A growing list of Democratic presidential contenders want the U.S. government to legalize marijuana, reflecting a nationwide shift as more Americans look favorably on cannabis.
Making marijuana legal at the federal level is the"smart thing to do," says California Sen. Kamala Harris, a former prosecutor whose home state is the nation's largest legal pot shop. New Jersey Sen. Cory Booker, a prominent legalization advocate on Capitol Hill, says the war on drugs has been a"war on people."
In 1992, then-White House candidate Bill Clinton delivered a famously tortured response about a youthful dalliance with cannabis, claiming he tried it as a graduate student in England but"didn't inhale." And two decades before that, President Richard Nixon unleashed a war on marijuana and other drugs and it helped carry him to a second term.
During his 2012 run for governor, Inslee opposed the ballot initiative that made Washington one of the first two states to legalize so-called recreational marijuana. As governor, however, he has frequently touted what he describes as Washington's successful experiment with regulation and has urged the Obama and Trump administrations not to intervene. He recently began pardoning people with small-time marijuana convictions.
To Mason Tvert of the Marijuana Policy Project, a pro-legalization advocacy group, it's not surprising there's broad support among candidates to end the federal prohibition.But there are limits:"We are not seeing any candidates saying, 'I am currently a marijuana user,'" he added.In a 2003 Democratic presidential forum, candidates John Kerry, John Edwards and Howard Dean acknowledged using marijuana in the past.
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