Senator Charles Grassley (R-IA), an inveterate drug warrior, doesn't want to hear the L-word in Washington.

Sen. Jim Webb (D-VA) has introduced legislation calling for a thorough evaluation of the U.S. criminal justice system, namely for the purpose of exploring ways to reduce our world-record prison population. As you might guess, simply discussing whether we should keep millions of American behind bars is enough to terrify the drug war's most committed champions.

They can’t handle the tough questions, so they're trying to make it illegal to even ask. Drug war hall-of-famer Sen. Charles Grassley (R-IA) today introduced an amendment to Webb's bill that would literally prohibit the commission from talking about legalization or even decriminalization:

AMENDMENT intended to be proposed by Mr. GRASSLEY
….
SEC. ll. RESTRICTIONS ON AUTHORITY.
The Commission shall have no authority to make findings related to current Federal, State, and local criminal justice policies and practices or reform recommendations that involve, support, or otherwise discuss the decriminalization of any offense under the Controlled Substances Act or the legalization of any controlled substance listed under the Controlled Substances Act.

These words are a legal blueprint for silencing all criticism of the war on drugs before the experts even get a chance to discuss it. The whole thing flagrantly violates the spirit of the entire inquiry and renders meaningless everything Webb is trying to do. And yes, that's exactly the point.

No one has done more than Charles Grassley to make the drug war into the horrible mess that it's become, so you can bet he'll do anything to protect his shameful legacy. If he succeeds, the bill will almost certainly end up protecting bad policies instead of exposing them. We can’t let that happen. Click here to tell your Senators to oppose this misguided amendment and let the experts do their job without political interference.

A serious evaluation of criminal justice and drug policies is long overdue and that effort means nothing unless all options are debated openly.

US Rep.

Dear friends:

We are excited to announce new legislation in Congress that would protect many medical marijuana patients and providers from federal prosecution.

One in four Americans now lives in a state with laws governing medical marijuana.  Unfortunately, law-abiding citizens can still be prosecuted on federal marijuana-related charges.

Today, Congressman Sam Farr introduced the "Truth in Trials" Act, H.R. 3939.  This bill would enable law-abiding citizens facing federal marijuana related charges to introduce evidence at trial showing that they were in compliance with state law.

"Truth in Trials" needs a lot of support in the U.S. House of Representatives if it is to succeed.

Please e-mail your member of Congress right now.  Ask him or her to cosponsor this important legislation.

Click here:  http://www.americansforsafeaccess.org/house

Thanks!

Sanjeev Bery
National Field Director
Americans for Safe Access

Americans for Safe Access

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Dear friends:

Following the enormous victory for medical marijuana patients and their caregivers on Monday, a strong MPP champion on Capitol Hill, Congressman Sam Farr (D-Calif.), plans to introduce an important bill in Congress next week.

While the new Department of Justice policy creates a de facto protection for patients and caregivers who are "in clear and unambiguous compliance with existing state laws providing for the medical use of marijuana," the Farr bill — which MPP staff helped write years ago — will codify this protection in law.

It will also address another injustice:  Currently, medical marijuana patients in the 13 states where medical marijuana is legal are barred from telling federal jurors that their use of marijuana was for medical purposes, even when state laws explicitly permit medical use. Congressman Farr's Truth in Trials Act would guarantee defendants in federal medical marijuana cases the right to explain that their marijuana was for medical use. And more importantly, defendants could be found not guilty if the jury finds that they followed state medical marijuana laws.
 
Will you please urge your member of Congress to co-sponsor this legislation? MPP's online action system makes it easy: Just enter your contact information and we'll do the rest.

This is such an exciting time for our issue. Thank you for standing with us in the fight.

Sincerely,

Rob Kampia
Executive Director
Marijuana Policy Project
Washington, D.C.

P.S. As I've mentioned in previous alerts, a major philanthropist has committed to match the first $2.35 million that MPP can raise from the rest of the planet in 2009. This means that your donation today will be doubled.

