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Feb-26-2009
Salem-News.com


"What the President said during the campaign...is consistent with what we will be doing here in law enforcement" - U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder


(WASHINGTON D.C.) - Speaking at a press conference on Feb. 25 with DEA Administrator Michele Leonhart, U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder told reporters that ending federal medical marijuana raids "is now American policy."

Don Duncan, California Director of Americans for Safe Access, says the Attorney General’s comments are the latest sign of a sea change in federal policy prompted by a groundswell of grassroots pressure by Americans for Safe Access (ASA) and our allies.

"They came as a response to Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) raids carried out by Bush Administration holdovers in California in January and February," Duncan said.

President Obama indicated he would end the DEA raids during his presidential campaign, a position reiterated by the White House following DEA raids in raids which took placeon February 4.

In response to a question last night about DEA raids at medical marijuana facilities in California, Holder said, "What the President said during the campaign...is consistent with what we will be doing here in law enforcement. He was my boss in the campaign....He is my boss now. What he said in the campaign is now American policy."

Medical marijuana patients and advocates, who have mounted a massive grassroots campaign to influence the new Administration’s policy, cheered the Attorney General’s comments.

72 million Americans live in states where medical cannabis is legal, but federal law prohibits its use under any circumstances.

More than 100 Americans are currently facing prosecution, sentencing, or serving time in prison for medical cannabis offense right now.

ASA is working closely with a number of groups to ensure that the emerging change in federal policy signals an end to prosecutions and brings those already serving time for medical cannabis offenses home to their families.

ASA has provided recommendations for a new national medical cannabis policy to President Obama and the 111th Congress earlier this year. We are working overtime now to be sure those recommendations are heard in this new era of compassionate federal policy.

Source: Americans for Safe Access

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Hell yea!  I wrote the AG a couple weeks ago after the California raids, 'long with the pres and my senators. 

I feel special.

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When I spoke with Barack Obama at a Capitol Hill reception in September 2004 (two months before his election to the U.S. Senate), he said he agreed with me that states should have the right to determine their own medical marijuana policies without federal interference.

That was the beginning of a series of events that culminated two days ago, when Attorney General Eric Holder announced — while standing next to the current DEA administrator — there will be no more DEA raids on medical marijuana establishments in California or elsewhere. This is significant, given that Holder is the "top cop" of the nation and the boss of the DEA!

Medical marijuana patients, dispensary owners and staffers, growers, MPP staffers, and other activists are breathing a sigh of relief ... having been terrorized by the Bush administration for eight years.  How did we get to this point?

Please watch this one-minute video clip of Obama responding to one of our campaign volunteers in New Hampshire on August 21, 2007, in the heat of the presidential primary campaign ...

After that, Obama publicly reiterated that he would discontinue Bush's policy, including in an interview with the editorial board of an Oregon paper. And, since Obama was elected, we've kept in touch with high-level staffers in the White House and on his transition team, as a way of keeping this issue on their radar screen until the policy was officially changed. 

Then, when Bush holdovers in the DEA raided five medical marijuana dispensaries in California in the days after Obama took office on January 20, MPP barraged the media and MPP members barraged the Obama administration to demand an end to the DEA's raids (and to fire the Bush holdovers).

And, of course, MPP and a host of other organizations — including conservative groups like Citizens Against Government Waste — have built support for the annual vote (from 2003 to 2007) on the House floor for an amendment that would have forbidden the DEA and the Justice Department from spending taxpayer money to subvert state-level medical marijuana laws.

All of this advocacy by thousands of patients, dispensary owners, volunteers, paid lobbyists, medical associations, and so many others has paid off. You did it; we all did it.

Now it's time for us to take our work to the next level by (1) enacting medical marijuana laws in Illinois, Massachusetts, Minnesota, New Hampshire, and New York; (2) improving California's and Rhode Island's existing medical marijuana laws in order to provide licenses to dispensaries in both states; (3) reopening the federal "compassionate IND program" so that patients in all 50 states can obtain legal access to medical marijuana; and (4) passing our medical marijuana ballot initiative in Arizona in November 2010.

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