The U.S. remains a deeply divided nation in 2020, and likely for many years to come. The presidential election and hundreds of down-ballot races were far closer than most pundits and pollsters predicted.
But in all this deadlocked division and confusion, there’s one area of clear consensus: drug policy. In deep red states like South Dakota, purple states like Arizona, and blue states like Oregon alike, voters decided it’s time to legalize the use of drugs like cannabis and psilocybin mushrooms. Literally every pro-drug ballot initiative won. In not one case did the usual scaremongering messages break through. It was enough to put you in mind of the classic Onion headline: “Drugs win drug war.”
The war has been won in the space of two presidential election cycles. Colorado and Washington were the first states in the nation to vote for legalizing recreational cannabis, in November 2012 — and that was most definitely controversial when it finally kicked in in 2014. Fears of overdosing, or accidental dosing of children, were widespread. You may recall the infamous New York Times column in which Maureen Dowd went to Denver, ingested edibles without understanding the dosage, then freaked out in her hotel room. Dowd also did what a lot of pundits were doing: wrote about people who got high then committed crimes as if there were a correlation.
Going back even further, medicinal cannabis had been a thing since California started it in 1996, but it lived in the shadows for years. The first handful of nonprofit “patients groups” lived in fear of DEA raids. Getting a license to run a dispensary, and a card to prove you had a qualifying condition, were both onerous processes until the mid-2000s. Here too, the Times wagged a finger: after a story in which a San Francisco writer and her friend obtained cards ostensibly to help treat her migraines, the paper’s opinion page called them “bad actors.” (Full disclosure: The friend was me.)
But attitudes changed fast — especially when the potential revenue became clear. Colorado now clears $1 billion a year in dispensary taxes and fees. (“Pot tax helps fill our potholes,” as one Denver resident put it.) Some 16 states had legalized medical marijuana by the time Colorado went recreational. Alaska and Oregon legalized recreational weed in 2014, while California, Nevada, Maine, and Massachusetts followed suit in 2016. Again, there was a two year gap before the first recreational dispensaries appeared. Michigan went recreational in 2018, Illinois in 2019.
And now, a mere two years after California adults first walked into weed stores without a card, the floodgates have opened. Arizona, Montana, and New Jersey made recreational cannabis legal, the latter pleasing New Yorkers who no longer have to drive to Massachusetts for their weed (but are frustrated that their own state House hasn’t yet legalized it). Mississippi took the baby step of approving a medical marijuana initiative, although the state also voted for a second initiative that restricted the first.
And then there’s South Dakota, one of the most conservative states in the union, which legalized both recreational and medical cannabis at the same time, the first state to do so. Gov. Kristi Noem was strongly against it — but given that she botched her state’s response to COVID-19, which is raging in South Dakota even as Noem refuses to mandate masks, residents clearly shouldn’t be turning to her for medical advice.
All in all, the count now stands at 35 states with legal medical marijuana and 15 (plus D.C.) that have made it fully legal for all adults. Another 13 have legalized cannabis with a limited THC content, allowing the CBD industry to flourish. Wyoming and Idaho are the only two states to have taken no steps towards legality, and even Wyoming has decriminalized possession. Looking at you, Idaho.
The mushroom mandate
Meanwhile, the humble psilocybin mushroom can now be safely cultivated for personal use in the state of Oregon and in Washington D.C., which decriminalized it. Oregon will set up a “psilocybin service center” where a licensed therapist will talk you through your trip. We don’t yet know what medical conditions will be officially sanctioned by the state for psychedelic treatment, but there is some evidence that mushrooms alleviate PTSD, as well as OCD, depression, addiction, and anxiety. In other words, many of us could use them right about now.
This doesn’t just build on the work of mushroom scientists and advocates like Paul Stamets, or the popularity of Michael Pollan’s psychedelic explainer How to Change Your Mind. It also follows successful ‘shroom decriminalization ballot initiatives in two cities, Denver and Oakland, in 2019. Microdosing psychedelics is increasingly popular and surprisingly effective. Some activists believe we’ll see them sold at dispensaries one day. Oregon’s service center experience will be closely watched by scientists keen to do more studies — and by other states, especially as they grow more eager for new revenue streams in the current economic downturn.
Another Oregon ballot initiative will be closely watched: the decriminalization of all drugs for personal use. This isn’t a license to cook meth or sell it on the street — sorry, Walter White — but it does mean that if you’re caught with a small amount of anything on your person, you won’t be charged. The initiative also redirects cannabis tax revenue to pay for addiction treatment, which is what we should have been doing with hard drug offenders all along.
Oregon isn’t taking a giant step into the unknown here. Portugal decriminalized all drug possession in 2001 — and as anyone who has been to the beautiful city of Lisbon knows, it hasn’t exactly turned into a cesspool of crime. In fact, total decriminalization has led to fewer muggings, less drug-related theft, fewer needle-related infections, and a decline in overdoses. Crucially, it also changed the language around drug use. The word for “junkie” was dropped in favor of “person with addiction disorder.” It’s almost as if we should be kind to our fellow human beings who are trapped in the cycle of addiction, which often correlates to poverty, instead of throwing them in jail.
Speaking of jail, many of these ballot initiatives also address the unfairness of marijuana convictions. Arizona and Montana will quash low-level sentences — which have historically hit people of color the hardest — just as California did in its recreational initiative. Arizona’s measure goes a step further and sets aside 26 retail licenses for “individuals from communities disproportionately impacted.” Because this is one other position that appears to have broad bipartisan support in 2020: There are far too many people in U.S. prisons, and they deserve a fair shake when they get out.
The next president may not be able to get America to agree on much. But if he pushes for cannabis decriminalization at the federal level, treating it the same as alcohol and nicotine, and quashing convictions — all things Joe Biden has pledged to do — he will find voters cheering him on in red and blue states alike.