Opinion | Marijuana convictions must be expunged before companies profit

But for whom? Usually not those doing time for possession of marijuana. Here’s an idea, though: Offer free tuition at Northern Michigan University for those who have been savagely ripped from their families and friends and had their lives damaged by the criminal justice system simply because they were black, brown or Native and had pot on their person.

It can only help, given how white the entire industry is shaping up to be. “Legal marijuana is an overwhelmingly white industry whose promises on racial equity have been left unfulfilled,” Kristen Clarke, president and executive director of the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law,She added: “As case in point, people of color made up to 86 percent of marijuana arrests in New York in 2017.

You can see not dissimilar inequities play out among consumers, too. Here in Denver, Colorado, though recreational marijuana has been legal since 2012, it’s not uncommon to see black and Latinos and Natives hide their joints and edibles while white folks openly puff and pass. The policy nexus of pot and people of color is now a popular Democratic talking point as we near 2020. Presidential candidates Bernie Sanders, Cory Booker,and several of the other nine POTUS-hopefuls are calling for the legalization of marijuana and speak to the scourge of racism in policing when it comes to cannabis.

“The War on Drugs has not been a war on drugs, it’s been a war on people, and disproportionately people of color and low-income individuals,”

THINK

THINK 👍😎🇺🇸☝️

THINK Here come the socialist dictates...

THINK Possession of cannabis is still a federal felony. Congress doesn't care to fix this.

THINK It needs to be federally mandated.

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