California Lawmakers Move To Thwart Possible Federal Cannabis Crackdown

With news coming out of Washington D.C. hardly auspicious for the legal cannabis movement, California legislators have moved to protect their state’s budding recreational industry.

California bill AB 1578 would allow local and state officials to refuse to follow through with federal mandates towards cannabis businesses in California.

Specifically, the bill reads: “This bill would prohibit a state or local agency, as defined, from taking certain actions without a court order signed by a judge, including using agency money, facilities, property, equipment, or personnel to assist a federal agency to investigate, detain, detect, report, or arrest a person for commercial or noncommercial marijuana or medical cannabis activity that is authorized by law in the State of California and transferring an individual to federal law enforcement authorities for purposes of marijuana enforcement.”

The bill was introduced a week before White House press secretary Sean Spicer announced that President Trump’s administration foresaw “greater enforcement” against states that legalized recreational pot. But the bill does come well after Trump’s appointment of the outspoken anti-pot U.S. Congressman Jeff Sessions as Attorney General.

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California voters legalized recreational marijuana in last November’s election.