It seems that Congress isn’t all that concerned with going after the states that have passed medical marijuana laws and we couldn’t be happier. This means that medical marijuana patients won’t have to get their medicine from the black market/illegal channels.
(Now, I’m not sure the Justice Department is happy, Jeff Sessions still believes the decades old and long proven party line LIE, but we are thrilled. He had this to say in February, “States, they can pass the laws they choose. I would just say it does remain a violation of federal law to distribute marijuana throughout any place in the United States, whether a state legalizes it or not.”)

The new budget includes a provision called the Rohrabacher-Farr amendment that allows states to continue to craft their own medical marijuana policies without fear of federal intervention. Here’s the full text of the marijuana provision:

“None of the funds made available in this Act to the Department of Justice may be used, with respect to any of the States of Alabama, Alaska, Arkansas, Arizona, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Florida, Georgia, Hawaii, Illinois, Iowa, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina, Ohio, Oklahoma, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, Vermont, Virginia, Washington, West Virginia, Wisconsin, and Wyoming, or with respect to the District of Columbia, Guam, or Puerto Rico, to prevent any of them from implementing their own laws that authorize the use, distribution, possession, or cultivation of medical marijuana.”

While this isn’t unusual (lawmakers have continuously renewed the medical marijuana provision in every budget since it first passed in 2014) it does seem to demonstrate that Congress isn’t interested in creeping in on state marijuana laws under the Trump administration.

However, Sessions could still technically go after states that have legalized recreational marijuana because they are not shielded by the language in the budget bill.

Currently, though medical marijuana is legal in 29 states and the District of Columbia (and 16 states have laws allowing limited use of cannabidiol or CBD) it is still illegal at the federal level. Again, this is good news but our time to stop working, to stop being vigilant, has not yet come.

Source: Huffington Post