Carrie Johnson at the Washington Post has written a nice story on the Durbin bill to reduce federal crack cocaine penalties to the level of powder cocaine penalties. It quotes my colleagues Jasmine Tyler of Drug Policy Alliance (known inside the Beltway as "Jazz") and Julie Stewart of Families Against Mandatory Minimums (FAMM), the sentencing reform group that has led the fight to end mandatory minimums since the early '90s.

I have a minor nitpick with the article, which is that it presents the issue as having civil rights and justice reform advocates and some politicos on one side, with law enforcement on the other, quoting a spokesperson for the Fraternal Order of Police saying that in the past their members have favored raising powder cocaine penalties instead. While the article doesn't say that all law enforcement is against reducing the penalties, it does fail to mention that there is also law enforcement support for lowering penalties. The press release from Sen. Durbin announcing the bill cites Los Angeles police chief William Bratton, Miami police chief John Timoney, and the National Black Police Association.

I also have to comment on some of the comments I saw by Post readers. Most of the commenters were in support of reducing penalties as the bill does. But a few characterized it as "stupid," saying it would allow people to go on selling crack in inner city black communities, and thereby hurting those communities. As usual, it's the people throwing around words like "stupid" who've done the least thinking about the issue. If they had in fact stopped to think, they would realize that: 1) possession sentences are getting adjusted by this bill, helping people now going to prison for years for just for possessing tiny quantities of crack; and that: (2) incarcerating a drug dealer just creates a job opportunity for another dealer. Often the new would-be dealers fight it out over the old dealer's turf, hurting the community much much more.

Fresh from the Hemp Industries Association (HIA) annual convention last weekend in Washington, DC, a pair of real life farmers who want to be hemp

Sen. Richard Durbin (D-IL) Thursday introduced the Fair Sentencing Act of 2009, which would eliminate the 100:1 sentencing disparity in federal crack and powder cocaine cases.

Update: There's video footage from C-Span2 of a Tuesday Congressional briefing on this issue by the Crack the Disparity coalition, online here. First speaker, Chief of NAACP DC Bureau Hilary Shelton.

In July we reported that a bill in the House of Representatives, the Fairness in Cocaine Sentencing Act Fair Sentencing Act of 2009, had passed the full Judiciary Committee. Today Sen. Dick Durbin (D-IL) introduced a Senate version of the bill. There's no bill number yet, but we'll post back with it when available. Click here to read the Durbin office's press release.

The Fairness in Cocaine Sentencing Act Fair Sentencing Act would increase the quantities of crack cocaine that are needed to trigger certain mandatory minimum sentences. Currently one can receive a five-year mandatory minimum prison term for possession of just five grams of crack cocaine, vs. 500 grams of powder cocaine needed for the same sentence, for example. Passage of the Act will mean that it would take 500 grams of crack to trigger the mandatory.

In addition to Durbin, seven other Judiciary Committee members are original cosponsors: Judiciary Committee Chairman Pat Leahy (D-VT), Judiciary Committee Members Arlen Specter (D-PA), Feingold (D-WI), Cardin (D-MD), Whitehouse (D-RI), Kaufman (D-DE) and Franken (D-MN). Two other senators, John Kerry (D-MA) and Chris Dodd (D-CT) are also original cosponsors. While these are all Democrats, some conservative Republican senators had indicated they were likely to or were considering also supporting it. We'll see what happens.

We were one of many organizations signing a letter to the Hill supporting this reform. Groups cited in the press release as supporting the bill include the American Bar Association, the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights, the National Black Police Association, and the United Methodist Church. The release also cites as supporters LA and Miami police chiefs Bill Bratton and John Timoney, and US Attorney General Eric Holder.

