Delegates at the Democratic National Convention are set to vote on a party platform on Monday that touts President Joe Biden’s marijuana pardons and rescheduling moves, while calling for broader reform to expunge prior records. But even with Biden stepping aside in the 2024 race, with pro-legalization Vice President Kamala Harris as the new nominee, the party’s latest draft platform doesn’t promote broader cannabis decriminalization like the prior version adopted in 2020 did.

The party is also blasting former President Donald Trump, the Republican presidential nominee, over his prior administration’s anti-cannabis actions.

The Democratic National Committee’s (DNC) Platform Committee released its draft platform last month, before Biden announced he was bowing out of the race. As far as the marijuana provisions are concerned, the document is identical, even though Harris and Biden share differing views about federal cannabis policy. Unlike the incumbent president, Harris backs federal legalization, which she’s spoken about as recently as March in a closed-door meeting with marijuana pardon recipients.

The platform that’s set to receive a vote during the first day of the DNC convention says that the cannabis pardons Biden issued are among the “historic steps” the administration has taken to promote criminal justice reform in his first term. “No one should be in jail just for using or possessing marijuana,” it says, echoing the president’s increasingly common refrain.

“No one should be in jail just for using or possessing marijuana. Sending people to prison for possession has upended too many lives and incarcerated people for conduct that many states no longer prohibit. Those criminal records impose needless barriers to employment, housing, and educational opportunities, disproportionately affecting Black and brown people. President Biden took historic action to end this failed approach by pardoning people convicted federally for using or possessing marijuana. He has called on governors to use their pardon power to do the same for state-level offenses. And his Administration is taking a major step to reschedule marijuana so it’s no longer classified as more dangerous than fentanyl or methamphetamine.”

The platform, meanwhile, also says that Democrats “will take action to expunge federal marijuana-only convictions.” While Biden had repeatedly suggested his pardons already cleared records, he more recently clarified that that’s not the case. While pardons represent formal forgiveness, a president cannot unilaterally expunge records.

Notably, however, more broadly decriminalizing or legalizing cannabis is not explicitly mentioned in this year’s platform. Kevin Sabet, president of the prohibitionist group Smart Approaches to Marijuana (SAM), cheered that exclusion on Monday, commending those who “helped so much behind the scenes.”

The final Democratic Party Platform has *no* language supporting marijuana legalization. Good work to all who helped so much behind the scenes!
https://t.co/NidFTN29NX pic.twitter.com/wvACTYb26X

— Kevin Sabet (@KevinSabet) August 19, 2024

In addition to decriminalization, the prior 2020 platform DNC adopted also pushed for medical marijuana legalization, which is also omitted from this new draft version.

But the final form still stands in stark contrast with the 2024 GOP platform, which doesn’t touch on marijuana specifically at all but does promote policies that promote an anti-drug agenda. The party said it will “crack down hard on” and “demolish” drug cartels, for example.

Democrats are also hoping to leverage the contrasting marijuana positions of the Biden-Harris administration and Trump. DNC’s platform states that the Trump administration “threatened federal prosecution for marijuana cases in states where marijuana was legal” by rescinding Obama-era guidance that generally urged discretion in enforcing prohibition for cannabis-related activity that was legal under state law.

“Trump’s approach to criminal justice could not be more different,” it says. “His Administration threatened federal prosecution for marijuana cases in states where marijuana was legal.”

Before Biden dropped out of the race, his campaign also played into those differing policy positions, with multiple email blasts and online advertisements that frame the incumbent as the better choice for those who support cannabis reform. Since Harris ascended to the top of the ticket, however, her campaign has been silent on marijuana policy issues.

Observers are also awaiting a formal statement from Trump about where he stands on a recreational legalization measure that will be on the November ballot in Florida, where he’s a resident, after he said he’s increasingly open to decriminalization amid the state-level legalization movement.

Harris has a more defined position on cannabis issues heading into the election. While critics, including Trump, have been quick to point to her prosecutorial record on marijuana, she’s also sponsored a comprehensive legalization bill in the Senate and called for legalization as recently as March during a closed-door meeting with cannabis pardon recipients.

Meanwhile, Harris has selected Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz (D) as her running mate, choosing a candidate who backed numerous cannabis reform measures in Congress, called for an end to prohibition when he was running for governor and then signed a comprehensive legalization bill into law in 2023.

As president, Trump largely stayed true to his position that marijuana laws should be handled at the state-level, with no major crackdown on cannabis programs as some feared after then-Attorney General Jeff Sessions rescinded the Obama era federal enforcement guidance. In fact, Trump criticized the top DOJ official and suggested the move should be reversed.

While he was largely silent on the issue of legalization, he did tentatively endorse a bipartisan bill to codify federal policy respecting states’ rights to legalize.

That said, on several occasions he released signing statements on spending legislation stipulating that he reserved the right to ignore a long-standing rider that prohibits the Justice Department from using its funds to interfere with state-legal medical marijuana programs.

DNC has separately played up the Biden-Harris administration’s marijuana reform platform on social media—but it’s received some pushback after suggesting that cannabis has already been rescheduled and that the country’s “failed approach” to marijuana has now ended.

Separately, a series of recent polls found widespread majority support for cannabis legalization, federal rescheduling and marijuana industry banking access among likely voters in three key presidential battleground states: Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin.

Majority Of Americans Say Marijuana Use Is Punished ‘Too Harshly’ And Past Records Should Be Expunged, Poll Finds