be thrilled.”

It won’t just be the White House watching to make sure Washington and Colorado get it right. Voters in Oregon and Alaska could weigh marijuana legalization measures next year, and several states could face ballot questions in 2016, activists say.

Meanwhile, Latin and South American countries are also considering pot reform, and the Obama administration’s stance on Washington’s and Colorado’s laws could embolden them, said Ethan Nadelmann, executive director of the New York-based Drug Policy Alliance, which supported Washington’s law. Uruguay has already approved plans to license marijuana growers and shops.

The DOJ’s decision came nearly 10 months after the votes in Washington and Colorado, and officials in those states had been forging ahead to make rules for their new industries without knowing whether the federal government would sue to block sales from ever taking place on the grounds that they conflict with federal law.

Licensed, taxed marijuana sales in the two states are due to start next year, and officials have estimated they could raise tens or hundreds of millions of dollars for state coffers.

The administration’s guidance laid out eight federal law enforcement priorities that states need to protect if they want to authorize “marijuana-related conduct.” They include keeping marijuana in-state, off the black market, and away from children; preventing violence and gun crimes related to marijuana distribution; and preventing drugged driving.

The DOJ noted that it simply doesn’t have the resources to police all violations of federal marijuana law, and so it would focus on entities that threaten those priorities. If a state’s enforcement efforts don’t work, the feds could sue to block the state’s entire pot-regulating scheme, Deputy Attorney General James Cole wrote in a memo to all 94 U.S. attorneys around the country.

The priorities are similar to the factors the Justice Department has previously considered in determining whether to shut down medical marijuana dispensaries. But the memo also clarifies that just because a regulated marijuana operation is big and profitable isn’t reason enough to raid it.

Peter Bensinger, a former head of the Drug Enforcement Administration, criticized the announcement, saying the conflict between federal and state law can’t be reconciled. Federal law is paramount, and Attorney General Eric Holder is “not only abandoning the law, he’s breaking the law,” Bensinger said.

Some in the marijuana-reform community also criticized the memo, noting it did not represent a fundamental change in the law, which would require the approval of Congress.

“It’s like, ‘We’re going to be tolerant of this as long as we feel like it,’” argued Seattle marijuana defense attorney Douglas Hiatt. “Is a new administration just going to come in and shut it down?”

But others pointed to language in the memo they found remarkable coming from the Justice Department: an acknowledgement that a well-designed regulatory system could actually help achieve federal law enforcement goals.

“Indeed, a robust system may affirmatively address those priorities by, for example, implementing effective measures to prevent diversion of marijuana outside of the regulatory system and to other states, prohibiting access to marijuana by minors, and replacing an illicit marijuana trade that funds criminal enterprises with a tightly regulated market in which revenues are tracked and accounted for,” Cole wrote.

A Pew Research Center poll in March found that 60 percent of Americans think the federal government shouldn’t enforce federal marijuana laws in states where its use has been approved. Younger people, who tend to vote more Democratic, are especially prone to that view.

But opponents are worried these moves will lead to more use by young people. Colorado and Washington were states that helped re-elect Obama.

Kevin Sabet, the director of Project Smart Approaches to Marijuana, an anti-legalization group, predicted the new Justice Department policy will accelerate a national discussion about legalization because people will see its harms — including more drugged driving and higher high school dropout rates.

Kristi Kelly, a co-founder of three medical marijuana shops near Denver, said the Justice Department’s action is a step in the right direction.

“We’ve been operating in a gray area for a long time. We’re looking for some sort of concrete assurances that this industry is viable,” she said.

___

Yost reported from Washington, D.C. Associated Press writers Alicia Caldwell in Washington, D.C., Rachel La Corte in Olympia, Wash., and Kristen Wyatt in Denver contributed to this report.

