Biden took the decision to grant the pardons on Thursday and also asked the secretary of health and human services and the attorney general to “expeditiously” review how marijuana is scheduled under federal law.
However, the move will not affect the nearly 2,000 people who were convicted while Harris was San Francisco district attorney (DA) because those convictions were not made at the federal level.
Biden called on governors to consider taking similar steps when it comes to state-level offenses for possession of marijuana, which could potentially impact those convicted while Harris was district attorney.
The vice president served as San Francisco DA from 2004 to 2011 and during that time, attorneys at her office secured 1,956 misdemeanor and felony convictions for marijuana possession, cultivation or sale, according to data from the district attorney’s office reviewed by The Mercury News in 2019.
Those numbers included people who were convicted of more serious crimes as well as possession of marijuana and California attorneys who worked on the cases told The Mercury News that many of those convicted of low-level marijuana possession were never sent to prison.
“There is no way anyone could say that she was draconian in her pursuit of marijuana cases,” Niki Solis, a high-ranking attorney in the San Francisco Public Defender’s office while Harris was district attorney, told the outlet in 2019.
Harris served as California attorney general from 2011 to 2017 but the vast majority of marijuana-related prosecutions are conducted by county district attorneys, who are elected locally.
Since her time as San Francisco district attorney, Harris has come out strongly in favor of decriminalization of marijuana. In 2017, she supported the SAFE Banking Act, which allowed banks to work with marijuana businesses and avoid potential punishment from the federal government.
Harris backed the Marijuana Justice Act in 2018. That act would have removed marijuana from the Controlled Substances Act and allowed states to legalize it. She subsequently supported other legislation that would do the same.
In December 2018, Harris tweeted: “Decriminalizing marijuana at the federal level isn’t just a smart thing to do —it’s the right thing to do. We can’t keep repeating the same mistakes of the past. Too many lives have been ruined by these regressive policies.”
During the 2020 vice presidential debate against then Vice President Mike Pence, Harris said marijuana would be decriminalized at the federal level by a Biden administration. That led to a surge in the share price of major marijuana producers.
Newsweek has contacted Harris’ office and the San Francisco district attorney’s office for comment.
Those convicted of marijuana possession during Harris’ time as San Francisco district attorney will not benefit from Biden’s pardons, but California Governor Gavin Newsom could use them as an opportunity to act on state-level offenses, Hirsh Jain, a cannabis industry consultant, told The Sacramento Bee. State law already provides for the review and expunging of some marijuana convictions.
“Just as no one should be in a federal prison solely for possessing marijuana, no one should be in a local jail or state prison for that reason, either,” Biden tweeted on Thursday.
