{"id":58169,"date":"2022-11-17T11:25:00","date_gmt":"2022-11-17T19:25:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/2022\/11\/17\/florida-ag-commissioner-appeals-dismissal-of-medical-marijuana-patients-gun-rights-lawsuit\/"},"modified":"2022-11-17T17:45:42","modified_gmt":"2022-11-18T01:45:42","slug":"florida-ag-commissioner-appeals-dismissal-of-medical-marijuana-patients-gun-rights-lawsuit","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/2022\/11\/17\/florida-ag-commissioner-appeals-dismissal-of-medical-marijuana-patients-gun-rights-lawsuit\/","title":{"rendered":"Florida Ag Commissioner Appeals Dismissal Of Medical Marijuana Patients\u2019 Gun Rights Lawsuit"},"content":{"rendered":"<\/p>\n

A federal judge recently dismissed a lawsuit from Florida\u2019s agriculture commissioner\u00a0that challenges a ban on medical marijuana patients\u2019<\/a> rights to buy and possess firearms\u2014but the state official isn\u2019t ready to give up the case just yet.<\/p>\n

Commissioner Nikki Fried (D) and her patient co-plaintiffs appealed the decision to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit on Wednesday.<\/p>\n

\u201cAs I said when I filed this lawsuit, no patient should have to choose between their medicine and employment, or a roof over their head, or access to capital\u2014or any of their constitutional rights,\u201d Fried said in a press release.<\/p>\n

The case centers on the argument that the federal firearms ban for cannabis patients is unconstitutional.<\/p>\n

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Our appeal today is an important step in the fight to make sure no patient has to choose between their rights and their medicine.<\/p>\n

\u2014 Commissioner Nikki Fried (@NikkiFriedFL) November 17, 2022<\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

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While Fried expressed optimism following oral arguments in a hearing on the Biden administration\u2019s motion to dismiss, citing her legal team\u2019s \u201ccompelling\u201d performance<\/a>, a U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Florida judge ultimately disagreed, saying in a 22-page opinion earlier this month that the plaintiffs \u201chave standing but that their claims fail on the merits.\u201d<\/p>\n

The gist of the Judge Allen Winsor\u2019s ruling was that he sided with the Justice Department\u2019s arguments that people who use marijuana, regardless of state law, are engaging in criminal activity at the federal level. And, therefore, there\u2019s precedent to deny them the right to have firearms.<\/p>\n

The judge recognized that there\u2019s a congressional rider in place that prevents DOJ from using its funds to interfere in state medical cannabis programs. But it described the policy with specific parentheticals, saying \u201cCongress has precluded the Department of Justice (for now) from prosecuting crimes that Congress (for now) chooses to maintain on the books\u201d since the rider must be annually renewed.<\/p>\n

\u201cRegardless of whether Plaintiffs are prosecuted (or whether Congress allocates funds for their prosecution), possession of marijuana remains a federal crime,\u201d Judge Allen Winsor wrote. \u201cThe Rohrabacher-Farr Amendment at best precludes prosecution now; it does not forever bless Plaintiffs\u2019 actions.\u201d<\/p>\n

Fried, who unsuccessfully ran for the Florida Democratic gubernatorial nomination this year and is set to leave office from her current position in a matter of weeks, said on Wednesday that she\u2019s not giving up the fight for marijuana reform.<\/p>\n

\u201cI will never stop being an advocate for full cannabis legalization,\u201d she said. \u201cFull legalization will resolve many of the issues caused by irrational, inconsistent, and incoherent federal cannabis policies. Medical cannabis patients have the same Second Amendment rights as every American. Federal law cannot deem it illegal for a medical cannabis cardholder to purchase a firearm.\u201d<\/p>\n

It\u2019s not clear what will happen to the lawsuit once her Republican replacement as agriculture commissioner is sworn in.<\/p>\n

In any case, one of the most controversial aspects of the firearms case deals with a recent U.S. Supreme Court ruling<\/a> in a New York case where justices generally created a higher standard for policies that seek to impose restrictions on gun rights.<\/p>\n

The ruling states that any such restrictions must be consistent with the historical context of the Second Amendment\u2019s original 1791 ratification.<\/p>\n

DOJ responded earlier in the case by raising eyebrow-raising historical analogues<\/a> to justify the federal ban by drawing\u00a0parallels between medical cannabis patients and people who are mentally ill, panhandlers, Catholics and other groups that were previously deprived of the right to possess firearms.<\/p>\n

Despite the pushback over those alleged analogues, the judge said in his dismissal ruling that the federal government\u2019s position had merit.<\/p>\n

\u201cLaws keeping guns from the mentally ill likewise flow from the historical tradition of keeping guns from those in whose hands they could be dangerous. Plaintiffs recoil at being compared to the mentally ill\u2026but one does not have to label marijuana users mentally ill to recognize that both categories of people can be dangerous when armed,\u201d the judge wrote.<\/p>\n

