Bill To Legalize MJ In Minnesota Will Be Best ‘In The Country,’ Top Lawmaker Says

During a press conference, House Majority Leader Ryan Winkler (DFL) and Sen. Jeff Hayden (DFL) said that after conducting a statewide tour to get public input on reform and discussing the issue within the party and with administration officials, they’ve reached conclusions about fundamental principles for legalization legislation that “will be drafted and ready early this session.”

“We heard from Minnesotans that our current cannabis laws are doing more harm than good,” Winkler said in a press release. “By creating a regulatory framework we can address the harms caused by cannabis and establish a more sensible set of laws to improve our health care and criminal justice systems and ensure better outcomes for communities.”

“The cannabis legal system that we have today is a failure, and the message is that we need to figure out how to move on from that,” he said. “It will be a bill that will represent the best step forward for Minnesota and should be the best legalization bill in the country to date.”

But while the legislation is expected to be released this session, the lawmakers made clear that the path to passage is politically thorny and it’s “highly likely that it will take more than one year to get it done.”
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