MPP Challenges Candidates

The Marijuana Policy Project (MPP) has been trying to get all of the presidential candidates to support the legalization of marijuana for medical use -- or at least not to tell lies about medical marijuana. They've been pretty successful in that effort.

But there are three holdouts -- naturally, all three are Republicans. Rudy Guiliani, John McCain and Mitt Romney still say that medical marijuana is not needed, that there are adequate substitutes for it and that marijuana is a dangerous drug. Of course this is nonsense. Just ask the sick people who are helped by the medical use of marijuana.

So the MPP has now issued a challenge to these three candidates, and they've even put the challenge on a truck billboard (see picture above). They say they will donate $10,000 to any of these three campaigns that can prove the lies they are telling about marijuana and its medical use. Here's what MPP has to say:

Last week, MPP offered the campaigns of presidential candidates Rudy Guiliani, John McCain, and Mitt Romney $10,000 apiece to back up their statements regarding medical marijuana.

The challenge was accompanied by a massive billboard featuring the three Republicans with Pinocchio noses. Details are available here.

We’ve made great progress in New Hampshire this year in pressuring the presidential candidates to take strong, public, positive positions on medical marijuana: Our efforts have led to 10 of the 17 major Democratic and Republican candidates pledging to end the DEA’s raids on patients and providers in the 12 states where medical marijuana is legal.

During the past nine months of this campaign, the three clowns on the billboard persistently made patently false statements in response to questions from patients who have benefited from medical marijuana — insulting seriously ill people and flouting a huge body of scientific evidence.

Muscular dystrophy patient Clayton Holton was rebuffed by this trio at three separate events in New Hampshire this fall. Video footage of Gov. Romney’s snub was widely seen on CNN and YouTube.

Indeed, the candidates had the gall to claim to Mr. Holton and other patients that marijuana is too dangerous for medical use or not needed because adequate substitutes exist — claims that are refuted by the patients themselves, not to mention published scientific data.

Since appeals to science, compassion, and common sense haven’t worked, we’re speaking to these candidates in a language we know they understand — campaign contributions. If they can back up their claims, we’ll donate to their campaigns. But if they can’t, they need to stop lying.

But we don’t expect to have to pay. A panel of medical experts is ready to evaluate any responses we receive from the three campaigns, and we’re confident the candidates won’t be able to support their baseless claims.

Indeed, we’re still waiting for the campaigns to respond at all. Will you please make a donation to MPP today so that we can continue to pester these three candidates through the end of the New Hampshire primary season?

Rob Kampia

Executive Director

Marijuana Policy Project

Washington, D.C.