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Mexico\u2019s president said on Tuesday that his administration will respect the Supreme Court\u2019s decision this week to invalidate marijuana prohibition<\/a>\u2014but he\u2019s open to putting further reforms before voters on the ballot if the open-ended legalization doesn\u2019t achieve certain goals.<\/p>\n President Andr\u00e9s Manuel L\u00f3pez Obrador said at a news conference that \u201cof course we are going to respect what the judicial power has decided, and we are going to evaluate, we are going to see what effects it has,\u201d according to a translation.<\/p>\n \u201cIf we see that it does not help\u2014that it is not good for the country, that it is not good for facing the serious problem of drug addiction, that it is not good for stopping violence\u2014then we would act,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n Lawmakers have had plenty of time to act since the court first declared that the country\u2019s prohibition<\/a> on personal possession and cultivation of cannabis was unconstitutional in 2018. But despite being granted multiple extensions to enact a policy change, the Congress failed to get the job done<\/a> by the latest April 2021 deadline.<\/p>\n \u201cThere was no consensus because there are two visions [in the government], as in the country,\u201d the president said on Tuesday.<\/p>\n \u201cThis should not surprise us because the government represents the people and we have to collect the opinions, the feelings of all the people,\u201d he said, adding that the \u201cpeople always have to have the reins of power in their hands, and that is what participatory democracy is for.\u201d<\/p>\n The resulting inaction prompted justices to hold a vote on a general declaration of unconstitutionality<\/a> on Monday. A majority agreed to end criminalization, though the Ministry of Health will still have some regulatory authority with respect to permitting personal cultivation.<\/p>\n From the president\u2019s perspective, it\u2019s now a wait-and-see situation to evaluate how the largely unregulated market will function and whether a voter referendum may be necessary.<\/p>\n \u201cIt means collecting the feelings of the people, the points of view of all and seeing how this is developing\u2014measure how this measure going to be applied, what effects is this measure going to have in practice,\u201d he said<\/a>. \u201cIf we see that, instead of helping, it hurts, we would propose a change. I would send, according to my faculties, a bill.\u201d<\/p>\n\n \u201cI think we could have results in a short time. We will evaluate what happens,\u201d he added. \u201cThat is why I am in favor of participatory democracy. These issues\u2014if well-informed, if well-organized, debates, listening to all the points of view of specialists, of citizens, young people, everyone, after listening to everyone\u2014a consultation is applied and so it is decided. This is leading by obeying.\u201d<\/p>\n It\u2019s not clear what exactly the president is implying he would put before voters if the modified legalization does not achieve primary objectives like reducing violence or curbing addiction. But he hasn\u2019t been vocally opposed to legalization, and it stands to reason that he\u2019s signaling that a referendum could be centered around approving regulations that build upon a legal system.<\/p>\n That\u2019s exactly what lawmakers have been working towards, and advocates have been pushing for, over the past three years.<\/p>\n The Senate approved a legalization bill late last year, and then the Chamber of Deputies\u00a0made revisions and passed it in March<\/a>, sending it back to the originating chamber. A couple of Senate committees then\u00a0took up and cleared the amended measure<\/a>, but leaders quickly started signaling\u00a0that certain revisions made the proposal unworkable<\/a>.<\/p>\n That\u2019s where the situation stood for weeks as the court\u2019s latest April 30 deadline approached. There was an expectation that the Senate would again ask the court for an extension, but that did not take place. Instead, lawmakers have begun floating the idea of holding a special legislative session in order to get the job done this year.<\/p>\n After the Chamber of Deputies approved the Senate-passed legalization bill, senators said that the revised proposal was critically internally conflicted\u2014on provisions concerning legal possession limits, the definition of hemp and\u00a0other\u00a0issues\u2014and lawmakers themselves could be subject to criminal liability if it went into effect as drafted.<\/p>\n But Senate Majority Leader Ricardo Monreal Avila said in April that if the court were to make a declaration of unconstitutionality before a measure to regulate cannabis was approved, it would result in \u201cchaos.\u201d<\/p>\n He said on Monday, though, that \u201cthe court has made a decision we must observe and respect.\u201d<\/p>\n But he said there are \u201celements of uncertainty\u201d that lawmakers \u201chave to attend to in the coming days and weeks.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cI will meet with the parliamentary groups and their coordinators and start working on legislation\u2026in which we can build it with consensus in a broad way [while] also listening to society,\u201d Monreal said. \u201cThat is our obligation, and we are not going to renounce it.\u201d<\/p>\n \u2014 Senado de M\u00e9xico (@senadomexicano) June 29, 2021<\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n In other words, there is consensus between the president and Senate leadership that the court\u2019s ruling will stand\u2014at least in the interim as lawmakers review its impacts and consider further reforms.<\/p>\n Sen. Eduardo Ram\u00edrez Aguilar of the ruling MORENA party said in April that \u201cat this time,\u00a0it is important to legislate in the terms that are presented to us<\/a>\u201d and then consider additional revisions to cannabis laws through subsequent bills.<\/p>\n That\u2019s been the position many legalization advocates have taken as well, urging lawmakers to pass an imperfect bill immediately and then work on fixing it later.