When the U.S. House debated legislation to change federal law to legalize marijuana, Rep. Cliff Bentz, who represents Central, Eastern and parts of Southern Oregon, led the Republican debate.

The House voted on Friday to approve the bill, which would fix the split between federal law and 19 states where recreational marijuana is legal including Oregon. However, the future of the legislation in the Senate is unclear.

Bentz said police in Southern Oregon have been overwhelmed by cartels that continued marijuana operations even after the state legalized it.

Law enforcement officials say marijuana grown in Oregon is being shipped to East Coast markets, where marijuana largely remains illegal under state laws.

The bill sets up penalties for failing to properly register a marijuana business but does not include any money to enforce that provision, he said.

The taxes on growers in the bill would also mean the price of legal marijuana would be about 30% higher than black-market products, leaving illegal growers with a still-lucrative market, Bentz said.

He warned that cartels would expand their reach across the U.S.

While Bentz said it has long been apparent legalization would come eventually, the current effort was “the wrong approach.”

Fellow Oregon congressman, Rep. Earl Blumenauer, a Democrat who represents Portland and parts of Multnomah and Clackamas counties, said he agreed with Bentz about the problems associated with illegal marijuana production in the state, which include mistreatment of immigrant laborers on illegal growing operations and black market marijuana.

But Blumenauer, a longtime legalization advocate, disagreed about the remedy.

Federally legalizing the drug and regulating the industry would help solve the problems Bentz raised, Blumenauer said.

“The problem of the cartels, the illegal activity, the black market, is a result of the fact that the federal government does not have its act together,” he said. “People across the country have acted to take it into their own hands. And as a result, we have a piecemeal approach.”

Federally legalizing the drug and regulating the industry would help solve the problems Bentz raised, Blumenauer said.

“The problem of the cartels, the illegal activity, the black market, is a result of the fact that the federal government does not have its act together,” he said. “People across the country have acted to take it into their own hands. And as a result, we have a piecemeal approach.”

In the 220-204 vote to legalize pot under federal law, three Republicans joined all but two Democrats in approving the measure.

Reps. Matt Gaetz and Brian Mast of Florida and Tom McClintock of California were the Republicans who voted yes. Reps. Chris Pappas of New Hampshire and Henry Cuellar of Texas were the Democrats who opposed the bill.

U.S. Reps. Ted Budd, R-N.C., Mike Johnson, R-La., Liz Cheney, R-Wyo., Lee Zeldin, R-N.Y., and Cheri Bustos, D-Ill., did not vote.

The House bill would remove marijuana from the controlled substances list, expunge convictions for federal marijuana crimes and add a 5% federal sales tax that would fund programs meant to improve communities harmed by marijuana prohibition.

The Senate, where Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-New York, is a major supporter of legalization, did not take up a previous version of the bill that the House passed in 2020.

Schumer, along with Senate Democrats Cory Booker of New Jersey and Ron Wyden of Oregon, sent a letter to the rest of the Senate in February asking for help writing a legalization bill in that chamber.

In a tweet after the House vote Friday, Wyden said that, “it’s past time for Congress to listen to the will of the voters.”

Racial justice

Democratic backers in the House emphasized the bill’s racial justice components. People of color are more likely to be arrested and convicted for marijuana crimes, even though they use the drug at similar rates as white people.

“Despite changes in state laws and social norms, as I have said, its use remains illegal under federal law, often resulting in devastating consequences … for Black, Latino and Native communities,” House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer of Maryland said on the House floor Friday.

The bill would raise potentially hundreds of millions in new tax dollars annually and use them to fund local grant programs for job-training, literacy, youth recreation and more. It would also provide loans for small businesses for legitimate marijuana enterprises.

“We have a long journey ahead to achieve social justice and criminal justice reform,” U.S. Rep. Troy Carter, a Louisiana Democrat, said. “The war on marijuana is a costly relic of the past.”

GOP opposition

Republicans raised a litany of objections to the bill. Congress should focus on inflation, illegal immigration, crime and the war in Ukraine, rather than legalizing marijuana, several GOP members said.

“Record gas prices, record number of illegal immigrants crossing our Southern border, and what are Democrats doing today?” Ohio Republican Jim Jordan said. “Legalizing drugs and using American tax dollars to kick-start and prop up the marijuana industry. Wow, what a deal for the American people.”

The problem of the cartels, the illegal activity, the black market, is a result of the fact that the federal government does not have its act together.