Republican presidential candidate Carly Fiorina Thursday said she would allow states to pursue marijuana legalization without federal government interference.

“I believe in states’ rights,” Fiorina told The Des Moines Register, when asked whether she’d crack down on legal marijuana in Alaska, Oregon, Colorado and Washington. “They’re within their rights to legalize marijuana, and they’re conducting an experiment I hope the rest of the nation is looking closely at.”

However, Fiorina made sure to drive a hard distinction between advocating for states’ rights and endorsing marijuana specifically. In fact, Fiorina personally opposes legalization, and when sick with cancer, refused to accept medical marijuana as treatment. (RELATED: GOP Presidential Candidate Carly Fiorina Has A Complicated Relationship With Marijuana)

According to Fiorina, her doctor was glad she turned down marijuana because it’s a complex compound not fully understood. Nevertheless, while Fiorina does not support legalization, she does support decriminalization, not just of marijuana, but of drug use in general.

She opposed Proposition 19, a measure to legalize pot in California, precisely because it would generate additional tax revenue for Sacramento. For Fiorina, cities like Sacramento and Washington, D.C. already have a spending problem and so should not encouraged with more funds.

She still remains skeptical of the medicinal value of marijuana and thinks people are getting the wrong ideas about the drug. For Fiorina, marijuana is emphatically not like beer, contrary to Obama’s assertion that cannabis is less harmful than alcohol “in terms of its impact on the individual consumer.”

“It’s quickly becoming a consensus position in both parties that states should be able to set their own marijuana laws without federal interference and harassment,” Tom Angell, chairman of the Marijuana Majority, told The Daily Caller News Foundation. “While it’d be great to have a president who personally supports legalization or acknowledges marijuana’s medical benefits, what’s most important is whether a candidate plans to spend federal resources overturning duly enacted state laws when they get into the Oval Office.”

Follow Jonah Bennett on Twitter

Content created by The Daily Caller News Foundation is available without charge to any eligible news publisher that can provide a large audience. For licensing opportunities of our original content, please contact licensing@dailycallernewsfoundation.org.

Content created by The Daily Caller News Foundation is available without charge to any eligible news publisher that can provide a large audience. For licensing opportunities of our original content, please contact licensing@dailycallernewsfoundation.org.