Representatives Tulsi Gabbard (HI-02) and Don Young (AK-AL) introduced today two landmark bipartisan marijuana bills.
Introduced was The Ending Federal Marijuana Prohibition Act of 2019, to remove marijuana from the federal Controlled Substances list and allow states the freedom to regulate marijuana as they choose, without federal interference.
This would deschedule cannabis from the Controlled Substances Act and put a stop to federal prohibition, but it wouldn’t legalize it in the sense of creating a legal and regulated market. The next would begin the collection of data on the efficacy of state legalized and medicinal cannabis programs.
Also introduced was The Marijuana Data Collection Act of 2019, which would study the effects of state legalized medicinal and non-medicinal marijuana programs from a variety of perspectives, including state revenues, public health, substance abuse and opioids, criminal justice, and employment.
In other words, these two bills would get the federal government’s hands out of cannabis once and for all and also kickstart the process of learning more about what is working (and what isn’t) in medical and recreational states.