Marijuana prohibition advocates are giddy at the news Friday that President-elect Donald Trump will
nominate Sen. Jeff Sessions to be his administration’s first attorney general.
The Alabama Republican is one of the nation’s most consistent and quotable foes of pot legalization, and at the helm of the Justice Department he could aggressively enforce federal laws that criminalize possession of pot for any reason outside limited research.
Sessions has condemned President Barack Obama for saying marijuana is less dangerous than alcohol and for taking a hands-off approach that allowed states to regulate recreational pot markets following passage of 2012 ballot initiatives.
At an April hearing, Sessions predicted support for state-level legalization would “ripple throughout the entire American citizenry” and said: “We need grown-ups in charge in Washington to say marijuana is not the kind of thing that ought to be legalized, it ought not to be minimized, that it is in fact a very real danger.”
At the hearing he praised the “Just Say No” anti-drug campaign of former first lady Nancy Reagan and
expressed concern about the undoing of years of effort “trying to send that message with clarity that good people don’t smoke marijuana.”
As attorney general, Sessions could withdraw a 2013 policy document called the Cole Memo that gave states a green light to unfurl retail pot businesses. Or he could intensely scrutinize compliance with priorities the memo said could trigger federal intervention,
including interstate smuggling, increases in drugged driving or health consequences.
