Norma Pence

House Democrats pushed back against a Republican attempt to include a flavored marijuana vaping ban in a broader anti-vaping bill that passed the chamber on Friday, arguing that it doesn’t make sense to prohibit products that are already illegal under federal law. Instead, several lawmakers argued that Congress should enact separate cannabis reform legislation that could include provisions designed to protect public health and reduce the appeal of marijuana to youth. The issue first came up during a House Rules Committee hearing on Wednesday, with Rep. Morgan Griffith (R-VA) introducing an amendment to “include a prohibition against flavored marijuana products” such that they would be “treated in the same manner as flavored tobacco products” under the bill. While the congressman argued that language of the legislation implicitly already provides for such a ban, he said it was important to clarify to send a message to young people that they can’t vape products containing nicotine or ...

House Democrats pushed back against a Republican attempt to include a flavored marijuana vaping ban in a broader anti-vaping bill that passed the chamber on Friday, arguing that it doesn’t make sense to prohibit products that are already illegal under federal law. Instead, several lawmakers argued that Congress should enact separate cannabis reform legislation that could include provisions designed to protect public health and reduce the appeal of marijuana to youth. The issue first came up during a House Rules Committee hearing on Wednesday, with Rep. Morgan Griffith (R-VA) introducing an amendment to “include a prohibition against flavored marijuana products” such that they would be “treated in the same manner as flavored tobacco products” under the bill. While the congressman argued that language of the legislation implicitly already provides for such a ban, he said it was important to clarify to send a message to young people that they can’t vape products containing nicotine or ...

The country’s first diversity-focused marijuana trade association came to Sen. Bernie Sanders’s (I-VT) aid on Thursday, issuing a statement “to affirm our support and appreciation” for the 2020 presidential candidate’s recent comments on minority involvement in the legal cannabis industry. During a Democratic primary debate on Tuesday, Sanders pledged not only to end federal marijuana prohibition and expunge past criminal records if elected, but also to help people of color find an economic foothold in the industry. “We are going to provide help to the African American, Latino and Native American communities to start businesses selling legal marijuana rather than let a few corporations control the legalized marijuana market,” he said. [embedded content] It’s an argument familiar to most legalization advocates, and several recent state marijuana laws have included provisions aimed at ensuring social equity in the industry for communities that have been targeted by the war on drugs....

The country’s first diversity-focused marijuana trade association came to Sen. Bernie Sanders’s (I-VT) aid on Thursday, issuing a statement “to affirm our support and appreciation” for the 2020 presidential candidate’s recent comments on minority involvement in the legal cannabis industry. During a Democratic primary debate on Tuesday, Sanders pledged not only to end federal marijuana prohibition and expunge past criminal records if elected, but also to help people of color find an economic foothold in the industry. “We are going to provide help to the African American, Latino and Native American communities to start businesses selling legal marijuana rather than let a few corporations control the legalized marijuana market,” he said. [embedded content] It’s an argument familiar to most legalization advocates, and several recent state marijuana laws have included provisions aimed at ensuring social equity in the industry for communities that have been targeted by the war on drugs....

The country’s first diversity-focused marijuana trade association came to Sen. Bernie Sanders’s (I-VT) aid on Thursday, issuing a statement “to affirm our support and appreciation” for the 2020 presidential candidate’s recent comments on minority involvement in the legal cannabis industry. During a Democratic primary debate on Tuesday, Sanders pledged not only to end federal marijuana prohibition and expunge past criminal records if elected, but also to help people of color find an economic foothold in the industry. “We are going to provide help to the African American, Latino and Native American communities to start businesses selling legal marijuana rather than let a few corporations control the legalized marijuana market,” he said. [embedded content] It’s an argument familiar to most legalization advocates, and several recent state marijuana laws have included provisions aimed at ensuring social equity in the industry for communities that have been targeted by the war on drugs....

The country’s first diversity-focused marijuana trade association came to Sen. Bernie Sanders’s (I-VT) aid on Thursday, issuing a statement “to affirm our support and appreciation” for the 2020 presidential candidate’s recent comments on minority involvement in the legal cannabis industry. During a Democratic primary debate on Tuesday, Sanders pledged not only to end federal marijuana prohibition and expunge past criminal records if elected, but also to help people of color find an economic foothold in the industry. “We are going to provide help to the African American, Latino and Native American communities to start businesses selling legal marijuana rather than let a few corporations control the legalized marijuana market,” he said. [embedded content] It’s an argument familiar to most legalization advocates, and several recent state marijuana laws have included provisions aimed at ensuring social equity in the industry for communities that have been targeted by the war on drugs....

Hemp production in the U.S. has scaled up rapidly since lawmakers lifted federal prohibition of the crop, with more acres of hemp grown in the country today than at any point since the 1940s. But the fledgling industry is still very much in flux, and reporting practices that vary wildly from state to state have hampered efforts to fully understand it. Those are the top-level takeaways of a report released Wednesday by the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) that explores the economic viability of the American hemp industry as the country transitions to a legal era. After decades of prohibition due to hemp’s close relationship to its high-THC cannabis cousin marijuana, Congress in 2014 approved state-level pilot programs, allowing growers in certain states to produce and sell hemp as part of limited research initiatives. In 2018, lawmakers went further, ending federal hemp prohibition entirely. Since then, the sector has exploded. “Under the pilot programs, United States industri...

Amid her campaign for Congress, the wife of one of the most prominent voices advocating for keeping marijuana illegal says that she supports federally reclassifying cannabis from its current restrictive status. Amy Kennedy is one of the Democratic candidates for Congress seeking to unseat Rep. Jeff Van Drew of New Jersey, after he flipped his party affiliation to Republican and pledged his “undying support” for President Trump. Kennedy’s husband is Patrick Kennedy, a former Democratic congressman from Rhode Island and a co-founder of Smart Approaches to Marijuana (SAM), the nation’s leading cannabis prohibitionist group. Current candidate Kennedy, like SAM, opposes broad marijuana legalization—but she also disagrees with the group’s platform on at least one key point. Kennedy wants marijuana removed from Schedule I of the Controlled Substances Act, she recently told The Press of Atlantic City. That departs from SAM doctrine, which calls rescheduling “neither necessary nor desirabl...

Amid her campaign for Congress, the wife of one of the most prominent voices advocating for keeping marijuana illegal says that she supports federally reclassifying cannabis from its current restrictive status. Amy Kennedy is one of the Democratic candidates for Congress seeking to unseat Rep. Jeff Van Drew of New Jersey, after he flipped his party affiliation to Republican and pledged his “undying support” for President Trump. Kennedy’s husband is Patrick Kennedy, a former Democratic congressman from Rhode Island and a co-founder of Smart Approaches to Marijuana (SAM), the nation’s leading cannabis prohibitionist group. Current candidate Kennedy, like SAM, opposes broad marijuana legalization—but she also disagrees with the group’s platform on at least one key point. Kennedy wants marijuana removed from Schedule I of the Controlled Substances Act, she recently told The Press of Atlantic City. That departs from SAM doctrine, which calls rescheduling “neither necessary nor desirabl...