“As will be shown on Nov. 2, Californians are not going to let politicians in Washington, DC tell them how to vote,” reads a statement from Joseph McNamara, a retired San Jose chief of police.
McNamara’s statement, released by “Yes on 19,” comes hot on the heels of a leaked Justice Department memo in which Attorney General Eric Holder suggests that the DOJ and the Drug Enforcement Agency will single-handedly police marijuana use in the state of California if Proposition 19 passes in November.
“We will vigorously enforce the CSA against those individuals and organizations that possess, manufacture or distribute marijuana for recreational use, even if such activities are permitted under state law,” Holder wrote in the memo to several former DEA heads.
“Passing Proposition 19 in California will undoubtedly kick start a national conversation about changing our country’s obviously failed marijuana prohibition policies,” McNamara’s statement says. “If the federal government wants to keep fighting the nation’s failed ‘war on marijuana’ while were in the midst of a sagging economic recovery and two wars it just proves that the establishment politicians’ priorities are wrongly focused on maintaining the status quo.”
McNamara also criticizes Washington for contributing to California’s economic woes by interrupting its economy and flooding its prisons with convicted marijuana users.
On Thursday, “Yes on 19” released a petition signed by top law professors from across the country, endorsing the law and praising its legal clarity. As late as Tuesday, the DOJ was denying that it had a plan in place to respond to the possible passage of Prop. 19.