Democratic presidential hopeful Beto O’Rourke announced a broad plan Thursday for legalizing marijuana nationwide and repairing some of the injustices the so-called war on drugs has wrought in Black and brown communities.



The Democratic Party has increasingly moved toward a consensus that Congress should legalize weed. But O’Rourke’s marijuana plan, the most detailed one yet issued by a 2020 candidate, goes further, listing a spate of demands aimed at correcting a century’s worth of prohibition-driven injustices.

“We need to not only end the prohibition on marijuana, but also repair the damage done to the communities of color disproportionately locked up in our criminal justice system or locked out of opportunity because of the War on Drugs,” O’Rourke said in a news release. “These inequalities have compounded for decades, as predominantly white communities have been given the vast majority of lucrative business opportunities, while communities of color still face over-policing and criminalization.”

The former El Paso congressman’s plan would grant clemency to people currently in prison for marijuana possession and would expunge the records of those with previous possession convictions. He would also regulate marijuana much like alcohol, limiting the drug’s sale to adults and prohibiting smoking in public spaces.

O’Rourke is also calling for a federal tax on the marijuana industry, which would be used to fund a monthly “drug war justice grant” to give people formerly incarcerated for nonviolent marijuana offenses. His plan would require that the majority of licenses for marijuana businesses go to minority-owned shops and people with previous weed convictions, and would waive licensing fees for low-income people with such convictions.

Black people across the nation were nearly four times more likely than whites to be arrested for marijuana possession in 2010, according to a 2013 study by the American Civil Liberties Union ― despite data that suggested the groups use the drug at about the same rate.