Politics
Trump’s Federal Budget Cuts Could Boost Marijuana Legalization Efforts As States Seek New Revenue, Congresswoman Says
A Democratic congresswoman says the Trump administration’s push to make states pay a larger share for public services such as food assistance and health care amid his efforts to cut federal spending might ultimately “push them in the direction of legalizing marijuana” so they can offset those costs with cannabis tax revenue.
In an interview on the National Cannabis Industry Association (NCIA) Voice of Cannabis podcast that was released on Thursday, Congressional Cannabis Caucus co-chair Rep. Dina Titus (D-NV) commented on a wide range of marijuana policy issues—including bipartisan legalization legislation, stalled action on federal reform and the destigmatization of cannabis use in her state after enacting an adult-use marijuana market.
One of the “only good things that comes out of the policy of the White House is that they are pushing more things to the states to pay for—like [Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP)] and like Medicaid—and so states may be looking for additional sources of revenue,” Titus said. “That may push them in the direction of legalizing marijuana, to some extent, so they can get that tax revenue generated.”
Titus said the lawmakers who back reform were initially “optimistic” about the prospects of a federal policy change under President Donald Trump because of comments he made on the campaign trail in favor of rescheduling, industry banking access and a Florida adult-use legalization ballot initiative left the impression “he was going to be supportive.”
“Now we’ve seen that kind of stall, and we have this crazy secretary of [the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS)] that I think is on drugs,” the congresswoman said, referencing Robert F. Kennedy Jr. “I don’t know where he’s coming from, and so it’s hard to read what the administration is going to do and if they’re going to make it a priority and if they’re going to weigh in. So that’s another element of the politics that we have to keep in mind.”
She added that, within federal circles, the “emphasis has shifted over to psychedelics that seems to capture the media more— and I think that blurs our message and may not necessarily work to our advantage. We got to be sure that we aren’t taken off down some other path and we don’t accomplish [cannabis reform] before we go.”
To that end, several top administration officials, including Kennedy, have been advocates for expanding research and access to psychedelics.
NCIA’s Aaron Smith also asked Titus about her personal evolution on the issue and the unique dynamics between Nevada’s gaming and cannabis industries.
The congresswoman acknowledged that the gaming sector did initially oppose the push to legalize marijuana “because they weren’t sure what the impact would be on their bottom line.”
“It’s like the appeal to millennials: How does gaming do that? So they were afraid, ‘Well, people are just sitting around getting stoned and listening to music. They’re not going to come down to casinos. How’s that going to impact us?'” she said. “But now we have moved from medical marijuana to recreational marijuana” and added cannabis consumption lounges to the program.
“So that’s harder to kind of set up and figure out how to operate to keep marijuana separate from alcohol. But that’s kind of in progress, and we’ll see how that works out. But there’s not any real stigma to it here in Nevada anymore,” Titus said, sharing an anecdote about how during the last election, her team decided to experiment with meeting and registering voters who were lined up outside of cannabis dispensaries.
“We were out there doing that, but, unfortunately, a lot of the people there were tourists. They weren’t people who lived in Nevada, so didn’t help us politically very much,” she said.
As far as federal reform goes, although the congresswoman feels efforts have stalled compared to expectations—and attention to psychedelic policy issues may have diverted attention from marijuana—she still anticipates that “the effort will kick up” once Congress deals with budget-related issues.
“It’s just so hard to say about this administration. I mean every policy position they take, they switch the next day or the next hour. Look at tariffs—back and forth, back and forth. Employees of the federal government, same thing,” she said. “So it’s hard for me to predict, but until they kind of get on board more, I think you will still see a reluctance by Republicans in Congress. So I’m not going to bet on a certain day.”
“I mean, I know the odds, so I’m not going to do that—but I think you will see enthusiasm, or at least attention to it, ramp up some,” Titus said. “It’s not just getting it passed on the floor. We got to get it to move out of committee, and that’s the first really big step. If you make that happen, then on the floor might be a little easier, and it’s going to take both houses.”
“The House has been more willing to pass some of this legislation than the Senate has, and so I think that’s where your work is really cut out for you in from the lobby and advocacy side,” she said.
The congresswoman also weighed in on a bipartisan bill—the Strengthening the Tenth Amendment Through Entrusting States (STATES) 2.0 Act—that she filed in April alongside fellow Cannabis Caucus co-chair Rep. Dave Joyce (R-OH) to end federal marijuana prohibition in states that have legalized it, while providing for a basic federal regulatory framework for cannabis products.
The provisions of the STATES Act “didn’t go as far as a lot of Democrats would like to see,” she said. “They’d like to see it totally deregulated or descheduled, but we’re starting to realize that you’ve got to eat this one bite at a time, and this would be a good way to do it,” she said. “Republicans like to talk about states’ rights, and that’s what this does. And we recognize that states are so far ahead of the federal government that if we’re not going to catch up, we at least need to get out of the way. And I think that’s the message that this bill sends.”
Photo courtesy of Philip Steffan.