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DOJ green light for Wash., Colo. pot reformers

Immigration Reformers Are Winning August

Activists lead a march in favor of immigration reform in Sacramento, California, last week. (Rich Pedroncelli/Associated Press)

Activists opposed to immigration reform were all set to spend this month putting pressure on lawmakers to kill the legislation. But it hasn’t exactly been a show of force.

Last week, the Tea Party Patriots and NumbersUSA, two groups opposed to “amnesty” legislation, heavily publicized a rally in Richmond, Virginia, featuring Steve King, the firebrand Republican congressman who recently claimed most undocumented youth are physically fit drug mules. But only a few dozen people showed up — far short of the hundreds organizers had planned for.

Journalists posted photos of a lonely-looking King under a gazebo in a mostly empty public park. A reporter for Breitbart News, Matthew Boyle, tweeted, “If grassroots wants to kill #Amnesty they have to show up. #teaparty they are not here in Richmond.”

@seungminkim/Twitter

Activists on both sides of the immigration debate had put heavy emphasis on the importance of flexing grassroots muscle during this month of congressional recess. The idea is to show Republicans in the House of Representatives, which hasn’t settled on a path forward on the issue, where the most passionate support lies. And as August winds down, the Richmond event seems indicative of the overall trend. Hundreds of immigrant advocates have appeared at rallies and town halls across the country. But the other side, the opponents, have been mostly absent.

Hundreds of reform advocates recently rallied at the Bakersfield, California, office of Rep. Kevin McCarthy, the House GOP whip. (A local television station put the number at “more than 1,000“; Breitbart reported it was about 400, mostly “Mexican in origin,” and noted the presence of “about two dozen counter-demonstrators.”) More than 500 pro-reform activists, including the mayor of Springfield, Ohio, and local clergy, showed up at Speaker John Boehner’s district office. The Washington Times counted about 60 pro-reform activists calling on Rep. Frank Wolf in Herndon, Virginia. They marched through the streets of Asheboro, North Carolina, and gathered alongside the Catholic diocese in Salt Lake City. In Corpus Christi, Texas, a Republican congressman, Blake Farenthold, took to Twitter to beseech opponents to show up and counter the 10,000 pro-reform petitions that activists delivered to his office.

Anti-immigration-reform groups were hard pressed to come up with evidence of similar grassroots fervor for their side. Indeed, many of the examples they cited seemed to show the opposite. A NumbersUSA organizer passed along footage from a town hall where Kansas Rep. Lynn Jenkins was asked repeatedly about immigration; all the questioners in the clip are pro-reform, but booing rumbles through the crowd as they speak. At a town hall for Rep. Karen Bass, the California Democrat is asked about an unrelated piece of legislation that would deport “illegal alien gang members” (and explains why she opposes it). In Elkhorn, Nebraska, Republican Lee Terry is asked, “Will we see a path to citizenship in the immigration bill?” as DREAM Act activists are shown in a local television report.

Anti-reform groups appear to be canceling events for lack of participation. The Tea Party Patriots once boasted of summer rallies in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania; Dallas; and South Carolina, but they’ve disappeared from the calendar on the group’s website. Another anti-immigration-reform group, the Black American Leadership Alliance, had planned a nine-city “We Are America Tour,” but had to drop half the stops. “Dear friends, it is with deep regret that I must inform you all that we had to drop several rallies,” an organizer wrote on Facebook, in a post that has since been removed but was spotted and preserved by the pro-reform group America’s Voice. “We were unable to get organizers for the following: Miami, FL., Chicago, IL., Roanoke, VA., and Wisconsin. The Ohio rally is still going to happen, but not under the “Tour” title. FAIR is leading that rally. That leaves us with 4 rallies. Phoenix, AZ. Richmond, VA. And rallies in Houston, and Dallas, TX. Even the rallies in Houston, and Richmond, VA, are not completely confirmed at this time.”

Courtesy of America’s Voice

FAIR stands for the Federation for American Immigration Reform, a Washington-based group that opposes legal and illegal immigration. In a Washington Post article last week, the group’s communications director acknowledged being outgunned by activists for the other side. “It’s a staggering, well-financed hard push by the left and the right,” Bob Dane told the Post.

