Marijuana fight puts U.S. Congress on collision course with Sessions
WASHINGTON • Congress is heading for a confrontation with Attorney General Jeff Sessions over pot.
Sessions is seeking to crack down on marijuana use while lawmakers from both parties are pushing legislation that would do the opposite.
Measures have been attached to must- pass bills in the Senate that would allow Veterans Affairs doctors to counsel patients on the use of medical marijuana, and to continue blocking the Justice Department from pursuing cases against people who use medical marijuana in states that have legalized it.
Some l awmakers are pushing to go even further. Sen. Cory Booker, a New Jersey Democrat, this week unveiled legislation that would legalize marijuana at the federal level.
In the House, Republican Matt Gaetz of Florida proposed legislation that would change the federal classification of marijuana to allow research and a range of medical uses.
Booker said the law needs to be changed because minorities and the poor are disproportionately arrested for what amounts to a minor offence.
Eight states have fully legalized marijuana for adult use and 21 more have legalized it for medical use only. Federal law continues to ban the use and sale of cannabis. During the Obama administration, the Justice Department didn’t actively prosecute marijuana offenders, an approach Sessions has said needs to change.
“I’m not sure we’re going to be a better, healthier nation,” he said in February, “if we have marijuana being sold at every corner grocery store.” He later added, “My best view is that we don’t need to be legalizing marijuana.”
In April, Sessions put out a memo to U. S. attorneys about his crime- reduction efforts and said one of his subcommittees will “undertake a review of existing policies in the areas of charging, sentencing, and marijuana to ensure consistency with the department’s overall strategy on reducing violent crime and with administration goals and priorities.”
The president has repeatedly expressed his dissatisfaction with Sessions, a former senator from Alabama, for recusing himself from a federal investigation into whether there was collusion between Trump’s presidential campaign and Russia. The new White House chief of staff, John Kelly, told Sessions in a phone call over the weekend that Trump doesn’t intend to fire him, according to a person familiar with the conversation.