Dear Editor,
Currently, 19 states and the District of Columbia have legalized adult use of cannabis. Several more will be voting on adult-use legalization in November.
But it's still illegal in Wisconsin, even though we are surrounded by legal states. Polls show 83% support legalizing medical cannabis and 61% support legalizing it for all adults. Gov. Tony Evers strongly supports both medical and adult use legalization.
Unfortunately, the Republican nominee for governor, Tim Michels, who has spent much of the last decade in Connecticut and New York, where cannabis is legal, opposes giving the people he's asking to vote for him options available to him and his family when home back East.
Michels' running mate, Roger Roth, has been a vocal opponent of lower cannabis penalties in the GOP-majority Legislature. Gov. Evers' running mate, Sara Rodriguez, shares the governor's views supporting cannabis legalization.
In the attorney general race, legalization supporter and incumbent Attorney General Josh Kaul is opposed by Fond du Lac County District Attorney Eric Toney, yet another staunch opponent of legalizing cannabis.
While politics today is often simplistically framed in a divisive red vs. blue manner, citizens need to look past the labels. With polling finding the public strongly supports legalization, one might think the entire GOP ticket would embrace this as an issue of basic personal freedom. But they do not.
Wisconsinites need to reelect Gov. Evers and Kaul, trustworthy public servants who understand the damage cannabis prohibition causes and respect the majority public opinion.
Gary Storck, Madison
