Vice President Kamala Harris says the administration’s move to pardon people for federal marijuana possession offenses is an example of how it is delivering for Americans, particularly young and Black voters who could be key to President Joe Biden’s reelection bid this year.
The White House also cited the cannabis clemency move in a new fact sheet on efforts to “advance racial justice and equity and ensure the promise of America for all communities.”
Speaking with Gray DC in South Carolina ahead of the state’s primary election last weekend, Harris was asked about the significance of the Black youth vote for the Biden-Harris campaign. She stressed the importance of reaching that demographic and said cannabis clemency is one action that should be uniquely appealing.
“Another issue [is] what we have done to pardon tens of thousands of people for simple marijuana possession under the federal law—because, frankly, nobody should have to go to jail for smoking weed,” Harris said.
“So these are some of the things that we have done that I think really do resonate with young people, with Black voters and young Black voters, with young Black men,” she said, also citing efforts to increase access to high-speed internet and fund historically Black colleges and universities. “And there’s more to do.”
While Harris said “tens of thousands” have been pardoned under President Joe Biden’s October 2022 and December 2023 clemency proclamations, the Justice Department estimates that roughly 13,000 people have been granted relief under the executive action.
But inflated rhetoric around the pardons has been a consistent theme, with Biden himself frequently exaggerating the impact by falsely suggesting that people were released from prison over marijuana and that criminal records were expunged. A pardon simply constitutes formal forgiveness, and nobody who received a pardon was actively incarcerated in federal prison over simple possession.
As advocates have also pointed out, there are still people in federal prison over other non-violent marijuana offenses. They’ve pushed the Biden administration to do more, including keeping his key cannabis campaign pledge to decriminalize marijuana.
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