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Melissa Harris-Perry: Welcome back to The Takeaway. I'm Melissa Harris-Perry.
Ralph Northam: This goes back centuries. What we're doing now is just making it equitable and we're stopping the disproportionate arrest of individuals.
Melissa Harris-Perry: That was former Virginia Governor, Ralph Northam, last year after he signed a bill legalizing small amounts of recreational marijuana for people 21 and over in his state. Now, this law, which went into effect last July was supposed to reduce racial inequity in drug arrests and charges, but a new analysis by The Washington Post suggests it hasn't worked. Black folk make up about 20% of Virginia's population but continue to account for 60% of marijuana-related cases in the state's court system.
Joining me now is Chelsea Higgs Wise, founder of Marijuana Justice. She's also host of the podcast Race Capitol. Chelsea, welcome to the show.
Chelsea Higgs Wise: Thanks so much for having me.
Melissa Harris-Perry: Are you at all surprised to discover that the racial disparities persist even more than a year after this new law went into effect?
Chelsea Higgs Wise: Melissa, unfortunately, I am not surprised. This type of inquiry about the racial disparities and marijuana enforcement is something that we've been watching on an annual basis for the last three years and when it came to 2020 decriminalization in Virginia, we saw the same disparities. Now, one year after legalization, unfortunately, we're just watching the same police practices continuing to impact people in our community.
Melissa Harris-Perry: Give me a sense of what that looks like. On the ground for folks who maybe don't have experience with this, if it's legal, it's legal. How can police stop and arrest someone?
Chelsea Higgs Wise: Unfortunately, there are many exceptions to what we are calling legal possession still here in Virginia. What I really want to be clear is that the prohibition of marijuana has always been the gateway for criminalization, particularly for Black and brown people in this United States. Here on the ground in Virginia, there are still many opportunities for people to be criminalized with marijuana and in Virginia, there is no public use on consumption of marijuana, so it has to be in a private dwelling.
Unfortunately, many people that are renters, particularly, they are still unable to consume marijuana, at least by the smoking means, within their own private home, particularly in public housing, federal housing, which is the most affordable housing in our commonwealth, Virginia, because it is still federally legal, that also means that there is a zero-tolerance policy for consuming or possessing marijuana within their own household.
We also understand that our young folks are still very targeted, which means that even that small age between 18 and 21, where folks are adults but still unable to use, we know that the young folks, particularly between the age of 18 and 24, have always been the majority of folks that have felt this enforcement and they're continuing to feel that enforcement as well.
Also, this may not be captured within the state data, but just to mention for folks that are not US citizens in Virginia still legally possessing and consuming marijuana is just not something that they are able to do without consequence. There are many different ways that folks can still be criminalized here, even though it is legal to possess and it is also illegal for law enforcement to stop, search, and seize even for the smell. We've taken many precautions and protections but still, we're watching these police practices really target Black Virginians.
Melissa Harris-Perry: All right. Does this mean that we're on the wrong track around racial equity and justice by going down a decriminalization legalization track, or is it just that we haven't gone down that path far enough?
Chelsea Higgs Wise: It's definitely that we have not gone far enough and we also have to, unfortunately, let go of the idea that regulation of adult-use sales is going to decrease these disparities, and zero of the 19 legal states have we seen this to be true. It really means that we have to be more intentional with truly repealing the prohibition of marijuana and that goes from the enforcement of possession, it goes into whether we are firing workers for testing positive because marijuana stays in our system for 30 days. It goes into are we separating families and removing children for responsible adult use of cannabis.
We still as a society have not yet really looked at what it really means to decriminalize the entire structure of the drug war that many people are still suffering from. Even beyond the drug policy conversation, I would bet that just about every law that we have enforced right now, we would see the same type of racial disparities. It is really just common police practices that we are criticizing right now, but what we have an opportunity to do in this drug policy, particularly with cannabis, is to continue to repeal this criminalization that we have and really provide the repair that is owed.
It is on us to not just say, "Well, this is just what happens," but to really look at this opportunity as a new way to legislate, a new way to regulate, and a new way to bring care rather than criminalization to our communities.
Melissa Harris-Perry: I want to dig in just a bit more on this reparative context that you've given us. I know that the mission statement of Marijuana Justice indicates this language about repairing the harm even beyond the question of moving farther down the road to truly ending prohibition, what else also needs to be done in a reparative context?
Chelsea Higgs Wise: I think that Virginia felt really great when Biden made his most recent announcement about pardoning the simple possessions because that is something that we did on a technical level in 2021, but yet, we really need to expand that level of expungement and record sealing to not just encompass those with misdemeanors. Folks with felonies have really taken on the harm in the route of prohibition because with a felony, that's even more collateral consequences around getting employment, getting housing, getting education and loans, and that sort of thing.
Even beyond expungement, we also have to look at release and re-sentencing those that are serving time because of marijuana-related offenses. Marijuana Justice partnered with the Last Prisoner Project in 2021 to present to the Virginia legislators a report that said in our state-level prisons, we have over 500 people that are still incarcerated for marijuana-related offenses and do deserve a second look at their sentence after we have legalized the simple possession.
That number of 500 people does not include those in local jails as well as those that have community supervision with ankle monitors. That number was from last year. As we are seeing, the arrests are continuing. We're also looking at how the prohibition of cannabis has also impacted families that are over-- With families that are engaged with the Department of Social Services here in Virginia, there is a policy gap that still allows for testing positive of marijuana to be a reason to be reported to CPS and possibly to have children removed when a judge looks at custody.
There is also this idea that folks that are using marijuana responsibly in the state might also have to be subject to drug test at their job and that would then remove the access to be able to take care of their families. This worker protection is something that we also have to look at. Melissa, I haven't even talked about what we need to do for equitable access and opportunity to the industry side. This is truly just the repeal and the repair structures and components that we have to look at if we're taking a serious look at equitable legalization being a gateway to dismantle the war on drugs.
Melissa Harris-Perry: Chelsea Higgs Wise is founder of Marijuana Justice. We say thank you for your time today.
Chelsea Higgs Wise: Thank you so much, Melissa.
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