We reported on US Attorney General Eric Holder’s announcement regarding the Obama Administration’s policy on medical marijuana providers in states with medical marijuana programs.  The Attorney General said, ”What the president said during (the) campaign . . . is now American policy,” referring to then candidate-Obama’s statement last April.  When asked about medical marijuana on a trip through Oregon, Obama said, “What I’m not going to be doing is using Justice Department resources to try to circumvent state laws on this issue.”

Did we celebrate too soon?  Is anyone concerned that nobody has specifically said, “The US Justice Department will not raid providers of medical marijuana in the states where that is legal” or even used the words “medical marijuana” with respect to these statements?  Are you frightened that these statements leave a bit too much wiggle room for clever politicians?  Read this story from the LA Times and then answer:

The U.S. attorney in Los Angeles sent a confidential memo to prosecutors last week ordering them to stop filing charges against medical marijuana dispensaries, then abruptly lifted the ban on Friday, according to sources familiar with the developments.

A Justice Department official said Friday that the attorney general did not direct O’Brien or any other U.S. attorney to alter policies regarding the prosecution of such cases.

In addition to being told to stop filing new cases, prosecutors were instructed to refrain from issuing subpoenas or applying for search warrants in pending cases, said the sources, who requested anonymity because they were not authorized to speak publicly about the matter.

Another e-mail came out Friday instructing prosecutors to resume work on medical marijuana cases.

Here’s my prediction: we will see more medical marijuana dispensary raids and the Obama Administration will claim they have no issue with legitimate medical marijuana providers, but these providers were operating outside California law and these providers were diverting medical marijuana to the black market and these providers were selling to minors and whole raft of excuses where they emphasize that these providers are a reasonable exception to “using Justice Department resources” because they were outside of Prop 215 / SB 420 / Jerry Brown’s Guidelines and therefore, the DEA is not “circumvent[ing] state laws on this issue”.

I hope I’m wrong, because if Barack Obama can’t forsee the enormous backlash even one more raid will provoke, he’s not as savvy a politician as I once thought.

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