Attorney General Nominee Lynch Says She Does Not Support Legalizing Marijuana

Loretta Lynch, the nominee for U.S. Attorney General, said in her first day of confirmation hearings that she does not support the legalization of marijuana.

At the hearing, Senator Jeff Sessions of Alabama read aloud from a January 2014 New Yorker magazine interview with President Obama. The president told the magazine, “I smoked pot as a kid, and I view it as a bad habit and a vice, not very different from the cigarettes that I smoked as a young person up through a big chunk of my adult life. I don’t think it is more dangerous than alcohol.”

Sessions asked Lynch if she agreed with the president’s view. She responded, “Well senator, I certainly don’t hold that view, and don’t agree with that view of marijuana as a substance. I certainly think that the president was speaking from his personal experience and personal opinion – neither of which I am able to share.”

Lynch added, “Not only do I not support legalization of marijuana – it is not the position of the Department of Justice currently, to support the legalization, nor would it be the position should I become confirmed as attorney general.”

NPR reports the president said in a YouTube interview last week that the federal government is “not going to spend a lot of resources” enforcing marijuana laws.