Lawmakers are releasing a report on MORE acts ahead of the floor discussion in the House

The legislature released a report featuring majority and minority leaders of the House Judiciary Committee, who presented their arguments for and against bill HR 3617, the Marijuana Opportunity, Reinvestment, and Expungement (MORE) Act, which is being drafted by the panel’s Chair, Rep. Jerrold Nadler , is sponsored (D), reports Marijuana Moment.

Members of the House Judiciary Committee introduced the Nadler-sponsored bill in September 2021.

The Marijuana Justice Coalition (MJC), a broad alliance of national advocacy groups convened by the Drug Policy Alliance, including the American Civil Liberties Union and Human Rights Watch, sent a letter to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D) and House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D) called for a vote on the MORE bill.

The MORE Act reverses the longstanding federal ban on marijuana by removing it from the Controlled Substances Act — ending the state-federal conflict over cannabis policy and giving state governments more powers to regulate marijuana-related activities, including of retail sales.

The bill creates an Opportunity Trust Fund to support a Community Reinvestment Grant Program under the Department of Justice, substance abuse treatment programs and the Small Business Administration (SBA) that would allow grants for states and localities that use marijuana overturn convictions.

A “Minority Views” section of the report by Judiciary Committee member Jim Jordan (R) criticized the bill as “a huge government subsidy and stimulus to the marijuana industry” that would “open the floodgates for marijuana cultivation and distribution.” , and selling within the United States allows transnational criminal organizations to further exploit America’s addiction crisis.”

A House Rules Committee meeting is expected on Wednesday to decide whether to amend the bill.

“The communities most harmed by cannabis prohibition benefit the least from the legal marijuana market,” the report states. “A legacy of racial and ethnic injustice, compounded by the disproportionate side effects of 80 years of cannabis prohibition enforcement, is now limiting participation in the industry. Less than a fifth of cannabis business owners identify themselves as minorities and only about 4 percent are black.”

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The report finds that “enforcement of cannabis prohibition laws costs taxpayers approximately $3.6 billion a year” and impacts black people “who are nearly four times more likely to be arrested for cannabis possession than their white counterparts, despite similar rates of use in all population groups. ”

The report highlights that people of color have historically been targeted through discriminatory sentencing practices, “resulting in black men receiving drug sentences that were 13.1 percent longer than sentences given to white men.”

This article originally appeared on Benzinga and has been republished with permission.