A former GOP congressman who President Donald Trump initially nominated to serve as U.S. attorney general during the current term is renewing his call for marijuana rescheduling—saying the “game is over for Democrats at the ballot box” if the president moves forward on the reform, which he said he’d decide on within weeks.
Matt Gaetz, former Florida Representative who withdrew his name from consideration to be the AG due to unrelated controversy, devoted a large portion of Monday’s One America News program discussing federal marijuana laws.
Gaetz said that, while in Congress, he was the only Republican to have co-sponsored a marijuana legalization measure led by Democrats. “If Americans are looking for something more than low gasoline prices or a safe border, they want our laws to make sense, at the very least, in this decade.”
Gaetz pointed out that the Controlled Substances Act still lists marijuana as Schedule I, meaning that it is “just as bad as heroin” and even worse than fentanyl.
According to the rescheduling plan that Biden initiated and is now before the Drug Enforcement Administration, marijuana will be moved from Schedule III (CSA) to Schedule 3. The move would not legalize marijuana at the federal level, but allow licensed cannabis retailers access to banking services. It could also facilitate research.
“Rescheduling is the government saying, ‘okay, maybe this isn’t the same as crack cocaine—and maybe doctors should be allowed to prescribe it without acting like they’re handing out plutonium,'” he said. Here’s the real kicker: half of the nation is already allowed to use marijuana under state laws.
“States like Florida, California, Colorado and so many others—even red states, they’ve got dispensaries that look like Apple stores. Gaetz explained that when you walk into the store, it is like a THC Genius Bar. The people are paying tax on it. Renters are profitable for landlords. There are more jobs. Uncle Sam is doing what? “Pretending that it is still a cartel-produced product, smuggled in the country inside a hollowed out coconut.”
If President Trump did this, it would be the end of the Democratic Party at the polls. “We can be the party which allows marijuana to be used safely by people without them pretending their glaucoma cat is using it,” said he. It’s practicality and populism. Suddenly, MAGA hats in line at the dispensary, patriots buying prerolls called ‘1776 Freedom Kush.’ Beautiful.”
Trump made his first public comments on cannabis since taking office on Monday, but he didn’t specify where he stood—despite endorsing the policy change on the campaign trail. But he said the decision will be made within weeks.
Gaetz stated, “Don’t be misled: there are still those who believe marijuana to be a gateway substance. Mountain Dew can be a gateway to marijuana if one drinks enough. “In reality, marijuana can be compared to eating Oreos in three-season quantities and thinking deeply about ceiling fans.”
Rescheduling has an important law and order aspect that is rarely discussed. If you remove the ridiculous marijuana charges, it frees up courts, police and prisons so they can deal with real criminals. The police should be chasing MS-13, not some Phish fan growing 3 plants in his garage. Let’s also not forget that the drug war has been similar to many wars America fought during my lifetime. In the end, the drug war has won. We’ve fought the longest and most deadly battles in history. “Drugs won.”
“If Trump reschedules marijuana, he can finally say, ‘we’re focusing on the real killers now and I fixed this ridiculous policy the swamp ignored for half a century.’ Gaetz added, “Imagine the trolling potential.” Gaetz said, “Every governor from blue states who has been preaching the legalization of marijuana for years without ever actually doing anything. Trump is able to do it all at once. CNN’s heads are going to explode. Rachel Maddow’s rage will not be calmed by even the stickiest of indicas. The New York Times will run an op-ed titled ‘Is Trump doing this just to win?’ And the answer will, of course, be yes—and that’s because it is the right thing to do.”
“The only real argument against it is, ‘Well, we’ve always done it this way.’ If we followed that logic we would still use rotary phones, and think that margarine was a healthy food. So here’s my pitch: President Trump, reschedule marijuana. Do it BIG, and do it Loud. Sign the order with a gold Sharpie, hold it up for the cameras and say, ‘this plant was treated more unfairly than I was.’ It’s a pretty impressive statement. This is good for politics and economics. It’s time that the federal government stop pretending Snoop Dogg, El Chapo, are all in the same industry. If anyone still holds their pearls in their hands, give them a CBD Gummy.”
Gaetz made his latest remarks months after predicting that “meaningful reform” of marijuana was “on the Horizon” with the current administration. He praised the President’s “leadership”, in support of rescheduling.
Even though the choice was controversial, advocates and other stakeholders felt encouraged by Trump’s selection of Gaetz as the head of the Justice Department after his election. It would have marked a big change to have an attorney-general who actively promoted reform. This would also have been good for the process of rescheduling.
Trump chose the former Florida attorney general Pam Bondi as his nominee to head DOJ. And, in turn, the Senate has confirmed her choice. Bondi refused to reveal how she would handle key marijuana-policy issues during her confirmation hearings. She also opposed medical cannabis legalization as the state’s attorney general.
After the announcement by the president that he would make a final decision on cannabis’ rescheduling in the next few weeks, congressional members from both parties are encouraging Trump to do the right thing.
Separately a new political group that has the same treasurer of Trump’s own super PAC wants the president to reschedule the marijuana. It released an ad highlighting his support for this reform while on the campaign trail.
The treasurer of the PAC, Charles Gantt, is the same person named as treasurer of Trump’s political committee, MAGA Inc., which recently reported receiving $1 million from a marijuana industry PAC that’s supported by multiple major cannabis companies.
That committee, the American Rights and Reform PAC, separately released ads in May that attacked former President Joe Biden’s marijuana policy record in an apparent attempt to push Trump to go further on the issue.
A post recently shared on social media shows that MAGA Inc. (also known as Make America Great Again Inc.) created its own ad touting Trump’s support of “commonsense” reforms such as removing marijuana from Schedule 1 under the CSA, and letting each state set their policies.
However, the fact that the narrator ends the commercial by saying “Donald Trump as president” suggests it was likely prepared in advance of the 2024 elections.
The owner of the major gardening supply company Scotts Miracle-Gro recently said Trump has told him directly “multiple times” since taking office that he intends to see through the marijuana rescheduling process.
Trump’s former acting head of the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) also recently predicted that the administration will soon “dig in” to the state-federal marijuana policy conflict, emphasizing the need to “eliminate confusion, not create it” amid the rescheduling push.
Meanwhile, Terrence Cole, who was sworn in last month as the new administrator of the DEA, declined to include rescheduling on a list of “strategic priorities” the agency that instead focused on anti-trafficking enforcement, Mexican cartels, the fentanyl supply chain, drug-fueled violence, cryptocurrency, the dark web and a host of other matters.
That’s despite the fact that Cole said during a confirmation hearing in April that examining the government’s pending marijuana rescheduling proposal would be “one of my first priorities” after taking office.
Last week, former White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer predicted that Trump would not legalize marijuana, though that is a separate issue from the current rescheduling proposal under consideration.
Meanwhile, a strategic consulting and research firm associated with Trump—Fabrizio, Lee & Associates, LLC—conducted a survey of registered voters that showed a majority of Republicans back a variety of cannabis reforms.