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http://www.latimes.com/politics/la-na-pol-trump-marijuana-20180608-story.html
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President Trump said he likely will support a congressional effort to end the federal ban on marijuana, a major step that would reshape the pot industry and end the threat of a Justice Department crackdown.
Trump's remarks put him sharply at odds with Atty. Gen. Jeff Sessions on the issue. The bill in question, pushed by a bipartisan coalition, would allow states to go forward with legalization unencumbered by threats of federal prosecution. Sessions, by contrast, has ramped up those threats and has also lobbied Congress to reduce current protections for medical marijuana.
Trump made his comments to a gaggle of reporters Friday morning just before he boarded a helicopter on his way to the G-7 summit in Canada. His remarks came the day after the bipartisan group of lawmakers proposed their measure.
One of the lead sponsors is Sen. Cory Gardner (R-Colo.), who is aligned with Trump on several issues but recently has tangled with the administration over the Justice Department's threats to restart prosecutions in states that have legalized marijuana.
Trump said he is likely to support the federal legalization effort despite a warning against it from a coalition of narcotics officer groups.
"We urge you to see through the smoke screen and reject attempts to encourage more drug use in America," they wrote in a letter to Trump Thursday.
The marijuana industry continues to be whipsawed by mixed messages from the administration.
In January, the Justice Department sent pot businesses into a panic by rescinding an Obama-era policy that restricted prosecutors from targeting sellers who operate legally under state laws. Sessions warned at the time that any pot business could find itself in the crosshairs of prosecutors — regardless of whether marijuana was legal in their state.
The move enraged Gardner, who said the administration had earlier given him assurances that there would be no such raids, at least in his state. At Gardner's behest, Trump in April ordered an abrupt retreat from the announced crackdown. Trump made the order without even consulting Sessions, a sign of their tense relationship.
But prosecutors did back off. During this administration, there have apparently been no federal raids or seizures of pot companies for sales that are legal under state law.
"Remarkably little, if anything, has changed," said John Vardaman, a former Justice Department attorney who helped draft the Obama-era rules, known as the Cole memo, after former Deputy Atty. Gen. James M. Cole, who issued it. "Almost every U.S. attorney in states where marijuana is legal has decided to apply the same principles as the Cole memo," said Vardaman, now an executive at Hypur, which sells banking compliance software to marijuana companies.
mod edit: changed the content of the OP to be more accurate and in line with the reporting in the article
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