All of these sentences should be repealed, of course, but in the meanwhile the Fairness in Cocaine Sentencing Act Fair Sentencing Act will help a lot of people to avoid some terribly long prison terms. Crack sentencing has been an injustice since the laws were passed in the mid-'80s, and a political issue since at least the early '90s when I started tuning in, so it's taken awhile to get to this point. It is looking pretty good for this to finally happen, but we can't take anything for granted. Look for an action alert sometime next week after there's a bill number.

Last week, Sen. David Vitter (R-LA) proposed a nasty amendment to deny housing aid in New Orleans to entire households that included people convicted of certain drug offenses or other crimes. These folks paid their debt to society and got crushed by a hurricane, only to have David Vitter (who's not exactly perfect himself) come along and try to put their whole family on the street.

The whole thing is too sickening for words, fortunately I don't have to craft many, because the U.S. Senate voted it down decisively.

Meanwhile, that same day, reformers scored a huge victory in the House of Representatives, which passed legislation significantly limiting drug warrior Mark Souder's vicious "Aid Elimination Penalty" that blocks education for students reporting drug convictions.

These may seem like no-brainer issues that anyone with a fraction of a conscience would easily comprehend, but it hasn't always been that simple. One rarely finds the U.S. Congress making two smart drug policy decisions on the same day. It would be crazy to think that bad drug war legislation is a thing of the past, but I do think it's safe to say we're moving slowly but surely into a new political battlefield in which the word "DRUGS!" is no longer a massive landmine that invariably stops politicians dead in their tracks.

Each success we achieve in Washington, D.C. is big, and not just in terms of the specific policy implications of a particular event. We're dealing with a political culture that has long deemed it suicidal to deviate even slightly from the drug war doctrine. There's a powerful lesson to be learned each time the drug war loses the vote and no one gets sent home over it.

The infamous Higher Education Act (HEA) anti-drug provision, or "Aid Elimination Penalty," which bars students committing drug offenses fr

Update: Souder concession speech -- "... I was probably going to lose today." It's an interesting glimpse into the prohibitionist mindset.

Today the US House of Representatives passed a student loan bill that includes language limiting the infamous "Aid Elimination Penalty" -- a law stripping students of financial aid because of drug convictions -- to include only sales convictions, not possession. The law was previously limited to offenses committed while attending school and receiving federal financial aid. If the Senate follows suit, on this reform or something similar, it will be limited yet again.

Yesterday we alerted our members that Rep. Mark Souder, the author of the law, was planning to offer an amendment on the House floor to strip out the language and keep his law the way it is now. Souder withdrew the amendment before it came to a vote. Check back at Drug War Chronicle for further info tonight or tomorrow.

It's not a done deal until it passes the Senate, until it survives the conference committee, and then until the larger bill it is part of passes both chambers of Congress in its final form. But things are looking good. We including me personally have been working on this for 11 years, and this is a big day for us. Thank you to everyone who took action, this week or before, to help make this possible.

Update: We won.

Dear friend:

Our nemesis in Congress, arch-drug warrior Mark Souder, is at it again. Earlier this year, the House Education & Labor Committee passed a student aid bill including language to scale back his infamous financial aid/drug conviction law. The new version of the law would only count sales convictions -- a great step forward, though we still want full repeal. More than 200,000 students already have lost aid for college because of drug convictions.

Tomorrow, we're told, Rep. Souder will offer an amendment on the floor of the House of Representatives, seeking to have this good language stripped from the final version of the bill. PLEASE CALL YOUR REPRESENTATIVE AND ASK THAT HE OR SHE VOTE NO ON SOUDER'S AMENDMENT TO THE STUDENT AID BILL. Students should not lose access to college because of drug possession convictions! The bill is called SAFRA, the Student Aid and Fiscal Responsibility Act, H.R. 3221.

To reach your Representative (or find out who your Rep is), call the Congressional Switchboard at (202) 224-3121. When the receptionist in your representative's office answers the phone, politely say something like the following:

"My name is _____ and I'd like Rep. ___ to vote against Rep. Souder's amendment to the Student Aid and Fiscal Responsibility Act, which would deny educational opportunities to students with minor drug possession convictions. Blocking access to education causes more drug problems and hurts the economy. Thank you."

