Sen. Elizabeth Warren says she’s open to legalizing marijuana — a question that all Masschusetts voters might have the opportunity to decide for themselves on the 2016 ballot.
At the opening of a new health center and supermarket in Brockton, Warren said she’s changed her mind after several states legalized medical or recreational marijuana.
“For such a long time now we’ve just taken the position, 'No, no, no, it’s bad,' and don’t even look to see whether or not there are medical uses of marijuana that maybe quite valuable,” Warren said. “Now that we have states that have legalized marijuana, I think we ought to be collecting data.”
Warren says she wants the federal government’s National Institute of health to do more to fund research on the medical applications of the drugs.
Massachusetts Attorney General Maura Healey <A href=“http://wgbhnews.org/post/healey-gives-stamp-approval-million-dollar-tax-marijuana-legalization-ballot-questions”>approved two potential ballot questions this week that could end up before voters in 2016 — one measure would regulate and tax marijuana like alcohol and the other would end all restrictions on the drug for anyone over 21.
Proponents of both ballot questions still need to gather tens of thousands of signatures before the 2016 ballots are finalized.
