Author: Johnny Green

In late 2018 Mexico’s Supreme Court issued a ruling striking down cannabis prohibition. Mexico’s highest court (no pun intended) deemed Mexico’s cannabis prohibition policy to be unconstitutional.

Initially, Mexico’s Supreme Court gave lawmakers a one-year deadline to pass legislation to implement the Court’s decision. Unfortunately, that initial deadline was not met and lawmakers requested an extension, which the Court granted.

The second deadline could not be met due to the start of the coronavirus pandemic, and another extension was granted, this time with a deadline of the end of 2020.

With the pandemic failing to subside, yet another extension was granted, this time for April 2021. Unlike previous pushes for a legalization measure by lawmakers in Mexico, it appears that the third time could be the charm. Below is more information about it via a news release sent to us from our friends at NORML:

Lawmakers in Mexico’s lower chamber voted 316 to 129 on Wednesday in favor of amended legislation to legalize and license the adult-use marijuana market. Because House lawmakers made changes to the language of the bill, it must now go back to the Senate for reconsideration.

“We applaud lawmakers in Mexico for advancing a more just and sensible marijuana policy in their country,” commented NORML Executive Director Erik Altieri, “By legalizing the possession and personal cultivation of marijuana by adults, and regulating its commercial sale, our neighbors to the south are implementing marijuana laws that represent common sense, sound public policy, and popular opinion. Our own elected officials should learn from their Mexican counterparts, in addition to those governing our northern neighbor Canada, and finally end our failed federal prohibition of marijuana.”

Under the proposal, those ages 18 and older would be permitted to legally possess personal use quantities of cannabis (up to 28 grams). Home cultivation of up to six plants is also permitted. Corporate production and retail sales will be allowed under a commercial licensing scheme.

Medical cannabis production and distribution, which is already permitted on a limited basis, will continue to be regulated separately by Mexico’s health ministry.

In 2018, justices on Mexico’s Supreme Court struck down Mexico’s marijuana criminalization laws and ordered lawmakers to enact legislation regulating the plant’s production, sale, and use.

If approved, Mexico will join Canada and Uruguay as the only other countries to have formally adopted marijuana legalization nationwide.

The war on cannabis has always been a war on people. The harms of cannabis prohibition have caused havoc and suffering all over the globe, including in North America.

For many decades cannabis was completely prohibited in Canada, the United States, and Mexico. Cannabis is still prohibited at the federal level in the United States, and in Mexico it’s still prohibited for adult use, however, cannabis is legal nationwide in Canada now.

At the local level cannabis is legal for adult use in a growing list of states in the US despite federal prohibition. Virginia recently announced that it will legalize cannabis for adult use in the coming years, making it the 16th state to do so. Washington D.C. has also legalized cannabis for adult use.

All of that legalization is coupled with medical cannabis reform. Medical cannabis is now legal almost everywhere in North America in one form or another, from limited CBD laws all the way up to robust medical cannabis programs.

Reform victories have led to the creation of numerous legal cannabis markets throughout the North American continent, including in the United States where the demand for cannabis is tremendous.

One of the biggest selling points for cannabis legalization is that it transfers cannabis sales from an unregulated system that has a large organized crime and cartel presence to a regulated system that provides for the sale of tested, regulated, and taxed products, with taxes benefitting all of society.

There’s new data out regarding seizures of cannabis at the US/Mexico border, which is insightful given how much unregulated cannabis has been smuggled from Mexico into the US over the course of many decades.

As expected, border seizures have diminished with more consumers opting to shop within a regulated system, which is detailed in a news release below via our friends at NORML:

Marijuana seizures along the southern border have fallen over 80 percent since 2013, according to data published this week by the US Drug Enforcement Administration.

In the agency’s 2020 National Drug Threat Assessment publication, author’s write: “In US markets, Mexican marijuana has largely been supplanted by domestic-produced marijuana. In 2019, CBP [US Customs and Border Protection] seized nearly 249,000 kilograms of marijuana along the SWB [southwest border], a decline from over 287,000 kilograms in 2018. CBP marijuana seizures along the SWB have decreased more than 81 percent since 2013, when almost 1.3 million kilograms were seized.”

Marijuana seizures at the southern border reached an all-time high in 2009, when nearly four million pounds of cannabis were confiscated by federal agents.

Colorado and Washington became the first two states to legalize the commercial production of marijuana for adults in 2012. Thirteen additional US states have since passed similar laws.

Commenting on the sharp decrease in US demand for Mexican-produced cannabis, NORML’s Political Director Justin Strekal said: “This dramatic shift in the cannabis supply chain is a welcome development. As reformers predicted, when given the option, consumers choose their cannabis to be grown in America. States’ decisions to legally regulate cannabis has, as expected, led to a precipitous drop in demand for imported cannabis and has significantly disrupted the illicit cannabis trade in Mexico. These are important developments to emphasize as additional states continue to discuss replacing cannabis criminalization policies with those that seek to legalize and regulate the marijuana marketplace.”

The full text of the DEA’s 2020 National Drug Threat Assessment is available for download.