Booker blasts GOP rider to block DC pot law

Sen. Cory Booker (D-N.J.) listed several complaints he has with the government funding deal, including repealing D.C.’s decision to legalize marijuana. 

“When Washington, D.C., grapples with the devastating drug war … the people of the city come together and try a different way forward, should we not respect their results?” Booker said on the Senate floor Thursday. “This is undermining the democratic will of the District of Columbia and should be taken out.”

{mosads}House Republicans added several small priorities to the $1.1 trillion “cromnibus,” which would keep the government funded past midnight. House leaders expected to pass the measure Thursday to avert a government shutdown, but have delayed the vote because of a lack of support.

Some Republicans don’t support the measure because they say it doesn’t go far enough to stop President Obama’s executive order on immigration. Democrats have blasted GOP riders to repeal parts of the Dodd-Frank financial reform law, to increase campaign contribution limits and to stop D.C. from implementing a law to legalize marijuana.

Booker said none of these measures should be in the “must-pass bill” because they deserve an open and fair debate.

“This is no way to run the globe’s greatest democracy,” Booker said.

In November, D.C. voters overwhelmingly approved a ballot measure to legalize small amounts of marijuana — as did voters in Oregon and Alaska. Booker said D.C. should be treated the same as other states that have legalized adult consumption of pot.

Washington and Colorado were the first states to pass such measures.