House passes bill to legalize marijuana
Fox News Congressional Correspondent Chad Pergram details the House vote to remove marijuana from the government’s list of controlled substances on the Fox Report.
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A group of six progressive U.S. senators criticized the Biden administration’s “extremely disappointing” response Wednesday to their request last year to remove marijuana from Schedule I of the Controlled Substances Act, a category reserved for drugs that have no accepted medical use.
The Justice Department took six months to provide senators with a half-page response that simply said the Department of Health and Human Services does not recognize marijuana as a safe treatment for any disease or condition, a decision that senators opposed.
“It is clear that cannabis has widely accepted medical benefits that have been confirmed by the medical and scientific communities both here and around the world,” Sens. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., Cory Booker, DN.J., Kirsten Gillibrand, DN.Y., Ed Markey, D-Mass., Ron Wyden, D-Ore., and Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., write in the letter to the President.
“The therapeutic properties of cannabis, caused by the effects of the components tetrahydrocannabinol-alpha (THC) and cannabidiol (CBD), make it an excellent alternative to highly addictive opiates for pain relief.”
Marijuana is weighed and packaged for sale at the medical marijuana dispensary at the Northwest Patient Resource Center in Seattle. (Associated Press)
Biden promised to decriminalize marijuana and automatically expunge past drug convictions while on the 2020 campaign, but his administration’s inaction on marijuana policy has frustrated the progressive wing of the Democratic Party.
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The House of Representatives voted 220-204 to decriminalize marijuana at the federal level in April, with three Republicans voting in favor and two Democrats voting no, but the legislation has stalled in the Senate.
The six progressive senators wrote in Wednesday’s letter that the president should take executive action to issue pardons for anyone convicted of a non-violent marijuana-related crime.
This photo shows a jar containing a strain of marijuana nicknamed “Killer D” at a marijuana dispensary in Unity, Maine. (AP Photo/Robert F. Bukati)
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“The administration’s failure to coordinate a timely review of its cannabis policy is harming thousands of Americans, delaying research and denying Americans the ability to use marijuana for medical or other purposes,” the senators wrote.
Paul Best is a reporter for Fox News Digital. Story tips can be sent to Paul.best@fox.com and on Twitter: @KincaidBest.
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