The governor of Maryland says the mass pardon he issued for prior marijuana convictions was about more than addressing the public policy consequences of criminalization. As someone who was exposed to the criminal legal system at an early age, and having been a medical cannabis patient himself, he said there’s an important personal psychological impact of attaining that relief.
Gov. Wes Moore (D) spoke with Vlad TV about his personal experience with cannabis and the criminal justice system in an interview that was released on Sunday. He stressed that part of what motivated him to grant historic relief to people who’ve been criminalized over marijuana was to ameliorate not only the “practical” consequences of a conviction but also the “emotional” repercussions.
Moore, who issued over 175,000 pardons for cannabis and paraphernalia convictions in June, said the move was “important because I want people to be able to better enter into an economy” and also because he “did not understand how we continue to punish people for something that’s no longer illegal in my state.”
“I did it because you cannot talk about the benefits of legalization if you don’t deal with the consequences of criminalization,” the governor said, adding that
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