Jeff Sessions Is Making Congress Mad With His Pot Policy, And It May Backfire

[yuiyoshida]

“It has awakened a sleeping giant,” Republican Rep. Dana Rohrabacher told BuzzFeed News.


If Attorney General Jeff Sessions hoped his latest encroachments on marijuana would make politicians back away from legalization, it’s not working.

Last Monday, three weeks after Sessions gave federal prosecutors wide berth to begin marijuana busts in states where it’s legal, Phil Scott, the Republican governor of Vermont, signed a bill making Vermont the ninth state to legalize the drug.

The strongest pushback against the Trump administration’s new marijuana policy, however, seems to be in Congress — where dozens of lawmakers are pushing legislation that would handcuff Sessions on pot.

Ironically, Sessions is sparking more enthusiasm for recreational marijuana on Capitol Hill than any time in Congress’s modern history.

“It has awakened a sleeping giant,” Republican Rep. Dana Rohrabacher said of the way politicians are reacting to Sessions repealing the Cole memorandum, a policy from the Obama administration that tolerated pot companies in states that legalized the drug.

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https://www.buzzfeed.com/dominicholden/this-is-why-jeff-sessions-pot-policy-may-backfire-in?utm_term=.ahjy1epnn#.raNlp1qjj