When you're done, please forward this alert to all your friends, and please post it to sites like Facebook and Twitter too. A copy of this alert can be found at http://stopthedrugwar.org/alerts/college_aid.

Also, please send us a note letting us know that you've taken action and if the staffer you spoke with told you anything that sounds important. Visit http://www.raiseyourvoice.com for further information on this issue and the hundreds of organizations that support repeal.

Thank you for taking action! Please consider making a donation to support these efforts.

Sincerely,

David Borden, Executive Director
StoptheDrugWar.org
Washington, DC
http://stopthedrugwar.org

P.S. Find StoptheDrugWar.org on Facebook here and here, and on Twitter here.

You Can Make a Difference

Dear friends,

Ask your representative to support making medical marijuana legal. 

Email your representative

Congress has heard the evidence about the medicinal benefits of marijuana, but legislators still haven’t changed federal law to reflect scientific fact. Tell them to end the federal medical marijuana ban now!

While Congress ignores the science, patients like Eugene Davidovich, who operates a medical marijuana collective in San Diego, are criminalized. He complies with state law and the California attorney general's medical marijuana guidelines, but the San Diego district attorney is threatening to throw him in prison anyway.

Bolstered by the federal ban on medical marijuana, the San Diego DA is systematically harassing patients, and Eugene now faces four felony charges. This is outrageous! Will you join me in asking Congress to end the federal medical marijuana ban?

Congressman Barney Frank (D-MA), chairman of the powerful House Financial Services Committee, has introduced legislation to make marijuana legal for medical use, but opponents are organizing to defeat it.

Our message to Congress is simple: Federal law enforcement should stop harassing and arresting people for medical marijuana.  It’s cruel.  It’s capricious.  And it’s a waste of precious taxpayer dollars.  Enough is enough!

Just like you and me, lawmakers know the truth about medical marijuana.  Only you can hold your member of Congress accountable.  Tell your representative to face the facts.

Sincerely,

Bill Piper
Director, Office of National Affairs
Drug Policy Alliance Network

House and Senate appropriators have agreed to ax only 11 of 48 non-military discretionary spending programs targeted for elimination by the Obama administration, but funding for the Safe and Drug-F

A congressional study released Tuesday reveals that US military forces occupying Afghanistan have placed 50 drug traffickers on a "capture or kill" list.

The House Judiciary Subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism, and Homeland Security Wednesday approved a bill designed to end the disparity in sentencing for federal crack and powder cocaine offenses.

Last week we reported that the crime subcommittee of the House Judiciary Committee had unanimously passed H.R. 3245, a bill to reduce federal crack cocaine penalties to the same level as those for offenses involving powder cocaine.

The full Judiciary Committee approved the bill today, we just heard, by a vote of 16-9. I'll post back with a link to the roll call when it becomes available on Thomas, or follow the link to the bill above to check in the meanwhile. Reports indicate it is expected to be taken up on the floor of the House of Representatives, and that a bipartisan Senate bill is expected out soon too. So this is big news.

Not the only big news -- read more in our current top Chronicle feature, "Winds of Change Are Blowing in Washington -- Drug Reforms Finally Move in Congress."

As I noted here two weeks ago, legislation to repeal the ban on use of federal AIDS funds for needle exchange programs was included in a House subcommittee's health budget bill. The language survived an attempt on the House floor to repeal it, and so has made it through the full House of Representatives.

Satisfyingly, the Congressman who tried to delete the language was Mark Souder, who also lost a committee vote on Tuesday to significantly gut his anti-student aid drug law. Souder's pro-AIDS amendment lost 211-218.

The flip side is that 49% percent of Congress voted to continue spreading HIV and Hepatitis throughout our communities.