Jeff Sessions

Jefferson Beauregard Sessions III was born on December 24, 1946 in Selma, Alabama. A Republican lawyer and politician, he was U.S. Attorney General from February 2017 to November 2018 under the
Donald Trump's presidency. His name remains associated in cannabis culture with a visceral and assumed hostility to cannabis in all its forms.

A political career in the conservative South

Jeff Sessions began his career as a federal prosecutor in Alabama in the 1980s, before being elected Republican Senator for the state in 1996 - a position he held for twenty years. In the Senate, he
stands out for his ultraconservative positions on immigration, crime and drugs, systematically opposing any reform of American cannabis policy.

Sessions' war on cannabis

Appointed Attorney General by Donald Trump in January 2017, Jeff Sessions immediately put an end to the policy of tolerance put in place by the Obama administration towards states that had legalized cannabis. In January 2018, he revoked the Cole Memorandum - a federal directive that guaranteed legalized states non-intervention by the federal government - theoretically paving the way for federal prosecutions in states where cannabis is legal.

The decision sent shockwaves through the legal cannabis industry and caused a bipartisan political uproar - including among Republican elected officials in states that have legalized cannabis. In practice, the revocation of the Cole Memorandum does not result in a wave of federal lawsuits, but it does create lasting legal uncertainty that hampers investment in the sector.

Sessions is known for his cartoonish statements on cannabis. He is quoted as saying that the Ku Klux Klan seemed acceptable to him until he learned that some members smoked marijuana - a quote whose authenticity is debated but which sums up his public image in the cannabis community.

A symbol of resistance to legalization

For the global cannabis community, Jeff Sessions embodies the figure of the pure ideological opponent - someone whose hostility to cannabis is not based on scientific or public health arguments, but on a conservative moral worldview. His time as head of the US Justice Department has paradoxically galvanized the pro-legalization movement by giving it a concrete, high-profile enemy.

He resigned in November 2018 at Donald Trump's request, for reasons unrelated to cannabis - his decision to recuse himself from the investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election having deeply angered the president.