\u201cAlthough the prohibition reaches those habitually using marijuana (even if not currently under the influence), habitual drug users are analogous to other groups the government has historically found too dangerous to have guns,\u201d he continued.<\/p>\n

\u201cAt bottom, the historical tradition of keeping guns from those the government fairly views as dangerous\u2014like alcoholics and the mentally ill\u2014is sufficiently analogous to modern laws keeping guns from habitual users of controlled substances. This provides another justification for upholding the challenged laws.\u201d<\/p>\n

Therefore, the \u201cchallenged laws are consistent with the history and tradition of this Nations\u2019 firearm regulation.\u201d<\/p>\n

The court also contested the plaintiffs\u2019 challenge by saying that \u201cunlawful drug users can regain their Second Amendment rights by simply ending their drug use.\u201d<\/p>\n

In a September filing, DOJ seemed to partially back off its prior assertions<\/a>\u00a0that cannabis makes people more inclined toward violent crime in general, but it did say that those who consume marijuana are intrinsically too dangerous to own guns because they\u2019re breaking federal law, even if it\u2019s a misdemeanor offense.<\/p>\n

Fried and others, in an earlier filing in the case, took issue with the department\u2019s insistence that medical marijuana patients are inherently dangerous, while still maintaining that people who drink alcohol have a lawful Second Amendment right because drinking is federally legal for adults.<\/p>\n

DOJ\u2019s original motion for dismissal read as \u201cinsulting,\u201d Fried, a Democrat, told Marijuana Moment in August<\/a>. \u201cI think that they missed the ball here\u2014and it\u2019s very disconcerting that this is the direction that they took.\u201d<\/p>\n

Biden\u2019s Justice Department relied on arguments \u201cas \u2018contradictory and unstable\u2019 as their overall marijuana policy,\u201d the plaintiff\u2019s last filing says, citing 2021 remarks about the state-federal cannabis conflict from\u00a0conservative Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas<\/a>.<\/p>\n

With this latest court ruling, the current federal policy persists, making it so people are denied gun purchases if they\u2019re honest about their cannabis use while filling out a Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) background check form\u2014regardless of state law.<\/p>\n

President Joe Biden hasn\u2019t weighed in on the commissioner\u2019s lawsuit, but he did recently talk about the ATF policy in the context of a possible federal investigation into his son Hunter, who admitted in a memoir that he\u2019d bought a gun while suffering from a substance misuse disorder.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis thing about a gun\u2014I didn\u2019t know anything about it,\u201d the president\u00a0told<\/a>\u00a0CNN. \u201cBut turns out that when he made application to purchase a gun, what happened was he\u2014I guess you get asked\u2014I don\u2019t guess, you get asked a question, are you on drugs, or do use drugs?\u2019 He said no. And he wrote about saying no in his book.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cSo, I have great confidence in my son,\u201d he said. \u201cI love him and he\u2019s on the straight and narrow, and he has been for a couple years now. And I\u2019m just so proud of him.\u201d<\/p>\n

As Fried previously told Marijuana Moment, the lawsuit wasn\u2019t not about expanding gun rights, per se. It was a matter of constitutionality that she and other key allies in the gun reform movement feel would bolster public safety<\/a>\u00a0if the case ultimately goes in their favor.<\/p>\n

Supporters of the lawsuit argue that the ATF requirement effectively creates an incentive for cannabis consumers to either lie on the form, buy a gun on the illicit market or simply forgo a constitutional right.<\/p>\n

In 2020, ATF\u00a0issued an advisory specifically targeting Michigan<\/a>\u00a0that requires gun sellers to conduct federal background checks on all unlicensed gun buyers because it said the state\u2019s cannabis laws had enabled \u201chabitual marijuana users\u201d and other disqualified individuals to obtain firearms illegally.<\/p>\n

There have been previous efforts in Congress to specifically protect medical cannabis patients against losing their right to purchase and possess guns,\u00a0but those efforts have not been enacted<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Read Fried\u2019s appeal<\/a> of the dismissal of her medical cannabis patients\u2019 gun rights lawsuit below:\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

\n

\n

Congressional Researchers Lay Out Six Key Limitations Of Biden\u2019s Marijuana Pardons<\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

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The post Florida Ag Commissioner Appeals Dismissal Of Medical Marijuana Patients\u2019 Gun Rights Lawsuit<\/a> appeared first on Marijuana Moment<\/a>.<\/p>\n


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\nRead More: Florida Ag Commissioner Appeals Dismissal Of Medical Marijuana Patients\u2019 Gun Rights Lawsuit<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A federal judge recently dismissed a lawsuit from Florida\u2019s agriculture commissioner\u00a0that challenges a ban on medical marijuana patients\u2019 rights to buy and possess firearms\u2014but the state official isn\u2019t ready to give up the case just yet. Commissioner Nikki Fried (D) and her patient co-plaintiffs appealed the decision to the U.S.Continue Reading<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":458,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"false","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[18,81],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/58169"}],"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=58169"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/58169\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":58170,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/58169\/revisions\/58170"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=58169"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=58169"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=58169"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}