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Memorandum for All United States Attorneys Page 2 <br />Subject: Guidance Regarding Marijuana Enforcement <br />• Preventing violence and the use of firearms in the cultivation and distribution of <br />marihuana; <br />• Preventing drugged driving and the exacerbation of other adverse public health <br />consequences associated with marijuana use; <br />• Preventing the growing of marijuana on public lands and the attendant public safety and <br />environmental dangers posed by marijuana production on public lands; and <br />• Preventing marijuana possession or use on federal property. <br />These priorities will continue to guide the Department's enforcement of the CSA against <br />marijuana -related conduct. Thus, this memorandum serves as guidance to Department attorneys <br />and law enforcement to focus their enforcement resources and efforts, including prosecution, on <br />persons or organizations whose conduct interferes with any one or more of these priorities, <br />regardless of state law.I <br />Outside of these enforcement priorities, the federal government has traditionally relied on <br />states and local law enforcement agencies to address marijuana activity through enforcement of <br />their own narcotics laws. For example, the Department of Justice has not historically devoted <br />resources to prosecuting individuals whose conduct is limited to possession of small amounts of <br />marijuana for personal use on private property. Instead, the Department has left such lower -level <br />or localized activity to state and local authorities and has stepped in to enforce the CSA only <br />when the use, possession, cultivation, or distribution of marijuana has threatened to cause one of <br />the harms identified above. <br />The enactment of state laws that endeavor to authorize marijuana production, <br />distribution, and possession by establishing a regulatory scheme for these purposes affects this <br />traditional joint federal -state approach to narcotics enforcement. The Department's guidance in <br />this memorandum rests on its expectation that states and local governments that have enacted <br />laws authorizing marijuana -related conduct will implement strong and effective regulatory and <br />enforcement systems that will address the threat those state laws could pose to public safety, <br />public health, and other law enforcement interests. A system adequate to that task must not only <br />contain robust controls and procedures on paper; it must also be effective in practice. <br />Jurisdictions that have implemented systems that provide for regulation of marijuana activity <br />1 These enforcement priorities are listed in general terms; each encompasses a variety of conduct <br />that may merit civil or criminal enforcement of the CSA. By way of example only, the <br />Department's interest in preventing the distribution of marijuana to minors would call for <br />enforcement not just when an individual or entity sells or transfers marijuana to a minor, but also <br />when marijuana trafficking takes place near an area associated with minors; when marijuana or <br />marijuana -infused products are marketed in a manner to appeal to minors; or when marijuana is <br />being diverted, directly or indirectly, and purposefully or otherwise, to minors. <br />