Bernie Sanders doubles down on calls for marijuana reform at Wisconsin rally

Written By Emily Gray Brosious
 

 

(Photo credit: Alex Wong/Getty Images)

Sanders talks marijuana decriminalization in Wisconsin.

Democratic presidential hopeful and Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders rallied with supporters on Sunday in Wisconsin, ahead of Tuesday’s primary.

Sanders reaffirmed calls to reform national marijuana policy and held up legislation he’s introduced in the Senate to end federal marijuana prohibition, as reported by KTRK.

“We can argue about the science and the pluses and minuses about marijuana, but everybody knows marijuana is not a killer drug like heroin,” Sanders said during the rally.

In Wisconsin, nine of the state’s largest cities have already decriminalized marijuana already. Simple cannabis possession remains a crime at the state level, however, as reported by the Stevens Point Journal.

Wisconsin has not passed a comprehensive medical cannabis law yet, but it does have a CBD-only law on the books, which allows for the medical use of high-CBD, low-THC cannabis oil for patients with severe epilepsy.

Marijuana is legal for recreational consumption in four states and the district of Columbia. Medical cannabis is legal in 23 states and DC, and numerous states have passed CBD-only medical cannabis laws as well.

Additional states are pushing to legalize marijuana for recreational and medical use in 2016.

Sanders is the only presidential candidate, aside from Libertarian long shot Gary Johnson, who has openly called to end marijuana prohibition at the national level.

Sanders’s Democratic rival, Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, has stopped short of embracing Sanders’s position, although she has voiced support for states’ rights to pass their own marijuana laws. Clinton has also called to reclassify cannabis down to Schedule II drug, which would facilitate more open medical marijuana research.

Marijuana is currently classified as a Schedule I drug under the Drug Enforcement Administration’s Controlled Substances Act, which is defined as the most dangerous category of drugs with no accepted medical use.