Kamala Harris Campaign Criticizes Trump’s Support for Florida Marijuana Ballot Measure, Calling It “Blatant Pandering”.
Vice President Kamala Harris’s campaign recently went after former President Donald Trump over his comments about Florida’s marijuana legalization ballot measure, saying it was “blatant pandering.”
On Truth Social, Trump wrote in a post late Sunday night that he would vote yes on the upcoming amendment that will legalize marijuana in the state if passed.
“As I have previously stated, I believe it is time to end needless arrests and incarcerations of adults for small amounts of marijuana for personal use,” Trump wrote. “We must also implement smart regulations while providing access for adults to safe, tested product.”
But while Trump is showing his support for legalizing the drug, Joseph Costello, a spokesperson for Harris’s campaign, said that this position from Trump doesn’t match his record.
“Despite his blatant pandering, Donald Trump cannot paper over his extensive record of dragging marijuana reform backward,” Costello said in a statement Monday. “As president, Trump cracked down on nonviolent marijuana offenses – undermining state legalization laws, opposed safe banking legislation, and even tried to remove protections for medical marijuana.”
Costello claims that Trump does not “actually believe in marijuana reform.”
However, in his post from Sunday, Trump said he would continue to work on marijuana reform if he wins this November.
“As President, we will continue to focus on research to unlock the medical uses of marijuana to a Schedule 3 drug, and work with Congress to pass common-sense laws, including safe banking for state authorized companies, and supporting states rights to pass marijuana laws, like in Florida, that work so well for their citizens,” he wrote.
President Joe Biden has been working on rescheduling marijuana, with his administration announcing earlier this year that it had begun the formal rulemaking process to give it a Schedule III designation.
“This is monumental. Today, my administration took a major step to reclassify marijuana from a schedule one drug to a schedule three drug. It’s an important move toward reversing long-standing inequities,” President Biden said in a statement at the time.
However, despite his campaign promise in 2020, Biden has not been able to decriminalize marijuana at the federal level while in office.