<\/p>\n Under the prior proposal, adults 18 and older would be allowed to purchase and possess up to 28 grams of marijuana and cultivate up to six plants for personal use. The deputies made changes that principally concern the regulatory structure, rules for the commercial market and licensing policies.<\/p>\n One of the most notable changes made by the Chamber of Deputies was that the revised bill would not establish a new independent regulatory body to oversee the licensing and implementation of the program as was approved by the Senate. Instead, it would give that authority to an existing agency, the National Commission Against Addictions.<\/p>\n Deputies also approved additional revisions to increase penalties for unauthorized possession of large amounts of cannabis, prevent forest land from being converted to marijuana growing areas and to require regulators to \u201ccoordinate campaigns against problematic cannabis use and\u2026develop permanent actions to deter and prevent its use by minors and vulnerable groups.\u201d<\/p>\n Advocates had hoped for more. Throughout this legislative process, they\u2019ve called for changes to further promote social equity and eliminate strict penalties for violating the law.<\/p>\n While the bill would give priority for licenses to marginalized communities, advocates are worried that there might not be strict and specific enough criteria to actually ensure that ends up being the case. They also pushed for an amendment to make it so a specific percentage of licenses would be set aside for those communities, but that did not happen.<\/p>\n Monreal Avila, the Senate majority leader, said ahead of the Chamber of Deputies vote that there \u201cis no problem if they modify the cannabis law, we have no problem.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cThat is their job and their function. And on the return we will review whether or not they are appropriate,\u201d he\u00a0said<\/a>, according to a translation. \u201cThe idea is to regulate the use of cannabis and not ignore a prohibitionist approach that generated a great social problem in the country.\u201d<\/p>\n The president, for his part, said in December that a vote on legalization legislation was delayed due to minor \u201cmistakes\u201d in the proposal<\/a>.<\/p>\n The legalization bill\u00a0cleared a joint group of Senate committees<\/a>\u00a0prior to the full floor vote in that chamber last year, with some amendments being made after members informally\u00a0considered and debated the proposal<\/a>\u00a0during a virtual hearing.<\/p>\n Members of the Senate\u2019s Justice, Health, and Legislative Studies Committees had\u00a0approved a prior version of legal cannabis legislation<\/a>\u00a0last year as well, but the pandemic delayed consideration of the issue. Sen. Julio Ram\u00f3n Menchaca Salazar of the MORENA party said in April that legalizing cannabis could\u00a0fill treasury coffers at a time when the economy is recovering from the health crisis<\/a>.<\/p>\n As lawmakers work to advance the reform legislation, there\u2019s been a more lighthearted push to focus attention on the issue by certain members and activists. That push has mostly involved planting and gifting marijuana.<\/p>\n In September, a top administration official was\u00a0gifted a cannabis plant by senator<\/a>\u00a0on the Senate floor, and she said she\u2019d be making it a part of her personal garden.<\/p>\n A different lawmaker\u00a0gave the same official, Interior Ministry Secretary Olga S\u00e1nchez Cordero, a marijuana joint<\/a>\u00a0on the floor of the Chamber of Deputies in 2019.<\/p>\n Cannabis made another appearance in the legislature in August, when Sen. Jesusa Rodr\u00edguez of the MORENA party\u00a0decorated her desk with a marijuana plant<\/a>.<\/p>\n Drug policy reform advocates have also been cultivating hundreds of marijuana plants in front of the Senate, putting pressure on legislators to make good on their pledge to advance legalization.<\/p>\n Meanwhile, in the U.S., conservative Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas on Monday\u00a0denounced the federal government\u2019s inconsistent approach to marijuana policy<\/a>\u00a0and suggested that it may necessitate a reevaluation of an earlier ruling that upheld prohibition.<\/p>\n DEA Says Cancer Patients\u2019 Request For Medical Psilocybin Could Fuel Illegal Drug Market<\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n The post Mexican President Considers Putting Marijuana On Ballot Following Supreme Court Ruling<\/a> appeared first on Marijuana Moment<\/a>.<\/p>\n
Mexico\u2019s president said on Tuesday that his administration will respect the Supreme Court\u2019s decision this week to invalidate marijuana prohibition\u2014but he\u2019s open to putting further reforms before voters on the ballot if the open-ended legalization doesn\u2019t achieve certain goals. President Andr\u00e9s Manuel L\u00f3pez Obrador said at a news conference thatContinue Reading<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":458,"featured_media":48547,"comment_status":"false","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[18,81,126],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/48546"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/458"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=48546"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/48546\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":48548,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/48546\/revisions\/48548"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/48547"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=48546"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=48546"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=48546"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}\n
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Todav\u00eda faltan detalles por legislar en materia de cannabis, actuaremos con prudencia y mesura en beneficio de la sociedad, mencion\u00f3 el presidente de la Junta de Coordinaci\u00f3n Pol\u00edtica, @RicardoMonrealA<\/a>; sobre la reciente decisi\u00f3n de la @SCJN<\/a>. pic.twitter.com\/bPistwFNgy<\/a><\/p>\n\n
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\nRead More: Mexican President Considers Putting Marijuana On Ballot Following Supreme Court Ruling<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"