05/12/2020
US House votes to decriminalize ma*****na, little chance in current Senate.
Nearly all center-left Democrats in lower US chamber, joined by a handful of libertarian Republicans, voted Friday to decriminalize ma*****na, a move that could nudge President-elect Joe Biden to follow suit from late January.
The bill would also see the records of many people detained on federal ma*****na charges expunged and would also establish regulation and taxation of the industry, as with alcohol or to***co.
Vice President-elect Kamala Harris, a senator until next month, had campaigned to "remove the burden of ma*****na convictions" blamed for excessive jailing of peoples of color by the hundreds of thousands.
Republicans said the move was a hollow gesture amid the coronavirus pandemic.
House Republican minority leader Kevin McCarthy accused Democrats of putting "cannabis on the House floor" instead of focusing on COVID-19.
Expunging ma*****na from federal act
The bill would remove ma*****na from the federal Controlled Substances Act, where it is listed alongside he**in and co***ne, with tough penalties.
In recent decades, many US states have legalized ma*****na for medical use, and some, like Colorado, have freed it for recreational consumption.
Canada to the north legalized ma*****na in 2018. And, last month, Mexico took a first step toward undermining local gangs that supply the United States.
Decriminalization advocates had argued that cannabis caused relatively low harm and that legalization would dissuade violent growers and traffickers.
"Radish farmers don't kill each other over territory," said Tom McLintock, a California Republican who favored the bill.
"This is a historic moment," said Democratic Representative Tulsi Gabbard, while the Democratic chairman of the House Judiciary Committee Jerry Nadler said prosecution and incarceration at federal level had proven "unwise and unjust."
On Wednesday in Vienna, the UN Commission on Narcotic Drugs voted narrowly to remove cannabis and cannabis resin from its so-called 1961 Schedule VI, following a 2019 recommendation from the World Health Organization.
The WHO maintained, however, that other narcotics listed, including he**in, fentanyl analogs and other opioids, were dangerous and often deadly.