Bolts Magazine provides a guide to drug referendums in the 2022 midterms
by Alex Burness, Bolts
It’s only been ten years since voters in Colorado and Washington State legalized recreational marijuana. Those were national milestones at the time, but others quickly followed; recreational marijuana is now legal in seventeen more states, and the November midterms could expand that map further, potentially bringing legal marijuana deeper into conservative areas.

Five states are voting on legalizing recreational marijuana, and most are staunchly Republican. The issue has long drawn support across the political spectrum, and these elections will again test the sense of a growing national consensus against marijuana prohibition.
Even President Biden, who was a dedicated soldier in America’s war on drugs while a senator, is coming around. Last week he ordered a federal review of marijuana’s classification as a “Schedule 1” substance, defined as having h “no currently accepted medical use and a high potential for abuse,” and he pardoned an estimated 6,500 people with federal convictions for marijuana possession, plus thousands more convicted in the District of Columbia.
The national debate over the war on drugs is also shifting past marijuana. Colorado, which helped launch the wave of weed legalization a decade ago, is now considering emulating a measure adopted by Oregon in 2020 and legalizing psychedelics.
Recent Posts
Report Details Private Equity’s Stranglehold On US Healthcare
March 27, 2023
Take Action Now “The damage that private equity has wrought on Americans’ healthcare from cradle to grave, simply for profit, has become…
20 Years Later: Confessions Of A Conscientious Quitter
March 27, 2023
Take Action Now Like so many Americans, I was a victim of sadistic marketing that pushed me to believe that becoming a Marine was the best and most…
Here’s What To Know About The United Nations’ IPCC Reports
March 27, 2023
Take Action Now The IPCC might be the most used acronym in climate science. The scientists behind the influential IPCC report discuss what it is and…
We Don’t Have To Choose Between Nuclear Madmen
March 27, 2023
Take Action Now The madness has remained resolutely bipartisan. Joe Biden quickly dashed hopes that he would be a more enlightened president about…