Amidst the discussions from politicians about the decriminalization of weed, President Barack Obama responded by saying that he would not interfere with states that legalized marijuana.
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He said this to ABC’s Barbara Walters in the interview, scheduled to air today:
“We’ve got bigger fish to fry. It would not make sense for us to see a top priority as going after recreational users in states that have determined that it’s legal.”
Both Colorado and Washington state voted to legalize marijuana for recreational use in November, and just this month the initiative was put into effect. But now the move has put state laws at odds with the federal governments narcotics regulations in place to curb drug trafficking and usage.
The Department of Justice has said repeatedly that nothing has changed about their enforcement of federal drug laws, and they are weighing a lawsuit against both states to clarify the legal status.
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Recently, former presidents Bill Clinton and Jimmy Carter criticized America’s war on drugs, saying that it has failed. Carter has been a long time advocate of drug-law reform, preferring rehabilitation instead of criminalization.
But Obama told Walters that he still had a duty to enforce federal law:
“This is a tough problem, because Congress has not yet changed the law,” he said. “I head up the executive branch; we’re supposed to be carrying out laws. And so what we’re going to need to have is a conversation about, How do you reconcile a federal law that still says marijuana is a federal offense and state laws that say that it’s legal?”
Obama also touched on his own youthful past. In his candid memoir Dreams From My Father, he wrote about his own experiences with marijuana and cocaine.
“I want to discourage drug use,” Obama said.
“There are a bunch of things I did that I regret when I was a kid,” he said. “My attitude is, substance abuse generally is not good for our kids, not good for our society.”
I think it’s safe to say that all politicians took their turns ‘chiefin’ it up. Even the Commander-In-Chief. We still love him though.
SOURCE: Politico
