DEA Seizes Cannabis, Cash At Four California Facilities This Week
Los Angeles, CA: Nearly three out of four American voters say that President Barack Obama should uphold his campaign pledge to halt federal intervention in states that allow for the use and distribution of medical marijuana by authorized patients, according to a national poll of 1,053 likely voters by Zogby International and commissioned by the NORML Foundation.
Seventy-two percent of respondents said that President Obama should “stop federal raids against medical marijuana providers in the 13 states where medical marijuana has become legal.” Only 21 percent of respondents said that he should continue the raids.
While campaigning for the presidency, Obama pledged not to use Justice Department resources to try and circumvent state (medical marijuana) laws.”
Since President Obama took office two weeks ago, the US Drug Enforcement Administration has undertaken at least seven separate raids of state-authorized medical marijuana providers in California and Colorado. On Wednesday, DEA officials, acting without the cooperation of state or local law enforcement agencies, served federal search warrants on at least four Los Angeles based medical marijuana collectives. Agents seized medicine, cash, financial records, and computers, but did not make any arrests.
California NORML Coordinator Dale Gieringer called the DEA’s most recent raids legalized piracy.”
Several national news outlets, including the Los Angeles Times, denounced the DEA’s actions.
Commenting on the results of the Zogby poll, NORML Executive Director Allen St. Pierre said, Seventy-two percent of the American public has said ‘enough is enough.’ They want to see an end to the DEA’s callous and unscrupulous conduct in California and in the other twelve states that have legalized the medicinal use of cannabis. President Obama, it is time for you to keep your word and to bring and end to DEA’s morally bankrupt behavior.”
This may well be happening, because in today’s Washington Times White House spokesman Nick Shapiro said, The president believes that federal resources should not be used to circumvent state laws, and as he continues to appoint senior leadership to fill out the ranks of the federal government, he expects them to review their policies with that in mind.”
Zogby conducted the poll on January 29-31, 2009. The poll has a margin of error of +/- 3.1 percentage points.
For more information, please contact Allen St. Pierre, NORML Executive Director, at (202) 483-5500, or Dale Gieringer, California NORML Coordinator, at (415) 563-5858. Additional information is available online at: http://www.canorml.org or http://www.canorml.org/news/obamaraids.html.