Ron DeSantis re-ups warnings about legal weed in schools, restaurants
Gov. Ron DeSantis is continuing to make the case that legalized recreational marijuana would do what Florida’s medical market has not, and create a pungent wave of olfactory assaults in all public spaces.
“If you read that actual text of the Constitution that will go in it says there can be no penalty, criminal, civil or otherwise for smoking or possessing up to three ounces of pot, which is about 40 to 50 joints. Some law enforcement say more,” DeSantis said of the Adult Personal Use of Marijuana citizen initiative on November’s ballot.
Though the Legislature would be permitted to enact laws consistent with the amendment, including permitting recreational-use dispensaries to compete with the medical companies in the Florida market, DeSantis asserts that process wouldn’t offer usage restrictions.
“So that means, like, you have it in the schools, they can’t punish you,” DeSantis said. “I think it means you bring it into restaurants and use (it), and they’re not going to be able to do anything. The indoor smoking law in Florida does not apply to this. There’s no limitations in the amendment language.”
From there, DeSantis put on his constitutional lawyer hat.
He argued that “this amendment for you to be able to possess and smoke pot” is “more broad” than “the First Amendment is, than the Second Amendment is, than like core amendments that grew out of the founding of this country.”
DeSantis, who spent roughly $150 million on his failed presidential campaign this year shortly after winning re-election to his second term, ripped into the “bogus” ballot initiative process as one driven by political chicanery.
“This is why these ballot initiatives are so bogus. What you will see as a voter is not what actually gets put into the constitution. Who would vote on something that they don’t even get a chance to read? It makes no sense that you would do that.”
DeSantis said that initiative drives “draft their own summary and they try to make it as pleasant as possible.”
“They focus group the language, they poll test it, they do all this stuff to try to get voters to say it sounds good. ‘Whatever, I’ll vote yes on it.'”
As he has before, he also chided the Florida Supreme Court for a faulty review process, saying the two dissenters from the majority position were “correct” in looking to snuff out the pot push.
Florida’s Governor made the comments Tuesday at Umatilla’s Caldwell Park Community Building.
They are far from his first comments warning about the potentially pernicious impact of pot smoke on Florida’s culture.
“I think you’re going to see people, you will be able to bring 20 joints to an elementary school. Is that really going to be good for the state of Florida? I don’t think so,” DeSantis said in Tampa June 12.
During his remarks in Umatilla, DeSantis was asked about his new Freedom Fund political committee, which is designed to stop this initiative, a push to remove state government restrictions on abortion, and other issues the Governor wants to engage in.
He was coy in his remarks, noting that unnamed “stakeholders” were interested in defeating the weed push, which requires more than 60% of the push to succeed. He previously has suggested that the hemp industry, which was targeted by legislators for selling Delta 8 and other intoxicating compounds, would be on board with his anti-weed push.
At least through June 14, stakeholders from the hemp sector and other business verticals had not ponied up; the Freedom Fund account had just $10,000 in it, a fraction of the $13.2 million cash on hand in the Smart and Safe Florida political committee.
A.G. Gancarski has written for FloridaPolitics.com since 2014. He is based in Northeast Florida. He can be reached at AG@FloridaPolitics.com or on Twitter: @AGGancarski