Switch to Marijuana Could Help Biden with Core Voter Group

The Biden administration’s move to loosen federal marijuana regulations could help the president make much-needed progress among younger voters, a group that was crucial to his 2020 victory but is showing dwindling enthusiasm in his candidacy for re-election.

The Drug Enforcement Administration’s announcement last month that it will move forward with removing marijuana from Schedule I to Schedule III represents the most substantial federal action on the drug since it was first scheduled in 1970.

While not yet complete decriminalization, the change, once finalized, would make marijuana use and possession a less serious crime at the federal level. According to Democratic pollster and strategist Celinda Lake, this could be coupled with a criminal justice message to appeal to young voters.

“I think it needs to be linked to criminal justice reform, which the president and vice president have already been very active in. And I think it’s a really, really good part of a package to talk to young people about abortion, about threats to democracy, about student loans,” Lake said.

The measure was welcomed by marijuana advocates, but also criticized for falling short of their demands for full decriminalization of the drug, which Biden supported in his 2020 campaign.

“There are only jurisdictional limits here and that’s the problem,” Lake said. “That’s why I think linking it to criminal justice reform is a very, very strong combination.”

Among voters under 30, President Biden beat former President Trump by 24 percentage points in 2020, according to for Pew Research. O Harvard Youth Research in March it found that Biden’s advantage over Trump among younger people was 8 points. Among likely voters, this metric rises to 18 points.

Rudy Garrett, vice president of empowerment at the advocacy group Alliance for Youth Action (AYA), acknowledged that Biden is “worse off among a variety of young demographics” compared to his first showdown with Trump.

“He’s got a lot of catching up to do and I think it’s like the dichotomy versus the lesser of two evils, Biden versus Trump,” Garrett said. “So I definitely see a clear need to reach out to voters early and pay close attention to the issues they voice in each state because the experiences of young people across the country are so diverse.”

Most of the country supports the legalization of marijuana. A March survey of Pew found that 89% of adults favor legalizing marijuana to some extent, and this metric is highest among adults under the age of 30, with 93% favoring legalizing marijuana, whether for recreational or medicinal use.

A Schedule III designation will mean that marijuana is not yet decriminalized, and access to medical marijuana is unlikely to expand under the change. Marijuana political groups have not shied away from expressing their disappointment.

“Rescheduling marijuana is not a policy solution to the federal criminalization of marijuana or its harms, and will not address the disproportionate impact it has had on Black and brown communities,” said Cat Packer, director of drug markets and legal regulation at the Drug Policy Alliance , shortly after news of the DEA decision broke.

Paul Armentano, deputy director of the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws, noted that conflicts between state and federal laws will persist even after the new rule is finalized.

“The goal of any federal cannabis policy reform should be to address the existing and unsustainable divide between federal cannabis policy and the cannabis laws of most U.S. states,” he said.

But advocates for youth voting say it’s still a win for voters who care about the issue.

“I think the argument the government can present [is] they are making progress on issues that concern young people and working to decriminalize substances,” Cristina Tzintzún Ramirez, president of the advocacy nonprofit NextGen America, told The Hill.

Tzintzún Ramirez said the Biden-Harris campaign could add rescheduling to the list of campaign promises the administration has delivered on, including canceling student debt and climate change commitments.

Biden announced last month that he was canceling student debt for more than 277,000 borrowers, while the administration and environmental groups touted the Reducing Inflation Act as the largest-ever investment in combating climate change.

But like the recent action on marijuana, critics have argued that he also hasn’t gone far enough in these areas, especially when it comes to reaching young voters.

Sen. Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.) said Politician earlier this year that Biden’s actions to combat climate change are unlikely to satisfy young voters due to “a number of other pro-fossil decisions” he has also made.

And Biden’s signature student loan forgiveness program was struck down by the Supreme Court last year, forcing him to take more incremental steps.

AYA’s Garrett reported that if Biden wants to secure more young votes, he needs to come up with more concrete plans in the coming months — and focus messaging on swing states with the largest number of young voters up for grabs.

“Some of the typical swing states, like Wisconsin, Ohio, Florida, are the spaces where we see young people looking for third-party options. So I think there is a greater opportunity for engagement in those states,” she said.

“And continuing to work to address youth issues and having a clear plan for what that means could build more trust over time, rather than just waiting for him to win a second term and then setting priorities.”

This story originally appeared on thehill.com read the full story