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Former CIA officer Mike Baker told Joe Rogan on his podcast that “it’s time” for marijuana to be legalized. During a conversation on the March 10, 2021, episode of the Joe Rogan Experience, Baker told Rogan, “the horse has left the barn, regardless of what anybody thinks about it.”
Rogan, who has advocated for legal marijuana, said he thinks there is optimism that the Biden administration will do something around cannabis. “You don’t have to smoke it,” Rogan added.
Baker is a frequent guest on the Joe Rogan Experience, previously appearing 10 other times, including on November 7, 2020, and on August 3, 2020. Baker worked in covert field operations in the CIA for 17 years before leaving the government in 2000 to start an investigations company, Diligence. The Idaho resident currently serves as the company’s president and he also hosts Black Files Declassified, which is available on Discovery+.
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Baker Told Rogan He Has Recently Invested in a Cannabis Business
The former CIA officer revealed to Rogan that he has recently invested in the cannabis business. Baker told Rogan, who has long been a proponent of legalized marijuana, “I’m starting to become a believer. I’m not a believer in Bitcoin yet, but I’m a believer in Cannabis.” Rogan quipped back, “Well it’s f***** giant business. That would be like not being a believer in trees. They’re out there.”
Baker said his company is “hitting it from another direction.” He said, “I’ve done some work, a couple of shows on the problems that are around cannabis in terms of the cash economy, the inability of banking systems to get involved and all of that. So we’re going in on a business that is worried about the tax and banking side of things. So it’s sort of the intersection of the trade with commerce and pulling it into the legitimate world of commerce.”
Baker told Rogan the Biden administration should focus on “legitimizing it” and “getting it out of the cash economy.” He said the business, Casa Verde Capital, is backed by Snoop Dogg. “It’s sort of an initial foray,” Baker said. “And for a guy that came out of the 80s, that’s sort of an interesting thing.”
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Biden’s 2020 Democratic Platform Called for Marijuana to Be Decriminalized & Rescheduled Federally
The Biden administration has not made any announcements or revealed any plans regarding marijuana, but during the 2020 election, Biden said he supports decriminalizing marijuana and rescheduling it as a Schedule II controlled substance. It is currently a Schedule I drug, on the same level as heroin. Biden has also said he would expunge federal criminal records for marijuana charges.
The Democratic platform, set at the Democratic National Convention in August 2020 stated, “Democrats believe no one should be in prison solely because they use drugs. Democrats will decriminalize marijuana use and reschedule it through executive action on the federal level.”
Maritza Perez, the director of the Office of National Affairs at the Drug Policy Alliance, which advocates for legalization, told The Verge in February 2021, “I think the Biden administration agrees with us, at least on the piece of expunging past records. At this point, this is something the administration cannot ignore; this administration and this Congress have to do something.”
Esquire’s Sarah Rense wrote in January 2021, “In short, marijuana will almost certainly be decriminalized under a Democratic-controlled Congress and a Biden presidency. What remains uncertain is just how far legislation would go to address racial disparities and make reparations to communities unfairly punished by the last decades of our country’s so-called War on Drugs. Legalization is way the hell up in the air.”
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