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Sen. Cory Booker (D-NJ) says that while he believes the justice system has effectively handled prosecution against President Joe Biden\u2019s son, there\u2019s still a double-standard in the country that has allowed presidents and members of Congress to admit to past marijuana use with impunity while subjecting thousands of less privileged people to punitive cannabis laws.<\/p>\n
In an interview with CNN\u2019s \u201cWho\u2019s Talking to Chris Wallace\u201d that was released late last month, the senator was asked whether he believes that there\u2019s a partisan bias in the criminal legal system, pointing out that the Justice Department offered Hunter Biden a deal in which he will plead guilty to two tax evasion charges and avoid prosecution over separate allegations that he lied about being an active user of an illegal drug when filling out a federal form to purchase a firearm.<\/p>\n
Wallace contrasted the case with the ongoing federal prosecution of former President Donald Trump, who is facing dozens of felony counts in connection with classified documents he allegedly kept and displayed unlawfully after leaving office. Booker said that he wasn\u2019t familiar with the details of Biden\u2019s prosecution, but he did have something to say about cannabis-related enforcement disparities.<\/p>\n
\u201cLook, you\u2019re talking to a guy who has seen the worst of the criminal justice system in America\u2014where you see a two-tier system,\u201d Booker said. \u201cIf you\u2019re a congressperson, a senator or a president, you can admit to using marijuana, but we are a nation that has been arresting young, low-income Black and brown people\u2014literally thousands in America who can\u2019t get jobs\u2014for doing things that\u2026at least\u2026four presidents have admitted to doing.\u201d<\/p>\n
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\u201cSo I don\u2019t know the particulars of this case. I imagine that there were prosecutors\u2014a Trump-appointed prosecutor, who like many prosecutors are going after it with vigor\u2014and they came to a plea deal,\u201d he said. \u201cAs far as I\u2019m concerned in the work that I have to do, I think justice has taken its course.\u201d<\/p>\n
As part of the plea deal, the Justice Department is not expected to pursue criminal charges against the president\u2019s son over his alleged unlawful possession of a firearm while being an active user of an illicit substance. Before details about the deal were announced, attorneys for Biden reportedly told DOJ officials that a recent federal court ruling on gun rights for people who use marijuana should invalidate any charges related to allegations<\/a> that he lied about his drug use on the federal firearms purchase form.<\/p>\n Lying on the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) form is a felony offense\u2014but the constitutionality of the underlying drug question itself has come under scrutiny in several federal courts, at least as far as cannabis is concerned. Biden\u2019s counsel specifically cited\u00a0a February ruling in the\u00a0U.S. District Court for the Western District of Oklahoma<\/a>\u00a0that deemed the ban preventing marijuana consumers from buying and possessing firearms to be unconstitutional.<\/p>\n Trump\u2019s charges, meanwhile, are related to allegations that he improperly and illegally stored highly sensitive documents\u2014at times, revealing them to people without clearance\u2014in violation of the Espionage Act.<\/p>\n Booker said on CNN that he did not see a partisan double-standard, even if he does believe it to be true that high-level officials are able to get away with admissions of illegal drug use that have landed countless others behind bars.<\/p>\n \u2014 The senator, who has championed cannabis legalization efforts in Congress, is separately pushing for cannabis expungements<\/a> to be part of a bipartisan marijuana banking reform bill that may receive a Senate committee vote this month<\/a>.<\/p>\n Booker has said that lawmakers are working to \u201cresurrect\u201d the package of marijuana reform legislation<\/a> from last session, acknowledging that failure to advance a banking fix for the industry \u201cliterally means that hundreds of businesses go out of business.\u201d<\/p>\n In April, he also notably called marijuana a \u201cdangerous drug\u201d<\/a>\u00a0that he nonetheless wants to legalize and regulate.<\/p>\n California Courts Have Sealed 90 Percent Of Eligible Marijuana Cases, State Attorney General\u2019s Report Shows<\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n The post Booker Slams \u2018Two-Tier System\u2019 Of Marijuana Criminalization That Shields Powerful From Punishment While Discussing Hunter Biden Plea Deal<\/a> appeared first on Marijuana Moment<\/a>.<\/p>\n
Sen. Cory Booker (D-NJ) says that while he believes the justice system has effectively handled prosecution against President Joe Biden\u2019s son, there\u2019s still a double-standard in the country that has allowed presidents and members of Congress to admit to past marijuana use with impunity while subjecting thousands of less privilegedContinue Reading<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":458,"featured_media":66503,"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\/66502"}],"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=66502"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/66502\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":66504,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/66502\/revisions\/66504"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/66503"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=66502"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=66502"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=66502"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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\nRead More: Booker Slams \u2018Two-Tier System\u2019 Of Marijuana Criminalization That Shields Powerful From Punishment While Discussing Hunter Biden Plea Deal<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"