Kamala Harris, operating in her capacity as District Attorney, was openly against California's Proposition 19, a 2010 initiative that would have legalized recreational marijuana in the state of California. In an interview with Capitol Weekly, a newssite in California, her campaign manager stated that: "Spending two decades in court rooms, Harris believes that drug selling harms communities. Harris supports the legal use of medicinal marijuana but does not support anything beyond that."
God forbid an elected official change their views over the course of a decade!
And let's not pretend her opposition to prop 19 was unique. A solid majority of voters and state officials opposed the bill for a variety of reasons: conflict with federal anti-weed laws, economic concerns, studies that it wouldn't curb cartel activity, and increased regulatory burdens on medicinal growers. Considering the majority of the country, including Kamala, is sincerely on board with legalization now, it's silly to single her out as an opportunistic liar. Do you think every person who's changed their mind on weed is an opportunistic liar?
Besides, it's not like prop 19 would have been an end-all-be-all. It's still illegal at the federal level, and even after Cali's recent legalization, yearly weed arrests only fell by about half (as you kindly pointed out). In fact, things have been ramping
up since legalization, with the black market more rampant than ever. Guess she was right that prop 19 was an iffy plan for reducing drug "crimes". After medical legalization, there were still frequent federal raids of providers, which, being an advocate for medical marijuana, Kamala did oppose (whereas the AG at the time was outspokenly in favor).
Heck, even Warren was outspoken against recreational legalization at the time! Everyone has their reasons.
To answer your question, an infraction still means an arrest, which still often means they are arrested and held in lockup while the DA deliberates on whether to pursue or not.
This is blatantly false.
"In California, an
infraction is a public offense, but arguably not a crime, and is not punishable by imprisonment. Any person convicted of an
infraction may only be punished by a fine, removal and/or disqualification from public office."
and
"Infractions are less serious offenses than misdemeanors. They are punishable by a maximum fine of $250. Unlike misdemeanors, they do not subject an offender to incarceration."
and
"Most traffic tickets you get are considered 'infractions' which means you cannot go to jail for these violations. A
traffic infraction is considered a minor offense and you cannot be punished with jail for a traffic infraction or placed on court probation. Typically, the punishment for an infraction is a court fine. If you fail to appear in court on your first court date for an infraction, the court will not issue a warrant for your arrest but will place a hold on your license."
Side note: let's not equivocate being imprisoned with being briefly detained following an arrest, k?
I would also like to remind that Kamala Harris's job as top cop, aka Attorney General, grants her the privilege of dictating which crimes to focus on and which crimes to pursue. Additionally they are often outspoken, politically, such as when Eric Holder voiced his opinions and stances on waterboarding and issues concerning Gitmo. Thus Kamala Harris had every opportunity throughout the years to take a stand and showcase her true colors, and the colors she chose to show were entirely blue. She would rather appear tough on crime (her stances against recreational, her stances on truancy) than to make a stand for her people
"Her people" strongly opposed recreational marijuana. Besides, being a prosecutor isn't supposed to be a political job. Barr is a great example of why.
Plus, as "top cop", she outright said:
"I am not opposed to the legalization of marijuana. I’m the top cop, and so I have to look at it from a law enforcement perspective and a public safety perspective. I think we are fortunate to have Colorado and Washington be in front of us on this and figuring out the details of what it looks like when it’s legalized."
and
"I'll tell you what: Standing up for the people also means challenging the policy of mass incarceration by recognizing the war on drugs was a failure. Now is the time to end the federal ban on medical marijuana. Let me tell you what California needs, Jeff Sessions. We need support in dealing with transnational criminal organizations and dealing with human trafficking – not in going after grandma’s medicinal marijuana,”
Calling the truancy thing an example of being "tough on crime" is total bullshit (not to mention unrelated), but w/e.
(such as her downright idiotic claims that she "smoked in college while listening to tupac" despite
2pacalypse coming out several years after she finished her degree at Howard University or UC Hastings
source)
Breakfast Club already debunked this themselves, but go off.
There is something to be said about evolving stances politically and growing over the years. I am all for this and there are certainly instances where something egregious might be said twenty years ago that holds no relevance in today's society, however when the political stance of a certain someone is roughly only a year old
Those previous 2 quotes I posted are from 5 years ago. Like I said, even Warren wasn't "open to" legalizing weed until 2015, and even "in August 2016, Warren would not commit to voting yes to the ballot question that legalized marijuana in Massachusetts that year in an interview with MassLive."
Kamala's signed on to practically every legalization effort since she became a senator (for example: introducing the bill you're responding to) on top of being in favor of legalization in her last AG term. All that considered, if you think she'd flip her position out of nowhere when elected, then I urge you to check your bias, mate. lol Because that's dumb as shit.
What do you think would happen if she were president? She'd null her sponsorship on those legalization bills? She'd veto a pro-weed bill that made it through Congress? Come on.
Edit: let's just take a moment to recognize how fucking stupid it is to see "Kamala Harris wants to decriminalize weed, expunge records, and use the tax revenue to boost minority communities" and immediately jump to "lulz guys remember that clip in 2014 when she laughed about weed? Fuk that bitch amirite??"