A Black American Leadership Alliance representative was unavailable for comment. The Tea Party Patriots’ national coordinator, Jenny Beth Martin, told me the disappearing rallies were not “set in stone,” so their listings were removed until they could be finalized. Martin also told ABC News that Tea Party activists are more focused on the push to defund Obamacare than on defeating immigration reform. Roy Beck, the executive director of NumbersUSA, which claims to be the largest grassroots group against citizenship for undocumented immigrants, previously told me his group was gearing up for a major August mobilization, but in an interview Monday he denied that was ever the goal. “We did not try to organize anything massive,” he said.

NumbersUSA has alerted its members to 181 past events, with 70 more scheduled for this week and 142 still to come, involving more than 100 Republican members of Congress. Members have reported back to the group that they felt they were in the majority at 90 percent of the events, Beck told me, based on the way the audience rumbled and booed.

As for the poorly attended Richmond rally, Beck acknowledged it was disappointing, but blamed the lack of turnout on a bad location choice. “We picked a spot that, it turns out, has the highest homicide rate in the city, and apparently a lot of people were afraid to come,” he said. Beck seemed to associate this danger with the African-American population: “We wanted to be there at a place where we could talk about the huge population of descendants of slavery who have never yet been part of the American Dream,” he said. “But sometimes passion and principles get in the way of practicality.”

Beck admitted that his side is not as galvanized as activists were in May of 2007, when an outpouring of grassroots anger — directed by NumbersUSA — helped derail the last immigration-reform push. But that’s because reform has less chance of passing this time, so activists are less concerned, he said. “This year, it’s very much like there’s a wildfire out there coming for your town, but everybody knows there’s a reservoir between the fire and your town, and that’s the House of Representatives,” he said. “Everybody has been told by the media the bill is dead on arrival in the House.”

In any case, Beck said, all the rallies in the world won’t do reform advocates any good if Republican members of Congress aren’t taking positions in favor of reform, and that’s not happening in a major way. McCarthy said he was for a piecemeal approach, with border security coming first. Tennessee Rep. Scott DesJarlais, confronted by an 11-year-old girl whose father faces deportation, told her it was brave of her to speak, but “we have laws, and we need to follow those laws,” to applause from the audience. Virginia Rep. Bob Goodlatte, who as chairman of the Judiciary Committee is something of a gatekeeper for immigration policy, reiterated that he does not believe the undocumented should get a “special pathway to citizenship” not available to would-be legal immigrants.

“August is so much more important to the pro-[comprehensive immigration reform] side than to us,” Beck said. “They really had to change a lot of minds. Our job is to hold people where they are …. We’re just feeling that the line has been held.”

Advocates of immigration reform say Beck is moving the goalposts. They count 23 Republican members of Congress who have come out in support of a path to citizenship, including many for the first time this month.

“I knew we were going to do really well [mobilizing people]; I just didn’t think the other side wouldn’t show up,” said Frank Sharry, the longtime immigration-reform advocate who heads America’s Voice. “In 2007, they were formidable. You could argue they kicked our ass. They generated a huge volume of opposition to the bill, and it was a big factor in our defeat.”

To Sharry, the rapidly forming takeaway from this August’s political-organizing battle is that opponents of immigration reform are a paper tiger.

Before the recess, “there was a sense that immigration reform was going to be a hot topic, and Republicans would come back telling leadership we want no part of it,” Sharry said. “If anything, you have more and more members saying, ‘We’ve got to do this.’ That’s a surprising and welcome development.”

Sharry agreed with Beck that attendance at town halls is not the same as votes in Congress. But, he said, “I think it shows that at this point, the forces for reform — left, right, and center — are much stronger than the forces opposing reform. I think we’re more likely to come into September with momentum than they are, and that’s not what many would have predicted just a few short weeks ago.”

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Immigration Reformers Are Winning August