JUDY WOODRUFF: Tomorrow,
New Jersey will become
the latest state to allow
the sale of recreational

marijuana to people over
21. It's one of 19 states
where such sales are
legal or about to begin.

But, as William Brangham
reports, these states
are legalizing cannabis,

a substance that remains
illegal under federal law.

WILLIAM BRANGHAM: Roughly 40
percent of Americans now live in
states where marijuana is legal,

but because of the drug's
federal status, cannabis
businesses struggle with banking

and pay extremely
high tax rates.

So, will lawmakers here in
Washington address this divide?

Joining me now is Natalie
Fertig. She covers marijuana
policy for Politico.

Welcome.

NATALIE FERTIG,
Politico: Thanks.

WILLIAM BRANGHAM: So, New Jersey
is making this move, joining
all of these other states.

NATALIE FERTIG: Yes.

WILLIAM BRANGHAM: We know that
the House has passed a bill that
would legalize is marijuana.

What is its status,
and what would it do?

NATALIE FERTIG: So, the bill
technically would decriminalize
marijuana. It would make it

federally legal or
decriminalized to possess
and to use cannabis,

but then it would leave
it up to the states
whether they then want to

legalize cannabis and
allow people to produce
it and sell it and tax it.

That's kind of similar to how
America's alcohol laws work.
The bill would also expunge some

cannabis-related records, and
it would create some social
equity programs, which would

give funding to people who want
to get into the industry who've
been disproportionately hurt

by the nation's marijuana
laws up to this point.

WILLIAM BRANGHAM: Does that
have any chance of passage? Is
the Senate going to take it up?

NATALIE FERTIG: It's a really
complex question. I mean,

we're sitting here in April of
2021 -- '22. What year is it?

WILLIAM BRANGHAM: Twenty-two.

NATALIE FERTIG: Twenty-two.
Twenty-two. (LAUGHTER)

WILLIAM BRANGHAM:
It's hard to keep up.

NATALIE FERTIG: It's
hard to keep up.

And this was something
that Democrats talked about
when they ran in 2020.
And we don't have a lot of

Congress left in this -- in this
time period for the Senate to
take this up and work on it.

Senator Schumer has said that
this is a priority for him.

But he has also said that
he's not going to have
a bill until about just
before the August recess.

That really leaves an even
smaller amount of time

for the Senate to deal with
something that is an incredibly
complex problem or -- to solve.

WILLIAM BRANGHAM: There's
this other issue and a piece
of legislation about banking,

which I mentioned before,
that does seem to have
more bipartisan support.

Again, what would that do, and
how likely is that to pass?

NATALIE FERTIG: Yes, so
where decriminalization
doesn't even have

all Democrats on board,
the banking bill has
Republicans on board.

The problem with the banking
bill, which would let
cannabis businesses access

small business loans and
get banking accounts,
which, currently,

because it's a federally illegal
substance, they can't do, that
bill has more support from

Republicans, but it doesn't
have support from all of
the progressive Democrats.

So, Senator Schumer
specifically and Senator
Cory Booker have said,

we don't want this bill
to pass unless there are
other elements incorporated

into it or passed alongside it
that would help people who have
been hurt by the war on drugs.

So there's this growing
sort of concept within
the Democratic Party,

especially progressive
Democrats, that definitely

came out of everything that
happened in the summer of 2020
with George Floyd and this

increased focus on criminal
justice reform that you
can't allow people to
make money off cannabis

without helping people who have
been put in jail previously
for making money off cannabis.

So that's really kind
of where this divide
has come down to now,

and that's holding
up the banking bill.

WILLIAM BRANGHAM: If
the federal government
were to act cohesively
on this and give states

the green light, is there a
sense that more states would

suddenly become like New
Jersey and jump on board?

NATALIE FERTIG: It's possible.

There's definitely states
that use federal illegality
as an excuse to not legalize.

It's unclear whether or not

they would just find another
excuse after that happened, or
if there are truly lawmakers in

those states that are
just waiting for the
federal government to
give them the green light.

I think that states will
still have to deal with
the same issues that the

federal government is dealing
with. And those issues tend to
hold up cannabis legalization,

even in states that really,
really want it. We saw this
happen in New York, which tried

multiple times to legalize
cannabis, but the details
really held them back.

So I don't think that we would
suddenly see 15 states legalize

weed the minute that the federal
government's laws changed.

WILLIAM BRANGHAM: Before
these states started to
legalize, there was a
lot of concern raised

by critics that teenagers
are going to suddenly be
using a lot of marijuana,
that there's going to be

motor accidents because
everyone's going to
be stoned and driving.

With this national
experiment happening,

is there evidence that any of
those fears have come to pass?

NATALIE FERTIG: So, that's a
really complex question, mostly
because there is not great data.

We have small data points
on each of those things
from different states. But

in almost every circumstance,
there's another data
point to either caveat or

to compare against that sort of
conflicts with the data. A lot
of that is because cannabis is

not federally legal. A
lot of the data we would
need to really understand
the impact of cannabis

on a national level would take
the resources of the federal
government to understand.

So, while the sky hasn't fallen
in, there are not thousands
of or tens of thousands

of new teenagers, there's
not 6-year-olds smoking
joints on the street
corner, we don't really know

the full extent of impact
on all of the things
that you just mentioned,

which is rather
unfortunate, given that
it's been almost 10 years.

WILLIAM BRANGHAM: Natalie
Fertig of Politico, thank
you so much for being here.

NATALIE FERTIG:
Thanks for having me.

JUDY WOODRUFF: And very
helpful to have that update.