Groups on opposing sides of the push to legalize marijuana in Arizona disagree over the potential effect of Donald Trump as the Republican nominee for president.
“There's a lot of people who are upset with government and upset with the way things are, that would bode well for the marijuana campaign” Barrett Marson, spokesman for the Campaign to Regulate Marijuana Like Alcohol, the group behind a ballot initiative to legalize marijuana.
Trump leads the Republican field after winning a majority of Super Tuesday states.
The chairman of a marijuana-legalization opposition group said the possibility of seeing Trump at the top of the ballot wouldn’t affect the drug initiative results.
“The position to oppose the legalization of marijuana and the availability of more marijuana is about protecting our youth,” said Seth Leibsohn, chair of Arizonans for Responsible Drug Policy. He does not believe the anti-establishment passion of some Trump voters would affect the marijuana initiative.
Trump told reporters in Nevada that marijuana legalization should be decided state-by-state, The Washington Post reported last year.
The pro-legalization group has collected approximately 180,000 signatures in support of the ballot initiative, Marson said. The group wants a sizeable cushion above the 150,000 required signatures necessary to trigger the question’s placement on a statewide ballot.
The signatures are due in July; voters would have their say in November.
