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Donald Trump To Be Confronted By Marijuana Advocates On Inauguration Day

By Val Powell
Published on: 20:05 PST, Jan 3, 2017

Donald Trump has been largely ambivalent towards marijuana, and now advocates are ramping up the pressure for the president-elect to take a position on the legalization of weed.

They previously campaigned for Hillary Clinton, thinking that a vote for her would bring them closer to the legalization of marijuana in the US. However, all their strategies were thrown out the window when Donald Trump won.

Back then, the Republican-controlled House of Representatives was ignoring the lobby for weed legalization. Now, the molehill had just become a mountain because Republicans are also in control of the White House.

Erik Altieri, executive director of the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws told the Denver Channel, that they are back to the drawing board to craft a blueprint that will attack the issue from multiple angles.

“We’re having our supporters generate emails to their senators,” he said. “We’re having them sign a petition to President-elect Trump, attempting to get him to clarify his position on marijuana policy.”

The publication noted that Donald Trump used to be warm to the idea of marijuana legalization back in the ’90s when he was still a Democrat. He said then that the US is “losing badly on the war on drugs,” and the answer to that is to legalize the industry so the government can impose regulations and control.

Now, however, the tides have turned and the president-elect is refusing to touch the subject with a 10-foot pole.

“In terms of marijuana and legalization, I think that should be a state issue, state-by-state,” Donald Trump told the audience during a political rally in October 2015. “Marijuana is such a big thing. I think medical should happen — right?”

He also thinks that recreational marijuana, like what Colorado, Alaska, Oregon, Washington, and the District of Columbia have adopted,” is bad.” In fact, he “feels strongly about it.”

“I love Colorado and the people are great, but there’s a question as to how it’s all working out there, you know? That’s not going exactly trouble-free. So I really think that we should study Colorado, see what’s happening,” Donald Trump commented on Colorado’s marijuana law.

In November last year, four more states voted to allow recreational marijuana: California, Maine, Nevada, and Massachusetts.

While advocates think there’s hope yet for Donald Trump to turn his view on marijuana around, comedian Bill Maher is pessimistic about that possibility.

In an interview with ATTN, he believed that drug raids against marijuana might increase during the Donald Trump administration. It bears saying that Senator Jeff Sessions, the incoming attorney general, is also not a fan of weed.

“Don’t piss off your old dealer,” Maher told marijuana users. “You know, the guy you used to talk to before you got the weed and kind of deal with his skanky girlfriend and kind of be interested in his stories? You might have to do that again.”

But then again it seems marijuana advocates will attempt to poke the bear as they plan on passing out joints during Donald Trump’s inauguration.

The campaign is started by DCMJ, which successfully lobbied for marijuana legalization in Washington D.C., as a way of forcing the issue.

As founder Adam Eidinger said, “We are forced to do this type of publicity stunt because the Trump administration hasn’t mentioned marijuana once since he was elected. It reminds people that the public wants change, and the politicians aren’t doing it.”

The campaign is set for Jan. 20 and around 40 ounces of marijuana — or equivalent to 4,200 pieces of joint — will be handed out for free. However, Eidinger quickly clarified that they have no plans of blocking the inauguration of Donald Trump.

[Featured Image by Drew Angerer/Getty Images]

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