Ever the criminal justice reform populist, former Prez Trump signals support for marijuana legalization in Florida and elsewhere

When he was president, Donald Trump played a critical role in advancing, and then signed into law, the most significant federal criminal justice reform in a generation, the First Step Act.  Trump has also often talked up expanding the federal death penalty and he presided over 13 federal executions during the last six months of his presidency.  Based on polling and other indicators, I view these aspects of Trump's criminal justice record as reflecting his populist inclinations.

In that spirit, I was not too surprise yesterday when Trump authored this Truth Social post to signal his support for Florida's Amendment 3, which would legalize adult use of marijuana in the Sunshine State.  National polls in recent years have generally shown about 2/3 of Americans support marijuana legalization, and various polls in Florida have shown nearly 60% of support for Amendment 3.  (Notably, ballot initiatives in Florida require 60% of the vote for an amendment's approval.)  Because marijuana legalization has lately proven quite popular with ordinary citizens, Trump's post and position seems to reflect his populist instinct.

In addition, in reviewing Trumo's post, I was struck by how certain language he used and points he made echo long-standing criminal justice reform advocacy.  Here are excerpts with some key terms emphasized:

We will take our streets back by being tough & smart on violent, & all other types, of Crime....

At the same time, someone should not be a criminal in Florida, when this is legal in so many other States.  We do not need to ruin lives & waste Taxpayer Dollars arresting adults with personal amounts of it on them, and no one should grieve a loved one because they died from fentanyl laced marijuana.

Notably, a wide array of criminal justice reformers and advocacy groups have long talked up the importance of being "smart" on crime.  The "Smart on Crime" label has often been embraced by coalitions of reform-minded groups at the state level, such as in Kentucky and Louisiana and Texas.  Even more notably, in 2013, then-US Attorney General Eric Holder launched a major reform effort labeled the "Smart on Crime" initiative.  And that "smart" branding may well have been drawn from the title of Kamala Harris's 2009 book "Smart on Crime: A Career Prosecutor's Plan to Make Us Safer."

Meanwhile, expressing concern about overcriminalization and also geographic unfairness in criminalization echoes justice reformers' oft-stated concerns (though racial inequities in criminalization are typically given more attention than geographic inequities).  And the suggestion that arrests of adults for mere marijuana possession can "ruin lives" has been a key theme in marijuana reform advocacy found in reports from the ACLU ("the price paid by those arrested and convicted of marijuana possession can be significant and linger for years, if not a lifetime") and editorials in the New York Times ("marijuana convictions — including those resulting from guilty pleas — can have lifelong consequences for employment, education, immigration status and family life").

Interesting times.