Donald Trump appeared on the Lex Fridman Podcast in an extended interview released on Tuesday. Marijuana was among the various political topics discussed.
Fridman asked the former president and GOP presidential candidate to talk more about his surprising Saturday announcement that he’s endorsing Florida’s cannabis initiative, the proposed constitutional amendment that seeks to legalize recreational marijuana. Trump proceeded to extol the praises of medical marijuana, which has been legal in Florida since 2016.
“Well, I just put out a paper and first of all medical marijuana has been amazing. I’ve had friends and I’ve had others and doctors telling me that it’s been absolutely amazing the medical marijuana,” Trump said.
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Trump then laid out his views on the need to create a clean and lawful marijuana program.
“We put out a statement that we can live with the marijuana. It’s gotta be a certain age. It’s gotta be a certain age to buy it. It’s gotta be done in a very concerted, lawful way and the way they’re doing in Florida I think it’s gonna be actually good … it’s gonna be very good.”
Once a resident of the Big Apple and now just a visitor — mostly to the city’s hallowed halls of justice — Trump bashed the Empire State’s cannabis program.
“It’s gotta be done in a clean way. You go into some of these places like in New York. It smells all marijuana-y. You’ve gotta have a system where there’s control,” he said.
Trump mentioned in his Saturday announcement that a public smoking ban should be put into effect if marijuana is legalized in Florida. Trump ally and former Republican Party of Florida Chair state Sen. Joe Gruters also proposed to regulate public smoking if the initiative passes in the November 2024 election.
Trump’s final comment to Fridman about marijuana: “You take a look at the numbers, it’s been very hard to beat it,” Trump said, referring to positive polling among Democrats and Republicans alike for the marijuana legalization measure. “So I think it’ll generally pass, but you want to do it in a safe way.”
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Photo: Benzinga edit with images by Shaleah Craighead and Gage Skidmore on Wikimedia Commons and Kindel Media on Pexels
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