United States: Barack Obama's administration wanted to decriminalize cannabis

Barack Obama has was the 44th President of the United States, in office from November 2008 to the end of 2016.

Under his authority American states have been able to legislate on cannabis as they saw fit. A belated confession, but it would seem that he wanted to go further. During his two terms in office, the civil servants of the National Drug Control Policy (ONDCP) were ready to decriminalize cannabis across the country. For a number of political reasons, this project never came to fruition.

Thomas McLellan, a former deputy director who worked in the White House office during the former US president's first term, explains in the Huffington Post that «the government was in favor of decriminalization but not legalization».

Focus on opioids in the United States

L’Barack Obama's administration finally focused on the issue of opioids in the country. Priority was given to the care of people addicted to illicit substances such as opiates, away from the judicial system.

The 1988 anti-drug law created the ONDCP, tasked with preventing the legalization of illicit substances, so that there would be no respite in the War on Drugs. For the ONDCP, »drug legalization is an uncontrollable capitalization in the War on Drugs». Supporters of cannabis legalization have often questioned the credibility of ONDCP officials on possible reform of the law, and Barack Obama's administration has not budged.

Today, with the Republican President Donald Trump's administration, a legislative evolution on cannabis is unlikely, in particular because of the Attorney General Jeff Sessions, a prohibitionist committed to cannabis legalization who demands mandatory minimum sentences.

According to’American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), an organization defending individual rights and liberties under the U.S. Constitution, millions of cannabis-related petty crimes could have been avoided if the possession of weed was not considered an illegal act.

Mehdi Bautier