{"id":73934,"date":"2024-04-09T13:54:23","date_gmt":"2024-04-09T21:54:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/2024\/04\/09\/biden-not-doing-enough-to-protect-state-marijuana-laws-congressman-says-as-feds-seize-products-from-licensed-businesses\/"},"modified":"2024-04-09T15:45:21","modified_gmt":"2024-04-09T23:45:21","slug":"biden-not-doing-enough-to-protect-state-marijuana-laws-congressman-says-as-feds-seize-products-from-licensed-businesses","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/2024\/04\/09\/biden-not-doing-enough-to-protect-state-marijuana-laws-congressman-says-as-feds-seize-products-from-licensed-businesses\/","title":{"rendered":"Biden \u2018Not Doing Enough\u2019 To Protect State Marijuana Laws, Congressman Says As Feds Seize Products From Licensed Businesses"},"content":{"rendered":"<\/p>\n

A Democratic congressman says recent reports of U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) agents seizing marijuana from state-licensed businesses in New Mexico<\/a> underscores how the Biden administration is \u201cnot doing enough to protect states who are not waiting for the federal government to catch up.\u201d<\/p>\n

Over the past two months, CBP has seized hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of cannabis products from state-legal operators\u2014a recent trend that seemingly conflicts with the administration\u2019s non-intervention position for state marijuana laws.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Biden-Harris Administration is not doing enough to protect states who are not waiting for the federal government to catch up,\u201d Rep. Earl Blumenauer (D-OR), founding co-chair of the Congressional Cannabis Caucus, told Marijuana Moment.<\/p>\n

\u201cThese seizures underscore the confusion and harm caused by the growing gap between the federal government and state-legal operations,\u201d he said. \u201cAbsent descheduling, President Biden urgently needs to issue guidance to prevent this type of infringement from happening again.\u201d<\/p>\n

Blumenauer, a longstanding champion of cannabis reform, has been sharply critical of the Biden administration over perceived shortcomings on the marijuana policy reform front.<\/p>\n

In a letter sent to Attorney General Merrick Garland last month, he called it \u201cunacceptable\u201d that the Department of Justice has yet to reissue federal marijuana enforcement guidance<\/a> to discourage interference in state cannabis programs, leaving Americans in a \u201clegal limbo\u201d despite promises to update the policy.<\/p>\n

The congressman also recently laid into a top Biden official over the \u201cpolitical malpractice\u201d that is the president\u2019s failure to end marijuana prohibition<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, in a statement to Marijuana Moment regarding the New Mexico seizures, CBP said that, regardless of state laws, \u201cthe sale, possession, production and distribution of marijuana or the facilitation of the aforementioned remain illegal under U.S. federal law, given the classification of marijuana as a Schedule I controlled substance.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cConsequently, individuals violating the Controlled Substances Act encountered while crossing the border, arriving at a U.S. port of entry, or at a Border Patrol checkpoint may be deemed inadmissible and\/or subject to, seizure, fines, and\/or arrest,\u201d they said.<\/p>\n

But while the state-federal cannabis policy conflict is well-understood, it remains unclear why this seemingly localized enforcement escalation is happening.<\/p>\n

U.S. Sen. Martin Heinrich (D-NM)\u00a0said in a recent statement that DHS should focus is checkpoint enforcement activities on combating illegal fentanyl trafficking, \u201cnot seizing cannabis that\u2019s being transported in compliance with state law.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cNew Mexicans are depending on federal law enforcement to do everything they can to keep our communities safe,\u201d he said. \u201cOur resources should be used to maximize residents\u2019 safety, not distract from it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Rep. Gabe Vasquez\u2019s (D-NM) office said the \u201cissue has been raised with the Congressman and his office is looking into it.<\/p>\n

\u201cCongressman Vasquez believes that the federal government should respect New Mexico law,\u201d the office said. \u201cCongressman Vasquez is also a co-sponsor of the SAFE Banking Act, which would support the legal cannabis businesses throughout our state.\u201d<\/p>\n

While targeting state-licensed businesses is a seemingly new trend, a 2022 report from the Government Accountability Office (GAO) did show that most CBP drug seizures at checkpoints actually came from\u00a0agents taking small amounts of cannabis from American citizens<\/a>\u2014not large interdictions of illicit drug shipments from transnational cartels, as one might assume.<\/p>\n

In 2019,\u00a0a coalition of senators requested a review<\/a>\u00a0of Border Patrol immigration checkpoint actions, citing a past report that found a significant number of searches and seizures were executed against U.S. citizens for low-level marijuana possession.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, CBP has taken steps to revise its own internal cannabis policies, narrowing the window of employment ineligibility over past marijuana use from two years to three months.<\/p>\n

Sen. James Lankford (R-OK) criticized the modest reform in a letter to CBP\u2019s acting commissioner on Sunday,\u00a0arguing that it \u201cundermines the security and integrity of the Border Patrol workforce\u201d<\/a>\u00a0and questioning the \u201ctrustworthiness\u201d of recruits who used cannabis.<\/p>\n

Last year, CBP cautioned employees, as well as their family members,\u00a0against using even federally legal CBD products<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The federal legalization of hemp and its derivatives has also\u00a0created complications for CBP\u2019s enforcement activity<\/a>, leading officials to seek out portable marijuana analyzers to quickly identify cannabinoid profiles and help distinguish between marijuana and hemp.<\/p>\n

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Senators Condemn Russia Over American Citizen\u2019s \u2018Ludicrous\u2019 Incarceration For Medical Marijuana<\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

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Photo courtesy of Mike Latimer.<\/em><\/p>\n

The post Biden \u2018Not Doing Enough\u2019 To Protect State Marijuana Laws, Congressman Says As Feds Seize Products From Licensed Businesses<\/a> appeared first on Marijuana Moment<\/a>.<\/p>\n


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\nRead More: Biden \u2018Not Doing Enough\u2019 To Protect State Marijuana Laws, Congressman Says As Feds Seize Products From Licensed Businesses<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A Democratic congressman says recent reports of U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) agents seizing marijuana from state-licensed businesses in New Mexico underscores how the Biden administration is \u201cnot doing enough to protect states who are not waiting for the federal government to catch up.\u201d Over the past two months,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\/73934"}],"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=73934"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/73934\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":73935,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/73934\/revisions\/73935"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=73934"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=73934"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=73934"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}