Lawmakers in the Pacific Northwest said they’ll defend state cannabis laws after U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions’ decision to lift an Obama-era policy that took a hands-off approach to federal enforcement.
In rescinding the Cole Memorandum, which is widely understood to have opened the door for legalized cannabis across the country, Sessions plans to let federal prosecutors decide how aggressively to enforce federal cannabis laws in places where it is legal.
Yet the prosecutors Sessions has tasked with deciding what that regulation will look like for the region’s marijuana industry haven’t said much about how they plan to interpret and execute those laws, leaving shop owners in a haze over state and federal industry rules.
“Right now there’s just a lot of uncertainty, a lot of anxiety,” said Ramsey Hamide, the co-owner of Main Street Marijuana in Vancouver, the top-selling cannabis shop in Washington.
“That’s going to take some time to digest exactly how that’s going to impact us day-to-day.”
