When it announced its support for lawmakers’ efforts to decriminalize weed last month, Amazon didn’t just become the biggest company in America to back marijuana legalization, it captivated the cannabis industry in the process.
Now, as bills pushing legalization remain stuck in Congress, activists fighting for liberalized cannabis laws are hoping the e-commerce giant will take the next step and use its considerable D.C. muscle to help get them passed.
Lobbyists for legalization are pinning their hopes on Amazon using its experienced lobbying team and deep pockets to support their efforts, believing it could help them launch ad campaigns and persuade lawmakers opposed to legalization — especially those who represent states where cannabis is legal — to change their minds. Cannabis lobbyists and advocates who have spoken with Amazon made it clear that the company is already engaging in cannabis discussions in Washington, D.C. Whether Amazon actively lobbies or invests monetarily in legislation is the question on everyone’s minds.
“I'm quite disappointed that we've really seen no movement whatsoever at the federal level,” said Matthew Schweich, deputy director of the Marijuana Policy Project. “I think that if Amazon were able to lend its political support to federal reform and fund state level efforts, that would be a net positive for the cannabis reform movement in this country.”
One third of Americans currently live in a state where cannabis is or will soon be legally sold for adult use, and 68 percent of voters support federal legalization, according to a Gallup poll conducted last year. But corporate America and Congress have been much slower in coming around to the issue. Many companies and the federal government still drug test employees, even in states where cannabis is legal, and a federal decriminalization bill that passed the House last year stalled in the Senate.
Amazon has one of the more relaxed stances on cannabis among major U.S. employers. It supports legalization and made the decision to stop drug testing employees for cannabis, which will expand the company’s prospective employee pool. Though its online delivery infrastructure is unmatched, advocates say the company has given no indication that it plans to get into the weed business itself if cannabis is legalized nationwide.
Amazon said last month that its “public policy team will be actively supporting The Marijuana Opportunity Reinvestment and Expungement Act,” otherwise known as the MORE Act, which would decriminalize cannabis and provide for expungement of some non-violent cannabis offenses, had been a long time coming. The company had preliminary conversations about whether to get involved in the national conversation on CBD — a substance contained in the cannabis plant that was federally legalized in 2018 — and marijuana last year, according to a person with direct knowledge of the matter, but there were internal disagreements about whether the company should do so and what the optics would be.
Most told POLITICO that the money and influence Amazon could bring to the issue could be a big help to a still-underfunded lobbying effort. But there is also some trepidation that Amazon’s involvement indicates it actually plans to enter the industry in some way, and that it could influence federal legislation to be friendlier for big corporations.
https://www.politico.com/news/2021/07/2 ... eed-500263
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