Jacob Ogles
Will a recreational pot measure give one company an economic high?
A new advertisement from the Vote No on 3 campaign asserts that the ballot measure was written to give the state’s largest medical marijuana company a monopoly on the Florida market.
“They wrote it, they rigged it, and they’re hoping you fall for it,” a narrator says in the 30-second spot. “Amendment 3 isn’t the ‘marijuana’ amendment. It’s the ‘monopoly’ amendment.”
While the ad itself never mentions a business by name, a press release makes clear the target: Trulieve. That company through mid-August provided $65 million of the nearly $72 million raised to date for the Smart & Safe Florida campaign supporting Amendment 3. That followed the company completely financing the effort to get the measure on the ballot.
Vote No on 3 campaign officials predicted the measure will fail if voters see it as an effort by a single company to back its own private interests.
“Floridians know a bad deal when they see one,” said Vote No on 3 spokeswoman Sarah Bascom. “This amendment does nothing for them and was written solely to pad the profits of the mega marijuana corporations by granting them a monopoly. It’s not about access to weed, it’s about corporate greed.”
The ad focuses, as a result, less on what the amendment will allow if passed and more on what will remain against the law.
“Marijuana mega corporations spent 60 million bucks putting Amendment 3 on your ballot,” the narrator states. “Why? It entrenches their monopoly, bans homegrown pot, and gives special licenses to corporations.”
The ad suggests that no businesses act philanthropically.
“Giant corporations don’t do things out of the goodness of their heart. They do things to make money. And that’s exactly why they wrote Amendment 3,” the ad states.
The ad continues by saying the campaign for the amendment has tried to prevent the measure as reasonable policy, when really it would benefit the business most heavily invested in it.
5 comments
Victoria Olson
September 9, 2024 at 11:27 am
Alcohol is a much bigger problem more people are killed by drunk driving. where are the statistics for pot related deaths ? Because there is none to little. When they make alcohol illegal, I would vote against it but my vote is YES just another power political ploy.
Dont Say FLA
September 9, 2024 at 11:32 am
And a weed monopoly, if one were to exist, would be worse than Florida’s current situation of unregulated, fentany’all laced, illegal weed how?
Stephen D
September 9, 2024 at 11:45 am
So the dirty weed is going to magically disappear when the corporations are allowed to sell the twice the price clean weed?
JD
September 9, 2024 at 11:59 am
So you know weed prices of illegal dirty weed vs legal clean weed? How do you know they won’t be the same price, safer product? Don’t you pay more for regulated hooch than bath-tub gin?
Tom
September 9, 2024 at 12:35 pm
Much the same way that I don’t buy backyard moonshine because I can walk into a liquor store and buy bourbon. I have a friend with cancer and I drive him to the pot shop on occasion when he needs a ride. They have sales and frankly, it’s pretty inexpensive. Why deal with gang bangers when you can buy good quality edibles/ leaf / whatever and not run the risk of getting ripped off or killed?