Senator Cory Gardner is making marijuana reform a reality

Sen. Cory Gardner (R-CO) said on Wednesday that he has “pretty good confidence” that Congress will pass far-reaching marijuana reforms this year, citing conversations he’s had with key committee chairs and President Donald Trump.

Gardner, who is the lead GOP sponsor of separate bills to let cannabis businesses access banking services and to protect states that have legalized from federal interference, said bipartisan support for his legislation “sends a strong signal that it’s time to pull the federal government’s head out of the sand on marijuana and actually address” the issue.

“It’s a sign that it’s no longer acceptable for the status quo [to continue] and we need to actually fix this conflict in federal and state law,” he said.

The senator revealed that he’s had “a number of good conversations” with Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC), who chairs the Senate Judiciary Committee, as well as “some of the others in key committees like the Banking Committee.”

“I actually have some pretty good confidence that we can move forward on a solution this year,” Gardner told Yahoo Finance. “I think the consistent drumbeat of businesses and organizations and individuals going in to share their story with Chairman Graham and others has really made a key difference in terms of how we’re going to pass legislation to actually fix this conflict.”

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Highlight: "It’s time to pull Congress's head out of the sand, the federal government’s head out of the sand on marijuana…" says @SenCoryGardner on bipartisan lawmakers teaming up to reform marijuana laws. https://finance.yahoo.com/

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11:04 AM - Jun 5, 2019

Of course, cannabis reform legislation would also have to be signed by Trump, who Gardner said he considers an ally on the issue.

“I think the president would look at it as a commonsense approach that helps him out as well,” he said in response to a question about whether passing the bill he is co-leading with Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) could aid her presidential campaign as she seeks to oust the incumbent occupant of the Oval Office. “He’s been supportive of this approach from the get-go. The conversations I have had with him over the past year-plus have been very productive.”

“I think that this is something he understands needs to be done because of the number of states—47 states have now moved forward—and to use his term, we’re not going to go backwards on this. Let’s fix the problem,” he added.

While Trump has not been particularly vocal about the issue since being elected, he did say last year that he “really” supports legislation to let states set their own marijuana policies without federal intervention when asked by a reporter.

Meanwhile, a number of political observers have pointed out that bringing home a federal cannabis win of some kind or another to Colorado could go a long way toward aiding Gardner’s own bid to be reelected next year.

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Key bipartisan lawmakers say they are confident Congress will move on legislation designed to free cannabis businesses from the risk of breaking federal laws.

“I actually have some pretty good confidence that we can move forward on a solution this year,” Sen. Cory Gardner (R-CO) told Yahoo Finance about the Strengthening the Tenth Amendment Through Entrusting States Act (“STATES Act”), a bill he co-sponsored with Democratic Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-MA), and one of several bills introduced in Congress to address concerns that plant-touching transactions could run afoul of the Controlled Substances Act and U.S. banking regulations.

If passed, the STATES Act would prevent federal authorities from punishing state-compliant cannabis businesses that would otherwise face criminal prosecution for possessing and distributing marijuana, which remains designated as a schedule 1 narcotic.

“I think the consistent drumbeat of businesses and organizations and individuals going in to share their story with Chairman [Lindsey] Graham, and others, has really made a key difference in terms of how we’re going to actually pass legislation to fix this conflict,” Gardner said.

‘An invitation to money laundering’

A lead Republican sponsor for another bipartisan, and a more narrowly-tailored bill that would protect banks from cannabis-related penalties, the Secure and Fair Enforcement Banking Act (“SAFE Act”), Gardner reintroduced the measure in the Senate in April with Democratic co-sponsor Sen. Jeff Merkley (D-OR).

“This broader bill, I support it,” Merkley told Yahoo Finance. “Sen. Cory Gardner from Colorado has done a good job leading that effort. But sometimes the broader the bill gets, the less support it has. So we’re trying to find both the policy path and the political path forward.”

Persuading lawmakers to vote yes on a policy that would undo decades of drug regulation takes time, Merkley said. It’s why he believes the SAFE Act may be getting more traction.

“It’s caught in the evolution of thinking about cannabis,” Merkley said. “We now have more than half of our states ... that really understand that this cash economy makes no sense. It means that you have hundreds of thousands of dollars, millions of dollars moving around in duffel bags, in backpacks. It’s an invitation to money laundering, to organized crime to petty theft, to not even paying your taxes accurately.”

Merkley said the Senate version of the SAFE Act had gained 31 sponsors and was gradually building steam. Its companion bill in the House passed out of committee in March. “We’re expecting positive action on the floor,” Merkley said.

Questions remain about whether hemp, a form of cannabis with non-psychoactive levels of THC, needs to be explicitly covered in the various bills, despite its legalization under the 2018 Farm Bill. Hemp contains another phytocannabinoid, CBD, suspected to have therapeutic benefits.

“We’re pushing the FDA to act quickly because that’s really the hang-up now,” Merkley said. “Some states are a little nervous — what is this CBD oil? And does have something to do with marijuana? And can we intercept it? And the answer is no. This is now a full, agricultural product but it needs to have the FDA put out regulations that pertain to labeling and shipping, just to give everyone, to get the message, if you will, that this is now a legal, agricultural commodity.”

Representatives Ed Perlmutter (D-CO), Denny Heck (D-WA), Steve Stivers (R-OH) and Warren Davidson (R-OH) introduced the House version of the SAFE Act. On Wednesday, the House Financial Services Committee issued a report on the legislation. The bill was discharged by the House Judiciary Committee, and placed on the Union Calendar, indicating it may come to a floor vote sooner than expected.

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