Biden needs to lean on his executive authority now. He has been delaying and underutilizing it so far. There is an enormous amount he can do on climate, student debt, immigration, cannabis, health care, and more.
Time is running out – we need to move and use alternative paths.
— Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (@AOC) December 20, 2021
Here’s some analysis by Marijuana Moment
It’s been nearly a year since President Joe Biden took office, and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) says it’s past time for executive action on marijuana reform and other issues.
As congressional Democrats fret over the likely defeat of a large-scale social spending bill after a moderate Sen. Joe Manchin (D-WV) announced over the weekend that he will oppose it, Ocasio-Cortez is urging the president to start taking unilateral action on various progressive policies, including cannabis.
“Biden needs to lean on his executive authority now. He has been delaying and underutilizing it so far,” she tweeted on Monday. “There is an enormous amount he can do on climate, student debt, immigration, cannabis, health care, and more. Time is running out—we need to move and use alternative paths.”
Ocasio-Cortez, who recently filed a bipartisan bill to incentivize state-level cannabis expungements, has been critical Biden when it comes to cannabis. Even before he was elected, she told Marijuana Moment that his remarks on the campaign trail about cannabis as a potential gateway drug amounted to “Reagan-era talking points.”
“The only thing that marijuana, due to the failures of U.S. policy, is a gateway to is our mass incarceration system,” she said at the time.
The congresswoman was among the first to suggest that Biden use executive authority to advance marijuana reform, joining 36 of her colleagues on a letter to the president in February that implored him to grant mass pardons to people with federal cannabis convictions. Biden recently received a follow-up letter demanding a status update.
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